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yuranaSoooo, this has been gestating for a couple of days, since I finished reading the epilogue, so I think it's time to bring my jumbled thoughts into a coherent (hopefully?) text. Maybe this is all super obvious, but I want to write it down anyway.
As it says in the title, basically it comes down to Candy being the portrayal of a world without god. Let me explain. (SPOILER ALERT!)
There is a lot of analysis out there, talking about the relation of Gnosticism to Homestuck. For more on that you should definitely check out the amazing youtube videos by optimistic Duelist. But for purposes of this text I'm going to propose that the ultimate source of creation and meaning within Homestuck is the game itself - Sburb. The players can become creators, but ultimately, they are interchangeable. What remains is the game that always ensures its own existence by facilitating the continued creation of new universes.
So when John decides against using his retcon powers to ensure the integrity of the game (the integrity of canon, of narrative coherence),he severs the connection of his universe to the game, to the force, that gives his world meaning and purpose. Without the influence of the Sburb (of canon, of god), things just happen, forever, until the heat-death of the universe. I don't think there will be another session of Sburb in the Candy universe. Caliborn might or might not one day live on earth C, but he won't play Sburb. After all, nothing that happens there has any relevance to the canon anymore. In the same vain it makes perfect sense that Dirk's goal in Meat is to bring about another session of Sburb. The narrative has to be continued, so that it can continue to give the world meaning. What's the point of being an anime villain, if there is no more story to be the villain of? That's also the reason why there are sequel hooks. The narrative always continues, that's the whole point of Meat.
So, let's look at how the different characters react to the meaninglessness (the absence of god) in Candy:
John is the most fascinating and the character that first made me think of all this. He seems to me like a man who is losing his faith and not dealing with it very well (which is where the title of the post came from). He is like someone who just found out that, instead of being created by God for a purpose, we are in fact just sequences of genes brought about by coincidence and the uncaring forces of the laws of nature. We live on a small rock floating through endless space and then we die. No higher power is guiding us, or judging us. For someone who spent his formative years in an epic battle between good and evil for the creation of the universe, of course that feels 'wrong'. If there is no narrative, no meaning, then that means that even if he is one of the creators of this universe, in the end, he is nobody special. Because no-one in this universe is special. He is no longer the chosen one, because a universe without a narrative doesn't have any chosen ones. And without the guiding had of god (of canon) people do not live narratively satisfying lives, they just kind of live and shit happens. Just as in our world, in the world of Candy there is only the meaning you make for yourself. John is really bad at this, he is used to having meaning provided for him, being the hero of the story. No wonder he is depressed.
Rose on the other hand seems to really enjoy living outside of canon and so does Roxy. This makes a lot of sense when you think about the fact that both characters always rebelled against the constrictions of the narrative anyway. Especially Rose always tried to break Sburb, but of course never succeeded. For her being outside of canon means freedom to live her life as she wants.
Dirk, who's ego is so enormous in Meat that it takes over the narrative, can not imagine living in a world without meaning. He is rather the villain of a story then being just some guy in a world without meaning. This nicely illustrates how perceiving a greater meaning in the world relates to your sense of self. It's a hard blow to the ego, to accept that you are in fact just one speck of dust among a billion others and that on a cosmic scale nothing you will ever do matters, no matter how grand your plans.
And similar, old Calliope can't even conceive of a world without canon having any value. She is so bound up the the mechanism of Sburb that just living your life and making your own meaning with your own choices is not something than even occurs to her as being an option. She has to get back to canon to continue the narrative.
The longer I think about it, the more I like Candy. It's not an epic story, but it has more to say about the world we actually live in and how to cope with it than Meat does. Like, after leaving a terrible abusive relationship, dance around the kitchen in your underwear, because what else can you do? Nothing means anything in the end, except for the small joys we make for ourselves every day.
As it says in the title, basically it comes down to Candy being the portrayal of a world without god. Let me explain. (SPOILER ALERT!)
There is a lot of analysis out there, talking about the relation of Gnosticism to Homestuck. For more on that you should definitely check out the amazing youtube videos by optimistic Duelist. But for purposes of this text I'm going to propose that the ultimate source of creation and meaning within Homestuck is the game itself - Sburb. The players can become creators, but ultimately, they are interchangeable. What remains is the game that always ensures its own existence by facilitating the continued creation of new universes.
So when John decides against using his retcon powers to ensure the integrity of the game (the integrity of canon, of narrative coherence),he severs the connection of his universe to the game, to the force, that gives his world meaning and purpose. Without the influence of the Sburb (of canon, of god), things just happen, forever, until the heat-death of the universe. I don't think there will be another session of Sburb in the Candy universe. Caliborn might or might not one day live on earth C, but he won't play Sburb. After all, nothing that happens there has any relevance to the canon anymore. In the same vain it makes perfect sense that Dirk's goal in Meat is to bring about another session of Sburb. The narrative has to be continued, so that it can continue to give the world meaning. What's the point of being an anime villain, if there is no more story to be the villain of? That's also the reason why there are sequel hooks. The narrative always continues, that's the whole point of Meat.
So, let's look at how the different characters react to the meaninglessness (the absence of god) in Candy:
John is the most fascinating and the character that first made me think of all this. He seems to me like a man who is losing his faith and not dealing with it very well (which is where the title of the post came from). He is like someone who just found out that, instead of being created by God for a purpose, we are in fact just sequences of genes brought about by coincidence and the uncaring forces of the laws of nature. We live on a small rock floating through endless space and then we die. No higher power is guiding us, or judging us. For someone who spent his formative years in an epic battle between good and evil for the creation of the universe, of course that feels 'wrong'. If there is no narrative, no meaning, then that means that even if he is one of the creators of this universe, in the end, he is nobody special. Because no-one in this universe is special. He is no longer the chosen one, because a universe without a narrative doesn't have any chosen ones. And without the guiding had of god (of canon) people do not live narratively satisfying lives, they just kind of live and shit happens. Just as in our world, in the world of Candy there is only the meaning you make for yourself. John is really bad at this, he is used to having meaning provided for him, being the hero of the story. No wonder he is depressed.
Rose on the other hand seems to really enjoy living outside of canon and so does Roxy. This makes a lot of sense when you think about the fact that both characters always rebelled against the constrictions of the narrative anyway. Especially Rose always tried to break Sburb, but of course never succeeded. For her being outside of canon means freedom to live her life as she wants.
Dirk, who's ego is so enormous in Meat that it takes over the narrative, can not imagine living in a world without meaning. He is rather the villain of a story then being just some guy in a world without meaning. This nicely illustrates how perceiving a greater meaning in the world relates to your sense of self. It's a hard blow to the ego, to accept that you are in fact just one speck of dust among a billion others and that on a cosmic scale nothing you will ever do matters, no matter how grand your plans.
And similar, old Calliope can't even conceive of a world without canon having any value. She is so bound up the the mechanism of Sburb that just living your life and making your own meaning with your own choices is not something than even occurs to her as being an option. She has to get back to canon to continue the narrative.
The longer I think about it, the more I like Candy. It's not an epic story, but it has more to say about the world we actually live in and how to cope with it than Meat does. Like, after leaving a terrible abusive relationship, dance around the kitchen in your underwear, because what else can you do? Nothing means anything in the end, except for the small joys we make for ourselves every day.
