Redemption.

[gwynnevere]

Friends. Which characters, in your opinions, are most in need of redemption? How should/could they be redeemed?


All answers here are valid.

[TC]

What if I like it when people are evil?

[gwynnevere]

What if I like it when people are evil?

You are...entitled to that opinion.

[Sahxyel]

Almost every character in Homestuck including Caliborn/LE are slaves to fate or the narrative depending on how many levels of meta you decide to smoke that day. By that metric nobody really should be held accountable for the things they do because the story forces them to do it. Even Gamzee, who revels in his role, was put in the position of it and unraveled from discovering his whole damn existence is a big stupid joke. That's kind of the benefit and the downside of this whole narrative wankery, it removes agency from every character and the actions they perform.

Though if I ignore all this I'll say who DOESN'T deserve redemption it's Jack (Bec) Noir.

[gwynnevere]

Almost every character in Homestuck including Caliborn/LE are slaves to fate or the narrative depending on how many levels of meta you decide to smoke that day. By that metric nobody really should be held accountable for the things they do because the story forces them to do it. Even Gamzee, who revels in his role, was put in the position of it and unraveled from discovering his whole damn existence is a big stupid joke. That's kind of the benefit and the downside of this whole narrative wankery, it removes agency from every character and the actions they perform.

Though if I ignore all this I'll say who DOESN'T deserve redemption it's Jack (Bec) Noir.

Good to know.

[rookie1978]

i'm glad the epilogues treated redemption arcs as a joke because 99% of the time they were, I honestly do think bec noir could get an interesting arc though. Come back to Jack Noir after the ring got taken and he got face-punched by Parcel Mistress. Act Omega did this pretty well by making him work in the community again despite still being mostly an asshole about it. I'm pretty sure in-canon he's just supposed to be dead, though.

I also don't see why the kids ever attacked Spades Slick. He was obviously trying to kill the guy they were trying to kill (the other Jack) and as far as I remember never even antagonized, much less interact, with the kids/trolls. Seemed weird that he was just turned into another bad guy- he wanted to kill the other Jack and by extension Lord English too, and it was just to get revenge for his property getting destroyed. Remember the Casino? That never stopped being a thing.

[Darth_Energon]

i'm glad the epilogues treated redemption arcs as a joke because 99% of the time they were, I honestly do think bec noir could get an interesting arc though. Come back to Jack Noir after the ring got taken and he got face-punched by Parcel Mistress. Act Omega did this pretty well by making him work in the community again despite still being mostly an asshole about it. I'm pretty sure in-canon he's just supposed to be dead, though.

I also don't see why the kids ever attacked Spades Slick. He was obviously trying to kill the guy they were trying to kill (the other Jack) and as far as I remember never even antagonized, much less interact, with the kids/trolls. Seemed weird that he was just turned into another bad guy- he wanted to kill the other Jack and by extension Lord English too, and it was just to get revenge for his property getting destroyed. Remember the Casino? That never stopped being a thing.

They killed him because "Vriska said so"

[rookie1978]

i'm glad the epilogues treated redemption arcs as a joke because 99% of the time they were, I honestly do think bec noir could get an interesting arc though. Come back to Jack Noir after the ring got taken and he got face-punched by Parcel Mistress. Act Omega did this pretty well by making him work in the community again despite still being mostly an asshole about it. I'm pretty sure in-canon he's just supposed to be dead, though.

I also don't see why the kids ever attacked Spades Slick. He was obviously trying to kill the guy they were trying to kill (the other Jack) and as far as I remember never even antagonized, much less interact, with the kids/trolls. Seemed weird that he was just turned into another bad guy- he wanted to kill the other Jack and by extension Lord English too, and it was just to get revenge for his property getting destroyed. Remember the Casino? That never stopped being a thing.

They killed him because "Vriska said so"

Most bad things can be attributed to Vriska, can't they?

[Sahxyel]

I also don't see why the kids ever attacked Spades Slick. He was obviously trying to kill the guy they were trying to kill (the other Jack) and as far as I remember never even antagonized, much less interact, with the kids/trolls.

Ignoring for a moment that Spades Slick is one to become violent and stab someone as a hello as his nature as a Jack Noir entails, he comes from the Troll's session of Exiles and was explicitly betrayed by them and exiled from their game. Karkat had a pact with him but it wasn't Karkat who was on the building with the Super Strider Bros, it was Terezi. Terezi was the one who set the betrayal in motion and even though Karkat fundamentally disagreed with it they still went through with their plans.

He could have been harboring a grudge for that. I know I would have!

SPADES SLICK DID NOTHING WRONG

[egg]

I enjoy the idea of a redemption arc because it teaches you that someone no matter how bad can become a good person if they try (and also have consequences for their actions). However, I think there are good ways to write a redemption arc and there are bad ones.
As someone who had a very poor conduct when I was younger, it's very difficult for me to enjoy a redemption arc where someone just... becomes good and stays that way. Firstly, a lot of people need a complete change of mindset - they have to start trying, but they won't be perfect at it right way. Heck, it might take several years just for someone to stop making simple mistakes that more well-adjusted individuals don't.
In that sense, I find that Epilogue Gamzee's redemption arc is a parody not of redemption arcs in general (please don't make fun of the idea of someone growing as a person), but of shallow redemption arcs, that are clearly meant to give a character "development" instead of treating them like a person who did some introspection and decided to re-examine their behavior.

