It’s not often that I gripe about the FE3H community as a whole but if there’s one thing that really grinds my gears, it’s that SO many people boil Dorothea Arnault down to the “flirty, sexy woman” trope she was written to subvert

[a thread]

I think pre-launch and even early game it’s very easy to pass Dorothea off as the stereotypical diva who hits on everything that moves. They set her up for that with her dolled up looks, her stardom at the opera, and the way she really does come on strong in many C supports.

But the important part of that initial image (and honestly why I came to adore her as a character) is that Dorothea is very much not what she seems. Dorothea is a street urchin who’s terribly angered by the nobility system and the status quo the power of Crests have over society

Dorothea is also a famous songstress who is terrified of the life she knew on the streets, and a songstress that very quickly learns she can avoid that by exploiting the very same system she despises. And so she finds herself struggling and struggling to escape poverty.

It’s such an interesting character and conflict laid underneath a trope that we’ve already seen in Fire Emblem games! But instead of her falling into a simple role of “sexy lady that pounces on any man in a 5ft radius”, she completely turns it on its head.

But so often I see that pre-release and early game image just. Perpetuated in the FE3H fandom. And I get that it can be played up as a gag, I get it. But when so much Dorothea content is this flirtatious, sex guru of Garreg Mach I have to wonder if we even played the same game.

I just don’t think people get that when she flirts and pokes and prods that a good 90% of the time it’s...an act?

Dorothea’s flirting is a survival mechanism. Dorothea doesn’t flirt because she loves romance, or because she thinks it’s fun. Dorothea flirts because she is quite literally terrified of ending up back in the gutter where she came from.

Byleth’s supports are actually a really good depiction of that. Dorothea says in no uncertain terms that she’s worked to keep up the diva act ever since she left the stage because she believes she has nothing else to her name.

Caspar’s support is a really good example of this too, where she flat out depicts her flirting/dating/etc not as something even remotely enjoyable, but instead as something she’s using to work towards a better future for herself

Petra’s is yet another point where she simply, flat out says her entire purpose for coming to Garreg Mach is to marry into money

Dorothea eventually finds genuine romantic feelings, but it takes a WHILE to get there. In the early parts of her character arc she uses her act as a lifeline, and she uses it bc the opera taught her that she could exchange her voice and looks and that very act to keep on LIVING.

And you see pretty clearly that it’s an act, bc when the war starts her goal shifts from long term survival to surviving the next day. She doesn’t care enough to put up the act anymore, and that + the fact that she’s watching common soldiers like her die? It makes her miserable

I used to think that Dorothea had this radical change over the course of the time skip but honestly? The more I look at it? She’s the same person, still scrabbling for survival but this time she doesn’t focus on impressing a man she wants to marry.

None of this is to say that Dorothea isn’t passionate, or emotional, or even that she isn’t a romantic at heart. She’s definitely all of those things. She has so many genuine moments in her supports (with the BEagles + ESPECIALLY with Edelgard and Petra) where she shows as much.

But it’s frustrating to get a character with so many layers to her and only get to see the icing that hides the whole cake because she gets relegated to the role of “promiscuous flirty bi shipping vessel”.

Idk. Ship what you wanna ship. Rare pair away. Make Dorothea a wingwoman. But I think ppl really do a disservice to the way Dorothea was written when they buy into the fact that she flirts as her entire personality. There’s so much more to her beyond that. So much more to explore

And you guys don’t have to take my word on Dorothea as law!! I love her a lot but I won’t pretend to be the end-all-be-all of Dorothea knowledge.

I only ask that ppl maybe take the time to really go back and look at her supports and her backstory. Hell, I even missed a big part of it for months in her supports with Hanneman. If you do that, I really think you’ll fall in love with who she really is beyond the flirting.

(I mean. I’d venture to say she’s the best character in 3H, even including the lords in that ranking. But if you notice my icon and half the content I write about, you’ll probably find I’m pretty biased on that fact )