Can Town (The Official Homestuck Thread)

Favorite Troll?

  • Aradia Megido

    Votes: 10 16.1%

  • Tavros Nitram

    Votes: 6 9.7%

  • Sollux Captor

    Votes: 12 19.4%

  • Karkat Vantas

    Votes: 24 38.7%

  • Nepeta Leijon

    Votes: 15 24.2%

  • Kanaya Maryam

    Votes: 8 12.9%

  • Terezi Pyrope

    Votes: 21 33.9%

  • Vriska Serket

    Votes: 10 16.1%

  • Equius Zahhak

    Votes: 4 6.5%

  • Gamzee Makara

    Votes: 7 11.3%

  • Eridan Ampora

    Votes: 6 9.7%

  • Feferi Peixes

    Votes: 9 14.5%
  • Total voters
    62
While I can't dig through the story to find something that proves it, I think Caliborn does regret killing Calliope, if only because it stunted his own growth and creativity, but he's too stubborn to admit it, like how Dr. Doom won't admit that the explosion that disfigured his face was his fault.

And yeah I think Porky's non-understanding of human interaction is reflected in Caliborn having a more "alien" personality than any other character. Cherubim are even more different to humanity than the trolls, and Caliborn's an outcast even among them.
 
He did explain all about Cherub biology, and about the uniqueness of Caliborn and Calliope's situation.

Cherubs (the red-blooded ones) are essentially parasitic worms of the frog-universes. Even their mating stuff works like flatworm penis fencing. As adults, they fly around destroying planets and things, and have to be opposed by the green-blooded ones, which act like the universal immune system. (Aranea's story explained that somewhere, iirc.) Usually it balances out, but Caliborn gamed the system thanks to Sburb - he basically promoted himself to parasitoid, and now kills universes, rather than just damaging them as a natural part of their cosmic lifecycles. He also screwed up his life history cycle by killing Calliope prematurely - now he can't metamorphosize into a proper, winged adult, and is instead stuck as a man-child forever (which was also commented on in-story, possibly by Spades Slick regarding LE, but I can't remember for sure). Consider also that Calliope's clearly got all the left-brain thinking while he's he right-brain, and now you've got a man-child who's essentially lobotomized himself too (well, hemispherectomized, but that's not colloquial), instead of absorbing her half of the equation. So you start to get a pretty good idea of why Caliborn has so many issues.

His relationship with women has always been pretty screwed up, ever since LE was introduced (even Doc Scratch was a bit of a creeper), but considering that normal Cherub intersexual relationships are nothing but struggles for dominance (over the sibling in childhood, over the partners in adulthood), he's almost hard-wired to be a misogynistic ass. Cherub romance is blackrom, which is why redrom was as vile to him as blackrom is to humans: that's just how his brain works, even in an unaddled form. The incest vibes are also largely thanks to his biology, since the mating drive is fuelled by the need to fill the void left by the predominated sibling (and maybe ectobiology shenanigans make them their own parents or something, ya never know). Of course, murdering his sister rather than absorbing her probably cranked up Caliborn's lady issues a few notches. Plus, his parents were a particularly volatile male and a very benevolent female, creating an even more dichotomous pair in the children, so before all the screw-ups, the cards are stacked in favour of Caliborn being a complete psychopath (and Calliope being so nice, with her access to the Alpha kids counteracting the usual conditioning towards isolation and naught but blackrom that's supposed to be caused by living in constant conflict with her sibling (with no one else around), and therefore amplifying her positive qualities - regrettably in turn causing feedback into making Caliborn jealous and even nastier).

Basically, it's nature and nurture that's made Caliborn a piece of work in-story. And from an external POV, the point of making him so horrible is to make sure we look forward to seeing the heroes kick his ass and save the day. He's entertaining in a "so bad it's funny" kinda way (to most/some of us, anyway), but he's not likeable or sympathetic as a person, and probably won't ever be, because as far as I can tell, he's not supposed to be. I think the idea that he's the hatedom (and/or the seedy underbelly of the fandom) while Calliope's the fandom is also spot-on from the meta side of his characterization. Like, when LE was introduced, there were complains that he was some Hulk monster: many people had been hoping for a more suave, film noirish, anime villain sorta guy, now boom, bishie Caliborn is here, ta da (but with tongue firmly in cheek, of course).

Anyway, overall, I think Hussie accomplished what he set out to do with the character, and hopefully there will be a fitting conclusion in store for him (and Calliope).
 
His relationship with women has always been pretty screwed up, ever since LE was introduced
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Do you think you could give some examples from before Porrim talked about it?
 
Well, he just tends to use and toss women away in all his incarnations. Damara was imprisoned from childhood and turned into his psychopathic handmaid who eventually actively welcomed her death at the hands of LE's next servant, the Condesce: obey or die, not much of a choice. Even Snowman was conscripted into the Felt with the sole purpose of eventually dying by Slick's hand when the time was right for LE's emergence, after her life and blood was linked with the frog-verse (the very thing she hates: fun times for her). Doc Scratch (another iteration of LE in a way) also had no qualms manipulating all the prepubescent girls (and in Vriska's case, maiming them too), and his interactions with them were always pretty skin-crawling to boot.

