how do you feel about the characterization?

I don't feel like the new dialogue for the pilot really reflects the way they spoke in the comic as much as I wanted, Dave in particular doesn't yap as much as I thought he would and like most other people I'm not a fan of changing his "too cool to care" persona to the one he had in the pilot

John and Rose were my favorites, though I found how much John swore in the pilot strange, I don't hate the idea of him swearing but I think it was better not to have it for John specifically just to have some more contrast with Dave's more informal way of speaking to differentiate their characters better with what little runtime they had

Jade didn't really do much so I don't really have that much to say about her

I did enjoy the voice acting, I don't mind how Dave sounded unlike some people who didn't like how high pitched he was it's just more the voice direction I'm not a fan of

I mean it was only 11 minutes long. It's just a proof of concept, not an episode one. I'm sure things will be much slower to characterize once we get the actual series, lol. Personally I found them all great, exactly how I imagined in canon, and I'm glad all the fanon takes will hopefully get less constant now XD Jade was ESPECIALLY perfect, IMO.

I think with the change to animated show over comic its gonna definitely change how the characters end up acting, but even so Dave is a bit off, i still really enjoyed how they've characterized him but it doesn't feel like the same Dave from act 1 so im excited to see where they take him when the show proper comes out. John and rose were exactly what i expected to be tbh, both acted pretty much how they did at the start of the comic from the little we saw, jade didn't really get too much screen time so to early to say for now.

The voices for the cast i really enjoyed, roses in particular feels spot on for what i imagined. as for Daves voice i think the way he emotes isn't what i expected, which i think most people are thinking the same thing, he doesn't have that non chalantness that he had initially, but the voice itself being higher pitch i think does fit.

Overall i think they did a pretty good job of characterizing them. will be interesting to see how the community reacts to the changes they will inevitably make to the characters tho.

ErisolspiteIs#1 -- oh yeah, this is the unrefined pilot version and i think it's a great starting point :) i like it already for what it is and i'm excited to see where they take it next! i don't think fanon is ever going anywhere though, or at least i hope not. everyone is entitled to their interpretations of the characters + fanworks don't have to submit to the authority of canon if they don't want to. DL;DR and all that!

DM and TG -- i'm glad to see both of you mention jade's little screentime, i felt a little bad not even giving her her own paragraph in the thread starter (^_^;) i have the same sentiment as above: it's just the pilot and i'm happy with what i got

didn't mention this in the opener but i was pleased to see that they lifted lines straight from the comic, too! obviously this has the benefit of being in-character because the character literally said that in original canon lolol. i'm not sure how many are direct quotes tho! i thought it was especially fitting to quote a rare "!" usage by dave (hope you like hammers dude!) since that lines up better with the emotiveness in the pilot.

Honestly for a pilot and something as densely written as HS, I think they did okay. Coolness and aloofness being synonymous as they used to be when the comic started is no longer the case and Dave's overtly overbearing persona seems more in line with both today's coolness and a good way to adapt the fact that the boy's mouth runs like a fuckin' motor tbh, without mentioning the fact that the whole of Dave's thing in the first acts is how much of a facade he's constantly wearing. I was slightly more bothered maybe with Rose's characterization as more stuck up than I would have expected, specially if we're priming the silliness that is Act 1 Rose buuut as all others have said, it's a proof of concept and as such it establishes a coherent introductory adaptation of the character dynamics we have had YEARS to micro-analyze haha. Love Jade's bubblyness coming to fore and while she seems a little flatter, it builds the necessary mistique. Overall happy but the denser part of all characters are yet to come so if we do get a full series, I think the challenge of maintaining a similarly steady building rhythm as the comic within the constrains of modern independent animation will be the wall against which the characterizations will crash, if they do.

i think the characterisation is charming. i like john in particular, dave i think is an interesting case - i think if they get greenlit and upgrade to longer episodes ill be more down for it. i want him to talk more lol, but his character considering the medium is Good Overall imo. i do wish he had a texas accent though. dont take the houston from the guy, youve already cut his rants!

i wish jade had more screentime. the space cadet joke was A+ but i want to see more of her. again, i think this is a time constraint issue more than anything else.

rose, for me, was 10/10. she feels exactly like the rose i remember loving when i started act 1 for the first time ever. i can see why some of it bothered people though, especially because she wasn't given the screentime to be silly. but i also have to remind myself that 11 minutes is really really REALLY short, especially for a proof of concept when you have to cram in that yes, you can make pesterlogs an animated conversation and of course you can show a strife, character design proof for the trolls and mayor and hussie etc.

