the epilogues aren’t “required reading” in the sense that yes, you literally do not have to actually read the epilogues and instead read a summary, the wiki etc, but that doesn’t mean it’s not “required reading” as in the comic literally picks up mid-story??

i think making the argument that the intended way to consume HSBC is literally to take the summary to replace actually reading the text the story is continuing is pretty insane. like, if a sequel to a movie starts with a summary of the previous film, does that mean it’s not a sequel anymore and you can just watch it standalone, letting the summary basically just replace the whole first part in your mind? for example, across the spiderverse, the sequel to into the spiderverse, starts with a summary of the first movie, all the info you need to know to understand the events of the actual film is presented in the film itself, but not a single sensible person would argue that watching the sequel without seeing the previous film is a “normal” or “appropriate” viewing experience. like, you could do it, but you’re still getting an incomplete experience.

i feel like its entirely disingenuous to imply that a recap‘s purpose is to replace the original text. it’s just not. thats why it’s called a recap, it’s recapping events that already happened and that you already *know* about, just didn’t quite remember. that’s why stories insert a recap of events within themselves - why sequels sometimes start with summaries, why “on the previous episode” sequences exist, not to actually replace the experience of viewing the original, but to make sure the audience remembers the relevant information. the recap doesn’t exist for you, someone who wants to start the story from the middle for arbitrary reasons, it’s for a person who read the epilogues when they dropped and are hazy on the details and need a reminder. you *can* read it as a replacement, but that is on your soul.

not reading the epilogues before HSBC is just the modern “i started reading at act 5”. like, sure, you can scour the wiki and have your friend fill you in on the details, but you don’t then get to go on the internet and say “the first four acts are not required reading for hivebent”.