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Lucy: an Emphasis on Vulnerability 🫧

(Note: this is a write-up from eight months ago that I very recently edited, so... not new, but certainly improved lol)

If I had to settle on just one thing, my favorite aspect of Lucy’s character would definitely be how her emphasis on vulnerability shapes her relationship with Atsushi. It’s something I appreciate more and more every time I comb through her appearances…

… which I do because I’m starved for Lucy content, rip. ༎ຶ‿༎ຶ

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No, but seriously. If you ask me, Lucy doesn't entirely avoid the pitfall of the archetypal tsundere who’s bad at being vulnerable, sporting her fair share of arbitrary hot-and-cold moments. But while she isn’t a full-on deconstruction, it wouldn’t be fair to call her played straight, either.

For one, her criticisms of Atsushi are, more often than not, genuine criticisms, not simply deflections, and “being vulnerable” encompasses considerably more than just “admitting her crush.” Furthermore, being bad at vulnerability is, by itself, not the crux of her conflict; it's being bad at vulnerability while at the same time valuing vulnerability above all else. Let me explain.

Prior to her epiphany on the Moby Dick, Lucy resented Atsushi for having found people who – in her mind anyway – valued him unconditionally, considering him privileged on this front. Meanwhile, the man she worked for was a literal power tycoon, and at no point did she express the same envy toward him. This wasn’t hypocrisy on her part – not necessarily. If anything, it was a subtle hint at the way she thinks. She doesn't measure “privilege” by how rich or well-off someone is, rather, by whether or not they've found a place to belong.

This checks out in more ways than one. After all, Lucy’s only real goal while in the Guild was belonging, and she went above and beyond to achieve said goal. Hell, she crafted an entire persona around the villainous role she'd been assigned, all in the hopes that she’d win Fitzgerald’s favor and be kept around. And when that went awry, she allowed herself to become a maid – a source of menial labor, not too far a cry from her orphanage roots – just to avoid being alone.

She didn't care about the money or the benefits (in stark contrast to why most of the other members were there), and though she was eager to engage in villainy if it meant painting over her victimhood, she just barely tolerated being a villain, viewing it more as a means to an end than anything worthwhile.

It’s no coincidence, then, that she turned seemingly on a dime when Atsushi prompted her to re-evaluate her victimhood. She was receptive to his appeal not to abandon her past self, not just because he’d made himself “credible” in her eyes by revealing his scars, but also because – ultimately – a change of heart for her was as simple as lowering a mask.

Presently, Lucy is Atsushi's caring critic first and foremost.

She frequently calls into question his reckless heroism, i.e., his tendency to dive headfirst into danger for the sake of being a hero, thereby validating his existence. It’s a habit born of the Headmaster’s abuse – one he continues to cling to, and one she consistently challenges.

Hell, Lucy’s very introduction posed a challenge to Atsushi’s reckless heroism in the sense that, try as he might, he couldn't save her, only defeat her. Conventional heroism – the kind he used to save Kyōka, for example – was simply not enough...

... and lo and behold, it wasn't his strength that got through to Lucy, rather, his vulnerability.

But while Lucy is a blatant reversal of the way Atsushi often views his relationships (that is, through a lens of heroism) – and though she already understands Atsushi on a level most don’t, simply by virtue of perceiving his victimhood (as he does hers) – she also expects more from him than just salvation. Including just by existing, she presents a conflict that demands Atsushi be more of a person than a hero.

Their farewell “promise” is a prime example of this.

Bottom line is, it was never a real promise; Lucy knew full well that neither of them would be able to follow through. It was a last-ditch effort on her part to ensure Atsushi's well-being, knowing he was hellbent on jumping either way.

She appealed to Atsushi’s narrative by presenting an incentive for heroism, with the implicit condition that, in order to come back for her, he'd first have to… y’know, survive. Unbeknownst to Atsushi, though, salvation was never truly on Lucy’s agenda.

So in other words, the one time she did feed into his reckless heroism, it wasn’t to be saved, rather, to make him promise to live another day without his even realizing it. 

Post-Guild arc, this trend continues, albeit in different ways.

When Atsushi performs his aforementioned hero-dives in Lucy's presence, she tells him off for it.

In chapter 43, Cherrirs!, her upbraiding Atsushi for almost drowning is, notably, the first mention of his victory against the Guild that isn't an accolade. His fellow detectives have praised him left and right for it, and the Yokohama newspaper hails him (rightly) as the city’s savior. But Lucy’s reaction is another thing entirely. Is she in awe of his achievement? Absolutely. That's not what she focuses on, though. She focuses on him, insisting that he show a little self-preservation, like a person would. 

When he tries to insert himself into others’ plights uninvited, she intercepts him.

