i was gonna say 'remind me to make a post going more in depth about this' but i dont have the ability to actually explain what i mean in depth that hard but like.... allison wanda ruth ksbd and wander sotc are two sides of a "humanity" coin to me
- allison is only one woman and she is pathetically small in the scope of the universe and there are a lot, like a LOT of things much larger and stronger and scarier than she is... and she goes okay, but what if i did it anyway. determination and being a force that can bend Quite Literally the universe in your favor, and, in her case, it results in wanting everyone to have nicer lives. wanting to live in a little house with her girlfriend and mentor and friends. The entire comic is about this Go look
- this is kinda just my own interpretation of sotc so pardon me if this means nothing to you, but once again, wander is literally just One Guy and the colossi... embody their namesake. and they are undeniably parts of their environments, whether that be coexisting with the animals around them, Literally having moss and flora grow over them, having entire monuments and stadiums BUILT for them, essentially being their own animal in their own ecosystem and outright Won't deliberately hurt you, arguably being covered in sculpting and carving and armor and other man-made things out of respect or reverence or fear or as an offering or as protection or anything, all having existed for We cannot even know how long, huge and hulking forces of life.... and then in comes one boy. reducing every single one to crumbling and ash on the floor, all because he loved ONE person. and he ends up dying for it, all because all he could see WASN'T what these colossi were, or were for their environments, or what people may or may not have known them in the past, but just this girl that he loved, and wanting to bring her back.
something about futility, something about hubris, something about the ability to build up and tear down your own gods, something about willpower, something about only knowing what you know and this can be either a very good thing or a very bad thing, something about no matter how small your world or life or wants or mind is you can do some very drastic and impactful things regardless, something about connections and lack thereof and the effect that has on someone, something about "this is impossible" "well i think it should be possible", something about power/status Not really mattering if you have the will/actions to show them up? etc etc etc.
they're both really good symbols of pure, utter, unabashed humanity in two little examples to me, and ones i refer to a lot when talking about other charas that i think are showing complete stupid, small, hopeful, impactful humanity, to me. i love it
Occasionally I remember an essay I wrote years ago when I was bored one day about how well Wander is characterized despite SotC having next to no dialogue. Even without saying anything, everything about him feeds into such a clear picture of a human being, and his motives and singlemindedness as you've mentioned in are no small part of that.
This kid is no warrior. He's good on horseback and he can shoot a bow for sure, but he's probably never touched a sword in his life if the way he swings is any indication. But still he stole a sacred cursed sword and rode off into the forbidden land to enlist the help of a dark god, all in hopes of reviving his... Girlfriend? Sister? Girl he thought was pretty? Does it matter? She's important to him and that's all there is to it.
And he succeeds! She wakes up! That's all he wanted! But at what cost? What did he give up? What did his actions cost the world? We'll never know. And I think that's okay. Honestly my takeaway from this game is... Sometimes maybe it's not worth it, sometimes maybe things would be better if you cut your losses. But that sometimes it's impossible to see that.
Sorry, I have feelings about this game but I didn't mean to ramble. Point being I love your post! 🥰
i love the these things bind us together and show us what we can do, in the metaphorical sense, and how so very often it bleeds over to the literal. not in whole cloth, but in drips and drabs and shining moments of great personal strength.