OH NYGOSDD???

it’s actually insane to me in retrospect that viktor got the arc he did. I need to go back and count his screen time minutes, but it’s clear that he’s up there numerically, and his story has so much weight within the narrative outside of just numbers as well.

beyond that, though, is the fact that viktor's narrative is fundamentally one about internalized ableism and the systemic structures that encourage it.

(obligatory disclaimer #1 that I have a significant mobility disability and a progressive chronic illness, but I am only one disabled person.)

imagine this: you are a child. you are disabled. the world you live in is one where you cannot afford healthcare; no one is there to teach you how to even use your cane correctly. your world is inaccessible and, worse, even the people who would normally show class solidarity with you don't, because you are not even able to do what they expect from you. characters like vi, powder, claggor, ekko, and mylo are all shown care and solidarity that viktor isn't — because they are able-bodied and therefore able to "pull their own weight."

this, at least, is an environment that can probably be overcome or mitigated by age and meeting people in your community who do care about you. this is an environment comparable to that of many, many, many disabled people who manage to thrive in a deeply unfair and ableist world.

but then you encounter a man who sees that you have talent and tells you as much. he does not ask much of you and he does not care that you are disabled. all he asks is for some help, which you give, and in return he teaches you the things he knows. what comes of this, after all is said and done and your understanding of the world has been fundamentally changed, is that you do have something you can give to your community, to the world. you have a talent which you can use to make yourself useful. you're not strong or sturdy but you can make machines, and that is always in need.

but you can't skate by on being useful like a normal child. the onus is always on you to prove that you're worth the air you breathe and the space you take up, that it's worthwhile to keep you alive. and the place to go to make yourself the most useful, where the most change can be made, is not a place you have any traditional way of accessing. you, through tenacity and grit, manage to get there anyways. (the show doesn't depict this, but any way viktor would have managed to get to the academy would have involved significant difficulty and possibly deception).

and when you get there, to that towering city of bronze, you find that nothing you do actually matters all that much.

everyone looks at you and sees your disability. everyone looks at you and sees where you're from. no matter how smart or accomplished or helpful you are, your behavior will always be, in their eyes, representative of your people. you could handle the stares, the rejection. but their judgement is dangerous to you and your people.

so, in order to survive, you must be perfect. you must project confidence or at least indifference to their cruelty. you must do as you're told and accept meager promotions and toil away as an assistant. you might be the only disabled zaunite they'll ever meet, so you have to make it count. if you fail, if they decide everyone from the undercity is lazy and useless, it's your fault.

you tell yourself you won't let them get to you. you tell yourself that you believe in your abilities.

it's a convenient narrative, and it's wholly untrue.

you, after all, are only a human being. a lifetime of the chips stacked against you is nearly impossible to overcome.

and so the image you build of yourself is that of a man far more self-confident than you, one who is quiet and reserved but proud of his accomplishments. the man you actually are, though, is one desperate for acceptance. desperate to assimilate. you chase your dreams, yes, but you can't bear to take credit, can't bear to be the face of them. you don't let yourself get close to anyone except the man you've built all of this with, who you love more than anyone else. you don't let anyone touch you (except him) and you don't touch anyone. you convince yourself you don't deserve his love or anyone's, that you're not whole enough for that.

you take it so far that, when you finally have the technology you think can cure your terminal illness, the first thing you try to fix is your leg. not the thing eating at your lungs and cutting short the time you thought you had, but the leg which has marked you as Other your entire life. and even though it doesn't quite work, even though it still causes you pain with every step, you force yourself to run on it — faster and faster until you're outrunning the ships and screaming because you may have visibly "fixed" your leg but it still hurts the same.

and when the system is not only oppressive in the material sense but also set up to make you hate yourself, there is almost no escaping this cycle of self-hatred. throw in the fact that in season 2 viktor keeps getting tossed from resurrection to resurrection against his will and it's no wonder the man did the things he did. it doesn't excuse them by any means, but arcane is not interested in excuses — it's interested in what makes people do the things they do. everything that he did to the people in the commune was a reflection of his own self-hatred, both because he still possessed it after death but also because, since he was programming the hexcore to try and save his life but started with "fixing" his leg, it is designed to make people as physically "normal" as possible. the faceless, identical machine people are a metaphorical representation of the ideology viktor has bought into in his pursuit of self-hatred and internalized ableism. his whole arc across both seasons is a demonstration and condemnation of the ways that systems of oppression reinforce self-hatred in the people they are oppressing.

obligatory disclaimer #2 that I don't think arcane did everything right. I'm frustrated with the direction of season 2 away from the piltover/zaun class conflict and towards the broader league of legends universe. but I do think, as a disabled person with a very similar experience of my disability to viktor, that this arc is well-done and very compelling. in the end, what saves the world is viktor accepting that he is deserving of being loved. I'm going to be thinking about this one for a good long while.

