#plus them arguing is such a plot point to work around and i don't want to write conflict resolution like YAWNING BORING SLOPPY

[emloafs]

you should write them in spain next 😭😭

i want to so bad!!!! literally sharing a bed trope when

[scrapyardboyfriends]

How do you think they are going to deal with the Seb plot of it all?

He’s definitely coming back. I don’t think a paternity twist is happening, but rather Ross and Robert arguing over custody.

Ah the Seb debate...

Yes, you're right, he's definitely coming back at some point. I really don't see the paternity twist theory happening at this stage either. Not that they haven't done late stage paternity twists with other characters but that was way down the line and I don't even feel like they ever considered this. And I don't know what purpose it would really serve now other than to make some people very happy and make Robert even more miserable.

I'm torn on whether or not Seb will be back sooner or later. Sooner because he could be a catalyst for other things, Robert's prison backstory, Aaron getting closer to Robert through Seb or because of Seb and that driving John crazy leading him to escalate his antics. Or later because there's plenty of things to explore with Robert again before we get into the Seb of it all and it's easier and more fun to have Robert just be unhinged about his love for Aaron without having divided priorities. Plus, he needs time to settle into the village.

Ross already bringing it up gives me pause, but I'm hoping it's later rather than sooner, mostly for the sake of my sanity because I know it will be insufferable around here when he does return.

Now, I also don't want Robron to finally get back together and then have them throw Seb at them because that would be exactly what they did with Liv and I would hate that.

I think my ideal timeline for Seb would be to let Robert acknowledge his existence when he first gets back and Ross inevitably brings it up, but have him say he needs to get himself sorted out first before he can be a dad to Seb. Set that all aside and focus on him settling into the village, being unhinged about Aaron, exploring his prison backstory stuff and wrapping up the John story. Maybe we have some Affair 2.0 in there or at least an emotional affair. But after the John stuff comes to a close, they're not at a point where they can get back together yet because Aaron needs some time after the John stuff and Robert needs sometime because even if they've been having an Affair or emotional affair, Aaron still chose John over him, even if he sort of gets it. In any case, they both need a minute and then we can bring Seb back into the mix for whatever reason and that can throw a wrench in them getting back together too fast. And they can explore Robert getting to know Seb again and they can have Aaron want to see Seb but be tentative and Seb can ultimately help bring them closer together again and then we get a build up to a reunion and the proper reunion and then Seb can promptly go into the kiddie cupboard and constantly be having off screen play dates with Isaac until it's time for him to show up once every three months and be adorable.

That means we get as much insane Robert/Robron as we can get before the John stuff wraps up, and we don't saddle them with an 8 year old the moment they're back together. Feels like the best of both worlds.

The other thing about Seb for me is that I've always been a bigger fan of the Aaron and Seb dynamic than the Robert and Seb one. And I need them to take this opportunity to actually build the Robert and Seb relationship and see him struggle to reconnect with him on screen so that there's a better foundation than the insta love they went with last time. Also they need to hire a really good kid actor that has good chemistry with Ryan.

Also, I would have Ross work with Robert with regards to Seb. Ross doesn't have a legal leg to stand on when it comes to Seb. He and Rebecca weren't married, weren't even together when she died. He never adopted Seb. That's the whole reason he had to go to Robert in the first place to decide what to do and leave him with the aunt. So I feel like Ross just wants to be able to see Seb again and therefore it would be in his best interest to help Robert connect with him. And obviously all of the teasing/barely veiled hostility banter between them that would come with that which could be kind of fun.

[dusty-daydreams]

What bothers me is some people appear to think of Eloise as a "Not Like Other Girls" type of "feminist", which is not how I read her at all. I don't see her as thinking any less of other ladies, she just has nothing in common with them. Which is probably very lonely! And yes, unlike other women out in society, she does have the privilege of a family that will support her in spite of her radical politics, and she has been growing (and needs to do more growing) in her understanding of that privilege. (She can daydream about being a spinster because she can afford to be one.) But I've really liked her arc this season, with her trying to make new female friends even as she struggles to find commonalities.

I totally agree Anon!

Eloise is absolutely not a ‘Not like Other Girls’ woman. Just because she thinks differently than other people around does not make her a ‘Not like Other Girls’ because she (for the most part) doesn’t disparage other women when Francesca says she wants to take a “get it over with” approach to the marriage mart she is supportive. When she finds out that Penelope enjoys society and high society events, she indirectly apologises for acting in away that meant that Penelope couldn’t talk to her about it.

Plus for the most part her frustration is directed at men who view women as inferior, and at sexist systems.

I had hoped that this season would have had her continue to build on her progress last season when she began to realise she is not the first person to have these ideas, and in fact there is a brewing grass roots movement going on. That storyline could have continued without her visiting the radicals, by showing her reading things or talking to Benedict about the rights of the working classes or trying to discuss aspects of her feminism with Cressida. Like seriously I think queen bitch Cressida would be all for certain feminist ideals at the time like changing laws surrounding property ownership, and inheritance.

However I wish the show would have her family be more emotionally supportive towards her, like she has a comparatively very good home life, but it feels like most of her siblings treat her and her politics as a bit of a joke.

Which leads me to my other point, I don’t think the show actually knows what to do with Eloise and her feminism and they too often treat it like a joke. The show has become so unrooted from historical realities that the misogyny in the setting is extremely vague and changes to suit the plot, which makes having a character that is coherently fighting against that misogyny impossible.

Like Eloise went from arguing that women should be allowed to be admitted to university in season 1 when things were (a little bit) more historically grounded, to very vaguely saying that Women would have so much more time on their hands if they didn’t have to think about marriage all the time.

The devolution in the show is clear, in season 1, the alternate history was the removing of (certain types of) racism from admits English nobility and gentry, but the misogyny of 1813 was alive and well, women needed to marry because that was where her value and security was, women didn’t have alternatives to marriage for economic security. Now in 1815 and with the fantasy of the show taking over - women need to marry because what - that’s what she is supposed to do, and that social pressure is bad - but it’s not a true systemic problem?

Basically the show has lost any historical grounding it could have claimed to had, and as such Eloise’s feminism is just as vague as the misogyny she is fighting against. Which means that the show inevitably plays Eloise being a character in a Romance show that disdains romance a joke and not an interesting facet of her character the way it was shaping up to be in season 2

That said I did enjoy an Eloise cut off from a Penelope that pretended to care and agree with her politics, trying to make new friends, and trying to honestly engage in their interests.

[twig-tea]

BL/QL Ask game : The Ugly, the Bad and the Worst

Thank you for the game, @clara-maybe-ontheroad! And thanks for tagging me @clara-maybe-ontheroad and @lurkingshan! I started out by saying to myself that I'm going to do my best to ignore my urges and just answer the first thing that comes to me rather than treating this like a quiz. And then I went into a fugue and worked on this for >5 hours. WHOOPS.

Original version here for anyone else who wants to play!

Also quick warning, this is asking about the worsts, so TW for mentions of horrific plot points below.

Worst soundtrack / weirdest song choice in a BL

Ohhhhh man, ok so the first thought that came to mind was Never Let Me Go, which mostly had fantastic background music, and that's maybe why when it didn't hit it stood out so badly (sorry to my man Pond, not all BL actors should be singers! And having his OST play over their kiss in Part 7 4/4 was just mean). For the record I love this show (actually maybe it should go in one of the below categories because so many tumblr folks dislike it) but this was rough.

Most cringe-inducing line (cute)

These don't tend to stick with me...there are so many, and I am allergic to sincerity so everything earnest is various levels of cringe to me. So with that in mind, basically everything Gavreel ever said in Gameboys counts.

Most cringe-inducing line (actually bad)

Anytime someone said "Once I start I won't be able to stop" or some variation.

Most stupid decision made by a character

Jun Ho deciding to die rather than bite Min Hyun in Kissable Lips. Min Hyun was offering. it would have made Jun Ho human. He could have had his friends around to make sure he didn't go too far and kill him. Instead he decides to fade away in his arms like a dick. WHY.

Special mention to NuengDiao going back to his hotel where his murderous uncle is waiting with no plan other than to walk in wearing a suit and a cocky expression in Never Let Me Go.

[@bengiyo and @wen-kexing-apologist are correct about Teh giving up his spot to Oh Aew in I Told Sunset About You as the actual correct answer, btw]

Worst plot line

Every penultimate episode crises resulting in the leads splitting up so that they can reunite in the finale that are not earned and significantly detract from my enjoyment of a series [this list is not comprehensive]: 2Gether, Minato's Laundromat S2, Enchanté, Love Class, Plus & Minus.

