To say Homestuck is an important part of my life is an understatement. I think I was around 9 or 10 years old when I was (unintentionally) introduced to Homestuck via my older sister. She tried really, REALLY hard to not facilitate me being invested in the comic. She Failed. From day 1 I liked the simple designs and the funny visual gags and Eridan. Eridan was always my favourite. But the worst part? I didn't know how to read English at the time.
So, my entire understanding of Homestuck back then was a scattered half-comprehension of the fact that it was about something complicated with a lot of characters and aliens murdered each other a lot. I LOVED it. I theorise that it's from this period in my life that I got such an affinity for "patching up" stories, as it were. Being able to string together unrelated events in the narrative into some cohesive overarching plot was my younger self's instinct in order to make something understandable out of the monolith that is Homestuck, and today it's evolved into my incessant need for theories, headcanons that patch plot holes, and generally being overly-obsessed with timeframes and plots making sense.
It is also from Homestuck, you may rightly assume, that I got the cadance I speak in. Unironically, I learned how to read English thanks in large part to Homestuck, and it's flippent use of casual language, purple prose and unabashed swearing is potentially the biggest reason for why I speak like that myself. "Fuck" is a buffer word to me, and I blame Karkat.
All of this to say, though, that I was very, VERY young when I first read Homestuck (debatably not even HAVING a "first read"), and I was also quite young when it ended. And, truth be told, I hated the ending. I was very unsatisfied with everything that took place post-retcon (at the time not even knowing what "retcon" even MEANS so, yeah, another thing Homestuck inedvertantly taught me), and while part of that was due to my biases (I hated Vriska so fucking much) another part is that I just... wasn't media literate enough to really UNDERSTAND the comic. I went cold on Homestuck soon after the ending, other fandoms picking up the slack and letting me be obsessed, and while it remained in my conscience via a staple of my artstyle and vocabulary, it also kind of fell to the wayside. I'd attempt re-reads here and there but never get much farther than Act 4 out of pure BOREDOM with the trolls (which were originally the reason younger me even liked the comic!!)
So, think of me as a born-again Homestuck. I was indoctranated into the religion fandom at a young age, and was entirely too much of a baby literally and figuratively to understand the bible source material and what it was actually trying to convey, so I'm righting those wrongs now. I'm taking up the mantle and rereading the comic from start to finish, to see if I can get fresher perspectives or new opinions, and to finally settle the debate:Is Vriska Valid?
Was the Ending any Good?