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Amity Blight is a fan favorite character and one of my personal favorites. Amity Blight is an autistic lesbian tsundere, and uptown who has gone from being Luz’s snobby mean girl enemy to her adorable and devoted girlfriend. Like many of the Owl House’s most interesting female characters, Amity Blight serves as a foil to Luz Noceda.
Amity and Luz begin the series at opposite ends of the social hierarchy but in a similar place of alienation and insecurity. Luz was an outcast on Earth because of her eccentricities, and on the Boiling Isles due to her very humanity. Said humanity also gives her a physical disability which complicates her learning magic. Amity on the other hand enjoys socioeconomic privilege from being born a Blight, belonged to a clique of popular kids, and is the top student in her class at magic school. Abomination magic, Amity’s specialty, also happens to be the most privileged/prized type of magic. Amity and Luz were apprenticed to the Boiling Isles top cop and criminal respectively.
The two girls were in that place of alienation for related but inverse reasons. Luz paid the price for going against the grain and being herself. Amity on the other hand conformed to what was expected of her, and as a result felt alone even when surrounded by nominal friends.Both girls turned to books, particularly the Good Witch Azura series, to try and escape or at least gain some relief from their lonely and miserable lives.
Luz and Amity's character arcs revolve around the same four basic themes: Authority vs. Rebellion, Fantasy vs. Reality Identity and Belonging, and Family
Before we learn about any of Amity’s hidden depths however, we first get to see all of Amity Blight’s worst traits.
Bad First Impressions
To say that Amity and Luz’s relationship got off to a rocky start would be an understatement bordering on absurdity. Luz and the audience are first introduced to Amity as the bully to Willow. This causes Luz and the audience to sympathize with Willow and to dislike Amity.
Willow briefly smiles but then a magically animated wheelbarrow holding a large closed jar of abomination goop rolls into the scene; sitting atop that jar a green haired girl is reading a “Magic 101” book. Willow’s smile breaks. The green haired literal literally looks down on Willow while addressing her. The green haired girl stands over Willow (who is still kneeling on the ground) and says “you’re so unnoticeable into ya” and chuckles. The flower dies, symbolizing whatever feeble confidence Willow managed to build up in the past few minutes has been broken. This is our introduction to Amity Blight.
Amity proceeds to gives Willow a condescending, snarky, and self-aggrandizing pep talk. Even though Amity is introduced as an Alpha Bitch, she has other traits right off the bat. She enjoys reading and takes pride in being the top student.
excerpt from Owl House Analysis, Chapter 3: I was a Teenage Abomination
Tough love is a motif in the Blight Family; it’s how Odalia rationalizes her mistreatment of her children, it’s how Emira and Edric rationalize their mistreatment of Amity, and it’s implied to be how Amity rationalizes her mistreatment of Willow. The Blight children all learned this mentality from their mother; and I believe Amity learned her style from back-handed compliments from Odalia as well.
Amity’s first impression of Luz is as the person who helps Willow cheat on assignment. Amity is studious and a hard worker and as such hates cheating with a passion. Luz and Willow’s actions also result in Amity losing her “top student badge”.
It’s worth pointing out that Amity’s bullying of Willow was entirely verbal. She never physically harms her in any way. Contrast that with how Amity initially treated Luz. The very first time Amity interacts with Luz, she grabs her, yells at her, and throttles her. Then when that gets her sent to the principle’s office, Amity tries to get Luz vivisected/killed by Principle Bump. Then when Luz and Willow are about to escape, Amity conjures abominations to try and stop them. Amity’s initial treatment of Luz shows the depths of cruelty and ruthlessness that Amity is capable of.
Luz the Scapegoat
Amity has a habit of blaming others for her stupid decisions and of blaming Luz specifically for things that aren’t her fault. Amity got herself sent to detention because she grabbed Luz, throttled her, and yelled at her; yet according to Amity it’s Luz’s fault she got in trouble. Amity is embarrassed after it’s revealed that Lilith cheated to help her in the witches duel, but Amity blames Luz for that humiliation.