The most problematic show you've watched

I've seen literally all of them so this feels like an unfair question lol there are layers of problematic; like, is it even worth considering all of the problems with A Round Trip to Love, or The Shortest Distance is Round, or What the Duck s2? I wrote out summaries for these and then decided no thanks. If anyone wants to know they can DM me.

In terms of series that are problematic but not often considered problematic, I'm calling out Love Area the series. It hits two of my pet peeves: shitty treatment of a poor character by an oblivious rich love interest that directly affects their sources of income, and an ableist subplot. I think it also has an unearned separation in the penultimate episode but honestly I remember thinking they should stay split up so maybe it was earned.

A show people love but you find bad

Vice Versa. Sorry to all who love that show. I wanted to like it; the colouring and cinematography are beautiful and the alternate universe was neat worldbuilding. But the plot makes me so, so angry.

Ditto Cutie Pie the series. I just can't enjoy it.

A show people find bad but you will defend

Honestly there are several, but the one that is most disliked that I will ride hardest for is probably Secret Crush On You (which I argued ended with one of the most healthy relationships in a BL here LMAO). I get why people find this show hard to watch, the cringe is real. But the gender expression! The found family! The "he's a weirdo and that's why I love him" dynamic! The mutual lusting! The body dysphoria! The fact that both start by playing into BL tropes and it's only by throwing those out that they can actually have a meaningful relationship! The way both characters have real growth! And like yes Toh is a fanboy stalker but that is problematized in the show! It gave us the growth from fanboy to faen that Be Mine Superstar didn't. I have a lot of emotions about this show.

ALSO because I cannot stop, I will forever to my dying breath defend Color Rush. I don't care what you say about dead fish kisses I can't hear you over the incredibly powerful metaphor about the queer experience!

A show that is just objectively bad but you enjoyed it

Bahahhaha. Um. So many, my friends. OH I'm going to take this chance to shout out the lesser-known webseries Discipline Z: Vampire (Korean, YouTube, 2020). It's ostensibly a sequel to Discipline, but the only thing they share is a single character so you don't need to watch it to understand what's happening in Discipline Z (they are entirely different shows in every way; Discipline is more youth slice of life with a queer story as part of the ensemble). Listen, I'm talking about this show in this category for a reason; it's about a vampire who falls for a street dancer, whose motley crew of hacker friends help rescue the vampire from an evil corporation that wants to experiment on him to understand his immortality. It is BAD.

But. BUT! I love it. Everyone is so pretty. There is a cute hacker girlie. There is scifi nonsense to explain immortality. There is a good kiss. There are characters willing to sacrifice to do the right thing. I am a simple woman. [Fair warning to my happy ending only pals: this ending is ambiguous at best; there was supposed to be a follow-up epilogue for the couple, but it never got filmed.]

Bonus, En of Love was absolutely trash and it has a very special place in my heart. It's not good (like, at all), but it's great.

A bad show that you kept watching because you were intrigued/fascinated

Let's go with Physical Therapy the series. At some point I just kept watching like a car wreck to see how bad it could get. Also shout-out to Dinosaur Love, which was...similarly bewildering.

A bad show that you kept watching because you were horny

@lurkingshan already stole my first answer for this, but oh man I stay a Why R U apologist for the Fighter/Tutor chemistry. I actually think somewhere in there is a really interesting show, if the pandemic hadn't made it impossible for them to film the ending that they wanted to, but based on the Korean version and the parts that we were told had to be cut, maybe it would have actually made it worse. But just to get on my soapbox for half a sec, Tutor was in debt, working himself to exhaustion, and Fighter (after he got over himself) protected him at his one job, joined him to help him meet his sales targets at another, hired him for a third, paid off his debt collector to take the pressure off, and then took him on vacation to help him relax--twice. I have issues with depictions of poverty in BL but at least my man secured the bag while also pursuing love or whatever. Also he whispers "get inside me" while they're making out, sorry, Tutor will forever be a fave of mine.

Since that's taken, I'm going to use this as an excuse to shout out the hotness of My Day the Series. It was predominantly not great but the heat moments....

A bad show that you kept watching because of that one character

I'm giving this to Noey Watplu from I Will Knock You. I was obsessed with him. I want his confidence so badly. I love how he's essentially a dork in cosplay but gets away with it because of his rizz. Truly iconic. This man decided he was being seduced and said "bet". I really enjoyed this show because of him and him alone.

A bad show that you would still recommend

I'm going to put Ghost Host Ghost House here. It's "bad" in the sense that it had low production values (like, really bad, so bad the time of day changes at random because they lost the light while filming). But the romance was cute, the story around the romance was interesting, the worldbuilding around the merit credits was fascinating, the side mystery was so heartbreaking, the various characters actually had a lot of difficult emotions to portray, and overall I think this show is underrated.

I also already have and will again recommend YYY as a fun and fascinating watch to anyone who asks about it, @waitmyturtles is correct on that call.

The character that ruined a show the most

There are several annoying sides in BL, but I'm giving this to the side hets in My Oxygen. A fujoshi who records people without their consent for online clout is bad. A doctor using his role as a doctor to get closer to his patient is really bad. Pretending to be interested in his friend because the girl he likes is a fujoshi is worse; then using her brother as his friend's stand-in when his friend won't put up with it anymore is the WORST.

Most awful character that you hated

I mean, Lhong in TharnType takes it for not only arranging the gang rape of Tar, but being forgiven for it in the series. Neung in Tonhon Chonlatee comes a close second for attempting to rape Chonlatee and then claiming the moral high ground against his homophobic "friend". Tony in History 5: Love in the Future doesn't get enough hate for trying to murder someone just because he was his love rival. Namning in La Cuisine had her love rival bullied, beaten and who knows what she was going to do with that gun. Also shoutout to @wen-kexing-apologist's answer of Korn, in KinnPorsche, he was so insidiously evil, it was so well done.

Most awful character that you loved

I'm going with "awful" as not necessarily (just) morally bad but that people didn't like: Jaime from Win Jaime's Heart. Objectively he's a fuckboi of the worst calibre. He agrees to go on a webshow in which he dates Heart so that he can seduce the creator of the show Winston. And Jaime is so charming that I don't care about his bi wrongs (partially, to be fair, because the premise is ridiculous so it's hard to take too seriously).

Special mention (because it's not a series) to Wine in Red Wine in the Dark Night. I love a murder twink (speaking of, things are looking really good for me to stay in love with Ai Di from Kiseki if it keeps on this track).

If we're interpreting "awful" as characters that other people don't like, it'll probably go to Toh from Secret Crush on You or Gus in Diary of Tootsies. They're flawed, they're femme, they're fantastic.

A character that wasn't awful but that you just don't like

Can in Love By Chance and the sequels. Tinn is an asshole and knows it; Can is an asshole but is also self-righteous, but in all honesty his biggest flaw for me is that he's not competent and I have little patience for that.

A hero that should have been a villain

Tempted to give this to Ko from Love Poison for essentially trying to love spell date rape his love interest--this is only not that bad because magic isn't real so of course it doesn't do anything.

Possibly Athit (Boun's character) from Even Sun? I put a question mark there because this was so convoluted and hard to follow I'm not even 100% sure I remember it right, but from what I remember, this was not a romantic story at all.

Taking a totally different approach to the question, Joke from Hidden Agenda should have been a secret villain (in the sense that he should have been scheming and sociopathic but hiding it, ineffectually, from Zo) in order to make the series make sense, but apparently I can't have nice things.

And finally, special mention to Phu in The Promise for being the villain for so many of us already.

A morally bad character you're into

Zhu Zi Shu, canon war criminal and child murderer from Word of Honor. He thought he was doing bad things for good reasons (protecting the people he loves), realized he was just doing bad things and the people he loves were all dead anyway, and crafted a convoluted plot to get out of the secret society rules that he created to prevent anyone from leaving. And then he wanders aimless until he meets Wen Ke Xing and becomes as loyal to this equally morally dubious man as he was to his secret society. I love him (and them) so much.

Same type of deal, different scale of crime: Akk from The Eclipse. I have a soft spot for this trope.

A morally bad character you're not into and you wish people would stop being into

Xue Yang from The Untamed. Also a mass murderer, but doing it just for the vibes/to avenge his finger, so he gets zero love from me. People woobify him just because he's sassy it's...rough.

