IDE/Theory Thread 25: The Red Supergiant is the Forge

[ponce]

show spoiler

hide spoiler

Note, the scribble around the face swirl is black(the face?), compared to the dark green below it(The clothing?).

Also, it is not black, it is the same gray as his typing. (323232)

I had always assumed he was white or grey with red spirals on his cheeks, so he'd look like Jigsaw. Maybe their skin coloration is determined by their blood color?

[Conspicuous]

Theory: Doc Scratch introduced blackrom on Alternia in an attempt to find Lrd English the perfect mate.

That's why Grandma referred to him as the Batterwitch's ex-husband.

[Blaperile]

IDE/Theory: Both Calliope and uu sleep in a sarcophagus. Because why not more LE parallels/red herrings/references?

[Conspicuous]

IDE/Theory: Both Calliope and uu sleep in a sarcophagus. Because why not more LE parallels/red herrings/references?

Counter-Theory: Their shared body is always awake. If one of them is awake while the other's asleep, they have no need for a sleeping place.

[Solifuge]

IDE/Theory: Lord English, the 4th Wall, and You...
or "How I illustrate how you are all terribly wrong and bad at plot-theorizing."

So, been doing some thinking on the nature of the 4th wall throughout the story. Homestuck started as a story that recognized reader input in where the plot went, and it's even been directly noticed by the characters themselves. The characters made references to Hussie's earlier works, and the story recognized the author himself as a character (and a mortal one at that). Now, with how Calliope refers to the kids as "characters", and the fact that she seems to be reading the comic like us, it gets me thinking...

For starters, Calli and her brother are clearly the fandom. While she represents a light-hearted "flushed" love, with her obsessive reading, theorizing, and character shipping, he represents a "caliginous" love/hate relationship with the comic with his ranting habits, his obsession over game mechanics and abstractions, and his love of sudden plot twists. What's more, it's pretty obvious they are both involved in the origin of Lord English.

Suppose that Calli and/or her brother become Lord English. As fans, their reverse-breaking the 4th wall in order to kill Hussie was a way for her/them to secure authorial power, and enabled them to alter the plot of their favorite story... like some kind of supercharged 4th-wall-breaking fanfic writer. Recall how LE was introduced as one who was ALREADY HERE, who "assembles followers (ie. fans) in universes (ie. stories) he has marked for predation." MSPA readers have been Already Here since the beginning, and have the entire course of the comic's timeline to look over at our whim. We assemble our friends and others to pick apart the story for meaning, and act as predators on the comic for our entertainment.

To put it simply, you are Lord English. I am Lord English. We are the Antagonist. It's us.

It's not a new theory, but it is a theme that resonates with these new characters, and with Hussie's thoughts regarding reader-driven content and the importance of an author limiting it. In a 4th-wall-breaking story like this, it makes a kind of sense to have the ultimate antagonist be fans/a fandom which reverse-breaks the fourth wall, and for all their love for the story and its characters destroys the universe through their whims.

[Solifuge]

P.S.

So I'm just gonna throw out the bleeding-obvious thoughts I've been thinkin'.

- Calliope and her brother live in the same body, one asleep when the other is awake.
- Each of them has a shackle that only they can open. They shackle their body before sleep to make sure the other doesn't fuck too much stuff up. Possibly to keep each other out of personal spaces too, who knows.
- uu will find a way to stay awake permanently, effectively killing his sister. He's going to have to lose his leg to get out of her shackle and actually do stuff though.
- This is why Lord English has a peg leg.

Cutting off his own leg to escape a shackle is even a shitty SAW reference. There is pretty much no way this isn't going to be a thing that will happen.

[fractalVacancy]

IDE that's probably mostly canon: Gamzee either sneaks out when everyone else is asleep and blots out bits of the tome when Rose has it, or steals it at some point and blots everything out then before sending it on to Calliope for inscrutable Bard reasons of his own. The former is probably less likely to lead to death from blood loss.

