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How crazy is Henry? (How not-crazy is Henry?)
Asking this as a serious question. It's a trickier matter than it first appears to be.
The first thing that gave me pause was Henry's confession to the Avatar. "My love is suffocating," he says, "so be ready!"
All right. First thought, I am totally into that.
Second thought -- wait, you mean he's admitting he's got issues? ... He knows he has issues? Back up back up. What about Henry/Olivia B?
Henry: But thanks to that, I've developed this calm and cheerful personality, so it's okay~.
Olivia: I-it's not being cheerful. Henry, you're always... always forcing a smile...
Henry: Hm? No no, this is a real smile!
Olivia: You're wrong... I have never seen you truly smile, not even once... I... know because I dance. Those expressions that appear for only an instant, those are a person's true feelings. The harsh punishment from that institution... has made you like this, huh.... I... want to see you laugh. Your true smile and laugh...
Henry: The true me...? Nope, I don't get it. I'm me, right?
Well, the first possibility is that he understands more than he's willing to let on. I doubt that, because he just bared his heart to her -- and it's not just Olivia, he drips his angst all over anyone in C and B supports as long as it's relevant. He's incredibly open (which draws remark from Tharja in their supports) so if he's putting up a front, I'm going to need a reason for why he'll put up a front about his present happiness but not every last painful detail of his backstory.
The second possibility is that he understands the effect he has on other people, but not exactly himself. That is, he understands that he'll take a lot out of his lover, but not necessarily as a result of understanding himself. (This is like the difference between knowing not to touch the stove because it'll hurt, and knowing not to touch the stove because flames come out of it, which will burn you, which will hurt.)
Indeed, he says a lot of stuff about himself which seems off. For example, there's the line that makes Tharja incredibly suspicious: "I'm the owner of a pure and wholesome heart." (僕は健全で純真な心の持ち主だよ～。 - C support) It's too bad he says this before he gets a truth curse put on him. That would've been more conclusive. Nonetheless, B support closes with Henry wondering aloud (with no one else present) what curse Tharja had put on him -- he hadn't even noticed that he wasn't allowed to deceive. When Tharja says "You won't be able to lie or keep secrets in front of me," he apparently doesn't take that to be a description of the curse.
No, I think I have to believe that he's just hyper-open and hyper-honest. So I'm liking option two.
He does sometimes show an astounding knowledge of how things work. In Panne A, he proposes a startlingly smart doomsday scenario:
Henry: Oh, I see... you hate humans. Well then, what if I killed Chrom with a curse?
Panne: W-what are you saying?
Henry: Then everything would be chaos~. The destruction of war would spread out ever further~ And people would suffer more and more -- that'd make you happy, right Panne?
(Translated here off the Japanese because I'm too lazy to get up and grab my 3DS, but it's faithfully localized.)
He's mistaken about that last part, but that's a surprisingly optimal (and indirect) way to neatly cause a great amount of human suffering. He understands how leadership works.
Another observation is that Henry has polite versions of his Barracks conversations.
呼びかけ(協力して敵を倒そう。) Addressing (Let's work together to defeat enemies.)
（相手呼び）の戦い方って面白いね～。 [Conversant]'s fighting style is interesting, huh~.
次は僕と協力して戦わない～？▼ Next time, won't you fight with me~?
敬語 Polite
（相手呼び）の戦い方、面白いですね～。 [Same as above, but with polite endings]
次は僕と協力して戦いませんか～？▼
This is not the case for all characters. Gregor doesn't have a polite version, presumably because he's a manly rough dude and subservient to no one. Nowi doesn't have one either, presumably because she's childish. Henry does clearly feel subservience (as half his supports revolve around him offering favors to people and/or following orders) but the intriguing thing is that while he seems childish in his social interactions (and Panne remarks upon it), he's not that childish.
It could be a valid suggestion that he just had polite speech beaten into him (literally), but in that case you might expect him to overextend polite speech to all situations like a paranoid girly foreigner (or Soren, who in fact does use polite speech even with Ike). He doesn't -- the vast majority of the time he speaks quite casually, which says to me that he understands the social hierarchy and social context well enough to know when display linguistic subservience.
(In case you think this is a small matter, just know that this blows half of my tentative armchair psychoanalytic theories out of the water.)
The really difficult thing about this is that while he occasionally demonstrates competence, he also fails massively at being socially acceptable 90% of the time. (Let's count all the times he volunteers mass murder or killing an ally as an unwarranted solution!)
