i have a question about hiveswap as im just getting into it, considering that the events of hiveswap and hauntswitch both take place in the late 1900s, whats the point exactly?
we already know whats going to happen and that all of the characters are doomed fail on their goals and then die no matter the outcome. the caste system is never abolished, HIC stays in power, both earth and Alterna get destroyed, and doc scratch continues his plan without a hitch
none of it seems to really matter or serve any purpose other than worldbuilding for 2 already doomed worlds (3 if you count the cherub portal implying a lost society of cherubs)
Well, it is. It is worldbuilding, that’s what precuels are. They add extra context to events you already know will happen, they add to how they happened, how we got there. That doesn’t make them pointless.
It may seem irrelevant at first glance, but Hiveswap actually has a very important role.
It sets the stage for the arrival of the players on both Alternia and Earth-A
The events of Hiveswap are happening with an equivalent distance in years between both Alternia and earth
Which means the Beta children are about to arrive in their meteors (1995 - 1996) a little after the time when Joey and Jude are having this adventure (1994), which means the Alpha trolls will get to Alternia soon too.
Both timelines are mirrored in time, they both have the same exact amount of time before the end.
We know the Beta kids hadn’t arrived yet to earth during Hiveswap because it’s 1994, and that the Alpha trolls hadn’t arrived either because Trizza is the heiress, and there can only be one at a time, so Feferi isn't there yet.
This series of events are necessary for Doc scratch’s plan, otherwise he wouldn’t have intervened, giving Xefros a surveillance free communication channel, so Joey and him aren’t detected by the authorities.
He needs them under the radar so they can (while trying to send Joey back home) connect people with each other, cause necessary problems, kick start important events.
All which will set the stage for the 12 troll player’s arrival.
What do I think it’s the most important event Doc Scratch needs Joey and Xefros to make happen?
Trizza has to die. There can only be one heiress at a time, and if Feferi is about to arrive, then Trizza has to go.
The events of Hiveswap/HauntSwitch will cause the death of the heiress, either fighting against the Condesce, at the hands of the revolted trolls Joey and Xefros will influence, crushed to death by Feferi’s own meteor, who knows.
But if this is the "equivalent to 1994 on Alternia" and all that is happening it’s really happening as a mirrored version of Earth’s timeline, then the 12 trolls should be to arriving at different dates during the following year. Which means she doesn’t have much time left, as we know Feferi was the only heiress on Alternia during Homestuck. And we’re 13 years away from the end of the world. It needs to happen now.
It's the same tactic Doc used with Rose, Vriska and Terezi
The only reason he ever “helps” anybody it's because he needs them to make things happen.
He needs Joey and Xefros alive, he needs the rebellion to go through (even if it fails, it'll fail in a way that it's usefull for him), he needs Trizza gone so Feferi can come to Alternia and so the final stage of this plan of millions of years connecting dots and manipulating people to create a hostile planet for the new players to grow stronger that their predecessors, can begin. The rise of the new players.
I personaly think Tyzias might be the one to intercept Karkat or at least be involved in it.
It could be her, Joey or maybe someone else, but whoever intercepts him will have to know about the signless and according to Tyzias’s password (69) she already knows about him and she knows his symbol, and seems to be a follower in the down low. Tyzias also must knows how the singless promised that there would be another troll like him, and according to Doc scratch's explanation:
The followers of the summoner decreased enormously, but the Doc said himself that there were still some of them hidden and I think he was talking about Tyzias and her alies.
Sometimes we forget that there was intervention from the suferer's followers to ensure Karkat's survival
That’s why he has the sufferer’s symbol, someone who knew it gave it to him. And we know Tyzias knows.
The ectobiologist and team leader also seems to always be the last one to turn 13, (as well as the last to wake up as their dream self) so Karkat should be the last one to arrive, ending that chain of events.
Of course this all means that, by the time the end of the world happens, and asuming they’re all still alive, all Hiveswap trolls would be adults carrying duties off planet and would die the day of the apocalypse during the Vast Glub along with all troll Civilization.
The same would happen to Joey and Jude, assuming Joey is successful and returns to Earth. They would die on the 13th of April 2009 with the rest of humanity, not knowing they had a part in it or that their lost brother was the detonator of the end of the world.
It’s tragic in the end, but it’s necessary. Someone has to play that role.
They are the stagehands who prepared the stage for the first act of the play they were never meant to see.
And who knows, it may not be the end of them, maybe we’re too quick to assume they didn’t get saved somehow. By some random paradoxical event or deus ex machine that teleported them away from danger. We’ll have to wait and see how it plays out.
It's been a while since i wrote an analysis, i really missed that ^u^