#It is not canon. It is a valid canon interpretation if you want to

[yugsly]

Ok final verdict is inspekchin divorced or lovely dovey???!!??

Both and neither. It doesn't matter how I see them because they are in your hands now. You can take them any direction you would like and it's perfectly fine to enjoy them in any capacity you want. Both are valid interpretations.

That probably sounds like a cop out answer BUT it's just based in the way we see them at the end of the game- there IS no truth because we left it vague. The only thing that is "canon" is that they are left in a rocky and uncomfortable place at the end. Even I play in the space of both, there's no reason for each idea to exist in isolation. You can take what's there and mould it to your liking. What we see is toxic, but that doesn't mean they can't heal- OR get worse.

That being said, it's funny and awesome to see them killing each other with hammers like some Looney Toons shit. At the end of the day they are dumb cartoon characters that contain multitudes

[courfee]

people insisting that jegulus makes no sense with canon characterisations annoys me so much not least of all because their argument is always "Regulus only betrayed Voldemort for his house-elf". Where. Where in canon, since that's apparently what we focus on for arguments, does it say that Kreacher was his entire motivation?

Regulus died for Kreacher. Because he didn't want Kreacher to suffer on Regulus' behalf. But there is nothing in the books indicating that the betrayal, the Horcrux hunt, had anything to do with the fact that Voldemort hurt Kreacher.

So if you want to argue that Regulus was a Deatheater through and through and only turned on Voldy because he hurt his house-elf you need to stop pretending it is canon that you care about so much

[hollowingearth]

not to be the friend who's too woke but I genuinely feel that the only reason the fandom has such a visceral reaction to people calling Vi and Cait's situation domestic violence is because Vi is butch. yes, DV is more than just physical harm, it involves repeating patterns of abuse, all of which can be found in their relationship. Cait is Vi's only access to safety and food, she's isolated, she has to constantly prove her loyalty to Cait and renounce any ounce of lingering feelings she has towards the only family she has left, she's left in constant state of anxiety because of it.

[kisses-in-the-void]

One of the reasons I don’t agree with the interpretation that Melkor hated and mistreated Mairon is that, instead of being a "more accurate look at canon", I feel like it oversimplifies him and turns him into a flat caricature with no depth.

It's like he doesn’t even need a motive to hate someone, and hatred is the only emotion he’s capable of experiencing nonstop — like breathing. (I know the Valar probably don’t need air, but you get my clever metaphor.) It makes him a very boring and one-dimensional character, and I just don’t think he belongs in that category, even if he is a literal Satan and the root of all evil in Arda. But he still had his own specific reasons for actively loathing someone, even if sometimes those reasons might seem illogical.

He hated Varda because she rejected him. He hated Aulë because they were similar, but Melkor was jealous of his rival’s talents and insecure about his own. He hated Ulmo and his dominion — the ocean — because he couldn’t subdue it. He hated all of the Eldar because he believed they were responsible for his imprisonment in Mandos (since the Valar went to war against him to protect them). He hated Húrin and cursed his family because Húrin disrespected him.

Melkor might have been quick to feel anger, hatred, and a desire to destroy or punish someone — but he still needed a reason for it. When he felt denied, disrespected, threatened, or unable to control something. And I just don’t see Mairon falling into any of those categories.

On the contrary, not only did he willingly accept Melkor as his master and serve him to the best of his ability, but he also admired and adored him. I think even someone as evil and cruel as Melkor would have felt at least some satisfaction in having such a servant — someone who acknowledged him as a leader and as a talented creator. Maybe… he might even have been grateful.

I don't think it’s such a stretch to assume that he could have been pleased with Mairon to some degree. Or that it was absolutely impossible for him to feel any positive emotion when he accomplished something good (good from his own perspective, of course). Mairon, being complicit in all of Melkor’s deeds upon Arda, could very well have earned some rewards for it — and been uplifted above others.

