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sage-nebula · 6 years

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Deltarune’s Ending - Kris or Chara?

One of the most commonly debated topics in the fandom right now is whether the person who rips out Kris’ SOUL at the end of the game is Kris themself or Chara. Personally, I’m of two minds about it; my first instinct when I played the game is that it was Chara, but after playing through the ending a couple more times (and getting to know Kris a bit better), I’m starting to lean toward the fact that it may well be Kris, and that there are few different potential motivations for why they might have ripped their SOUL out and tossed it in the rusted birdcage. I'm making this post so I can have my thoughts all laid out in one place. Note that I’m not trying to “prove” or “disprove” either one of these theories, before anyone gets heated; I’m just trying to lay things out as I see them at the moment.

So with that said, let’s go beneath the cut.

Theory One: Chara

The first theory is that Chara took over Kris’ body at the end, ripped out their SOUL, and chucked it in the birdcage. There are quite a few reasons why so many of us jumped to this conclusion, I think, particularly since the ending was so shocking that our screams were heard around the globe. In no particular order:

1.) Kris’ design is very reminiscent of Chara.

While Kris’ hair color and skin color are actually the exact same colors used for Frisk, overall the brown hair + green and yellow striped shirt is very reminiscent of Chara for most of us, even though the green and yellow used in Kris’ shirt is not the same green and yellow used in Chara’s. (But then, the blue and purple used for Dark Kris’ pallet isn’t the same as Frisk’s shirt, either!) Though the exact same shades aren’t used, the colors are still relatively close enough that a player who doesn’t have Chara fresh in their mind won’t notice the difference. I didn’t, at least, and this is probably extra hilarious because I actually spent the entire day cosplaying Chara the day this came out (since it was our Halloween party at work, and I went as Chara since I got the locket with my collector’s edition---and yes, I’d planned this before I ever knew Deltarune was a thing, it was just very lucky timing). While there are definitely visual similarities to Frisk as well (again, the hair and skin color), the sweater color is likely what most players will zero in on, and the yellow and green is very reminiscent of Chara, moreso than Frisk.

2.) Kris has a sweet tooth, as does Chara.

Chara’s sweet tooth is a bit harder to spot, given that they don’t have as much of a public presence in Undertale as Kris does in Deltarune, but not only do they make it a point to gripe about how there isn’t any chocolate in Asgore’s fridge in the genocide run, but if you subscribe to the NarraChara theory, they also provide Frisk with a joke to tell Snowdrake about a kid who ate a pie with their bare hands. Considering that the other jokes that Frisk is provided with by the narrator also relate to Chara’s and Asriel’s childhood, it could stand to reason that the kid who ate the pie with their bare hands . . . was Chara.

And that . . . is a very Kris thing to do.

While I regretfully didn’t grab screenshots of this because I clicked through the dialogue options too quickly (and didn’t wish to play through the entire ending again), when Kris first returns home at the end of the day, Toriel tells them that she baked a pie---and then very sternly tells them to not eat the entire thing again, implying that Kris has done so before. Toriel also, if Kris talks to them about the pie, says that a pie is a perfect cure for loneliness . . . provided she actually gets to eat some. Which, again, implies that Kris has a history of eating entire pies by themself. (And let’s be honest, Kris is a naughty gremlin, evidence of which I’ll provide later in this post. They would totally forgo a fork and knife to just scoop the pie out with their fingers, you know they would.)

Sans, who met Toriel the night before, also has this to say:

Kris not only eats entire pies by themself, but they also break into Toriel’s room to eat all her chocolate. Pie and chocolate are two favorite foods that Chara and Kris seem to have in common.

3.) They both have “a SICK sense of humor!”