IDE regarding motivation: Gamzee at some point is fairly sober without being crazy and finds himself embarrassed by his role in things, so he sets out to conceal it.
Alternative IDE: Gamzee is working for LE, either at Doc Scratch's behest or after being contacted by the Condesce or maybe even the Handmaid if it happened early enough.
Subsidiary IDE to the above: LE's agents engineered Gamzee's childhood to ensure a sopor slime addiction so that he would go on a murderous rampage when he went into withdrawal. This seems pretty likely, since Doc Scratch and LE are supposed to be the Mirthful Messiahs.

There was going to be an IDE about the cherubs not having viewport functionality, but then I remembered that Calliope knows what the Alpha kids look like.

[researcherWisemon]

IDE: Gamzee used the "peculiar indigo ink" not because it's what he had on hand, but because it actually VOIDS the text beneath it.

[Blaperile]

Counter-Theory: Their shared body is always awake. If one of them is awake while the other's asleep, they have no need for a sleeping place.

Oh holy crap I hadn't noticed the fact that Calliope mentioned a "hypothetical" bed instead of a real bed. Welp.

[Conspicuous]

Oh holy crap I hadn't noticed the fact that Calliope mentioned a "hypothetical" bed instead of a real bed. Welp.

It's always the tiniest things, isn't it?

[LMLYP]

when lil' seb burst out of poppop's neck, jane clumsily re-attached the head with a fireplace poker

weekend at bernie's

aaauuggghhh jake

[Conspicuous]

when lil' seb burst out of poppop's neck, jane clumsily re-attached the head with a fireplace poker

weekend at bernie's

aaauuggghhh jake

Crazier theory:
Dirk will robotify the dead Jake and use his corpse for zany puppet antics.

[Reecer6]

Calliope and uu are the same person in different times?!?! Maybe they've paused time and can move through time easily, but what each does stays in every time period. uu is from the past, a cranky baby skull monster. It explains why he draws so terribly! And maybe the cherubs do not have different sexes, 'he' and 'she' refer to ages. They each have a home time period, and the bed only exists for a split second at sometime between them.

Time shenanigans!

[cyberHeroine]

If the hypothetical bed would have to be in neutral territory, it means that she would have to go to sleep in neutral territory, and therefore that they share the same body.

[Sneak.QQ]

So guys, I was browsing reddit's r/homestuck when I came across a theory about LE killing Hussie. And a good percentage of the fanbase believe that uu is somehow connected with LE, so... What if the only reason Lord English killed Hussie was because... he was dressed up as UU?

[Sparrowsmith]

So guys, I was browsing reddit's r/homestuck when I came across a theory about LE killing Hussie. And a good percentage of the fanbase believe that uu is somehow connected with LE, so... What if the only reason Lord English killed Hussie was because... he was dressed up as UU?

I thought this, but then I wondered why LE killed Robo-Hussie as well, and also doofed MS Paint with his pimp cane.

[Unclever title]

If the hypothetical bed would have to be in neutral territory, it means that she would have to go to sleep in neutral territory, and therefore that they share the same body.

It certainly adds more onto evidence pile that (doesn't stop from getting taller and) supports the IDE that they share the same body. But they could just share the same bed, or have bunk beds like a more dysfunctional version of Burt and Ernie.

Another thing that would support the IDE of them sharing the same body is id that shackle Calliope is wearing has UU's symbol on the other side of it, opposite uu's symbol.

[cyberHeroine]

The bed is purely hypothetical. It is a hypothetical bed.

Edit: Also, hypothetical is a good word.

[OrangeAipom]

What if the B1 batterwitch was a cherub instead of a troll? More specifically, UU?

pipefan413: For you see, the girl had uncovered so many dirty secrets about the terrible batterwitch, including the most troubling one of all.
pipefan413: Of course no one would have believed her, but she knew.
pipefan413: She knew the baroness was not human! :B

the batterwitch wouldn't dare file off her glorious horns and play human, even if her master demanded it. Calliope, on the other hand, is totally willing to go greyface and wear a wig.