Hussie also discussed it in a tumblr post before Porrim brought it up it in-game, iirc.
 
[ S ]GAME OVER.
Okay so after taking some milk to calm the fuck down, I'm gonna say things. So this is obviously a doomed timeline. Please let this be a doomed timeline. I know that if I believe enough in it being a doomed timeline, it will become irrefutably not fake Though it doesn't seem to be a REGULAR doomed timeline because, well, Gamzee dies. Hussie implied that he never died in any timeline he's aware of, which means this is more than just a regular "doomed timeline". More like a doomed doomed timeline (hey, if dave says there's an alpha alpha timeline, I can use doomed doomed timeline too.) Or maybe Gamzee just reassambles himself in which case fuck that guy.
Oh, and I loved John kicking the shit out of Caliborn. I don't care if this makes him angrier, or more motivated to become Lord English, that was awesome. SOMEONE had to step up and teach that little brat a lesson and it was done perfectly.
Also, Roxy saving Rose reminded me of this:
01499.gif

This is a great "coming back" flash and I can't wait for next Saturday.
Also, I need more milk.
 
homestuck topic on page 132

this page belongs to me now

should be a doomed timeline, since Meenah already said Aranea doing shit like this makes a doomed timeline- fuck Aranea, by the way- and unlike the alpha timeline, it wasn't constantly glitching out
 
Yeah, it could be another fake-out like the one he did with Karkat and Terezi's death.

But idk, it would seem like a huge waste of ti--what am I saying? It's hamsteak, of course there's going to be lots of wasted time.
 
I bet they aren't even going to say whether this was "meant" to happen or not and just have John's retcon powers sort it out ASAP.

In regards to the heroic deaths: I always understood that by "heroic" they meant a sacrifice for the greater good, but I tought it had to be a meaningful sacrifice.
 
(What are the rules for marking spoilers or not in this thread, btw? I can't figure them out, people keep doing different things...)

SiFi said:
I bet they aren't even going to say whether this was "meant" to happen or not and just have John's retcon powers sort it out ASAP.
Click to expand...
Yeah, my bets are on John changing things like how he made Dave and Jade's conversation about her breakup with Davesprite never happened: that was the trial run to get us used to the idea behind whatever's coming up next.

Like, if only a couple characters died, I'd say it could easily be another "cast deflation" or whatever, but jeeze, Karkat? And Jane and her bring-folks-back-to-life powers (the other logical way out of this corner, unless Caliborn does something but that seems less likely). And as mentioned before, Gamzee's not supposed to die in any timelines, so it can't just be a regular doomed one. I wouldn't put it past Hussie to slaughter a bug chunk of the cast, but even so, it seems too early for an endgame murderfest. But ya never know: psyches are annoying, but on the other hand, everyone dying would be a bit of a bummer if it sticks.

As for the video itself, it was great. Lots of interesting visuals and the usual host of effective callbacks. If I wasn't woken up last night by my brother screaming "noooo" and crying out the names of certain characters, it would have been very surprising when A6A6I3 stuff started happening amidst the continuation of A6A6A3.
 
hussie I know I said that I wanted character deaths to have more of an impact but this isn't what I wanted
 
whatever the answer is, i doubt its going to be something as simple as a doomed timeline. surely hussie wouldn't resort to such a copout after a huge flash animation and be like "oh none of that actually happened"

i mean, if
the timeline was really doomed, then why not just kill off everyone? what's the point of leaving terezi and rose and aranea alive (for the moment, at least)? they could have been killed off just as easily if everyone's going to be revived again

...

that said, i refuse to believe karkat is dead
 
Very good point about Rose, Terezi, Roxy and Aranea (and Dirk, all the sprites and John) surviving: I wondered about the possibilities of that too. But yeah, really doubt Karkat dies: assuming this isn't going to get undone, maybe Echidna saves him; she did want to speak to him for some reason, and he very specifically fell into the lava that leads to her. And if we're looking for non-retconning ways around this, I suppose we didn't really see hard evidence that Kanaya died either. Then there's the ring: perhaps the Condesce will take it from Aranea and use it to revive Jane, who can bring everyone else back - except Karkat (him losing that second chance so pointlessly always struck me a a very deliberate move, actually).
 
Walkazo said:
Yeah, my bets are on John changing things like how he made Dave and Jane's conversation about her breakup with Davesprite never happened: that was the trial run to get us used to the idea behind whatever's coming up next.
Click to expand...

You missed something there walkazo.
 
in any case,
just because they're dead doesn't mean they're gone from the story in any way... god tier characters have killed before (vriska), and yet she's still influencing the story (albeit in a fairly minor way)

and there's also the ring of reviving ghosts which can be used to bring them back, assuming their ghosts aren't obliterated by lord english
 
You know, I think the music in this one is pretty good. It goes for a kind of somber, haunting atmosphere in parts.
 
Well, I don't really dislike the flash music pieces either. But that doesn't guarantee that I like them to the point where I keep listening to them casually. Some I'm just ok with because they fit the events of the flash.

I think ironically my favorite part of the song is the one that plays while Karkat dies. There's like this high-pitched, weeping instrument in the background playing notes from Lord English's theme or whatever it is. Probably because I like English's theme, which is like double ironic.
 
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