In Undertale, we’re told that Chara has a “SICK sense of humor” by Flowey, after Flowey begins to realize that Chara is going to turn on him and kill him, too. Flowey, who is in actuality Asriel and thus knows exactly who Chara is, is accusing Chara of joking about killing him, partially out of hope that Chara is joking, but also because it wouldn’t necessarily be out of character for Chara to do so. After all, we know thanks to the True Lab tapes that Chara laughed when they accidentally poisoned Asgore with buttercups, and he almost died. We know that, on a route where all the dogs have been killed (or perhaps it’s just genocide, but I think it also works on routes where all the Snowdin dogs were killed) that Chara thinks such an act is funny, because when you examine the bag of dog food in Alphys’ lab after the dogs have been killed, the narration notes that “you remember something funny.” We know, if you subscribe to the NarraChara theory, that Chara thinks that the fate of Snowdrake’s mother is hysterical (to the point of “tears rolling down your face”), and is baffled when Frisk doesn’t feel the same way. And during a genocide run, when you’re in the battle with RG 01 and RG 02, after Chara runs the quote about “two lovers [. . .] whose love will end in Hell,” they end it with, “I can’t stop laughing.” Chara has a canonically cruel sense of humor. They find others’ pain and misery to be funny. And while Kris’ sense of humor isn’t exactly the same . . .

. . . it’s similar.

I’ll get more into this later, but Kris is known by their neighbors for being creepy, and we know that they in particular had a fondness for tormenting their classmate and neighbor, Noelle. Noelle is a timid girl who can’t stand up for herself, but numerous dialogue branches tell us that Kris did things like hide under her bed to scare her, put ketchup on their arm and told her it was blood to scare her, told her the pizza restaurant mascot ate children to scare her, and so on. Kris took delight in frightening Noelle, and at least on one occasion had to be beaten with a wiffle ball bat before they’d stop lying. This type of thing feels like the same sort of thing Chara would do. It’s not on the same scale as laughing about people being murdered, no, but it’s a prank at the expense of someone else’s feeling of safety and comfort. It falls in line with someone who has “a SICK sense of humor.”

4.) The way Kris moves at the end of the game is reminiscent of how Chara walks during the genocide run, as told by Papyrus.

While we don’t get to see very much direct movement from Chara during Undertale given that we control them most of the time (most), their gait is described by Papyrus right before that battle:

Having one’s walk described as a “shamble about” paints a very striking image. Chara, while controlling Frisk, is not walking normally; their walk is a slow, awkward shuffle. While I don’t have a gif of this on hand, a “shamble” is the best way I can think of to describe the way Kris walks after they pick themselves up off the floor at the end of the game, even before they’ve ripped out their slow. It’s a very slow, awkward walk; they can’t even hold their body up straight. While we never got to actually see Chara “shamble about from place to place” in Undertale, we were told that’s how they moved, and we did get to see that in Deltarune with Kris there at the end. (It’s notable, too, that this is a striking difference from the only other time we saw Kris move on their own, which was when they dove to protect Susie from the king.)

5.) They flashed a slasher smile, and raised a knife.

Chara was very fond of knives. At the beginning of a genocide route, while looking through Toriel’s kitchen, they ask in red text, “Where are the knives.” At the end of a genocide route, when they find the Real Knife in their former bedroom, the flavor text reads, “Here we are!” While knives are arguably also Kris’ signature weapon due to the fact that they used a sword in the dark kingdom (and that “kris” is a type of dagger), the association that Chara has with knives can’t be overlooked.

Additionally, there’s the slasher smile. In Undertale, whenever a monster encounter begins on a genocide route, the “!” that normally appears above Frisk’s head is replaced with “=)” as the battle begins. While that’s not necessarily a slasher smile per se, we know that Chara is also prone to doing a “creepy face.” We’re told this the first time during the True Lab video tape movie marathon, wherein Asriel (in the past) urges Chara to “do [their] creepy face” for the camera. Near the end of the genocide route, meanwhile, Chara makes a “creepy face” at Flowey, which causes him distress and panic. We don’t know for sure that this is a smile, but given how happy Chara is to kill and how the smiley appears above them every time a new encounter starts, I’d wager that a slasher smile is definitely the kind of “creepy face” Toby had in mind when writing those lines and designing this character. (Additionally, I believe that Flowey tells Chara to stop looking at him with that “creepy face” at about the same time he accuses Chara of having a “SICK sense of humor,” so it would make sense if Chara was smiling there, rather than wearing any other kind of expression.)

