Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-33883848-20190404103106

Ive played the game several times,read hundred theories about this character,collected all info about them and so i feel obligated to debunk some misconceptions concerning this rather controversial character

1.WAS A HUMAN ABOVE ALL

While they call themself a demon in the second genocide ending,during their lifetime they were clearly a human.

a.Monsters decribe them as a human while they can recognize human beings and the ones that arent despite the physical appearance as proven by the genocide run where noone recognize Frisk as a human,which obviously means that they were a human and humans as you know are complex and always have understable reasons behind their"bad actions"

b.They had a human soul as you see a human red soul on their coffin.

c.They had passions and likes .They loved to draw as drawing golden flowers,loved chocolate,to knite,gardening"worn dagger perfect for cutting plants"and read japanese literature .So,its pretty unlikely that killing and hurting people was their only passion,their passions rather hint that they were just that a human kid.

d.They had a strong feeling of hope in their eyes as said by Asgore and COULD understand feelings during their lifetime"i cant undertand those feelings ANYMORE".

e.They were shy and introverted as showed by their pose on the familys photo where they hide themself behind the flowers and disliked to be filmed for this same reason ,always asking Asriel to turn off the camera.

Given al of this,its safe to assume that they arent pure evil for sake of evil as they shows many human characteristics and complexity and as every single human,thus,they likely have understable motives behind all of their actions and arent just acting"bad"simply because they were born evil.

2.CHARA NEVER PLANNED ANY WAR

This is the main argument people use to proove that Chara is evil but the fact is :its never confirmed in the game.The game only says that it would be the consequnces of their actions,not that its something they wanted.That because murder always has bad consequences according to the lore of this game.But what confirms that Chara never planned to eradicate humanity??

a.Chara seems to knew that the control would be split as asriel say that they would fulfil their plan "together"and Chara wanted to absorb 6 human souls.Iam i the single one that see a major flaw here??If chara wanted to eradicate humanity they would know that the souls they would absorb wouldnt allow them to and take over.Chara would only have 1/7 control,so do you think they could eradicate any race with only having 1/7 of control??It would even let humanity opportunity to kill the fusion even though Asriel would turn into a god like entity since it would be over the 6 souls control and as it would still be affected by cruel intentions since asriel would still be a monster

Not only that but the souls can rebel as during omega flowey fight,so it would fail Chara's plan.We dont know why the souls cant rebel against Asriel during the pacifist last fight ,perhaps because all of those souls are composing his soul as the narrator says?

b.Chara refers to their plan as "our plan"and not "my plan",so their plan was common to Asriels one and asriel's plan was to free the monsterkind.Their plan was only the one that Asriel agreed to so "Well be strong well free everyone.Six we just have to get six...".If Chara had any ulterior motive,they would call it "my plan"not "our plan".

c.Flowey still think that Chara wanted to free the monsterkind despite the fact that he know that Chara wanted to kill the villagers."Lets finish what WE started and free everyone".Despite the common belief,hes not refering to death but the real freedom as he wants to show monsters what humanity looks like"Let finish what we started and free everyone.Let them show what humanity really looks like",the only way for monsters to see humanity is by breaking the barrier.And Flowey confirms that he really wants to break the barrier"as lomg as you are arround living on the surface doenst seem to be that bad".

So even Flowey,the one whe knew Chara better than anyone,better than all fans,still claims that Chara only wanted to free the monsters.And thats not related to idolisation here since he has a pretty twisted morality now,so he would rather see as a good thing if Chara wanted to eradicate humanity but he still claims that Chara only wanted to free the monsterkind .That because he know Chara and know that they genuinely wanted their freedom and wouldnt be able to kill every single human.

So given all of this,i think its much more likely that Chara only wanted to free the monsterkind.

3.CHARA DOESNT DESTROY THE WORLD SIMPLY BECAUSE THEY ARE A SADISTIC LITTLE SHIT

Actually,Chara thought you wanted to destroy the world given how much they are suprised if you refuse to "No...?".They expected Frisk to choose to erase the world.Why wouldnt they?After all why else would Frisk kill all monsterkind if its not for a mission as erasing the world?For fun??thinking it would cause no consequnces??

However since the world destruction is consequence of their actions"It was was you who pushed everything to its edge and led the world to its destruction but you cannot accept it,you think youre above consequences",Chara erase it regadless your choice "You made your choice long ago".At first they thought you were killing monsters thinking it was a mission,they thought you killed all monsters to gain enough power in order to destroy the world"Now we have reached the absolute ,theres nothing left for us here.Lets erase this pointless world and move on to the next"(which why they are surprised if you refuse to destroy it)but by wanting to recreate the world,you showed that you killed everyone thinking it would cause no consequences"but you cannot accept it,you think you're above consequences".