Tags

arcane viktor arcane Jayce Talis this awoken something rooted deep inside me i need someone to tranquilize me god his character means so much to me

Adding nuance in Navy and Orchid

Me and a friend had a nerd voyage about Navy and Orchid, and Paw brought up their cameo in AVA11 - Victim, in which I never previously considered—and it generally got me thinking about their relationship in compliment of the Newgrounds Tragedy. It had me contemplating about what if, rather the Newgrounds Tragedy was responsible for their substantial regression. What went wrong? I really would have never even begun to compose my thoughts if it weren't for him, so all credits!

Navy and Orchid's relationship is especially interesting to me as they were written and programmed to persist as these ideal, beautifully in love couple who attend towards their child. It's on the thumbnail of their uploaded file after all. All 3 of them in the frame! Protective and adoring arms wrapped around Purple.

Now, the timeline of this is a bit rough.

Purple in the thumbnail appears as though he's rather young. I can safely conclude that he is roughly around the same height as the first combat sequence in his presented backstory in AVM29 - Note Block Universe. The thumbnail provides some context that their story was perhaps on-going.

Navy being written as this character who gives strict but positive practices on combat towards Purple. Giving encourages. Orchid being a kind, lighthearted and comforting supporter toward this, nothing more and nothing less.

Nothing more because their creator was not given a chance to, that is.

The destruction of their file in the 2011 tragedy forced a sudden halt. An acute awareness that the couple's intervention with each other was nothing but automated; synthetic, leaving a sour taste as one would when your entire reality and purpose is completely shattered. There could be no interference towards their line of written story and code, forcing them to stick with their present (or what is known to them as the present)

No updates, no progression, no development, no further growth. Really, just nothing. Just an uncompleted story that forces the two to endure and carry on where they had been abandoned at. It's not like they have any other choice, just as the thousands of animations beside them.

As mentioned, Navy was loving, but designed with strict authority and boundaries towards training.

Navy's intentions and reasoning towards the sparring is unknown, making me beg the question; does he even know? Was his creator given the time to?

This confusion can host some hostility, oh undoubtedly.

Following with these characteristics in oppose to how he handles the aftermath of the tragedy, Navy engages in being impatient, inconsistent, irrational, eager, pestering, forceful, and downright abusive from the power imbalance in reflex to the instability of not having some designated context or rather purpose. Security.

Orchid, being the timid bystander. Providing comfort and sanctity to Purple every once in a while from a far too rough sparring. She's kind, neutral, observant, and naturally empathetic. But the entire interference leaves this bitter taste as she's nothing more than this role.

And honestly, that is heartbreaking for Orchid, and downright sad. Discomfort of aiding in your child's physical and mental development due to the dreadful profound ability of your unfair positioning does not correlate to not standing up for them at all. She has her priorities of not interfering unless certain that he is being empowered. She does not appreciate power imbalances—and this shows as she rather progresses from present comfort towards near audibility unless firm - and this is where I believe her fatal flaw comes in. Ignorance until positive.

And this shows in Purple, it shows a lot.

She does try her best, yes. She's still very loving, she still really loves Purple. She loves Navy. it's in her code after all. But her noticeable absence speaks volumes that she was attempting to distance herself.

But I find the reasoning to be much more due to Navy than Purple, if I'm being honest.

Navy and Orchid's relationship is surely strange. So in love in contrast to their narrative, then stranded to a rough prevention of their chronology. It doesn't defeat the purpose that they still, very much love each other. But the revulsion that it was nothing but a hoax will leave a agonizing dread in the atmosphere.

But after all, they have nothing else to stick to. Be optimistic with what you're left with, make best out of the worst. They can continue where their unfinished log was unfortunately Interrupted. And it goes as unwell as you would expect.

Hell, Navy's reaction towards these issues definitely encourages a hatred in Orchid and prompt towards distance. She was obviously discouraged from him and his impulses way early on, but the conflict rises when her son is the most vulnerable victim of it, and she does not like this.

Orchid and Navy are a loving bunch but two very different individuals. It wasn't too long until Orchid's comforting, soothing nature began to grow anxious and clash with Navy's raw approaches, outbursts and harsh eagerness. The worst part is that this isn't even Navy's fault.

And this shows. You would think once Navy leaves—she could rest. She could feel secure. She is loose from this lined attire that kept her glued to these strict set bounds; she's ridden of worries, and,

And this is where she proves you wrong. She is guilt-ridden, she's upset. She's left paralyzed, numb, in shock, detached. But why?—Why would she feel this way? Isn't she relieved of the split from the first ever obligated context she was programmed to be with?

Oh.

Ohh,

Ohhh, my poor girl.

And it's such a complexity of being doomed by the (unfinished) narrative. And it's rather the contrasting spectrum of it: the burning hatred of the figure you were made to love vs the boundless affection of how at the end of the day—you were still made to love them. The horrors is inescapable, no matter how much you try to run away from it.

Tags

theory animator vs animation AvA alan becker avm ava/m nerd voyage orchid avam navy avam purple avam now purple's character is.. God where do I even start and that isn't positive stable interpretation for the most part until you get to the concept of aging and timeline.. “we learn about Purple's origin” is all i needed to know that we're getting into serious shit

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sscardinal7

3 months ago