I knew when I started Vargas that Scriabin would be in it. He didn't have a name at that point, but I already had a feel for his personality and his voice. Scriabin's constant doubt and anger and cynicism is something that's always been with me, in one way or another (particularly when I cry, I just yell at myself much like Scriabin does to Edgar). I just gave it an outlet. A lot of my characters come from me wanting to express some part of myself in some way, then evolve from that into their own people (Dowasure, cough).

At any rate, Scriabin was not entirely created with Vargas, although the seeds of him were there. He wasn't really solidified until sometime around February I think, when I knew I'd have to give Edgar's voice a name and a solid form, like Sickness and Nny's various voices. I spent half-an-hour staring at a picture of Edgar trying to think of what he should be. I went over various options like a doll or a crucifix but nothing really fit. Ironically, I thought a lot about how when after I decided, I'd look back on that picture and wonder at how I once didn't know.

Anyway, I let myself just draw and then voila, the first picture of Scriabin. A blur of Edgar, Nny, Dowasure, and my big brother Chris, his character design wasn't unusual for me. Especially his trenchcoat, since I have an obsession with them. At any rate, I didn't know how I could justify Edgar's voice having a human body, so I thought some more. Meanwhile, I was listening to an OC Remix from Castlevania: Symphony of the Night called Scriabin's Long Library, and I remembered that DJPretzel said that the composer Scriabin focused a lot on atonality.

I couldn't think of a better name, and I thought the atonality thing worked for what I knew Scriabin would eventually do to Edgar, so I decided to go for it.

Now with two problems, I had to decide how to justify his appearance AND his name. I came up with the action figure as the source, but still had to justify the toy itself. What would be cause for a toy like this? A movie. What kind of movie? So I thought about where my movie toys had come from. I decided that Scri most looked like a reject from a Matrix movie, what with the black and trenchcoat and all, then remembered how JTHM tended to make references to things but change them just slightly (Nine Inch Heels, for example). Voila. Make a parody version of the Matrix and that would be enough. I chose Zeitgeist for the title because I remembered my english teacher from high school talking about it and how knowing the word and what it meant meant you had a free pass into pretentious snob city (along with bildungs roman). I thought that since JTHM parodies were so mocking, it'd make sense to call the Matrix parody Zeitgeist, the most pretentiously stupid artsy name I could think of.

After that, figuring out how to get the toy to Edgar wasn't too hard, and then I filled out the Matrix bit a bit more. The Matrix focused around Neo, Trinity, and what's his face...Morpheus. Scri was obviously Neo, so I needed a chick and a guy, and I needed names. I flipped on my playlist and one of Eric Satie's songs came on. I always liked Satie's music, so I decided that was a artsy sounding composer name that would be passable. I went and looked up Satie out of curiousity to see if he was still alive and in the process saw the name Liszt mentioned on a page about Satie. Sounded good enough, so I grabbed that one too. It was only later that I actually did ANY research into Liszt, ha ha. I didn't think anyone would ever care enough to check me on the names anyway.

SO names set, I modeled Liszt and Satie from what I remembered of Morpheus and Trinity, except I gave Liszt Devi's hair for the heck of it. I'm not sure why, looking back on it. I guess just cause I thought it'd be funny. I thought up some rudimentary personalities for the three in the movie and a ghost of a plot, enough for Squee to vaguely reference to and sound credible enough so that Scriabin's appearance would be believed.

Haha, Zeitgeist only exists to justify how Scriabin looks and to a lesser extent, his name. I never really planned on making it into anything else because it served its purpose to me, which was making Scritoy believable and letting me keep Scri's character design at the time.

Heh, in a way, you can blame that OC Remix for most of Zeitgeist's existence. By the way, if you ever have a chance I recommend playing Castlevania: Symphony of the Night cause it is an awesome game (ironically, the library that the remix does was REALLY IRRITATING AAGH).

Anyway, from there Scriabin developed and changed and became more himself as time went over. Scriabin's voice is very clearly defined for me, as is his personality.

One of the things that interests me about Scriabin is that he's possibly the most negative character I've ever created. I have made generic villians and I do have characters who do horrible things (cough kaggie cough) but I don't think I've ever made such a horrible sadist like Scri. I think it's because of this that Scriabin feels like such a deeply personal character for me.

I mean, I love Edgar to death and I do relate to him a lot, but it's not the same as Scriabin for me. Edgar belongs to Jhonen Vasquez, no matter what I do to him. I mean...no matter how much depth or backstory or random things I associate to Edgar, he still belongs to Jhonen because Jhonen created him. Scriabin's my own, so I feel more deeply attached to him. Scriabin has so many fiercely negative qualities. He does terrible things all the time, he's unbelievably selfish and manipulative and cruel. What interests me about him is that no matter what he does, how low Scriabin sinks, what terrible things he does, I can always understand why he did them. I can understand why Scriabin does what he does, but I read something lately that made me think about Scriabin too. I understand Scriabin, but that doesn't mean that he's right. I don't want people to think he's right either in some cases, because sometimes, he just isn't. Diaryfic, for example. I can understand why Scriabin did everything he did, but understanding why doesn't make what he did right.

I feel deeply connected to Scriabin because he fascinates me so much. I know he's borrowed from various people in my life or moods that I've been in and it all comes together in his own way, if that makes sense. I think that's why I feel kind of possessive and jealous about him, it's because he's so personal in his weird way. Like Dowasure. In a way, the two of them are on the opposite sides of the spectrum in terms of personality, but I still feel attached and responsible for them both. They've taken so much from me, positive and negative, and when I look at them I can see blends of me and others becoming themselves. Wow that was the stupidest sentence ever. YAY I'M NOT MAKING SENSE.

But anyway, for all his flaws I love Scriabin. He's a part of me, a negative horrible part but he's still a part of me nonetheless, just like my other characters. I know that I can go into Scriabin's voice without any trouble, like I can for Dowasure or my other characters, and he'll keep changing and growing as he continues to be inspired by things I notice about myself or others. He'll always be a part of me.