You’re very wrong in multiple ways. But I can tell by your preemptive defensiveness that you’re not open to the idea that you could be.
So I’m replying for others to see confirmation from someone that knows about the subject matter that you’re wrong.
And to you, this might just be a criticism of a portrayal of fictional character but you didn’t just stick to that.
You made the majority of your post telling people how grief is supposed to work in a way that comes off judgmental and shamming.
And I don’t want anyone to stubble across your comment and come away feeling that way. Especially if it’s on top of whatever grief and trauma they’re going through.
You’ve never had a loved one get murdered and it shows. You are not an expert on grief. My response to you is completely separate from the comic because it doesn’t matter to me if you don’t like his portrayal. But your reasoning is wrong and out of touch. Grief doesn’t come in one size and it doesn’t affect everyone in the same way. Trauma looks different on people.
I feel like the author doesn't really understand grief. The espers grief feels performative.
The esper is a character. Before you attack me remember that. He's not real. The author has written his grief in a way that feels performative. I'm not attacking a real person, don't be weird.
The reason I'm saying that is because it's been a year and he is still grieving like it's the first week. This just isn't how grief works. I'm not saying that you're not still grieving after a year, you can grieve for the rest of your life and that's perfectly normal.
You just aren't still constantly surprised by your grief after a year. You're nervous system simply will not allow it to remain as acute as it was in the first few weeks. It's not physically possible, so what's happening is performative grief where he is faking and forcing himself to feel as if it was still the first week she passed.
"Why does everything remind me of them?!" Bro, it's been an entire year of you being reminded of them constantly why are you acting surprised?
"I smiled, that's betrayal of their memory." It has been a year, you have smiled and laughed hundreds of times since they died, why are you acting surprised?
"I can't live without them!" You've already lived without them for a year, why are you acting surprised?
Some of you are going to come in here and be like "you don't understand everyone grieves differently this is perfectly normal!" And I'm here to tell you that it's not normal. It's character that's being badly written. It's bad writing.
The author should have made the story much more recent to Anna's death if they wanted to make the esper act this way. This should be a month or two after she died. This is the sort of grieving you would expect a month or two after someone died. This is not what grief looks like after a year.
Do some research about grief before you attack me because you like this fake not real and badly written character.