Vriska did nothing wrong, and here′s why

Watch the video-version here

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Vriska Serket is a [massive understatement] controversial character originating in the cult multimedia webfiction homestuck. Much like the work she springs from, Vriska is a figure you either love or love to hate in equal measure, and even the folks who do have affection for the divisive heroine will usually concede that she did terrible things and/or is a bitch. A few people, perhaps most vocally the wonderful Kate Mitchell, writer of Vriska’s Pesterquest route, have however championed a position that is scarcely encountered in earnest unless you know where to look: The insistence that our girl genuinely, literally, did nothing wrong whatsoever, morally speaking, and that's the stance I am going to argue here. Not exactly in the way that Kate, or anyone else for that matter would. The beliefs expressed in this essay are purely my own and so on and so forth, but I had yet to see a similar defense on YouTube so I figured I’d make one. We'll go through all crimes Vriska has been charged with in the court of public opinion vaguely chronologically, and hopefully I can convince you that there is at least a lot more nuance to be had on the matter. Disclaimer though: it is impossible to discuss any of this without massive spoilers for the comic itself and minor spoilers for its adjacent works such as the paradox space comics and pesterquest. If you have not read homestuck and just want to know what the controversy is about: here's your chance to leave if you care about spoilers. I'm sorry I can't help you, but all the media discussed is highly recommended. I'd love to see you again in a few months after catching up, should you still be in the mood for some weapons grade unadulterated vriskourse. If you are still here: The following are the content warnings for this discussion: death of children, abuse, murder, ablism, grooming, determinism, suicide, fascism, spider-vore, manipulation, self-loathing. I will try to handle each topic with care, but that doesn’t change the fact that we will be delving into some truly vile subject matter. You know the work, you know what’s coming, here we go.

Villain coding:

A young girl, shrouded in shadow and framed by a spider web, grins deviously at her monitor, flashing razor-sharp fangs in the process. She’s wearing an eye patch, because of course she is. Heroes aren’t introduced that way, the media-savvy reader well knows, and by the time we are told that Vriska habitually feeds children to her monstrous arachnid of a guardian, the villain coding has thoroughly worked its magic. It isn’t helped by the fact, that we learn this in her introductory page, the place where the hobbies go, the charming idiosyncrasies, not the obligations that make your life a living nightmare. We have at this point seen exceptions to the format for Sollux and Nepeta, but they were rather more overt, and didn’t have the misfortune of being quite as evil looking. Still. Villain coding isn’t a defense by itself, the character being made to descent the spiral staircase of a gothic castle might well be a genuine monster and deserving of their stylistic treatment. So: Was it morally wrong of Vriska to kill those innocents? I promise this isn’t a rhetorical question: Was it?

Accusation 1: Feeding Kids to Spidermom

What’s the correct course of action when you are a child and a horrifying spider beast has taken it upon itself to nonstop scream into your mind, that it needs to be fed bodies or it will kill you instead? The utilitarian argument; that you should just lay down and die, because that’s the course of action which harms the fewest people does very little to convince me personally. It isn’t in any way morally wrong to do that, of course, but would you say that it is unethical not to? Would you demand of a child, or an adult for that matter to simply accept death due to the circumstances of their birth? Keep in mind that running away isn’t an option either due to the mental link, and since trolls without Lusi get culled. Here’s the kicker though: The people Vriska fed to her guardian sort of had it coming. Not in the way Terezi sees it, most likely weren’t any more wicked than the average Alternian, but they were playing Flarp. A game, mind you, which is described to us on multiple occasions by separate characters with troll-standards for precarity as highly dangerous. Everyone is aware that death is an option. Nepeta doesn’t play it, because she considers it too risky, and Nepeta hunts alternian fauna for food on a daily basis. These trolls weren’t coerced, there seems to be no broadly malicious incentive-structure nudging one to play Flarp. They simply entered a death game of their own accord. Knowing the rules and knowing the risks. If there is any group of people you can morally kill if you actually care about staying alive, it would probably be these fucks, and assuming Spidermom could possibly have just kept killing by herself, as she did when Vriska was a wriggler, if push came to shove, her selection of nourishment likely wouldn’t have willingly signed up for the high risk of death. I’d personally consider that worse. When I picture evil, I think of someone like Eridan, a literal fascist who opens fire on lowblood settlements from an airship, for fun, not Vriska, someone who wins Colosseum battles against willing participants, so she isn’t murdered by her guardian. Sounds a lot less malicious if you put it that way. But then again, a lot of this does circle back to the villain coding, I think, and it’s a recurring problem within homestuck discourse. The comic pulled the same trick in reverse before with Bro Strider, whose blatant abuse of Dave was framed as wacky and charming, so much so that when Dave opens up about it later on, some folks perceived it as a retcon, and similarly Vriska’s later obvious heroics cause a few people actual cognitive dissonance. Aesthetics are effective, and if you aren’t paying attention, they’re probably being wielded against you, unlike the doomsday devices.