And it’s very much canon that he trusted Mairon the most — that Mairon was his greatest servant and held "the great power" under his command. To me, that suggests something closer to respect (at least to the extent Melkor was capable of feeling it for anyone) rather than hate, and also a recognition of the value of his most devoted follower — loyal from the Elder Days to the very end of their relationship.

[4thelovabob]

I see your "Yelena can only be interpreted as aroace based on a few noncommittal answers" and raise you demisexual erasure (tongue in cheek)

[burning-academia-if]

The talk about Rook is interesting to me because I don't know... maybe it's just the way my brain is wired, but I can't really "read" a character as a gender? So basically, I just take the word of the author for truth, and that's how I see the character, because I'm not really able to do anything else than take it for face value.

So to me, Rook reads as cis-male because that's what you said he is.

Yeah! I think it depends on the reader! Personally, I don't mind if people take a "the author is dead" approach to my work and interpret things as they want lol

[ragnarlothcat]

I know I’m a chronic overthinker but I’ve been in the same fandom for three years or so now and I was reflecting that writing seemed so much easier when I first started out. Just looking at my output since 2021 shows a clear trend: I’ve been writing much less and it’s been taking me way longer.

I figured that I’d gotten a little burned out and that three years is a long time to focus solely on the same two guys making out and that there’s a limit to the number of situations I can put them in before I start to get bored. But I don’t think that’s quite my problem because even now, a million years later, I have ideas for dozens of fics and AUs that would be interesting to explore or funny to write.

No, it’s that I’ve let the larger fandom overwhelm me and it’s left me constantly second-guessing my writing. And I don’t mean that I’ve gotten nasty comments or asks, because I haven’t! All the other fans have been consistently wonderful and fun people with really valuable insights. And it’s not that I’ve been obsessing over stats or comments or worrying about going against popular headcanons. I mean, I’m just as excited as anyone else to see an AO3 email in my inbox but I’m also perfectly happy posting niche fics for an audience of me and my three weirdest friends.

It’s more that after so long engaging with other fans and other fics and the general meta, I’ve ended up writing too self-consciously. I’ve read so many interpretations of canon events, analyses of characterization and comparisons between fiction and real-world politics over the years, and I’ve enjoyed them because I genuinely care about these stories and these characters! I like seeing what everyone else thinks and then considering their points of view, no matter how bewildering they might seem at first.

But now it feels like I’m writing almost defensively, like I have to justify every choice I’m making based on this enormous and contradictory body of information. Three years ago I’d have written a scene in a few thousand words and moved on to the next plot point with my momentum intact. Now I’m constantly wringing my hands over things like physical details (I guess he’s not exactly a redhead) or broader social implications (is this trope misogynistic?) or finicky logistics (these locations are too far apart for this scene to make sense) or controversial character nuance (does writing this guy as a kind, doting husband make me an abuse apologist???) and the result is that I’m paralyzed with indecision and a ridiculous need to support everything I write with a lot of context that isn’t especially fun to write or, I suspect, especially fun to read.

I’m aware that this problem is entirely in my own head and that no one has asked me for any of this. And it’s not that all those questions aren’t interesting and important things to contemplate. But I miss the days of sitting down at my laptop and going “wouldn’t it be funny if these dorks played a video game together?” and then writing exactly that.

I don’t know. Were my fics better three years ago? I kind of doubt it. I’ve looked back at some of them and if nothing else I now have a better grasp of what tense I’m supposed to be using. But I definitely had more fun writing those older stories, which maybe feels more important.

[vantablackdraws]

What do you think of that hc that hc Baiken as non-binary?

