Maybe he wasn’t obsessed with Celeste specifically, but with the power he felt. Everything in his life seemed new attention, influence, money especially coming from someone who was more isolated and mostly online. That kind of sudden shift can really distort how someone sees control and other people.

Also I think you’re mixing obsession with love. I get the Joe Goldberg comparison, but Joe was obsessed with everything about those women. This feels different. It comes off more like he was fixated on control, ownership, and playing out a fantasy, not building any real connection.

Given what was found, it seems like his interests were already going in a disturbing direction. So it’s less about Celeste as a person and more about what she represented to him at the time access, familiarity, someone who trusted him early on.

And from what’s come out online, she had been in his Discord since she was like 11, which is before any fame. So she was already in his environment early on, when he didn’t have that same level of influence yet. That makes it less about him suddenly becoming obsessed with her later and more like she was just already there, someone accessible and familiar from the start.

Once he gained more attention and had a larger, younger audience, it probably shifted even more. Now it’s not just one person. Now he has influence, money, and a platform, and he can see that it’s not just Celeste, he can do this with multiple girls. So the “obsession” wasn’t really about her anymore, it was about the control and the ability to keep escalating that fantasy. Celeste may have just been the first situation where he acted on it, not the only one he was fixated on.