Accusation 2: Building doomsday devices

Vriska might not be the smartest character in homestuck, but she isn’t an idiot, and she sure seems hellbent on staying alive. The idea that she would or could build a functional apocalypse machine and would be willing to give it to an outwardly genocidal, emotionally unstable douche like Eridan Ampora is laughable. Clearly Vriska has never successfully tested the doomsday devices she builds, since Alternia still firmly exists for better and for worse, and seeing how the Catenative Doomsday Dice Cascader isn’t secured against accidental activation at all, does nothing when it is activated, and is supposed to be sent to Eridan, who would want to use it to wipe out all land dwellers including Vriska herself, it is exceedingly obvious that she doesn’t actually believe they work. When Vriska builds cool looking tech and calls it a doomsday device, she’s larping. She’s larping because her life sucks, because her friends hate her, and because she’s all alone in a massive evil looking castle, so she might as well roll with the punches. We’re talking about a girl who takes every opportunity to cosplay or pretend to be Marquise Spinnerette Mindfang, let her have this.

Accusation 3: Lying to Terezi

Another point of contention people have with the whole feeding kids to your Lusus business, is that Vriska roped someone else into helping her with food acquisition against that person’s stated moral opposition. While this would be a fair point in the abstract, I think it takes Terezi by her word a bit too much and ignores contextual info. It is made petty obvious that Terezi knew Vriska wasn’t just orchestrating the demise of the wicked. She was against it, sure, but she still played along. She was neither tricked, nor controlled, and she could have quit her collaboration at any point as she eventually did. Those don’t seem like the actions of someone who cares a great deal about the lives of innocents, and of course she doesn’t. Terezi loves His Honorable Tyranny, an immense court monster which will often just eat the folks running the trial. Execution seems to her a reasonable punishment for minor slights against the empire. She has no issue with the death of innocent people. Her problem with Vriska being insufficiently selective in her choice of spider food is that it ruins the larp. It ruins her vigilante phantasy of being a badass Legislacerator dealing out justice on her own terms. Terezi only quits when her friends get hurt, when Vriska crosses a moral boundary which she actually cares about, and Terezi isn’t made complicit in that in any way. All of this is in the text, but you’d be forgiven for coming away from it thinking of Terezi as an off kilter, though fundamentally morally righteous character, despite her justification for murder being way flimsier than Vriska’s, if one doesn’t fully buy into the idea that any flarper already signed their own death warrant.

What does “Did nothing wrong” mean?

At this point we should probably clear up some definitions. When I say “did nothing wrong”, I don’t mean “never made a mistake” or “always did the best thing imaginable”. If you give a peanut bar to someone who you don’t know has an allergy, you did nothing wrong. You simply did a morally neutral thing which had negative consequences. Similarly “always did the best possible thing” is a useless definition, because no character or person has ever done that. The definition I’m going with is “Engaged in no action, which isn’t copacetic with a conventionally heroic figure”. Note: some people oppose the phrasing, because it allegedly stems from the antisemitic “H*tler did nothing wrong” meme popular on 4chan. This is false. That particular phrase was first used online in 2011, and instances of the generic “X did nothing wrong” can be found in fandom circles from at least 2006 onwards. Do not cede ground to n*zis. There are other camps which use the statement to mean something else. Often, it’s wielded hyperbolically as “Vriska did some shitty things, but not to the extent people think” or “Vriska did quite a few shitty things, but I like her anyway”. Another one, which is common in some circles, and which I think the aforementioned Kate Mitchell uses is “Engaged in no action, which would make me call the quality of her character into question”. That’s slightly different, because it allows for manipulation. Behavior which is still perceived as bad can be blamed on the influence of Doc Scratch, and that’s completely fair. If an adult, much less an ancient borderline omniscient deity grooms a child into doing something terrible, then the child isn’t to blame, the orb-creep is. I just think that it’s semantically misleading. The child in that scenario still would have done something wrong, they just wouldn’t really be to blame. So if you’re wondering why I’m not bringing up manipulation: that’s why. It doesn’t matter to my argument, I don’t think Vriska did anything super terrible period, and that is absolutely astounding. Between Alternian culture, Spidermom and the meddling of Doc fucking Scratch, Vriska is an absolute freak of nurture. By all right she should be a monster worse than Caliborn at his peak and it’d be perfectly understandable (for as troubling a trend as abuse victim to villain narratives are), but she isn’t. She’s an absolute bean, an unequivocal hero and god’s favorite princess, but let’s get to the bit where people usually play the manipulation card.

