Home page 520—Someone Finally Calls Out Rogio

It’s funny, in the early days of Kique Nordin’s Home, I thought Kargo and Rogio where going to be foils. Kargo‘s role would be to support Roamer as a lover on the protagonists’ side of the story, and Rogio would support Ranach as an antagonist. So imagine my surprise when Rogio defected from Ranach and the Meteor Tribe in order to help Kargo and Ferah escape. I thought he would be an interesting character who would make atonement for his past mistakes aiding Ranach and experiencing true family with the protagonists. He even supported Roamer’s journey back to the Meteor Tribe to find and free Ronja. Surely, Rogio was just a good guy who did bad things on behalf of Ranach.

Boy was I wrong.

My first turning point from liking Rogio as a character to hating him came during a talk between him and Roamer. Basically, Rogio was okay with a nasty breakup between Roamer and Kargo, despite knowing the latter deeply cared for Roamer. Instead of being a good friend and trying to encourage a positive sense of closure, he moved in on Roamer and had sex with him days after said breakup and pushed a relationship on the younger dog. Then strove to keep that relationship secret after returning to a reformed Meteor Tribe run by Ronja, long after Ranach had been banished.

The second point of anger came when it became clear that Ranach wanted to starve the tribe by keeping them held hostage within the territory’s walls. Rogio was in the best position to deal with Ranach because they were former lovers. As Vigr, another MT member pointed out, Ranach was at loss when he thought Rogio was dead. So seeing him alive could give the tribe the leverage needed in order to save them. Instead, Rogio snapped at Vigr for the logical plan, and then proceeded to have a panic attack. While Vigr was understandably annoyed, the other members of the tribe coddled Rogio.

Kique stated Rogio had PTSD from the former relationship. Which makes no sense because Rogio never put up with abuse from Ranach. Even when he was left to die after betraying the MT under Ranach’s rule, he didn’t hold ill will toward his former lover. So the fact that he suddenly had this fear from his previous relationship reeks of BS. Mind you, this kept him from fighting for the tribe when they could have used the extra dog power. How infuriating.  

This leads me to today’s update of Home (page 520). For a long time now Kique has had Kargo playing the role of a jealous ex-lover who never got over the breakup with Roamer. It’s a shame that if Rogio was allowed to move on from Ranach, the same wasn’t granted to Kargo. For once I’m glad his ex-lover role is coming into play as he’s actually confronting Rogio over his relationship with Roamer.

Again, you have to remember that Rogio choose to enter a relationship with a manipulative lover, and in many ways was just as manipulative. (He chose to side with Ranach during the first rebellion led by Kargo, he poisoned Ranach’s father, the former Jarl of the Meteor Tribe on Ranach’s behalf, then chose to lead a second rebellion because Ranach made him third-in-command of the Meteor Tribe instead of second-in-command.) Kargo knows Rogio can’t be fully trusted, thus my happiness upon seeing this direct attack.

Notice how Rogio easily kicks Kargo away. This guy isn’t weak, and if I need to hammer the point home (no pun intended), every time Ranach acted out of line, he was easily pinned down by Rogio. When I think about how this big guy was fine with sending out the smallest females and even his own lover (Roamer) to fight Ranach’s summoned beast, it pisses me off.

Kique wants the audience to believe that Rogio is nothing more than abused victim of Ranach, but all I see is a selfish and manipulative character. Any goodness that he does is only to his benefit, and the sad shtick is just an act.

We all know that Kargo will be the one punished for attacking Rogio, but this last panel makes me wish that Kargo could make good on his words.