So why are people calling Infinite edgy?

[Azure P]

Since Indigo Rush was kind enough to provide the definition in the other thread.

That pretty much sums up the whole Sonic franchise.

 

The problem I see is people tend to associate 'edgy' with 'bad.' That's what people have issue with it seems.

[Kuzu]

It's a meme, and like all memes, it has been distorted.

[Sega DogTagz]

 

Bleeding Edge Edgyness right there.

To me, its has less to do with the character himself, and more with how they Market him. Infinite is a mysterious big bad, with a deep voice and the capability to effortlessly put a boot to the neck of the main character of the franchise. Combine that with his theme, and I have no problem throwing the Edgey label on his shoulders.

Won't be long till he's walking down streets and not even looking back at explosions too.

[Chris Knopps]

It's because he's essentially Mephiles redesigned.

He has the stereotypical voice, the whole "adjusting his mask" thing going on edgy characters do, and his design follows Mephiles fairly well.

Thus... Edge.

[KHCast]

Is "badass" the same as "edgy"? Just curious, I always thought the two were related

[Tara]

6 minutes ago, KHCast said:

Is "badass" the same as "edgy"? Just curious, I always thought the two were related

From my interpretation, "edgy" is the attempt to appear "badass" while failing miserably.

[KHCast]

4 minutes ago, Tara said:

From my interpretation, "edgy" is the attempt to appear "badass" while failing miserably.

So for example to put it in context, would someone like Hitgirl from Kickass be considered badass whereas by contrast Shadow is simply just edgy?

[Tara]

Just now, KHCast said:

So for example to put it in context, Hitgirl from Kickass is considered badass whereas Shadow is simply just edgy?

Honestly, I thought Kickass was kind of an edgelord of a movie in itself, so it's all subjective.  If one character or thing fails to be "cool" or "badass" to you, then you'd probably think it's "edgy" in the derogatory.

[Chris Knopps]

I GOT IT!!!

I knew Infinite looked familiar...

[Detective Kaito]

Anything that's not rainbows and sunshine is automatically labeled as edgy in the Sonic series. It's a meme at this point.

[Tara]

I actually hadn't watched the Enter Infinite trailer before making any post in this thread, but now that I have...

I still don't get it.  He doesn't strike me as anything other than a generic cartoon villain, honestly.  Nothing nearly as try hard as Black Doom (except maybe his design being just as overly complex for lack of a more appropriate word) and I'm so glad that he doesn't have that Dr. Claw voice.  Conversely, nothing strikes me as particularly interesting about him, either.  But he doesn't come across as typical ow the edge memes.

Plus, that cameo of Dante from the Devil May Cry series was pretty cool!

[Bowbowis]

This actually came up in one of my status updates earlier today. Here's my conclusion from that:

Quote

Really what I'm getting from this is that Infinite is considered "edgy" because he's powerful, has a dark color scheme, wears a mask, taunts the heroes, and may or may not have a tragic backstory. Thing is that also describes one of the most popular villains in history:

Would you consider Darth Vader to be and edgy villain? Maybe the answer is yes, but I think we're at a point where we either need to take a step back and reevaluate what actually constitutes an "edgy" character or accept that being edgy is not necessarily a bad thing and stop using it as an insult and/or means of criticizing something without addressing any tangible issues.

Here's the whole thing if you're interested: https://board.sonicstadium.org/profile/7252-bowbowis/?status=876421&type=status

[Chris Knopps]

I think the problem is that Infinite is following the Japanese stereotypes for what makes a cool character, hence the voice, the way he moves, his poses, it's very anime in nature, and while in general the franchise has that going for it, Infinite pushes this to a much greater degree, hence my reference to Gladion.

It's a bit underwhelming to have Infinite following such a standard/generic form of "cool" or "edge" as folks have pointed out, but he still comes off as interesting nonetheless, much more than the D6 to be certain, and as of right now, even much more than Eggman himself.

At least Infinite wasn't given the clown treatment Eggman got for his music. It sounds like you can take Infinite seriously, even if in its own comical manner.

[Kuzu]

1 hour ago, Tara said:

I actually hadn't watched the Enter Infinite trailer before making any post in this thread, but now that I have...

I still don't get it.  He doesn't strike me as anything other than a generic cartoon villain, honestly.  Nothing nearly as try hard as Black Doom (except maybe his design being just as overly complex for lack of a more appropriate word) and I'm so glad that he doesn't have that Dr. Claw voice.  Conversely, nothing strikes me as particularly interesting about him, either.  But he doesn't come across as typical ow the edge memes.