Accusation 4: Pushing Tavros off a cliff

Yeah, permanently injuring one of your friends because you are frustrated by them is probably not the best of looks, and sort of shitty, admittedly, but here’s how Tavros describes Flarp: “It's a title under the EXTREME ROLE PLAYING genre, and playing it without caution can have serious real world consequences! But that's what makes it fun.” “I had it coming” is pretty much stated outright just before the incident, since allowing a mood-swing prone asshole, who is also a known murderer to control your surroundings is pretty much the least cautious thing anyone could imaginably do. That’s the defense, the following is pure speculation, but I don’t think Vriska would have let any serious harm befall Tavros, should he have chosen to fight the overpowered enemies. It’d go against her intentions, since from the dialogue it’s pretty clear that she sees this as another training exercise to make Tavros less of a wimp and turn him into a Summoner-type figure. Tavros wasn’t really between a rock and a hard place, though putting someone is such a predicament would of course still be highly morally dubious, if that person hadn’t first signed a waiver like Tavros did.

Accusation 5: The revenge cycle

Aradia didn’t sign the waiver though. Or at least not in the specific instance in which Vriska killed her, but here we have a pretty clear-cut case of self-defense. Aradia sends a ghost army to torment Vriska for the rest of her life, so she puts an end to it. While Aradia is the aggressor in that situation, I would still say that getting revenge for your friend is a perfectly understandable course of action, even if that friend got hurt due to his own stupidity. Blood feuds don’t necessarily require anyone to be in the wrong. Aradia is justified in cursing Vriska and Vriska is justified in killing Aradia and the same goes for the rest of the vicious revenge cycle. It is now perfectly reasonable for Terezi to believe that Vriska is a threat to her friend group, so she rats her out to scratch. Keep in mind that Terezi has no idea what scratch will do. He is a first guardian, so for all she knows he could have just killed Vriska instantly. The fact that Vriska only lost an arm and an eye wasn’t Terezi holding back. Terezi was fine with whatever would happen, and it happened to be mild. Vriska merely blinding Terezi on the other hand was her holding back. She could have done anything, and she chose to go easy on her.

Don’t defend characters just because you like them

Aren’t you glad I’m not calling these things intermissions? Consider yourself spared. I have read Homestuck five times. Once before it concluded, twice after it did and then two more times after the epilogues. Over the course of my existence on the web, I have written and read an amount of homestuck fanfiction that my friends find astonishing, troubling, and frankly indecent. Like I have a print copy of an original work by a homestuck fanfiction author. The monster of Elendshaven by Jennifer Giesbrecht, cepheidVariable, who also wrote most of the homestuck epilogues. It’s good. If it appears to you like I care too much, that’s because I do. I do care too much. But back to the point. Vriska is my third favorite character from this monstrosity of a work, and it speaks volumes to how much it means to me, that I care this deeply about even my number three spot. It is probably the only piece of media from which I could confidently describe twelve characters as favorites, but none of them went through quite as much development as Vriska. I didn’t like her on my first readthrough. I know, there must have been something horrifically amiss with that twisted little thing I called my soul back in those days. Only later did she grow on me as a problematic fave until I finally noticed that she wasn’t really all that problematic, if you compare her to other characters from the roster who are treated as unambiguous good guys by the fandom. Maybe the fact that I changed my mind is important context to you, maybe it isn’t. What I think is quite crucial to mention is that one should have no issue admitting the sins of fictional characters one has grown attached to. It’s an important thing to be careful with, lest one succumbs to apologia. I love Catra Sheraandtheprincessofpower, but she did hella things wrong. I love Daisy Themagnusarchives, but she did hella things wrong. “Abrasive feral lady” is pretty much my favorite archetype in media period, but the morality of a person should be thoroughly separated from whether you hold affection for them or not. If you’re looking for an excuse to not feel bad about liking Vriska, despite opposing her actions: Please reconsider. Do it for her. Don’t let your morals be muddied over something so trivial when you can just say “she sucks, but I like her anyway”. I disagree, but ethical frameworks differ, and I don’t so much seek to convince as to offer a perspective. Do with it what you will.

