I actually like Malleus quite a bit but to be fair his fans (not all of course but some of them) makes it hard to like him sometimes because it feels like they are forcing you to like him.
The thing with Malleus is it's either players that love him to a scary degree and players who hate him to also a scary degree which makes him an overwhelming character for me like I would have liked him more if I wasn't in the fandom.
He is treated way differently by the fandom (mainly the En) then other characters.
Like for example I see the players who dislike Leona publicly rarely get harassed unlike the ones who dislike Malleus.
Aaaaah 💦 For better or for worse, Malleus is a character that gets “special” treatment, both in-universe (OP, crown prince, etc.) and in the fandom. I don’t think you’d be the first to notice that.
I’ve heard way too many horror stories about run-ins with Malleus fans from my friends (though like Anon said, not ALL Malleus fans are like this, just a loud minority of them). I’ve also had my own unpleasant experience being anonymously harassed for over a year just for expressing the reasons why I don’t like him. All you need say is “I don’t like him”, and it tends to summon a few very strongly opinionated fans to defend him, to argue with you, or to insult your intelligence. They are also quick to defend any potentially morally grey action he takes, often dismissing it by redirecting blame or pointing to a sad aspect of his backstory to excuse him. It feels there’s a social pressure to like him or to protect him, even if it’s not always overtly stated.
I’m not exactly sure why this is seemingly a recurring issue when it comes to him specifically, though I’ve certainly speculated on the matter. I don’t think they realize that them acting this way only exacerbates things. People are not going to consider liking Malleus (or, if they do like him, they may feel ashamed of it) because of these extreme fans.
Then there’s the other side, the Malleus haters. I’m not sure what started this collective, but it feels like they may have formed as a countermeasure or in response to the intense Malleus lovers?? But this other extreme isn’t a great alternative. The language they use can also be needlessly hostile towards him, and there are some who seem to attribute every bad thing that happens to Malleus even when he genuinely had no hand in it. It can get very uncomfortable to read some of the vile things said over a fictional character.
And then I think the Malleus haters end up making the Malleus lovers feel like they/their boy is being attacked… so they retaliate… and it perpetuates a vicious back-and-forth. You end up being caught in-between the two and getting stressed out over it. One notable example is the debate on who is "responsible" for the dreams. It can’t be easy being caught in those crossfires 😔
Malleus has become a pretty popular character in JP recently (like, the latter half of book 7), but not to the same heights as what we see in EN (he’s not consistently placing #1 like he is in EN, more like 7ish in JP now?). However, I haven’t seen anything nasty from the Malleus fans over there. That’s probably because JP fandom is much stricter with fandom etiquette and don’t exert their own opinions on fans who disagree with them; they see something they don’t like? They just ignore it or block and move on. I really with EN fans could take a page out of JP fans’ books; the fandom would be a lot more peaceful that way.
I’m sure there are fans that take these extremes for every character (I have encountered something in this vein for Twst characters from every other dorm). They’re just less frequently seen because there are fewer fans of them compared to the sheer number of fans for Malleus.
I really sympathize with you 💦💦 It feels stressful to say you don’t like Malleus, and it also feels stressful to say you do like Malleus. There’s always that fear of Malleus lovers coming for the former, and Malleus haters coming for the latter. No happy medium…
















