#because also people playing around with putting Eridan in dresses is 100% harmless

[caligvlasaqvarivm]

how do you feel about march eridan?

Ok disclaimer before I get into it, trolls wearing dresses = great and fantastic; in fact, given that the gender differences in troll culture are so much less significant, ALL the male trolls should own some femme-ass clothes, even if it's as simple as just having a skirt version of their pants, and it's a little lame that we didn't get that.

That said, March Eridan specifically kind of annoys me because it has 0 basis in canon (aside from some shoutouts in things like ministrife sprites) but has taken over Eridan discussions so wholly that it's become widely accepted as part of his character that he's really into femme stuff when the opposite is true, and he's got some pretty major characterization tied up in the fact that he does lean so masc, and what specific type of masc he tends to present as.

So first of all, Eridan dresses up to emulate Dualscar, and this is very obvious and straightforward; if you've read the big essay I have pinned to my blog, you know that this is all a part of his basic "I have to be a big bad sea dweller or Something Bad Will Happen" suite of issues.

Thus, we can ALSO assume that the choices he made that aren't made to emulate Dualscar are reflective of his ACTUAL taste in clothing. For example, blue pants instead of purple and black - I believe that this is because Eridan likes to dress up in the blood colors of his dates; he wears a lot of blue because he's hatedating Vriska (and never quite seems to get 100% over her), and we also see this in the rings on his fingers - half of which are fuchsia, for Feferi.

So that leaves us with the glasses, shoes, and scarf. And we know why he dresses like that! It's because he's a hipster. (The scarf has an added benefit of being associated with harry potter-style wizards).

CCG: PAST YOU, PRESENT YOU, FUTURE YOU CCG: AND ABOVE ALL, UGLY SCARFNECKED DOUCHEBAG HIPSTER YOU CCG: WAIT I FORGOT, ALL OF THE YOUS ARE THAT YOU

And very specifically, a masc hipster from the era - the glasses and the ugly-ass shoes are dead giveaways. The slicked-back hair is reminiscent of that fashion style, too. He is also a douchebag. This too is important. He draws from character archetypes of the time that were generally agreed upon to be the most punchable people in existence; his introduction calls him "KIND OF A TOOL" and he consistently acts according to that. Like, I mean, just LOOK at those shades. Those are not the shades of somebody you want to be trapped in a conversation with.

A fairly accurate Eridan fashion board would look something like this:

And, like, it kind of matters that he dresses like this specific breed of pretentious male douchebag; on a meta level, that's the impression he's supposed to give the audience, and on a diegetic level, he CHOOSES to look like this because he has these kinds of interests, but is relegating them to secondary accessories.

We never hear him talk about liking hipster shit; we have to hear it from Karkat and glean it from his design. This is because, as I've talked about before, he actively distances himself from things that make him happy, things that he'd enjoy. The constant push-pull between his ACTUAL interests, and the ones he thinks he has to have because he's supposed to be a big nasty sea dweller, is a huge part of his characterization - for example, the way he keeps claiming that magic and wizards are fake and shitty, but has no less than 6 wizard statues in his respiteblock alone, and cared about his crappy wands enough to bring them onto the meteor.

So that's one of my other issues with March Eridan and the general fanon that he'd be really into femme clothes (and, by extension, fashion) - he wouldn't be forthcoming about it, even if it was true. He has a deep sense of shame and insecurity surrounding what few interests he actually has, because they feel stupid, ridiculous, and frivolous, next to the intense anxiety he has about playing the role society gave him. He's got a very strong sense of duty that makes it very difficult for him to relax and actually enjoy something. Which, you know, probably feeds into his hipster-ness - a movement often defined more by what it doesn't approve of than what it does.

Canon Eridan, when he has a choice of what to wear, overwhelmingly chooses masculine clothing with hipster connotations. And this matters, it's part of his characterization, it says something about him, the same way that it's important that Karkat dresses very simply and baggily (we all know how many insecurities Karkat has about his body) or that Sollux's bifurcation is shown in his clothes. So please please please don't misunderstand my dislike of March Eridan as me saying I don't want him in dresses; I purely dislike it because it's usually SUCH a misread of his character.

And to prove it, here's my other gripe with March Eridan stuff: all the dresses shown in the not-canon "official" artworks don't even flatter his bodytype. Why do his custom mannequins in Pesterquest have CURVES when his Pesterquest sprite doesn't?????

Please, I'm begging you, there are guides for dressing this body type, and even historical fashions that deliberately try to emulate this body type, please if you're going to dress him femme and HC that he enjoys fashion, please put him in clothes that flatter him please

I think Eridan should own some femme clothes, because on Alternia, there are very few differences between the genders, he's rich enough to afford it, and he clearly has more of an interest in fashion in general - but I think the fact that he has a clear canon preference for masculine styles is significant, and I'm really annoying, so it kind of does bothers me that this is a controversial opinion. That being said, I don't want to tell people what they Should and Should Not do, because that's lame. Who cares. He's a fictional character, let people draw him in dresses. Would be very happy if this post causes people to draw him in different styles of dresses though :pray:

#I'm not going to tag this #because also people playing around with putting Eridan in dresses is 100% harmless #and i'm not going to ruin the fun by going But The Canon Says - #i'm just really really really annoying about canon and i kind of assume people follow me for that reason #but please dont let my annoyingness hamper your fun #if you enjoy putting eridan in dresses then by all means keep doing it #peace and love and rise above