Accusation 6: Bullying Tavros

Vriska Serket is not that smart and not particularly empathetic. In addition, she is a massive hardass and a huge bitch. A lot of people read her insistence that she is trying to help Tavros as a cruel joke, but it kind of makes sense that she would go about it the way she does. Tavros has stated that he wants to be a hero, wants to be confident and self-assured, so Vriska, being a freak of nurture as previously stated obviously would think that tough love and constant challenges are the way to achieve this goal of his. Vriska’s treatment of Tavros is still shitty, as he didn’t knowingly sign up for this, but it doesn’t seem malicious at all and more like a simple incompatibility of methods. With different framing and a character, the audience wasn’t already negatively inclined toward, most of Vriska’s actions would be read as the standard student and hyper tough mentor dynamic. She’s probably even one of the more helpful server players despite her attitude. She gets Tavros the pshoooes code so he can get around and seems to generally help him with his quest despite thinking it’s boring and pointless.
The ablism is a different matter though. It’s not okay, of course, and in a different work I would absolutely hold it against her, but that’s just the issue. Ablism is a property of homestuck, not of Vriska. Dave, Karkat and the narration itself say shit just as bad as Vriska ever has. Let’s say there’s an audio drama read entirely by someone with a certain accent, with characters from all over the place, then the conclusion we draw wouldn’t be that any one character actually has that accent, but that it’s part of the execution, of the filter through which we are looking into this world. Similarly I’d argue that Vriska isn’t especially ableist, we are just looking at her through the filter of an author, who is or at least was at the time ableist. Vriska is herself missing an arm and an eye, but because of how twisted up her character is into toxic notions of self-sufficiency, she feels like this is a thing one should just get over the way she and Terezi have. That’s an unfair standard of course, because only Tavros’ paraplegia is treated as an actual disability by the text. Vriska doesn’t appear to have any lasting issues and Terezi essentially gained a superpower. The idea that you can just get over a disability through willpower is validated by the text within which the scourge sisters exist, so I think her holding that (Again: deeply flawed) mindset is to be blamed on Hussie, not Vriska.

Accusation 7: Causing the creation of Bec Noir

From authorial impositions to metanarrative impositions, we get to Vriska’s first major play at canonical relevance by engineering conditions which lead to Jack’s fourth prototyping and therefore tons of death across multiple sessions of Sburb. Importantly though, this tragedy has already occurred. Vriska is retroactively making herself responsible, but Jacks rampage has already been observed as an integral part of the alpha timeline. It would have happened anyways and if it hadn’t, everyone would have faded from existence. There’s a very crucial distinction to make here though when it comes to moral reasoning around fate mechanics, because the self-justifying nature of the alpha timeline is a really lazy excuse, I think. It’s not inconsistent, but it is forgiving to the point of meaninglessness. Saying “Vriska did nothing wrong because the alpha timeline demanded she do all of the things she did, and Vriskas who behaved differently were wiped from existence” not only misunderstands ethics, but it’s also terribly artless. Gamzee killing Nepeta is inscribed into the nature of the alpha timeline. Everyone would have faded from existence, had Gamzee not killed Nepeta, but that doesn’t make the action morally justified, because Gamzee did not know this. He didn’t kill Nepeta as part of a paradox-special trolley problem, he just did it and reality happened to validate it. Vriska creating Bec Noir or Rose sending John/June back into canonicity to deal with lord English are different, because not only has the associated suffering already happened and isn’t prevented by refusing to cooperate, it also is, at these points, a known quantity that not complying with canonicity will spell doom. Sometimes the alpha timeline judges your actions, and sometimes it forces your hand. These two scenarios are not morally equivalent to most people, and though they have the same outcome, they aren’t even equivalent to a hardline utilitarian, since one never knows what the alpha timeline “wants”. If you have two choices: Killing a friend and not killing a friend, then there are four possible outcomes: “they’re dead and everyone else lives”, “they’re dead and everyone fades into nothingness”, “they and everyone else keep on living” and “they live for a bit until everyone fades into nothingness”. If you don’t know how the Timeline will judge your actions, the good choice (not killing your friend) produces better results more of the time. If the outcome is known however, you are just choosing between “a few people die” and “everyone dies”. Taking on the burden of making that choice and shouldering the guilt isn’t just morally neutral, it is unambiguously heroic.

