The Amount Of Times Spamton Lets Kris Know And Emphasizes He Wont/cant Force Them To Do Anything Hits

the amount of times spamton lets kris know and emphasizes he won’t/can’t force them to do anything hits me so hard

he says it not just once, not twice, but three times. so its clearly really important to him that kris knows that.

if there’s one thing spamton deeply cares about, it’s the ability for people to make their own choices. to be able to think for themselves. just to have the option to follow their own judgment. you can of course, still persuade someone to do something, because if you persuade someone that’s still them weighing the pros and cons for themself. they still have the option to choose. he’s pretty principled in this regard.

he wants kris to be able to make their own choices too. as a puppet he can’t have that for himself, and he sees a kindered soul in kris—he sees them as an extension of himself, and so whatever logic applies to him applies to them as well, including his principle of the freedom of choice. that also means the concept of consent would be extremely important to him. he does not want to force his will upon others.

and that’s another point i should touch on. here’s another few lines that strike me as profound.

spamton immediately acknowledges after saying “NO, I DIDN’T HEAR ANYTHING JUST NOW!!!” that something was said, rendering the former line that he didn’t hear anything as bullshit. it’s really hard to put this into words, and i can’t describe it as anything other than desperate. he is so consciously aware of how fucked he is. but for whatever reasons he has a hard time being direct about it.

i do not believe this was due to some metatextual force preventing him from asking for help. i think it’s just his personality and his principles.

he doesn’t want to force his will on others. so he has to do it indirectly. he’d feel a bit of shame, i guess, in asking for help. i mean he does want help but he needs to ask for it indirectly. you know how some people are like, “just asking …. for a friend”? it’s EXACTLY like that. he knows he needs help and does want help but he can’t accept that. he can’t let himself seem cringe and maudlin with no good reason. so he has to cast his personal sentiment off into the objective ether and like, separate it from himself, or subject it to logical scaffolding. he doesn’t understand why someone would value individual sentiments over reason; it feels like an accident for him to be feeling something. unless he assumes control over it for the sake of creating a deliberate sentimental impact on others, he’s got the “if i said anything worrying no i didnt <3” mindset.

you could get it out of him but only if you sat down and went, “okay. let’s be real with each other..level with me. tell me your demons and i’ll tell you mine. fair?” and he realizes he has nothing to hide or lose. because what’s happening here is that you’d be giving him persmission—consent. he doesn’t want to drop something heavy on you if the context is not appropriate for it. he doesn’t want to impose his will on you. he won’t force you to listen, he can’t force you. the world does not move towards him, he moves towards the world. he needs your consent that it’s okay first. because otherwise he senses that he is bringing the atmosphere down. that is why spamton was so quick to brush off his cry for help. it wasn’t professional. it wasn’t in his controlled presentation that he chooses to manifest for the sake of others. and it’s like, “fuck i cant do that to a customer. fuck me. they don’t wanna hear that. i need to be a good host to them.” (and good GOD i feel that SO fucking hard it’s unreal. “how are you feeling?” hey hey that’s MY thing to ask. let’s not get too carried away.)

anyway. going back to the beginning, these lines, not only just by themselves in isolation, but also in the context of being repeated for emphasis, is genuinely one of spamton’s most touching aspects i think. auhhaaahhgghhh

I feel like Spamton would enjoy gambling, slot machines especially. I’m not sure why, it’s just a thought I had

I don't think so. He does say he is not in it for the money, but for the freedom. Plus you tend to lose more money than you gain...He would not want to re-live that.

I did hear a long time ago that casinos are apparently designed in such a way that it's easy to get lost in, and I think he would hate that.

On Spamton and Villany

I thought about writing this because I think reflecting on his role in the narrative is interesting

He's a villain in the sense that he's an antagonist. Literally has a mini boss battle, a secret boss battle and is the main antagonist and final boss of the alternative route. When you lay out his story and his actions he quite literally behaves like the evil corporate guy from a late 90s movie about dogs saving the day. It's impossible to deny he's a villain, even as sympathetic as his story as told by him makes him seem to be

Just because a villain is sympathetic and relatable doesn't mean that they're not a villain, and just because a character is a villain by definition doesn't mean they can't be sympathetic and relatable. More often than not, villains really do turn out to be more sympathetic and relatable simply because they need to be more developed for them to make sense as a villain (have motive and reason, etc), which isn't always the case for protagonists and heros.

That being said, Spamton is a fascinating character because while he's a villain and he's a pretty shitty person in general, his backstory, the way he frames it for the player, and his entire side quest make him extremely appealing, to the point you're pretty much willing to forget or brush aside all his bad behavior, because after all, he's nothing but a poor little meow meow

And that's exactly what he wants you to think.

I’m not trying to be like “Spamton was never happy” because I don’t think that’s accurate, but I don’t think that being famous was something he enjoyed as much as he makes it sound like he did.

A lot of celebrities will say that fame makes it harder to form relationships, because there’s always that question of “are they really my friend/lover/etc or do they just want to be near me because I’m famous” that lingers in the back of their minds.

Spamton probably had better relationships back when he was with the addisons, it’s easy for me to imagine him internally doubting his new friends and refusing to get overly close to them when he was a big shot, because he’s always worried about the possibility of them only liking Mr. Number 1 Rated Salesman 1997 and not the real, genuine Spamton G. Spamton that’s hidden behind his big image. 

And at this point, he doesn’t want anyone to see the genuine Spamton, that Spamton was unsuccessful and forgettable and it’s uncomfortable for him to think about who he really is. Or who he really “was,” because he’s trying his best to put his addison days behind him. He can’t fathom the idea that anyone else would want to see the genuine Spamton either, especially when he can be a big shot for them instead, so even if he made new friends that would have been supportive and would have wanted to get closer to him, he just pushes them away and stops them from forming any kind of deeper connections.

