One thing that will never cease to amaze me is how OVERLOOKED VI’S TRAUMA IS IN ARCANE.
Maybe it’s just the oldest daughter in me talking; But the trend I most often see in Arcane posts, rants and such, is a back and forth over Caitlin and Jinx. Who’s in the right between the two, who’s justified, who has more of a reason to grieve over their dead parent.
Vi is almost NEVER talked about when it comes to who has the right. And that is SO oldest sister of her.
She was the one old enough to properly understand what happened when their parents got killed.
She was the token older sister, always prepared to defend and take the fall for her younger siblings, hell, she was even prepared to get arrested or God knows what to protect Powder, Milo and Claggor at the age of what, 14-16?
She DID get arrested, and she was in there for about 7 years, in the darkest, dampest place she could possibly be, without sunlight, or fresh air, or ANY idea on if she would ever get out, her only hope and reason for pushing on STILL being her younger sister who also accidentally killed their entire family. WHO VI STILL LOVES AND WANTS TO PROTECT DESPITE THE FACT. And we also learn that Vi was definitely physically abused while she was stuck in that cell, (the look on her face when she hears that clunking coming down the hall proves it wasn’t an every once in a while thing.) She was literally forced to grieve alone, in the worst place imaginable, with no one to help her.
She is consistently shown blaming herself for the decisions of other people, because the over-pressured sister and daughter in her will definitely never fully grasp the fact that ITS NOT HER FAULT.
She had to come to terms with the fact that her little sister had chosen to work for and bond with the man that was responsible for the death of their father figure, and even then, after hearing the things Jinx had done, the ways she’d changed, Vi STILL tried to love her, to save her.
She was faced with a choice between her sister, and her (basically) girlfriend, and no matter how much you defend Jinx, or how much trauma she went through, or her lack of emotional maturity, none of that takes away from the pure terror of watching your sister point a gun in the face of someone you love, trying to make you ‘choose’. And then in the same moment, watching your girlfriend point a gun at your sister? Constantly being stuck in the middle of everyone you love?
Almost everyone she has ever loved either died, or completely turned on her, becoming a different person, or just straight up abandoning her.
The difference between her and the other trauma filled children of this series is that she’s not easy to pity like everyone else. She’s actually strong, and hasn’t completely lost her morals or snapped, even after everything she’s been through, so people don’t sympathize with her. She’s the token older sister, overlooked, over relied on, and villainized when she shows any sliver of fragile humanity.
(SORRY FOR MY VI RANT I JUST NEEDED TO GET THAT OUT 😔✊)