The clock strikes just

The universe doesn’t agree though, now does it? When Terezi stabs Vriska, her death is neither that of a martyr, nor an impermanent one resigning itself to cosmic insignificance. The clock strikes just. And that, for a while at least, is that. Who do we think we are to disagree with the universe? Well, there is some debate on the matter, seeing how the clock doesn’t come to a stop naturally, but rather is broken by Spades Slick in Vriska’s moment of judgement. Hussie for his part claims that the scene was meant to be ambiguous, but my infernal loathing for authorial intent is only eclipsed by my unshakable disinterest in any thoughts and opinions of Andrew Hussie specifically, so we aren’t gonna go down that route. What if just is just just in this instance and the clock breakage coincidentally coincides? Well, I’d say fuck it. And the comic agrees. Sburb as a game is the primary antagonist of homestuck. Its rules start out appearing asinine before making their way straight through casually unfair towards outright malicious. It makes you responsible for the end of your world, before giving you an unalterable role to agonize about without explaining it. A calling? A challenge? A cruel joke? Sburb asks nothing less than the deaths of children for a chance at success, a chance that is often zero from the very start by design. If you figure out that all is hopeless, it forces you to pull the trigger on your own life and that of all your remaining friends yourself if you want your species to have another shot. And so, Homestuck is fundamentally a story about cheating, about finding loopholes, breaking rules and taking leaps of faith to protect your little group from a system that is callously designed to destroy you, if not physically then emotionally. The ultimate weapon is a tool against English just as much as against the oppressive systems of the universe he infests. A power which challenges the crude despotism of the alpha timeline’s “all that is must be” morality. It’s a story about living in a society and a story about revolution. So, when the clock strikes just, its judgement comes from a place of malice or at the very least apathy. Who does the universe think it is? In the end, when all is set right, Terezi is the one to decides Vriska’s fate. The characters for themselves. One more act of cosmic disobedience, for when throughout eternity has anything good come out of Doc Scratch’s study?

Accusation 8: Killing Tavros

Just imagine, you wrap up a nice day of keeping the timeline from exploding when the guy you wasted hours and hours on training threatens to kill you for just that reason. You like the fact that he at least shows some initiative finally, so you even let him charge at you with his lance. No mind control, nothing. You give him a fair shot and then you defend yourself. Unarmed against a guy with a weapon who clearly stated that he intends to kill you. Some people might object that Tavros didn’t pose a real threat to Vriska’s life and thus should have been spared, but I really don’t think anyone should have to put up with assassination attempts just because they are stronger. The trolls are at this point trapped on the meteor, and Vriska does still sleep like anyone else. Being vastly more powerful doesn’t always protect you and I think allowing the existence of someone who wants to kill you and has made an attempt at it before in what is essentially your house is an unreasonable demand. You cannot charge at someone with a lance and expect not to get killed. Did Vriska goad him into it? Kinda, she definitely didn’t try to dissuade him, but he clearly already made up his mind, and blaming someone for not trying hard enough not to get killed isn’t terrain I’d want to enter. Note: If you care about authorial intent, and shame on you if you do, the terrible clown had this to say on the matter: "He attacked her. It was self defense. And even if it wasn't, how much stupid bullshit are you supposed to put up with from a guy before you're ready to run a lance through his chest? Seriously.", Which is admittedly pretty funny and accurate.

Accusation 9: Fucking over (Vriska)

