#fine whatever

It comes down to two things.

1) Harlan’s inability to separate himself from Arthur, which really hurts the narrative stakes, because no one can disagree with him without getting punished, everyone can’t help but love him, and Arthur never needs to actually change or grow as a character despite growth being one of the cornerstone themes of the show. I know that nothing interesting will happen with Arthur because we’ve seen time and time again that it won’t. Harlan takes the easy way out, because he wants Arthur to win and thinks Arthur is always right. Characters like Yellow, Lilith, and Larson, who don’t fall over themselves for Arthur, are punished by the narrative for the crime of…not bootlicking Arthur immediately, even when, in Yellow’s case, ARTHUR is the one who’s aggressive and starts swinging first. And all three of those characters ultimately love him, too, or, in Larson’s case, see him as a savior because he helped free him/kill him.

2) John and Arthur are, in my opinion, boring. They have been since S5. There’s basically no conflict. They immediately forgive each other for everything. John has turned into Arthur’s hype man/narrator who has basically no independent thoughts or feelings, and when he DOES have feelings that Arthur doesn’t like, Arthur immediately shuts it down and gets no pushback. The father & child dynamic/references (while brief!) are never actually addressed head-on by either of them, despite that being something they should by all rights both have strong feelings about. Again, the narrative stakes are nonexistent. It’s fine for Arthur and John to love each other and be devoted to one another to the exclusion of major conflict, but it makes for boring listening. I’d much prefer for them to be side characters to someone else, so that the keystone relationship in the show isn’t just a nothingburger where the same conversations are replayed over and over again and nothing really changes.

Hggghhghh ii gijinkass ughhh

I drew half of ii cast either, but i didn't uploaded it, maybe id upload them but laterrrr cuuzzz i wanna change something in them a little bit

Also today's my birthday soo happy bday to me yeah yeah ill upload bday art sooner (if ill ever upload it lmao)

You might want, say, your character Jill to go talk to her estranged mother for a very important plot reason. This interaction is necessary, but due to her bad relationship with her mother, this might be a challenge. If Jill is combative, assertive and unbending, she would not do this happily. The writer will have to do a lot of work to get the character to engage in this interaction while being in-character.

If she's reserved, avoids conflict, and generally doesn't want to do this, the writer will have to give her something to overcome these traits by building up a scenario. Maybe the stakes are high and the mother has information to help, maybe Jill has spent a lot of time in the rest of the story learning to conquer her fears, etc.

Point is, a well-written character will often give a creator trouble, and challenge them into creating appropriate routes to get them from Point A to Point B. A well-constructed character is one who often challenges the writer, and in doing so, paves way for an internally coherent plot.

Hinata is none of this and Neji's death highlights why.

Okay, so the story tells me Hinata cares deeply for Neji by having her call him "nii-san"/ big brother. They seemed to have grown much closer together off-screen. But this speech pattern is enough to at least show they are tight now.

Then, Neji dies.

What is the appropriate reaction to seeing your brother die for you? Hinata has vaguely been shown as someone who cares a lot? Like I have never seen truly care for other characters outside of Naruto, but that's because she ceases to exist outside of Naruto but like let's give this credit and say she is someone who cares a lot.

Hinata cares a lot, Hinata's brother has died for her. She was also said to be "working very hard to fix the Hyuuga Clan" so she also cares for his freedom. I am going to be very generous here and use this to conclude she would probably be upset then that he died doing his role as her servant/slave based on the clan hierarchy.

How should she react?

Based on how previous sibling-interactions have gone, she should be utterly devastated and visibly upset. Like, an overtly emotional reaction that is about Neji on a long-term basis. Or at least for an episode.

When Itachi died, Sasuke just shut down. When Gaara was presumed dead and he was kidnapped by the Akatsuki, Temari was losing her goddamn mind and Kankuro was deeply upset. Shikamaru also shut himself down and got extremely angry and impulsive when Asuma died, and he's actually very cold and pragmatic. All of them hand long-lasting, extreme reactions.

So, following this pattern, Hinata should also be the same. But she doesn't have a character, and the author wants get from Point A (Naruto losing hope) to Point B (Naruto gaining hope again).

Hinata is the one who should be facilitating this. A well-written character would've added something in this journey from A to B, synthesizing a reaction and story element. Instead, she just.....her face is blank, her speech is entirely about Naruto and she uses Neji as an example to fuel him. He's dead next to them and she's talking about how assuring it is that she finds holding Naruto's hand.

Can you imagine Temari saying that to Naruto? Or Sasuke? Sakura? Anyone?

Heavily stylized pitayagato.