#about router

[jullbnt]

(Very late) Linktober 2023 – Day 21. Link

Finally!!! This one almost cost me my sanity it's been too long 😵

I haven't drawn enough Twilight Princess (even though it's one of my favorites) so here's our beautiful country boy.

I've listened to the complete Twilight Symphony twice while drawing this, I'm so addicted to Zelda music :))

Previous (Day 20. Fire/Lava/Heat) | Next (Day 22. NPC)

Linktober 2023 Masterlist

Linktober 2023 Twilight Princess

[chaispicelatte]

I was thinking about how one of my favorite genres of Sonadow content is Shadow realizing Sonic is way more fucked up than him (the alien hybrid made in a lab in space). And then I had the thought of Shadow realizing ALL of Sonic's friends are sort of weird and terrifying in their own right.

Sonic:

Him being freaky is a given

No one really knows much about his origins, yet he has power on the same level of Shadow, who was engineered in a lab with the help of an alien dictator

Is usually chill but relishes any opportunity to flex his powers and push them to the limit

Only thing keeping him from being an interdimensional threat is his altruism, which Shadow has somehow learned to just trust (which honestly scares him more)

Tails:

First off, why is this child flying a plane? Does he have a license? (The subject was quickly changed last time Shadow asked)

It takes months for Eggman to come up with new tech for his schemes only for this kid to reverse engineer it and come up with a new counter in half a day

Shadow has seen him make weapons that violate the Geneva Conventions out of a mechanical pencil and box of scraps

Also has better aim than GUN snipers with 10 years of training

Shadow takes him out first when it's him vs Sonic team because he doesn't want to risk either Tails getting a clear shot or him having time to pull out some other bullshit

Knuckles:

Knuckles being insanely strong is nothing new, Shadow is also strong

The difference is that Shadow's strength either comes from momentum, precise control of chaos energy, and/or knowing exactly where to aim. Knuckles doesn't need to do that, he's just strong enough to lift a mountain on his own

Shadow would think that Knuckles just doesn't know how to use chaos energy in that way (he's too dense to figure out Rouge is flirting after all)

Until one day Shadow's Chaos Emerald is acting weird. He reluctantly brings it up to the group chat to see if they're having the same issue. Knuckles says "Hold on" and goes quiet for a couple minutes

Then Shadow's Chaos Emerald goes dark. He would have thought this was a harbinger of another disaster if it didn't regain its color a second later. It's also working perfectly fine again

Knuckles used the Master Emerald to fucking turn them off and on again ("Yeah, it's the Master Emerald for a reason.")

Sonic asks if that's tied to the time Knuckles punched the Super out of him and that only causes even more questions that Shadow is too exhausted to ask about

Amy:

At first glance, she seems the most normal. She's got an apartment in the city, a day job, and is an active member of the community

Is a bit of a jack-of-all-trades when it comes to abilities

Shadow held her hammer once, and it's easily over a ton, but she's swinging it around all day with no problem

At first Shadow thought her bracelets were similar to his limiters, but they're just bracelets. But they are almost solid gold and crack the ground when they drop

Even weirder is that while she has more muscle than the average girl, it's nowhere near the amount needed to be as strong as she is. And he doesn't sense that her body's being augmented by chaos energy the way he does

And when Shadow thought about that, he started thinking about where she stores that hammer. He stores small stuff in his quills all the time, but no way could Amy do that with something of that size. Even when he watched closely, he just saw her hide it behind her back, and it was gone

It becomes obvious that Amy has some control over chaos energy, but the way she used it was so weird that Shadow can't make sense of the how or if she even knows she's doing it

And then there's how she always seems to know exactly where Sonic is. Shadow was starting to think she put a tracker on him with how precise she was

That was until Shadow noticed that every time he ran into her on accident, she instead seemed to be...expecting him

Amy chalked it up to her tarot cards, Shadow isn't so sure

Just what exactly was she seeing when she mixed him or Silver up with Sonic?

