first thing to do is to be meta. duh. talk about dirk strider please.
Of course. I've gotta talk about Dirk Strider, because I am Mod Dirk, after all.
Let's talk about our favorite Prince of Heart, Dirk Strider. My beloved.
From the moment Dirk is introduced in the story (on this page, introduced here), he’s seen as this ‘cool guy’. He tries his damn hardest to emulate Alpha Dave, his bro whom he never gets to know directly, due to the difference in time that they have. In the literal sense, Dirk tries to emulate the abilities and powers of a Knight (passive exploitation class) while being a Prince (active destroying class).
This does not really go well for him, and, mirroring Dave in the beta session, he tries to be the server player to his friends, and succeeds at this, albeit not as well as he could have.
As a Prince of Heart, Dirk ghosts Mind while destroying Heart. What this means is that he cuts down passion and emotion, often coming off as cold to the touch. He’s a dick without wanting to be one, essentially. He holds himself up to the most impossible standards, and often times hurts his friends accidentally by ‘destruction.’
He’s hurt his friends before, this is known, but it’s not always intentional. His relationship with Jake English in the comic, through contextual clues as well as analyses made by people long before I made this blog, Dirk gets very ‘up close and personal’ with Jake, which freaks him out, and makes him push Dirk away, even in Dirk’s time of need. This relationship dynamic is not entirely Dirk’s fault, because Jake isn’t perfect either. It could have been resolved, but it wasn’t.
Dirk is also consistently immersed in his splinters, he feels responsible for the actions of other versions of himself, even if they are just under different circumstances, like how he likely felt about Dave’s Bro.
His challenge in Homestuck, especially in The Game, is to not destroy himself along his path, which he doesn’t quite succeed at, but doesn’t fail, either. After learning that his friends died in the pre-retcon timeline, Dirk willingly gives up, and is presumably dead by the time John goes back to fix the timeline. Which brings me to another point, is the singular line that Dirk says, upon being prompted, “I failed.” (1 | 2) I could go on for about an hour about this, but I honestly suggest you go over to this post about Dirk and NPD, which explains it a lot better than I can.
So, Dirk Strider. A heavily layered character with many, many splinters, and a three-dimensional hell of a personality. Hope I did him justice.