The show that disappointed you the most

From hype to execution? So Much in Love / Ni Yam Ruk. I slogged through such awful subs TWICE (because they claimed they redid them, but they are still terrible) to try to give this show a chance, because the premise sounded right up my alley. I still think there's a show in there that I would have liked, but it is literally unwatchable.

Most disappointed from what the show seemed like it was doing at the start to what it delivered in full is a tie between The Shipper and Step By Step.

The Worst Show of Them All Because of Your Own Reasons

That's My Candy. I've only ever dropped/not finished I think 3 or so shows? And this was the most painful and the one I am least likely to ever finish. The pairing was overplayed, the comedy was heavy handed, and the plot was absolutely cringe inducing. It was literally torture trying to watch this.

If you made it this far, thank you for reading!

Tagging @visualtaehyun @nothingsbetterthancoffee @lurkingteapot @snidgetwrites @formayhem @slayerkitty @respectthepetty @ginnymoonbeam no pressure as always! And if you play and I didn't tag you but you're reading this, tag me anyway! I love reading everyone's answers.

[bonesandthebees]

All throughout today, I've been thinking about the fact Rose is tagged with major character death as well as that dreaded 'execution' tag. I would say Wilbur and Phil as POV characters, plus Tommy, are the main characters whose deaths would count as mcd. And now that we've gotten to the events of the ball, I feel like the picture of why those tags are there has been painted. Though to us, it's blurry and far away.

Tommy will get caught up as a result of his involvement that night, I am sure of that. Most likely has someone like Wilbur trying to defend him or otherwise take the heat off him. Maybe someone tries using his involvement to ruin his chances in the heir competition. I could also see a scene where Phil tells Wilbur to cut his losses (aka turn his back on an imprisoned Tommy) but I'm not sure how that could come about because surely if Tommy is suspected, the next logical step would be to question and/or suspect Wilbur as well.

With sandduo themselves though, it's interesting how that could affect their ending. If Wilbur is the one who gets tried and executed, Phil may have to endure talk about how far his son has fallen and people wondering why someone with ears everywhere seemingly never noticed what his own son was up to or how bent on revenge he was. If Phil is tried and executed, Wilbur knows he'll have to endure similar derogatory whispers regarding his father's character and people wondering whether the young man who was raised to be like Phil will go down the same slippery path. And if they both end up at the gallows, it will be said Phil went too far, wielded his influence too irresponsibly, and dragged his son down with him by corrupting him. I have no doubt that whatever happens to them by the end, they will try to save the other because they can't lose their dad/son to this. Survival will no doubt be paired with fleeing with a ruined reputation, either voluntarily or due to banishment etc.

Niki could possibly be framed but I don't have many thoughts on that other than 'it could be pointed out she had the motive' with the assumption she got someone else to do her dirty work. Also something something lesson about cutting your losses/reluctantly betraying your friends from Phil again.

I know you can't say anything about the validity of these theories/thoughts but I thought I'd put them out there now and see whether they had any merit by the time we reach the end.

you're right I can't say anything to any of this but it's very very fun for me to read and look at with big ol eyes... though I would argue more than just phil, wilbur, and tommy count as major characters in this fic. in my head the characters I count as 'major' would be wilbur, tommy, phil, niki, and quackity since they are all the 'main players' so to speak and each have the most 'plot relevant' relationships to wilbur, our protagonist. don't know if 'plot relevant' is the phrase I want to use but I just mean like the plot is centered around those relationships if that makes sense

anyway just things to keep in mind :) ty for the theories theyre very fun to read

[faraige]

ok so my two cents on what I'd like to see/my theories for Além do Guarda-Roupa (My Magic Closet/A Través del Espejo) season 2 in case it happens:

First of all, Carol explains the whole Fever Kiss Mistake asap and Kyung believes her (after the ending I don't think it would make sense for him not to). She wanted to fix that mess before they closed the portal and with her progress after they did I don't think she'd chicken out this time around.

Chul and Dieguinho’s relationship!! Dieguinho’s father grumpily learning to accept his son and Chul being a part of it as his boyfriend!! His father being hard on Chul at first until he sees how strong, fit and agile he is and ending up bonding over sports and how much they care about Dieguinho!!

Mok and Nayara being the absolutely amazing team they have proven to be before and just being the absolute MVPs in their job of helping the rest of the team in whatever the hell they do.

Onto more Plot Heavy things: Everyone gets an Emergency Meeting so Luisa doesn't sell tickets to Carol's room to pay for her mother's treatment. This could lead to an ultimatum to get her the money or else she's doing whatever it takes to save her mother. Here they could do parallel plans:

seeing how the guys can't simply send the money to Carol or Luisa directly without getting A LOT of eyes on them, maybe Mok and Chul work with Nayara to rally the fans somehow (make the cafeteria an event point for something without the band having to break the k-pop history of not going to Brazil? Idk enough about k-pop to know what could be believable, tbh).

Carol goes find her father to ask for the famed money. The way they wrapped up that storyline in the ending felt complete to me, seeing how she could let go of the guilt about what happened to her mother after her own father wrote to her that it wasn't her fault, nor the accident nor him leaving, and it could be closure enough for her. Still, they left the door open for her to go find him if she wanted or needed to, which could be a great way for her to reconnect with her South Korean heritage, visit Seoul and spending time with Kyung as her guide. Seeing that journey could also open the wound Kyung carries from his childhood about his mother abandoning him and start to heal it, although I don't feel that's necessary, even if it could be interesting. Plus, both Carol and Kyung being lovey-dovey around Seoul could stir some drama the same way sightings of ACT in Brazil did in S1.

Carol uses the money she wins on the competition, which should be for her to be able to dance without a worry in the world, but we know that’s not how this kind of stories usually go. She could get in a lot of trouble if she gave that money to Luisa, so either she gives her the money and has to make it back before the wrong people notice, but at least her aunt gets more time, or it’s a last resort plan that they save in case of it being necessary. Not very sure how this could thing could go because I don’t know anything about ballet or its world aside from it looking pretty, but I feel Carol’s dream when it comes to ballet mixing with the harsh reality paralleling the idols' carrer struggles could be very interesting. (Maybe the group “hires” her as a collaboration with the ballet institution that did the competition and ImpACTades? Idk!).

The Whole Dae Ho Thing. There's a lot to unpack there, because if the show had a villain at all (aside from the company that created ACT and their manager), Aunt Rebeca was it for most of the time, seeing how she was the Evil Stepmother in this Cinderella story, even if at times it felt like Dae Ho could toe the line if he wanted to, but firmly staying a "white swan". Still, by the end of the last episode one could argue that he did end up crossing that line, stealing Kyung's credit and following every single agency order, even if apparently he felt bad about it.

The same way Carol's arc in S1 followed themes of letting go and accepting and embracing herself fully through her friends, Dae Ho doesn't have that through the season at all. It's almost the contrary, almost accepting himself as a tool to others and losing himself in the process, so S2 could explore how broken and barely holding on he is and how he needs to break down the pieces to rebuild himself better and more loyal to himself and those he loves in a harsh, injust world.

Honestly, there's A LOT that could be said about Dae Ho and his development through the season and what it could mean for him going forward, but because the group has to stay together and working successfully in order for them not to get evicted and losing the portal, they have to resolve it internally and quietly (their manager is probably gonna make things incredibly more difficult). Therefore, I expect and lot of Mok and Chul hijinks to cover up whatever's going on.

Kyung doesn't care about being the leader or about recognition (his credit is his tho, even if he doesn't care as much as he would have once), but Dae Ho lost his trust even after they both closed the portal together. I'm very, very interested in seeing how they decide to explore their life-long friendship and their possible reconciliation.

I hope there's a conversation about how Chul and Mok weren't told about the closing of the portal, but I'm not holding my breath.

Ok! I honestly have a lot more thoughts that I initially believed, but I needed to get them out of my system!

[amusedunderclock]

Backlog: Talking About Movies - Sonic The Hedgehog 2 (2022)

Originally I posted this somewhere else Dec 2022, but I'm trying to consolidate right now.

Sonic The Hedgehog 2. I actually did hear some spoilers for this one. Plus, it's taking a plot point from the game Sonic 3 & Knuckles. So I knew that going in. Still I can't lie. While the kid movie aspect is still there, I think the movie is good in spite of that.

Simply I think what held Sonic 1 back was its 90 minute run time and lack of...idk character variety? I guess? It was really just Sonic bouncing off of like, 2 actors. One being a normal ass guy. Didn't hate him though.

While here, well we have Tails and Knuckles.