Cream and Vanilla:

Shadow hadn't had many run ins with Cream, but had heard she was stronger than she looked

Sonic once joked that she'd become a more popular hero than him if her mother let her go on more adventures

Shadow didn't think much of it until an incident in which he was fighting Eggman's badniks

A couple had escaped and were heading to a Chao Garden. Shadow goes after as fast as he can, but when he gets there, he's cheerfully greeted by Cream, sitting on a pile of destroyed badniks

Shadow walks her home, and is greeted by her mother and her overprotective pet robot. Gemerl is easy enough for Cream to calm down though

Though Vanilla is a...different story. She seems friendly enough on the outside, even invites Shadow to stay for dinner. But something about her unnerves him enough to gently turn them down

The look in Vanilla's eyes was too familiar, he'd only seen it in very experienced GUN agents. Like she was sizing him up, looking for any weak spots, and considering the best way to dispose of him if necessary. But not out of any malice, just as a force of habit

On his way home, Shadow remembers tales from an older GUN agent about the legendary Agent V. Said agent had been said to be dangerous enough that few knew their face, but had gone missing several years ago. But the lack of records on them or any urgency for GUN to find out what happened to them led many to believe that they were just a myth

But Rouge once said with certainty that she did exist

Shadow decides not to make that connection

[championofdogs]

This will come as no surprise to anyone but God phone and internet companies are so scummy and predatory.

I was cancelling my services because I'm moving which is what I told them, and I specified that I wasn't interested in continuing with them because I'd had bad experiences in the past. So he pauses to look over my file and then confirms that sadly there are no discounts he can apply to my plan.

Cool. Great. Didn't ask, actually. I'm just cancelling my internet. Thanks for making me wait ten minutes for you to do something I didn't ask for.

Then he transfers me to the loyalty department to 'cancel my services' and she also immediately starts looking at deals. So I have to explain again that I don't care what deals you find, I'm cancelling my internet.

THEN as she's going through the cancellation she asks if my phone is also with them, which it's not. So she asks if I'm in a contract and starts going on about a phone deal they have. Like I'm on the line cause they know I'm disappointed with the service, why would I want to ... Give them more money??

I recognize a lot of it is just script they have to read, it's not really on them specifically, but what a lack of tact.

[self-indulgent-paw-patrol]

I'm still having trouble with my Wi-Fi at home. I'll contact the company before I leave to work this morning.

For now, activity on the blogs I'm responsible for (the pups', Ryder's and Liberty's) will be totally on hold. I'll keep showing up here occasionally to chat and check how things are going but I'll keep their askboxes closed until this mess gets fixed.

[teatitty]

My two biggest Iruka hc's are that 1) he also took part in the third shinobi war, first as a messenger because kids are harder to keep track of and can easily slip in and out of sight during chaos, and then he became a router, which is when you infiltrate the enemy to get information to 'route' their advance and/or lead them into traps and ambushes because again: Kids Are Better At Sneaking Into Places

And 2) He lost absolutely everything during the Kyuubi attack. Not just parents but his home all the things they owned, any heirlooms, clothes, furniture, pictures, just gone. Completely. The only things he managed to salvage were a badly damaged hunting book of his dad's that detailed various traps which Iruka has spent years trying to restore to varying success and a few singed sealing scrolls of his mother's that he used to further his own studies in secret

[unironicallycringe]

man I'm just gonna say that it's incredibly fucking weird to walk onto a stranger's blog, project your own predatory age headcanons onto a character with no canon age, and then decide that means the blogger condones it.

like?? my dude?? the only person talking about that is you because it's your headcanon?

"you're bad because I think of this ageless character as a 30yo being paired with a teen" well I sure goddamn don't and I didn't need to hear that shit! it's not only extremely inappropriate, it's creepy as fuck! so like, maybe do some self-reflecting on why you decided that a stranger should abide by your headcanon, and maybe also stop doing that.

[torchickentacos]

My local bestbuy tech support counter is shockingly competent and wonderful. Over the summer there was the thing I posted about with my phone battery and the employee who drove to the next town over to get a new battery since they didn't have one for my old phone model. And THIS time, my wifi card was loose in my computer and he was like 'okay well it might come loose again because [xyz slightly-damaged but functional part], and even though it's fixed for now, I'd feel bad for charging you about it when it's not a full replacement so don't worry about it'. so shoutout to my local bestbuy again

[henrysglock]

It's All About Computers? Always Has Been.

