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lightpinkhibiscus · 4 months

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Nobody understands Amy Rose (and how would I write her)

Yes, another thread, I need to let some feelings go before I choke myself with them.

So, as I said before, 2023 felt like a huge apology gift for Amy fans, which makes me wonder, so why am I not surprised we are back with the Amy disrespect again just as the year is close to ending? Latest TailsTube really felt shitty, she gives Sonic a picture of herself with a heart portrait (which Sonic replaces) and she receives a broken Motobug from Omega, F U C K I N G A M A Z I N G, merry fucking Christmas. What's worse is that Amy doesn't speak up about her annoyance, she just shrugs it off like a good girl. You know how much I hate the arguments against Riders Amy? Everyone talks about Amy smacking Sonic with her hammer but no one talks about the stupidity he did before, sending her flying with Eggman for the sake of his Blender default cube deserved a beating, she respects herself enough to let go shit like this.

Why do people praise Amy getting disrespected like this and then clap with your ass cheeks when she doesn't express her disappointment? This is the exact issue that's been plaguing this character for a good while, she can't express her emotions anymore, she can't be herself anymore, she HAS to be the boring straight man of her team or else she's annoying. Say what you will about her past incarnations, but Amy has and will always be more interesting when she's an absolute menace, when she's cheesy, loving, and most importantly, fun to watch. Having a permanent frown when her team does something dumb doesn't make her interesting, it makes her boring, bland, it's an Amy that lacks fun.

Let me put it in perspective, if this bland Amy were what we got for an entire line of games, she would embrace her boring life, she would just shut up about being left behind, she would stay behind always because "girls not allowed" or "she ain't invited", and she definitely won't progress with Sonic because she has to be a damn tsundere who has to wait for the boy to make any bloody move. Is this the shit you'd tolerate for 30 years?

Maturity and Tarot cards are not replacements for her entire personality, if you cannot list what are Amy's traits without saying she's mature, doesn't chase Sonic or list what she USED to have for personality while talking about modern, am I expected to interpret you as Amy fan or someone who understands the character? You're a poser at most to me.

Amy used to be so much more, but nowadays it's impossible to determine what the fuck is she supposed to be because of this fanbase, she can't love Sonic because "she's a stalker", she can't use more than the hammer or be strong because "she's a civilian", she can't be on Team Sonic because "she's got Team Rose even though her teammates are never there", she can't show any emotions other than nice because "she's annoying", and she definitely can't be involved in significant ways on the bigger messes because "she has to always 100% solve everything with kindness". That, or the last exit she has is to be replaced with another "cooler" character and Amy has to either be pushed further to the background like in Archie Sonic or be retired, what a fucking joke. The lengths people go to trash on this character again and again, despite getting what you wanted, despite getting rid of everything Amy is, you'll never be satisfied until she's gone.

How would I write Amy?

Okay, enough about my frustrations, it's clear that if it were for this fandom, Amy would suffer the most painful of deaths to get her out of this franchise, they can't understand this character because they don't want to.

But how would I write her? Well, it would be easy to say "write her like X, Y or Z game", but I don't want to do that, and people always have the habit of misinterpreting her portrayals whether it be positively or negatively, and we all know which of the two is.

Here's how I see it:

-Amy is an optimistic person who always lights up the entire room when she's in it, you wouldn't be able to be sad while she's in (she won't allow it lol)

-But she's also someone with a lot of energy, a facet that she shares with her loved one, she can get bored easily if she's doing nothing or doing the same things every day

-When it comes to love, she's a full on ride or die. Take for example Valentine's Day, she'd shower you on a lot of gifts and take you to romantic dates every year, she never forgets, but she also makes sure to cater to her partner's needs, not just her own

-Many of her accomplishments come from her undying determination, if something feels hopeless, she'll try again and again until it works out

-Amy is kind to friends and foes alike, unless they are evil for the sake of it (Eggman). She knows if her foes are either misguided or too scared to fight back the forces that pushed them to that path, so she guides them to the light through her natural kindness