This trait of Amity’s mostly goes away after she reconciles with Luz at the end of Lost in Language, but it reappears in Through the Looking Glass Ruins after Amity loses her job at the library. What I find interesting is what specifically Amity blames Luz for. “Everything's changed since you came here. Being around you, it makes me do stupid things and I wish it didn't.”
You have to stop training forever
Luz imitates the Good Witch Azura by challenging Amity to a witches duel, and Amity accepts. You can tell that Amity is having fun roleplaying the villain.
The bet that Luz and Amity make over this duel is unfair due to how imbalanced the stakes are. If Luz wins all Amity has to do is apologize to King and admit humans can be witches too, if Amity wins then Luz has to admit she’s not a witch and stop training forever. Luz has to give up her dream if she loses, the only thing Amity has at stake here is her pride. Amity’s terms, and the fact she seals an “everlasting oath” (presumably the Boiling Isles equivalent of the unbreakable vow from HP) over this bet reinforces Amity’s ruthlessness.
One factor to keep in mind is that when Amity makes this bet, she doesn’t believe Luz is capable of performing magic anyway. It seems to be common knowledge on the Boiling Isles that humans can’t perform magic the same way witches do, but this is misinterpreted to mean humans can’t do magic at all. When Amity insists that Luz isn’t and can never be a witch, and tries to force Luz to acknowledge this; Amity isn’t just being cruel, Amity honestly believes that’s the truth.
When Luz shows Amity her light spell, there’s a brief moment where Amity is staring at the light ball looking surprised and sad. Amity realizes what she was trying to take away from Luz and starts to feel guilty. Amity is still a tsundere however, so instead of apologizing she turns away from Luz and talks down to her again. “That's nothing. A child could do a light spell. But... I've never seen it cast like that.” Luz doesn’t get angry or defensive. “It doesn’t come naturally to me like it does to you, so I’ve had to improvise”.
Amity’s perspective of Luz shifts from seeing her as somebody pretending to be a witch, to seeing Luz as somebody trying her hardest despite a biological disadvantage. In this moment Luz earns Amity’s respect (even if Amity is too proud to admit that right now) and as a result Amity unbinds the oath.
Amity’s final line this episode shows a paradox in the way she now sees Luz “Humans have no magical ability. But I doubt that'll stop you.”
Amity doesn’t automatically become good however. In the very next episode she says Willow was “born without talent”, and then later in the episode she takes a picture with her faux friends and posts it to Penstagram with the following caption “It's Conjuring Night! No Dorks Allowed!🎃♥️👻 Shout-out to my fellow witches! #humanscanbiteit 🤮🚫”.
How Amity interpreted Luz’s attempts to befriend her
When Amity and Luz meet at the Covention, Amity persists in holding a grudge and viewing herself as the wronged party. Amity refers to Luz as “Willow’s Abomination thing”. Luz doesn’t seem to bear a grudge against Amity however, and seems like she just wants to put the past behind them and become friends.
“Uh... Hey, Amity. So, funny story. Not an abomination. Sorry for the confusion last week. I-I'm Luz. The human. Hi!” Her apology rings hollow because she doesn’t admit to cheating or lying; the phrasing of the apology implies there was just an innocent misunderstanding even though Luz and Amity both know that’s not what happened. When Amity intentionally stomps on King’s cupcake, then smiles says and “Oops. That was an accident”, Amity is reflecting Luz’s behavior back at her.
In Lost in Language, after Luz sees Amity reading to kids, Luz once again tries to be friendly and once again comes across as obnoxious instead. “Reading to kids. Wow. Looks like this sour lemon drop has a hidden sweet center.” Luz wasn’t intending to give Amity a backhanded compliment but how’s Amity supposed to know that? Amity uses backhanded compliments herself against Willow so of course Amity is going to think Luz is doing this on purpose.
Later in the episode, Luz believes that “befriending the siblings” will help her “befriend the Amity”; but Luz befriending and making mischief with Emira and Edric just reinforces Amity’s negative perception of Luz.