Some would argue its just manipulation thats supposed to guilt trip Frisk so they would be eager to give their soul but Chara still blame Frisk alone in the second geno ending aswell,the one where they already have their soul.

And Chara clearly doesnt want to keep world destroyed in the second genocide ending"Should you choose to create this world once more".So they need a valid reason to keep it destroyed.

In short,Chara destroy the world regadless your choice because its your consequences for killing monsters(likely because by killing monsters you both became more and more detached from the world as love is supposed to make you emmotionaly distant) but by recreating the world you showed them that you killed everyone thinking "youre above consequences",thinking it woud cause no consequences.And they even let you to recreate you the world if you give up your soul,which would only give them one advantage:the ability to love (if you press the "save "button ),if Chara was that evil (or hated life/monsters)then,they would keep the world destroyed as everyone would stay dead.

4.ITS NEVER IMPLIED THAT CHARA WANTS THE PLAYER TO DO THE GENOCIDE RUN SINCE THE START

They dont give any kill count in the ruins,something they would if they wanted the player to do this run.They are also passive in all runs besides the geno run,implying that they change in the genocide run. In fact Chara is following Frisk's guidance as they no longer trusts themself when their plan failled and their guidance showed them that power is the "purpose of their reincarnation".They dont even knew why they come back to life untill you showed them why"at first i was so confused.Our plan is failled,why was i brought back to life ?you with your guidance i realized the purpose of my reincarnation power".The japanese version even confirm so"Thanks to your guidance I realized what my revival was,that's power".And they are souless at that so unable to feel compassion"creatures like us wouldnt hesitate to kill each other"they no longer feel compassion towards monsters and as such they cant judge by their compassion anymore.

Chara also describes many monsters positively ,for example they says that Toriel "knows best for you",they ask you to not pick on looxs "dont pick on him",says that one isnt evil but just hanging out in wrong crowd etc...And most importantly ,they see undyne as a hero even in the genocide run even though she never showed in this run that she hate humanity.It seems like they see them as a hope to stop Frisk,so deep inside they dont really wants Frisk to kill those monsters even though they feel themself obligated to let them to as they dont trust themself to do anything and is following the guidance of the only person they can always follow.But yeah,in this run they dismiss some monsters as Toriel or Papyrus or Monster kid,perhaps its to reduce their guilt regards killing them well because:

a.Toriel is their mother so they likely feel guilty about killing her.And when you kill her even in this run they still shows sadness as showed by cooker narration "Noone will ever use this anymore.."so they try to dismiss her saying that shes not "worth talking to"

b.Papyrus likely remind them of Asriel,so it would cause guilt killing him so they try to dismiss him as "forgettable"

c.Monster kid ,iam not sure.Perhaps they really see them as a "free exp",given how agresively they approach this monster.Or they feel guilty about killing an inocent monster and try to cope with it saying its a "free exp"?Who knows...

Chara also doesn't want you to kill everyone again as they suggest a path that's "better suited"when you pursue genocide again,proving that they dont want you to kill without any valid reason.That also proove that Chara doesnt feel any hate towards monsters as otherwise they wouldnt ask you that at all but would ask you to continue the rampage instead,or keep the world destroyed instead of suggesting you to choose a path thats"better suited".

Finally,if you never kill ,Chara says that bag full of dogs food is "half full",which means that they are optimistic and if you kill at least one monster they are pessimistic as they says "its half empty".So in fact they dont want Frisk to kill,they want to believe that Asriel was right regards sparing the attackers and didnt betray them.In the genocide run,you shows them that you cant survive without killimg since you literally kill every single enemy,so Asriel betrayed them ,which is why its the only run they shows anger towads Asriel.

Strangely,Chara abort genocide even though you spare monsters that dont provide exp or gold as Glad dummy,so it seems like they abort it because you show them that the world doenst really work on kill or be killed (and not because it becomes impossible to "reach the absolute"),that you dont need to kill to survive and so the world doesnt need to be destroyed (by the way ,the kill or be killed philosophy is the Reason why Flowey wants to annihilate the world,so its also likely Chara's motive for wanting to destroy the world)

One thing that would a bit contradict it is this line "Comedian ran away faillure"as many see this as an insult directed towards the player as they let Snowy to run away. However,they dont say "You're a faillure"but just "faillure"implying that its not an insult but rather a statement of facts :you failled your job by letting Snowdrake alive(and faillure commonly means "defeat").And that also proved to Chara that you dont need to kill to survive since Chara returns to "normal"when they abort the genocide run and so Chara no longer wants power nor destroying the world,otherwise they have no reason to refuse to provide the kill count. I mean how would they know how many monsters are required to kill to reach the "absolute"and that Alphys evacuated some monsters??