-She is as much of a girly girl as she is a tomboy, one day she might be cooking, baking, making some cute decorations or simply window shopping, the other she might be speeding through a meadow, competing in tournaments or training her strength

-Amy will always tell how she feels to the world, love, anger, sadness, happiness, fear, you name it

-She has an undying love for adventure, although she can't live a nomadic lifestyle like Sonic, she can spend days outside of her home on the other side of the planet

-She goes after Sonic because she always knows there's fun to be had around him, even if her feelings don't get reciprocated (much to her frustration), the adventures they share make it worth the chase

-Amy is unwilling to giving up, whenever she puts her mind on something, she never lets it go until she fulfills it

-She's a natural born leader, but unlike others, she leads by example and attitude, not by giving out orders

-She's quick to make new friends even through misunderstandings, she's just that friendly

Weaknesses

As much as Amy has strengths, she also has weaknesses:

-Amy has poor self preservation, mostly for the sake of trying to help and end up caught in trouble

-A lot of the time she puts others' needs above her own, a strength in itself but also a flaw, as she might not admit needing help if it means ignoring the other

-There are moments where she might end up with more than she can chew, not out of narcissism but not knowing her limits all too well

-Because she can track Chaos energy, sometimes she tracks the wrong hedgehog, but gets so caught up in the moment she ends up hugging them by accident

-Amy can have poor temper if people push her buttons enough times

-Because of her need of proving herself, sometimes she overworks herself to exhaustion

-Despite being strong, she barely reaches to the levels of Sonic, Shadow, Blaze and other powerful characters (but she's definitely above the average folk and the kids)

-Amy worries about her weight, which is why she lashes out in annoyance when others point it out

-When jumping to danger, she doesn't think twice about it

-She can't spend a lot of time alone, maybe it has to do with not having any friends before meeting Sonic?

Powers and abilities (Fandom didn't trademark this phrase, and even if they did, they can go fuck off)

-We all know this one, her Piko Piko Hammer, a supposed toy hammer who's origins are still unknown. Contrary to... certain individuals, the hammer is not what makes Amy strong, Amy makes it stronger than it looks. With it, she can hit enemies, catapult herself to the air and also spin with it in mid air to create the illusion of flying. She can also amp it with energy to create shockwaves and tornados out of it. Adept on it's use, Amy is a formidable rival against those who stand against her. However, let's say that she loses it or gets destroyed, what happens now?

-Amy has learned a lot from the hammer but she's also wanted to learn as many of Sonic's abilities as possible, when going after the fastest thing alive, it's kind of natural that she wanted to be faster. When it comes to her speed metric, she can go to Mach-2 speeds with little effort, she's not faster than Sonic or Shadow, but it's still impressive. She's also learned a couple of Sonic's moves, not all but still a good chunk, spinjump, spindash, homing attack, boost, light speed dash, and even his multi lock from Lost World. Amy wasn't born with any of these stuff, with no Sonic on sight to learn from, she had to learn herself by memory, forming clunky versions of said abilities until reaching near mastery the more she adventured.

-Amy's own foresight wasn't something she was born with, like many things, she's had to get in tune with the forces of Chaos herself. The cards haven't told her where to find her destined encounter, Amy felt where they were after many attempts of using her cards. After a long while, this foresight grew into a full on sixth sense to the point of not needing the cards to track down Sonic or anyone anymore, as such she also gained sharper senses (sometimes they fail her but that's besides the point). With the cards, Amy is also able to attack in different ways, but they're weaker than her quills and especially the hammer, but they work efficiently for transportation, like giving herself a small glide and jump height or using them for an improvised mono wheel, not as fast like on foot but fun nonetheless. She can read the future to certain extent, but those readings are always so vague and cryptic she prefers not to dwell on them too much.

-But what about Chaos Energy? That's an entirely separate subject, because of recent outings we know she's capable of using the Chaos Emeralds to go super, the power only goes to the same level of Tails, Knuckles, Mighty and Ray though. But when it comes to the raw emeralds, she can use them individually to activate their desired effects. As I said, she's a walking Chaos tracker, she just knows where Sonic is because of his Chaos energy, same as how he located Emerl, the catch is that she doesn't know she is and attributes it to natural intuition.