She doesn't appreciate his repeated attempts to be the hero in situations that aren't his to be the hero in, and urges him instead to let people fight their own battles – again, like a person would.

When he fumbles in his relationships, she confronts him. In contrast to Kyōka, who earlier in Cherrirs! indicates that she doesn't really require anything from Atsushi – just being around him is enough – Lucy requires him to talk things out with her. After the Moby Dick goes down and they don't see each other for a while, Atsushi more or less forgets about her. In his mind, Lucy asked him to save her, he wasn’t able to, she got off the ship by herself... and that might as well be the end of it. He doesn’t consider the possibility that their interaction meant more to her than a failed promise of heroism; that she might expect him to remember her as a person, not just forget her as someone he couldn't save.

When the people close to him don't consider how their being hurt or killed might affect him, she reminds them. When Kyōka recklessly tries to leave Anne's Room in chapter 118, Mystifying Being, Lucy stops her, pointing out how devastated Atsushi would be if anything were to happen to her. In doing so, she applies her philosophy of person > hero to Atsushi and Kyōka both at the same time. She encourages Kyōka to be more than just a hero by telling her to think of how it would impact Atsushi as a person if she died.

Atsushi doesn’t want the Headmaster's words haunting him forever. His ultimate goal, albeit unconscious, is to grow into his own person – a person who believes in themselves and doesn’t base their entire worth off of one attribute. Lucy is someone who pushes him toward that goal, if also unconsciously. Like Akutagawa, she doesn't think Atsushi's trauma defines him. She may not be informed of the specifics – of the Headmaster’s role in it all – but she continues to see Atsushi as more than just a hero, and treats him accordingly.

It’s worth noting, too, that – by the Guild Aftermath arc – Lucy has already gotten what she was after all along, and so it’s no wonder she hasn’t expressed any desire to join the Agency. In her Guild days, she never truly wanted to be a villain. It makes perfect sense, then, that – upon being dissuaded from villainy – she wouldn’t simply “default” to heroism. Unlike Kyōka, her watershed realization wasn't that she wanted to save people, rather that, through "imagination" (read: empathy), loneliness could be vanquished. Belonging is Lucy’s ultimate goal, and she’s nothing if not consistent.

As it often goes with tsunderes, being vulnerable isn't Lucy’s strong suit. That's why her go-to method of conveying her care for Atsushi is yelling at him to stop being so thoughtless. That's why her comforting skills could use some serious work.

And that's why, at one point, she absentmindedly reveals to Atsushi how much his Moby Dick display meant to her, only to backpedal.

But for all she dances around the subject of her crush on Atsushi, feigning indifference or even hostility, their shared vulnerability is like a precious gem to her. So naturally, her feelings of debt toward him, as implied in the above interaction, stand regardless of his many failures to save her in the conventional hero way. After all, he saved her in the way she values most: as a person.

For a time, all Lucy was capable of giving in return for Atsushi’s “ultimate favor” was conventional heroism – or in other words, many a close call and many a trip to Anne’s Room. That, of course, brought up a whole new dilemma: if conventional heroism was a worthless currency, but vulnerability was just out of reach, how could Lucy ever come close to repaying her debt? She didn't know. All she did know was that she had to pay him back one way or another, and that’s where her most glaring flaw – her quid-pro-quo mindset – came into play.

Lucy's quid-pro-quo mindset, seen mostly (though not exclusively) in her relationship with Atsushi, is her most glaring flaw because it undermines the values and priorities that make her, well… her. It’s a relic of her time in the Guild – a time defined by a strict (and frankly damaging) principle of transaction: usefulness in exchange for not being alone. It makes it so she's driven to help Atsushi out of a sense of indebtedness, rather than out of the same genuine care – the same emphasis on personhood and vulnerability – by which she would be driven otherwise. Furthermore, it inspires recklessness and self-sacrifice, two qualities she openly discourages in Atsushi.

It goes without saying, then, that the events of the Sky Casino arc were a major leap forward (no pun intended) for her. When Atsushi saved her from Nathaniel, thereby repaying her for her acts of service as he’d promised so many times he would, she realized that – just as her care for Atsushi doesn’t depend on his being a hero, Atsushi's care for her doesn’t depend on her being vulnerable. The illusion was shattered.

Ah, the wonders of character development. ✨

Thanks for reading!

Okay, so Killingham's power is to put other people to sleep and control them? And Sommers' power would be to bring children's fears to life? Or is that also part of Killingham's ability? Like, his powers bring people's greatest fears to life, and as a result they fall asleep and Killingham can control them, similar to what Sugar's devil fruit did?

And the Loki-Luffy parallels just keep growing!

This one is particularly poignant not just because of the fact they both looked up to strong pirates, but the circumstances of why they looked up to pirates are also connected.

