How would you re-do the retcon?

“Feferi wasn‘t revived because she wasn’t relevant” is a recursive argument. If she was revived, she would have been more relevant.

But in any case, it’s not unreasonable to want the story to include Feferi or Eridan, regardless of their “villain“ or “relevance“ status.

@ethanclark What would be the point of having the story include Feferi? Feferi's purpose as a character is to perform background worldbuilding on Beforus by way of introducing the readers to the post-scratch version of its ruler. Between Hivebent itself and OpenBound I feel like Homestuck got all the use out of her it could reasonably expect to.

re: ethanclark

A recursive argument is actually the best type of argument to make about Homestuck. As we all know, It Keeps Happening.

@Ruki Makino I think exploring Feferi as a character is a compelling enough reason to bring her back. She had big dreams of becoming a ruler on Alternia; What do those dreams look like now that Alternia’s gone?

Also, I think Meenah could learn a thing or two from her. Maybe the same same goes for Feferi if you want to give her an arc where she learns why coddling people is cringe.

@vriskazone true, can‘t argue with that.

to elaborate further on what I said: it never felt like Feferi got a complete arc in Homestuck. Like, we’re introduced to this girl who’s set to be the next ruler of an intergalactic empire. She breaks up with her moirail, then- oops, she dies! except not really, she’s still a ghost, but as a ghost she doesn’t really do much.

Yes, you can read Alternia!Feferi as just a way to tell the audience what Beforus!Feferi is like. But even so, when you introduce a character like Feferi with explicit goals for the future, there’s an expectation that you’ll, you know, do something with that?

I’m not saying that Feferi HAD to succeed or even stay alive. But to me, Feferi doesn’t read a case of subverted expectations; It reads as a case of unfinished expectations.

@vriskazone

1. When I say "not time travel as Homestuck defines it", I'm not saying Homestuck disagrees that it is time travel, I mean that it distinguishes John's thing as an action from the sort of time travel used by Dave or Aradia or what have you. It's a different name, but it's not not time travel, John calls it that multiple times, both before and after saying it's "not really time travel", specifically to distinguish it from what Dave does. It's time travel in the Back to the Future changing-history sense, where the rest of it is time travel in the Dragon Ball multiverse sense. It's not like the stipulation that disagreeing with Caliborn's script makes your timeline explode makes that a totally different system, so I don't see why calling this "retcon" makes this a different system. It narratively comes with all of the strengths and weaknesses that the ability to alter history innately carries with it, so at this point it's a completely semantic argument. If you want me to call it "changing history" instead of "time travel" then fine.

2. It's perfectly valid to argue which roles are more satisfying for a story, actually. If they put her in another role and I thought it was more interesting, I wouldn't be complaining, would I? And you're right! We don't have any context for how Vriska has grown over the journey. That's what I'm complaining about! It sure would've been nice to see it! Or anyone else's. Like the journey that we already did see, hence why it's silly to me that they shelved that one and replaced it.

3. No, me being bored is boring. You don't have to agree with me nor are you obligated to form an elaborate response to something you aren't interested in, but please do not be disingenuous.

@reimaruwa

I have no trouble engaging with Homestuck's mechanics. I'm not sure why you're writing about me like I'm some stereotype that discovered the comic last week. I think that Homestuck going so far into the meta elements of the narrative that it gives John the power to alter literally anything, and has that be the solution to the mass-grave it dug for the lion's share of the cast the previous chapter, saps the tension and stakes from the story, and detaches the audience from being as invested in the protagonists as they previously were. I don't think this is an invalid opinion.

@ethanclark "What do those dreams look like now that Alternia’s gone" seems like a pretty straightforward "replicating the Beforan nanny state on Earth C" to me. Which, to be entirely fair, would be a tonal fit for Candy, but you'd have to push Jane to the sidelines in her own villain arc to make it work. I just don't really think that the advantages of keeping her around are significant enough to justify that, you know?

Deep Dive Devin is very right.

The retcon is simply boring, is what I think. It doesn't really matter how it examines the tropes of retconning or the point it's trying to make nor whatever its themes are when the thread is about what could have been written instead of the retcon skipping three years of development to replace it with an admittedly good flash and that godawful lilypad sequence. (but not really because everything before the retcon still happened to the characters and "matters" and yadda yadda yadda).