^ November 1st, 1984

^March 11th, 1986

^ Sometime from 1986-1988

^ September 24th, 1990

[yrrtyrrtwhenihrrthrrt]

Internet Update: I think the Vodafone guy meant my router would arrive by,,, *next* Tuesday 🥲👍🏻 so we are still struggling folks

[deafenedkitty]

(=^・ェ・^= ) < PHONES BEING DUMB

[polysyndetonaddictsupportgroup]

Every time you talk about the Battle of Yokohama it makes me wanna cry, because I feel like you never lose sight of the fact that these are just kids. It doesn't ever feel like you're treating them as adults, you're always treatinhg them as children in an adult situation that they should never have had to deal with. I don't have any kids myself, but the urge to burn down a world that would lead to kids making these choices is damn strong (even if the world in question is fictional)

I’m so glad because that was one of the most important parts of the battle of Yokohama for me. I wanted it to be impossible to forget that they’re children. They’re spectacular children, don’t get me wrong, but they’re children. That’s part of what makes the world so quickly fall in love with these kids. Everyone spends the night all crowded around their TVs praying that these kids that came to save them make it through the night.

I think the nature of public attention is such that it’s sort of impossible to exist in the spotlight and have a wholly healthy relationship with the public. Take Izuku and Mirio—a lot of the attention around their “relationship” is facially positive. People are thrilled about and supportive of Leku.

But Izuku and Mirio are in agony because 1) they’re not dating, that’s their fucking brother, and 2) they feel like the only reason why the theory that they were dating took off was to invalidate their professional partnership on the day they were literally touring their office.

And I’ve touched on this in other asks, but Izuku and Mirio are actually a fabulously successful team up. They realized while training for Mirio’s licensing exam that the two of them were unstoppable in the field together. Like, hands down, they fight better with each other than they do anyone else. They’re just so in tune with each other that they can tell what the other is going to do in the field at a glance and support them. They could not possibly be going into a better partnership, and their fighting history proves that.

The reason why they beat the Fatal Five was because it was them. Mirio and Izuku made their plan, set their trap, and trusted the other to handle themselves.

Izuku knew a ridiculous amount about the Fatal Five going into this fight, because the mastermind who heads it was a very famous quirk analyst before he was revealed to be working with these villains. Izuku was actually a huge fan of him. He bought this guy’s textbook and had him sign it before finding out he was, you know, evil. So he just consumed everything about this case when it happened.

Izuku realizes that these guys are going to want to split up themselves. They always used to split into specific team ups during their initial reign of terror, because some of their Quirks weren’t complimentary. Like, if they changed the team ups they usually did, they would be risks to each other when they fought.

So he does the analysis and decides which group he and Mirio are going to be best suited to fight. And Mirio trusts his analysis, so he goes with it.

But the Five switch up the team ups. Izuku ends up fighting someone he didn’t expect, and Mirio ends up fighting someone he didn’t expect. When Izuku realizes what happened, the mastermind guy asks Izuku if he’s afraid for his friend. And Izuku is immediately like “nah, Lemillion can handle himself.” And he means it.

They both have an absolute trust of the other’s judgment and abilities in the field. They could not have picked a better partner to be heroes with.

But the public just doesn’t want to admit that. So they’re publicly supporting them as Leku The Power Couple and using it to undermine Izuku’s support for him over the past few years.

The public attention is a mixed bag. The Class 2-A kids (+ Nejire, Suneater, and Lemillion) are really the World’s Kids after the battle. The public is aggressively supportive and protective of them. And when the battle ends, they are about to fucking riot for these kids and their licenses.

At the very start of the battle, there’s a news crew that’s trapped in Yokohama who decides to keep the broadcast going. They went to Yokohama to cover the attack on Tartarus, and by the time that everyone realized that Tartarus had fallen, the villains were coming, and the heroes weren’t, there had been a major accident on the highway out of town and there just wasn’t any hope of getting out in time. No one would let them in to hide in a building, so they decided to hide in their news van and keep the camera rolling no matter what happened.