So again,its unlikely that it's related to the fact that Chara thinks they cant reach the "absolute "anymore .Also if Chara still wanted power they would continue to provide the kill count even though Frisk failled to kill Snowdrake.So,Chara no longer wants power to destroy the world when you let Snowdrake to run away as it showed them that you dont need to kill in order to survive,so that the world isnt working on "kill or be killed"and that you cant destroy it.

After all,Frisk even shows to Flowey if killing is necessary to survive or not:

"Since i defeated you i thinking,is killing really neceseraly.I honestly dont know anynore.Proove to me youre enough strong to survive".And if you kill nonsters in your next run he would say "So killing people is actually fine?",prooving that hes not manipulating you (otherwise its pointless to admit that Frisk proved them that killing people is fine if he only wanted Frisk to do the pacifist run )And nothing implies that he ever manipulate you,he take your friends souls only when he realize that Chara was in Frisk all along"Chara are you there?".So,similarly Frisk shows Chara if killing is necessary to survive or not.

To conclude,it seems like they provide you the kill count only because you showed them that you're in a "mission"(gain enough emotional power to destroy the world)and that's "kill or be killed".They abort the genocide run when you fail to kill anyone as you proove by that you can survive without killing,so that the world doesn't deserve to be destroyed and so that you don't need to gain emotional power anymore.

PS:Pretty sure the "where are the knives"line is related to self harm since you can easily kill monsters with murderous intentions.And yeah I know that Chara is glad to find the"real knife"in Asgore's home during the genocide run but remember what's the true purpose of this Item"Perfect for cutting plants" =)

PS:And yeah they slaugher Flowey very aggressively but remember Chara has 20 lv at this point (as you see when you check their stats)and its proven that love make you more inclined to hurt as showed by how Frisk hit the dummy depending on their love.

5.ASRIEL NEVER SAID THAT CHARA WAS A BAD PERSON

"Maybe the truth is Chara wasnt really the greatest person,while you frisk youre the type of friend i wish i could always have""

Keep in mind that Frisk can be an ashole in the "pacifist"run too.They can insult monsters and hurt all of them until they have only 1 hp left but he stil says that Frisk is "the friend he wish he always had".Since its not related with being mean,its seems like its related to a specific aspect of them:Frisk refused to kill even in self defence,Chara doesnt,so he wish to had a friend like Frisk,a friend with who he could share his compassion for life.

And he still have an idea that Chara care about monsters as he ask them to not be worried by them ,even after realizing that they "werent really the greatest person","Seems like everyone is perfectly happy,peace and harmony would rule across the land .TAKE A DEEP BREATH THERES NOTHING LEFT TO WORRY ABOUT[...]See you latter Chara".So again,this line doenst mean that he figure out Chara was cruel,but that he stopped his idolisation,.After all he didnt want to doubt of Chara in lifetime"No ill never doubt of you never!",which les him to agree with the plan and to death.

6.CHARA NEVER INTENTIONALLY POISONED ASGORE

"But we accidentally put buttercups instead",both made this mistake,so it was an accident.sure he says that Chara "laughed it off"but...he says that he was supposed to do the same thing.. "I should have laughed it off like you did.." Hes not stupid after all he know that Chara is sadistically smiling in the geno run"You got a sick sence of humour",so he would know that Chara was sadistically laughing if they were really sadistically laughing and so wouldnt say that he should do the same thing.

And "laughing something off"commonly means "to light a situation in order to make it seem less serious"https://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/laugh+it+off

Since they choose this same horrible method to die instead of idk failling or other methods that would hide their suicide ,they choose the most painfull one ,plus a method that would ruin their chances to hide their suicide since they would share some symptons with Asgore.So they felt very guilty about it and only tried to cope with it by "laughing it off".

Sure monsters says that they fell "ill"but i doubt that asgore and toriel that chara killed themself....because well...thats something private...