Endgoals

-Marry Sonic the Hedgehog and earn his respect (I know some idiots hate it, but face it, Amy was created to be a love interest, she wouldn't exist if that position weren't necessary)

-Share her life with the people she loves

-Learn to be more independent

Conclusions

Okay, I'm really sorry but I needed to vent my frustrations, and that's because this year was so perfect, we got everything we wanted and more out of Amy, but then what happened? She's back at being made fun of again, and she can't express obvious disappointment or else the fanbase storms her house with forks and tourches. Whenever I repeat time and time again that she's not allowed to express herself, this is what I mean, and yet the fanbase plays it deaf and pretend nothing changed because she doesn't break their fragile sense of masculinity anymore. I don't even expect my entire chore list to be exactly what I want out of Amy, she's much simpler to write than most people think, what I ACTUALLY want is for SoA to respect her legacy, her past, who she was. Amy doesn't need to change, she never did, all she needed was to be respected on these stories (and given better gameplay opportunities because the Advance gameplay SUCKS), that's fucking it, she never needed to lose who she was, that just sends a bad message of "you're not good enough unless you become a people pleaser", and she ain't no people pleaser.

I don't want to gatekeep this character, but given all the shit Amy fans went through, I have the need to. Besides, and this is personal, her struggles, efforts and accomplishments made me believe that there is hope if you don't give in to the darkness, in a way, she helped me out of my hopeless state even if just a bit.

Sega could've just given up on Amy after the 90s, games were growing and tropes were being forgotten, the position of love interest wasn't necessary anymore, she could've died here and there without reaching Sonic Adventure while a new character took her place, only remembered as a relic of the past not worth revisiting from a forgotten Genesis add-on. But this is not the timeline we're living, she's still here, reaching far across new frontiers, another part of her history that made me want not to give up as much as I want to.

I hope that we are not back to the era of Amy being an unwelcome presence to the "classic trio" and that all of my fears are just bullshit, but Sega does not have a good track record when it comes to Amy, much less the fanbase, who have made any and all attempts possible to exclude Amy from having any good things.

#amy rose #sonic the hedgehog

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lightpinkhibiscus · 8 months

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How do you feel when people call Amy a stalker?

People can call her what they want, however…

Do i think it's fair to call Amy a stalker?

In some of the games? Yes, and even in some of the ones she wasn't a stalker per-se, she still showed possessive and obsessive tendencies that are problematic irl. So i get it.

Generally? No. Her character originally wasn't supposed to be a harasser and she sure isn't one in the present. I feel like they really fucked up by turning her into one at the time and - luckily - the franchise has been clearly trying to do better for her these past few years.

I think Amy's changing characterization is an interesting topic of discussion, so even though i technically already answered your question i'll take this chance and proceed to talk about my fave for way longer than i need to :).

Note: This is just my take on Amy and the way i understand her character. Sorry for any writing mistakes in advance (english is hard) and feel free to correct me if i'm factually wrong about something (i wrote this thing mostly from memory so i imagine i must be.)

Amy has changed A LOT troughout the games and has been in the hands of many different writers across Sonic media ,so when talking about her is important to be specific about what game,series or comic we are talking about (and sometimes even language),and while i know that some of you might not agree and i respect that, i think that -looking at the subtleties- Amy has had at least 6 different portrayals through the course of the games. That being said,i believe the idea that she is a stalker comes especifically from the characterization they started giving her around 2003

Originally,Amy was envisioned as a sweet 12-year-old kid who had a huge unreciprocated crush on her idol and a passion for fortune-reading ,but who wasn't exactly much of a heroine herself. In the classic era,her place in the narrative was just to serve as a damsel in distress and a cute,funny detail. Ofc,in comics and animated shorts for games like Origins, we have gotten more content of classic Amy being fully independent and capable of defending herself (even more with the upcoming playable mode for her in Origins Plus), but i think we can all see how such aspects of her character weren’t included at the time she was created.