[asocksual]

I don't think vriska is a bad guy, but I think the little we saw of (vriska) proves that she has the potential to be better to herself and others

[asocksual]

also I'm a huge sucker for heel-face turns generally

[RoyalFiddle]

Redemption is lame without the confines of a narrative piece, and especially lame in reality. But, within Homestuck, it's hard to really consider anyone truly object, as everyone (From Vriska to Gamzee to Eridan to even Dirk) had reasons for what they did that make it hard to consider them absolutely abhorrent, and telling any of them they need to change who they are for the reason of making them "Good" is a disservice to their characters. People have motivations and refusing to acknowledge that for a sickly sense of "UwU so smol" is just... wrong, imo

[thorondraco]

Almost every character in Homestuck including Caliborn/LE are slaves to fate or the narrative depending on how many levels of meta you decide to smoke that day. By that metric nobody really should be held accountable for the things they do because the story forces them to do it. Even Gamzee, who revels in his role, was put in the position of it and unraveled from discovering his whole damn existence is a big stupid joke. That's kind of the benefit and the downside of this whole narrative wankery, it removes agency from every character and the actions they perform.

Though if I ignore all this I'll say who DOESN'T deserve redemption it's Jack (Bec) Noir.

That is one of the many paradoxes of paradox space. In a sense reality its coerces this behavior by making non narrative supportive behavior invalid. Yet every choice and action has to belong to the character. It needs it to be their choices and theirs alone. Yet it does everything in its power to ensure only one choice is valid in the looping chain of cause and... effect...

What if, it does that because everyone already has a tiny bit of narrative control to begin with? Their choices have weight and the three pillars are meant to control where that weight is thrown? When someone becomes their ultimate self, they gain the power to overcome the control of paradox space and wield this metaphysical weight as they see fit. IF they survive the sickness that comes with it.

So basically agency is not absent, its denied and controlled artificially.

[Dream Muttman]

Caliborn needed to be redeemed by beating the crap out of himself.

[arachonteur]

I feel like additional redemption arcs would wind up being kind of redundant when compared to the extremely nuanced Vriska/(Vriska) unredeemed/redeemed dichotomy, or in bad taste, especially characters who people clamor for redemption arcs for, like Eridan. It would take a very deft hand to redeem that dude.

[VASKA]

Eridan, definitely. I think there's a lot of good things that could come from Eridan as a character, especially because he's such a horrible, disgusting person in a way that is very much relevant to the real world, but at the core there's really one thing that makes Eridan so awful: entitlement. He thinks he deserves a relationship, he thinks he deserves to win, he thinks he deserves to survive even when leaving all his friends for dead. He will throw anyone under the bus to get what he thinks is rightfully his, without any regard for how his actions effect others.

The reason I would like to see a redemption arc for him is because the story and the character would both have to confront this entitlement and humble that annoying bastard.

[aspiringWatcher]

You know what? Fuck that noise.

Give everyone who needs it a shot at a redemption arc. Allow everyone to question the reasons they've been doing the fucked up shit they've been doing and set themselves on a way to a better tomorrow.

This is mere wish fulfillment, but why not?

[Flame_Warp]

Eridan, definitely. I think there's a lot of good things that could come from Eridan as a character, especially because he's such a horrible, disgusting person in a way that is very much relevant to the real world, but at the core there's really one thing that makes Eridan so awful: entitlement. He thinks he deserves a relationship, he thinks he deserves to win, he thinks he deserves to survive even when leaving all his friends for dead. He will throw anyone under the bus to get what he thinks is rightfully his, without any regard for how his actions effect others.

The reason I would like to see a redemption arc for him is because the story and the character would both have to confront this entitlement and humble that annoying bastard.

Honestly, I don't even know that that's true of Eridan. I mean, he TRIES to get Fef and Sollux in on the plan, he actually WANTED to let them survive with him (well, theoretically.)

If you go back and look, Sollux is actually the one who escalates that whole thing, and Eridan doesn't even fucking kill him! Eridan is a stubborn entitled jackass, but he's also a teenager who's been told by the world that that's how he should be. Dude barely even needs a redemption arc so much as an intervention.

Which, hey! Pesterquest!

[Sokota]

Eridan, definitely. I think there's a lot of good things that could come from Eridan as a character, especially because he's such a horrible, disgusting person in a way that is very much relevant to the real world, but at the core there's really one thing that makes Eridan so awful: entitlement. He thinks he deserves a relationship, he thinks he deserves to win, he thinks he deserves to survive even when leaving all his friends for dead. He will throw anyone under the bus to get what he thinks is rightfully his, without any regard for how his actions effect others.

The reason I would like to see a redemption arc for him is because the story and the character would both have to confront this entitlement and humble that annoying bastard.

I wouldn't say he needs a Redemption arc per se, but I would definitely enjoy seeing more content and elaboration on his relationships and personality. The thing about redemptions arcs is that they can seem forced sometimes, so I'm not really able to say if I would necessarily enjoy a Total Erasure of Everything He Has Done Wrong.