purpleskiesandroses

Resident Evil: Degeneration (2008)

I love this moment in Degeneration because it says a lot about Claire and Leon's dynamic.

Leon throws Claire a gun, and she catches it like pure muscle memory. She does not panic, fumble, or hesitate. She just starts shooting and drops every zombie in front of her without missing. It is a quick reminder that Claire absolutely knows what she is doing. She has survived Raccoon City, Rockfort, Umbrella soldiers, monsters, and the general horror show that follows this franchise around.

But the part I really like is what happens after. Once the immediate danger is over, Claire goes straight back to Rani and hands the gun back to Leon.

And Leon does not even reach for it at first. He hesitates, like he expected her to keep it. Or maybe like he is a little disappointed that she is not going to stay in ass-kicking mode with him.

His reaction has very strong Jackie Brown energy: “What the fuck happened to you, man? Shit, your ass used to be beautiful.” lol

Because Leon knows Claire can fight. He has seen it. He knows she is not helpless, and he knows she is not scared when it actually matters. But Claire is not Leon. She does not live with a gun in her hand. She does not seek that life out.

She will pick up the gun when someone needs protecting. She will handle the threat. She will make the shots. And then, once the danger passes, she gives it back.

Makes this moment very cool to me. Claire is capable of violence, but she refuses to make it her identity. Leon carries the gun because that is his world now. Claire can use the gun, but she does not want it to become hers.

▋What always gets me about a “Claire fans should chill, Leon was there too” type of post is the condescension of it. Of course you get to say that from a position of comfort when your favorite is already the most protected, centered, and popular character in the series.

And that is exactly why these posts are so annoying: they keep shrinking the discussion down to the safest, smallest possible point. “Leon was there too.” Okay. Nobody is confused that Leon was physically present in RE2. That is not the issue.

The issue is bigger than that, and Claire fans have been talking about it for years. It is about franchise priority, character allocation, and Capcom’s long-running habit of letting Leon absorb more and more of the emotional and narrative space around other characters while Claire gets less follow-through, less payoff, and less continuation of the arcs that were naturally hers.

Yes, in the original RE2 Leon was there too. Fine. But Sherry mattered to RE2 above all as part of Claire’s story. Claire is the one whose scenario is emotionally structured around protecting her, caring for her, and getting her out. That is the heart of Claire’s arc there. So when later material keeps circling back to Leon & Sherry while Claire & Sherry is neglected, of course Claire fans are going to be annoyed. That annoyance did not come from nowhere.

And that is why the fake-neutral “well Leon was there too” line is so irritating. No one is saying Leon was nowhere in that story. The point is that Claire had a specific, meaningful role that people are constantly trying to flatten, minimize, blur, or reassign, and then acting like Claire fans are unreasonable for noticing it.

What makes it even more obnoxious is that people like this act as though Claire fans defending Claire’s place and Leon fans defending Leon are the exact same thing. They are not. One is defending a character whose importance is constantly being absorbed into Leon’s orbit, and the other is defending the franchise’s golden boy, who already gets handed everybody’s traits, dynamics, and narrative weight by fandom and often by Capcom itself. Those are not equal positions. One is defending against erasure; the other is protecting the most comfortable, dominant reading in the fandom.

And that is the part that never gets acknowledged: Leon only gets to have all of this sustained connection, follow-up, and emotional continuity with Sherry because Capcom chose to keep building it around him. That is the whole point of the criticism. Claire fans are not stupid. We know Leon was “there.” We know RE6 and later material exist. What we are angry about is why the franchise kept choosing to build on Leon’s connection while neglecting the character who was the emotional anchor of Sherry’s story to begin with.

So when people say “but Leon was there too,” it feels beside the point at best and condescending at worst, because they are treating the later franchise output like neutral proof instead of part of the very pattern Claire fans are criticizing. Leon gets more games, more visibility, more narrative continuation, and then people turn around and use the results of that favoritism as proof that his bond matters more in the first place. That is exactly the problem.

