#mini character analysis

More before and after!! At this point I'm just rambling, I apologize! :""D I'm just so fascinated with it, like....

With Jinx and Viktor, when they nearly jump, we know the characters well enough to understand what brought them to that point. All the episodes leading up to their moments over a ledge explain why they would even consider it.

But Jayce's attempt is one of his first few appearances. To stay within the Arcane canon and ignore LoL lore, we know nothing about the kid save for that he's intelligent, a bit of a mama's boy, a bit short-sighted, and really into the whole magic thing. The scene where he nearly kills himself is one of Jayce's most important ones, but not at all because it's where he meets Viktor. It's the show telling people that this kid—despite having a caring mother, people who admired him (and his looks), and all his brilliance—did not want to exist if he couldn't live his dream, and I think that should be taken more seriously.

Basically, Viktor's presence and the start of their partnership doesn't make the scene important. If we're all gonna be so for real, if he still had his research, Jayce would have made Hextech work with or without Viktor.

Which makes his character all the more admirable because man, Jayce could've seen what Viktor had been doing with his work/as a result of his work and lost his mind (as in, crashed out on Viktor).

So South Park revolves around four boys who live in the small town of South Park in the middle of buttfuck Colorado.

Stan's the mature one who always tries to find a lesson in everything

Kyle's the Jewish one who has serious beef with Cartman

Cartman's the fat one who's a literal Nazi

And Kenny's the poor one who wears a big ass parka that muffles his voice, and he dies all the fucking time cuz of his parents attending a cult of Cthulhu meeting either while his mom was pregnant, when he was a newborn, or fuck, maybe he was born right there at the meeting

Yeah

We're talking about Kenny

So Cartman wants to be a vigilante, and his costume is styled after a raccoon. His superhero name is actually a slur against black people, and yes, I think that's intentional, it's South Park, for fuck's sake, but because his costume is based off a raccoon, and I didn't know it was a slur as a kid (I first got into South Park as a literal child because of Mysterion), I genuinely thought it was just short for raccoon, but uh nope. He's a mastermind little shit. So anyway, as his vigilantee self, he's out on the streets at night, and has a dramatic inner monologue that's interrupted when he sees another kid playing superheroes at night. He's like, "who the fuck are you?", and the kid introduces himself as Mysterion. Cartman's like "yeah, cut the shit, Kyle, I know it's you" and Mysterion's not giving him shit about his identity, cuz it must remain a secret. Cartman's like "yeah, well no one can know my identity either" and Mysterion replies with a pretty sick burn saying: "I assume you must be Cartman. Cuz you're fat."

We don't learn Mysterion's identity to be Kenny until a later episode where ALL the kids are playing superheroes. When Kenny's Mysterion, he puts on a very gruff voice similar to Batman to disguise his usual speaking voice (most of the time his voice is muffled by his parka, but in rare moments when he doesn't have his hood up, he sounds like a normal fucking kid)

So the kids are investigating the cult of Cthulhu (at this point, Kenny doesn't know why he has the uncanny ability to die and come back like nothing happened) and that leads to this clip that I wanna talk about. Mysterion is surrounded by the cult and the other kids are either up on a roof, or they're surrounding the cult. So Stan (as his superhero persona, Toolshed) is like "let him go" and the cult's like "nah" and stabs Mysterion unexpectedly. He's taken off guard, isn't expecting to be hurt, so he doesn't think to put on his gruff voice cuz he's in pain. If he was expecting it, he would've done the voice. In a later episode as Mysterion, he impales himself at the bottom of a rocky cliff to try and prove a point, and declares in his Mysterion voice "that FUCKING HURTS!"

When he's stabbed by the cult, because he didn't see the attack coming, his grunt of pain sounds like himself without his hood muffling his speech. He just sounds like a normal kid, they just stabbed a child. He never asked to be like this, and he hates it. He remembers every time he's died and has expressed genuine discomfort, saying it "fucking hurts". To add insult to injury? Nobody remembers him dying at all. Anytime he's died, they all claim they have no idea what he's talking about if he tries to bring it up. He actually lost his shit when Kyle said it'd be "pretty cool" not to be able to die. All the other kids playing superheroes don't have actual powers, they're just playing a game, but Kenny? Being Mysterion is kind of an escape. It's not about playing superheroes, it's about being a legitimate vigilante that uses his curse for good.

Getting stabbed by the cult is a reminder that yeah, he can't die, he'll be back, but he's just a kid. A kid desperately trying to make good use of this power he never wanted.

Meanwhile I see Simon as the more active participant, who carries all his emotions on his chest, who pushes and pulls and when pressured too far falls apart into pieces before turning aggressive again. Very instable emotional and in general and pretty demanding. But like... there's more but i should probably make a longer post about how i see Simon, especially in connection to his childhood trauma.

I've seen a lot of book reviews saying Max is the obligatory "normal one", and I guess the general consensus is that takes on sort of a protagonist role who does not really have much to offer as a character. I could not disagree with that more, though, especially upon my later reads. From the way I see it, Max is maybe the most integral character (besides our antagonist) to this book.

Max is the sheepdog. We establish that right off the bat. He is a watcher, a quiet protector and observer. He is gentle and contemplative-- you don't hear him speak up as much as the other characters or show out, but you see those very characters from his perspective, and you come to love them through him. He is, of course, the initial holder of the walkie talkie and the surgeon's assistant--it's through these things and more that we come to realize that Max is the true shepherd of the group, despite Kent's size and Eef's charisma. He's silent until he's needed, and he shows his capability and wisdom as a leader when others are in trouble (i.e Kent during the storm, the Sparkplugs/Newt in the boat, need I go on)

Of course, a huge chunk of that portends to his friendship with Ephraim. He's his wrangler (ha) yes, but they balance each other out-- Ephraim feels a lot of fearful rage, and Max is the only one that can comfort him and bring him a sense of calm. Likewise, I think Ephraim is a very righteous and emotional character driven to action when he feels like things aren't fair (I'll get back to this later.)

On the other hand, Max is the defuser of conflict, even though he himself ends up taking a backseat most of the time.

While he's no therapist, Gabriel definitely has qualities of one. His concern for Julian went past a police officer wanting to prevent a juvenile delinquent from becoming a criminal again. He genuinely wanted Julian to have a successful and happy future despite his past. He has genuine compassion for these criminals, and want them to live their best lives.

This brings me to my main point: does Gabriel ever look at these criminals and think "I can fix them," not from the perspective of a hopeless romantic who fell in love with a toxic person, but from the perspective of a criminal psychologist who wants to help these criminals, but knows deep down that he can't? Seeing all these criminals, many of which were victims of circumstance, and locking them away behind bars for years or even decades. All of it must take a toll on Gabriel, despite the fact that his job states no requirements of him helping the criminals.

And this brings us to another topic: Gabriel's job as profile. A profiler is defined as "a person who records and analyzes someone's psychological and behavioral characteristics, so as to assess or predict their capabilities or to assist in identifying categories of people." Gabriel's job is to simply analyse these criminals and suspects, not help them. While his kind and compassionate nature doesn't allow him to simply turn a blind eye to people who clearly need psychological assistance, he also understands that his job isn't to help criminals but to analyze them. The battle between compassion and responsibility is one that Gabriel has probably fought for as long as he's worked in the GPD, and will continue to fight as long as he's the GPD's profiler.

So...yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if Gabriel holds a lot of guilt and emotional baggage because of his job.