#tts rant

Season 3 honestly felt like it had so much planned but ending up dropping the ball on most of it. I’m not entirely sure if it was do to Chris and his whims or studio pressure or whatnot, but this season felt extremely rushed and it didn’t do anyone any favors. I feel that Cass was kinda put on the back burner for most of the First half of the season, becomes a threat in Cassandra’s Revenge, and is tossed back and forth for the rest of it. 

I honestly can’t complain too much about her episodes between CR and the finale, they were nice and gave us at some nice bits of character development. That all got thrown out the window in Plus Est En Vous (I’ll come back to this.)

Let’s start with how when only get to see glimpses of Cassandra in the first half of the season. Honestly, every time we saw her I honestly felt as if she didn’t plan any of this out. I get that at the time she and Booberry couldn’t hold an entire episode to themselves, but it would’ve been nice to see the same uncertainty but slightly to the left every time we checked in ( And I know it’s Zhan Tiri, but her character was so fucking dumb, but that’s a rant for another time). 

I felt as if Cass didn’t think this thing through before she took the Moonstone. She had at least a couple of weeks between when they left The House of Yesterday’s Tomorrow and when they reached the Dark Kingdom, so she had plenty of time to think about what all this choice entitled, and what she was going to do afterwards. But nope, she mopes and tries to control the rock while being pulled around by Casper’s bitchy cousin.  

Then Cassandra’s Revenge aired. Again, I really liked everything from CR up until the finale. I had a few nitpicks here and there but it was good for her character. And then... Plus Est En Vous. I honestly don’t even know where to begin with this episode. There’s so many problems that I could write an entire rant of it’s own. 

For now lets focus back on Cass. She has so much screen time this episode, and piratically does nothing with it. She destroys her old room, puts the rotted blackberry in a cage, and cries for forgiveness when she looses. Yes she died helping or whatever, but she was all ready to kill Rapunzel until the Moonstone was taken from her. And let’s not forget about everything she destroyed and lives she ruined at the end of OUaH. And what is her punishment for he action? Nothing. Absolutely. Nothing. Varian, a literal child, was sent to prison for almost the exact same crimes, and Cass gets off scott free. That’s bullshit and we all know it. 

Oh but what was it that caused her do do all of this again? Oh riiiiight, Mommy issues. (Can you tell how much I loved this?)

Can I just say that Gothel being Cass’ mom makes no goddamn sense? I’m going to anyways. Gothel being Cassandra’s mother makes no goddamn sense. Why would Gothel, a woman canonically know for being nothing but vain and selfish and who never does anything if it doesn’t benefit her, have a child and go through the process of raising her only to have her do basic house chores? Sure having someone do you’re work for you would be nice, but not worth the nine months of pregnancy, and the years afterwards of raising and training she’d have to go through after.

Wanna know what makes even less sense? This being the sole reason that Cass betrayed Rapunzel. Like, Cass, Honey, you didn’t even know or care about who your mom was four episodes ago, and that’s what you’re using as your villainous motivation?

Alright, let’s take a quick break and do a little thought experiment. You are the kid of the highest ranking officer of the military, and are well on your way to taking his place once the chance arises. But instead of continuing training for when you do get that chance, you get assigned to babysit and teach your leader’s long lost daughter. You make friends with her, accidentally bring back the reason she was kidnapped, and eventually leave with her as she follows her destiny. But on the trip towards that destiny, she constantly ignores you, brushes off your advice and actively drags not only herself, but you and the rest of your party into obvious dangers that could’ve been easily avoided. We’d all be pretty frustrated in that situation right? And then some spooky little gremlin shows up and tells you that your friends ‘adopted’ mother, who you know was super abusive, is actually your bio mom. 

I want you to take a look at these two possible motivations for betraying your friend. Between not feeling heard and actively being pushed aside/ignored or Worst mom of the century in actually my mom, which is the better motivation? If you went with the first one, good job! You get a cookie.  

I honestly don’t know where they went wrong with this. Through out the first two seasons, Rapunzel constantly ignores Cassandra’s advice and gets into more trouble, or she straight up insults Cass in both her words and actions (i.e. Challenge of the Brave and after the crispy hand in The Great Tree) They had the prefect way for Zhan Tiri to manipulate Cassandra, and they didn’t use it?!

