2019-07-21 1:59:04 ¶ ●

Haven’t checked this blog in a minute so I didn’t realise I had a few asks. I’ll have a look at them later today!

2019-07-21 4:46:13 ¶ ●

## karkat's "o:B" emoji is either an angel or a devil

(in reference to the significance of the letters O and B)

good point! this is actually alluded to directly in the text of the comic:

> GG: is that supposed to be someone with a halo and goofy teeth?
> GG: ARE YOU MAKING FUN OF ME?
> CG: NO, NO
> CG: YOU’RE LOOKING AT IT BACKWARDS
> CG: THOSE ARE MY HORNS

this connects directly to karkat’s sign, which is also a version of the B/O symbol that represents a demon and an angel stacked against each other.

possibly worth noting that “halo” is a term occasionally used in astrophysics regarding black holes, which the letter O is also connected to.

2019-07-21 4:49:01 ¶ ●

## Do you think that the ghost Callie who Roxy gives the ring is from the Game Over timeline or the post-retcon?

I personally don’t tend to concern myself a lot with whether a ghost is pre- or post-retcon. As far as I see it, if the Ring was exchanged after the retcon, then the character it was given to is a post-retcon character.

2019-07-21 5:25:21 ¶ ●

## i've been wondering for a long time now under what circumstances the dolorosa was reborn as a rainbow drinker, since it's heavily implied to require 1. significant sunlight and undead exposure and 2. a death that doesnt destroy the body. given the ancestors who were around then, and the lack of doc scratch or other ocmments indicating DS interfered with her like he did kanaya, and kanaya's kimonos indicating the influence, my bet is the handmaid killed her to complete the metamorphosis

I’m not sure all of these assumptions are necessarily correct.

While it’s true that the comic implies rainbow drinkers are to some extent fueled by sunlight, Kanaya and Porrim seem to believe that many rainbow drinker traits are natural jadeblood adaptations to living in the brooding caverns. From A6I3:

> KANAYA: Im Told Its A Trait Confined To Those Of My Caste
> KANAYA: They Tended To Spend A Lot Of Time In The Brooding Caverns Where A Convenient Source Of Light Was Often Handy

I’m more of the belief that rainbow drinkers being confined to the caverns weakens their powers, rather than outright prevents them from transforming.

In any case, the Dolorosa banished herself from the caverns after taking in the Signless, so she would have had plenty of access to sunlight subsequent to that.

I don’t think Kanaya’s connection to Japanese culture need to be so convoluted; her Japanese-style items of clothing probably simply connect to the fact that, like Damara, she was a protege of Scratch’s.

2019-07-21 5:48:46 ¶ ●

## vriska's pool of blood at her death forms the silhouette of callie ohpeee's horns

interesting observation!

at first i thought it might be more likely those are Makara horns, given the ancestral feud in play between the Pyrope, Serket and Makara bloodlines, but I think this could be read as a symbol of Vriska’s Martyrdom.

Scorpio is the sign of the Conqueror, which is the path given to Caliborn by Yaldabaoth; the other path, leading to death, is the path of the Martyr, given to Calliope. as such, the version of Vriska who dies rather than lives on to become the Conqueror could be seen as taking on an aspect of Calliope.

2019-07-24 6:52:00 ¶ ●

## i somewhat agree with the idea all jadebloods have the potential for the mutation, but it does seem liek death has some relationship to manifesting the mutation in its complete form, since Doc Scratch and Aradia both highlight Kanaya's death as being the trigger for her drinkerhood

It’s possible for any number of things to have multiple triggers. Kanaya becoming a rainbow drinker when she died is important because it fits with Homestuck’s overarching death-and-rebirth theme, but just because it’s important by no means makes it the only way.

2019-07-29 6:16:45 ¶ ●

## Just wanted to add to your observations about the poison that 1. John ends up "hosting English" in Candy as well, with Jake living at his house and 2. it remains odd that WV's first words to John in the Medium (BOY. YOU THERE, BOY. QUIT ALL THIS SCURRYING AROUND) get repeated almost verbatim when Lord English first speaks.

Good observations! Probably worth noting is that when they dwell together, Jake and John partake in a bottle of whiskey together; i.e., Jake brings poison into John’s home. Scenes involving alcohol in the Epilogues seem mostly concentrated around Jake, in fact.

Lord English has always had an intriguing relationship with the exiles concept, between Caliborn inhabiting an exile station during the final stretch of Homestuck and Lord English inexplicably keeping Karkat’s exile station locked away in a vault deep within his mansion. If English himself is connected to the forces that control the characters, it only stands to reason that he might ultimately take control over the protagonist of the story.

2019-07-29 6:22:05 ¶ ●

> When next he’s jostled awake, it’s by a figure that looks uncomfortably like—

> JOHN: dad?

This line in Candy where John mistakes Jake for his adoptive father has always nagged at me, because Jake and “Dad” Egbert don’t actually share any blood relation at all.

Is it possible what John actually thinks he sees when he opens his eyes is himself?

2019-07-29 6:36:08 ¶ ●

I know this is an unusual post from me, but are any of my followers aware of any existing analysis of parallels between Homestuck and the film Being John Malkovich?

I saw the latter recently and was struck with the presence of potent MSPA and Homestuck motifs and themes. Most obvious among them was the puppeteer character who uses his puppetry skills to master control over people’s bodies, and the related concept of living eternally by hopping from host body to host body, but the use of a small door as a portal into somewhere completely different also reminded me of the recurring portals in Problem Sleuth.

I also had in mind the technique where a character with one name is used to represent another character with the same name, ala this conversation where John Egbert attacks himself through Cusack as a proxy. Malkovich’s name is dropped a handful of occasions in Homestuck itself because of his role in Con Air, but I haven’t seen that movie to be able to analyse that connection myself :(

2019-07-29 7:00:13 ¶ ●

## aranea quirks B, kankri quirks B/O, porrim quirks O

I didn’t have Porrim in mind when I thought up the 8B/0O numerology, but I can think of a couple ways it could apply.

As the Maid of Space, Porrim is connected with Aradia as the Maid of Time. Her O’s being followed by a + sign contrasts with Aradia writing her 0′s with a strike through them (and often following them with dashes, as in 0_0). Her intimate relationship with Aranea acts as a Beforan reflection of Aradia and Vriska’s deadly rivalry.

An association between Porrim and the letter O also makes me think of something I hadn’t considered in-depth before, which is the connection between a black hole and an opening or womb. Visual similarities between the Reckoning (and the Rapture by extension) and sperm cells approaching an ovum are widely recognised; the Dead Cherub using Earth C as an egg or chrysalis from which she is born again follows on from this same symbol.