I honestly at first was like "fym nb Baiken?" And then when I played the alternate path of her story mode in accent core +r and saw the ending I was like "Ohhhh that's why some hc her as non-binary" and then I said "hell yeah, why not?" (I even made a custom palette with the nb flag colors and ended up using bc for funsies and bc I'm also nb lmao)

Gonna be completely honest, that's a question I've had some thoughts on for a while now, and I do feel uncertain answering it as someone who isn't nonbinary or trans so like, feel free to take this whole thing with a massive grain of salt or just disregard it entirely

(For the sake of convenience and also for this ask I'm just gonna use they/them when referring to Baiken) I think that line from +R where Baiken says "I gave up being a woman a long time ago" could have a lot of meanings. You could take it literally and view it as Baiken saying they aren't a woman, or that they're nonbinary, transmasc, a trans man, agender, just any form of genderqueer whatsoever. I also believe that the term/pronoun they use to refer to themselves is a hard masculine one in Japanese (also feel free to correct me on that). Pair that with the fact that they say "no miss" to Delilah when she first talks to them, the way they carry themselves being more masculine leaning like their strut, and I'd say that's pretty solid evidence to back that up. But you could also interpret that line with their story of vengeance as well. Maybe "giving up being a woman" means they don't feel they can be a "woman" by usual societal standards. Being a samurai is already a more masculine leaning occupation, even if there are/have been female samurai. And we've seen that Baiken's lived a tough life as a ronin, once again telling Delilah that it's a lot of scrapping by. What good is being feminine if it's futile in the face of their revenge? How can you even be soft and caring when your journey is anything but? It's not even just shedding your femininity, it's shedding your humanity, giving up your chance to live a normal life in pursuit of one brutal and demanding goal. Of course, like all things, two things can be true. They can renounce their chance at a normal life while also not really caring about gender whatsoever. Maybe they don't even want to be a woman in the first place, maybe they are a woman and are just more androgynous/masculine leaning in some ways, who knows! And who cares! Daisuke hasn't said anything about it and I think it's obvious at this point that he's not the most subtle when it comes to this stuff (i.e. Bridget, Testament). In the end, canon/fanon is just your sandbox and you can literally do whatever you want, and that's great. I personally think that any way you spin it, Baiken's always been pretty GNC in some way shape or form, it's just about how you want that to look.

[shannonsketches]

he's so important to me

[lokh]

and listen. old men yaoi aside. wouldnt de-ageing snake like. defeat the point

[lord-squiggletits]

A tangent from the tags of my previous Pharma post (and I just thought about this so bear w/ me if it's hastily reasoned) is that the Autobots being generally sanctimonious is actually sort of a reason why I find a lot of IDW Optimus interpretations to miss the mark, specifically the accusations of calling him stuff like self-righteous, caring more about principles than people, etc. And I know that sounds really ironic, but out of every Autobot (and almost every character period), Optimus is one of the few people who has a very forgiving/humanistic perspective on life or at least has a political approach of "if we don't stop fucking fighting we're going to be at war forever and eventually just kill ourselves."

He very explicitly wanted a diplomatic end to the war and not a military victory/conquest. He extended multiple offers to Megatron personally to work together and end the war (Autocracy trilogy, which was pre/early war, and Chaos Theory, which was late/end war, so from this we can assume Optimus' stance was consistent the whole time). When ppl hated him so bad they rioted he removed himself from the planet rather than argue or fight to justify why his actions were the best he could do. Sandstorm starts murdering Decepticons and Optimus solves the murders and then throws Sandstorm in prison bc sparing one of his Autobots the consequences of his actions is less important to Optimus than keeping the peace and making sure anyone who threatens to ignite wartime hostilities is punished for it. There are multiple characters throughout the series that other people give up on as too far gone or too cowardly/evil/damaged to be worth helping where Optimus alone is the person who says "I think they can get better/they did bad things but they're still people" such as the Dynobots, Blurr, Prowl (despite how OP's patience with him hung by a thread by the end of it), Shockwave, and, yknow, fucking Megatron of all people.