Most of my problems with season three would be fixed if they had gone with this building problem of Cass being ignored and the growing frustration with it. Cass is unsure? Remind her of how Rapunzel ruined her chance to prove herself. Cass refuses to listen to reason? Well Raps wouldn’t listen to her. 

And it would’ve been so easy to direct Cassandra’s anger at just Rapunzel to encompass the entierty of Corona since King Freddy over here didn’t listen and caused all of the problems in the show (Again, rant for another day).

But that’s just speculation on my part.  I’m not a writer for the show, nor am I knowledgeable about the circumstances behind it’s production. All I am is a fan who really liked Cass’ character and was disappointed with how it played out.

As Chris Sonnenburg decided, Rapunzel is the main focus in the show, and the writing choices surround her more than anyone. Personally, I and many others wish that Eugene would have been given the same prioritization that he got in the original movie, and this is where you and I may disagree. This being said, it was the decision of the writers to focus on Rapunzel and Cassandra's friendship, at whatever expense that focus may have cost the writing or the other characters. As I have already said, it is ultimately the writing that I think most of us can agree was an issue, regardless of who our favorite characters are.

And I admit that it is a bit of an oversimplification to say that it's just a matter of Cassandra overshadowing Eugene. There's more to it than that, but I do hope that what I'm referring to makes sense.

From a technical standpoint, there is nothing wrong with the writers deciding to focus on Rapunzel and whoever else they want to loop into that. For a show that cares so much about trauma, though, I think that it is owed to Eugene, as the deuteragonist of the movie and as Rapunzel's closest companion, to address his grievances, great and small, from a much more empathetic standpoint, which, in my humble opinion (that you may or may not agree with) the writers fall very short of. Like you said, Eugene has a large role and is important to the show - the plot relies on his actions. He also is an emotional support for Rapunzel, who wouldn't be who she is today without him. But his actions rely on his character, though, and his character is what suffers - at least, in my argument, concerning the respect that it is given in consideration of his opinions, traumas and motivations. To basically summarize: when I say that Eugene is "overshadowed," I'm referring less about how often he appears and what he does, and more to his allowed emotional complexity and how his decisions, good and bad, are connected to that.

Both Rapunzel and Cassandra's feelings are given a lot of validation, especially Cassandra's in her arc about feeling like she never gets a chance and how she was abandoned my her own mother (though I think Rapunzel's traumas are downplayed, but that's another can of worms that this post isn't trying to open). Cassandra is given a lot of mercy and empathy from Rapunzel, as well as the writers, who give her multiple points of dialogue and song discussing her feelings and why she went down the path that she did ("Waiting in the Wings", its reprise, "Crossing the Line", and "Nothing Left to Lose" all give her a clear voice to explain her sorrows ). This show loves talking about certain characters' traumas and making the connections between their choices and how much they have suffered, especially hers.

But I don't think that this is the case with Eugene, at least not half as much as it should be. The writers kind of forced him to accept Rapunzel and Cassandra's strained friendship which is where Cass "takes priority" over him here. I do still have an issue with "No Time Like the Past," because Eugene's life experience and trauma stemming from dealing with shady people for years should not be trumped by the oversimplified virtue lesson of "friends shouldn't leave friends behind". We've met the Stabbington brothers, the Baron and Stalyan - very tough people who have all sworn destruction on him at some point (Yes, he did them dirty too, but my argument here is that this is just how the "dog eat dog" world is - trust no one, because it will kill you.). There is also a lot of implication from his relationship with Stalyan that she was abusive towards him (I'm sure that @tangledbea can refer you to more detailed posts on that), and he witnessed Rapunzel's abuse from Mother Gothel first hand, so he has all the reason in the world to believe that people who wish harm on you shouldn't be trusted. And he was right - Cassandra was the one who chose to betray Rapunzel. She also maintained several times that she was done being Rapunzel's friend. For the writers to keep pushing them towards reconciliation without the proper handling of the dialogue, suggests three things:

That Rapunzel should continue to long for Cassandra's friendship, instead of moving on (bad for Rapunzel)

