Ryslig Application

OOC INFORMATION
Name: Amanda
Contact: margaretbooth
Other Characters: Amanda Young, Margaret Booth

CHARACTER INFORMATION
Character Name: Barbara / Ima Wiggles
Age: 21 (currently; she was 19 upon her initial arrival in Ryslig)
Canon: American Horror Story: Freak Show
Canon Point: Post-death, pre-afterlife.
Character Information: General plot information is here. Specific information on her character can be found here (ctrl + f "Barbara"). Because very little about her has been put online, I'm including a quick summary below:

Barbara comes from a family of very wealthy New York socialites. Her parents (especially her mother) are so profoundly ashamed of her that they began telling people she was pregnant out of wedlock rather than admit she's just fat. Yes, they really decided that being knocked up before marriage was the less shameful explanation in 1951.

Her family shipped her off to a weight loss clinic in Miami under the cover story of sending her away to give birth to this nonexistent child, and it was there that Elsa Mars discovered her. She successfully recruited Barbara by promising her a place that would celebrate her size rather than ostracize her for it, and Barbara, rechristened "Ima Wiggles" after "the greatest fat lady of all time," joined Fraulein Elsa's Cabinet of Curiosities in Jupiter, Florida as the resident fat lady. Though some of her new peers were rude to her regarding her size, she found life there far preferable to that at home, and started going by her new stage name as she began to make friends and even stumbled into a brief relationship.

Once firmly entrenched in her 'new family' Ima willingly participated in some of their shadier actions, including severe mutilation of an adversary and the attempted murder of a traitor. When the freak show was sold to a cruel, unstable man who infantalized her and otherwise mistreated her friends, the whole group of them (Ima included) quit, deciding starving on the street was preferable to taking their new boss's abuse. This led their ex-employer to gun down nearly every freak he could find. Ima, aware of the massacre but unable to run or hide, was shot in the face and killed.

Personality:

Ima is described as a hedonist, a "lover of the physical world" in her very first appearance, and that's the single most apt way to describe her approach to life. Negative connotations attached to the word should be disregarded, however, because her hedonism doesn't come at the expense of others. Ima simply seeks pleasure for its own sake. This is most obvious when it comes to food: she's a lover of food who takes great pleasure in eating, so much so that her body serves as a testament to it. She also has a prodigious sexual appetite, beginning a sexual relationship with a fellow "freak" soon after joining the show, and can be seen later opening her silk robe and showing off her body to carny workers once this relationship dissolves. That these two appetites came to intertwine at some point in her life is perhaps a natural progression; though it seems to make many around her feel uncomfortable, she isn't at all shy about it.

As a self-described "Park Avenue princess," it can be inferred that her only exposure to the drastically different before joining the show consisted of herself. She proves to be radically accepting of others despite this; she doesn't so much as bat an eye upon meeting people with severe birth defects and developmental disorders. Instead of having the adverse reaction one might expect someone raised in so much privilege to display, she instead immediately regards her new peers as equals. She doesn't gawk at or 'other' any of them. She immediately develops a crush on the young man with "lobster hands," flirtatiously offering him her hand while not being put off in the least.

It's not just about her tendency to accept people, either, as she's possessed of a warm disposition in general. She's described as an innocent, a naive girl who doesn't realize the freak show world is dying and can't even imagine what she's getting herself into. Those who come to her in heartache are all but guaranteed to receive comfort, and although she can be awkward in giving this comfort at first there's always a heartfelt warmth in it. She doesn't need to know a person well (or even at all) in order to want to ease their pain; this is likely due in part to the less-than-compassionate way she's been treated in the past. Having been on the receiving end of emotional abuse, she doesn't like to see others in such a state of pain, and will actively step in to physically protect others if possible (she's normally gentle, but won't hesitate to use her size against an aggressor if needed). She's also used her size as a comfort to others. She makes for a great literal shoulder to cry on, and gives comforting hugs to those in need of emotional support.

There is one very profound testament to her kind disposition that's worth a specific note. The central villain of the story (and Ima's eventual killer) became a brutal murderer partly because his family is wealthy and he could get away with anything. Despite an equally affluent and toxic upbringing, however, Ima grew up without that sense of entitlement and desire to control others. It stands to reason, then, that a large part of her sweetness is due to nature rather than nurture, and it's genuine through and through.

Her past abuse, combined with her naivete, is what causes Ima to cling desperately to her new "family." While she makes no apologies for who she is, she also seeks to belong, to find true camaraderie, in an effort to replace the family who are deeply ashamed of her. She acts as though her parents' shame and disgust has no lingering hold over her, but that couldn't be further from the truth, and once she finds a sense of belonging in another group she'll take steps to keep from being cast back out. Ima hasn't experienced much of the world, having lived a very sheltered life, and due to this she's easily excited by and doesn't know quite what to make of the world outside high society. She doesn't know what it will take to remain 'in' with any given group, meaning she has no way to gauge which actions in service of this goal are reasonable and which are extreme. As a result, these aforementioned steps she's willing to take in order to remain with her friends are very drastic indeed, all of them major overreactions that often reach the level of violence.