They thought they were going to be murdered on live tv, and the station made the call to keep the broadcast up no matter what. Because those were their friends who were sitting ducks, and the heroes were not going to get to hide from the consequences of this decision. The entire world would know what happened because they chose to fight All for One over the escaped villains.

But it’s hard to keep that promise when they get dragged out of the van and the villains who do it very happily take over filming while killing them.

Izuku and Todoroki end up showing up just in time to save them. Shinsou and Iida drag the potential victims out of the way and offload them on Kaminari, who needs to get to the hospital with the other students on hospital/ambulance duty and, coincidentally, so do these guys. But for different and more pressing reasons. They can all ride together.

CONVERSATION TOPICS THAT KAMINARI DENKI THINKS ARE APPROPRIATE FOR THE CAR RIDE OVER:

The fact that he’s absolutely not going to help Izuku and Todoroki fight those guys and neither will anyone else even though they are wildly outnumbered because those two are both absolutely fucking insane and go all out in fights together and he is but a man. god help those adult villains because they’ll need it.

The fact that he thinks they go all out in fights together as part of the weird flirting ritual fueling the suffocating sexual tension between them

The fact that everyone’s suffering because of how much suffocating sexual tension is between them

The fact that the suffocating tension gets even weirder when Bakugou enters the mix

His theory that Bakugou and Izuku had a toxic and mutually disastrous homosexual dalliance before they came to UA and that’s why they’re Like That

The fact that he doesn’t blame them because like. He hasn’t not thought about it when it comes to Izuku.

His refusal to accept shame on the above point because he knows for a fact that every single other student in that car has done the same. Can any of them honestly say that they would be here right now had Izuku not, at one point, gently cradled them by the hand and gazed passionately into their eyes and talked about their quirk like it was the most magical thing in existence. Can any of them say they’re not a little bit in love with Izuku and thereby forever willing to go along with his certifiably insane bullshit. Is he in the car with fucking liars.

The fact that the words coming out of his mouth right now are fine because these guys seem super chill and they’ve totally bonded in the last seven minutes and they’re gonna edit this out in post, right? Right? Oh, they can’t? This is live? Haha, he’s so fucked.

The fact that it literally does not matter what happens after this because they’re all either dying or losing their licenses tonight so like. How is this affecting them in the long run. How.

His realization that he has no marketable skills because he feels like they’ve just all been punching people and hoping for the best for the past year and a half and what the fuck do they do after they lose their licenses??? He can’t be a barista. He’s not talented enough to do latte art.

His evaluation of who’s going full vigilante after they all lose their licenses for this fight, which includes Izuku (seems to only follow the law because it’s convenient to him, will absolutely disregard it at slightest prompting), Todoroki (always on Izuku’s bullshit), Iida (doing it to supervise Izuku and Todoroki), Uraraka (needs an outlet for her violent tendencies), and Bakugou (refuses to be outdone by Izuku). Up in the air about everyone else.

This does four things: 1) it makes it violently and unforgettably apparent that car loads of children just showed up to fight these villains 2) it makes everyone convinced from the jump that this is a 100% illegal rescue mission that likely will result in these kids licenses being revoked if they don’t get fucking killed 3) launch Kaminari into international stardom as a beloved media darling and 4) ruin Izuku’s life specifically because between Kaminari and Todoroki the fucking lore drops about him that happen in this night make it so that no one ever shuts up about him again.

By the end of the night, people are legitimately planning riots if Their Kids get their licenses revoked for this. The fuck is the HPSC going to do? They just revoked the licenses of the only heroes that show up.

The HPSC dedicates themselves to gaslighting the entire world full time trying to convince everyone that they were totallyyyyyy in on this thing from the jump and this is a 100% approved rescue mission they embarked on as a joint effort with UA. This is just a big misunderstanding stop tweeting the video of Kaminari talking about how this is all illegal and they’re all losing their licenses okay stop tweeting it.

Class 2-A is sort of Schrodinger’s children by the end of this. The entire fight made it so inescapably clear that they were all kids and shouldn’t have ever been there.

