Writing Discussion - Blog Posts

blaire is peak and why rusty can't write truly evil women

If you've found this post, I don't need to introduce Leasebound to you.

Instead, we're going to talk about the fandom.

Leasebound's fandom has a sort of Lemony-Snicket-esque schism, with Rusty's intended audience and (hilariously) the exact opposite. I've seen both sides of the Leasebound audience, and I've noticed something interesting.

...nobody hates Blaire.

Okay, that's a HELL of a sentence to make, and very exaggerated. I've seen 'Blaire unenjoyers' and other people treating Blaire like the Eric Cartman of Leasebound, it's an eye-catching statement that makes people read more of the text post.

But I wouldn't call it wrong, I'd give it a 'hyperbolic.'

Even on the side of Rusty's intended audience, Blaire isn't loathed. I've seen many enjoyers of Blaire who either talk about how much they went her to talk gender to them, so to say. On the flipside, the worst interpretation of Blaire is a misogynist who pushes her activism on other people, which is more or less her canon intent.

But if Blaire was as bad as Rusty Hearts portrayed her, I don't think we'd see so much art of Blaire. In fact, I put down a poll, and Blaire pretty much took the #1 spot for the 'character with the most fanart' almost instantly, beating out characters such as Jaden (who took silver), Riley, and Violet. And it pretty much sticks!

I've seen a lot of Blaire fanart from the Leasebound tag on both sides! I've seen a lot of Blaire discussion and discourse on both sides, either about the possibility of a redemption arc, a rewrite, thirsting over her, etc.

So...we can pretty much say Blaire is a bad strawman.

Strawmen are supposed to be one-note characters the main cast is supposed to be more interesting than and can fight with no pushback. Blaire is massively popular across the board in the Leasebound fandom, has discussions about her that are multi-layered, and has wonderful fanart from people that really like her.

Done. That's all.

But we're not done. We need to keep talking.

Rusty Leasebound is very good at some things. Her chapter focusing on Shez had emotional, gut-wrenching art, and there is a definite appealing quality to the way she draws things.

Some things, atleast.

But Rusty is not a great writer. There's tons of other essays and an entire discord server that can point all the flaws in her story out enough to write an epic worthy of the Mahabharata. Leasebound has largely forgotten what it is to be a mouthpiece for her political opinions, its characters are one-note and one-dimensional, she focuses on the wrong things at the wrong time, and many more that will make my fingers cry as I type this. But I want to focus of Rusty's tendencies to tell, not show.

Blaire is not evil. She's not even Maleficent or Ursula or Cruella evil. And she's no Makima either. Blaire is just a woman passionate about her beliefs, and makes the mistake of pushing them on other people. That's not evil, that's a flaw. Women cannot be perfect all the time.

But we're meant to believe she is evil. In this panel of the Actor!AU, we are TOLD by Rusty that Blaire is meant to be evil.

Blaire isn't evil! Come back to me when she puts a living creature in a blender, or something!

While the statement is understandable, you're using it in the wrong way! Because there is no reason for the casual Leasebound reader to ever believe Blaire is evil, the way you portray her!

(Yes, casual Leasebound readers exist. Quinty's one.)

And there's multiple occasions of this 'tell, don't show' narrative Rusty keeps pushing.

For example: Meriam.

Meriam is told to be the protective, strong mother, but I'm not sure that's entirely the case.

Meriam has serious flaws in her parenting that is never acknowledged. Shez was made to basically worry for her siblings at a young age, which sounds horrible for a young girl.

(side note: criticism of the comic has often lead to more interesting, and realistic plotlines for leasebound to include.)

She's obviously traumatised, and it shows in her parenting. When she shuns out Rissa and her boyfriend; that's not good! If Rissa wants her family by her side, she won't get it because she's marrying a man. Meriam always keeps Shez on the pedestal like she's Luisa from Encanto.

Nobody asks how's Shez. Someone help Shez.

And there's so much more!

We get snippets of Riley, a MAIN CHARACTER'S backstory from one-off panels and dialouges, but we heard the majority of it from Rusty in the comment section, Rusty confirming fan speculation, the cast page, non-canon panels, etc. Nothing in the main story!

And that just makes Riley...really boring. The most interesting part of Riley is Blaire right now, and that's REALLY bad, considering we're supposed to dislike Blaire.

Here are some more examples of Rusty telling, not showing:

Muddles:

Riley:

Various statuses of offscreen characters:

Blaire and many others of Rusty's characters have fallen into one of her biggest writing flaws' clutches, but it's interesting as to how fan perception and works have essentially made one of the most three-dimensional characters of the comic, aside from Jaden. And that's one of the main problems with Leasebound.

I want to end this with an open letter. I don't know if she'll read it, but if you do:

Listen to criticism, and find out what's wrong with your comic. Tune in to different parts of the fandom, even when you don't agree with them. At the heart of the war, we all share one thing: reading your comic. Don't take that for granted; many amazing, better written comics would love to have the attention you have. Your art is good. I enjoy reading Leasebound when it's about the characters, not how we're supposed to percieve them. You have something; harness it before it goes away! And at the rate Leasebound is going- it might go away really fast.

Thank you for reading. I don't have anything else to say.

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Hey, remember when a radfem accidentally reblogged a post by a non-radfem-