Plus, that cameo of Dante from the Devil May Cry series was pretty cool!

I feel like it's a combination of the theme song and his similarities to Shadow, the harbinger of the "edge" memes. He's basically Shadow +. Faster than Sonic, a deep and brooding voice, and possess abilities that nobody else has. So of course people would make the obvious comparison.

He's also the embodiment of what a younger, immature child would find "cool" in a character, and that's what most people associate "edge" with.

[Chris Knopps]

Well, at least it's something that will interest children AND older audiences in its own way this time. Tacky perhaps, but at least there's a sign of an interest in a broader audience in there.

(Finally)

[StaticMania]

1 hour ago, Tara said:

I'm so glad that he doesn't have that Dr. Claw voice. 

Well, it's not like they can give 2 characters that kind of voice...I don't think it'd be fitting of the design. 

 

But who knows?

[Tara]

9 hours ago, StaticMania said:

Well, it's not like they can give 2 characters that kind of voice...I don't think it'd be fitting of the design. 

 

But who knows?

If the number of characters having a particular vocal timbre is a problem, then we'd have the problem of him sounding very similar to Mephiles.  Either way, it's beside the point lol.

10 hours ago, Kuzu the Boloedge said:

I feel like it's a combination of the theme song and his similarities to Shadow, the harbinger of the "edge" memes. He's basically Shadow +. Faster than Sonic, a deep and brooding voice, and possess abilities that nobody else has. So of course people would make the obvious comparison.

He's also the embodiment of what a younger, immature child would find "cool" in a character, and that's what most people associate "edge" with.

I mean the comparisons with Shadow, Mephiles, etc. are all valid. But the fact that he basically resembles the sort of villain a child would make up is just bad writing in general, not specifically edgy in my opinion.  Mainly because he doesn't really do anything that is particularly out of bounds for the Sonic series, i.e. carry realistic guns, have some kind of visible scarring, drink blood, or what have you.  I don't get the impression from him that they're trying to impress me with how mature, controversial, or otherwise nonconforming the character is, so much as he just strikes me as just blandly written.

[Osmium]

As long as we're talking about definitions of edgy, well here we go. 

THIS is edgy. It's probably quite easy for lots of you to know why too. It's called "Blood Hunter", he's got huge and flashy weapons right in your face, he's muscular and his clothes are ripping, he's fucking pissed. And the background is a miasma of bones, smoke, and some industrial background. Everything is designed to look as violent and unhappy as possible. But all the things I've listed are all superficial traits that are just symptoms of what edgy really is. 

I'd say edgy is the effort to be cool, but cool and is obviously subjective, and the way they usually go about it is to have something that goes outside the norm for the sake of going outside of it, trying a lot to be as offensive and uncompromising as possible, the ironic thing about this is that when a lot of people try to go outside the norm for the sake of it, they become the new norm, at least for a little while. Now being edgy is not a bad thing, and the usual shock value of it can bring great entertainment. George Carlin's stand-up I would consider to be on some part of the edgy spectrum, but a vast majority of people wouldn't consider that bad at all. That's because there's different forms of edgy that appeal to different sorts of people.

There's the sort of edgy like you see above and in Shadow the Hedgehog and all that, the intense violence for the sake of it, swearing, huge weapons and all that, the sort that's supposed to appeal to kids and young adolescents, it's a form of cool you may go for at the time but look back and go "what was I thinking??", but then you got the other stuff like George Carlin and Amazing Atheist, a bit different in form but still out to grab that side of you that just says "fuck all this soft shit!!". It's directly linked with presentation too, the things you are doing are often less important than the way they are portrayed, that's the whole basis of internet trolls. It's not just a kiddie thing, I think just about everyone gets that urge every once in a while to go "fuck everyone else" and have an impact with it. 

And like I said, when a lot of people try to avoid the norm by going this route, that becomes the new norm. You can go onto YouTube and find hundreds of millions of swear rants that have no impact because fucking everyone does them. The thing I don't get though is that Infitite's cool ship set sail sometime in 2006. He's more than a decade late to his party. 