I said the first movie didn't want to get bogged down in explanations and that hurt it. In this one, they don't explain EVERYTHING, but do a decent amount. The Owl thing was probably planned since the first movie to be explained in 2. Doesn't exactly color the first movie in a new light. But the elaboration in this movie is an improvement.

The jokes are also improved. Did I outwardly laugh? No. Still thought they were funnier.

But I just skipped Sonic and Tails dancing. The bar is probably the one part of the movie I just didn't care about because

1) There was already a similar scene in Sonic 1.

2) Cringe. Sorry.

3) SONIC HAS SUPERSPEED.

But I think that's the key here. For the most part, I did care. They set up a goal for Sonic to achieve. It's not just a fuckin car drive to a building in a city for some rings that means nothing to the villains. It is for the Master Emerald and requires multiple steps.

There are multiple callbacks. Not only to official Sonic lore or just game references. But to the previous movie. And I know that sounds simple for a sequel, I'm just saying its a point over Sonic 1 as the elements come together better.

G.U.N. is a thing now.

I think a criticism for this movie was either that the Sonic characters were the focus, or that the human characters were there at all. Its been hard to tell. But I can say right now, I had little issue with either party here. It's better than chainsaw dude from Sonic 1.

Just speaking in 2024 for a sec, there was a push in the 2010s in the Sonic fandom to suggest any human character besides Eggman is terrible to have in the franchise. I could care less about it. Keep the humans, discard them, whatever. The character could be a Koala or a Doorknob, all that matters is that they're well written or have a strong reason to be in the story. Far as I'm concerned with at least G.U.N., it's a plus that they're there. Especially with what the Sonic 3 movie is working on.

Still, the kiddy element is still there. Humans act like it's a kids movie and that means their screentime could've been a little less. And Sonic is a kid. How old is up for debate. The movie seems to think he's anywhere from 7 to 15. That vague window.

That means Tails is younger, of course, aaaand Knuckles.

Knuckles is weird to me. Because like, Idris Elba is cool, but I think the implication is that Knuckles is around the age as Sonic with that deep a voice. Possible I guess, but It's still odd to me. But I like his voice better than main Knuckles in Sonic Prime. For all that's worth given that show's reputation upon ending.

People may argue the movie is still too simple. But at the end of the day, there's barely Sonic media really diving into how Sonic, Tails and Knuckles would really initially team up character-wise. Outside of comics. (I was only a couple episodes into Sonic Prime when writing this and once again, reputation.) In most games, they're already friends. Before that, the story of how they met was told through sprites and manuals. So I appreciate this interpretation. Still, I think Tails could've use a little more time. Going from someone who didn't see himself as a hero, to fighting Eggman could've been focused on more.

Eggman works. Probably not in the most optimal way, but he works. Although it's Jim Carrey being himself like always. Got more of an Eggman feel from the last movie at some points. Swear by the credits of Sonic 1, he was attempting some kind of Pollock impression and just didn't follow up on it in 2. Still, I understood Knuckles & Eggman teaming up.

That Emerald absorption was kinda interesting. It plays a part to foreshadow Super Sonic and for a moment when you first see Eggman at the coffee place I genuinely went "Damn. What the fuck is Eggman about to do here?" Idk, it helped Eggman look more like a villain despite the comedy. It works.

...What didn't work were the visuals when he first grabbed the Master Emerald. That was off.

Should probably say something more about G.U.N. here. I did not expect them to be everyone at the wedding. This feels like one of those things that people will call obvious. I guess with that one scene with the groom's boys working out and the groom being played by Criminal Minds. But whatever. I can't predict everything. If that was obvious, flew over my head. The main human character is a damn cop and didn't see that shit coming. Fuck you want from me? I was just focusing on the damn Master Emerald the whole time.

But that does make me wonder. For the record, the G.U.N. shit is smart and it probably improves Sonic 1 as the government isn't just siting idly by. But you'd have to assume they probably didn't expect Sonic to show up where they were. So what was their actual plan there?

I guess the options are

A) They DID expect Sonic to show up eventually because he's that dumb.

B) That was all just a ploy to arrest Tom and Maddie away from Sonic. Or in the long term, infiltrate their family and ease Sonic into a false sense of security down the line to ensure his peaceful surrender. Maybe even taking the ring tech.

I guess it would have to be the long term idea if only Tom got taken in when things went south.

Now that I think about it, ring production just goes unexplained in this movie franchise. Pretty sure Sonic just drops a bunch at least twice in this sequel. When the initial bag of rings was so important, it was THE PLOT of Sonic 1. Like, is he picking them back up? Making new ones? Ultimately, it doesn't matter since Knuckles clearly has his own and Tails could probably build a teleporter or something.

Technically, this movie has the same ending as the first. As in "Sonic fake dies, but the power of love makes him stronger than ever." Same time, this one works better only because like I said, Super Sonic. It ties into the lore, and it was foreshadowed by Eggman absorbing the Emerald. Kinda wish it led to a more interesting fight at the end, but the movie had a good amount of fighting otherwise I'd say.

And, of course, the teaser. THAT I knew about. I've even seen the concept art pointing towards a much darker Sonic 3. Don't think it's gonna reach that level, but this movie convinced me it will do more than just have Sonic characters flossing. Idk how it works tho.

At the time I wrote speculation for what they could do with the movie in terms of making the lore fit that movie universe and what would happen in the 70s. Since then, things have leaked. I don't really remember much of it tbh so it'll still be fresh when I eventually see Sonic 3. So I'll just leave it at what I said without the speculation.

I said Idk how the third movie would work. Not even the fact that the man said G.U.N. was established after Sonic 1 (Then again, it could've been a revived project after 50 years). No, it's just that I don't think the movies established well enough that Sonic showing up on Earth was shocking, but they literally made Shadow.

There's room for this to make sense. It's an abandoned project from the 70s in the movie universe. And hell, it'd add an extra layer to how Robotnik worked with the government. But 50 years of Shadow probably means they wouldn't NEED Robotnik to stop Sonic.

The game lore is a whole different thing. Since Sonic is 100% established as a good guy in that world full of fast animals already. He's fighting Eggman, who the government doesn't side with. But even THEY have deterrents because of Shadow. Come on, Sonic gets jailed twice.

Let's sum this up. Is this what people wanted out of a Sonic movie? It's not perfect, but this is definitely in the right direction.

Would I watch it again? I talked about it this much, so obviously. Could I see a better overall movie out of this? Yeah. But it's good for what it is.

[greatwyrmgold]

On one hand, you are right. One Piece has themes, and those themes result in certain patterns repeating in its villains. On the other hand, i do think that Doflamingo's substance is less unique than many other villains; he is similar to bit-part hubris freaks like Don Krieg in ways that other villains aren't. Examples under the cut.

I'll start by pointing out another villain archetype common to bit-part villains: The coward with power behind him who uses that power as an excuse to push people around. The example who comes to mind first is Spandam. This mostly serves as a quick hard counter to arguing that all One Piece villains fit one template.

The most Don-Krieg-ish arc villain in Paradise is Kami Eneru. At first glance, his god complex resembles Krieg and Doflamingo's combination of arrogance and other-people-are-tools.

But there are important differences! First off, escalating that arrogance to the level of a literal god complex is, in my opinion, no mere difference of scale. Eneru isn't merely overconfident, he's borderline delusional! Second, while he views other people as beneath him, he's willing to see them as people in a way Doffy and Krieg don't. If the survivors of his "death game" didn't all hate him, I get the sense that he would have taken them with him to Endless Varse, regardless of whether they'd provide him any benefit.

Also, he has a specific dream. Eneru doesn't want to maintain or claim a position of power; he wants to go to Endless Varse. This both changes the shape of his plotline (the Straw Hats need to stop a specific plot) and has thematic significance. Eneru's dream is as strong as Luffy's, which is why he arguably succeeds. Skypieia isn't destroyed, but he does go to the moon.

I'll lightning-round a few other examples, starting with Boa Hancock. She was an antagonist for about a volume, and I think the differences between her and Don Krieg are self-explanatory. Same with Foxy the Silver Fox, except without the crush on Luffy.

Crocodile doesn't have the same kind of superiority complex, and most of his plan is covert enough to set him apart from other villains. Doflamingo covered up the origin of Dressarosa's toys, but he didn't have a whole secret society running a conspiracy to instigate a civil war and take control of the ashes!

Hody Jones is quite similar to Arlong, who fits the Don Krieg template about as well as Doflamingo. But Hody isn't alone; he's working hand-in-hand with Vander Decken IX, who has a completely different personality and goal, which ultimately causes conflict between them that isn't possible with the unyieldingly vertical relationships between Doffy and his subordinates.

