Impromptu Character Analysis Of One Regulus Arcturus Black

impromptu character analysis of one regulus arcturus black

i think the key to regulus as a character – at least my version of him, since there isn’t really a canon – is that all his life he’s been searching for somewhere to belong; somewhere that would foster him and allow him to thrive; somewhere that needed him as much as he needed it, even if he didn’t know that’s what he wanted.

both at first and till the end, he clung to his family as his place, but he was the second son, so he wasn’t truly needed. this led to some possible resentment of sirius, who was the heir and got that special place all to himself just by merit of being born first, but didn’t even want it; in fact, actively rejected it. this led, i think, to reg damaging himself to become the perfect son in every way: to be everything that sirius wasn’t. this meant his parents were happy with him bc he was perfect, but no matter what he did, no matter how hard he worked, no matter how perfect he was, he’d never have that place. not like sirius.

and then sirius got himself sorted into gryffindor and reg saw, fleetingly, a chance. now he was even more obviously the perfect son. he did everything right. but to his frustration, sirius went out and found himself ANOTHER place – another family – and reg still couldn’t even grab a place within his own because sirius still had it. so he burned and he burned, hoping to carve himself into what they wanted – hoping that he could rebuild a new him, a better him, from the ashes of his old self, and then maybe they would give him a place… a place in their hearts. in their minds.

i think regulus just really wanted to be loved; to be cared about. and that was a common problem throughout his life – mom and dad don’t care about me, all they care about is sirius; now they’re yelling at him and i hate it and i love it but they’re still not paying attention to me because i’m neither bad enough or good enough to not fade to the background (i am nothing, i am no one); sirius doesn’t care about me, clearly, because he left me, and yes, he asked if i wanted to come with, but i can’t and he knows i can’t because i have a duty to this family even if he decides to shirk his. i don’t have that luxury. i don’t have the ability to fit in wherever i go; to charm people’s faces off until they’d die for me. i could go with you, sirius, but i know i wouldn’t fit in where you’re going. i don’t entirely fit in here, either, but at least here, i’m not a stranger. it’s a case of bad thing vs worse thing.

and then came the death eaters. i don’t think regulus had any love for muggles/muggleborns, but i don’t think he hated them either. he just got so caught up in trying to be who his parents wanted him to be that he went and did what was expected of him. perhaps he would find somewhere to belong within this group of people like him – purebloods; people with lost or buried souls; even several members of his extended family. plus, i think he always had at least some interest in the dark arts and being a death eater would allow him to explore that.

but it wasn’t what he thought it would be. he was horrified when he found out what the dark lord was willing to do, because although regulus appears to be fairly neutral, he still has a line. horcruxes and horrific treatment of his house elf – one of the only creatures who really cared about him – definitely crossed that line. and then, suddenly, he once again found himself on the outside looking in. he now knew that he did not belong here, which made him a lone sheep in a pack of wolves, saved only by the wolf skin he drapes himself in. he knew he had to do something about this, but he had nowhere to go – his family still more or less supported voldemort, he had no true friends, and his brother hated him (or so he thought).

and so he walked straight to his death; and so he drowned.

i think that regulus also felt like nothing fairly often. all of his family had niches that they carved out for themselves (sirius as the spirited rebel with his heart beating proudly on his sleeve; his father standing tall and emotionless, always in control, a cold, solid wall of stoicism; his mother with her icy eyes and sharp tongue and terrifying beauty), but regulus? regulus was just the second son. he tried his best to be perfect, but perfection is not a personality trait; it just made him even more of a blank slate on which his mother could draw. at school, if he was anything, he was sirius’s younger brother. being a black gave him automatic reverence in some circles and contempt in others, but no matter how much it defined his identity, it never helped him find it. being a death eater felt right for his surname, but not for him. as much as he raved about the dark lord’s ideals (hoping that if he talked it up enough, he could convince himself), he always felt at least slightly out of place in that group. so he wasn’t really regulus the death eater and he wasn’t really regulus, perfect son and heir to the noble and most ancient house of black, but he wore both like masks because without them, he was just regulus. and just regulus was nothing to both himself and everyone else. and i think that’s why he was so willing to lay down his life to get rid of the horcrux – because he hoped that maybe if his death meant something, it would be enough to counteract being nothing all his life.

