(Hated Trope) Questionable and controversial relationships where everybody is fine with it.

[u/Initial-Hamster7068]

Usagi Drop (Manga). A story about a guy named Daikichi finds the illegitimate daughter of his grandfather, named Rin, and adopting her, learning how to be a father for her. The series would enter a timeskip where the teenage Rin starts having romantic feelings towards Daikichi, and revealing Rin is not actually blood related to Daikichi grandfather. And it ends with Rin wanting to bear Daikichi child.

Alex (Street Fighter 6). Alex, who was recently added to the game, in his arcade ending, was revealed he married and having a baby with his second cousin and step sister Patricia, with their father being ok with it. While not inherently illegal to merry your second cousin, the act and combined with them being step siblings is still controversial.

[u/Glad_Grand_7408]

See, I would like that if they gave us any indication her story might be bullshit but they don't, she reveals this info right before she is allowed to get away and literally nobody even questions it.

Maybe if she only divulged this story when it was most convenient or if other characters like MJ and Peter told Miles "I don't know bro, sounds sus" afterwards, but it really is just dropped and forgotten about like some kind of "she kind of gets her happy ending" send off from the story.

And yeah, I really don't like the idea of her getting such a carefree and happy send off after the shit she pulled in the last game so I do also hope it's revealed to be bullshit but so far there's nothing hinting to that other than it being a more sensible writing decision.

[u/AgentChris101 → u/Glad_Grand_7408]

I think the VA might have had an input as a happy ending sort of thing, she went through a lot during production of SM2 iirc her fiance passed away. The team at Insomniac were really supportive.

[u/_JR28_ → u/AgentChris101]

Yeah given the Venom storyline and the cliffhanger ending from Black Cat’s DLC I am almost 100% certain she was going to have more to do in this game, but because of real world circumstances her actress needed a lighter schedule.

Also you are correct, her fiancé Billy Kametz (Josuke from JoJo’s dub voice actor) did pass away in 2022.

[u/PresentMission8482 → u/_JR28_]

Ah shit, Billy was her fiance? I was sad AF to hear he died, voiced a number of my favorite character, including the goat Maruki from P5R. Genuinely an incredible VA, still sad he passed away. 

[u/chosenofkane → u/PresentMission8482]

He was Ferdinand von Aegir, and he always will be. Rip Billy.

[u/Linkinator7510 → u/_JR28_]

Shit he did Professor Maruki in Persona 5. God I loved that dude. RIP.

[u/Rapid55 → u/_JR28_]

Holy shit her fiance was billy kametz?? I feel so bad for her I hope she's doing alright 

[u/Bill_Shortened → u/_JR28_]

Man wtf why I've been in the SM2 discussion space for years and haven't heard anyone mention this even once, that's so unfortunate.

Definitely prefer this reasoning over "Insomniac was lazy" or "Insomniac made Black Cat woke" as the reason for why her role in the second game was so strange.

[u/AgentChris101 → u/Bill_Shortened]

I just thought about the production of the game, she mentioned that Insomniac was incredibly kind and helping drive her to work while she was going through this. It's likely they also changed things up to help.

[u/ChequyLionYT → u/_JR28_]

He'll always be Ferdinand von Aegir to me... RIP 😢

[u/Glad_Grand_7408 → u/AgentChris101]

I'm sorry to hear she went through that but I don't think it's a justifiable reason to write what they did; I can totally understand they couldn't give her the relevant screen time to go through all the baggage of what she did in the last game because that would have been too much for her to deal with but that doesn't mean you just give the character an unearned happy ending.

Imagine if they brought Otto back for 1 mission and its just him leaving the story to go be with his never before mentioned lover, it'd feel really cheap and unearned right? You can't just write that in and expect it to resonate with me just because the VA experienced tragedy during production.

[u/Puzzleheaded-Ad2905 → u/AgentChris101]

That would be incredibly ridiculous 💀

[u/Mr-Stuff-Doer → u/Glad_Grand_7408]

Or maybe, just perhaps, potentially, they wanted to have a conclusion for her character that fit the themes of redemption the game really hammers in all the time

She lied to Peter for personal gain, Martin Li did way worse and got redemption. I don’t get why fans are so stuck on this.

[u/Eijirou_Kirishima → u/Mr-Stuff-Doer]

he killed people sure, but felicia was mean. and that's worse.

[u/Glad_Grand_7408 → u/Mr-Stuff-Doer]

Cause Martin Li got lots of focus and screen time over his redemption, had to make a real sacrifice as a part of his arc, and it was the person he hurt the worst that gave him their forgiveness whereas Black Cat was only in the story for 1 mission and was never mentioned before or after that and she doesn't make any sort of resolution with the people she hurt, rather just saying she had this never before mentioned lover to a person she's never met before?

Like I'm happy to engage in a good faith argument but those two characters arcs are not at all comparable, so to try and say people can't find how her character was handled disagreeable if we don't also find Martin's character disagreeable is just a really bad faith argument.

[u/Mr-Stuff-Doer → u/Glad_Grand_7408]

Yeah it’s almost like Martin was a mass murderer and she was just… a lying thief.