homestuck is honestly... really beautiful??

like, not exactly from a literary standpoint. there's a shitload wrong with homestuck there.

it's way too self-referential for its own good, relies way too much on convoluted-ass jokes (esp. in act 6)

and often spoils what could be tender moments with unnecessary humor

and there's like a gazillion plot points and it's unlikely they will ALL be resolved satisfactorily

but... that's kind of the point??

even despite all the out-there humor it's still hella realistic

like. goddamn. i dont even know how to word this. im rambling at this point.

i guess... it's just nice to... see people come together?

like, people who think they've got their shit together at age 13 and they're all hotshots

when suddenly BAM some big quest arrives (not usually a literal quest but there it is)

and suddenly they're delving way deeper into themselves than they ever planned to

and... every character deals with it exactly as you'd expect teenagers to deal with it

they dont talk to anyone about it, find horrible coping mechanisms to deal with it because that's what they were taught to do

"don't open yourself up, it's weak, it's annoying, it's disgusting," that's all you really get from society when it comes to mental health

and that's some damn shitty education.

and it takes a real damn long time for these guys to figure out that, no, this... really ISNT healthy at all??

it does a damn good job of not just showing character development in a literarily symbolic way

but as actual HUMAN development as someone comes to terms with themselves

like terezi leading up to [s] terezi: remember, and the dave-dirk conversations

it's all following a basic human progression of

Be Naive>Do Something Seemingly Bad>Wake Up>Realize You Fucked Up REAL Bad>Hate Yourself>Isolate Yourself>Come Out>Talk It Over>Move On

and it does a good job of showing relationships too

like, at first the characters seem to be great friends, but after awhile you realize all that entry-level stuff barely scratched the surface

it's when these friends start opening up to each other that it gets really intense

and sometimes really bad!! but other times really good

and another thing, these relationships arent always about Big Damn Quests or Feelings Jams or Saving the World

a lot of the time it's jokes that fall flat, lots of rambling about things that dont matter, one-sided convos or personal faults or cliches

and a lot of grandstanding to make yourself appear better for other people

a lot of acting going on, like with dave pretending to like all this ironic stuff and even somewhat believing in it but deep down not really

most of the character development is about breaking out of that acting mode

accepting the boring parts of life or the bumpy parts of life or your personal faults and jokes that fall flat and all that

accepting that other people live their own lives and doing the best you can to help advance them

accepting responsibility for yourself, but not in the way that you overload yourself with regret or self-hatred

accepting responsibility in the way that you change things you can change

let things go when you can no longer fix them

don't project your faults onto others, don't overblame yourself for mistakes

accepting responsibility for not just the things you do wrong, but the things you do right

because people really don't give themselves enough credit

and you REALLY need that to live healthily. not even as a coping thing. just as a general human need.

i really think i've made my point by now but yeah. homestuck gets it

its the most true-to-life thing ive ever seen