Hi! First of all, I wanted to say that I happened upon your blog by chance and decided to read through your pinned essay master post, which I found so well-written and intriguing it got me to actually give tcoaal a chance, and now I’m a little obsessed, so thank you for your excellent analysis!
Second of all, I also wanted to pick your brain about something that stuck out to me, as I think your take would be illuminating. In one of the routes - I believe Shots n Such? - Andrew confronts Ashley about her supposed affection for him, challenging her to name even a single thing she actually loves about him - which she fails to do. What do you make of it?
I’m asking because it really struck me as a telling - perhaps even damning - moment for her; despite her perceptiveness, despite knowing him better than anyone, despite telling him she loves him constantly and despite being terrified of life without him - does she actually even like him? Are there any qualities of his she actually does appreciate? For all his bitching and moaning, Andrew does state a couple of times the things he likes about her (he thinks she’s funny, determined, observant, hot, etc.) but I can’t really think of Ashley ever doing the same for him.
A lot of people seem to think she wants their relationship to be affectionate if not romantic, but like. Does she? If anything, we hear way more about the things she doesn’t like about him, and with the way she’s constantly trying to spend time with him you’d think she would have mentioned by now what she actually sees in him, if anything at all.
It makes me wonder if she’d even want her brother around if she actually connected with another human being aside from him. Andrew had a taste of other people and nevertheless chose her because he doesn’t want to live without her (and also because he doesn’t like anyone else) - but would Ashley feel the same way if her brother wasn’t literally her only relationship in the whole wide world? Would she want to keep him around if she realized she had options?
As an aside, given what was teased in the devlog I wonder if this might perhaps be part of her character arc throughout Burial 3, as Andrew’s jealousy leads us to believe she’s at least been getting along with Six Eyes.
Looking forward to hearing your future thoughts about the game in general and this topic in particular!
Sorry for the late response.
In the case of S&S, that was a fawn response to try to stabilize the situation. Because she exists in a constant state of emotional scarcity and neglect, Ashley has only ever been able to leverage love as a manipulation tactic (and the aforementioned fawn response if you don't consider that manipulation), because she's never been given any space to develop her love as anything else.
It's important to note that leveraging love to manipulate doesn't mean it's not genuine. The drunken sex scene seems to be a pretty strong indicator that there's still something real there, not to mention all the dream imagery. I do strongly believe she values Andrew on some deep genuine level, it just doesn't come out in circumstances where she or Andrew can acknowledge it.
Basically, she's only ever been able to think of what she is in relation to Andrew, and never what Andrew actually is to her. Thus, she can't come up with a reason why she actually loves him.
I still hold that Ashley would function better without Andrew than Andrew would without Ashley and I think that fact is gonna end up being the central conceit of the Burial route.
I do think she'll end up choosing him in the end though, at least in the non-disaster endings.
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