Like, I know someone here said something about how "suspension of disbelief" people don't try to engage with homestuck as is but the retcon is literally pushing you away with how lame it is lmao. Oh yeah all that drama you've been reading, and the flash that felt so heavy and awful where everyone died? Yeah we're just magicking that shit away. But you have to be fine with it because it technically fits just fine into the story and has had some allusions to it before! As for the new versions of the characters, whom you might be interested in? Um, have like a few flashes and eight really long conversations that are mostly about nothing. Other people will call you detatched and entitled if you don't like this, by the way.

There's just no angle to actually come at the retcon in way that is satisfactory for me. It doesn't really matter whether I try to enjoy it or not (and I have, for the record), it's just a cheap plot point that kills the pacing and stakes of the comic while adding nothing of value besides Terezi and Vriska's character arcs. Which don't even really matter, because I'm talking about their pre-retcon versions lmao.

What would I write as the retcon? I don't think I'd write one, since I think the concept is flawed. No house juju, no nothing. I'd like to keep Game Over and Terezi:Remember (mostly the Vriska and Terezi bits) though, so I'd probably introduce other plot points earlier on to justify them in a convoluted way. What would I introduce? Who knows, something coolish hopefully. Resolving both of these flashes in a satisfactory way would probably make the comic somewhat longer than it already is.

I don't really see how the game over timeline/character arcs were made irrelevant by the retcon tbh. It's pretty relevant for June in both Epilogues! I think seeing the characters as somehow less familiar (or even not "really themsselves") now because we didn't see these "new" three years is a big part of June's conflict in Candy and it's interesting how certain fans just fall into the same trap. The retcon is a great and fun part of the comic, it sets up the epilogues and the themes of the HSBC really well.

I feel like they could of resolved some arcs better

Terezi and Vriska should of been on a more equal footing instead of having Terezi feeling overdependant on her.

Karkat should of done something more important in the finale instead of just become a joke, he doesn't have to be leader, but reducing him to a gag feels cruel considering his self-loathsome nature.

I feel like we should relfect more on the fact that everyone from John and Roxy's og timeline is dead I think we brush over that too much.

And the fact Jade was alone for years.

Oh and more trolls should of fought HIC, especially Karkat.

LISTEN. I GET VRISKA IS IMPORTANT. BuT LEAVE HER OuT OF IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! THE RETCON HAS GROWN ON ME (FOR THE MOST PART) BuT WATCHING THAT GOG DAMNED VRISKAGRAM FLASH MAKES MY BLOOD BOIL....... IT FELT LIKE SuCH A NOTHING BuRGER BRO. YOu SEE THESE CHARACTERS GO THROuGH THESE MASSIVELY IMPORTANT ARCS ONLY FOR IT TO BE ERASED BECAuSE. "OH VRIKSA IS THERE! SHE FIXES *EVERYTHING!!!!!" FuCK OFF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! tUmUt. I THINK VRISKA SHOuLDVE STAYED DEAD AND JuNE SHOuLDVE SAVED SOMEONE ELSE. LIKE FEFERI (IM BIASED BuT ANYONE WOuLD DO). IT WOuLD GIVE SOMEONE WHO GOT KILLED OFF EARLY MORE SCREEN TIME, AND IT WOuLD CHANGE ALOT OF DYNAMICS ON THE METEOR! I uNDERSTAND VRISKA IS IMPORTANTE BuT SHE REALLY COuLDVE BEEN uSED ANYWHERE. I *GENuINELY* THINK PuTTING HER ON THAT METEOR WAS THE LAMEST THING YOu COuLDVE DONE WITH HER. YES, IT HAS PLOT RELEVENCE LATER WITH TEREZIS CHARACTER AND WHAT NOT. BuT I FOuND IT MORE INTERESTING WHEN TEREZI COuLDNT STOP BEATING HERSELF uP ABOuT IT BECAuSE *SHE* KILLED VRISKA. I THINK IT WAS VERY VERY IMPORTANT FOR HER CHARACTER AND THERE WAS ALOT HuSSIE COuLDVE DONE WITH IT BuT IT GOT SCRAPPED.

ROSE, TEREZI, GAMZEE AND DAVE WERE ALOT MORE INTERESTING TO *ME* BEFORE THE RETCON.