Panne has A Theory about Henry, herself:
…あなたは本当に何でもするでしょうね。 ... You really will do anything, hmm.
命をなんとも思わないあなたなら。 Life means nothing to you.
どうやらあなたはまだ
学ばねばならないものがあるようね。 It seems there are still things you must learn.
私にしか教えられないのであれば… And if only I can teach you...
仕方がないわね。放ってはおけない。 it can't be helped. I can't let you loose.
It seems a little odd to conceptualize Henry's issue as never being told that Violence Is Not The Answer, but in a really narrow-minded Video Game World way, this is conceivable. People were violent at his BFF and he was violent back. Authority figures routinely used violence to control their charges and in hindsight he views this acceptable. Then he joined the army, and uh, what's that about violence being the answer?
Realistically speaking, I highly doubt he could live as long as he had and never had anyone impress upon him the importance of not randomly killing allies before Panne and Miriel. Realism aside, I think Panne's monologue represents what the developers intended here -- someone totally capable of understanding, but never taught what's right.
Ok. Let's put realism back in. Panne is full of shit. And there must be a more substantial reason that Henry takes killing lightly. He does value life lightly (when it's not the life of someone he's attached to), but it takes more than a low evaluation of life to suggest killing all the time -- fear of societal retribution, weakening the army/country/whatever, etc.
I want to bring up something that's featured a lot in my Childhood Headcanon thoughts, because it seems to go against any reason for Henry to be as he is.
Ricken: Henry, you... knew the Plegians that we defeated, right? So... do you ... resent us or anything?
Henry: Hmmm... I'm not sure what you mean by "resenting you". Will anything good come out of resenting you?
Ricken: No... nothing. Not for us, or for you either.
Henry: Then I don't resent you. I don't let anything bother me~
I mean, seriously, "will anything good come out of that," that's some zen shit right there. But then the conversation continues,
Ricken: Y-you're pretty lighthearted, huh.... I'm sure, if I up and died, you wouldn't let that bother you either....
Henry: That's not true~ I'd be sad if you died. And next time, I'd probably kill the guy who killed you~
Ricken: Huh? But... so, that's because you'd resent that guy, right? That seems to contradict what you just said...
Henry: That's true! I wonder why~?
Ricken: I-I'm the one asking...
Henry: When I was in Plegia, I didn't feel like this, though. Hmm. It's because you've become a "friend" to me that I feel that way, maybe~?
... Okay, no, so Henry totally gets jollies out of revenge, and he's totally done the resentment thing -- both here hypothetically, and in that incident with the wolf.
So when he says "will anything good come out of that," he means that on a rational level. Henry doesn't enjoy darkness in itself. Henry doesn't engage in malice for the sake of malice, and contrary to the running joke, I think it'd take an external motive for him to pull serial killer shit.
That's all well and fine until you ask about the rational cost-benefit of some of the shit he suggests, like cursing army members in the name of science (which Miriel talks him out of, with a cost-benefit argument), or making all of humankind (including his S supportee) suffer for the sake of one Taguel who doesn't even show signs of liking him, etc. It just seems like he often doesn't have enough motivation to be suggesting these things if he were honestly thinking through the consequences.
I suppose it works if you theorize that support branches aren't supposed to co-exist in the first place, and furthermore Henry instantly attaches to any stranger worse than a six-year-old Soren. You still must wonder about the cost of shocking/offending the person you're proposing these things to, though...
I've been writing this post for over an hour. I'm done for now. Tentatively, I'm concluding that Henry is sincere but lacks any self-awareness, and seems to understand the social hierarchy, but perhaps not what other people intend or desire.
As for his line to the Avatar, I'm going to take the angstiest route and suggest that he internalized the idea that he is a burden.
Okay, I'm done. Good night.
EDIT: Also I made a Henry icon.
EDIT2: Which is supposed to be slightly warmer-colored than this, holy shit I need to remember to turn off flux. -_- (Ehh I guess this works as a slightly less orange icon.)
The first thing that gave me pause was Henry's confession to the Avatar. "My love is suffocating," he says, "so be ready!"
All right. First thought, I am totally into that.
Second thought -- wait, you mean he's admitting he's got issues? ... He knows he has issues? Back up back up. What about Henry/Olivia B?
Henry: But thanks to that, I've developed this calm and cheerful personality, so it's okay~.
