Scandalabra is a metaphor: a rant
Ok I usually don't post this kind of stuff but I'm gonna get real annoying here and show a rant I've gone on to my friends at 1AM over Scandalabra (like a normal person /s). I straight up get feral because I love him and I realized that the game did him dirty, and by going through the tag I've noticed some things that make me want to eat paper.
Gonna keep this under the cut 'cause I uhm. I wrote a lot. You've been warned.
Ok so I'm gonna assume going forward that you've played his run in full or otherwise have seen all he has to offer. I will however remind you about these specific dialogue choices you're given, and that will be at the center of the rant:
I find it concerning that Scandalabra will choose his entire personality going forward through some back-handed comment the player makes. He cares so much and it feels forced to have to only choose one or the other to me. One locks him into a persona and one locks him into going back to a self he never felt connected with.
I've seen people argue that to like Scandalabra you must also like Jon Wick and vice versa, and while do agree in some way, I... I find myself having a hard time. I want to love every side of him, but the way the game presents those sides honestly pisses me the fuck off. Because Jon Wick is not a good representation of Scandy's growth to "let go of his fake self to find strength in their real self", no matter how it's played out in his realized ending.
And I say all this because I've come to subscribe to a very specific read of his character that better explains why I'm so against the game's possibilities. That is...
SCANDALABRA IS A DRAG METAPHOR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Consider, if you may: Jon Wick felt lame for being a normal, boring, fake candelabra, so he decided to make himself a dainty, dandy, pure persona and to present himself with a different name. People straight up find him annoying and off-putting, he even forsakes relationships (romantic or otherwise) in the pursuit of purity, but he continues, because that's a self he's more comfortable in - hell, he sounds like he's having a lot to fun to me! Who are we to deny and belittle the life he's chosen for himself, no matter how ridiculous? So what if a "boring" man wants to be a little gay on main?
My main point is that he chose to be like this. Just because that's not his real name and that's not his birth-given self, are we supposed to assume and think that he's a fake? NO!! YOU CAN BE THE YOU THAT YOU WANT TO BE, AND THAT CAN BE YOUR REAL SELF AS MUCH AS YOU PLEASE!! Most clear of all to me is how, when you tell him that you like the "fake" him, he says "So you get where I'm coming from?". He has his own reasons to be like this!!!
Like, hell, what is this dialogue option when you tell him that you prefer him as Jon Wick? It feels so incredibly insulting to me, and it's the only thing you can say to him in that moment.
I'll be real, I don't like fans who mainly or solely like Jon Wick. To me, on a surface level view, it feels like they took away a part of Jonathan just to get it on with the brooding low-voiced assassin. Perhaps they do have a nuanced view, but if so it's hard to tell. I won't deny that I'm at fault too for being the kinda person who appears to be solely into Scandalabra (I've only made one post here, but trust me, I've swarmed my friends and my side blog with stuff). And I won't deny that only liking that side of him isn't fair to him either, because he can put that mask all he wants, but deep inside he'll always feel like he's hiding - perhaps repressing - a part of himself. He literally considers it a scandal that must be kept a secret between you two.
That one high empathy check with Scandalabra reveals that, despite his… Proclivities... He wants to be deeply and truly loved and understood. I don't think the game ever really gives you an option to give him what he wants at the end of the day, because if it did, I'd already be telling him that he's safe to be whatever he wants. To let him have the final say, or to choose both. In an ideal world I'm able to tell him that he doesn't have to drop any pretenses because there's no pretense to be found in a self that makes you happy, but that he still has to accept all sides of himself to truly be satisfied with himself. That he's allowed hold multitudes.
I don't think I'll ever find it in me to like Jon Wick (assassin) - especially because he exists mainly to be a reference to a movie series -, but I think there's a lot to unpack outside of the canon about a Jon that can present himself as Scandalabra as he pleases and still be normal and boring Jon Wick at the end of the day, either behind closed doors or with trusted people, and still be loved for either of it.
But I guess I'm stuck telling him that I like him more when he's putting on a mask so that he may never take it off. Because, to me, that's the least bad of the binary options I'm given.
Thank you for coming to my TEDTalk, that is all.
TL;DR Scandalabra is a drag metaphor and the game did him dirty by being unable to tell him that he can be both Scandalabra and Jon Wick without having to hide one side or the other.
