There are parts that are deliberately offputting in a way that doesn't quite reach the level of transgressive art but do represent this really interesting shot across the bow towards the reader regarding how mutible a lot of the things people seem to like about the comic and the characters are.

It also emphasises a lot of the weird callousness that comes from having a bildungsroman narrative that also has apocalyptic stakes. Stuff like Rose's plan involving sending younger versions of herself and her friends off to die as proxies in order to fulfill the debt to the narrative the versions of the characters who matter have incurred for thier happy ending, while she rots into this fake myopic self actualisation.

There's a thread throughout Homestuck about characters having some level of awareness of their own development as people being baked into the universe and the ugly endpoint of that being someone looking at the world around them spiralling out of control and only being able to ask "How does this effect me?" Like millennial versions of the people who started out as hippies, got into self-help and ended up alone in the suburbs.

I also liked the Johnrezi parts, seeing Egbert be down bad for someone after being oblivious throughout the main comic was very funny.