howdy, welcome to my sonic sideblog where i get hedgehoggy with it!! i post + write primarily about team dark but let it be known i am deeply attached to every character ever
i have many opinions but i don't care for discourse, if we disagree we disagree idc we are all just playing with toys
also i reblog various ships and i dont tag them sorryyyy i struggle to tell when things are intended to be romantic so im sparing myself the hassle lmao
shadow's bouts of amnesia weren't because of stasis and falling to earth they were because he has DID and after each incident the previous host gave the fuck up and made someone new front instead without telling them what's going on
sonic figures it out because he's the main character so of course he does and he's like "hey man, don't take this the wrong way but... are you, like, one guy? or a bunch of guys?" and shadow (doesn't know they're a system yet) is like "what the FUCK are you talking about"
(Rouge ask) Omg that was so helpful thank you. Everything I could've wanted and more!!!!! I cannot wait to incorporate this into my ponderings and musings thank u so so so much. I'm going to get a good grade in rouge fan and rouge multishipper
Do you happen to have any thoughts on how rouge views trust/vulnerability? I am trying to craft a beautiful polyship and develop the dynamics but it turns out I am a fake fan of rouge and I do not know how much of her character is performative/for her job (i.e needing to act as her whole thing is being a spy/thief etc) and how much is earnest and how likely she is to trust people and how that is presented. I know her as a character but im really struggling to get inside her head.
Honestly even just a point on where to look in canon would be useful, I feel like I’m just missing information about her. I haven’t finished SA2 and I imagine thats part of my limitation lol
Thank u in advance !
OH BOY DO I!!!
rouge is a very difficult character to get the hang of because 1- she's always a side character and 2- her characterisation has changed a lot over the years. there's very little concrete information about her so none of us really know her lmao, we're all kinda just making assumptions based on what we do know
i'll talk about some scenes and then go further into my headcanons, but they are just headcanons so feel free to disagree and interpret things differently!
(warning: this is like 1k words lmao)
in the third act of sa2, knuckles saves rouge from falling to a presumed death (youtube link). the game seems to forget that she has wings but that's okay we can assume she was taken off guard
she becomes very defensive and accuses him of having ulterior motives for saving her. she calls him a creep, though her tone is teasing and lighthearted, keeping the conversation surface-level and impersonal.
she gives him the pieces of the master emerald, claiming that she doesn't want them anymore because they 'stink like echidnas do'. it's an expression of gratitude masked behind indifference and an insult. note that she never verbally thanks him for saving her life-- which knuckles even points out.
when knuckles apologises to her, she watches him leave and lingers for a while. as she, too, turns to leave, she stops and looks back, smiling privately to herself. when unobserved, her demeanour is much softer and betrays her fondness.
this scene is a great example of rouge blatantly concealing her feelings, and there are a few reasons why that could be. she could fear appearing vulnerable, and acknowledging that he saved her requires acknowledgement that she needed to be saved-- as someone who works alone (more on this later) she needs to be self-sufficient. she could dislike mushy, sentimental conversations. she could be unsure of how to express her emotions, and keeping a conversation at surface-level means she doesn't have to try.
there's also that she and knuckles are implied to have romantic feelings for each other, but that reason is boring on its own imo. to me, it's a combination of all of the above.
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possibly the most emotionally sincere rouge has been in canon is in sonic 06 when (youtube link, sorry it's a short lmao) she tells shadow that she'll remain by his side even when the world is against him.
omega points out that power provokes animosity and she hangs her head in silence until shadow starts walking away and she turns abruptly, saying his name in a tone that sounds almost surprised, like she didn't expect herself to speak.
she looks at shadow, but only as he is turned away. she closes her eyes before she speaks and keeps them closed as she says "even if you believe everyone in the world will be against you" (pause, she finally opens her eyes) "know that i'll always remain by your side" (she turns away) "remember that."
and then she faces away, head bowed, as shadow leaves!! they don't make any eye contact at all!!
it's so awkward. it implies that she doesn't usually say such things, but her need for him to understand her undying loyalty forced her to say it anyway. behind her aloofness, she cares deeply and will side with those she loves even if it's difficult or frowned upon.
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all we really know about rouge is that she's a government agent and also a notorious jewel thief, which is a massive conflict of interest-- everyone she meets will likely disapprove of at least one aspect of her life. both occupations involve a lot of travelling and dangerous situations, which isn't really conductive for making and maintaining friendships.
on a related note, she doesn't have any established friends from pre-canon. it's plausible that shadow and omega are the first people she grew close to, and they're both isolated, complicated, misunderstood people with backgrounds that nobody else can relate to. consider what it could imply about her that they're who she finally 'fit in' with.
i think she was very lonely pre-canon, and maybe still is. i think that, to get to the position she's in when we meet her, she would have had to rely exclusively on herself, which would naturally cause some trust issues. combine that with the possibility that she never learned how to trust people, and you get someone that holds her heart behind a wall so dense it seems impenetrable.
but it isn't! as shown by the shadow clip, she is capable of trusting and being vulnerable, but it's difficult and she probably hates it.
in terms of how much of her personality is an act, i feel similarly about her as i feel about sonic in that i don't think it's entirely an act, but she definitely emphasises certain traits and suppresses others. i think she genuinely likes to flirt and show off and bicker, but she intentionally leans into the 'femme fatale' archetype because it's uncomplicated and prevents people from trying to learn more about her.
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situations and relationships change people, so you could characterise her the same way i do and still have her be openly affectionate.
i don't write her that way because i write a lot of team dark and they all have issues with vulnerability but if she were close with, for example, amy, she'd be regularly encouraged to share her feelings (and be rewarded for doing so) so she'd do it more.
i think it would take a lot of time and the change wouldn't be linear (she'd probably go through phases of freaking out and withdrawing again) but rouge, just like any other character, has the potential to be open and loving and happy in a relationship.
tbh i think a poly relationship could be good for her because the unconventionality of it would ease her nerves about having to behave a certain way.
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this was a Lot and yet i still have more i could say lmao so if you have any questions about anything specific lmk!
again, most of this is just my opinions so feel free to take whatever works for you and disregard anything that doesn't
dude why are you so absurdly talented and skilled . how do u do it
help ummm thank you??? djfjdjf
i assume this is in regards to fics so,, basically i've been writing on and off my whole life. i remember being a little kid and typing the first like 200 words of stories (before immediately getting bored because i was, like, 5) on the family computer. yakno, back when family computers were a thing.
life hack! start ur passions when ur too young to care that ur bad at it, so that by the time ur old enough to have taste ur already a few steps ahead
i'm really lucky that i liked writing as a kid and idk if i'd be doing it now if i hadn't because my tolerance for being bad at things is very low
as far as actual advice goes, think about things sooo deeply. imo creativity matters way more than skill because what you have to say is more important than the way you say it. lean into what makes your perspective unique and what you personally find interesting, partly because it'll make your work better and partly because it'll be easier to ignore any flaws
(for real though i was incredibly surprised and flattered to receive this thank you what the heck)
it might be one of those tumblr updates that only certain people get but for me when u go to share a post there's an option at the bottom to save as image
and it looks like this (notably it is light mode even if ur on dark mode)
"There is no platonic explanation for this" - outaded. there always is
"There is no straight explanation for this." - great. doesn't exclude platonic from the conversation. Only works for queer couples
"There is no explanation for this." - covers all grounds. the new big thing. there is nothing. there will never be anything. all that is and all that was is no more.
shadow's bouts of amnesia weren't because of stasis and falling to earth they were because he has DID and after each incident the previous host gave the fuck up and made someone new front instead without telling them what's going on