Olivia: I-it's not being cheerful. Henry, you're always... always forcing a smile...
Henry: Hm? No no, this is a real smile!
Olivia: You're wrong... I have never seen you truly smile, not even once... I... know because I dance. Those expressions that appear for only an instant, those are a person's true feelings. The harsh punishment from that institution... has made you like this, huh.... I... want to see you laugh. Your true smile and laugh...
Henry: The true me...? Nope, I don't get it. I'm me, right?
Well, the first possibility is that he understands more than he's willing to let on. I doubt that, because he just bared his heart to her -- and it's not just Olivia, he drips his angst all over anyone in C and B supports as long as it's relevant. He's incredibly open (which draws remark from Tharja in their supports) so if he's putting up a front, I'm going to need a reason for why he'll put up a front about his present happiness but not every last painful detail of his backstory.
The second possibility is that he understands the effect he has on other people, but not exactly himself. That is, he understands that he'll take a lot out of his lover, but not necessarily as a result of understanding himself. (This is like the difference between knowing not to touch the stove because it'll hurt, and knowing not to touch the stove because flames come out of it, which will burn you, which will hurt.)
Indeed, he says a lot of stuff about himself which seems off. For example, there's the line that makes Tharja incredibly suspicious: "I'm the owner of a pure and wholesome heart." (僕は健全で純真な心の持ち主だよ～。 - C support) It's too bad he says this before he gets a truth curse put on him. That would've been more conclusive. Nonetheless, B support closes with Henry wondering aloud (with no one else present) what curse Tharja had put on him -- he hadn't even noticed that he wasn't allowed to deceive. When Tharja says "You won't be able to lie or keep secrets in front of me," he apparently doesn't take that to be a description of the curse.
No, I think I have to believe that he's just hyper-open and hyper-honest. So I'm liking option two.
He does sometimes show an astounding knowledge of how things work. In Panne A, he proposes a startlingly smart doomsday scenario:
Henry: Oh, I see... you hate humans. Well then, what if I killed Chrom with a curse?
Panne: W-what are you saying?
Henry: Then everything would be chaos~. The destruction of war would spread out ever further~ And people would suffer more and more -- that'd make you happy, right Panne?
(Translated here off the Japanese because I'm too lazy to get up and grab my 3DS, but it's faithfully localized.)
He's mistaken about that last part, but that's a surprisingly optimal (and indirect) way to neatly cause a great amount of human suffering. He understands how leadership works.
Another observation is that Henry has polite versions of his Barracks conversations.
呼びかけ(協力して敵を倒そう。) Addressing (Let's work together to defeat enemies.)
（相手呼び）の戦い方って面白いね～。 [Conversant]'s fighting style is interesting, huh~.
次は僕と協力して戦わない～？▼ Next time, won't you fight with me~?
敬語 Polite
（相手呼び）の戦い方、面白いですね～。 [Same as above, but with polite endings]
次は僕と協力して戦いませんか～？▼
This is not the case for all characters. Gregor doesn't have a polite version, presumably because he's a manly rough dude and subservient to no one. Nowi doesn't have one either, presumably because she's childish. Henry does clearly feel subservience (as half his supports revolve around him offering favors to people and/or following orders) but the intriguing thing is that while he seems childish in his social interactions (and Panne remarks upon it), he's not that childish.
It could be a valid suggestion that he just had polite speech beaten into him (literally), but in that case you might expect him to overextend polite speech to all situations like a paranoid girly foreigner (or Soren, who in fact does use polite speech even with Ike). He doesn't -- the vast majority of the time he speaks quite casually, which says to me that he understands the social hierarchy and social context well enough to know when display linguistic subservience.
(In case you think this is a small matter, just know that this blows half of my tentative armchair psychoanalytic theories out of the water.)
The really difficult thing about this is that while he occasionally demonstrates competence, he also fails massively at being socially acceptable 90% of the time. (Let's count all the times he volunteers mass murder or killing an ally as an unwarranted solution!)
Panne has A Theory about Henry, herself:
…あなたは本当に何でもするでしょうね。 ... You really will do anything, hmm.
命をなんとも思わないあなたなら。 Life means nothing to you.
どうやらあなたはまだ
学ばねばならないものがあるようね。 It seems there are still things you must learn.
私にしか教えられないのであれば… And if only I can teach you...
仕方がないわね。放ってはおけない。 it can't be helped. I can't let you loose.