Especifically in the adventure era (AKA the birth of modern Amy) they gave Amy her iconic strong,compassionate,romantic personality and an interest/love for adventure (and her sassy attitude ofc). I also want to point out that in this first portrayal ,her love for Sonic feels more like innocent childish idolization than an obsession and that her character doesn't revolve exclusively around it.

They slowly started planting the seeds for her character to stop being a "damsel in distress" by making her playable and defeat ZERO all on her own at the end of SA1,then also being playable in Sonic advance and helping Sonic get out of prison in SA2 (and tagging along for the rest of the adventure). In all these games,her character revolves around empathy,optimism and kindness. The way she protects the flicky since the moment she finds it,how she defends Gamma from Sonic and the iconic moment in SA2 where she convinces Shadow to help save earth are all great examples.

THEN, in Heroes , they decided to try something new with her taking her confidence and sassy attitude to a whole other level. Giving her the chance to be a fully-fleshed hero who didn't need rescuing anymore. She became independent and the leader of her own team of friends who she wanted to help. I love this Amy cause she feels really strong,determined and empowered without losing her peppiness,silliness,positivity and kindness. Her flaws are also especially endearing to me: How much of a wild kid she is,How even if she means well, she relies way too much in brute force, How she has trouble getting out of her own head, etc. She really feels just as confident and energic as Sonic when insulting her enemies and reassuring her allies,but just like him,you can tell she has a huge heart.

HOWEVER, as much as i love how they made her strength and bravery shine in this game, Heroes was the game that gave birth to the idea that Amy is willing to chase and even fight Sonic just to insist that they should marry (in SA2 she did follow him to the prison but it was only to help him and tag along in the adventure).

Ofc this was supposed to be comedic and to be seen as childish,harmless behavior- I say this because the rest of the characters,including Sonic himself,don't seem to take it seriously- but what was supposed to be seen as an endearing flaw at the time, would rapidly mute into what's probably Amy's worst portrayal ,as the writers turned it into harassment for the next mainline games (Ignoring Shadow the hedgehog where she is the same as in heroes and only has a brief appearance.)

Before i go into Battle,i just want to say that the definition of stalker according to google is “a person who harasses or persecutes someone with unwanted and obsessive attention.” A definition that definitely did not apply to her before Heroes,but that i can't deny that does apply to Amy for the next few games:

In Battle, Amy is suddenly written as aggresive and self-centered. All her compassion and empathy from the adventure era is gone, intimidating people (even Cream) and demanding information from them from the get-go. Of course she does a few good things throughout the game too,like take care of Emerl and such,but she still mainly uses him for her benefit (calories counter and emerald radar). Right off the bat,at the start of her storyline she insists on searching for Sonic even when she herself assumes he is hiding from her -which implies she knows what she's doing is worth hiding for- and tries to justify her behavior by saying that Sonic actually loves her and that he is being “ just shy “ or that “ he got cold feet”- while others characters react in a way that implies that's obviously not the case and that her behavior is worrysome..

I think it's important to mention that before Battle, we hadn’t gotten a single line of dialogue that implied that Amy tought that her behavior could be hurtful for Sonic, nor did she ever threaten anyone at all unless it was self defense. She knew he didn’t reciprocate her feelings and was actively trying to make him fall for her anyways,sure, but we gotta remember that while the canon ages might have been scrapped recently, at the time Modern Amy was created they were still very much canon and you can tell they had them in mind when writing these characters. Amy was supposed to be 12 ,so it makes sense that she didn't understand why Sonic wouldn’t accept her affection. She idolized him and misinterpreted the fact that he always was protecting her as possible romantic interest,but never actually imposed anything on him. The worst thing she ever did to him was hugging him without consent,and again, the games implied that she clearly didn't realize such a thing wasn't ok. Sonic also didn't seem to want to hurt her feelings so while he did run away and expressed being annoyed by her he never explicitly told her to stop. I actually think that if he had sat her down and made it clear to her that what she was doing was truly bothering him, The Amy from the adventure era would have stopped, but i doubt he cared enough to do that honestly.

