So, what do you guys think of Anna votes halting after the Fire Emblem Reddit getting a hold of the poll?
I'll be honest...Anna was always gassed up far more among the Smash fanbase than she ever was in the actual Fire Emblem fanbase. For most of her existence, she was a "recurring" character in the same way that Nurse Joy was recurring in Pokémon. Like...literally the exact same way.
Her being made playable in Awakening was a cute bonus thing that was a side objective in-game with no bearing on the plot, to act as a celebration of the series. Then Fates made her playable because, hey, Awakening did it...and made her DLC locked. Then she wasn't in SoV because Gaiden was the only game without her at all. Then she was in Heroes as one of the Askr Trio! ...Only for her to basically never do anything but sometimes give exposition. You could remove her from Heroes and basically nothing would change outside of the tutorial. Then Warriors added her but like, it was Warriors.
This came to a head in Three Houses, which had the most superfluous Anna shoehorning of all. In a game that created so many characters beloved by the Fire Emblem fandom...Anna was a cardboard cutout with basically nothing besides "I like money." No supports either. She was there because she had to be there.
Engage at least managed to do something new with her by making the Elyos Anna be a child, giving a new spin on her character beyond "hello, I like money." And with that, it marked like the third time Anna felt like an actual character instead of a box on a checklist, after Awakening and (remarkably) Warriors (thanks to her Celica support).
Maybe it's harsh, but to me it always felt like the Anna push came purely from the Smash fandom overvaluing recurrence as a trait, without taking into account
what those appearances are. To a lot of the Smash fandom, Anna is an iconic recurring character. To a lot of the Fire Emblem fandom...she's an easter egg who became playable in the game that would have been a send-off, and then sort of became a minor annoying obligation for several games afterward.