Gecko Moriah is way different. He subverts people's freedom in a completely different way from the warlords and wannabe warlords, and his affect is less prideful than slothful.

I'm partway through Whole Cake Island, but Big Mom is her own flavor of dictator. She rules in part through fear, of course, but more significant is her abuse of family dynamics. She is the abusive, controlling parent blown up to gigantic scale, not just in terms of height but scale, controlling over a hundred direct descendants (plus in-laws and their associates) through a mixture of fear and shame. No one wants to disappoint their mom!

Captain Kuro is arguably the first arc villain in the series, and while he is a crucial foundation for both overarching themes and specific motifs—including one specifically relevant to Doflamingo—he still stands out.

Yes, he uses people as tools and blames them for his failures. Yes, he has an inflated ego. But that ego doesn't manifest in simple megalomania; it blinds him to ways he could achieve his goals that don't rely on him and on his plans. His downfall doesn't simply come from pissing off the wrong pirate at the wrong time, but from the tunnel vision his ego gives him.

There are a lot of ways to make a villain different in substance from Don Krieg, and...well, Doflamingo isn't identical to Krieg. But he doesn't distinguish himself as well from other villains in Krieg's mold.

Back in 2022, before my repeated attempts to get into One Piece, there's only one villain from the series I'm confident I'd be able to identify as a One Piece character. I don't know what the OP fandom thinks its most iconic villain is, but as a fandom outsider, I'd have guessed Doflamingo Donquixote.

Having read the Dressrosa arc, I'm not that impressed. And not in the way I'm not impressed with Frieza, where he doesn't click with me but I see why he'd be the series's most iconic villain. Doflamingo has cool powers used in creative ways, but aside from that I can't think of anything he does better than previous villains.

He's another entitled jerk with a lot of power and no regard for people he considers "lesser". What distinguishes Doflamingo from Don Krieg, aside from superior power level and style?

Doflamingo menaces an entire island-kingdom instead of a single restaurant, and he keeps up his reign of terror for ten years instead of ten minutes—but again, higher power level.

Doflamingo reshapes the battlefield with his Birdcage, but Don Krieg's destructive cannons and poison gas and such do something similar. Smaller, less effective, less visually impressive—but again, higher power level and superior sense of style.

Doflamingo not-so-secretly regards his followers and family as mere tools, to be discarded if they become a liability, just like Krieg. He cultivates a one-sided feeling of familial loyalty among his closest followers, but that's not really focused on in the Dressrosa arc.

Doflamingo is confident to the point of arrogance, so was Krieg. Doflamingo's is more tempered, but that's not enough to set him apart on its own.

Doflamingo's arrogance and sense of superiority comes from his Celestial Dragon heritage rather than Don Krieg's superior manpower and weaponry, which feels like part of it. Doflamingo is one of the first Noble antagonists the Straw Hats face, as much a pirate as he is a greater power. But this isn't the first time the Straw Hats fought against the Powers That Be, or even the first time Luffy punched specifically the son of a Celestial Dragon.

Nothing about Doflamingo feels Special. Or at least, not Special enough to make him an iconic villain, the one villain non-fans can identify. He feels like a remix of older villain components with a fresh coat of paint, new powers and new atrocities and new action scenes. What sets him apart from the crowd?

Is it the buildup he got as early as Sabaody Take One? Is it his liminal status, the last mere pirate Luffy fights before challenging the Emperors and re-challenging the World Government?

Is it his superior style? Because for all I criticized Doflamingo, his design is straight fire.

This man steals the stage with an ease few anime villains can match. And that's before he encloses an entire island in a stringy birdcage. His substance doesn't thrill me, but style is another thing entirely.

[perexcri]

what's on your s5 wishlist? the silly, goofy things!!!

oh hello!! i saw several other people on my dash get this question, so thanks for including me :D

(also, i wanted to say congrats for finishing come back to me and forgive everything!! my apologies as i have not read it yet, but i know how challenging it can be to finish a longer work like that, so congrats on accomplishing what you did and for making something you're proud of :] 💜💜💜)

so my expectations for s5 are on the floor because sherlock hurt me too much back in the early-2010s so now i live life with no expectations for tv. but!! as far as silly goofy things i would love to see:

Argyle being a chekhov's gun of plot relevance like he was in vol2 getting them into the pizza shop. idk how, but i want him to have vital info that helps them avert the apocalypse. i'm thinking maybe since he's an outsider and isn't is as mired in all the UD stuff as everyone else that maybe he has some clarity about the situation that comes with distance. like have him point out something super obvious and everybody be like "well why didn't WE think of that"

i also think some pedantic bickering among the main group is warranted. just have them argue over something so minute and so unnecessary and get lost in the details of it because it's the damn apocalypse and of course they're looking for a distraction

i have one post-s4 fic where they go to a grocery store for a supply run and Mike slips on a rotten banana,,,not to reveal my love of slapstick humor on main but like. i do think something like that happening to any of the main characters would be funny, full offense to them (fic can be found here!)

and finally, there is an alternate universe that lives in my head where stranger things is a monster-of-the-week, 22-episodes-per-season styled show that has gimmick episodes, and if i were able to manifest at least one gimmick episode for s5 (that will never happen bc of the show's format but pls let me dream), i would want them to have a bottle episode/memory loss episode like Tabula Rasa from Buffy the Vampire Slayer!! just something where all the older and younger teens are stuck in Mike's basement, something happens, and all of them wake up with no recollection of who they are and have to piece together what they can based on the information they have contained on their persons and in the environment around them. i wanna write this fic so so bad and have for MONTHS now but just haven't gotten around to it,,,but tbh i don't care if it would be a total tonal disconnect from the rest of the season. i would 100% watch an hour long break from the main plot just to watch all the main characters suffer temporary amnesia and have to figure out who they are. plus it'd be funny just to see what people come up with, like...do Steve and Nancy wake up next to each other and assume they're a couple?? with Will's drawings up in the basement, do people assume it's Will's house? what happens when they find a family photo and realize Nancy and Mike are siblings and this is their house? things like that would be so so fun!!

anyway sorry for the long rambles but thanks for including me and for stopping by!! i hope you're doing well :] 💜

[eddie-brii]

Okay, after playing through it a few times, is it weird I'm finding there's a lot I'd like to change or rewrite in fics as far as character interactions in HoA? Like I really like Salim and Jason's relationship and how it evolved. But..... Rachel, Eric and Nick just don't have that much charm to me???

I like Rachel to some degree as I know what it feels like to be a woman in a field where you have to have balls bigger than the guys but I feel like she got reduced down for the whole love triangle thing, I honestly really only enjoyed the interaction she had with Clarice, Joey and Merwin. I feel like even Jason got a little more interesting dialogue with her than the main two that her interactions are focused with, but that's only if you bring Clarice with her from the Blood bit and towards the end when they find out she is infected too. I mean they're supposed to have worked together for at least a few months before the whole incident occurs and you do see a portion of mutual respect that I really wish they expanded upon.

I understand why Eric wouldn't be as open about things with anyone other than Rachel but it feels like he's only there to be the reason they're there to begin with and pine for Rachel. He gets a bit of hate from the fandom but I feel like it's a little unfair as I don't think we get to fully see Eric. Like, I hate how his dialogue was written as I feel like the only reason he has any meaningful interactions is because of something to do with Rachel, the conversation with him and Salim for instance, you could have still had that relationship building without her being the reason for it.

I'm not even sure if I want to get fully started on Nick as I really feel like he got dealt dirty, he's almost always the antagonizer in the relationships he's in when some of those moments could have been spread around to other members of the five. The checkpoint talk, the constantly wanting to leave people behind, the over attachment to Rachael that can be a sign of obsession due to him going through a traumatic event making him latch on hard to anyone even remotely emotionally available to him (it's honestly probably a good thing Jason was better at compartmentalizing as Nicky could have latched onto him instead, though I feel that would have been more interesting) I get it, he's not in a good head space but it gets ridiculous at some points, ie wanting to leave Salim behind after having the relationship building with him. You could probably argue the same for Jason wanting to shoot Clarice and Rachel but in he's defense the idea that the UV light could work to save them is on the far fetched side.

I have literally found through my playthroughs I couldn't care less if Nick, Eric or Rachel died but heaven help me if I fuck up and get Salim or Jason killed, then I'm just going throw the whole game system away at that point. Not really but you get the sentiment. There's so much I'd like to change, not even counting the development of other characters that I feel literally got hit for no reason other than plot (I'm looking at you Joey, Clarice and Merwin) that could have made the story more interesting.

