T H I S .

i know i’m not very active here and just. lurk. but

T H I S .

Literally this post summarizes my exact thoughts.

There was so little content of The Wall! It was so disappointing! And I’m not just saying this because I run a blog; The fact that we had so little attention of the Wall legit upsets me! Listen, I love the Toppat Clan with all my heart, but having more content for The Wall would be slightly preferred imo

The Wall is home to two of my favourite characters- The amount of lore we could have had with The Wall would’ve given so much to work with! We basically know nothing about Dmitri, Grigori- Nobody! Like,, wtf did Frosty do to get his ass trapped in jail? I Know it’s irrelevant but I wanna know!

We have enough information about most of the Toppats to at least know what personality they have, which jokes they work with and don’t work with, a comprehensive backstory we can piece together through lingering lore pieces, yadda yadda...but wtf do you know about The Wall? Basically nothing! Why is Dmi’s reputation so important to him? What even is the backstory of The Wall to begin with? Who ran The Wall before Dmitri? We get that with the Toppat Clan- In fact, we are literally shown each former leader through pictures and given information about them through bios! We get nothing with Dmi and it makes me SAD.

Don’t even get me started with how badly Grigori —unironically my secound favourite character in the who series— got treated!

Where were his L I N E S-

Mans LITERALLY had no voice acting in CtM- I Don’t know why I care so much, but I do-

Just give The Wall the representation it needs- My only reference for these fuckers is the fandom and child I-

Man.

Sorry for the rant I’m very passionate about these things-

The Wall should’ve played a bigger role in Completing the Mission: An analysis/infodump/rant that’s honestly longer than it should be

Hello dear subscribers I am here today to talk about not only my disappointment regarding how little we see of The Wall in Completing the Mission, but to analyze what could’ve been a really intriguing character and a perfect foil for Henry (in a different way than Ellie).

Part 1: Dmitri Johannes Petrov, a break in the genre

What makes Dmitri appealing as a character (to me at least) is much different than what makes other characters in The Henry Stickmin Collection appealing. What makes other characters in THSC so appealing?

Sometimes it’s their generally goofy or otherwise lighthearted personalities

Or a humorous element of an otherwise serious character.

Sometimes it’s an unexpected facet of a character that’s rarely shown to others.

However, none of the humorous elements that we love other Henry Stickmin characters for apply to Dmitri.

Relative to other characters, Dmitri is very serious in tone, such that trying to imagine him in a humorous scenario doesn’t feel fitting to his character. We don’t see him involved in any of Henry’s humorous gags, or even any of his own. Even Grigori, his second-in-command, has his humorous moments.

While it can be easily argued that this makes Dmitri’s personality stale in comparison to other characters, I’d argue the opposite. Dmitri’s serious no-nonsense tone makes for a very interesting foil to Henry–not just for how he behaves, but how he forces Henry (and others) to behave.

Part 2: More on Dmitri

So, we know that Dmitri is a serious character, beyond what we normally see. This no-nonsense attitude of his is reflected in how he talks to other people.

While he maintains some level of respect with Grigori (at least as far as we know from what little interaction we see between them), he’s much ruder to lower ranking employees at The Wall.

What else do we know about Dmitri?

Remember when I said that characters in THSC are often made more appealing because of a rarely seen side of them? This actually applies to Dmitri as well, but in a more subtle way than the examples above.

In Dmitri’s case, this “rarely seen side” to him is how much he cares about his reputation. He gets irritable at other members of The Wall when it gets threatened, as shown above. However, when Henry and Ellie escape and release the other convicts, he expresses to Henry just how serious it is to him–in a notably quieter voice than usual.

He takes his reputation very, very seriously, to the point of becoming vengeful if it’s damaged. In Completing the Mission, he ignores the entire Toppat Clan (and another government) to focus on Henry and Ellie.

It even drives him to desperation at the end of Toppat Recruits, being the source of his most memorable quote (and last words).

Yet, even with his apparent concern about maintaining his reputation and his anger when Henry and Ellie get in the way of that, we only get to see him in one route in Completing the Mission. (Okay, technically 2 but Pardoned Pals and Toppat Recruits are different endings branching off the same route.) These same motives could’ve put him as an antagonist in other routes branching off of Convict Allies.

Part 3: Grigori Olyat

Yet another reason I wish The Wall got incorporated more actually has to do with Dmitri’s second-in-command, Grigori. Despite being the secondary antagonist of Fleeing the Complex, we actually know very little about Grigori.

First of all, what is his relationship with Dmitri like? Is their relationship strictly work-related, or does it go deeper than that? Is it a friendly, fulfilling relationship for both of them, or is there some level of toxicity on one or both sides?

Stepping away from Dmitri, does Grigori have anyone else at the Wall that he considers close, or at the very least is on good terms with? Or do other employees at The Wall avoid him? Does he have anyone outside of the Wall that he’s friends with?

Out of the major characters in THSC, Grigori is easily the one we have the least information on, and even Toppat Recruits/Pardoned Pals does nothing to expand on his character.

Even with how little we see of Grigori, there are still noticeable differences that we can see between him and Dmitri. For one, Henry is still allowed to be his goofy self around Grigori, as long as Dmitri isn’t also present.

It’s also likely that Grigori is younger or less experienced working at the wall than Dmitri is, given that he’s unfamiliar with the protocol for dead inmates.

Also, accurate to his bio, Grigori is much more skilled with combat (and he’s even pretty acrobatic with it).

Whether Grigori and Dmitri’s relationship is positive, negative, or strictly work-related, these differences would’ve made for an interesting dynamic.

Part 4: The Lore

The lore surrounding The Wall could honestly be its own series of posts. But this post is honestly long enough as it is, so I’ll briefly summarize some of the more interesting aspects off the top of my head.

Multiple employees at The Wall are armed with spears that can blast lasers that instantly disintegrate any person they touch.

One employee was apparently hiding the fact that he’s an earth bender.

One of the inmates is an actual alien. This is never expanded upon.

There’s an unknown history between The Wall and the Toppat Clan, which has resulted in at least one locked up Toppat (probably more) and two undercover Toppats working at The Wall: Wallace Pemberton and Gordon Smith. Wallace Pemberton is confirmed to be loyal to the Toppats, but it’s unknown whether Smith is also a spy or whether he’s a double agent for The Wall.

So, with all that out of the way, and with this post having sat in my drafts for almost a month now, I hope this suffices for an explanation of why I wish The Wall had gotten more attention.