From what little we can glean of Luffy's early childhood, he had basically no one looking after him and no other friends his own age. Makino is the only adult living on the same island as him who treats him kindly but even then she's not his guardian. Loki was the pariah of Elbaf who had even less of a support system than young Luffy.

When a child is abandoned and ostracized, they'll naturally throw themselves at any scrap of potential positive affirmation they can find no matter the source. Even if said source is socially frowned upon like piracy. Sometimes it works out really well like with Luffy and Shanks. Other times, it puts the child in danger and sets the wrong example like with Loki and Rocks.

Bsd Chapter 121:

Dazai (hallucination) to Atsushi.

Dazai to Atsushi: Do you need things like “courage” or “hope” to overcome fear? No. You haven’t had those things from the start.

Dazai: You haven’t needed them. What you need to crush your fear, is a fear even greater.

Bsd Beast Chapter 4:

Beast Dazai to Beast Atsushi.

Beast Dazai: I do think you’re correct in saying that you’re a coward. Your former self was a fearful boy who would search for an escape route right in front of the enemy.

Beast Dazai: But ever since that day you’ve changed. Do you understand why that is?

Beast Dazai: It turns out that the best way to drown out your fear is with more fear.

three is a pattern, shanks!

Oh yeah I had...tumblr.....HI (⁠´⁠；⁠ω⁠；⁠｀⁠)

Though the latest chapter was relatively short and rose more questions than it gave answers, I believe Fyodor's speech about the "dimensions" is hinting Atsushi's role in the upcoming fight against Amenogozen.

In this panel, Fyodor is clearly talking about Akutagawa, who is able to block Amenogozen's space and time attacks. What's interesting here is the choice of words.

The individual inhabits "the paper world".

Ofc, this could only be a callback to the paper that magically popped out of thin air right into Fyodor's hand, and which he stabs to demonstrate that a two-dimensional character cannot escape an attack coming from someone outside the paper.

But! It is interesting to note that it can also call back the The Book, which Fyodor referred as "our origin" in chapter 119.

Akutagawa, like any other character in BSD (minus some exceptions), is part of the Book. Therefore, that would mean he is a two-dimensional character, since his life is part of a piece of paper. Now that Fyodor controls Amenogozen a singularity which defies the logics of the BSD world, he is "a dimension higher" than the Book. Which allows him (through Amenogozen) to land attacks that seemingly "come out of nowhere" (in the panel below Amenogozen's arm comes from Aku's belly instead of piercing it from side to side)

Now, back to Atsushi. In chapter 119, Fyodor said something that I believe is the hint for Atsushi's role in the fight against Amenogozen.

Atsushi is a bookmark. Therefore, that means he's not completely part of the Book, but outside the Book. Thus, a dimension higher than the Book, on par with Gozen (dimensionally speaking, at least).

It's also interesting to note that, in the panel below, Fyodor says "us three-dimensional beings", which could mean he's including Atsushi in this label - but this is kind of a stretch imo, since he could also just be referring to Gozen and himself.

At any rate, Atsushi's role as a "bookmark" has to be relevant for the upcoming final clash against Gozen. Especially if he fights alongside Akutagawa (forget that the latter has been stabbed. He is fine. The anime says sskk will fight together and I believe it. RYU IS FINE 🥲🥲)

After all, chapter 119 has already showed us that Aku can fight on equals terms with Gozen in terms of space and time (the first two dimensions).

All he lacks is the ability to counter the thrid dimension, "depth", that only the people "outside" the Book possess. In other words, people like Atsushi. We already know that the tiger's claws can erase abilities, so I think Atsushi is able to counter Gozen's 3D attacks... theoretically speaking.

So in conclusion, I think that chapter 119 and 120 gave us the hints of what the cast needs to defeat the divine being: someone who can counter him in the two dimensions of space and time (Akutagawa), and someone who can block the attacks coming from the third (Atsushi). Which would eventually lead to the final clash the anime has teased, with sskk facing Gozen, and this famous sentence finally taking on its full meaning:

No. Technically, there is no need for more than Atsushi and Akutagawa.

Technically. As long as they manage to complete each other's weaknesses with their own strengh.

Please note that this post is merely my own interpretation of the recent chapters, from which I've built my theories. They could be a total stretch and be proven wrong in the upcoming chapters. But I firmly believe that the elements from Fyodor's villain monologue have to be relevant at some point in the future. Hopefully chapter 120.5 and its successors will provide more answers than questions...

You know maybe Atsushi’s the one who gets transferred to the Port Mafia.

Not because there’s maybe no one else to go although that’s…definitely a reason for it.

But because after that stunt he’s just pulled he’s gonna be lucky if Akutagawa ever lets him out if his sight again.