Plus, does anyone else feel like the eclipse part was a little ridiculous or redundant? I get it's supposed to be the big finale but..... not going to lie it felt unnecessary from a story point of view for me.....

Sorry for the random rant but I'm actually trying to write something while expanding on certain things and the more I delve into the characters, the more I want to develop them more than what SMG did to begin with.

[vote-gaara]

your by far the best Gaara blog around with the most realistic view imo. Some people take their favorite characters way too serous and think they can do no wrong or they can defeat any opponent or they get really mad about ships they don't like and it's exhausting. its just nice to see you aren't raging every time someone has something bad to say about Gaara and its funny when you agree with them lol. You the true fan

ohhhh anon! Anon! Anon you mentioned the power scalers! Oh no, please forgive me. Anon...I love that you love this blog, but now I gotta rant. I am so sorry.

For real this might be the most malicious opinion I have, but... I can't deal with the power scalers. This is probably because I personally am not super interested in the whole "who is the toughest opponent Gaara could 1v1 without Shukaku, pre Shippuden, post-Naruto, while he stands on one leg and he already has been in 7 other battles in the past 30 minutes and Temari and Kankuro are dead and the moon is full and btw he also doesn't have any sand."

Of course I'm exaggerating, but honestly, power scaling just invites so much room for fighting it's not even funny. It's why sometimes curiosity gets the best of me and I end up on the Naruto subreddit only to slowly back away because there's just....so many power scalers and they're all fighting about the same fights, day in and day out.

And I know. I KNOW this is a Shonen manga...A lot of people are in it for the fights, but I feel like a lot of the nuance and themes of the series are lost on "who can beat who in a fight with just brass knuckles?"

Naruto wouldn't be the series it is without the themes surrounding friendship, love, betrayal, destiny and hard work over natural talent. These are the reasons the characters fight in the first place. Plus, a lot of the canon fights were won because of plot armor or as plot devices. Not to mention Naruto used to be about actual ninjas doing ninja stuff rather than sheer power...Remember when Naruto fooled Kiba in the chunin exams? Blew my freaking mind how brilliant that was!

Anyways... I always see people ranting about the canon fights and it's just so banal to me. For example, "Lee should've beat Gaara in the Chunin Exams."

And that's okay...Fair enough, you could argue that, but like....Where does the rest of the series go, though? HOW DO WE PROGRESS IF LEE WON CAUSE OF POWER SCALING?

You wouldn't get Gaara's hospital scene so you would never really know his motive for why he is the way he is...Then Shukaku would just erupt during the Chunin exams, I guess, and that would be that...No fight between Gaara and Naruto, no redemption. Really there would just be no story at all at that point.

It's like people take character losses as personal slights, which I understand because Deidara will always get two massive thumbs down because of what he did to my boy, but also Gaara's defeat and kidnapping just needed to happen. It demonstrated that the series had high stakes cause Kishimoto could just lampoon my favourite character at any point in time, and I'd be like "that's it, I quit!" only to realize that he's actually ok in the end. Actually, Gaara's defeat made me love him more because I felt more empathy for him that he tried so hard to defend his village only to die in the end, and also because no matter how much he had changed he will always have to deal with the legacy of once being bonded to Shukaku.

It's just feels like a richer experience to have characters fall on their faces and lose sometimes.

And as for Lee losing in the Chunin exams...Man...was that ever a battle because honestly I loved both characters. I didn't want either of them to lose, and I really felt for Lee. Yet, he was better off losing because we got the rest of the story surrounding Gaara, and we got that amazing poetic justice when Gaara comes and saves him from Kimimaru.

Plus, that fight humbled Gaara which is just great, cause he was a lil' brat in the beginning, which is fine cause I loved him anyways.

Thanks for this message...Sorry it literally turned into a raging rant though LOL

[dgcatanisiri]

So let me try to tackle this.

You bring up the developers having a soft spot for Leliana in Dragon Age and not getting the same response? That's because Leliana is not put in the forefront in the same way - Liara is a romanceable companion in two full games, plus the LotSB DLC for ME2, while Leliana is a romanceable companion in one game, a cameo in another, and a non-romanceable NPC in a third. She has a significantly smaller shadow cast over the games, especially considering the Dragon Age's rotating protagonist - her relationship with the Warden ends up being different from the one with the Inquisitor, while Liara's relationship with Shepard is an across the board thing.

And that "across the board" issue is where it comes down on - you can barely interact with Liara in ME1, even potentially leave her on Therum until you're ready to go to Ilos and need her to unlock that last plot barrier, and then she ends up a) greeting Shepard on Illium with a mandatory hug (while Ashley/Kaidan only get a hug if they were romanced), b) striking out between the time gap of the ME2 prologue and game proper to recover their body all on her own, and c) when confronted about that, her response, again, across the board, regardless of romance and relationship status, says that she did it because she could not let Shepard go. And I can add that d) she does this and locks out everyone else from the Normandy, including Ashley/Kaidan, who may be Shepard's ACTUAL love interest, locks them out of the loop by not telling them about it, and then condemns them for their lack of supporting Shepard on Horizon.

Liara's actions are written from a perspective of her as Shepard's love interest first, and then just get the serial numbers filed off to call that the friendship. Which pushes her closer and closer to Shepard than the player may well feel is proper for her.

Like my go to on this is the fact that she gives Shepard's body to Cerberus to allow them to perform their "Frankenstein thinks this is crossing a few ethical lines" science experiment of resurrecting them. This is a bodily autonomy issue - SHE decides that she will give their body to Cerberus, gives them to go ahead, and outright says she did it for her. And Shepard's response to finding this out? They can be a little grumpy about her keeping it quiet, but then wrap back around to the friendly lines and never address it further, and the game presents her as being there for these very emotionally intimate moments - moments that, if you don't take with her, you get no alternative.

And yes, that's obviously an issue of how much resources were available for variation, but the point is that instead of offering variation, the decision was made that these happen with Liara or pretty much no one.

We get to have Miranda express regret and remorse for just wanting to put a control chip in Shepard's brain, remove their autonomy. Liara choosing to put her wants and desires first and ignoring whatever Shepard may have wanted for their body after their death is considered a positive.

But to center on the bodily autonomy issue... She makes this decision about someone else for her sake. It'd be one thing if she'd argued that Shepard alone could handle the Reapers. But she says that she did this because SHE could not let go of Shepard. If someone did that to me? AT BEST I would keep them at arm's length. I would absolutely NOT want them around me every day - like in Shepard's place, in ME3, I'd probably have told her to pack up her Shadow Broker resources and go work on the Crucible, rather than stay on the Normandy. An option that not only is not available, no one seems to think is even CONCEIVABLE. Liara is mandatory in ME3 - in fact, she's the most mandatory companion, required on four missions, two of which she easily could serve as a voice over the comms instead. On top of Eden Prime trying to write her as having this "we're going back to the beginning" reverence... Except she wasn't THERE at the beginning.

And then there's my perspective as a queer man. I have no interest in romantic relationships with women, but there is a lot of a narrative push towards emphasizing the relationship with Liara, with that blatant romantic undercurrent. Meanwhile, I can't have a proper romantic relationship for my male Shepards with another man until ME3. So the game is pushing THIS relationship forward at the expense of anything I'm looking for... Yeah, that seriously bothers me.

And then there's the fact that the decision was made that as the teaser image for the next Mass Effect game, we get a very pointed image of Liara. That the developers keep. coming. back. to her. Now, yes, it's a teaser image, something meant to draw eyes, and probably meant to appeal to fans of the Shepard trilogy who are upset over Andromeda having been something of a soft reboot - but it's a series of narrative and promotional choices that favor Liara at the expense of all other characters. She is in function shown as, player characters aside, the most important element of the franchise.

I could go on - I have a dedicated tag for this on my blog, and, sure, you could chalk it all up as "boo Liara hater" and that jazz, except here's the thing about it. I don't actually hate Liara. I hate how the writing waters her down - there is a fascinating character arc to be had in her doing these things of questionable morality, of how she is putting her wants and desires first, of how she could be wrapped up in the isolating tower of the Broker and disconnect from the world outside her. But the writing DOESN'T. They water her down, trying to make her portrayal as the least objectionable, of sanding down and smoothing her edges and issues so that we are positioned to never get the chance to respond to her flaws AS flaws, that she is to be celebrated for just being Shepard's greatest cheerleader.