And on top of that Optimus' internal thoughts most of the time revolve around feelings of guilt, responsibility, anger, hopelessness/barely hanging on to his ideals, and so on. Bro regularly has thoughts about how the entire Autobot-Decepticon war was his fault and is depressed to the point the thought of dying/martyring himself makes him feel relieved. So like. Idk guys I don't think those are the personality traits/actions of a self-righteous person who thinks he's correct about everything and everyone who opposes him or fails his moral standards is just evil or whatever.

[nerditudes]

You ever look at Haruhi in OHSHC and think 'is there a word for how Haruhi feels about gender?'

WELL BOY GOLLY THERE IS!

Haruhi is most likely gender apethetic aka apagender. This is an identity that means a lot of different things to a lot of different people. The interpretation chosen here is based on my own personal experience as a previously gender apathetic person. It may not reflect other's experiences.

Haruhi doesn't feel any certain way about any gender. In fact, they're more likely to let others infer what gender they are. Any pronouns are welcome to him-- and pronouns might shuffle around in threads. If this is confusing, lmk OOC and I can stick to one or two in the threads. This also means your muse is open to using whatever pronouns they'd infer from Haruhi. You're NOT being transphobic! Haruhi literally does not care either way. Most folk default to masc pronouns when he's masc, fem when fem, and enby sprinkled throughout. But I don't mind what you use for them, either. I play Haruhi as a trans character-- because while they don't mind identifying as a woman, Haruhi doesn't consider themselves one. They don't consider themselves anything, really. He's got more important things to worry about like his grades and keeping his scholarship afloat [and honestly, dealing with Tamaki is a borderline full time job].

So please don't feel anxious or worry about how to address this character!

[hazmatmaid]

Because someone was a real one and offered me some much-needed words of kindness, I'll let you in on something I've been intending to do:

Something that has been bringing me great comfort and joy since Ch2's release has been the development of an alternate route in which Spamton ultimately earns a happy ending, spent with his wife and daughter (which of course comes with shenanigans, but that's for later); the idea being that he's cleaned himself up just enough to form connections again to get to that point. Anyone who's been following my stuff for the past few years knows that said daughter is Shirley (but for now, the wife is a secret/surprise).

Although many times, I'll be scrolling through the tags, or something will be recommended to me via my dash or the "related" posts and blogs...frankly some of them, especially the popular ones, feel like they're taking this from me, and it's mostly because it feels like people care more about those than whatever this will be. Like no one will bat an eye in my direction or find it valid because they're so adamant/show a clear preference for how they want Spamton to be portrayed. I'm talking about purely headcanons and fanonical stuff that seemingly everyone has accepted as canon for some reason, to the point that I fear getting dogpiled for daring not to accept or adopt them, because the way I see him is apparently not how most people do.

I know that's not usually the intent, and they're basically off in their own fanon world that I'd prefer not to be part of, but it's things like that which make me afraid no one will care that I'm going in this direction, not those ones.

[amtrak12]

Me: rolls my eyes and judges fic writers who talk about how they can't control the characters, the characters control them, and then laugh it off like it's a good and valid way to write

Also me while writing my own fic: Oh shit... did you really just think that, [character]? Daaammmn..... I've never considered that for you before, but it makes so much sense. I love it!

[snaggletoothedbastard]

i know this is a thing that Literally Everyone says, but some people really do need to stop viewing their personal headcanons as Facts.

[blacksurvivalnostalgichanges]

Eleven:Next, "What are the colors of Garten of Banban 1 (The Opila puzzle)?" A, red-blue-yellow-white-pink, B, reddish-nothing- red-ish -blue-lilac, C, green-whitey-reddish-pink-lilac-orange, or D, square-triangle-whatsapp-strawberry? Vote now!

Rozzi:I think D.

Eleven:Why are you voting D? It's what I asked you to write down! Strawberry??

Rozzi:It's just in-character for you.

Eleven:But I didn't say that! I didn't- This is recent! I didn't go "square triangle whatsapp strawberry"... Four isn't even the right amount!