Amity’s suspicions about Luz appeared to be confirmed when she sees Luz with her older siblings, inside her secret hideaway and holding the pages of her diary. “You two are the worst. But you... I've been trying to figure out what your deal is. Are, are you a poser? A nerd? I know. You're a bully, Luz.”
Reconciliation
The first time we get to see Amity being unambiguously nice is towards the beginning of Lost in Language, when Amity is reading the Otabin book to a group of kids in the library. She’s also clearly enjoying herself. As soon as Amity spots Luz however, Amity’s walls go back up. Being the tsundere that she is, Amity lies and claims she’s only reading to kids for extra credit.
Amity rejects Luz’s offer to help “Human do you see me going to the Owl Shack and bugging you while you... fry up owls? [ scoffs ] Okay, I don't really know what you do there, but every time you come near me, I get in trouble. Just leave me alone.”
Amity still persists in blaming Luz for things that aren’t her fault, but she comes across as desperate and upset rather than aggressive. Amity’s admission of ignorance is also important. At this point Amity barely knows anything about Luz. Amity’s preconceptions about Luz were challenged at the end of Covention and now she’s trying to figure out what Luz’s deal is.
Luz actually complies with Amity’s request, says “I’m sorry. I’m sorry” and turns around to leave. There’s a moment when Luz is leaving when Amity raises her hand like she’s about to reach out, but then she never does. Later we hear from Amity’s diary “I saw that… human girl again. I may have overreacted. I don’t want to come off as cruel, I just… can’t show weakness.” This is probably in reference to their interaction earlier in the episode.
Though Luz gets to see Amity’s good side pretty early in the episode, Amity doesn’t get to see Luz’s good side until the climax. Luz helps Amity escape and together they succeeds in defeating the corrupted Otabin. Luz also makes Amity for the first time in the series. This wholesome moment can be taken as foreshadowing of the what sort of relationship Amity and Luz will eventually have.
This might also be the moment Amity first started developing feelings for Luz.
We get to see Amity’s gentle side again when she tells the cured and apologetic Otabin “Hey, it's okay. We're still friends.” After the battle, Amity has her defenses back up and tells Luz “this never happened”.
What Luz does next is I think what solidifies her redemption (for lack of a better word) in Amity’s eyes. “Wait. It doesn't make up for reading your diary but would you wanna borrow this? I noticed you only had up to four.” Luz didn’t read Amity’s diary on purpose (and I think by this point Amity has figured that out) but Luz doesn’t bring that up or try to defend herself; instead she acknowledges that what she did hurt Amity and tries to repay her while acknowledging that Amity isn’t obligated to forgive her.
“Thank you. [sighs] Maybe you aren't a bully. I haven't exactly been the friendliest witch either. I'll think on that.”
Friends
Amity Blight is absent for most of the middle portion of Season 1. We don’t see her again until five episodes later in Adventures in Elements which is when Luz meets up with Amity to give the Azura book back. The first thing Amity does in this episode is tell her siblings to stop bothering Luz and help Luz off the ground.
Luz steals Amity’s “training wand” and sets off a fireball that pisses off the Slitherbeast, also draining the wands battery which stops Amity being able to use it to defeat the creature once Ed and Em have it restrained. This gets Ed and Emira and Eda captured. Amity traps Luz inside of a barrier while she goes ahead to rescue the others. Even when Amity is enraged at Luz for getting her siblings captured, Amity still cares about Luz enough not to want her to get hurt. Luz of course escapes and redeems herself by helping Amity to rescue their loved ones.
This is the episode that solidifies Amity and Luz’s friendship. Where Lost in Language left Amity and Luz’s relationship on an ambiguous but hopeful note, Adventures in the Elements ends with Amity being excited be in the same class as Luz and maybe even have an Azura book club (though Ed an Em promise to tell everyone about it). This episode wraps up Lumity Phase 1: enemies to friends.
Amity burying the hatchet and becoming friends with Luz doesn't mean her redemption arc is complete however. Amity also needs to make amends with her former best friend, Willow Park.