(Note: I’m not including the red eyes here because although it’s popular fanon to give Chara red eyes, I don’t think we ever truly see their eyes turn red in the game. Their eyes are hidden in the flashbacks by their bangs---another visual similarity with Kris!---and at the end of a genocide route, their eyes look dark. I don’t think they turn red; while they do change, it’s turn into completely black voids that dark goo bleeds out of. They might flash red when Chara does their jump scare, but the entire screen does, so that doesn’t necessarily make their eyes special.

EDIT: It has come to my attention that I was being very forgetful last night / early this morning when I wrote this post, because Chara does have red eyes in the soulless pacifist endings. Therefore, the similarities between Chara and Kris jump up even higher, with Kris’ red eyes mirroring Chara’s in those endings. Carry on!)

All of this said, while this does explain why so many of us jumped to thinking that Chara had taken over Kris somehow, this evidence fails to answer the crucial question: How? Deltarune is an alternate universe from Undertale; the two stories have overlapping characters, and perhaps exist in the same multiverse, but our Undertale playthroughs have no effect on this game. Thus, Chara’s line about “let’s move onto the next” from the end of the genocide route has no bearing on this one, particularly since not all of us completed genocide runs (and thus it would be rather punishing to players who did their best to leave the Undertale characters in peace to unleash Chara on this new cast anyway). Chara can’t have made it to Kris because of us, because not all of us made that deal with Chara in the first place.

And then there’s the deal itself. After successfully completing a genocide run, Chara agrees to allow you to remake the world if, and only if, you give them your (or rather, Frisk’s) SOUL. If you refuse, Chara tells you to die then, and leaves you in the void for a long while. When they connect with you again, they again demand your SOUL. From that point forward, every pacifist run you do will be a “soulless” pacifist run.

So here’s the second question: If Chara wanted a SOUL so badly, why would they rip Kris’ SOUL out of their body and throw it in the birdcage?

The SOUL is what Chara wanted, because the SOUL gives them the ability to move freely. If they had a SOUL here, it makes no sense that they’d discard it. And no, they can’t have two SOULs in the same body, because we learned from Undertale that humans cannot absorb human SOULs. They’ve got the one SOUL, and that’s it. Chara wanted a SOUL, so their actions there at the end (aside from the knife and slasher smile) don’t make a whole lot of sense given their original motivations.

And, again, we still don’t know how they would have gotten there in the first place, unless the fountain had something to do with it. We do know that Kris’ SOUL behaved strangely when they approached the fountain, but we have no further context for what that meant at this time.

Anyway, that’s the Chara theory. Moving on to . . .

Theory Two: Kris

The second theory is that this was an act from Kris themself.

First and foremost, let’s get this out of the way: Kris is a strange child. They are a naughty little gremlin and I love them for it. Note that I use the word “child” loosely here; we don’t have an exact age for Kris, but Toriel notes that they’ll be joining Asriel in university “soon,” and their classroom is noticeably more grown-up than the one Toriel teaches in (which Susie calls the classroom for babies). Given that Kris is noted to be heading off to university soon, that their classmates are old enough to work, that Monster Kid was aged up to Monster Teen to join the class (and that they’re in class with characters like Snowdrake, who were teens in the original game), I think it’s safe to say that Kris is actually a strange teenager, rather than a strange child. Nevertheless, I am an adult, and so teenagers are children to me, so strange child they shall remain.

Regardless.

Our first clue that something is not quite right with Kris comes from the very first scene of the game, where we get a look at the bedroom Kris shares with Asriel:

Asriel’s side of the room is bright and beautiful. He has a nice computer, tons of trophies, a bedspread with a nice pattern, star stickers, a flower portrait, an alarm clock . . . it’s clear that Asriel was a well-loved child who took good care of his things. By contrast, Kris’ side of the room is downright depressing. Their bedspread is a drab grey, as is their lamp. They have nothing on their shelves or on their dresser. And at the foot of their bed . . .

