#pilot dave

Small problems:

The only things here are things that don’t RUIN him because they’re small instances, but they’re worth mentioning.

His sylladex introduction was.. not good. This part is excusable, because it was a short pilot, which is why i see it as a minor problem. But at the same time, the sylladex should have an explanation in the full thing (assuming a green light on the show), as it’s the first bit of evidence that, despite his weird irony thing, Dave IS smart. I wish that’d been highlighted, because now he just seems like an asshole with no good traits.

On the topic of his bro- in the first conversations we see of him, Bro is NOT a casual topic. When he talks about Bro it’s a whole thing. Him just going “yeah my bro got me the sylladex, he’s so cool” just isn’t enough. It makes them seem like they have an average sibling relationship. He should be weird and randomly add an extra 2 lines about how Bro is the coolest. However it IS a pilot so,, excused.

My last is just his body movement. This is.. very unimportant, but I think it’d be a cool edition to see him doing ‘air turntables’ and the like instead of BIG body movements like getting into John’s ‘space.’ It’d highlight that Dave is pretty silly, while also keeping his calm demeanor.

Medium problems:

My medium problems are stuff that either wouldn’t fit in the pilot, or that isn’t enough to make it horrible.

To start- Dave doesn’t talk enough. Dave is the biggesr yapper in homestuck, no contest. Even more talking than Karkat somehow. In the pilot he never drones on, just says everything concisely. Really feeds into the annoying cool guy personality they gave him.

Next we have the lack of strilonde sass. ALL of them are a little bit dickish (even roxy sometimes), but pilot dave?? he’s literally just an asshole. there’s no witty comeback, or timing for great insults- he just calls john stupid for stuff and thats its.

And my final complaint is kind of silly, but it’s his lack of caution- remember this is a kid who grew up with a crazy brother who grew up in a booby trapped house. No sense of safety, ever. Yet he just.. drinks the apple juice. No worry it’s pee. What is this. What happened to Dave constantly being wary of everything. Ig one scene removal isn’t enough to completely rule out that they’ll give him this trait, but cmon :(

Biggest Problems:

These are problems that will GENUINELY make me quit the show. The true ruiners of Dave’s personality.

He’s smiling. All the time, smiling. We almost NEVER see Dave smiling. What the fuck. Like this immediately caught me off guard. Any dave fanfic ever will KINDLY remind you this boy DOES NOT SMILE and yet the show failed this miserably. This is a whole part of his character!! It highlights the trauma he experienced from Bro, and they just took it from him. Like what the fuck.

Next, his voice. The actor is fine I suppose, but there’s SO MUCH EMOTION in his voice. Almost all of the strilondes keep a pretty deadpan voice because 1. they’re traumatized, and 2. they believe it makes them more cool (cause they’re dumb teens n shit). Any comic dub of Dave will have him keep a monotone, unshaking voice unless he is having a LOTT of emotion at the time. So why, pray tell, is he ALWAYS having so much emotion?? Also, takes a way from his true cool guy personality.

And that goes to my final complaint- his overall personality. Pilot Dave is not witty. He is not awkward. He is not a tryhard. He is just an asshole. He insults John out of nowhere for his sylladex (in the comic john prompts it by complaining about his sylladex), he yells at john, and he’s just not nuanced.

Dave has a few major things that show his personality:

horrible irony

lack of emotion showing

decent amount of wit

rambling

overcompensating

care for john

there’s of course a lot lot more things, but these are the biggest we see when we first meet him. He’s certainly cool in some ways (sword fighter, smart, nonchalant), but he’s also obviously trying too hard. also, he obviously DOES enjoy John’s company. (cough cough, gayass)

Pilot Dave, though?

almost NO examples of him being ironic

so so much emotion

no rambling at ALL

annoying

consistently insults john

if you take away his irony, his wit, AND his rambling, he just seems like an average guy. But if you add him being expressive and an annoyance that makes him a generic asshole. because that’s what he was in the pilot. and he honestly doesn’t even seem to be nice to John.. at all. It’s like a movie where the jock and nerd become friends, but it’s mainly just the jock insulting the nerd.