Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-28175157-20160624105722/@comment-28839851-20160625002054

Chara did have a motive for killing the humans - they wanted to cross the barrier, collect more souls, and free the monsters from the Underground. Does that justify murder? Obviously not, but to say they did it for no reason simply isn't correct.

”Laughing something off” may seem incredibly inappropriate (especially when you accidentally poison your adoptive dad…) but it's possible it could have been a coping mechanism, which is not all that uncommon when someone is experiencing discomfort/negative emotions (and occurs on several occasions throughout the game - even some of the residents of Snowdin outright states that bad jokes are what keeps them going). I’m not saying this is definitely what was going on, but it is a possibility.

As for the Chara being the narrator (which I also think is a pretty solid theory): while the narration in the No Mercy run is cold and at times even disturbing… let’s not forget just how witty and playful the narration can be during the neutral runs! They constantly drop little jokes and puns here and there, and provides you with useful information during your journey.

Asriel knew about the plan before they combined their souls - the tapes implies that they talked it through - he was, if reluctantly, on board with the idea, at some point. It is however implied that he was manipulated to go through with it all, with Chara questioning his trust in them and their plan. The ”they wanted to see the flowers from their village” was just an excuse for Asriel to take them past the barrier.

It is also heavily implied that Chara was extremely self destructive, the most evidential line being how Asriel explains "they climbed Mt Ebott for a not very happy reason”, and I highly doubt they ever expected to be embraced and taken in by loving monsters. Of course, that does not justify the intent to murder, no matter how good their intentions were, but they were not motiveless.

Consider this: had they wanted to, they could have easily destroyed any monster in the Underground. But they did not, now did they? Had they really wanted to harm Asgore, they could have just attacked him in his sleep for instance, or at any given moment when he had his guard down, because why would he suspect his adoptive child (who we have no real evidence of being very aggressive during their stay in the underground [until fusing their soul with Asriel's, that is]) would attack him?

Also consider: isn’t one of the things we get to take away from Undertale that there is more complexity to a person than being Good vs Bad? That no one is just ruthlessly evil without a reason behind it? For most characters we get to know the reason behind their acts - Asgore wanted to give his people hope, Undyne wants justice for her people, and to protect what’s dear to her, Asriel is reincarnated into a soulless vessel with nothing but painful memories and inability to love, and also happens to have the ability to reset time at his disposal… and so on… But we really don’t have that much to go on when it comes to Chara. Why choose to only see the their mistakes and not try to understand why they acted like they did?

TL;DR Chara is as much of a complex character as anyone else. Not all of their actions can be justified just because they thought it was for a greater cause, but they did care for their family, and most probably, about the entire Underground.