By this logic, Ellie should be in the same boat with Dylan and not where she is right now or one step above Dylan but behind the rest of the cast. Ellie is the DAUGHTER of Sophia. The only difference is she is female. But for some reason, beyond logic, because she is female, she jumps to the front of the line, but people leave out the important part: she is still her DAUGHTER. If you look at how the story progresses on both sides, Sophia is already making out with her DAUGHTER in the shower, and Sophia is giving hints to Ellie on "Finding Nemo" the right way. It should have never been that easy with Ellie.
Up to this point, P.D. 11, Dylan has been doing lots of Perverted Things, Spying, "First Person" Shooters, etc... She didn't really see him as a "Whining Boy" until this update in the park with the Hobos. Before that, she was treating everything as it was "SEX-ED." If you reread the text, you'll find that Dylan said in the Bikini Event, "I can't believe it worked." which tells me he was planning this because Sophia said this would be the last time you'll get to see this in the Mall Event with Dylan. So he was manipulating the scene to see her nude or as close to being nude as possible. And when she heard Dylan speaking about those words, she asked him, "What did you say?" and his response was "Nothing."
It did change all of a sudden. There was no build-up to P.D. 12. You can see it for yourself. Indeed, we may not know the entire story, but we can only base our thoughts on what we know at present. The initial days of the game time period are maybe the first 3 or 4 days of the novel. Finally, we are at P.D. 12, which is almost halfway through the novel and now out of the infant stages of the novel. As the novel progresses, our thoughts will change with the new information we learn from the story.
This is what happens when you have 79+ characters with who she has interacted throughout the novel. You start to develop plotholes because many characters play a role, and L&P only has a limited amount of time to tell the tale, which screentime is limited. So, IMO, He should have to trim the fat at the start, In which he could have put more focus on key characters in the novel. And it appears we are starting to see that with the "Coach Sophia" going to DLC. Also, L&P is dropping hints that the 1st part of Sophia/Sam evening event may end up as DLC as well. What else will probably go "DLC" at this point?
We already discussed this part in another post, but IMO, there is nothing "Symbolic" about beating up a drunk guy because he ran his mouth, as this is the word you used to describe that part. As I said in my response, most people who deal with drunk people that talk "Trash" usually ignore them or tell them to move along. Now, If L&P wrote in such a way that the Drunk Hobo was invading her personal space and was trying to get up close and personal, like the thugs in the subway, after running their mouth and making gestures, and Dylan defender her then, I could say that would be "Symbolic" and I could see it fit into that scene much better, then what was shown.
The progression that has been shown has been "Two steps forward, One step back" when it comes to Sophia/Dylan. The gradual progression can work if there is a part in the story that feels impactful. Washing Dishes in the hope you can see Sophia changed in the mall or at some other point wasn't really impactful or huge. That was just someone washing dishes. The only little things I've seen were the foot massage and spending time with Sophia during the mall scene, cloth shopping for the Aiden event that had some impact. You probably could add some scenes from the Bikini event as well, but I don't think it was that impactful considering her thoughts at the end. At most, it was chipping the ice away with a hammer and chisel.
The only "Impactful" thing people are talking about is defending her in the park. IMO, it wasn't really that impactful taking into consideration again the drunk hobos.