There’s a questionable stain on the floor, and then the birdcage and the wagon, one of which (and we’d assume it’s the wagon, but given what happens at the end . . .) has “seen a few crashes.” If you knew nothing about Toriel or Asgore, you would assume that Kris was the unloved child, while Asriel was doted upon and spoiled rotten. We know this isn’t true; we see evidence in-game that both Toriel and Asgore love Kris very much, and want to make sure that’s known. Given how loving both Toriel and Asgore are (and how loving we know Asriel was to Kris, given that we’re told that Asriel used to do things like take Kris to the diner to get hot chocolate after their parents divorced, or how he used to carry them to school), we know that Kris wasn’t neglected or abused. Their side of the room is this barren, depressing, and creepy out of their own choice. And this is further cemented by their . . . other behaviors (a.k.a. here come the naughty gremlin receipts):

These aren’t even all the receipts I could have used; they’re just a small sample. Kris is the type of person who:

Eats entire pies by themself

Breaks into their mother’s room to eat all her chocolate

Drops bath bombs in toilets

Torments shy and timid neighbors (hiding under Noelle’s bed to scare her, telling her the pizza restaurant mascot was alive and ate children to scare her, putting ketchup on their arm and telling her it was blood to scare her . . .)

Spends church services trying to steal “sick fruit juice” instead of paying attention

Routinely forgets their pencils at home and bums pencils off their classmates (and let’s be honest, Kris isn’t the type to return those pencils, either)

Sleeps in class

Doesn’t wake up on time to the point where their big brother had to carry them to school on a regular basis

Is poorly behaved enough to be known as “creepy” by a neighbor, to the point where he tells them this to their face

I could go on. As much as Susie has been ostracized for being thought of as scary and intimidating, it seems that Kris has suffered much the same fate, with Asriel as their only friend, pretty much. It’s implied that Kris, like Susie, didn’t necessarily always want this to be the case; there’s a story told by Bratty (I think---might’ve been Catty, but I’m pretty sure it was Bratty) where they pulled the same trick on Kris that they did on Burgerpants in the original, telling Kris that they could be friends if Kris got them burgers---and then Kris did. (I think it’s also implied Kris stole the burgers, so again---naughty gremlin.) Kris wouldn’t have gone to those lengths if they didn’t want to be friends. But somewhere along the line, it seems Kris stopped caring, because Noelle comments on how odd it is that Kris is being so talkative, and we also see that no one wants to be their partner in class (and that, according to Berdy, Toriel is usually their partner). Kris’ bizarre behavior no doubt contributed to the reason why they don’t have many (if any) friends around town.

So with that being said, the idea that Kris is simply a creepy gremlin who likes to rip their SOUL out and throw it in a birdcage is not altogether that farfetched. After all, if Chara could do creepy things like poison themselves with buttercups so that they could fuse with Asriel and go on a killing spree, who’s to say that Kris couldn’t do creepy things like shove their hand into their own chest to rip their SOUL out and toss it in a birdcage? Chara and Kris do have a lot of similarities, after all, right down to their “SICK sense of humor,” so it’s not out of the question to think that maybe Kris is just the type of person to rip their own SOUL out and throw it in a birdcage at night. Maybe they’re just like that sometimes.

(Also, I won’t lie: The jokes about Asriel sighing and shoving the SOUL back in every morning are hilarious mental images for me.)

But apart from Kris just being like that sometimes, another idea struck me for why Kris might feel compelled to do such a thing . . . well, two other ideas, actually.

The first, and most basic, is that Kris was trying to reassert control. This is a theory that a few people have picked up on, I think. We know that we control the SOUL, and throughout the game we controlled Kris. We were told at the beginning that our choices don’t matter, but Kris’ choices ended up not mattering time and again throughout the game. And this has a noticeable effect; numerous people comment on the fact that Kris seems to be behaving oddly. The nurse comments that Kris can’t play the piano well even though they were always able to before. Noelle comments that it’s unusual for Kris to socialize. A few characters remark that Kris looks ill. They all shrug it off, but it’s clear that while we’re in control of Kris, they’re not in control of themselves, and so ripping the SOUL out at the end might be their way of taking control back (and perhaps the knife and slasher smile are meant to intimidate us rather than serve as a warning for what Kris is about to do to everyone else). That we can still control the SOUL while it’s in the birdcage is indicative of this as well.

