Can't believe I went from hating that man to loving him. Toby I love your beautiful mind for combining anime twink with sitcom dad's cool friend.
I remembered this iconic gif and had to recreate with Flowery.
I have a video file right here. If you want to use this in videos, streams, forums, etc. You can, just remember to credit if it's for a video. If you put this into gen AI, I will kick your ass. Somehow I'll find a way to do it.
I don't personally buy Gaster remaining as hands-off as he currently is, but my thoughts on why are kind of nebulous so I've never really felt like I've been able to go to bat on this front. But one thing I will say is that I can so vividly imagine him eventually paralleling this (↓) aspect of Alphys
did you like flowery? I think the fandom consensus is that we all hated him but then we all loved him in the end
ive been through my own arc with flowery... i took a lot longer than any of my friends to warm up to him, even by the end of the chapter i still kinda hated his guts, but despite myself i think i am fond of him now (that's normal for me though, i often take days to fully process something ive seen or read and start being able to analyze it outside of my own emotions in the moment).
he's so perfectly designed to be infuriating that it becomes funny the more you think about it. the way he looks, the way he talks so cutesy, the fact that nobody wanted a guy like this in the slightest. he's anti-bait. he's like a cringey camp counselor who makes dad jokes, or your ex-wife's new man who you know is trying to replace you in your kids' lives and succeeding. he's the most obvious "will turn out to be the most evil person here" setup ever but he's not that, he's genuinely really sincere and caring and you hate it. that's hysterical. it also puts the audience in a position to identify with ralsei the first time we get to see her really angry and bitter, to the point of being mean.
plus the idea of a character who's trying to simultaneously be wife, child, and bff all for the same person... that's really interesting. flowery was always going to fail, and he seems at least somewhat aware of that. but he still went for it anyway. he is an extremely doomed dude, which is what everyone loves, and that makes it even more agonizing to slowly grow endeared to him because god, are you really THAT easy to please? he isnt so anti-bait that he becomes bait again, but he is so anti-bait that it forces you to be aware of it, and aware of what the author is doing, and aware of your own feelings. and unfortunately that's really smart and funny.
Did you see Deltarune's Chapter 5 Weird Route? And if so, how does it make you feel about this comic you did long ago?
https://www.tumblr.com/hellspawnmotel/704116634989871104/some-clarity-from-one-angel-to-another
(ask i got over the weekend, answering now that ive had time to think about it)
i like how specific this is. of course, when i wrote that comic we had three less chapters than we do now, so we knew a lot less about noelle's feelings and what motivates her. and we definitely didn't expect kris to try and cover everything up like they did, and nearly succeed.
(this got long)
noelle is.... pretty self-centered, let's start there. that sounds bad, but i dont mean it in the way of "she doesnt care about other people". she very much does, and a lot of her kindness is genuine. it's the kind of self-centeredness that comes from being in survival mode for an extended amount of time, and hating yourself so much that you think everybody has it figured out but you. and the more stress she's under, the worse her mental state is, the less she's able to recognize the feelings of others as anything but threats she has to navigate.
it's for that reason that noelle is able to exist under such a massive level of denial in the weird route, and it's what pushes her to break completely and pursue "freedom". it no longer matters why kris is acting this way, or how kris feels about it. what matters is that in her mind kris has achieved the thing she's longed for, the ability to become somebody else, and through them she can become somebody else too.
so, back to the comic. it brings to mind the question of, if noelle had been clued in on what was happening from the beginning, would things have turned out differently? probably! when nobody trusts noelle with the truth, it reinforces the idea that she's too weak and helpless to handle it and that she's the only one who isnt in control. it was noelle's heart-to-heart with susie and her reconnection with kris in the dark world that gave her the courage to stand up for herself and everyone else against queen. it's been susie's willingness to be open about her feelings that's given noelle a space to open up as well. she never got anything like that from kris in weird route, only empty reassurances and soothing lies. (not blaming kris for that either, kris is operating under a massive amount of self-loathing and isolation as well.) so, if somebody had come to noelle and just explained exactly what was going on, how much this was hurting others, what the inevitable outcome would be? i dont think she couldve brought herself to the point she's at now. maybe she couldve even helped to change things.
but that's why weird route is a tragedy. at every step, things couldve been different. you can only continue it if you do everything exactly right, and keep cutting off noelle's options for escape. you cant really blame kris or susie for not making the choices that mightve saved her, it's not like susie knew anything either and kris wasnt in any kind of state to figure that out before it was too late (and hey, at many different points outright lying to noelle wouldve worked, if we'd let them!). it makes complete sense why nobody let her in, and that's why it's so painful.
(as an extra, this also makes me think of comparisons between noelle and chara in other ways. did chara also hate themselves so much that when their autonomy was taken away, they stopped being able to care who they hurt? is that how we were able to push them to the state we see at the end of nomercy, willing to acquire absolute power and freedom at any cost? because in a way, that kind of cruelty is freedom. it's freedom from guilt and responsibility. and once somebody at their breaking point is shown what they can achieve when they stop caring...)
do you think weird route will continue with kris and noelle? i don't know where else noelle's character could continue. it seems much more poignant for her and kris to have been 'used up', expended so we the player could breach the game.
i think it will. i'd be pretty disappointed if they were just dead and that's it, there's other things "used up" could mean. killing them in the name of pushing the game to its limits and seeing everything, we've done that before, in undertale. there must be something more this time.
the mantra through the weird route has always been "noelle will get stronger". it's always been about forcing a connection with noelle. you could say it's just because she's the only one with the power to do this, but i think that has to mean something else too.
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