And yes, the tag situation is part of why this gets so exhausting. You go into the Claire tag looking for Claire and so much of it is Claire in relation to Leon, posts defending Leon in Claire discussions, or just Leon-centric framing parked on top of her. So then when Claire fans push back, suddenly we are the ones who need to “chill”? Please.

So no, the frustration is not “pretending Leon and Sherry don’t matter.” It is asking why Capcom kept rerouting long-term emotional payoff away from the natural Claire-centered continuation and toward Leon instead, and then expecting Claire fans to accept that as organic. At a certain point it stops looking organic and starts looking like erasure dressed up as continuity.

First of all: this is not about the actors.

The cast is incredibly talented, and they deserve love, respect, and appreciation for the work they put into these characters. My issue is not with the performances. My issue is with the writing, the adaptation choices, and the direction the show has taken.

As someone who has read "Fire & Blood" and is Team Green, I stopped watching because the show no longer feels like an adaptation of the Dance of the Dragons. It feels like a version of the story that constantly softens Team Black, weakens Team Green, and strips away the complexity that made the original conflict interesting.

And let me tell you, I am Team Green, but I loved the way Rhaenyra was written and how she didn't need to be soft and a "strong female character" to have supporters and to play the game. So this really is not about teams, but about how the characters and the story were written in the show.

In the book, neither side is good. That is the point. The Dance is not a story about saints and villains. It is a tragedy about ambition, inheritance, pride, violence, family, and political failure. Everyone is compromised. Everyone is hypocritical. Everyone loses. But the show keeps pushing the audience toward one side.

Rhaenyra, especially, is framed far too often as a hesitant, noble, passive, almost saintly figure who simply wants peace and justice. But book Rhaenyra is not that. She is proud, ambitious, entitled, politically reckless, capable of cruelty, and deeply hypocritical. That is what makes her interesting.

Rhaenyra does not want a new world. She wants Rhaenyra to be queen.

She lives in a patriarchal society, yet makes no meaningful effort to improve the condition of women generally. She has three sons widely believed to be bastards, yet does nothing to improve the status of bastards as a class. She does not challenge the system for everyone. She expects exceptions for herself and her children while leaving the same oppressive structures intact for everyone else. And that matters politically. In Westeros, succession is everything. Putting disputed heirs in line for the Iron Throne and Driftmark is not a minor scandal; it is a recipe for future rebellion. It gives rival branches of the family and ambitious lords grounds to challenge the succession. It also creates a dangerous precedent in a society built around legitimacy, inheritance, and bloodlines.

And yet the show surrounds Rhaenyra with prophecy, white stag symbolism, and “chosen one” imagery that never existed in the book. The prophecy was not part of the Dance. The white stag did not choose her. The universe was not endorsing her. "Fire & Blood" is far more cynical and far more interesting than that.

Another thing is that the show also keeps taking strengths from Team Green and either removing them or giving emotional weight to Team Black instead.

Book Alicent is not a helpless victim drifting through events. She is politically savvy, intelligent, ambitious, strategic, and deeply involved in the Green cause. She knows how to play the game. She rules effectively alongside the Green Council while Viserys declines and while Rhaenyra is away on Dragonstone.

The show, however, strips her of agency again and again. Her choices are softened, excused, or blamed on misunderstandings. The deathbed “Aegon” confusion was never in the book, and it weakens her political motivation. In "Fire & Blood", the Greens crown Aegon because they believe he has the stronger claim, because they have prepared for it, and because Alicent is protecting her children. It is deliberate. Even Aegon only accepts the crown to protect his siblings.

Even worse, the show makes Alicent look like she does not love her sons. That is one of the most unforgivable changes to me. Book Alicent’s defining motivation is her children. She fights for them. She defends them and their rights as children of the king. She is not perfect, but she is a mother whose political world is built around their safety and their claim.

Turning her into someone who betrays her sons for the sake of reconciliation with Rhaenyra is not tragic to me. It is character assassination.