The second thought that occurred to me, though . . . is that maybe Kris is trying to make themselves less human, and more monster.

Think about it:

Monster SOULs are not like human SOULs. For one thing, monster SOULs cannot persist after death. Boss monster SOULs can, for a short time, but even they disintegrate after a few moments. Human SOULs also carry incredible power; it would take many monster SOULs to equal even one human SOUL. Combine this with the fact that human SOULs come in multiple colors, and have multiple abilities, and there is a lot that separates human SOULs---and therefore humans---from monsters.

Kris, as far as we know, is the only human in town, and they seem to be rather isolated and ostracized. Again, I don’t think this is a fault on the Dreemurrs’ part, or even the neighbors’ part; as we’ve established, Kris is a creepy gremlin, so we can’t really blame the neighbors for not wanting to spend much time around them. However, Kris’ isolation is still notable. Their side of the room is barren, in stark contrast to Asriel’s. The game console under Asriel’s bed has one standard controller, and one knockoff controller. These are little cues that point to the fact that Kris may feel as though they don’t fit in, despite the love they’ve received from their adopted family. And in fact, just like the story we have wherein Kris tried to befriend Bratty, we also get a story that strongly implies that Kris does wish they were a monster like everyone else:

When Kris was a little one, they asked when their horns would grow in---when they’d look more like their adoptive family. To placate them, Asgore and Toriel bought Kris a pair of fake horns, and Kris---wanting so much to be a monster just like their family---wore them for months. Eventually, Kris gave up; they clearly knew the horns were fake and gave up thinking they could ever be a monster like their family, something which may have caused the depression that led to them leaving their room so barren. (Because I’m sorry, but I can’t look at a room like that, and behavior like this, and not think that Kris has some major emotional issues going on.) We don’t have concrete proof that Kris still wants to be a monster today, but it’s possible (and perhaps even probable) that longing never went away---and now that they’ve taken a trip to the dark kingdom, and knows what their SOUL looks like and how to access it . . . maybe they figured out a way to get one step closer to being a monster just like they’ve always dreamed.

(Or so they think, but remember what Gaster that voice said at the beginning: no one can choose what they are in this world.)

I think that if it truly is Kris at the end, then Kris doing what they did because they want to be a monster and are willing to do anything they can to be a monster rather than a human makes them a more interesting (and sympathetic) character than if they did it just because they’re a creepy weirdo (as Chara was before them according to Papyrus). But that said, all of this is speculation, and we won’t know for sure what’s going on until the full game comes out . . . whenever that is. (And even then we still might not know for sure, because Toby likes to leave ambiguity in his games, and to be honest, I think that makes everything more fun.)

Either way, these are my thoughts on this for now. Goodnight.

#deltarune #kris dreemurr #chara dreemurr #meta #deltarune spoilers #delta rune spoilers #undertale

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keeper-of-words · 6 years

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The Problem With the Spn “Family”

I tried to find links for proof but I couldn’t find any cause I’m bad at this. So work with me if I get some of this wrong or some of my info is outdated I’m writing this from memory. Warning, this will be pretty long.

Remember a little while ago? Like yesterday maybe... I don’t know- who knows? Certainly not I! But I saw some people who were really Proud of themselves, oh so very Proud, for being so much better than a different group of people. Now, what on earth was that about? Oh! Yes! I remember now! It was about the Cockles(?) panel! And the J2M panel! Some people were hella shook about Misha Collins being excluded from the questions, which in all fairness is pretty rude. But like, Jensen and Jared are adults, now, I have no idea what kinda questions were being asked but they could’ve asked Misha for his input, they shouldn’t have to but they could’ve worked to include him. NOW ONTO THE COCKLES(?) PANEL. Now I know it was a big thing “Boo hoo, jared’s incroaching on our ship” and yeah, that kinda sucks. But like... get over it. The problem is how Proud the Cockles fans were for being so much more inclusive of Jared than the other group was. Sorry, I don’t know the fanon name. But they were so aggressively Proud about being so much better and i just ????? Are you really petting yourself on the back for something so mundane? Are you really that petty? Yeah it’s not want you wanted but going on the internet and saying how much better you are instead of confronting the problem- and oh, i don’t know, suggesting some ways to fix it?- you’re bragging about being a better person, which in my opinion isn’t that much better.