[LMLYP]

What if the B1 batterwitch was a cherub instead of a troll? More specifically, UU?

the batterwitch wouldn't dare file off her glorious horns and play human, even if her master demanded it. Calliope, on the other hand, is totally willing to go greyface and wear a wig.

that

iiiiiiis

a nice twist on "not human"

except B1 crocker was supposedly wicked and cruel? that doesnt sound like the calliope we know.

[OrangeAipom]

except B1 crocker was supposedly wicked and cruel? that doesnt sound like the calliope we know.

You got me there.

And it would require Calliope to get a body of her own. How that would happen, I don't know.

There is always God Tier, I suppose.

[Tayo23]

I thought this, but then I wondered why LE killed Robo-Hussie as well, and also doofed MS Paint with his pimp cane.

I'm pretty sure he just happened to find Robo-Hussie's head, since it looks like RH was disassembled to give Slick new body parts.

Ms. Paint was in the way, I guess.

[Hytheter]

If the hypothetical bed would have to be in neutral territory, it means that she would have to go to sleep in neutral territory, and therefore that they share the same body.

But if they share the same body, what stops either of them going into "non-neutral" territory? Ie each other's spaces?
I've seen some people come up with things like shackles that they put on themselves which prevent the other entering their area, but then what happens if, say, someone says "Calliope" to uu over the chat client? Would he fall asleep, then magically slide across the room to the neutral zone where the shackles put themselves on?

Note, the scribble around the face swirl is black(the face?), compared to the dark green below it(The clothing?).

Also, it is not black, it is the same gray as his typing. (323232)

I see what you're getting at, but keep in mind we have no way of knowing how accurate that picture is; it could be that the spiral is supposed to be on a grey face, but as far as I'm concerned it's equally likely that he just placed it randomly or missed the intended location.
In other words: We can't really extract any hard facts from uu's drawings because he is a really shitty drawer. :P

[Kaleb702]

But if they share the same body, what stops either of them going into "non-neutral" territory? Ie each other's spaces?
I've seen some people come up with things like shackles that they put on themselves which prevent the other entering their area, but then what happens if, say, someone says "Calliope" to uu over the chat client? Would he fall asleep, then magically slide across the room to the neutral zone where the shackles put themselves on?

He'd pass out and not have the shackle changed out. That's why it's against the rules.

[InvertedVoid]

But if they share the same body, what stops either of them going into "non-neutral" territory? Ie each other's spaces?

The rules of the elaborate game they are both playing. Going over to the other side would be bad juju!
Actually, uu pretty much did go over to the other side and make a mess out of UU's side of the room?


Ok, suppose UU, or uu, or both, are Lord English. And now they've killed Hussie. The author. On the page labled DOTA, which is that whole thing about the author is no longer the one who controls interpretation of their work.
What's story-Hussie done, the one who's dead and presumably has their job taken by LE, and thereby UU, uu or uU? Aside from pose dramatically, set up curtains, and attack a puppet with a broom, he's written the recaps.
Joke-ish IDE: Our next recap will be written by LE-uu, and he will recap ALL of homestuck, in such a way that completely turns around our understanding of all events, portraying Skaia as the villain, Nannasprite as a twisted manipulator who tricks (as a harlequin) John into believing in Skaia, who convinces his friends, who write the guide that the A2 trolls use, which leads to, um, dunno. Something bad. The Green Sun being created. Which is a bad thing because something hitherto unrevealed. Radiation. Bec Noir. Et cetera, et cetera. All in giant flashy text.
More serious IDE: LE takes over writing recaps.

IDE: uu has visions of the same thing UU sees, except flipped the opposite way, completing that "skully loking thing."