But they won, so everyone needs them to not be kids anymore and start saving the world.

The HPSC wants to ride these kids’ new notoriety as far as it can take them. This is the new stability they desperately need after All Might’s retirement. The entire world can agree these kids are amazing and everyone trusts them—right after they lost trust in every other hero in Japan. So they’re willing to expedite these kids licenses. Get them all on an advanced track and out on the streets—especially Midoriya Izuku.

Aizawa loses his fucking mind.

He has a very similar response to what you describe, actually. He wants to burn the world to the ground for forcing his kids to make these choices. At this point, he is nine miles past his breaking point. He was a first responder to Tartarus when it got attacked. He’s been fighting for even longer than the kids. He never agreed with Endeavor’s order, only found out about it ages after he gave it, and was in too deep to pull out himself. He was hoping someone, anyone would disregard it—only to find out his kids did, when the Idaten sidekicks said over the comms line that heroes have responded to Yokohama—oh god. Oh god, it’s Tenya and his friends. Tenya and his friends are defending Yokohama alone.

He has spent the entire night terrified that he was going to have to bury them. And when he finally got there, Momo was on the verge of bleeding out, Aoyama and Kaminari needed an MRI ASAP, Bakugou, who was like three days clear of the medically induced coma from the sports festival, had become completely unresponsive after the fighting ended, and problem child Midoriya Izuku told everyone he had been fatally wounded six hours ago and tried to tell his beloved classmates goodbye in the same breath. All of his kids had violent breakdowns after the heroes arrived. The few that didn’t end up needing surgery or passing out immediately upon being assigned a hospital bed had to be sedated.

And now he’s here, listening to this asshole talk about how he wants to get his kids all back in the field ASAP, when he should be calling Midoriya Inko and fucking apologizing to her for the fact that her son is currently undergoing medical treatment that he may not survive. And then making the same call to Yaoyorozu’s parents, and Kaminari’s, and Aoyama’s, and Bakugou’s—and you know what? He has to call and apologize to every fucking parent to every fucking kid in this class. But there he is, listening to this instead.

He screams at everyone.

Why were his kids there last night? Why the fuck did this happen? How the fuck did every single hero in Japan fail to the point where his kids were put in the position to have to make the choice to go themselves? Every single person in this room fucking failed for them to be in the position they are now.

Aizawa has never in his life been angrier about something than he was about Yokohama. He’s not even angry at the class. They were put in an impossible situation, and they decided to be heroes when no one else did. He can’t fault them for that. He can fault every other fucking person on the planet for putting them in that situation, but he can’t fault them.

[claratyler]

bro what the fuck i just watched the episode where L dies and THAT scene after they come back inside from the rain really is over the top.what the fuck. I did not remember that romantic piano music. Also the double-entendres of everything they say..on the one hand it's alluding to L's soon-to-be murder, but also clearly it's meant to be (or at least could be) understood as romantic. What the actual fuck did I just watch. Also why did they look at each other like that. What the fuck

[lychee-milk]

my cat is obsessed with sleeping on my wifi router

[fnaflucasverse]

hey so i found this action movie from like 1999 no one's ever heard of??? as they should it sucks. lol

Router belongs to @fivenightsatfreddysfanfiction

WOW this got out really out of hand. first it was going to just be perry but then i thought they looked kind of lonely so yk what? why not router! they work together after all (but lets be honest they fight like cats the whole time because Someone established a hierarchy for his affection/respect 🙄 and perry is absolutely losing)

alt versions under the cut:

[lamarie-artsy]

Wifi issues again :(

[lilenui]

A question, if I may be so bold: what is it you like about Shino and Yamagi, as characters and as a pairing?

You've been in the fandom much longer than me and I'm curious what resonated with you about that relationship in particular, in the first place. (The curiosity is possibly motivated by having spent so long picking apart my own obsession with the show, I turn to wondering about others' enjoyment of it as a change of pace!)

Ohhh. I don't think I can answer these questions without giving a bit of backstory, so! I started watching the show on 16th of December 2015, around the time the first cour was finishing airing, just before the two-week winter break. I binged the first 13 episodes and the rest - as it aired. And even on that first watch, there were three pivotal scenes which made such strong impression on me I distinctly remember myself watching them, I remember my reaction.