Maybe this inclusion is a bit self-indulgent, since I don’t see many people hold up Vriska’s cruelty towards her pre-retcon self as one of her primary sins, but I want this video to be about understanding Vriska at least in part, and it’s an important interaction for doing that. It’s a moment of intense self-loathing, which though neither healthy nor noble isn’t a crime last time I checked. Despite the “enviable cerulean swill” and “stupid idiot girl”-comments, a lot of readers have taken Vriska’s self-aggrandizement at face value, but if there is any point at which that ought to break down, it’s here. This is a woman who hates herself, every aspect of herself, and the only way she can think of her existence as worthwhile in any way is through her actions. It’s deeply transactional, every instance of usefulness buying her some purpose, some right to live despite her perceived intrinsic wickedness, mandating that the fire never go out, that there will never be rest or peace or lasting happiness. Not for her. It draws an interesting parallel to Dirk, probably the only character whose neurotic self-hatred is similarly defining and confining. While Dirk lives in constant fear of going overboard, of giving in to his desire to protect and control so much that he would become a monster, Vriska fears just the opposite: That she might slow down. That she might become useless. There are two conversations here, which kind of have to be read against each other, and the comic makes it incredibly hard to consciously do that, since they are literally more than a thousand pages apart. Maybe this is good, since it’d be too on the nose otherwise but that’s for everyone to decide for themselves. The first is a chat between (Vriska) and Meenah on page 6748 about Aranea’s play at cosmic relevance. Well, at least superficially. It’s very clear that (Vriska) is criticizing her younger self by proxy. That’s the reason why Aranea’s actions bother her so much to begin with. She describes it as self-indulgent, as glory hungry and immature, to insert oneself into the narrative’s unfolding, and she’s disgusted by it, seeing her current self-care and quiet observation as the mature option. The comic seems to validate her, showing us a Vriska who is actually happy for once, who’s less caustic and seemingly more introspective. This is a woman who would probably be a lot less divisive and would have a lot more friends… Skip ahead to 7785, and this faux character growth we have been lulled into is thoroughly shattered, when Vriska Prime shows up and points us once more to what Tavros said shortly before getting himself killed. That there’s a difference between being mean and being evil and a difference between being nice and being good. Any functional adult should know this by heart, and sitting back as people die isn’t good. Living it up while sitting on the ultimate weapon to finally put an end to all of this isn’t character growth, it’s narcissism. It is callous through and through. It’s cowardly, it’s selfish, it’s the opposite of introspective: It’s valuing your happiness over the lives of everyone else. Vriska is right to be disgusted by that. Meenah is right to leave. While she does deserve happiness as much as everyone else, Sburb is a game that runs on the blood of children and what makes Vriska heroic is that she will pick self-sacrifice each and every time. Even if she’s motivated by self-loathing, she’ll do what no one else will. She will fight the war alone if she must, for everyone, and expecting nothing in return. (Vriska) hasn’t even stopped hating herself. That reads pretty clearly from the earlier convo. She’s just chosen different parts to hate.

Accusation 10: The dubious ethics of mind control in general

That oh so enviable cerulean swill, it does have its perks though, and I’d imagine some people would see mind control as one of those powers you should just never use unless the alternative is far worse, and I can see why. I’m uncomfortable with it too. As people we quite cling to our notions of free will, but the scourge sisters’ dynamic does something really interesting to throw a wrench into this overly simplistic judgement: Terezi is better at it. All social interaction is manipulation at the end of the day. Every sentence and every gesture deposits thoughts directly into someone’s head, whether intentionally or not. It’s a speaker’s job, and while we all like to think we are too clever to fall for it, there will always be someone who’s cleverer. Despite a complete lack of powers, Terezi is better at leading the impressionable to their doom. The only difference with direct mind control is that we can’t take refuge in our precious intelligence. It works better on some people than on others, just like manipulation, but being resistant to it doesn’t feel earned, and that’s kind of a shitty mindset, so I’d rather see Vriska’s powers as a tool like any other, one which can be used for evil and for good. Like Equius’ strength, like Sollux’s mind powers, like Dave’s time travel. How does she use it then? Mostly for all the things we have discussed before, so I won’t reiterate, but also I find it more interesting to look at the times she doesn’t use it. Vriska has the option to make Tavros fall in love with her. She doesn’t. Vriska has the option to make Tavros kill her, when she’s lying on her quest-bed, but she doesn’t. She tries to convince him, sure, but she doesn’t make him do it, instead resigning herself to slowly and painfully bleed to death. These are the actions of a person who has quite a bit of respect for the agency of others, I’d say, unless there is no other option. Her powers seem to be in responsible hands.

Conclusion

In the end, Vriska is responsible for the trolls winning their session, is one of the only people to actually explain Sburb to the beta kids and finds as well as uses the ultimate weapon against English. In her off time, she commissions Aradia a new body, gets Gamzee under control and fixes Rose’s alcohol problem. To me, it’s not surprising that Aradia and Sollux seem to forgive her. She may be a bitch, and she may not think things through all of the time, but she’s the only person dedicated and stalwart enough to save the universe, and when the final reward comes into sight, she doesn’t even take it. From adversity, through adversity into the unknown... You can see it now. You’re looking at a survivor. You’re looking at someone who did nothing wrong.