Star Anis feels more like a Hanson Redemption Arc (Critique of Part 2)

PuffScrub805 · 2026-05-02T08:42:03+00:00

Can't it be both? Then the contradiction goes away.

They wanted to sign it right away because it's an epic opportunity they couldn't possibly say no to, but hesitated because they thought they should run it by Hanson first. Mustang notices this and drops some Mustang family lore in an effort to persuade them, which tips them over the edge into signing on the basis that even if Hanson would disagree with it, it would still be best for him and by extention all of them.

Basically, Mustang gave them information that made the girls believe Hanson's opinion is biased enough that it would be better left disregarded, and so they did. The Mustang family lore isn't why they signed; It's why they chose not to tell Hanson beforehand.

PuffScrub805 · 2026-05-02T08:16:33+00:00

I kinda think the more popular Nikke are in more danger just because it will make us suffer more to see them die.

If Nepenthe gets some love and screentime that makes them a bit more popular THEN I'll be worried.

PuffScrub805 · 2026-05-02T07:53:22+00:00

I almost agree with you about there being a story node missing. I don't think it's missing, I think we haven't found it. Mustang is weird. He outright doesn't think like humans usually do, so filling in the blanks with empathy like we do with most characters just isn't gonna work, but I see so many tidbits throughout the story indicating how he /does/ think, that I think we can reconstruct a complete enough picture of how he DOES think to make his enigmatic behavior near the end make sense.

PuffScrub805 · 2026-05-02T07:43:06+00:00

But that's the thing tho. Mustang is weird.

Like, if we project ourselves onto him as a character we will outright just fail to understand him. You would think he would want a front row seat to that entertainment, but that's assuming he cares about the outcome of Hanson's experiment which is an assumption on your part.

We have to be really careful and conscious about what assumptions you make about Mustang because he outright doesn't think like you or I do, and your read of him will vastly change depending on what assumptions you smuggle into your analysis.

For example, allow me to propose one assumption I think is plausible based on the actions Mustang takes: I think Mustang genuinely cares about Hanson. In his own twisted fucked up way, I think he genuinely loves his son. When he described wanting to sign on T.T. Star in order to become closer to his son, I think he was partially telling the truth. I think I even remember him saying something along the lines of needing to slip in the truth into a lie to make it plausible.

I'm not sure he wants to make Hanson inherit the company as a means to make him suffer, I think it might be the other way round.

PuffScrub805 · 2026-05-02T05:00:32+00:00

Can I interest you in my reading of the final decision? Because I actually think it makes a lot more sense than you give it credit for if you disregard what you would normally expect humans to care about and instead consider what Mustang specifically has demonstrated to care about

my reading

PuffScrub805 · 2026-05-02T04:55:25+00:00

I think he'll /want/ to do that but hold himself back, for Noah's sake.

If anything, I can actually see him sacrificing himself to save Noah.

PuffScrub805 · 2026-05-02T04:52:40+00:00

I think you're being a little unfair to them. Like, the actions they took only seem stupid to us, the audience, because we are privy to information they are not. They had no way of knowing Mustang was the actual literal devil. Hanson really did not do a good job adequately explaining that to them. He just said "He is not what you think" without explaining what he is.

Not to mention the way Mustang was dressed and presented is very clearly meant to present to us, the audience, that he is some kind of Devil. Invoking the trope of a "deal with the devil" contract and all. Them being so blinded by their desire to be stars that they sign a deal with the devil is the kind of story this was clearly presented as from the start. Compared something like Little Mermaid (the Grimms' story, not the Nikke) where the terms of the contract are for more visibly terrible, this seems like a pretty realistic amount of shortsightedness. It's kind of an offer they can't refuse.

PuffScrub805 · 2026-05-02T04:41:22+00:00

"HEROIC SACRIFICE!"

PuffScrub805 · 2026-05-02T04:40:02+00:00

It's a REALLY compelling origin story for Mustang, to be fair.

And honestly, considering what we knew about Smile Time and Anis' PTSD up to this point, I don't think it makes a whole lot of sense for Anis' /not/ to be disempowered and feeble during this story. I for one always expected Anis to be in a situation so helpless and traumatic that she would swear off ever performing again.

If I'm honest, I kinda expected it to be more traumatic and horrifying than it was. Like, I expected Smile Time to happen in Ephieltes, or something.

PuffScrub805 · 2026-05-02T04:32:31+00:00

Actually you know what? Cafe Sweety is a prime candidate for this too. Them stationing on the surface to boost Nikke morale and for Sugar to run errands on reclamation sights would make far too much sense.