The first scene was Shino pulling Yamagi out of the Mobile Worker during the first encounter with the Turbines (but of course). Essays could be written on that moment alone. It's just such a well crafted sequence, rising orchestral music perfectly timed with their clasping hands and Yamagi's reaction, his little gasp and a hand Shino grasped held to his heart. It definitaley raised an eyebrow, but most importantly, it set the tone for what Shino and Yamagi's narrative came to be: a collection of small, personal and intimate moments weaved into the grander narrative, very effectively showcasing personal stakes for the people involved in the fight. Of course everyone in Tekkadan has their own personal stakes, but what elevates Shino and Yamagi for me is how palpable was Yamagi's yearning, like his whole world depended on Shino's survival.

The second scene was Shino mourning his comrades after the Brewers fight. This scene floored me, it was as if a whole new emotional dimension to his character was torn open before me, and sucked me in immediately. I was instantly invested in this character. Murata's fantastic voice acting had a lot to do with that as well. Shino was cute before, if a bit loud, but all these new depths and layers!! Funeral Rites as a whole was a double whammy to me, stellar episode from beginning to end. And to top it off, it ends on Shino seeking Yamagi out to thank him. This is my third key moment, it solidified to me that whatever it is between Shino and Yamagi, is real and undeniably there. Yet another private scene loaded with tension and subtext. The dissonance between what the characters are feeling and what they're saying also added a whole different, poignant layer to the dynamic. Shino just a few minutes ago demonstrated he is a character of some considerable heft, but now he's also showing how considerate he is, that he values and acknowledges any act of kindness he's awarded and it's directed at Yamagi personally! In private! He made it so, so easy to become invested on Yamagi's behalf. I became obsessed within a span of few days, and from then on, my pathological attachment to them was being forged through months and months of pain and fearful anticipation.

Didn't help that it's such a smartly written relationship, nuanced, subtle. I think the fact that they are not the main characters helped a lot in this case. It doesn't beat you over the head with overly dramatic gestures, the strength of that relationship lays in how normal and relatable it is. It's just two boys, one has a crush, the other is oblivious, but not hopelessly so. I really wanted this for Yamagi, and I wanted the sunny boy to survive, I wanted them to defeat the odds. I was always aware all the necessary components for an effective tragedy were already there, but I dared to hope! Paradoxically, the more obvious the looming tragedy, the more I deluded myself it can be avoided because it's too obvious. Needless to say I got burned so badly I don't think I'll ever hope for anything ever again. I'm still hurting. I still think it was a colossal waste of a beautifully established queer romance. It could've been historic. Making fanworks for them is how I cope, and I think I'm going to be coping for a long while yet.

Apart from all the above, their interactions are just so great! They're filled with warmth, but also some bite. Yamagi is head over heels in love with Shino but he's not oblivious to his faults, he gives banter and push back. Sometimes he forces Shino to confront realities he'd rather avoid. They are a good match because their contrasting personalities are not so much at odds with each other but rather they compliment one another. And it's by design because, just like Mika and Orga, the two were designed around each other since the beginning. Shino is the Sun, Yamagi is the Moon. Much like Shino needs (and enjoys) Yamagi to discipline him at times and bring some sense into him, Yamagi needs Shino's energy to push himself beyond his self imposed limitations. The CD drama showcases this aspect really well, imo. I love that Yamagi's presence forces Shino to go a couple levels of intensity lower, so he can meet Yamagi where he's at, and that's where we see the real tenderness in Shino come out. Also because their scenes often just happen to involve physical contact of some sort, that in itself generates a lot of great chemistry. Now, most of that comes from Shino just being the guy with no sense of personal space, but it's also more opportunity to show how different is the touch he has for Yamagi and the other guys. Because Yamagi is not just "one of the guys" and never has been. I guess in Shino's mind Yamagi has his own category. He's so protective of him, and looks at him with such fondness. It's his own, patented "looking at the one I want to protect" type of smile. It's such a mutually uplifting relationship. I'll die on the hill that Yamagi triggered the resolution to Shino's character conflict, he is responsible for Shino's growth just like Shino is responsible for Yamagi's.

