Just rambling about the Stunticons a bit! This post is not targeted towards anyone, I am just thinking out loud.
When you have a group of characters whose entire concepts are basically "Each of them have a certain mental illness", like the Stunticons, there's a certain line that you have to be mindful of when you're portraying them. It is so easy to step over that line and "mock" the mental illnesses they have when you're trying to create cute scenes or joke around with the characters. Sometimes I see people talk about them or portray them in manners that really push that line and it kind of upsets me.
I love the Stunticons because I relate heavily to certain things about them. Breakdown especially is very very dear to me because I suffered a lot from paranoia during my teenage years, and I still do to this day. I am talking "There are sharks in my walls and under my floors. If I step down from my bed they will eat me." type beliefs that I carried with me well into my teenage years. These type of thoughts absolutely ruined my quality of life, and I have been scolded many times than I can count and never could give parental figures proper explanations as to why I behave the way I do. Because somewhere deep inside, I knew these thoughts were ridiculous and unrealistic, but they controlled my every action nonetheless. I only got over most of it when I was around 17-18 years old.
To this day there's lots of things that drive my mind absolutely haywire, but I am able to calm myself down and think rationally after living like this for so long. I am doing much better now! So not to worry. I have become my own therapist. Though, I still hope to see a professional one day.
This is why Breakdown means so much to me. At first, seeing him completely fine in Earthspark S1 was disappointing. But then I thought more about how he probably went through so much healing in the background, just like I did, and so this thought became my current ES Stunticons AU!
Sometimes though, I see his struggles being made into jokes, and it kind of stings a bit. Don't get me wrong, I am not against joking around, and I am aware it is completely on me that I get upset by it due to personal reasons! It is a me problem. Yet I still can't help but feel we should try to be more careful when handling such characters in our writing.
I am not free from critism when it comes to this either, though! I do my best to watch out for stereotypes when portraying the Stunticons, but I am not a perfect writer myself. ((Feel free to call me out on my wording so I can also improve my writing and description of such struggles, by the way! This AU has been here for about 2 years now, and my opinions about my old posts/answers to asks have changed quite a bit. I would like to correct myself if I said anything offensive or upsetting in those posts!)) While my writing of Breakdown may be influenced by my personal struggles, therefore having more of a ground to stand on, I can't say the same for the rest of the Stunticons. I find them relatable in their own way, but I do not have the mental problems that they do specifically. Yet, the way they are talked about whether in official media or amongst the fandom still rubs me the wrong way sometimes.
Now, there is no official post or media that states the exact mental illnesses the Stunticons struggle with. They are just called mentally ill and are given certain characteristics that fit in with real life mental illnesses. From what I've seen, they're mostly thought about with certain disorders in mind amongst the fandom: Wildrider with schizophrenia, Breakdown with paranoid schizophrenia, Dragstrip with narcissistic personality, Dead End with depression, and Motormaster with psychopathy. Like I said, these were not specifically stated, but people came to these conclusions by reading between the lines and taking in the cues. Therefore these characters are mostly perceived with these psychological disorders in mind. These are real issues that real people struggle with, so I really really wish that we can be more careful when talking about these characters and their struggles.
An example I can think of is Wildrider being called the "psychotic" one, and then being referred to as "nuts" and "crazy" in his Transformers Universe bio. I get that he's a villain, but the mental illness that he's written with is very much real, and I wish such words weren't used to describe him in official media. Even if you don't respect the character, there should be some respect given to the real life people who struggle with similar problems as him.
Wildrider being seen as "crazy" by other bots in-universe makes sense of course. Him even internalizing that he is that way also makes sense from a character writing standpoint. I always said that the Stunticons are viewed as the "crazy ones" by other Cybertronians, and Wildrider specifically adopts this as his personality and plays into it to cope. However, him being described that way by the official writers in his official bio is really upsetting to me. This wording of "crazy" is not taken into account as "a harmful term to describe someone with mental struggles", but instead is used as a quirk and a funny way to refer to the character.
There are lots of things I can think about when it comes to the portrayal of other Stunticons as well. But I also do not want to be misunderstood. I am not saying that the Stunticons have to always be reformed and be made into good guys just because of these mental struggles. I am not babying these characters nor the real life people who share these same psychological disorders as them. But I also want us to be more mindful in the way we talk and joke about them too.
I wanted to get these thoughts out of my chest because I see that thinking about Breakdown being paranoid about completely absurd scenarios is thought as "cute" by some. Seeing this kind of upsets me, personally. As nothing about what I went through by myself regarding my paranoid thoughts were "cute", instead it was all confusing and terrifying to go through alone. I lost such precious years of my life to this and other problems, it saddens me that it is seen as some sort of funny quirk. Once again, it is a me problem that I am upset by this. But I also think this shows how the words and the portrayals used for these characters can bring real people who struggle with the same issues sadness too. Making them more hesitant to come out there with their own experiences with the fear of not being taken seriously.
I am not here to police people on how to write these characters, and I do not want anyone to police anyone either! If you do not like how someone is portraying a character you like, I just suggest that you do not engage with that person and leave it at that! ((This includes me too! I will not be offended if you choose not to engage with my Stunticon posts!)) No harassing or anything like that. I don't own these characters, and you don't either! So anyone is free to portray them as however they want! I am just saying that we should all try to be more mindful with the words that we use to describe these characters and their struggles; and make sure that we do not infantilise them while portraying such real struggles.
It is very likely that none of our portrayals will be perfect depictions of these mental struggles. Every person goes through their own struggles differently, so there is not exactly a perfect way to portray everything. But just being more mindful is enough.
Thank you for reading! Once again, this was not targeted towards anyone, and I do not want people to use this post to attack others on how they think the Stunticons should be portrayed or not. I'm just sharing my thoughts, and hope that you can understand where I am coming from.
If you have any additional thoughts, I would love to hear you out! But keep in mind that this is not an opportunity for you to call anyone out or hate on anyone's work. Like I said, if you do not like how someone is portraying a character you like, just do not engage with that person, and leave it at that.
