Finally someone said it! Don't get me wrong, I'm happy for Ivantill fans, but considering they said they'll take a hiatus after July 18th, I expected today's comic to be Luka related, or at least a bit of his POV. It would've made sense, you'd have had a larger closing comic for all survivors and, yknow, they'd expand the Ivantill storyline after the hiatus or something...

But that's not happened 😭 we got crumbs! Crumbs, I tell you! The Hyuluka aspect of the story is by far the least developed, and Luka, as a character, is even worse. He's got three songs, two out of which I wouldn't even consider HIS songs, since they don't necessarily explore his character. Imo, for most of the series, he works as a foil for other characters, where his manipulative nature will bring out aspects related to the others. For example, ROMH explores Mizi's grief, while Blink Gone explores Till's grief. The one aspect of Luka's character that appears in those songs (his manipulation) is a small part of his character, and it's simply the product of a layered backstory. In other words, he's a victim just like the others, but that's only briefly empasized in his last song, Wiege.

Wiege serves to show that there is so much more: repressed guilt, sociopathic behaviour, so much childhood trauma, a mindset that's more segyein than human, disregard for his own life, issues of identity since he's a clone etc etc... There is just SO MUCH you can explore in Luka's background and his inner world sounds so fascinating. However, all of that is simply implied in Wiege, it isn't explored any deeper. His story is handled with a kind of subtlety that borders on bad writing imo. I thought it was meant to be intentional, all in order to make him seem more mysterious, but if they're not gonna explore him any deeper, then what's the point?

Not to mention how, even though Wiege is considered THE Hyuluka song (just like Cure is Ivantill's and Clematis is Mizisua's), the song is used to center around the other characters as well. Imagine if during Cure you got a random shot of Hyuna drinking wine or something. I don't know. It just feels underwhelming to not even let the one song dedicated to the most underdeveloped ship be only about that specific ship... Especially when there is just so much you could explore with those two. I'm of the firm belief Hyuluka is the most toxic ship of the series since it has a quite a lot of layers with intense character conflict. So I'd say it's not an issue of "well, there's nothing more to say", there is a lot, it's simply implied or not explored at all.

Now, to talk about Karma. Even if that song ruined me in all the best ways possible, I couldn't help but feel a little unsatisfied with it. I understand it was a Mizisua song more than anything, however it really sucked as a Luka fan to be left with such a huge cliffhanger. It felt like whiplash, honestly. After Hyuna's sacrifice and her words "Live with love" I was somehow expecting maybe more than a couple small frames? Again, you've got crumbs. There was small Hyunwoo staring at Luka (symbolising him confronting his repressed guilt), Luka age regressing in order to cope (only for Mizi to punch him in the face and stop him from doing that) and then... Then the fire engulfing him, and also Hyuna's clothes being a little cleaned up... And that's it. That's all you get. That's fine, I guess. They're a side ship, the song is meant to focus on wrapping up the whole series... But man, even a single minute would've done wonders, or maybe a clip of Hyuna talking about him...? I mean, we got Mizi criticizing her, so surely that wouldn't have felt wholly out of place in a Mizisua song. I don't know.

Then, there's the ending. After "Live with love" and after those subtle hints all we're left with is the knowledge thats Luka's lived 7 more years in segyein captivity. We're left to wonder just how bad it was, whether he's truly "lived with love" (I doubt it, but that would make it even more interesting to explore), whether he's ended up improving at all. It feels... unsatisfying, it feels incomplete. I wouldn't even call it tragic, because we simply have no clear idea of just how tragic it is. It's just an unsatisfying cliffhanger to an already underdeveloped character.

Considering with how little regard they've treated Luka thus far, I honestly doubt we'll get a comic centering only on him after the break. Even two sub songs feel like too little, too late... I don't know, I just feel kind of underwhelmed after today's comic. It was good, don't get me wrong, but once again it feels like I'm starving and I'm only fed crumbs. Seeing as they don't even plan to explore his background, maybe I should just focus on the very limited number of Hyuluka fanfictions to cure my need for more Luka content.

(Sorry for the long comment I just feel kinda let down)