#protectgraphite2k17

... I still really love how Ex-Aid is making no attempt to convince us that Kuroto is a good person now. Like, Poppy tried to give him a sympathetic motivation, and he was just like NOPE, I’MMA JACKASS. It’s like he’s their psychopathic pet or something who just runs around screaming wildly and being an asshole. No one likes him, no one trusts him. He’s unrepentant of his actions. He’s obnoxious and a total bastard. But he’s occasionally useful, so they keep him around despite the craziness and, uh... Uniqueness.

... So Ichabbie popped up front and centre on my dash today, so I wandered back into the tag.

... Sad that Ex-Aid is coming to an end soon, but excited (no puns intended) to see what Build will give us.

... Thinking about Graphite (something I do rather obsessively), it occurred to me that, as I mentioned @bonjourentrez said before, he’s the only enemy Bugster left. The two who are good and now... Semi good? (what do we call Parad’s change in attitude?) are both predominately noncombatants. Poppy’s a DDR character (okay, not exactly, but) and Parad isn’t even from a game, he’s, like, an embodiment for co-op or something.

For all they’ve been preaching that ‘Bugsters weren’t made to be killed by humans,’ the only Bugsters who have been shown as anything else are the ones who quite literally weren’t. Burgermon, for example, was not an enemy character, and he was the only other nice Bugster for a while (aside from Poppy). All the others have been final bosses of games, including Graphite, and the show hasn’t given a second thought to killing them.

Now Parad is with the good guys (they’d better address what he’s done more, or they’ll be veering into Regina Mills territory and don’t get me started there), but he’s not actually that good an example of the claim they’re trying to make about Bugsters not being canon fodder, because he never was; Masamune was wrong--Parad didn’t become a game boss until Kamen Rider Chronicle.

Graphite, on the other hand, is in that position. He’s the final boss of his game. If they wanted to actually address the thoughts and feelings of game characters who spend their lives being treated as pawns and beaten down, he would be a better choice to examine. Someone asked me what would happen if Graphite survived the next ep; that’s a great question, and I would love for Ex-Aid to explore the answer. Not beating around it by only giving non game enemy Bugsters a second chance, but showing how an enemy character and the human players find a way to work around that fate. Say Graphite does survive, and possibly considers helping them? How would they actually address the idea they mentioned before, of finding a way for everyone to coexist? Parad, Poppy, and even Burgermon aren’t good choices to exemplify this, from my point of view, as another writer. It would be more effective if they actually had to consider what they could do to allow for Graphite’s continued existence--because just ‘if there are no humans who can we play with’ won’t work for a Bugster for whom ‘play with’ means ‘be killed by repeatedly.’ Maybe I’m thinking far too much into a children’s show (probably), but I think there are a number of things in the plot that could have been handled better.

Whelp, nothing’s perfect, and I suppose that’s what headcanons and fanfiction are for--exploring possibilities the show didn’t.

... And I wanna be really vocal about wanting better for my Bugster fave Graphite, I’m just gonna start calling myself the Graphite Fan Gremlin. I creep into the Ex-Aid tag and complain about how all the other characters get development and atonement arcs except for Graphite. Like how now Parad is getting a ‘second chance,’ but the show is like ‘yeah, fuck Graphite’? Even though the only thing different about them is that Graphite’s host died--but the same goes for Poppy, and Graphite didn’t choose his host; it was just that once he was there, he naturally reacted by fighting to survive. There was none of this talking and understanding back then. He didn’t have a fucking choice, and it never occurred to him to do otherwise, because that’s not his personality. Also, as @bonjourentrez pointed out, Graphite’s the only one of the remaining Bugsters who is legit in the situation Parad talked about near the beginning of the season--a Bugster who spends their life doing nothing but being beaten down and repetitively killed by humans. Humans literally are his enemies. Not to mention he’s got a stubborn pride streak--he’s still hanging on to the score between him and Taiga, and he’s also got whatever Gemedus’ data is doing to him going on. From his point of view, everyone he thought cared about him, that he cared about, has turned on him. So yeah, he’s gonna be angry. He feels betrayed.

I started ranting already. This is gonna be the week where I complain.

… So, like… (sorta spoilers below)

Are they trying to make Graphite the Bugster we don’t like now or something? Because it’s a little late for that, I’m already way more invested in him having character development than Parad (sorry, Parad, you’re just not my cup of tea, I like the tough, angry type).

Like, yes, okay, yay, Emu and Parad work together (why are they both so tall?) CAN WE GET BACK TO GRAPHITE NOW?

Either do a Drive and give them all Heel-Face Turns, or… I don’t know. Or kill me. You can’t claim that Parad can decide to atone for his actions and then say that Graphite can’t. Like, what has Graphite done that Parad didn’t do more of, like, fifty times? Okay, so he actually killed his host, but did he have a choice in that? He didn’t infect Saki with his own virus–Parad and Kuroto did. Once he was there, he really didn’t know any other way to go but forward. I mean, this is Graphite here. He’s not one for complex plans and manipulations.

... What if, like, Graphite turns into Gemedus, but then the only reason the heroes plus Parad and Kuroto are able to beat him is because Graphite keeps on fighting from the inside, ala Ankh and other Ankh from OOOs?

Like, the last bits of his consciousness manage to subvert Gemedus in some way, allowing the others to defeat him. Then maybe he could revert to being Graphite and have a proper, heartbreaking death scene. I think Graphite is stubborn enough to pull that off. And while he might not do it to save humans, I can see him fighting anything he has to to survive, or maybe to try and protect Parad (or even Poppy) to some degree.