#i feel like vakama is anxiety coded

[bionicle-ramblings]

I mean this in the most inoffensive way possible, and this is purely my interpretation, looking back now that I've caught up more on the lore and read up on on the books and rewatched the movies:

Vakama is a very anxiety coded character

My evidence is more interpretation that anything else, but let me explain:

We all know how Vakama's story starts: he's an esteemed mask-maker in Ta-Metru, good enough to surpass his teacher and have the Turaga choose him to make the most powerful Kanohi mask of all time(pun intended), he's got friends he enjoys his time with, he has a good thing going for him, even if his city is overrun with Vahki that will attack on sight, there's a homicidal plant that's trying to kill everyone, and Ta-Metru isn't the most livable place to be, all things considered, but Vakama is at his most stable as a Matoran.

I don't have a lot of or any background on his Matoran life to really point out anything that comes across as anxiety, but I will say that Lhikan giving him the Toa stone and Lhikan's capture gave Vakama some kind of survivor's guilt, seeing as how Nidhiki literally threatened to burn Vakama alive if Lhikan didn't hand himself over.

Where we loop back to anxiety territory is the visions Vakama has, or rather what the visions could represent. Anxiety is often referred to as "being afraid of the future," and the future is something Vakama sees due to his visions. The closest I can think of that can be a real life interpretation of the visions(what it could be IRL) are panic attacks or anxiety attacks, nothing severe, but big enough that almost everyone who sees it chalks it up to, "being cross-wired."

Some other things that come off as anxiety coding are when Vakama still makes the Mask of Time, despite still being a Toa, when Vakama tries to feign confidence and gets irritable when he's trying to rescue the rest of the Matoran and is trying to do it as fast as possible, even snapping at and lashing out at his friends. Granted the latter, getting haughty and trying to get the job done quickly, seems to be more the result of Vakama internalizing Lhikan's sacrifice and last words, doing so in a, "he said he was proud to call me his brother, so now I have to keep him proud, even if he's not here to say it," which is a line of thinking that could bring us back to anxiety

In terms of how making the Mask of Time can be seen as something to do with anxiety, this requires a bit of a personal lense to view:

Have you ever been at a point where a big event or thing is coming up and to keep yourself from focusing on it, you try to focus on something else? For instance, if you were stressing about a new semester of school starting or a job interview or a test, have you ever tried to take the focus off of it by doing something like cooking a meal or writing ina journal or drawing? Just a small thing you're used to doing that both challenges you, but is relatively stress-free?

I imagine Vakama is doing mostly the same thing. With no sugar-coating at all, he's stressed the hell out about being a Toa and cannot really express that or back out because he was chosen, so he resorts to making the Kanohi Vahi; he's a skilled mask-maker and his job was to make masks, which he was very successful in. I also imagine it's a bit of a bargaining thing for him, like a sort of, "If I can succeed in making this, I can succeed going forward," thing.

There are smaller things that are also possible pointers or shows of Vakama's implied anxiety, namely how he chooses a weapon most familiar to him from his time as a Matoran(the disk launcher), how his mask power is invisibility, which I've personally felt sometimes when I was having anxiety moments("I don't want to be here right now, I don't want anyone to see me"), and just how quiet Vakama is in general, being someone who possibly wouldn't be noticed as much if he weren't the main protagonist in LoMN; I'm pretty sure if it was Matau or Onewa we were dollowing, Vakama would be an intriguing background character similar to Nuju, only slightly louder, so to speak

This was just a random thought I had, and most of it is just what I interpret, and sorry if it doesn't make a lot of sense😅

#bionicle #ramblings #long post #vakama #character analysis #anxiety discussion #i feel like vakama is anxiety coded #tw anxiety mention #< tagging just in case