For example: when her fellow freaks realize that their boss had killed one of their own, Ima chooses to arm herself and join them in their attempt at revenge, despite the fact that she never knew the murdered freak...and that their boss, whom they intended to kill in retaliation, is the one who 'saved' Ima from being an object of her family's ridicule and essentially paid her a salary just to be herself. When another person is discovered to have been engineering the death and dismemberment of several freaks in order to sell their remains for profit, she doesn't hesitate to participate in a ritual of torment and mutilation performed upon him. While her hedonism doesn't cause others any harm, this pure-hearted drive to belong definitely can, has done so in the past, and likely will again if given the chance. In the end, it's not her supposedly 'sinful' appetites that give birth to the darkest and most dangerous part of her personality, but her innocence and desire to be treated like a normal human being worthy of dignity.

This desire to be treated normally leaves her vulnerable in several ways. Firstly, she's easily influenced by charismatic personalities. When Elsa Mars promises Ima that joining the freak show will expose her to people who cheer and celebrate her size instead of people who find her disgusting and shameful for it--which is all she's ever known up until that point--she's eager to sign on. As Elsa enthusiastically encourages her to keep eating and maintain her figure, Ima feels truly wanted and appreciated for the first time in her life, and embraces her new world with every fiber of her being. Secondly, her first taste of being appreciated leaves her wanting something more: being desired personally, not just as a business opportunity. She actively tunes out or glosses over the way some of the freaks disparage her (calling her a pig, finding her physical appearance to be a disgusting joke). Even sadder, when the fellow freak she's harboring a crush on drunkenly turns to sex with her as a distraction from his mother's death and a breakup with his girlfriend, she turns a blind eye to the fact that she's being used and chooses to believe that they have something special. Ima isn't vain, but needs to feel wanted and valued because she spent the vast majority of her life serving as a source of shame for others, and as a result willfully ignores anything to the contrary as long as her basic desire for validation is met. She's ultimately a genuine person, and when those she wants to believe in prove to be considerably less genuine in their intentions, it's less painful for her to let sleeping dogs lie and pretend nothing is wrong than it is to reconcile the reality of the situation.

While the negative attitudes of her rich family and upbringing haven't rubbed off on her, some of the more positive attributes of her former station in life did. Despite lacking restraint, she's still cultured: her manner of speaking makes it clear that she's received a good education, and she's unfailingly polite and considerate to people who don't treat her poorly. Her table manners too are impeccable; for all she eats, not a single bit of it ends up on her clothing, and she's ever-prepared with thanks and compliments for those who cook and serve her meals.

It's important to acknowledge that Ima is also genuinely talented; she doesn't simply sit on the freak show stage for people to gawk at. She's a gifted singer with a unique singing voice (Ima is canonically a singer, and furthermore, her actress's singing ability is often compared to that of Adele). She also plays the guitar, capable of both reading music and playing by ear. While she served mostly as backup accompaniment in her own world, she can carry a song on her own, and she's actually a more talented singer than the boss for whom she sang backup.

Ima sincerely and vocally detests every aspect of her former life, from the fancy dress and gala events to her family's summer home. Due to her high society's treatment of her, she sees through the glamor to the backbiting insincerity and hollow pretension inherent in the lifestyle. Though bitter, she has no shame about who and what she is, instead focusing all her bitterness on the way people choose to judge her for it. She calls herself a 'big fat pig' in a moment of self-deprecation but adds that she likes herself the way she is immediately afterwards; while some of the stigma she's faced has clearly soaked in and left an impression on her, it doesn't stop her from essentially liking herself. In an environment where she's allowed to express herself and live freely, she's able to keep her dignity instead of trying to force herself to fit a role she never wanted to play. It's important to note that when she says she likes herself as she is, she doesn't mean she's come to the point of liking herself after being unable to change. She means specifically that even if she had the opportunity to change herself quickly and easily, she wouldn't take it, because she actively prefers herself as she is. It bears repeating that she isn't vain; she sees herself as pretty, but doesn't feel like others are any less attractive than her, and in fact sees most everyone as beautiful in their own way.

In her previous time in Ryslig, Ima did change in certain respects. She's become more willing to stand up for herself as a result of the hardships she's been through here, rather than let poor treatment at the hands of others go unchallenged in an effort to not make waves (she isn't ALWAYS willing to do so, but is willing often enough that it can be marked as a significant development in her personality). The event in which a replica of her abusive mother pushed her to the breaking point, causing Ima to kill it, was one of the greatest factors in this transformation. That being said, she's still as desperate for a sense of belonging as ever, and will feel even more vulnerable without it now than she did before. She spent most of her life not fitting in anywhere, but after several years of feeling like she belonged (a job flexing her singing talents at the theater, living in a bustling youth hostel, belonging to and helping to found the neutral contingent), she doubts her own ability to cope in isolation once again.

5-10 Key Character Traits: Hedonistic, accepting, warmhearted, innocent, desperate to belong, cultured, unapologetically herself, easily influenced, sincere, musically talented
Would you prefer a monster that FITS your character’s personality, CONFLICTS with it, EITHER, or opt for 100% RANDOMIZATION? Ima has already been sorted as a Nymph.
Opt-Outs: Ima has already been sorted as a Nymph.

Roleplay Sample: Here.