Alright, I have a feeling that some people aren’t gonna like this Hot Take™ of mine, but you know what? I’m not active enough on this blog to really care about my “reputation” at this point, sooo...
I haven’t found the courage to speak up about it in the past because I was afraid of how people would see me. But honestly? If anyone full-on hates me for what I’m about to say, then maybe this is for the best.
I’m...really getting sick of all the discourse surrounding Vanessa as a character, not going to lie. I get if you want to use her for angst purposes in your AUs and stories; I get if you don’t particularly like her as a character; I even get it if you like to sympathize with Snatcher as far a toxic relationships go. But this whole discourse that “anybody who likes Vanessa as a character is an awful person”? I’m sorry, but I just can’t agree with this type of mindset anymore.
Want to know why? Because it sounds exactly like the Snatcher discourse that’s also been going around. “Snatcher can’t be a dad/friend to Hat Kid! He tried to kill her!” sounds just like “You can’t redeem Vanessa! She killed the Prince!” to me. Not to mention that half of the characters in AHiT are problematic in one way or another. Mafia Boss, Conductor, DJ Grooves, Snatcher, Empress, even Mustache Girl! They’ve all done one or more questionable things within canon and have actively tried to kill Hat Kid. Why do these characters get overlooked while Vanessa is “completely irredeemable”?
The “canon” we have surrounding Vanessa is already very loose to begin with. The most you can find is the Time Rift storybook and a few letters hidden within the manor level, and even then, not everybody knows about those or even finds them in-game. Also, Shane Frost, one of people who helped create AHiT, doesn’t explicitly depict Vanessa as a completely evil character. If anything, from what I’ve seen, she only acts the way she does because of the way her mother treated her. And while that isn’t canon in the actual game anymore, let’s be honest here. Nobody really goes one hundred percent by canon, and what little “lore” you can dig up from the storybooks is open to interpretation.
There could be many reasons as to why Vanessa is the way that she is! But we don’t know for certain, because the lore and canon within AHiT is barely fleshed out. Maybe Vanessa could’ve had abusive parents; maybe her ice magic corrupted her based on her emotions; maybe she had some type of mental disorder. Does that make what she does “in canon” necessarily good? No, but if you’re going to portray her as a villian character, you have to have an actual reason as for why she’s motivated to do these things other than “she’s just evil”.
I’d like to clarify, Vanessa’s not one of my favorite characters. The ships “Snatchnessa”, “Moonessa”, and “Princenessa” aren’t even any of my main ships. But coming from someone who’s been bullied, even if indirectly, for the characters and ships they like? This is not okay. It’s gotten to the point where fanon has overlapped with canon so much, that people are starting all this unnecessary discourse just so we’ll fight with one another. And it’s become tiring.
It is not the end of the world if people like Vanessa or see her as a comfort character. You do not have the right to bully someone for having a “Vanessa turned good AU” when stuff like “Dadtcher” and “AHiT found family” are completely acceptable in your eyes. That’s hypocritical and, not to mention, it’s a cutesy 3D platformer game for pity’s sake. It’s not that fricking deep. Unless someone is outright justifying abusive behavior and using Vanessa to do so, there’s no need to attack anyone just for merely mentioning or making content of Vanessa.
I know not many people will agree with me, or even care for that matter. But if you’ve managed to read this far, please take at least some of what I’ve said into consideration, or at least with the smallest grain of salt. I don’t expect to change your opinion, and you can’t change mine; I just hope that some of you can see where I’m coming from with all of this. And if you can’t? I’m not here to argue. The block button is right there, so feel free to use it.
Thank you for your time.