I THINK MY PROBLEM WITH VRISKA IS THAT HER BEING ON THAT METEOR AuTOMATICALLY SCRAPPED THE *MAJORITY* OF MY FAVORITE CHARACTER ARCS. I uNDERSTAND MAYBE THAT IS THE "POINT" AND HuSSIE DO WHAT HuSSIE WANT. BuT SOMETIMES I LIKE TO HAVE GROWTH IN A STORY AND ITS CHARACTERS.

I ALSO DONT FuCK WITH DAVEKAT BuT THATS LOWKEY NEITHER HERE NOR THERE. THOuGHT ID MENTION IT BuT I DONT MIND *THAT* MuCH.

THAT IS MY OPINON ON THAT PART OF THE RETCON.

ALSO DISLIKE HOW ALOT OF THE CHARACTERS ARE WRITTEN NEAR THE END ON THE LILYPAD. BuT IT DOESNT PISS ME OFF NEARLY AS MuCH EITHER.

> I'm not sure why you're writing about me like I'm some stereotype that discovered the comic last week.

I just find this to be a fundamental disagreement on how to engage with fiction; I do not agree with the concept of "suspension of disbelief" or "stakes and tension" in the first place, and I think stuff like the retcon is deliberately challenging the traditionalist ways that readers invest in characters.

Either you're up for that kind of thing or you're not; I don't think I could argue you into turning how you see fiction 180 degrees around.

bring back 200000 more vriskas. add in 2000 more pages of lilypad dialogues. delete tavros and nepeta from existence. you're welcome #NoNeedToThankMe

@reimaruwa

Okay, so maybe "suspension of disbelief" was the wrong word. Obviously Homestuck is fantastical, but even if you disagree, you can at least see what I mean, right? You have Game Over, the bloodiest, most destructive animation in the story, where everyone is dead. And I as a reader am left wondering how they could possibly get out of this one. And the answer is that John has a secret special magic power that allows him to completely rewrite everything so that they never died at all, at the cost of also overwriting most of what we saw from them in act 6. I feel like it's fair to think that's pretty deflating! You can do almost anything with a power like that, and I always find myself asking "why this?" when a story does it, and the explanation is rarely ever satisfying.

As for the characters...well, people are the products of their experiences. We were there to see the experiences of the Game Over timeline, and we weren't there for the experiences of the new one. I'm happy to jump into a new version of those characters if we really have to, but that comes with the price of wanting to get an idea of who they are and why. Three years makes a lot of difference to a person! Living a totally-different three years would make me want to learn how a person got to that position, but the story seems largely uninterested in displaying much of that, and more like it wants us to just pick up most of the new lads where the old ones left off.

That's why I don't like the 'ultimate selves' conversation, within the context of Postcanon it's okay, but in HS proper it comes off almost as a handwave, to say something like "ehhhh we could maybe remember some of the stuff you care about, if it means that much to ya". It feels shallow, as far as the mentions in A6A6I5 are concerned.

Is that "traditionalist"? I don't know, if it is I'd like to know what it's being replaced with that is meant to invest the audience in the new timeline's characters, because it clearly didn't work very well on me. John and Roxy were by far the characters I had my eye on most in postcanon, and that's because I saw their whole journeys through Homestuck original. Even dead jetpack John still has his whole action period laid out clearly. It can't be that bad if it's kept around for 2/8 of the humans.

I would also add more Vriska. If you ask me anything about changing any part of Homestuck for any reason my answer will probably be "add more Vriska".

People don't realize that the primary goal of Homestuck is to make you realize how fucking awesome Vriska is.

Oh wow, there was a lot of fighting in this thread. Uh, me personally, I'd make it a time loop and force them to do it over and over until they get it right. Like ground hog day! Infinite character arcs and outcomes, makes Homestuck feel even more like a never-ending saga, and it would be really cool to explore what time travel does when fixated repeatedly and heavily on the same timeline. But I think ultimately if someone rewrote Homestuck, a lot of people would no longer like it, and a lot of people who don't like it now would, because it's all a matter of taste. It's fun to imagine though, right? How you would resolve those same issues in canon? Could be a cool fanfiction there. ^^

Anyway, does anyone in this thread smoke bug weed

Put me down for Team Wouldn't-Change-A-Thing. So far as I'm concerned, the Retcon doesn't "break" anyone's character arc: it's a fundamental PART of Vriska's, Terezi's and John's arcs.