Also, it’s probably worse since he needed help to get famous. He wouldn’t be where he is without Mike and the person on the phone, and he’s so happy and grateful for his success, but it just makes his image seem all the more fake. He sees all the posters of his face around the city and thinks, is that really me? Is that really what people want me to be?

Oh god, and when he falls from grace and his business fails. That had to have been his worst fears coming true, because none of his new high-class friends were there to help him. As soon as he was no longer big, they just left him to struggle alone. 

What if he had tried to form a deeper bond with them, what if he hadn’t kept them at arm’s length the whole time and had been their friend instead of a friendly acquaintance? If there was something that he could’ve done to build those relationships, it was too late to do anything now, and he’d already left all of his old friends in the dust when he became big, so he’s burned all of his bridges. 

So Spamton has to face the consequences alone. Nobody hardly even notices him struggling. And after the neo fight, when it seems like he’s actually died, who is there to care about him? If his popular friends even noticed, they don’t comment on it, they don’t cry for him. 

The only one from his days of fame that seems to remember him? Swatch. Swatch has sympathy for him and his fate, but they’re giving him the kind of pity you’d give when you read in the paper that an old has-been celebrity died. It’s kind of them to speak of him in a sympathetic light despite everything, but at the same time it’s a cold, informal type of sympathy, not the kind of sympathy you’d show to a friend.

The only ones who on some level cared about Spamton through everything were the addisons. They pretend not to know him if asked, and if they were aware of what happened to him post-eviction, then they looked the other way, which was cruel of them. But there was probably bad blood on both sides here, and both Spamton and the addisons likely did and said some less than kind things to each other. I don’t think it’s fair to blame either party for the fallout Spamton had with them, it seems like they all had a hand in causing it.

But before everything went wrong, the addisons used to socialize with Spamton over at the cyber grill, they treated him like any other addison even back when he was small and unsuccessful. They were the only ones who even attempted to check on him after he was evicted. They go as far as to close their shops, the foundation for their sole purpose in life, just to take a moment to properly mourn him.

The addisons weren’t there for him as much as they should’ve been, but in the end, none of the people he knew when he was a big shot were willing to be a friend to him after things turned sour. It was only his old friends the addisons who still cared enough about Spamton to try to honor his memory in some way.

sometimes i feel like toby fox made spamton and the addisons especially for people to hyperfixate on. everything about them seems so perfect for people to go rabid about its insane to me

for one, spamton himself pretty much counts for 4 people, those being addispam, big shot spamton, in game spamton, and spamton neo. now sure you mostly see people going rabid about in game spamton but ive seen plenty of people who are obsessed with a version we dont get to see on screen

secondly, even the main in game spamton himself is kinda up to interpretation. loads of people characterise him differently. if i compared two aus to eachother theyd often be very different and depending on the ones i chose could be almost like 2 different people, and then if i compared those to in-game spamton, theyd still be very different. also since you dont see addispam and big shot spamton on screen you dont even know what they acted like so again basically you can make your own guy to fixate on with a few prompts as to what he was like

dont even get me started on the addisons. now im biased as fuck here seeing that ive been fixated on the addisons for like 6 months now (send help) but toby fox basically gave us 4 templates for us to have fun with. sure based off of in game dialogue you have a bit to go off of when it comes to their personality (pink being an asshole and blue being caring for example) but even then every addison in every different au is slightly different and i have never seen two addisons turn out exactly the same. ALSO you dont even know the relationship these characters have to spamton meaning you can have them be siblings, you can have them be friends, or you can ship them based off of what you enjoy. OR you could just ignore them altogether (which a lot of people do lmao)

also another thing is the fact that you dont necessarily need to have your addisons' personalities just reflect off of spamtons. I mean the main 4 addisons give you enough to go off of to make your own, and you are given cyber city, an entire fantasy world for you to put them in. cyber city again is up to interpretation, some people have it be like a normal city, some people make it a utopia, some people make it a hellscape. the choice is yours!!

and even then in game spamton is so versatile. he is perfect for angsty stuff, fluffy stuff, or jsut silly stuff, and none of it is out of character. you couldnt really make an angsty spongebob edit could you, itd be weird and out of characer and no one would take it seriously. but also you couldnt make a silly walten files video, sure people do but its out of character and wouldnt actually happen canonically. but spamton on the other hand. hes the kinda guy who you can draw holding a wallet in his mouth like a cat and generally being silly but also you could draw him sobbing at the bottom of dumpster and neither would be out of character!! AAAA

also extra thing i thought id add but his backstory is also very up to interpretation, like i dont think ive ever seen two people who think spamtons rise and downfall went exactly the same. sure everyone has the same general idea of how it went but some people believe in acid theory, some people believe in puppetification theory, some people have a mix of both, some people have their own idea of how it went down, and with that you can project different parts of your own trauma onto whatever happened to him.

ok sorry that was so long thank you for reading my very biased ramble about why spamton is perfect byeeee

Some remarks about Spamton's hair

This is so minimal and so stupid but it's a detail I really really like

It just dawned on me that this?

this little bitch has a comb over, not a pompadour or slicked back hair or whatever. In the cungadero air freshener, he has a widow's peak, and presumably that's him in the past, right? Which means he probably doesn't have all that hair to spare anymore. How tragic for him

Which means not only that he's trying to hide his receding hairline, it also means that the comb over is all fucked up in Spamton NEO's sprites, truly showing his unhingedness

Look at this balding middle aged man. Stupid motherfucker