That Cassandra's boundary should be pushed (bad for Cass)

That Eugene is wrong for (correctly) identifying strained relationships as problematic (bad for everyone really, but Eugene specifically)

This is a big deal if we're talking about understanding the characters through the lens of psychology. Not to bring too much personal stuff into this, but as someone who has been in both Rapunzel's shoes (dealing with difficult people at the expense of my own well-being) and Eugene's (realizing that I really have to fend for myself in such situations), I just cannot get over the way that his feelings were brushed over here, and many other people agree with me. In the show, Eugene mostly is there to be Rapunzel's emotional support, which the show does a good job of, but outside of this role, most discussion of his own emotions and traumas are isolated (like his solo, "Everything I Ever Thought I Knew" being witnessed by nobody, and him "pouring out his heart" only to Pascal in Tangled: Before Ever after, never directly being give the chance to explain this to Rapunzel). Any time that his traumas and grievances are brought up in front of other people, he gets dismissed or laughed at. Examples are the writers using the "Horace" line to add comedic relief to him being hurt and angry at his dad for leaving him behind, and him getting angry at the Flynnposter guy for stealing his identity. When these are played as a joke, they just come across as him being insecure, arrogant, and always the one who is "in the wrong" at the end of the episode. Characters like Rapunzel and Cassandra are highly validated in their emotions, perhaps to a fault. Cassandra's faults are arguably a lot worse than Eugene's are by season 3, but because they are always directly and explicitly tied to her traumas, we are expected to feel empathy for her instead of laugh at her and hope that someone talks some sense into her. Same goes for Rapunzel's feelings, and mostly for Varian's. We excuse them because of the emotional appeal, but Eugene isn't allowed that emotional appeal because he's supposed to be the "funny" one. In contrast, it makes Eugene look like an insecure, superficial hothead, and not as someone who has deep wounds just like everyone else. The segment of the fandom on Tumblr that stans Eugene generally understands his behavior from an empathetic standpoint (naturally), but that's not as widely understood by the rest of the fandom. In turn, he's not that likeable to people who don't dissect his character as deeply as we do, which is honestly a problem that people have with Rapunzel in this show too. Varian and Cass' traumas are loud and clear. Rapunzel and Eugene's are not (I won't diverge too much farther into this, since the post here is about Eugene and Cass).

Also - although my main argument is about emotional overshadowing, here's a bit of a tangent where I think Eugene is physically overshadowed by her too. In the movie, Eugene is, of course, confident and funny, but he also has a distinct nonchalant, serious side to him as well, which the movie gives us many examples of. Cassandra is basically the epitome of those qualities, which, always having her front and center, does wash out the appearance of those qualities in Eugene. It's like when you place a muted version of a color and a brighter version of that same color side-to-side - the more saturated one just makes the other look gray. I'm not saying that Eugene's seriousness or skills are "dull" - rather, they are just one of many parts of him; but when placed next to a character who epitomizes those traits, all we see are the colors that remain. What do we have left if we wash out Eugene's seriousness, skillfulness and melancholia? Humor. Boisterousness. Chaos - all qualities that make up a part of him, but don't really allow his colors to shine....unless Cassandra is absent or in the background of the scene, and this is where I hope you can see the issue. It's a caricature of his goofy qualities, which reduces him to the "clown"/comedic relief character if we are trying to focus on Cassandra. There might be an argument along the lines of "well two serious characters can exist!" but in the writing, this ideal really doesn't hold up - in fact, there tends to be competition. Either one character will have this moment or the other. If character A gets it, then character B has to be doing something else. Take episodes like "Rapunzel and the Great Tree" and "Freebird" for example - Eugene just looks stupid in these episodes, which does not do justice to him because we all know that if he were present, he would have behaved in a way that is very reflective of his concern for Rapunzel's well being. The message this gives off, ultimately, is that Eugene really doesn't matter, and that he's a dispensable placeholder.

I could really keep going, but I think (and hope) that I've illustrated my point already. I've already said a lot, and I know I'm not the only one who has talked about this before, so I'll let this rest.

Thank you for your interest in this topic, and pardon me again if I didn't make my original point clear the first time.