CONFESSION:

I don't get the "hate" for Liara. I REALLY don't. So what if the dev had a bit of a soft spot for her? Same could be said for Leliana from DA yet I've haven't seen any hate for her. The whole notions these people that are so edgey with Liara truly make me laugh. 'She's forced to be Shepard's canon lover' 'I don't like her because of such and such'

Firstly: You can JUST be friends with her and have NO ISSUE with her being sad or what not. Secondly: She's not gonna be a canon romance at all, so get over yourselves.

While YES, I will admit and agree that in ME3 she was WAY over used in topic and conversations, though it was more so likely to make up for her abscence in ME2 (similar to Leliana and DA2-DAI, shocking I know), at the same time she played a key role in the game. Was she wrong about things, sure but who else would have filled that role of info broker?

It's almost as if all this hate for her truly comes for the fact that these people didn't get their version of Liara they expected. As if she was supposed to be meek and innocent and not grow up essentially. Or just hate her for no real reason or minor little thing. So when I look at theses confessions about Liara and crying foul about something I just shake my head and laugh at the absurdity of people.

[allhallowstiel]

it’s hard to articulate my feelings because a lot of them are conflicting and confusing so im just gonna do bullet points:

under the cut bc this got long

i had a feeling the marwa situation wouldn’t get brought up again so . yeah. there’s that. that’s just a thing we have to accept now ig. i’m sure i don’t need to explain why that was fucked up as many people have already done so in much better ways than i ever could. "but other characters get treated bad too-" you're telling me you don't see anything wrong with a woman of color turning into a white man and the idea that she's "happier like that"?

the colin reveal was fucking amazing like. jaw dropped and everything like. THAT was incredible and i think colin’s storyline this season overall- including his relationship with laszlo- was really well done. im gonna miss baby colin, but we knew from the get-go that it was temporary. i just wasn't expecting him to forget everything.

as far as nandermo goes, i didn’t want them together in this season like. At All. they’ve still got a long way to go and i thought that even before freddie, the episode that people say ruined nandermo. but, going back to what paul said about nandor, if nandor learned nothing from turning marwa into a freddie clone, then it does have me a little concerned on whether or not he’ll learn anything in season 5. in order for him to actually feel regret for how he has treated guillermo and work towards fixing it, he needs a major fucking realization (not necessarily a romantic one) so, it makes me worry that in season 5 their reunion will be nandor begging to have guillermo back because he can barely manage to take care of himself without him, when that shouldn’t be what reunites them at all. in fact, if that does happen, guillermo should reject him. 

so, this season pretty much reset everything and wiped the slate clean. colin robinson is back to his old self and remembers nothing from his childhood. laszlo no longer has the responsibility of parenting anymore. nadja’s club is pretty much dead. and nandor is back to being lonely and single and wants to pretend he doesn’t give a shit. guillermo comments on this, outright saying that nothing there ever changes and that he’s fucking tired of it, so he dips. and, like- i get that the vampires are very set in their ways. i wouldn’t expect them not to be. but this plus paul simms saying that nandor learned nothing this season kind of has me concerned- both for nandermo and for the show in general, but more for the show overall.

on the other hand, the season cliffhanger is an absolutely perfect set-up for some real change to happen all-around, not just with nandermo. probably not anything groundbreaking because we still have to consider how the vampires are- but wiping the slate clean creates new opportunities. but again, what paul simms said has me worried. if he wants the vampires to remain static and never actually become better or stronger people, and have guillermo be the sole dynamic character, that’s fine. despite being static, the vampires are funny enough to continue being entertaining- wwdits is a comedy first and foremost, after all. but that leaves guillermo with the task of moving whatever plot wwdits has forward- and now he’s set his sights on becoming a vampire. i doubt he’ll get what he wants right away- i don't see this whole derek thing immediately going the way guillermo wants it to- but right now it feels like guillermo is kind of carrying the show on his back (one could easily argue that he's BEEN carrying it). if he loses what makes him so relatable to the audience- his humanity- and none of the other vampires show any signs of ever even slightly changing... that kinda worries me. i mean, will i still keep watching?? uh, yeah. of course i will. i love guillermo. but it will change my thoughts on some things.

and yes, one could make the argument that guillermo’s “humanity” even as a human is barely there, given what he does and all. but the fact that he’s the only human main character allows him to connect with the audience in a way that the vampires can’t.

THAT BEING SAID. after the whole marwa thing and now paul simms saying this, im a bit... nervous. not angry (besides the marwa thing)- just nervous. so i’m going to sum up this very lengthy post with some of my hopes for s5: 

(i also want to make it clear that when i talk about the vampires changing i don’t mean them becoming “good people”. god no. by “change” i mean seeing the world in new perspectives, adapting better to the modern world, changing old ideas or beliefs, and yes- even changing how they treat the people that are important to them, because despite how stuck in their ways they are, i don’t think the vampires are completely incapable of genuine love)

i want the guide upgraded to be a main character in season 5. sean too because i think that would be fun, but i’m mostly concerned about the guide bc i think this show needs some more female characters in its main cast.

i also don’t want nandor’s two remaining wishes to be swept under the rug. this is mostly fueled by my desire to see the djinn again.

i want nandor to begin the process of accepting that he cares about guillermo and wants him in his life as more than just a familiar. im not saying i want a love confession right away- i don’t think they should dive into romance right away. i think they should take it slow, but they should also not be afraid of having nandor express care and concern for guillermo, especially if they want that relationship to be endgame (and I still believe it will be. im just a bit shaken rn but i promise im still an endgame truther).

and lastly i want nadja to kiss a woman. as wonderful as wwdits is with representing queer men, i feel like the guide and nadja don’t really get to openly express their pansexuality as much as nandor and laszlo do, so i’d like to see that explored more as well.

[tiffanylamps]

help. you've probably watched the show many times and have better memory than i do. juwon has to know what happened to dongsik's old partner and what dongsik did about it, right? do we ever find out what he thinks about that?

Hey anon!!! Thanks for stopping by and asking this question. I appreciate you coming to me for help :)

TL; DR: Joo Won mentions it once but Dong Sik distracts him with accountability and gay panic. He doesn't mention it again. We, the audience, don't find out the true ins-and-outs of what happened. So, no, we don't get to know if Joo Won is aware of what happened that night, nor do we get his opinion on the matter.

For a more in-depth explanation: keep reading!

Okay!! So.... In episode 1, whilst Joo Won is still working for Foreign Affairs, he presents the Manyang cold case to his colleagues as a potential lead for the numerous murders of sex workers within the Busan area. He links the only suspect of the Manyang cold case (Lee Dong Sik) as his main suspect. Which makes sense as it's the only lead he has to go on, at that point in time. This is when his colleagues point out that Dong Sik is infamous throughout the different departments because of his mysterious involvement in his partner's death. Some derogatory language is thrown around when discussing Dong Sik's mental health, only helping to fuel Joo Won's suspicions of him. Nine months pass, Joo Won investigates Dong Sik as best he can whilst still working within his department. He starts his sting operation, loads of things happen, and he gets himself transferred to Manyang to be close to Dong Sik.

In episode 4, Joo Won has gotten to the point of Desperate™️️ where he makes the brainy decision of... breaking into his suspects house and pointing gun at him. He then makes the even smarter decision of bringing Sang Yeob's suspicious death as an excuse for his behaviour (i.e, he's got the gun for his "protection"). Dong Sik has a trauma response to this and quickly diverts the conversation away from the subject, as a way to protect himself.

This is kind of last time Joo Won mentions it.

It is implied through his actions, and the way the subject is discussed throughout the different police departments, that the events surrounding Sang Yeob have been made hush, hush. It would seem that police saw that a rookie went after a murder suspect (it could be argued, semi-legally), ended up in a physical altercation with said suspect, which resulted in his murder. His partner (a Senior Inspector, if I remember correctly) then got injured himself.... and maybe... kills the suspect with his bare hands???? and wanted to cover it up... It is implied that it was brushed under the rug and all the details were kept from sight. (Don't quote me on this next bit) In the scripts, it is stated that Dong Sik only got demoted because he had a nervous breakdown and was stating things like "I killed them" whilst at work. Which is....... yeah..... (they really let my man go back to work without any counselling???)

