i was replaying lisa the painful recently and i got to this npc in the cave leading to area 1, and this dialogue has always stuck with me
this particular line always sticks out to me for a couple reasons. a bunch of other characters comment on how ugly buddy is the closer u get to her, but when u get to the mens hair club and find out that theyve actually kidnapped fardy, it seems like most of the men are really talking about him.
however, the area where u have this particular dialogue is WELL before the area where the mens hair club kidnapped fardy, which means that this guy, at least, actually IS talking about buddy.
i honestly find it to be such a fascinating commentary on the entitlement of men to womens bodies. none of the characters pursuing buddy seems put off by her age (as she is obviously quite young, since several of them refer to her as a girl and “little”), or her own desires and safety. all that matters to these men is that they want her, but once they see that she is, by their standards, ugly, she loses all worth.
and given the fact that this is a world completely gone to shit, with an entire species preparing to die off, their reactions are even more absurd. theyve found the ONLY girl still living (to their knowledge), a discovery which will allow the human race to survive after all… and all these guys care about is how ugly she is.
to put the cherry on top of all this - buddy ISNT ugly. normally one could just chalk it up to simplistic sprite work, so we cant actually tell what she looks like, but dingaling is really good at creating truly ugly, unpleasant character sprites. if he wanted to make buddy ugly, he could have, easily. and he didnt.
the fact that buddy is, based on all evidence, a normal, cute little girl, really puts the entitlement of these men into perspective. all the other issues with their pursuing buddy aside, there is nothing particularly off-putting about her appearance whatsoever. physically, nothing is wrong with her in the slightest, on top of her being the only girl in the entire world - and she STILL isnt good enough for them.
its a pretty fucking good piece of commentary, honestly, and i think it goes super unacknowledged by most fans. i mean, its of course obvious that the men are disgusting, but this particular aspect of their childish selfishness is never really addressed. ding did an excellent job weaving this common thread of entitlement through all of the npcs in the game, and it really is one of the crowning achievements of the story
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