And how they keep punishing Alicent by taking her agency and with assault situations - the whole feet thing with Larys, her marriage, Aemond kissing her - it only makes it clear to me that it was never about feminism for the show runners, but about Rhaenyra being the "strong female character" that will destroy the "evil side".

Helaena is another example. In the book, Helaena is Team Green. She is queen, Aegon is her husband, and they have children together. Their marriage may not be romantic in the modern sense, but it is not nothing. Aegon is said to share her bed until the death of their son. She is beloved by the smallfolk. She is a dragonrider bonded to Dreamfyre, one of the most important dragons alive.

The show reduces her almost entirely to prophecy and fragility. Her relationship with Dreamfyre is barely explored. Her role as queen is diminished. Her bond with her family is weakened. Her strength is removed.

Aegon II also suffers from this treatment. In the book, he is deeply flawed, but he is not an idiot. He is not meant to be a cartoon villain. He has one of the most extraordinary dragon bonds in the entire Dance with Sunfyre, the most beautiful dragon in the world. So why does the show make him seem incompetent even in basic Targaryen identity? Why is Sunfyre visually diminished, being rarely shown?

Daeron is another issue. In the book, Daeron is one of the Greens’ best assets: courteous, capable, brave, beloved, and an effective military presence. He was effectively the greatest threat to Rhaenyra, militarily speaking. He was fostered in Oldtown, which is normal in Westeros. That does not mean Alicent did not raise him or that he is only good because he was away from her. The show’s handling of him has been strange, delayed, and dismissive. He was in Oldtown for a few years only, not his whole life.

The Greens in the book are also much more united and politically competent. They are loyal to each other. They are strategic. They understand governance. In the show, they are constantly turned against each other, made weaker, more fractured, more foolish, and more cruel. Aemond turns against Aegon and bruns him. Aegon and Helaena barely look at each other. And Aemond is cruel towards Helaena. It never happened in the book.

Meanwhile, Team Black gets softened.

Daemon is one of the clearest examples. In the book, Daemon is dangerous, violent, predatory, and morally horrifying. He is not a romantic ideal. He is not simply a devoted husband who loves Rhaenyra. The show repeatedly leans into his charisma and his romantic appeal while transferring or emphasizing many of his worst traits elsewhere, especially onto Aegon. Daemon groomed his niece. He killed his first wife in the show. He is involved in horrific violence. Yet the fandom often treats him as “morally grey” while Aegon is treated as uniquely monstrous.

Then there is Nettles.

Removing Nettles is one of the worst adaptation choices. She is one of the most unique characters in the Dance. She is lowborn. She is not another polished Targaryen princess. She challenges ideas about blood purity and dragonriding. She is also the only confirmed Black character in the original Dance narrative, and her relationship with Daemon is one of the most ambiguous and interesting parts of his story.

Erasing her and handing parts of her role to Rhaena changes the story completely. It removes a lowborn outsider and replaces her with another Targaryen noble. It also removes one of the few characters who truly disrupts the aristocratic world of the Dance. It also makes Rhaenyra look like a saint, instead of the racist she truly was in the book.

And yes, the show’s racial choices frustrate me too. Making the Velaryons Black could have been interesting if the writing had meaningfully explored it. But instead, they erased Nettles, the one character whose presence actually challenged the Targaryen worldview from outside noble bloodlines. Criston Cole being a brown man could also have been interesting if the show developed him with care. Instead, he is often reduced to sexual scandal, humiliation, and villain framing.

Rhaenys also infuriates me. The show gives her speeches about Alicent serving men, as though Rhaenys herself spent her life fighting patriarchy. But what did she actually do? She toiled for Corlys’ ambitions. She allowed her very young daughter to be offered as a bride to Viserys. She accepted Lucerys as heir to Driftmark despite knowing the obvious questions around his parentage, instead of fighting for Baela and Rhaena. She later accepts political marriages between her granddaughters and Rhaenyra’s sons instead of truly advocating for them. So what was that speech supposed to be?