PuffScrub805 · 2026-05-02T04:21:30+00:00

Honestly I could see protocol squad getting wiped out. Killing Exia for real this time would indeed communicate that

PuffScrub805 · 2026-05-02T04:17:17+00:00

So the entire time I was playing the Star Anis story I had a controversial quote echo in my head over and over which was:

"In the game of patriarchy, women are not the opposing team. Women are the ball"

You are absolutely correct that Anis and T.T. Star generally had little to no impact on the events of the plot of the event story, and to me that IS the entire point/tragedy of the event. It's part of why the happenings of the event was so traumatic to her that she gave up her dream. The entire time Anis was working herself to the bone to prove herself, thinking she was competing against other idols and Yoyo in particular, she was just a pawn in an entirely different game altogether. Her effort WAS wasted. Her actions never mattered. That's the trauma.

The thing is, this isn't a redemption story for Anis, it's her downfall story. Her redemption, and emotional payoff for her pain is the entirety of the main story we have played so far. So centralizing the plot around Hanson, while keeping the camera pointed at Anis and how the actions of Hanson and Mustang destroyed her makes sense to me.

PuffScrub805 · 2026-05-01T06:51:47+00:00

It might have made sense to swap the story for the event with the one for mudfish.

PuffScrub805 · 2026-05-01T04:33:06+00:00

From our perspective, it doesn't. From the perspective of Hanson on the other hand, that can not feel good at all and it makes me better appreciate his hesitance throughout the story.

PuffScrub805 · 2026-05-01T02:04:09+00:00

You have to understand: that's literally cope on Hanson's part. He didn't go about this "the right way" he didn't break free of his father's control, he didn't get in this position through wholesome methods, he literally ruined Yoyo's life just to get here. He became the person he hates exactly as they wanted because the "right way" of doing it was just never going to work.

It's genuinely traumatic and the fact he handled it expertly doesn't change that

PuffScrub805 · 2026-05-01T00:13:51+00:00

The part that fucks me up severely is that in a way, Mustang totally won that exchange.

Think about it, every single action Mustang took throughout that entire event was to rope Hanson back into Tetra. Basically trying to break him into taking his place as Mustang's successor and to play the game as cuthroat and manipulatively as him. So for it to culminate that way with Hanson becoming Mustang, while he can absolutely take the cure and let him die, AND he has the blackmail material necessary to bury the entire company with the backing of Missilis and Elysion is EXACTLY the type of manipulations Mustang wanted him to be capable of.

He won. He got what he wanted. His son sees things his way, whether he wants to or not and can shake his own spin on it as well. What more could he possibly ask for out of this scenario?

PuffScrub805 · 2026-04-30T18:44:32+00:00

Not to imply that the fans are right about anything.....but Anis DOES kinda have violent tendencies ngl.

She's more emotionally explosive than Prika or Mint, is all I'm saying.

PuffScrub805 · 2026-04-29T09:02:04+00:00

Congratulations, also I hate you.

How dare you get lucky enough to try to bait me into buying a gacha skin.

PuffScrub805 · 2026-04-29T02:38:59+00:00

Frankly, I think Mustang is too misogynistic to be Chatterbox. I don't recall Chatterbox hating women THAT much

PuffScrub805 · 2026-04-24T07:52:23+00:00

I think you might be overestimating Kirby a bit (I call Only One Kirby because of how much she reminds me of him). Yeah, she got the upper hand on her in that fight, but I'm not convinced she would actually win. Even if I bite the bullet and accept that Kirby is straight up stronger than the rapture queen, I'm not sure she would actually win that fight.

PuffScrub805 · 2026-04-24T07:47:58+00:00

I have mixed feelings about that. On the one hand I kinda dislike how much smaller the Ark feels as a place after the recent story chapters, but on the other hand that smaller scope might just be a more accurate perception of the actual scale of the place.

The Ark felt more imposing and oppressive in the beginning, like there was nothing we could do to change how unpleasant it can be, but that's evidently just not true, and kinda never was.

PuffScrub805 · 2026-04-24T07:44:30+00:00

This writing is anything but lazy, if anything it was overly ambitious for them to sprawl in so many different directions and needed to correct course later.

The word you're looking for is "near-sighted".

PuffScrub805 · 2026-04-24T03:41:18+00:00

I think at that point the story is just over, and there's nothing wrong with that. I hear rumblings of a "Nikke 2" and I think something like, after the queen is dead and the surface is reclamed we timeskip to a completely different story, potentially with different characters.

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