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First, I want to briefly acknowledge how Warhorse accomplished that and praise the undeniable skill.

Hans earned our affection specifically because he didn't fit an easy role. He quickly proved himself (to the audience and to Henry) to be strange and surprising and unlike the tropes medieval fiction has trained us to expect. The writing was magnificently handled as it designed Hans's arc to break down the stereotypes of the genre and present to us someone so bizarre, so off-putting and belligerent but also generous and brave, who was sexual and unserious and naive but also fierce in select beliefs about the nature of his heart and the world. What seemed odd to us at first was masterfully turned into these delightful moments of "I knew he'd say that, and nobody else would." That's character writing nirvana! That's the epitome!

We cheered and feared for him right along with Henry, because Warhorse made it extremely apparent that this was OUR horrible lord. We were invited to feel a little of that feudal tribalism that Warhorse quickly teased into personal affection. He was OUR guy, Henry's guy, and nobody in fiction could replace him.

Enter KCD2.

KCD2 -- and Hansry -- is still masterful at making us feel things along with Henry. We're scared when Hans is taken from us. We obsessively try to get back to him. We share in Henry's distress and focus. You can clearly see that Henry loves Hans terribly from the start and it comes through in almost every scene. That's true even if you don't romance him, and it should be. After all, the journey of KCD1 established so well that Hans is Henry's horrible lord, his person, and the inverse is true too.

But something is a little different, isn't it.

Warhorse seems afraid to show us why in KCD2. They either (1) weren't quite sure how to show us without introducing redundancy, since obviously they can't repeat the journey of KCD1 within KCD2, and KCD1 was very much the journey of getting to know this weirdo lord enough to love him; or (2) they were afraid to show us how unique, weird, and singular Hans Capon and their friendship is outside the stepping stones of their romance plot.

And from a holistic narrative perspective, that is a major fucking problem. You don't have to look far for proof of the consequences. In avoiding using Hans's personality to its full effect to show us why -- why him, specifically -- KCD2 introduces characterization confusion that the KCD2-only/KCD2-first fandom is clearly struggling with. Beyond "Henry loves him so much, wow! I'm going crazy!!!" (me too), there is mass freaking confusion as to what these star-crossed lovers' dynamic is even like outside the context of isolated extreme events.

And so fandom reaches for the blandest cookie cutter roles instead. Cat vs. Dog. The Woman vs. The Man. Grumpy vs. Sunshine. Malewife, babygirl, etc etc. Those old homophobic, misogynistic cliches.

(BTW: Tom McKay often speaks with beautiful clarity about what Hans means to Henry and the inverse, so it's apparent the Warhorse team still understands what worked in KCD1. They get these characters very, very well. They just either didn't quite succeed at implementing it in their Part II... or they decided to water their KCD2 depictions down.)

Why would they do that?

Well, I don't know, but I have an idea. And my guess goes back, in part, to those Dudes on Reddit, a not insignificant portion of their fanbase. Those same Men TM that Warhorse so superbly convinced to love Hans as fiercely and crazily as the rest of us did.

Because the writing was excellent, and because they felt safe to love Hans crazily. Because surely Warhorse would never make him a romance option, ever. Can you imagine! As if! I can't tell you how many times people like this came to my house to tell me I was delusional and frivolous for writing Hansry back then, even as they were extolling their beloved bro-lord and making jokes elsewhere that If I Was I Would.

Ahem.

Anyway. Warhorse obviously doesn't care about overt bigots, and good on them for that. But that's a fairly small population, and surely they couldn't afford to lose the majority of their KCD1 audience and stay afloat.

So, if we were going to kiss Hans, there needed to be a sort of security blanket; something had to happen to make the majority of those Hans-crazy KCD1 fans feel safe. Not tempted. Not accused of wanting it. Not accused of asking for it. Not embarrassed for all those jokes about If I Was I Would.

They had to give them a graceful out to fall out of love with the character and deny they ever really cared about him.

So I think the writing team chose to yank out a few of his most special teeth, and then buried them under the overwhelming romance dialogue, and hoped it would be enough.

Was it? We all have to come up with our own answers for that.

But we can see this aligns with why the Warhorse PR packet evidently instructs everyone to begin discussing Hansry with the statement: "It's such a great OPTION that a very vocal minority was really upset about. The great thing about it is that it's entirely OPTIONAL!" They say this every time. Even McKay, arguably Hansry's No. 1 Warhorse evangelist.

As someone who has spent many years in editorial direction, I don't begrudge them for this press packety line at all; it's part of art as business; it's just useful background noise to understand what I'm getting at.

So. What I'm getting at is:

We couldn't kiss Hans in KCD1. And IMO, the story of Henry & Hans wouldn't feel finished if we didn't get to, so thank god KCD2 was brave enough to deliver. The love story is beautiful and well composed. One of the best in its genre, no question.

But because we can kiss him in KCD2, something undeniably changed about the friendship beneath the love story, draining it of a portion of weirdness and intensity that made it itself, in order to make both The Men TM and the Shippers TM feel safer. And by watering him and their friendship down to focus on keeping everybody a certain degree of comfy, KCD2 asks its audience to love Hans less fiercely, less crazily, than KCD1 did.