Again, this is the problem. The show gives certain characters modern-sounding lines about power, gender, and freedom, but their actions do not match.

And Maelor. The erasure of Maelor is something I cannot get over. That is not a small change. It affects Blood and Cheese, Helaena, Aegon, Alicent, and the entire emotional structure of the Green tragedy. Even George R. R. Martin publicly criticized the removal of Maelor and warned about the butterfly effect of simplifying the story.

At some point, it stops feeling like adaptation and starts feeling like distortion. That is why I stopped watching.

Not because I think Team Green are saints. They are not. Otto is manipulative. Aegon is deeply flawed. Aemond is dangerous. Criston is bitter and violent. Alicent is ambitious. I know exactly what side I support, and I do not need to pretend they are morally pure.

But that is precisely the difference. Many Team Green fans can admit our side is full of terrible people. What becomes exhausting is watching Team Black characters get romanticized, softened, excused, or turned into symbols of righteousness while the Greens are stripped of their intelligence, loyalty, complexity, and love for each other.

The Dance is supposed to be a tragedy where everyone is flawed. It is not supposed to be “Rhaenyra the chosen queen of feminism versus the evil misogynistic Greens.” Book Rhaenyra is not a saint. Book Alicent is not a helpless victim. Book Helaena is not just a fragile dreamer. Book Aegon is not an imbecile. Book Daemon is not husband goals. Book Nettles matters. Book Daeron matters. Maelor matters. The Green family matters.

Now, I repeat - The actors deserve every bit of praise. They are doing their jobs beautifully, even if the script is deeply flawed.

But the writing has lost me. This is not the Dance I wanted to watch.

There are a lot more stuff that I could point out and criticise, but theses are the ones on top of my head. In the end, I wanted to watch Fire & Blood. Instead, I got someone's fanfiction loosely inspired by it.

But hey, at least we got the whole prophecy thing linking to Jone Snow, right?

Anyway, if any Team Black stans want to yell at me, I'll be over here rereading "Fire & Blood", where nobody is the chosen one, everyone is awful, and somehow that's exactly what makes the story so brilliant.

sometimes I’m reminded that there are still people who don’t know ao3 was literally created by incest shippers — and the site’s sole purpose is to 1. be completely against censorship and 2. host all kinds of dark, taboo fics that are banned on other platforms — and the first ever fic that was posted on ao3 was a fic about an incest ship from supernatural.

you are in the house that was created by freaks. for freaks (affectionate). every disgusting thing you can think of is rightfully allowed and welcomed on ao3, because they are exactly the reasons why ao3 was created in the first place.

ao3 was created because its creators got tired of censorship, they got tired of dark and taboo fics getting banned on pro-censorship platforms, and they wanted a place that was safe for ALL FICS THAT WERE DARK AND TABOO.

ao3’s main principle is being against censorship and being proship / profic.

there are some things in fiction that make me uncomfortable, but instead of shaming people who are just minding their own business and not harming anyone in real life, I choose to curate my own internet experience by blocking/muting what I don’t want to see. ao3 has excellent tagging system, so instead of being a bitch, use their tagging system properly and you won’t see the things you don’t want to see.

it’s your job to curate what you see. it’s not other people’s jobs or responsibilities to censor themselves for your personal comfort. the world does not revolve around you.

also you cannot censor “only the things you personally hate” without expecting everything else, that isn’t of conservative beliefs, to be censored too. because censorship is a slippery slope and a fascist tool. I promise you there are people who think “why do tags for queer love even exist on ao3? they’re grooming children”.

if you allow the things that you hate to be censored — because someone with enough power gets to control what other people can and cannot create/consume, it will not stop at the things that you hate.

No. Fuuuuck that.

Leon fans get to be obnoxious. Chris fans get to be obnoxious. Wesker fans get to be obnoxious. Jill fans get to be obnoxious. Everybody gets to yell about their favorite character, demand more content, celebrate every crumb, theorize wildly, and act like their fave is the center of the franchise. But when Claire fans do it, suddenly it turns into a congressional hearing.

