#s act 7

[thefastestclockintheuniverse]

Just watched [S] Act 7, and again, I may do some Act 7 posting tomorrow, in the name of finishing Homestuck and getting some sleep before work - but I'd forgotten how beautiful it is. Like it's a stunningly cinematic piece of animation.

[vivaciousarcanist]

dunno if anyone noticed, but the youtube comments for collide, act 7 and the credits are all disabled

i wonder why this is

examples below

[stupidalteanpools]

I REALLY HATE THE FACT THAT JOHN HAS FOUR FINGERS

[ontologicalsynaesthesia]

Okay TERRIBLE SADSTUCK HEADCANON/THEORY TIME:

I was thinking about how miserable it’s eventually going to be for the beta and alpha kids, being the only immortals on Earth and eventually seeing all their troll and carapacian friends die (do carapacians die of old age?  I assume so?), and if they decide to repopulate the human race, seeing all their children/grandchildren/great grandchildren die too.  Maybe they could be sort of content for a while looking after all the mortal humans and trolls and carapacians as benevolent gods, but it seems like it would get old and lonely after a few thousand years.

Maybe that’s when they decide to go after Caliborn, back before he became Lord English.  They probably suspect they won’t make it, but trying to take down the bad guy before he has a chance to wreak so much havoc seems like a good way to go out.  (John might have the power to protect Earth from the effects of the timeline changes this would cause, like he did with LOWAS.)  Or maybe Rose figures out that they’re going to have to do it eventually to complete the time loop of Lord English’s existence, and they decide that it’s a good time when they’ve gotten sick of their divine monotony.

So that’s when the Masterpiece happens, and that’s why it's only the humans there.  They’re old, bored, lonely gods and all their other friends and loved ones are dead.

[ontologicalsynaesthesia]

Sburb Ramblings

Homestuck is over, and with a controversial ending that focused more on the creation myth aspect than the story and characters, I've been thinking a lot about Sburb.

In the (universe is too small a word; multiverse?  Reality?) of Homestuck, universes reproduce by distributing a video game intended to appeal to teenagers.  By playing this game, these kids sacrifice everything - their families, most of the people they know, any stability or life plans they might have had - to aid in the perpetuation of reality.  And they get in exchange... special powers, immortality (if they play things right), the chance to briefly reunite with a dead loved one, a mystical quest tailor-made for them to facilitate their personal development, and eventually - if they survive - a new home where they can live out eternity with their co-players and bunch of chess people.  Paradox Space has a sense of justice, as we see from God Tier immortality, and I think it tries to reward the children it drafts into its service as much as it can.*

Is it worth it?  I don’t know.  It would vary from person to person, obviously.  In a way, the players don’t have much of a choice; even leaving aside the stable time loop that inevitably leads to players’ creation if they do play the game, if the opportunity arises, it means that the world is ending anyway, and Sburb is probably their only chance to escape.  And even then... very few people playing it actually know any of this.

I’m not sure if it was ever stated in the comic, but I was always under the impression that the vast majority of Sburb sessions fail in one way or another.  In Homestuck, it took the combined efforts of five game sessions and two hard resets to produce one healthy new universe.  (I think it might also be a thing that only one session per planet can succeed, since I think the implication of the exiles rebuilding the players’ dead home planet is that it’s always supposed to serve as a new home that they take with them into the new universe?  That’s just speculation, though.)  Most people who try to play Sburb will die before they enter, or die in their session, or fail and just kind of live out the rest of their days in their Medium, probably without understanding what went wrong.

It’s kind of brutal and kind of sad.  But I think the main reward (or compensation) Paradox Space gives players is the opportunity to be part of a story.  In Sburb, there are good guys and bad guys.  There’s a clear conflict and clear goals.   Each player has a personal quest tailored to a potential arc of personal growth for them - something that shows up in stories all the time, but is not a luxury we get in the real world.  Not everyone takes the opportunity (Rose takes particular cynical delight in defying hers as much as possible), but it’s there.  Players have the potential to feel like they matter, like their lives have meaning in a way that tends to be more true in stories than in real life.

And (assuming the theory where the white doorway/juju is Homestuck the story is true) if they win the game, they have the opportunity to leave that story and go back to living real lives, for better or for worse.

* Someone could write a very interesting essay comparing Homestuck and Puella Magi Madoka Magica on this particular theme.