BUT in Battle and for the next three games,Amy doesn’t seem to be written as a 12-year-old who mistakes admiration for love anymore. This is where the writers started to portray her as someone who is clearly still young and definitely childish but not innocent at all (How she obsessively tries to burn calories to conform to beauty standards is a good example of how she feels more negatively influenced by the adult world around her than before.). Her whole character revolves around harassing Sonic and using her strength to intimidate others, and don't get me wrong,I like that Amy gets angry easily!! i like that she isn't afraid of a fight,that she complains a lot, that she throws insults around at her enemies and that she isn't a peaceful, submissive girl. After all,those are mportant parts of who she is. But Battle!Amy is on a whole other level: she gets mad at her friends just because they don't agree with everything she does or says. It's not about having a strong personality anymore,she's just generally aggressive. For the next few games she and Sonic can't have one normal conversation that isn't Amy imposing her own wishes over him and him trying to get away from her, so it's hard to believe she wouldn't realize that what's she's doing is wrong nor accidental as we were supposed to before. This time It just feels like she is deciding to ignore the signs.

This continued in advance 3 ,where she literally threatens him with her hammer just cause he shows signs of not being interested in spending time with her when they meet, Then in rush she becomes possesive and jealous the second he mentions Blaze and also seems to treathen him with the hammer in the credits scene because he is running from her hug.

Thankfully,they changed the direction of her characterization again after Rush. The best way i can describe the Amy that is present in Riders is a mix between all the Amys from before, one that has two very polarized sides to her personality. On one side,she is a peppy,sweet,over enthusiastic and romantic girl with a love for adventure, on the other she is a pretty intimidating one with an obsession with Sonic and very fiery temper. However,contrary to her last portrayal,she is more polite and actually asks Sonic if she can come with him various times,doesn't harass him and doesn't threaten people simply cause they don't agree with her anymore, but she still doesn't seem to have any sense of boundaries,still follows Sonic without permission sometimes and still clearly has no consideration for his personal space (and It's hard to tell if her disregard for consent when hugging him is accidental this time cause she isn't nowhere as innocent as she used to be before Battle but she is very childish still ). Another thing about this Amy is how her flirting is really intense, and even if she isn't as aggressive as the Amy from Battle,if someone messes a bit with her she doesn't hesitate to resort to intimidation or take her hammer out.

She still gets violent towards Sonic sometimes,but what's different from her last characterization is that instead of doing so merely because he doesn't show romantic interest in her ,its mostly because he doesn't follow on his promises (end of Black Knight) or shows up to save her “properly” (Referring to 1- that scene in Riders where he blows eggman -who had caught Amy- away with wind and she chases him with her hammer because “how could he not think that would hit her too “ and 2- the one in Zero Gravity where he arrives late to save her and she playfully throws him a few fists saying that “it took him long enough!”). I don't think she's right to do that but i don't consider it to be problematic either, since by that point the games had strongly implied that there was a non-spoken agreement between the two that he'll always show up to save her and the whole thing feels more playful than anything else. Mostly because Sonic seems to be fine with her being around again, as he never really denies her acussations or runs away when she gets mad,and even tries to explain himself to her. (which ngl is kinda cute from his part because he doesn't really have to.) I am,however, more critical of her getting annoyed just cause Sonic doesn't prioritize her,even if she doesn't take the hammer out and intimidates him in those cases.

So yeah,this Amy is one of the more famous -and infamous- ones,as her flaws and positive qualities are more balanced than the one from Battle. However,i personally don't like her much as there's almost no focus on the empathetic/compassionate side of her character that was so prominent in the adventure era and ,even if i wouldn’t call this version of her a Stalker , she's still is way too obsessive and possesive for my liking. The writing for her character is still pretty much completely based on being attracted to Sonic, to the point that In 06 she tells Silver that, if she had to, she'd “choose Sonic over the world"... which...i really don't like...