Chara laugh at misfortune only when you corrupt them.Given the dog food's bag,they become sadistic when your kill count is higher than 20 as they see the Snowdin dogs's death as "something funny"only when you killed more than 20 monsters.

Otherwise they dont laugh at misfortune at all,only to cope with disturbing situation. For example,they appears to laugh untill "tears run down their face"when Frisk choose "laugh"option during Snowy's mom fight but when you choose this option twice they would say "but its not funny"(and they dont even says "but you think its not funny "but that its objectively not funny),that proove that they use laugh as coping mechanism.And coincidently,Snowy's dad also laugh to cope with bad situation and then says "that's not funny".(And they also think that Frisk would say very cruel stuff to her,something they wouldn't if Frisk was that kind.I mean come on,Frisk completely crush Snowdrake saying that noone will ever love them as they are ,so that's not surprising that Chara expected Frisk to behave that callously)

7.CHARA WASNT CRUEL TOWARDS MONSTERS DURING THEIR LIFETIME

Rather reverse actually,Asgore saw them as the "future of humans and monsters",as someone who would make peace possible,they gave monsters hope to live in peace with humans.So they were definetely friedly towards them.Asriel says that Chara was the only person who could understand him .They also played together a lot "Youre the only one with who its funny to play".They also made a sweater to asgore that says "Mr dad guy",the one that likely took months to knite as Asgore is rather big.Flowey also notes how Chara and asgore were close as he believes that despite how hard he tried to convince Asgore,he would show those souls to Chara.

Its also strongly implied that Chara is the reason why monsters had lost their fear of humans and went to populate the rest of the underground instead of hidding in the ruins as Chara appears to lived in the ruins as Toriels house has a golden flower drawing that looks exactly the same as chara's drawing from Asgore's house in the exact same place as Chara's one,implying that Chara was the one who made it.Plus Toriels house has "a room under renovations"implying that Chara used to sleep here.And Chara is awfully familiar with the tree near this house"every time this tree grows any leaves,they fall right off"and you can even see Chara and Asriel playing arround this tree in Temmies concept arts(where they look nicer than any of their fanon depictions so far lol).And Chara fell in the underground arround 201X,while coincidentally monsters moved out the ruins at the begging of this year"Theres a old calendar here from the begining of 201X".Chara sure says that they "came here"at the end of this year,but they could so meant that this is the date they came in new home and the date could be circled because its the date the dreemurs decided to adopt them.I mean they wouldnt adopt a human right immediatly right??Also, Asriel was in the ruins when Chara fell,implying that he was living here before Chara fell as otherwise he has no reason to be alone in the ruins and so it seems like they moved on when Chara fell.

Some people would of course say that they manupulated everyone but really nothing implies so.Its also unlikely that they would be able to manipulate the people they lived with for arround 1 year without anyone noticing their "true nature",especially Toriel.They are also a kid not a mastermind guys and only has 1 lv and 0 exp at the start of the game as you see when you check Chara's stats(they are Under Chara's name),which means that they never killed anyone during their lifetime.So,no Chara never secretly killed any monster when they lived in the underground.

8.CHARA DOENST POSSESS FRISK IN THE GENOCIDE RUN

They likely says "its me Chara"because they no longer hide that they are inside of Frisk's body and share the same body with them as in this run Frisk is their new "best friend",so there's no need to hide personal stuff(which is why they reveal personal stuff about themself only in this run)as in this run,they think that Asriel betrayed them.So,when Frisk equips Asriel's locket(its on his bed's side),its "right where it belongs"as Frisk is now Chara's new best friend.That's a parallel with how Asriel see Frisk as "a friend he wished he could always had"instead of Chara.

After all ,they accuse Frisk for "pushing everything to its edge",stil often narrate using "you "pronoun in this run(which refers to Frisk "still just you Frisk"while the "i"is the pronoun they uses to describe themself)and even the sins belongs to this "you","you feel your sins screwing on your back","this plant judge you for your sins",.They also give you the kill count,that would be absurd if they were giving kill count to themself.They even says that Frisk and themself are "partners",which indicate that they work together. So they only take over in some instances during this run but not during the entirety of this run(and likely during pacifist/neutral cutscenes,i mean if the genocide run cut scenes are by Chara ,why the other wouldn't be??)

