Theatre Kid at 11 PM at Denny's Energy

April 18, 2021 11:01 AM

YouTuber Sarah Z has posted A Brief History of Homestuck, clocking in at a bit over 2 hours. The official version of the webcomic is here, although you may want to use the unofficial version with Flash support if you intend to read back through it. The sequel is here. Previously on MeFi.
posted by graymouser (10 comments total)

I loved Homestuck very much, and have continued to read through and enjoy each new spinoff as they've come out over the years. I made some important contributions to the community. I lived for the magic of seeing the homestuck update notifier pop up in the corner of my desktop at any hour of day or night, without any warning, ushering me on another installment of that epic journey. None of that goodwill could entice me to watch some youtuber's two-hour monologue.


(But in writing this, I learn that Psycholonials is already out, which I didn't think would happen for months yet, so that's my next move.)
posted by one for the books at 2:14 PM on April 18, 2021

Conversely, I've never been into Homestuck, and couldn't even get started with MS Paint Adventures, but I found this whole thing weirdly compelling (as I have with some of Sarah Z's other exhaustive histories of things that I wasn't particularly into, such as Supernatural or DashCon), and am both somewhat envious of the people who really got into it and kind of glad that I didn't invest too much time in sampling it.
posted by Halloween Jack at 2:54 PM on April 18, 2021 [4 favorites]

For those interested in reading Homestuck but intimidated by the length, I recommend Problem Sleuth, which was the proto-Homestuck in a way. It's very funny, better-paced imo, and you can read the whole thing in an evening. If you're into that and want more, going into Homestuck from there will have you well set-up on the in-jokes and the general theme of satirizing video-game puzzle bullshit.

One major difference, which I think is useful for context, is that all the "commands" in Problem Sleuth were reader-submitted (whereas Homestuck started that way but quickly abandoned it). So, the "puzzles" throughout the story were literally puzzles that Hussie was setting for the audience to solve.
posted by rifflesby at 5:57 PM on April 18, 2021 [5 favorites]

About a quarter of the way through it, and I agree with Halloween Jack. I’ve given Homestuck a few tries, bounced off it hard, but I’m willing to let Sarah Z try and explain it to me because she’s good at doing that. She’s energetic, kind, and enthusiastic about everything she presents, and that carries me through topics that don’t always appeal in their normal form. Even if I find the thing or the fans uninteresting she helps me see why others find it compelling.

I kind of wish COVID hadn’t doubled the length of many videos, though. Series that used to top out at 35-40 minutes are now hitting the 2 hour mark....
posted by GenjiandProust at 6:26 PM on April 18, 2021 [4 favorites]

I also have to confess that I find the... giant blue ears of corn?... design on the couch she’s sitting on weirdly compelling. A+++ YouTube decor.
posted by GenjiandProust at 6:29 PM on April 18, 2021

I wrote a "what is Homestuck about?" article for Hooded Utilitarian back in like 2012 that was recommended by Scott Pilgrim author Bryan Lee O'Malley to his couple hundred thousand twitter followers, and then about a week later Andrew Hussie wrote his own "what is Homestuck about?" essay wherein he seemed peeved by all the previous ones (including mine?), and then sometime after that Bryan Lee O'Malley interviewed Andrew Hussie about his creative process, so I'd like to take credit for my small role in outing Bryan Lee O'Malley as a Homestuck and allowing this interview to happen.

I haven't read the new one yet though. There are way too many characters, without being actively involved the fandom I don't have the mental bandwidth to keep track of them all. These days I just stick to trying to keep track of all the characters and plotlines in Hunter x Hunter, which like Homestuck also gives you a bunch of mnemonic devices to help you keep track of everything (four playing card suits / 12 aspects / 14 classes / 12 items in the zodiac etc etc etc) but unlike Homestuck doesn't have any time travel paradoxes or long-running and elaborate chains of events that run for years just so the author can make one meme-y injoke.
posted by subdee at 8:41 PM on April 18, 2021 [1 favorite]

Maybe I'll watch this two-hour video so I can remember all the plotlines again and finally read the sequel...

As good a time as any to direct you to Andrew Hussie's instagram. It brings me joy. Down with the confines of binary gender, up with whatever is going on in these photos.
posted by subdee at 9:04 PM on April 18, 2021

lots of great analysis here! especially liked the breakdown of how trolls made the perfect fan-projection characters

also, as a Homestuck fan who was 30-something & did not participate in any fandom activities other than reading the dang thing & discussing it with a single other 30-something Homestuck fan:

a) this video is very enlightening
b) sure don't regret my decision to not go on forums & get into fights about Vriska
posted by taquito sunrise at 2:47 AM on April 19, 2021 [4 favorites]

lots of great analysis here! especially liked the breakdown of how trolls made the perfect fan-projection characters

Yeah - I think the fact that so much of the video is analysis of the characters and fan reactions to them really tells a lot about the series.
posted by graymouser at 4:06 AM on April 19, 2021 [1 favorite]

And right on time... Mx. Hussie officially out as nonbinary as of yesterday.

https://vriskarlmarx.tumblr.com/post/649100826937262080/apparently-andrew-hussie-came-out-as

Congrats to them!
posted by subdee at 1:09 PM on April 21, 2021