In Sonic Chronicles , Amy gets a lot of dialogue and she is fine for the most part (She does get jealous in a scene but its not as bad as in Rush,She tries to make Sonic jealous by inventing a fake boyfriend and her levels of aggressiveness are up to the player's treatment of her. ) Near the final section of the game,Amy is scared they might die and aks Sonic if she can have a moment with him. She then tries to have a serious conversation with him and politely asks if he cares about her or if he likes her at all. if the player chooses to make Sonic say he does care for her she is legitimately surprised and thankful. Idk what happens If he rejects her cause i haven't been able to find any recordings of that and i never owned this game,but i'll assume that her reaction won't be too bad considering she is asking in the first place(?) feel free to tell me if you know…

This portrayal of Amy is still present in Unleashed (2008) ,in which Amy is there to cheer/support Sonic on throughout the game and to serve as an important indicator that Sonic is quite self conscious of his looks when he's a werehog. She is generally very sweet towards him in this game (especially when she shows no rejection towards his werehog form,which is a detail i adore), even if she does get annoyed when he doesn't pay as much attention to her as he does to Chip or reciprocate her feelings.

A good example is how, before the last temple ,she asks him if he'd like to go on a date with her after everything is over. If you choose the positive dialogue option she is ,again, positively surprised and thankful. If you make him say no she complains about how he's being mean, but doesn't insist on it and just accepts it.

In Free Riders (2010) ,Amy goes back to her violent portrayal and just generally acts extremely out out of character (like,she doesn't even fit into Battle's portrayal). It really feels like someone who didn't know anything about the character wrote her, so for the sake of my pink hedgie let's ignore it and go back to talking about portrayal 4.

I already mentioned her brief apparition in Black Night and there's nothing worth mentioning about her in Generations so i'll skip them.

This portrayal ended in Lost World (2013),In which they toned down Amy as a character in general,leaving out all of her flaws and iconic traits out. She feels plain and her strong personality,confidence,sass,energy,etc all seem to be completely gone. She's just sweet and that's it . For some reason there's a scene where she literally tries to confess to Sonic and is cut off before she can finish,which is very funny considering it had never been treated as a secret before??? it really goes to show how hard they were trying to pull some kind of reboot on her. Fortunately,this characterization was only a two-game-thing (She is just as plain in Forces (2015)) so i'll put it in the same bag as the Free riders one and we'll leave it at that.

After Lost world came Boom (2014) ,and then we got the most recent change of Amy's personality,which we all know has had a mixed reception from the fandom. Originally people thought that this Amy would stay just in the Boom universe ,but this personality has been showing up in the mainline games for a while now,like in Team Sonic Racing (2019) and Frontiers (2021).

This Amy feels older than any of the ones that came before her. She kept the sass,the love for romanticism,the positive attitude,the confidence and the strenght but her bad temper and over enthusiasm are gone,as she is generally more calm,less energetic and not childish at all. Most importantly,this Amy is extremely emotionally intelligent,as the rest of characters seem to look for her help and advice constantly ( to the point that she has been given the "therapist friend" title by the fandom and is even referred as "the nice one" by Eggman himself ). Another interesting thing about this Ames is that she doesn't flirt with Sonic anymore,In fact, she barely expresses her liking for him (She does so a bit more in Japanese.) and Sonic seems completely comfortable with this version of her around.

A lot of people say that this version of her is out of character and I completely understand where that comes from, but i must disagree because this characterization of Amy is the first one since the adventure era that focuses on her compassion/empathy rather than on her crush on Sonic, which combined with her intelligence,makes her not out of character,just the most emotionally mature Amy to date instead. I actually think that if the og modern Amy had grown up,this is the kind of adult she would have become.

A good argument to defend this point would be that one Egg-memo you can buy through the fishing minigame Frontiers where Engman talks about how Amy has "come a long way" and how it took her some time "to find herself" and get out of Sonic's shadow.