tw: mentions of abuse (walburga and orion a+ parenting)

the tragic thing about his parents is that, despite the abuse and the neglect, regulus loved them.

he loved his mother's intelligence, the way she knew how to answer most of his questions and how she could tell him the origin of each word, whether it was greek or latin or such.

he loved his father's wit, his sharp humour, those brief moments when he'd look at regulus with compliance, those fleeing seconds when his father would grant him a knowing, complicit look.

and their expectations, oh, he loved them and he hated them at the same time. they expected the best because they believed he could give it to them — and yet, what a wonderful suffering if he didn't live up to all those expectations. what an outstanding suffocation, trying to meet them all the time.

not to mention, regulus felt a little guilty about how much he loved their satisfaction once he gave them what they wanted. yes, the burden was a heavy one. yet, what a relief to feel the gentle stroke of his mother's hand on his cheek or to see a pleased smile on his father's lips.

and regulus can't forget about the times his mother called him his 'good son' and about how his father told him that 'he didn't disappoint' — it wasn't the same as saying he was proud of him but, to regulus, it was close enough.

sometimes, the good outweighed the bad (until it didn't). that was what sirius wouldn't understand.

they were good to him, as long as regulus didn't disappoint them. so, he just needed to be good, did he? he just needed to be the good son, he just had to avoid disappointing them, he just had to bear it and they would, maybe, finally love him.

sirius couldn't understand how he could love them.

still, regulus did. and it broke him more than hating them ever would have.

Some more kid!bkdk 🫶🥰

Based on that Lilo and Stitch scene

somebody help this man budget

Regulus headcanon / black brothers angst:

Is it even that strange that Regulus started doing everything that their mother wanted him to?

Regulus wasn’t the one to take the punishment if he fucked up, his brother was. Sirius would make sure that he was the one to take all of Regulus’ beatings. Knowing that his brother was on the line if he didn’t do as they say, he would just listen to their parents.

Nothing was worse than seeing Sirius in pain knowing it was his fault.

So he listened. He kept his head down. He did as he was told. All for Sirius to start detesting him. All for Sirius to leave him. Sirius started hating him because Regulus would listen to them, because he didn’t act up. What a fucking juxtaposition right?

So when Sirius left, and Regulus could theoretically do as he pleased without getting his brother in trouble, he could’ve just started acting out. But he didn’t. Maybe he had forgotten how to. How to have his own mind and opinions. All forgotten.

So he continued to keep his head down and doing as he was told. And Sirius continued hating him.

yuri and kitty make sense. it did not come out of nowhere. the rom com meet cute? all of the tension while yuri was “dating” dae and how easily that tension transfers to romantic tension after kitty’s dream? that doesn’t come out of nowhere. kitty and yuri in the beginning of the show are two people who are at odds but don’t really want to be at odds. once the dae situation is mostly resolved, they become fast friends, which it’s foreshadowed they can be in episode 1. moreover, kitty has been with dae since she was 12. she clearly has been focused on him and not herself, and her interest in yuri is allowed to flourish because she is not with dae when it begins. she does not think she will be with dae. and she is in fact actively looking for someone to kiss. moreover, even if it was out of nowhere (which it isn’t) kitty is 17 (16?). at that age, crushes appear out of nowhere all. the. time. and while it might not have been the best idea to tell yuri about her feelings, kitty thought she would never see her again. sometimes the right thing for you, the thing that will let you keep going, is going to hurt someone else. doesn’t make it okay, just is. and on top of that, she didn’t fully confess anyway. and kitty’s not known for making good decisions, since literally the first tatbilb movie. it’s up to yuri now to decide what to do with this information. she clearly has wanted juliana to come back, and it is unlikely she will drop juliana because of kitty’s aborted confession. additionally, the few times we’ve seen juliana have been 1) the flashback, 2) the kiss in the janitor’s closet (neither of which reveal much about her), 3) the phone call in the tent, 4) the phone call in kitty/yuri/q’s room, and 5) the scene at the airport. in 2 and 3, juliana seems to have resigned herself to a life without yuri, and seems honestly shocked that yuri cared enough to go to such lengths to find her. what does that say about what juliana thinks of the relationship that yuri is so invested in? in 4 and 5, 4 explicitly, juliana is worried about yuri’s friendship with kitty, and jealous of it, and pushes the fact that she doesn’t quite trust yuri’s telling her the truth about the platonic nature of their friendship. to be clear, i have absolutely nothing against juliana. i am interested and curious to see her as a full character in season 2, and i do, in fact, desperately hope that they do not villainize a black queer female character. on the other hand, black queer women can be toxic partners. limiting othered people to only heroic, savior-like, positive roles, is also not great. and exhibiting jealous and mistrusting behavior already when we have so few, brief scenes of her is to me an orange flag. i’m not worried about it yet, but i have noticed it. and often, people who imply that they don’t trust their partner not to cheat, have already cheated themselves. once again, i hope this is untrue, i hope i’m wrong. finally, kitty was not in the right to almost confess to yuri, but it is not the cardinal sin some people are pretending it is. yuri and juliana may continue, they may not. whatever happens, it won’t be kitty’s fault. it is not inherently homophobic if you don’t ship kittyuri, or if you ship minty. it is homophobic to perpetuate this idea that the ship came out of nowhere simply because you don’t ship it and have refused to see what the show is explicitly showing.