“Why would Claire be able to do that?”

“Why would Claire get another game?”

“But she’s in TerraSave.”

“But how would that work?”

“But is that realistic?”

Since when has Resident Evil ever required airtight real-world logic before letting a character’s role evolve? Leon was a rookie cop in RE2 and then RE4 turned him into the government’s roundhouse-kicking action hero. Nobody acts like that was some sacred destiny carved into stone from day one. Capcom made a choice, the franchise shifted, and now people act like it was inevitable.

So why is Claire the one who has to stay exactly where people left her? Why is it absurd to imagine her getting another major installment (RE10), another evolution, another central role? Why does every possible Claire story need to be cross-examined like we’re in court, while everybody else gets “wouldn’t it be cool if—” and a free pass?

Just say you don’t like Claire and go.

Because I am not doing homework to justify wanting more of a character I love. I do not need to write a thesis on why Claire Redfield deserves focus. I do not need to make her palatable to people who only support female leads in theory and then start flaking the second one actually gets centered.

The thing I am doing with Claire is the exact thing you are doing with your favorite character. Your version is not automatically more reasonable, more canon-compliant, more realistic, or more earned just because Capcom has historically given your fave more attention. That does not make your character’s importance objective truth and Claire fans’ enthusiasm delusion. It just means you are used to being catered to.

So no, I am not going to rein it in. I am not going to act like wanting Claire to lead again is some outrageous demand while everyone else gets to be loud, greedy, obnoxious, and shameless about their favorites.

There’s this very specific thing that happens with Claire where people are perfectly happy to acknowledge her importance in theory, but the second her fans actually treat her like the center of attention, suddenly everyone wants to qualify it, redirect it, or drag the conversation back to Chris, Leon, or whoever else they think deserves the spotlight more. OP said it cleanly, and I want to build off that because I am so tired.

▋I made the mistake of looking at Reddit and other fandom spaces after the Code Veronica remake reveal, and it is actually wild how quickly certain fans started trying to sand Claire out of her own game.

The second people were celebrating the trailer numbers and the reaction to the reveal, suddenly it was, “Well, people are just excited because it’s Resident Evil,” as if they would ever say that if this were Leon, Chris, Jill, or Wesker front and center. Be serious. If one of their favorites pulled those numbers, they would be treating it like a coronation. But because it’s Claire, suddenly the excitement has to be explained away as generic franchise hype.

And that is what annoys me. Claire gets folded into the franchise when her popularity is useful, but the second people want to celebrate her specifically, suddenly everyone has to run in with a correction. Suddenly Code Veronica is “really” about Chris and Wesker. Suddenly Claire is just the opening act in the game where she is literally the emotional entry point, the protagonist we start with, and the reason the story moves at all.

And honestly? I hope the remake makes those people sit through it. I hope they have to play Claire’s game for hours before Chris shows up. I hope they have to actually engage with her story instead of treating her like the waiting room before the men arrive.

Because the way this fandom loves to say it wants women centered, women leading, women getting focus - until a woman is actually centered - is something else. Then suddenly people flake. Suddenly the enthusiasm gets conditional. Suddenly they only care if the female lead is attached to a man’s campaign, a man’s rivalry, a man’s storyline, a man’s relevance.

They did it with Grace too. Let’s be real. A lot of people only played her story because it was baked into the larger campaign. If it had been split the way RE2R was split, plenty of them would have skipped it the same way plenty of them skipped Claire’s route and then still walked around talking about RE2R like they played the whole game. Who pays full price for half a story? Couldn’t be me. But apparently some people are very comfortable paying modern game prices to dodge female protagonists and then still acting like authorities on the material.

So yes, I am glad Code Veronica is Claire’s game first. I am glad they cannot get to Chris and Wesker without going through Claire. I hope the remake leans into that. I hope it makes the point unavoidable.

"Sorry, but I'm not on the menu."