Only problem i have with this Amy is that i wish she was more flawed and bubbly,as she can come off as a little plain from time to time. She is a bit too perfect for my taste. I'd like her to mess up more,to not always be so smart,to be more brute,bubbly and impulsive,a little bit more clumsy,fiery and wild,just so she could have some more of the charm of the original,y'know?

Before i talk about her more recent Videogame portrayal (TMoSTH) i want talk about IDW Amy, which is my favorite Amy!!!

in IDW, Amy's flaws and positive traits are balanced perfectly: she is flawed and relatable and can mess up sometimes because of her impulsivity, but she's good intentioned,optimistic and incredibly kind. She is a great fighter and leader,but also a wonderful friend who offers great emotional support. She has a strong personality, lots of sass and can be very aggressive and intimidating towards her enemies, but not any less of an empathetic and compassionate person because of that. Her strength and confidence are pillars for her character instead of nonsensical anger. She is energic, idealistic and still a romantic,but not obsessive nor possesive. Bubbly and peppy but still emotionally intelligent. She still loves Sonic, but her feelings for him feel authentic rather than childish idealization,and given that she now respects his space,she's just happy to be able to be fighting by his side and jokingly flirt from time to time.

Truly,i think this is Amy at her best,and i know i'm not the only one who thinks so,as IDW Amy is constantly praised by the fandom. However, something i hear a lot is people saying how they love IDW Amy but despise "Main Amy" -by which i'll assume they refer to videogame Amy just in general- and that way of summarizing all of Amy's game portrayals feels very odd to me, especially because IDW Amy is a culmination of every single good aspect that has been added to this character combined with everything that she was meant to be at the start. In other words,IDW Amy couldn't exist if it wasn't for all the game Amys before her.

in a way, IDW Amy feels like the "truest" Amy at the moment, considering that she represents perfectly everything that has made her positively memorable since the beginning and lacks every problematic aspect of her character that was added post her creation.

Now,I personally believe that Amy in TMoSTH is the same as in IDW. Her character doesn't revolve around Sonic and her flaws are funny and charming (The way she was so ashamed of how she broke her hammer when she tried to escape the closet with brute force ,how she didn't realize Sonic was actually hurt because she was too excited about the game, how she was overconfident and impulsively tried to solve the case and completely failed ,how she and vector started beating a wall violently after realizing the train was alive,etc),but her positive qualities shine throughout the game as well ( How she took the time to organize a party that she'd think everyone would have fun at,How she is so thankful that everyone showed up and doesn't mind that Shad and Sonic didn't bring gifts, how she makes sweets remarks about others and cute jokes in distressing situations,how she has faith in Shadow's goodwill, The way she delivers the final blow at the end and says that despite everything,she loved the party because it was an adventure,etc ). Throughout the game,Sonic and the rest treat her in a way that really goes to show what a good friend and a lovely person she has become ,and she expresses great appreciation for everyone's presence in her life.

It's honestly an amazing coincidence that this game takes place on her bday considering that it's the one that made this portrayal of her "game canon". As a fan of her, i celebrate it!

So yeah, i didn't talk about Sonic X Amy,Archie Amy nor all the comics,series and games that came out between the big videogame titles. There is much more about how Amy has been written that could be said, but i think i did a pretty decent summary of the most important changes her character has gone through the years game-wise,at least good enough to defend my point that she wasn't a stalker originally and she definitely isn't one now. As i mentioned before,i agree that she was portrayed as possesive and obsessive for a looong period of time and as an actual harasser for a shorter one , and that we should definitely recognize it and be critical of such things being portrayed as “quirky” and “funny” aspects when they are in reality, so hurtful. BUT summarizing her whole character by calling her a stalker and an obsessive fangirl is defining her based on the worst examples of her characterization and ignoring her good ones completely.

Feel free to disagree with my character analysis and the way i categorize her portrayals,but i strongly believe that Amy rose isn't meant to be a harasser,an obsessive fangirl or personal space invader.

My girl deserves better.

#character analysis #amyrose #sonicthehedgehog

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