[Meta77]

It's a word made by millenials. Those same ones that think hot topic clothing is what you wear to a job interview. Any chapters that isn't a bumbling idiot. Uses a pose. Sounds evil and treats others as weak is edgy. Most just use it to use it

[pastelspectre]

tbh i just use it as a meme now but when i shared the theme for infinite on fb i asked if we had finally found someone more edgy than shadow lmao

he's not really "edgy" though, i don't think. people just like to throw that word around like its nothing nowadays sadly

[Kuzu]

3 hours ago, Tara said:

 

I mean the comparisons with Shadow, Mephiles, etc. are all valid. But the fact that he basically resembles the sort of villain a child would make up is just bad writing in general, not specifically edgy in my opinion.  Mainly because he doesn't really do anything that is particularly out of bounds for the Sonic series, i.e. carry realistic guns, have some kind of visible scarring, drink blood, or what have you.  I don't get the impression from him that they're trying to impress me with how mature, controversial, or otherwise nonconforming the character is, so much as he just strikes me as just blandly written.

Well given that he might have connections to the Avatar, this is likely very much intentional. I don't see the fact that only children would take him seriously as a case of bad writing, but rather just shows where Sega's priorities are at as far as demographics are concerned. They've been targeting children in the most heavy-handed of ways since Unleashed for the most part, and this just seems par for the course.

[Tara]

17 minutes ago, Kuzu the Boloedge said:

Well given that he might have connections to the Avatar, this is likely very much intentional. I don't see the fact that only children would take him seriously as a case of bad writing, but rather just shows where Sega's priorities are at as far as demographics are concerned. They've been targeting children in the most heavy-handed of ways since Unleashed for the most part, and this just seems par for the course.

I mean, I have no qualms at all about Sega targeting children and thus making a villain that obviously belongs in a children's game.  I just think Infinite is kind of boring as far as children's villains go.  From what we've seen in any case.

And any connection to the Avatar character is bad in my opinion.  You have to be exceptionally talented to pull off that kind of fourth wall breaking shennanigans. =P

[Kuzu]

Just now, Tara said:

I mean, I have no qualms at all about Sega targeting children and thus making a villain that obviously belongs in a children's game.  I just think Infinite is kind of boring as far as children's villains go.  From what we've seen in any case.

And any connection to the Avatar character is bad in my opinion.  You have to be exceptionally talented to pull off that kind of fourth wall breaking shennanigans. =P

He's basically the idea of what a child would find dangerous and/or "cool" in a villain. Maybe the game will flesh him out, but I doubt it. But it's pretty clear that we're just meant to be "amazed" at his appearance and moveset than his personality and motives atm. That's actually rather standard for how most view the cast of this series actually...

And that is exactly why it's gonna fall apart lol. But I feel like the similarities Infinite has to so many "dark" OC's that fans create, and the fact that one of the main attractions of this game are actual fan generated OC's are a bit too coincidental.

[Chris Knopps]

9 minutes ago, Tara said:

I mean, I have no qualms at all about Sega targeting children and thus making a villain that obviously belongs in a children's game.  I just think Infinite is kind of boring as far as children's villains go.  From what we've seen in any case.

And any connection to the Avatar character is bad in my opinion.  You have to be exceptionally talented to pull off that kind of fourth wall breaking shennanigans. =P

They're not going to break out of their "safe zone" anytime soon. The simple fact of them going as far as they have in Forces in both tone and villain is a heart-stopping shock of its own no matter how tame it remains.

After the Lost World title I could have sworn we were getting a crossover with Barney featuring a plumbers mustache next.

[Tara]

2 minutes ago, Kuzu the Boloedge said:

He's basically the idea of what a child would find dangerous and/or "cool" in a villain. Maybe the game will flesh him out, but I doubt it. But it's pretty clear that we're just meant to be "amazed" at his appearance and moveset than his personality and motives atm. That's actually rather standard for how most view the cast of this series actually...

And that is exactly why it's gonna fall apart lol. But I feel like the similarities Infinite has to so many "dark" OC's that fans create, and the fact that one of the main attractions of this game are actual fan generated OC's are a bit too coincidental.

At this point I don't think we're supposed to be won over by his personality or anything because the game has yet to be released.  In marketing, we're usually (for better or for worse) asked to be drawn in by the surface details of the character and the kind of threat he poses to the plot and then we discover the depths of his character as we play the game.  The marketing for SA2 made no indication that Shadow was actually a very empathetic character with a tragic backstory.  We were just drawn in by the idea of the new villain.

Of course I'm not expecting Infinite to be fleshed out as much as Shadow was.  Just saying that at the moment, there's no reason for us to be drawn in by anything more interesting and less superficial.