Posting this here instead of in the Gender and Characterization thread because it’s mostly about Deathless and Wakefield’s characterization rather than specificly gender and characterization.
So I’ve been thinking about what @anon86661845 said in this post about the different ways a different-gender-identity Wakefield might have experienced/developed/resulted in their actions and personality, and so this led me to the question: what does this mean for a nonbinary MC, and for their interactions/romance/relationship with Wakefield?
It’s interesting that Wakefield seems, in both princecatling’s and my interpretation, to have kind of a simultaneously real sort of confidence and disaffectedness, and to not (we see this in their confession scene, as well as in a moment during the first dinner) (that is to say, that this aforementioned “coolness” is a result of a facade or socialization, or a defense–be it their real personality/feelings or not).
So if we look at the story from the perspective of a genderfluid/nonbinary Wakefield and a cis MC, that’s what we’ve covered before. But now consider the additional layer of interaction with the toxic masculinity/general desirability of certain traits of agressiveness and detatchedness in the Craft community when the MC is also nonbinary.
Now, what’s interesting here is that the game itself doesn’t give an explicit option for a nonbinary character, but the effect this creates with a nonbinary reading of the MC (accomplished by interpreting the MC as someone who uses she/her and related forms of address or he/him and related forms of address while also not identifying with either binary gender–I particularly relate to this reading because for a long time, I did the former while simultaneously identifying as agender, and though I don’t use those pronouns anymore, I was no less agender then and no more agender now, and both states were equal expressions of that) is that they have sort of made complete peace with their identity and live as if it were unquestionable–this actually very much brings to mind one potential scene you get if you respond to Wakefield’s leading question at the conference with the literal (I’m here to do craft things) truth–Wakefield is amused by your directness and the way you sort of (intentionally or not) missed their point.
Whereas I see the nonbinary Wakefield as someone who is much more aware of those conflicts and such (princecatling’s interpretation of their line upon seeing a skeletonized MC comes to mind). And perhaps this contrast between the nonbinary Wakefield’s relation to gender and the nonbinary MC’s relation to gender can change our interpretation of how Wakefield relates to the MC and the things they say…
But I’ll leave that for someone else to pick at, because I’m tired and not very coherent right now.
(also interesting to consider: Ace Wakefield (esp. with Ace MC))