It often seems to be assumed that Yona was a spoiled brat and had all the luxuries of the world while she was the princess, and she herself regards it that way. But I don’t think that’s necessarily the case.
Sure, she was ignorant, but she was also confined to the palace grounds and had no opportunities to interact with the outside world. And I don’t think that was her fault? King Il was a rather neglectful parent and isolated his daughter. She didn’t have a lot of freedom and it seems to be she had a lot of restrictions being the ‘princess’. I would consider someone more like Tae-jun, in the beginning of the manga, a “spoiled brat”, but Yona seems to have had more drawbacks being in the position she was in. She was given a lot of luxury items, but that cannot be substituted for the lack of freedom and care that she required. We see panels of her comforting her father when the Queen had passed away, while putting aside her own feelings on the matter.
I think Yona was in fact considerate and trying her best in the situation she was in. Which is also shown in the New year’s extra chapter 134.5:
I really like Hak’s monologue in the chapter where he disagrees with the people who call her a fool or say that she’s selfish and says that the princess is nothing like that.
Thank you! I’m so tired of how many AnY reviews and recs start out with a summary like “Yona is a spoiled bratty princess who doesn’t care about anything besides daydreaming about her crush and how much she hates her weird red hair, but that all changes when…” The reviews are always positive and praise her character development, but her character development isn’t “spoiled brat becomes caring and kind.” She was always caring and kind. Her character development is her learning how to use those traits to help a world she was previously too sheltered to know existed.