It seems a little odd to conceptualize Henry's issue as never being told that Violence Is Not The Answer, but in a really narrow-minded Video Game World way, this is conceivable. People were violent at his BFF and he was violent back. Authority figures routinely used violence to control their charges and in hindsight he views this acceptable. Then he joined the army, and uh, what's that about violence being the answer?
Realistically speaking, I highly doubt he could live as long as he had and never had anyone impress upon him the importance of not randomly killing allies before Panne and Miriel. Realism aside, I think Panne's monologue represents what the developers intended here -- someone totally capable of understanding, but never taught what's right.
Ok. Let's put realism back in. Panne is full of shit. And there must be a more substantial reason that Henry takes killing lightly. He does value life lightly (when it's not the life of someone he's attached to), but it takes more than a low evaluation of life to suggest killing all the time -- fear of societal retribution, weakening the army/country/whatever, etc.
I want to bring up something that's featured a lot in my Childhood Headcanon thoughts, because it seems to go against any reason for Henry to be as he is.
Ricken: Henry, you... knew the Plegians that we defeated, right? So... do you ... resent us or anything?
Henry: Hmmm... I'm not sure what you mean by "resenting you". Will anything good come out of resenting you?
Ricken: No... nothing. Not for us, or for you either.
Henry: Then I don't resent you. I don't let anything bother me~
I mean, seriously, "will anything good come out of that," that's some zen shit right there. But then the conversation continues,
Ricken: Y-you're pretty lighthearted, huh.... I'm sure, if I up and died, you wouldn't let that bother you either....
Henry: That's not true~ I'd be sad if you died. And next time, I'd probably kill the guy who killed you~
Ricken: Huh? But... so, that's because you'd resent that guy, right? That seems to contradict what you just said...
Henry: That's true! I wonder why~?
Ricken: I-I'm the one asking...
Henry: When I was in Plegia, I didn't feel like this, though. Hmm. It's because you've become a "friend" to me that I feel that way, maybe~?
... Okay, no, so Henry totally gets jollies out of revenge, and he's totally done the resentment thing -- both here hypothetically, and in that incident with the wolf.
So when he says "will anything good come out of that," he means that on a rational level. Henry doesn't enjoy darkness in itself. Henry doesn't engage in malice for the sake of malice
That's all well and fine until you ask about the rational cost-benefit of some of the shit he suggests, like cursing army members in the name of science (which Miriel talks him out of, with a cost-benefit argument), or making all of humankind (including his S supportee) suffer for the sake of one Taguel who doesn't even show signs of liking him, etc. It just seems like he often doesn't have enough motivation to be suggesting these things if he were honestly thinking through the consequences.
I suppose it works if you theorize that support branches aren't supposed to co-exist in the first place, and furthermore Henry instantly attaches to any stranger worse than a six-year-old Soren. You still must wonder about the cost of shocking/offending the person you're proposing these things to, though...
I've been writing this post for over an hour. I'm done for now. Tentatively, I'm concluding that Henry is sincere but lacks any self-awareness, and seems to understand the social hierarchy, but perhaps not what other people intend or desire.
As for his line to the Avatar, I'm going to take the angstiest route and suggest that he internalized the idea that he is a burden.
Okay, I'm done. Good night.
EDIT: Also I made a Henry icon.
EDIT2: Which is supposed to be slightly warmer-colored than this, holy shit I need to remember to turn off flux. -_- (Ehh I guess this works as a slightly less orange icon.)
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(and I like the icon).
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Seriously, though, the looks into Henry's psyche are engaging and help us decipher some of the strange characterization that's been present in this recent game. I really appreciate the translations and interpretations.
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BTW, do you go by any other names elsewhere? Seeing you around has made me curious.
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I got on here because I noticed that there's an invaluable FE fanfic community here and they have a ton to say. Anyone who doesn't write tactician fanfics all day is a friend of mine. :D
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But yes, the snob club lives here and we love our snooty fanfic and meta and stuff. Have you checked out
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Maybe when I put together some more ramblings on Plegia and its lovely society, I'll go put something up on that. I don't know if anything else I have to say is deep or thoughtful enough for that. XD
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If you have any plans to make others, know that I'd love to read them! :D
and maybe I could get around to writing one for Virion, now that's I've basically collected all his A supports, a couple S's and read the others...) fffff that'd take a while though xD;no subject
(I personally doubt I'll do this anytime soon for characters outside Henry, as he's the only character I've seen everything of, so far.)