#ace analysis

an ignored heart

Ace is an interesting character in my opinion. Not because of his writing (well that too), but because how he is perceived in most fan media that doesn't center him. Obviously, every TWST character has been heavily mischaracterised before, but it often does feel like he gets the short end of the stick.

A lot of people seem to simply view him as an egoistic, cocky brat. While he has definitely lied, schemed, tried to half-ass things, and ignore his duties and responsabilities, I think it's very important to understand that HE IS A 16 YEAR OLD TEENAGER. YES HE'S GONNA ACT FULL OF HIMSELF, YES HE MIGHT SEEM CHILDISH SOMETIMES, BUT WHEN ALL IS SAID AND ALL IS DONE ACE IS NOT A RUDE ASSHOLE, HE IS A TEENAGER JUST STARTING OUT LIFE.

Firstly, his rude comments most of the time are blunt observations. He doesn't sugarcoat his opinions, and he often tells it as it is. And that is GREAT. Honesty is GREAT. His bluntness is what pointed out Trey's overly-tolerant behaviour towards Riddle's tyranny. Does he sometimes lack the social skill to read a room and keep his mouth shut? YES. Is it normal to have that flaw accompany his good trait? YES.

Secondly, ACE IS NOT AN ACTUAL EGOISTIC ASSHOLE? "But Lucia he always calls himself so great and better than Deuce or someone else obvs stronger–" HE IS INSECURE AND TRYING TO HIDE IT. I will hold your hand as I say this, but PLEASE go read his vignettes. Ace is ALWAYS fussing over his appearence and how he is perceived. He WANTS to seem like a cool guy, which is, news shocker, a NORMAL thing for someone his age! Also, have we all read the same book 7?

As we know each character reflects onto a flaw of theirs when made to wake up from their dreams. What was Ace's flaw? He was SCARED. He was absolutely terrified to face Malleus in a fight, and he did not believe himself strong enough to do it or even important enough to have a reason to leave his fake-but-happy life. And can you BLAME him? Even compared to his fellow first years, he's the most average guy! Deuce is super hard working and had a "cool" past, Jack is hella buffed for a 16 yr old, Sebek is a KNIGHT-IN-TRAINING, and Epel is the cutest guy who could beat your ass both in a magic duel and a physical fight. Hell the magicless prefect is more "interesting" than him. Ace feels the NEED to overcompensate for how much of a loser he actually is, and I admit, it can make him SEEM like an asshole, but he truly isn't.

Again I say this, but Ace's insecurity REALLY runs deep, and it's the reason for most of his flaws. But he's the type to hide it and pretend everything is fine, which also brings me to my next point: Ace is a GREAT friend. He cares SO much for those close to him. Yeah, he's able to care, surprise! In fact, Ace is a damn empath! He can always tell when someone is faking something or when they're hiding being sad.

AND THAT'S NOT ALL! There are MORE traits of him that are HEAVILY ignored within the fandom. For example, Ace is NOT DUMB. In fact, he's hella smart! The issue? He's not necessarily academically smart, or as he himself states, route memorisation isn't his forte. Instead, he's amazing at practical stuff. He can pick up new skills easily. Hell, his ability to quickly learn animal linguistics serves as an important aspect of his in his dorm uniform vignette. But he ALWAYS downplays this skill of his! Because, say it with me, he's insecure and struggles to acknlowdge he's actually talented at something!!

Now, I hope this has helped some of y'all understand Ace better. BECAUSE I AIN'T DONE! The GAME needs to dwelve deeper into him. There are aspects that get mentioned and barely touched upon that only make his character more complex! Like his family for example. We have multiple vignettes where Ace mentions his older brother, and it's painfully obvious he looks up to him. But why? And how does that lead into who he is? How is his brother actually like? Ever since Ace mentioned how his brother once showed off an expensive watch he bought for himself on Ace's birthday, and gave him the BOX (which, albeit did end up filled with candy), made me wonder if Ace's brother is a bit of an actual, but unintentional, douchebag. Can he be one of the reasons for Ace's insecurity? And also, we need to know more about his parents!!!! We've only been told that Ace's dad is not a mage, just a magician, but I refuse to believe it's told to us just to have this lil haha fun fact. I need MORE info. Respectfully, not an actual Ace fan, just a lore lover (☆^ー^☆)

i find this to be a really interesting video, not just for its poking at asexuality in horror, but also for the way it discusses theory in general

(also it has a nice little opening for people who don't know asexuality as an umbrella term)

especially ideas of absence as an outdated way to look at asexuality -- and, i will add although that's not what this video is about, aromanticism -- a lot of people I've noticed think of ace and aro in terms of absence. the x on the kinsey scale for basically "none of the above," the "doesn't feel sexual and/or romantic attraction" terminology, right down to fandom (since we're here on tumblr) i think often dismissing these reads because of an assumption "it simply isn't" so what does one do with that??? (also lest we forget, a certain horrible bigot who decided to take a jab for the idea that ace people wanted people to know they didn't want sex...) (it's always framed like a "not/don't/none/nothing")

dr brewster gives some neat ideas into how to analyse texts (in this case with some canonicity to them) by what (in this case) asexuality adds to the narrative and the characters and the themes

there's something to think about there for aroness and aceness, because i always use these words in expansive ways (and no two characters or stories are written as aro and/or ace in the same way -- hawkeye in mash vs fraser in due south vs jessica rabbit vs seven of nine in star trek, etcetc), and a lot of what i've been met with is a sort of basic assumption that there's nothing much going on there, that these analyses idk. create a blanket nothing. that it takes away from text/is more... boring (and especially takes away from characters being interesting --

i guess there's something about shipping Disc Horse in that, and i do think a lot of that discussion has been simplified and flattened, but suffice to say... idk, shipping is fine, i do partake, but also sometimes being transformative means doing a bit more than that in the simple x-enters-y-fluff-sexy-times formula, and there's nothing technically wrong with not wanting to do more than that, but also people could be a bit more open to ideas they haven't considered before... summed up)

so potentially the answer is finding works that can explain why we need to be more curious and what that curiosity can lead to, narratively, thematically...

i think the above talk is a good beginning, like i said, specifically about asexuality in this case, but i like that it's really also highlighting just how much we've still got to do, culturally, to make works that are more (ironically) interesting, and to analyse works in more interesting (queer) ways