TG: not that im gonna be the hero of this bitch

TG: thats all you bestie

That line really stuck out to me. Isn't Dave breaking down mid act 5 the moment where he said "im not a hero | my bro was | john is | im not"? That was such a big moment in his character arc; it feels wrong for him to drop that so early in the show. If it was just for that I'd be really scared for Dave's character, but the ending (including the part with all the kids talking while John inserts the SBURB disk) is incredibly good. For that brief moment we get to see deadpan Dave in action, followed by insanely detailed panel redrawings (did anyone else notice the little dream John in Prospit?) that give me complete, unshakeable confidence that the pilot was made by Homestuck fans.

Jade doesn't get much of the spotlight, as you said, but I feel that's a good thing. Especially if they keep going with her chibi, call-only appearance. I spent a few years as a kid living in a pretty isolated area without any real friends, so Jade left a pretty deep impression in me (especially since I'd just gotten into hs at the time). She's this mysterious character who we don't know much about until later in the comic, who's later revealed to have spent her whole life dreaming, waiting for the time where - she knew - she'd finally get to go on an adventure and finally meet all her friends. She's an escape fantasy, a sort of outsider waiting for her time on the spotlight, and I really like how she got abstracted away into a little caricature of herself instead of showing us a video feed of her running around her room playing the flute.

different, but not as much as ppl are saying. honestly what is changed i like

BB -- oooh good point with the "hero" line. that almost seems precognitive, like something jade should say instead. i was so wrapped up in dave saying bestie (which i thought was hilarious honestly) that i didn't think twice

I don't know what's up but they all feel so... wrong... im scared

not that anyone here has done it, but i've seen people complaining about jade seeming infantilised which i think is kind of dumb since she's literally shown to be asleep at the end of the pilot. it's dream jade! and she's goofy! i do think swearing fits j[une] and it's VERY refreshing to see that acknowledged as a part of [her] character, since a lot of times it feels like fans turn [her] into some goody two shoes, which [she] just... isn't. LOL. i just wish [she] seemed more Anti-Dad. "aw." in response to [her] dad's note on [her] gift is not something 13 year old j[une] would say!

i dont really gaf about dave and rose in the pilot since everyone's already had their critiques, but i do wish the level of "this is a front they put up" matched between the two, instead of dave's being so high energy and rose being nearly 100% in line with her front. but honestly i think it's more in character than most people think.

I hear a lot of critique about Dave's characterization, which I understand, but please keep in mind we only see him interact with John in the pilot and...well...given the not very subtle JohnDave fanservice that's included in the pilot, it wouldn't surprise me if this is just how he acts around John because...Yaoislop...? (This isn't me hating on JohnDave, or implying they'll become canon in the pilot, but I feel it's a rather likely and servicable explanation).

My main actual gripe with the characterization is John. The more frequent swearing (and not even the fact he swears, but the fact he DOESN'T use replacing words like "darn" and "crap" as he often does in the comic), and the bit about the postmaster and his fingers (which felt...really uncomfortable to be honest, but that is just my opinion), etc...it all just didn't feel very JOHN to me. I haven't seen very many people talk about this, so I'm guessing this is a rather unpopular opinion!

I think Jade and Rose were...servicable? They did their jobs and didn't feel especially OUT of character, but they seemed more like surface-level interpretations of their characters. This could, of course, be that they didn't have many lines, and also Vivzie's studios aren't exactly known for writing complex female characters... I'd simply have to see more of them to form a full opinion.

Actually, opposite to the complaints of too much swearing, I think Dave was a little too tame with his vulgar language? He doesn't really SWEAR too often (at least in comparison to Karkat and such) but when he does it's pretty creative and comes with equally creative rants. Also I noticed he said "Damn", like...a lot...and I felt that was weird? I don't think he ays it more than 15 times in the comic (from memory).

Anyways, I did enjoy the pilot quite a bit! It was really good! BUT it is a PILOT for a reason, so expect a lot of these points to change.

I personally liked the characterization--Dave's especially feels like it's pulling more from Terezi's and June's descriptions of his speech than the assumed monotone based on his sprite. June does swear more, but I don't think that's as much a character change as a necessity to make it clear that this show has to be TV-MA.