They're a solid unit and a great team, much like in personal life, their skills and capabilities compliment one another. I could go for an entire season of just this dynamic. I love me some back-to back buddies and I prefer the dynamic to be equal. Most my previous ships were that, though admittedly this is more of a Shino and Eugene's thing. "The one who waits, and the one who goes into action" is more of a traditional heteronormative ship dynamic, but I still love it because of how good Yamagi is at wrecking Shino's posturing. Yamagi demands to be Shino's equal, and he is. It's pretty much solidified between us that Shino is destined to be dragged by the dick by his sarky twink and honestly, more power to him.

When it comes to the characters themselves, looking back at my other anime blorbos, it's undeniable I have a type(s). Feels like I tend to gravitate toward either the sanguine or the sardonic, and nothing in between. Shino and Yamagi embody these traits to a T, albeit and in a more subdued fashion and maybe that contributes to me being so into them. Although they also carry unique emotional vulnerability that effectively breaks the trope. Shino is this larger than life, louder than life, unreasonable, bombastic man, but he is also the one with deep rooted insecurity and feelings of his own disposability. Yamagi is the stoic, sarcastic, sophisticated man in the making, yet he is the one with the all encompassing, melancholic infatuation. I adore Yamagi's entire character as a concept. He had my heart in a vice. I don't know how anybody can not feel for him. I think I've already said a lot about why Yamagi is so special to me above. He's this strong, uncompromising, loving soul trapped in a fragile body. Completely out of place for his surroundings but still capable enough to make himself indispensible. I honestly think he's cool! We cannot forget he drove a freaking train, jumped out of a moving vehicle, and climbed a mobile suit! It's like he can go from vulnerable to takes-no-piss attitude in a second. Like he's very cute and all, but he's also a bit of a bully. There is no extravagance in his looks and mannerisms (beside his fabulous hairstyle) and it's very refreshing to see in a gay anime character.

As for Shino, in general he seems like a character created with a lot of love. I think all in all, he's one of the most well crafted, multifaceted characters in the entire cast. I love all his little quirks and eccentricities. His free and unabashed expressions of emotion. The way the good and wholesome aspects of his personalty contrast with the reality of who he is, a trained soldier willing to kill for his cause. He's the character who shows this contrast within Tekkadan really well because of how vividly his jovial personality clashes with his circumstances, I think. I love juxtapositions like that within characters and Shino has those in spades. Most notably, the self-sacrificial undercurrent which manifetsts outwardly as him willing to take the protective role, no matter the cost. His lust for life and utter devotion to his family combined with the casual acceptance of his mortality give me chills. Or the mask of a horny goofball covering the more reflective bits of his nature. I like that he seems to be incapable of guile. Like he's so genuine and so utterly lost whenever he's witnessing the gang's scheming sessions. He's great with children, he's free of prejudice, he's a great caretaker and a rock solid support for his mates. And if I'm being honest, I was not at all surprised when he was revealed as bi, like maybe it's feeding into the stereotype, but I've personally always saw enough flamboyancy there for that to be a possibility. I think this doesn't just serve his romantc plotline, it also informs his character more broadly, in that his capacity for love is virtually endless. I just wish he was let out of the closet more openly and allowed to live his truth. Goddamn he deserved better.

Also he's just hot!! Excuse me, but how is Shino not the hottest guy in IBO? Like I realise he's not intended for the audience to be necessarily perceived as that, McGillis and Gaelio are obviously the intended heartthrobs, but it's no coincidence Shino demolished "most desirable" ranking within the small queer community I watched the show with, lmao. Have people seen his original character artwork by Yu? The dreamy eyes, full lips, lashes for days? That's Tekkadan's true pretty boy right there! It's weird because he's the hot and dangerous war-man, and my cute baby boy I want to protect with all my might at the same time. I cannot with these conflicting feelings :u

Anyway! I think I've rambled so much and it still doesn't feel like I even touched anything beyond the surface. Hope there's at least something to read there (-u-)v