in this same vein, min ho and kitty make sense. it did not come out of nowhere. and while min ho might not have had the best timing with telling kitty his feelings, he did in fact wait until he had confirmation that she was no longer with dae. he might have said something further had the PA not interrupted, but he did not appear to expect anything from her in return after he told her (just as kitty did not appear to expect anything in return from yuri when she almost confessed). kitty is shocked, but very clearly not upset about the information. to us, it is clear that min ho has liked kitty for a while, probably longer than he knew or let on. sometimes so called “hatred” for someone is genuinely that, but as demonstrated in xo kitty, it is often the exact opposite. (i am of course talking about disliking someone interpersonally for muddled reasons, not disliking someone for genuine reasons, i.e. they’re a harmful person.) dislike for someone is often based on someone protecting themselves for whatever reason. based on all that we know about min ho, he has a lot of family related issues, and a lot of reason to put up walls in order to protect himself. he is initially “anti-kitty” because he thinks dae should explore his options with someone he is in the same country with and then because he thinks yuri is a better option. a lot of this quite clearly stems from the way he was raised, the fact that his father is on wife #3, and the classism that very much exists in korea (as it does in many places) and honestly probably because kitty is half-white (i am not saying there is racism against white people, there isn’t. i’m saying that there is often unfortunate biases against mixed kids from both/all of their communities). in the chuseok episode, he says “my parents thought they were true love, and then had the messiest divorce ever” (or something to that effect). that line is so telling: min ho doesn’t believe in true love, or maybe even love at all. he looks at it as transactional, what can i get from them and what can they get from me? it’s evident in his failed (i think?) tryst with the k pop star who’s name is escaping me, and in his situationship with madison. but spending so much time around kitty specifically changes his mind about these things. slowly, at first, and then much more rapidly. he’s still cocky, arrogant min ho, but he chills out a lot over those first few episodes. i think he appreciates that kitty actually responds to his teasing and one ups him oftentimes. and when he calls her his saesang, it’s so funny bc he is so clearly the one obsessed with her at all times throughout season 1. also, the dream happens after the chuseok episode, where they noticeably get closer. there is buildup! he thinks she’s beautiful when she enters his party, and is actively trying to resist his crush on her (because he thinks he shouldn’t have a crush on his friend’s girlfriend) when he reacts to it being her. he respects that he thinks she and dae are still into each other and moves his attention to madison. he knows her order in the detention episode. he is upset for her when he finds out yuri and dae lied. he saves her from the fireworks. he does not fight back against dae after dae attacks him because he thinks dae has the right to. he looks visibly shattered when kitty says min ho isn’t the one she was talking about. also, min ho would not have made the effort to sweet talk some flight attendant to find kitty’s seat and sit in coach because of nothing. 

with both kittyuri, and with minty, they are one sided crushes (at least at the moment) with potential to be reciprocated, and i think people are misinterpreting them because of that. neither of them came out of nowhere, neither of them are toxic, and neither of the two ships involving teenagers include characters who are morally bad.

in conclusion, let people ship things. ship things yourself! and most of all, do not take things that seriously. shipping should never be a war. even if you personally don’t like a ship, it is shitty to go and actively hate the ship, especially if the ship is not doing you any harm, especially if you go into the positive spaces for that ship to spread your hate. if you don’t ship something, do not interact with content for that ship. it is not that hard. it is 2023, not 2013. ship whatever the hell you want.