9.CHARA DOENST WANT FRISK TO DO THE PACIFIST RUN JUST TO DESTROY HUMANS

"Another path would be better suited"

They dont interfer in any souless neutral ending while they reach the surface in all of them( as Frisk does so and Chara is in their body )as nothing implies that anything wrong happened.So its unlikely that they wants to reach the surface in order to kill humans.Plus,Chara cant eradicate humanity unless they get a bomb or something but perhaps they want to make a deal with Kim Jong-un lol

And this is a pointless act as they can already erase the world .And if it was really their goal,why they show no indication that they want to reach the surface in your first genocide ending?And theres no evidences that humanity is destroyed or anything in the souless pacifist end aswell like ZERO,its implied that Chara killed Frisk's friends but not other monsters nor humanity

They likely just want to show Frisk that they arent"above consequences"as they clearly doesnt want you to kill every body again without a point and as they are very obsessed with consequences's thing and as they dont kill anyone in the souless neutral end.They likely yang Frisk s happy ending because Chara feels that its unfair to let Frisk live with people they killed for fun in a previous run,so those are "consequences"of your actions.Which explains why they only interfer with this ending

And there lot more counter arguments to this theory so...consider that as impossible.

10.CHARA CARED ABOUT THE DREEMURS

Every time Frisk dies in any run or sleep,they always hear Asgore's voice telling them to "stay determined"or "to wake up"(and wake up or return to life right after hearing his voice telling him to not give up).If it was meaningless to Chara,i doubt that Chara would ever dream about it,so it appears like Asgore really count for Chara aswell as his wish (staying determined and being the future of humans and monsters which Chara likely interpreted as monsters's freedom)

They also knitted a sweater that says "Mr.dad guy"to Asgore.Someone that always knew their father would never call him that way.The "mr dad guy"implies that this kid was uncomfortable to call this person just"dad"and Asriel called Asgore dad,so its really likely Chara who made this sweater.And Flowey also make it clear that both were really close since he think that Asgore would make exception to Chara and show them the human souls.

And they were also the only one who could understand Asriel"I said it before(in lifetime),you're the only one that can understand me Chara"and played a lot with him.Made "creepy face"to amuse him and when he asked them to "Okay, Chara, are you ready? Do your creepy face! AHHHHH!! Hee hee hee!".And both played a lot together"Remember how we used to play here?".

Regards Toriel,i already showed how they felt bad when you kill her,so they have a strong attachment to her.It also appears like they picked some of her mannerisms as the way to greet people as both says "greetings"while Asgore and Asriel says "Howdy",so they were pretty close.Toriel was also the one who took Chara's body to give them a proper burial,if they weren't close,i doubt that she would ever do so.

And most importantly,the most subtle detail that confirm it and that Toby Fox felt the need to include is the photo.That stroke me when i realised that the family's photo was...actually angled towards Chara's bed....Even the dumbest person can understand Toby's intentions here and what he wanted to implies...Dont act like this detail is insignificant:if Chara never cared about the Dreemurs,Toby wouldn't include this detail at all as it would indicate that they loved them.Sincerely,this is where that i realised that make Chara "an evil mustache twirling villain"was never Toby's intentions and that his intentions with this character was to make this character mysterious and so we would train your brain and make deductions by compiling all facts from the game.

But what did we do ???We did something that directly runs against the message of the game:we started to hate and fear what we dont understand and so demonize Chara above of how they were depicted in the game:we said that they were only manipulating the Dreemurs and the rest of the monsterkind and never cared about them,we said that they didnt want you to do the genocide again just because they wanted to go to the surface and kill all humans,we said that they were accusing the player to manipulate them,we said that they were abusive towards Asriel,we said that they were forcing the player to do the genocide run and that they represented our classical rpgs's tendencies,we said that they never wanted to free the monsters and were only manipulating Asriel,we said that they were a psychopath and that they couldn't feel love nor compassion even in lifetime,we said that they were not a human at first place despite them having a human soul,we said that they were laughing maniacally at Asgore's pain while the game never said anything above.

But if the game never said so,how we came to this conclusion??As i said fear and hate of unknown:we didn't know why Chara erase the world regardless our choice and why they yang your happy ending in the souless pacifist ending and why they act this way in the genocide run, this is why we demonized every single of their actions by adding ton of speculations and headcanons and assumptions that arent in the game itself.But the game gave us more details about other characters even though they were presented as evil creatures at first(Asgore,Undyne,Flowey,Mettaon,random ennemies etc...)and so we understood their motives for their bad actions and so we showed them mercy but Chara is never explicitly explained:they requires analysis which requires to take into consideration everything the game tells us about them and every single detail.So now that i clarified some of their so called "bad actions"and helped you to understand them,show them some Mercy as you did with everybody else... 