#catboyed

alright so i don’t know that i’d call any of what i do here a character analysis. i know you sent this in response to my post with klavier writing advice, so i’ll try to do the same here. this is a collection of things i try to keep in mind when i write apollo.

1. he’s rude

this one’s great. followers may know this about me, but i am also rude. it’s come up in my posts sometimes, because i actually have such poor manners that it becomes a problem for me every now and then. i swear a lot! it just comes out of me. sometimes, i have to write characters who don’t swear, or who swear very little, and that’s hell. that is hell for me. it’s a miracle i haven’t cursed yet in this post. just makes it easier to express shit, you know?

but apollo swears. i promise you that. apollo justice swears like a fuckin sailor. i…… will be honest i can’t be assed to find it, but there is a post on here where a lovely tumblr user broke down the speaking styles of various aa characters in the japanese original. if anyone wants to go find it and let me know, be my guest!! but what i remember about that is that apollo justice has a pottymouth. and ever since i’ve read that, i have clung to it with all my might. look me in the eyes. let apollo justice say fuck.

he also has no social skills. he isn’t rude on purpose! although i think sometimes he can be. i think he can be a mean little pissant when he doesn’t like someone. you know he would have ended daryan crescend’s life then and there if they hadn’t been in court.

but anyway, i think sometimes he is also just pretty bad at talking to people. he’s a lawboy! he’s built to practice law! he doesn’t know how to do anything else!! when he sees that vera is scared in the detention center, he makes the perhaps worst attempt at smalltalk we ever see in the entirety of the series. he doesn’t know how to be tactful, and he isn’t going to learn, because aside from law apollo is also all about truth. he sees lies, and he’s a bad liar himself, but sometimes lying is expected of you in social situations, and he’s not going to do it, and he won’t like it when other people do it. he’d rather be rude. and he will be. he will be very rude.

2. he has no volume control

as a person with adhd. very nice to write. i’ve never uttered a quiet sentence in my life. everything i’ve ever said i’ve screamed at the top of my lungs. also not on purpose! it just comes out that way.

if you write apollo justice, just remember to make him scream now and then. whenever he’s remotely excited about anything? scream. have him animate it with his body too! apollo’s sprites don’t just slam the desk, he hits it with both fists! he jumps back in surprise when something happens, and he pokes his big old forehead when he has to think. he’s an animated guy, and whatever reaction feels exaggerated to you in the moment is probably the one to go for.

3. he cries in court

and now, for something completely different.

he’s a little softie. :] we all remember apollo being in tears when he thought trucy had been kidnapped, even though he barely knew her then. he also mentions journaling in canon, where he goes back and leaves intricate retellings of his adventures in his diaries. also!! he really enjoys lamiroir’s music. for all that he’s loud and brash and impulsive, at the end of the day, the man probably sits down with a cup of tea and a soft-lit desk lamp to write about his day.

i would also like to take this moment to remind everyone of his reaction to meeting plum kitaki.

???: You, kid with the hair. You want something? Apollo: Urk! M-M-Me? No, not a thing! Bye! Trucy: Apollo! We can't leave without questioning her! What if she knows something! Apollo: B-But th-the Kitaki Family...! (They're the biggest organized crime syndicate in town!) ???: If you're going to ask something, ask it. If you're man enough. Apollo: Waaaaugh! R-Right! Trucy: Yay! Way to whip him into shape, ma'am! Apollo: (Does she know no fear!?) Plum: I'm Plum. Plum Kitaki. Wife of the fourth head of the Kitaki Family business. Friends call me Little Plum. Apollo: I-I'm l-little Apollo Justice, attorney at law. *gulp*

that’s right. he’s little apollo justice. :) cmaaahn. he’s just a little guy, and it’s also his birthday.

4. he punches his clients

ok, he punched one client.

i’m bringing these up in this order though because i think apollo’s impulsiveness is a really fun juxtaposition to him shaking and sobbing at having to speak to a woman on the street and in broad daylight, across from an active police scene swarming with cops no less, just because her name is kitaki. because i still think he IS impulsive.

i’ve had klavier bring this up in exorcism because it’s still one of my favorite apollo bits:

Klavier: Let us imagine you are walking through the park. You see two men facing each other. One with a pistol trained on the other. ...What would you do, Herr Forehead? Apollo: Well, I... I guess... I would try to stop them. I'd probably shout, "Stop!" Klavier: And you, Fräulein? Trucy: M-Me? Well... I'd probably scream, "Eeeeeek!" [a bit later] Stickler: Tossing the pistol aside, he fled from the scene. Apollo: [Hold it!] You didn't try to apprehend the criminal? 

i just… i mean, who would. who in their right mind would “try to apprehend the criminal.” i’d shit my pants, klavier, that’s what i’d do in that situation.

but apollo seems pretty sure that he would intervene, and you know what? i believe him. i think if apollo justice walked through a park and saw a guy shoot someone and then take off, he would fully chase after him like a fucking rabid dog, and then he’d probably jump him and call the cops, and when they’d get there they’d find bite marks on the guy for some reason.

he just also gets really scared when he sees mafiosi, instead of attempting to arrest them. essentially i just think, apollo sees something, anything, and reacts to it in the biggest, wildest way possible. a mafioso will have a normal conversation with him and apollo will scream and cry. a passerby will hold a knife to someone’s throat and apollo will single-handedly beat him to a pulp. phoenix wright will smile at him and apollo will uppercut his childhood hero. it doesn’t have to make sense. it just has to be batshit.

5. other stuff

two more things i’ve thought about a lot while learning to write apollo are his loyalty and his confidence.

loyalty first: there is not an ounce of misplaced loyalty in this man. once it became clear that kristoph was the borscht bowl club killer, apollo was on him, and he took him down. i fully believe that if phoenix had been the killer, apollo would have done the exact same to him. there is one moment in turnabout succession when kristoph first takes the stand, where apollo kind of gulps and thinks that this still feels like he’s his mentor, but he gets over that PRETTY quickly lol. and he wasn’t thinking about sparing kristoph for being his mentor, he just remembered to stand up straight and be a good lawyer in front of him.

confidence second. i get. SO bothered. when people write apollo without it. you listen to me. this five foot nothing freak thinks he is the best thing since sliced bread, and as a german person it’s difficult for me to say this about bread, but he’s right.

apollo thinks he’s fucking fantastic. he’s VERY proud of his vocal routine, he thinks it’s GREAT that he screams every thought he’s ever had. he’s really nerdy about law, he tells plum and trucy that he loves long and boring procedures as a lawyer, shamelessly. he very firmly believes in his hairstyle. everything you see apollo justice do he does on purpose. (which also makes me think that he knows EXACTLY what he does when he rolls up his shirt sleeves every morning. whore.)

the few times we see all of this slip is when he has to deal with rock star klavier. there’s a couple of times where he thinks that he wishes he could be as cool as klavier, but i’ve honestly never read that as apollo suddenly becoming self-conscious. i genuinely think he’s just annoyed that there’s someone whose shtick (being a very weird very loud lawyer but tall and with a guitar) looks cooler than his own shtick (being a very weird very loud lawyer but short and with no guitar). apollo thought he was hot shit before he met klavier and he continues to think he’s hot shit after he’s met klavier, but now he also thinks that he should be rich and famous for being apollo justice because that would make him even cooler. and, again, i kind of agree.