Now just in general the hate in this fandom- I’m sorry- Family. Is disturbing. Ya’ll remember a general amount of time ago (I don’t remember when this was, sorry, like genuinely non sarcastically sorry about loose grip on time) the muffins? Cause I remember the muffins. The muffins with the razor blades (or something sharp) that were given to this spn fangirl by another spn fangirl. Now! In all honesty, i don’t remember why this happened, but I’m like 83% sure that it had something to do with destiel. The poster had photos and everything (of which i did not click the links because i was a scared young child (I still wouldn’t click the links tbh)) That poor girl had to go to the hospital. She had major damage done to her mouth (which is kinda important) and it was all over a simple fictional ship. Then there are shippers in general. Now I don’t know if my last paragraph made it clear, but I don’t really care for Cockles. I think it’s kinda creepy. But destiel, oh hell yeah, I love me some destiel. Sastiel tho? Not too fond of that nuh uh, or sabriel really. My main is Destiel. And you know what? That’s fine! It’s also fine if you ship Sastiel! Or Sabriel! Or Literally anything in the show! Cause it’s your ship. But destielhellers ( I don’t know how to spelll) are the destiel shippers who literally harass the actors about destiel. Harassment baad. Now Cockles in general I just don’t like cause fore the most part none of us are particularly close to the actors so we only see a fraction of their lives ship if you will, I’m just not fond. But I’m getting off track The problem is that people get hate, death threats, and injuries because. and there are the people on the other side who are sending that. Now lets just say this: For every person who recieves a hate message there is a person who sent it. There boom now the fandom is split 50 50 (People sending hate could also be recieveing and also the people who never rcieved hate but we ain’t gonna acknowledge that cause I’m failing math). That means that at least 50% of the fandom are assholes. sooo yeah.

Let’s be real if my family was at all like this family I would disown myself (My actual irl uncle called me a bitch once (1) and i still avoid him) it’s horrible and toxic and you know what? I’ve never once sent hate. I do my best to support those who do receive hate in a way that I think is helpful, and if they say it’s not helpful I change it to a way that they say helps. So when I see these call out posts for the supernatural fandom I feel safe in knowing that it isn’t aimed at me. Could I speak out more? Probably. Could I donate to their Ko-Fi and commission them? I wish but I have like 86 cents so... Someday tho! And if you’ve done what you can, what they say helps and you haven’t sent them hate then you can feel safe (In my opinion at least) knowing that it doesn’t include you.

Alright, so I wrote this in the same way I speak. This is how I would talk if I was ranting to one of my friends. So here’s the TLDR: The supernatural fandom is trash. It has always been trash the entire time that I’ve been on tumblr. It’s full of entitled brats and abusers. And when someone complains about the entire fandom, and you know 100% for sure that it wasn’t you then shut up. It’s not about you, don’t make it about you. Get over yourself.

Personal note: I’m 16. I’ve lived perhaps a tenth of my life. And I am sitting here crying. I’m crying from anger and sadness. Every single day I see my favorite artist get ripped to shreds, and try to put herself back together again with little to no help, only just to get attacked again and again and again. I just want it to stop. I’m tired of people acting like she’s in the wrong, but she is not. And here recently, it seemed like people were finally listening, the hate didn’t stop, but people were listening. And now? Now that people are calling the Spn fandom out on it’s shit? Everybody who these callouts don’t apply to is getting offended and now they’re attacking her. She said something a few days ago on a post about “good people” in the spn family and how those “Good people” were haters. And she got attacked over it.

@eliciadonze I am so sorry. I’m so sorry for what people do to you. But it’s not your fault it’s never been your fault. I hope someday it gets better. You deserve so much better. I am so sorry. I hope someday people listen to you. I hope someday you get treated like the amazing person you are.

#I'm gonna commission you someday #I promise #I just ca't right now #but I want to support you more #you deserve it

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