[mor-os-blog]

im barely seeing Homestuck on my dash anymore and it’s pretty saddening to see evryone abandon the comic so quickly

[scrunch]

i could get all gushy and reflective about the past five years i’ve been reading homestuck and the experiences i’ve had through it (and how things have changed over the years, like having to do this drawing over 3 days instead of a during single evening back in the day, because i’ve become a Real Adult with a Job) but i think i’ll just stick with saying, thanks for the memories, andrew hussie (and friends)! looking forward to the next adventure :B

[ontologicalsynaesthesia]

Act 7 Theories

I don’t mind the ambiguity of the ending in and of itself, but there are no theories I can come up with that totally fit everything.

Here are my best theories, arranged simultaneously by least-to-most stuff you have to handwave, and least-to-most satisfying (imo).

1) The juju works more or less the way Caliborn and Vriska said it did.  Caliborn’s masterpiece happened somewhere/sometime offscreen, then Vriska deployed the juju and released the kids, who killed LE before going to the lilypad to claim the ultimate reward.  The resemblance of the doorway to the juju is just circumstantial simultaneity again. Handwave: when the kids had time to participate in Caliborn’s masterpiece, the resemblance of the doorway to the juju, why sticking his arm through the juju got John unstuck in canon

2) The juju works more or less the way Caliborn (and maybe Vriska) said it did.  Caliborn’s masterpiece happened to the group of kids from a different timeline (the pre-retcon one?)  who were indeed trapped in the juju, but Vriska either released them or was able to use the power they imbued it with to kill Caliborn. The post retcon alpha timeline kids in the meantime just finished up the frog and claimed the ultimate reward.  The resemblance of the doorway to the juju is just circumstantial simultaneity. Handwave: the ability of the the kids from a doomed timeline to actually contribute to the alpha timeline in a significant way, which timeline they might have come from, the resemblance of the doorway to the juju, why sticking his arm through the juju got John unstuck in canon

3) The juju works more or less the way Caliborn (and maybe Vriska) said it did. Instead of Caliborn’s masterpiece, however, the juju was created on the lilypad when the kids completed their new universe, and they were trapped there when they went through the door.  Since they took Earth with them, they were able to live there happily inside the juju for a while.  Vriska eventually got hold of it and used its power to defeat LE (either by releasing the kids, or just using the power they had imbued it with). Handwave: Caliborn’s masterpiece and thus the creation of LE at all, the timeline of the juju, why the happily-ever-after sequences showed the Sburb stylized sun we see in the new universe if they were just inside the juju, why sticking his arm through the juju got John unstuck in canon

4) Same as the above theory, except that the juju is and has always been a doorway to the new universe.  The kids lived happily for a while until Vriska deployed it again, removing them from it. Handwave: Caliborn’s masterpiece and thus the creation of LE at all, the timeline of the juju, why sticking his arm through the juju got John unstuck in canon (which makes an extra lack of sense in this theory, since you’d think he’d be sticking his arm through to the new universe rather than the old narrative)

5) The juju is a doorway to the Homestuck narrative, and the doorway on the lilypad is the juju.  The last thing we ever see the kids do is start to open the door (from the inside - this is why it’s the only time we see the juju flipped like this), because once they go through, they’re out of the story.  When Vriska uses the juju, it’s in the story as a recursive doorway into to the story, before the kids have left, and the power of the story (or something???) defeats LE.  This is the only explanation that satisfactorily explains to me how the juju could have given John his unstuck in canon powers; he was sticking his arm into a recursive doorway into the entire Homestuck narrative. Handwave: Caliborn’s masterpiece, how exactly Vriska uses the juju, the timeline of the juju

The last explanation is by far the most satisfying to me in a thematic and artistic way (Homestuck has been breaking the fourth wall in various creative ways since day 1), but I have to admit that it has the most holes in terms of what we actually see happen, and what the deal with Caliborn’s masterpiece was.  The first two explanations make the most sense, but still only kind of, and they’re thematically unsatisfying.

I guess we’ll just have to wait for the epilogue or something like Hussie’s post-Cascade exposition to see if we get any more clues or explanations.  I’m guessing the epilogue will just tie up some of the loose character threads without really solidifying what happened in act 7, though, which I would be fine with to be honest.