The full details of what happened that night and the following years after are not explicitly fleshed out in the show. This is obviously purposeful, as it isn't entirely necessary for the plot, and it leaves room for Dong Sik to be a more sympathetic character. If we were completely privy to the fact that Dong Sik murdered a man with his bare hands, his role in Joo Won accepting what he did the Lee Geum Hwa would not be as impactful. (Plus... if Dong Sik did kill Song Ji O, and the audience knew he did without question, it would give the audience the power to add morality into the whole affair. Which would distract away from the main messages and themes of the piece.) So, instead of setting themselves up for a messy failure, the creators leave it up for the audience to decide. (Personally, I believe he did kill him or at the very least, hospitalised him. I don't think Joo Won knows the full details of what happened throughout the canon. During this time period, I don't think Joo Won and Dong Sik were having heart-to-hearts about the past. They were busy with a 20-year-old murder investigation, and neither are very good with healthy communication. But I do think he'll come to know in the future- once he and Dong Sik are both in a better place.)

I hope that answers your question!! Thanks again. If you have anything further follow-up questions or thoughts, please feel free to send them my way : )

[marinette-buginette]

Answering under the cut:

Tbh given how much the wait is before chapters sometimes (looking at you chapter 9) y'all deserve long chapters from me 😂

So back when this was a oneshot it had like segments, like scene break line, scene break line. The first few ones where Sokka and Azula's POVs. Those segments were moved to what's chapter 1 and 2. Yes all of that was just the beginning of the oneshot, it's no wonder I had to swith it to multichapter lol. But to answer the other question yes, I do write out of order. Honestly a draft of mine could give people a stroke lol. I'm super messy in the way I write. I start a scene I write it I find myself unsure of a connection line or a dialogue or something I put a placeholder aka * x says something like* or *they do this* then move on. I jump back and forth between scenes, sometimes I write the ending without having the middle of the story etc. And I also write stuff further ahead. Like if I get in my mind a scene from chapter 10 let's say I'll write it down even if I'm only at chapter 6. I really build around original scenes I want to see, ideas I have. It's really messy but that's my brain. It really helps though cause if I'm stuck on a line I just move on instead of letting it block me if that makes sense.

Im glad you're enjoying the SWT headcanons and world building!

Now now don't give me that much credit, I don't know *exactly* what happens (my defence at the witch trials). Like sometimes I have a line and a very specific scene I want included but otherwise is very general. For example in chapter 6 I knew that I wanted Azula and Nakul meeting and Azula offering to do transcriptions, Sokka's shopping adventure, Katara and Azula ending up hanging out together (with the sepcifications of Katara running away from a suitor) (also one line I really wanted to include in her dialogue was the 'it's not like I expect my dream person to fall out of an ice berg into my arms you know' cause I thought it was hilarious), them sparring and then Sokka returning with gifts. The details of all of that only came to me while writing give or take.

Tbh ggenerally I'm not *that*much of a planner when I write mostly cause I stick with one shots however for a multi chapter yeah I like planning. Also cause I'm a big enjoyer of foreshadowing lol. Plus I wanted the story to be pretty bullet proof plot wise. Like I viscerally NEED things to make sense otherwise I'll lose my mind lmao. Like when I was doing the skeleton of the story I was thinking okay it's an AU but like what sort. In what world does it make sense this arranged marriage would happen given X Y Z. In what conditions would Azula end up in this situation etc. Like I dont want to go to in depth with it cause I'd spoil Iroh's motives but yeah, I couldn't just have dropped a they are getting married cause why not for no good reason lmao.

My plot points are mostly loose scribbles in my brain 😂 Like literally 85% of what I prepared it's in my head. I have some stuff written down jn a notebook that I did while at this useless training I had for work last September (I was without my phone) and I have to move it to my writing folder. Otherwise if I start a chapter I'd put some sentences down (saying it's bullet points is giving me too much credit lol) like *the scene where they spar * *the scene where they argue* etc. but that's about it. I really need to sit down and actually write all that. Also while everything in part 1 is done I certainly have gaps in part 2 and one of them is uh quite big. So I'll probably need to brainstorm a little when I plan it out in more detail. Cause I have some plots arcs that I have the beginning middle and ending of all sorted out and then I have stuff that's just hanging in the air.

And yeah you heard it here first folks, there will be a part 2! Tbh once you see the ending of chapter 10, I'm sure everyone in the comments will be asking for it a continuation cause uh.... It's certainly not a definitive ending what I wrote.

Director's Commentary - ⭐star⭐

I'm sorry it took a while to answer, but you gave me wayyyy too much power with this by letting me pick whatever. So I will do Duty Bound cause there's a lot with that.

A very long commentary under the cut:

First thing first, when I came with the idea I just wanted an arranged marriage AU for these two cause I love an arranged marriage. It was really only meant as a oneshot. A long one, but still. I think my original structure for it was Sokka POV, Azula POV, meeting, wariness, bonding, wedding, realization, hooking up, happy ending. Then at some point through writing it, I realized this is getting WAY too long to be a oneshot. Maybe I could make it like 2-3 chapters. Then I started thinking about all the things I wanted to include in it and realized I'll need more space. So I kind of put the general broadstrokes down and came up with the idea that I'll need 9 chapters.

Chapter 1 was like 90% done and chapter 2 was like 75% done when I still thought it would be an oneshot.

The first interaction scene between these two that I wrote (still when I thought it was an oneshot) is the hunting scene in chapter 7. Not the whole thing. Just the killing the wolf to the end of that scene part. The 'Oh' part as I like to refer to it. I was so happy with it I was like yes, this is exactly what I wanted and this is exactly how I want Azula to have this realization. One other shippy thing that was written was Azula's 'I hate that he is a good person' little monologue from chapter 4.

Then after writing a few more scraps I realized this is getting way too long and that's when I decided to switch to multi chapter.

What's now chapter 8 didn't exist in the original outline. The idea came to me randomly and I thought it was good and I was planning to include it in chapter 7 (yes the whole thing, with the ceremony, the parry, drunk Sokka, the rescue) and then realized...it's way too much, it won't fit, unless the chapter is like 15k words, so that's when I decided to add another one.

I do take ideas from comments, ngl. Someone suggested penguin sliding in the comment section of chapter 1, and I was happy to include that. There is a scene in the upcoming chapter that will also be something someone mentioned in a comment.

When I decided it will be multi chapter I knew it will be slowburn (which was a self challenge cause I am not the biggest enjoyed of writing it) but I thought it fit. I really didn't want to rush theirrelationship and wanted to space it out over months.

I knew exactly what their first kiss was going to be. I haven't actually written it in advance but I had it in my head since the early beginning

Scenes that weren't there originally but just came to me as I was writing: Azula seeing Sokka fight in Chapter 3, the wedding dance scene in chapter 5 (came to me while writing chapter 4), Azula and Hakoda's talk in chapter 7 (literally as I was writing), Sokka's return home also in chapter 7.

One scene that I would have really liked to include but didn't manage to make it fit was Azula and Kya singing together/Kya teaching her some traditional song. It would have been somewhere in chapter 6 but sadly I had to scrap it.

I geniunely did not expect it to be this long. I thought all chapters will be around 3k up to maximum 5k. Haha. Joke's on me. I also didn't expect it would take this long to write cause again, I expected the chapters to be shorter. I genuinely thought I'd be done with it by Sokkla Saturdays more or less. Ha. Ha. Ha.

I said this so many times when answering comments but I really took this fic as a headcanons and worldbuilding for the Southern Water Tribe canvas. If the North and South comics wouldn't give it to me fine, I'll do it myself. Also I am neck deep in my independent SWT Agenda in this. In case it wasn't obvious lol.

A lot of the basis of this fic was in essence a bit of a character study of both Sokka and Azula and how duty driven they are as characters and how serious they are when it comes of seeing something as their responsibility.

I had the general strokes of the plot planned since the beginning, even though I didn't know if I'd ever make it a full-blown story (past chapter 10 I mean), particularly the reason Iroh arranged this. Cause I needed it in the back of my head for this to make sense.

There are not that many original characters in the SWT. The only ones I made up are Lirin's sister, dad and brother-in-law. Other than that everyone else is pretty much pulled from other sources.

I knew what the ending of chapter 10 was going to be when I made this multi chapter, even if I wasn't sure if I'll make a Part 2 to the story.

It is probably visible in the story but... I love Kya, I love writing Kya. I made her be really into fishing cause I think it's both practical and nice. I wanted her to have something outside healing. Also I love mt headcanon that she's a bit taller than Hakoda (who isn't short either lol).

I wrote a few lines for it already and I pretty much know what to do with it and I have a feeling I'll write it before plenty of other things: the story's epilogue. Like the full story not just the first 10 chapters.

I am 95% sure I am writing a part 2. I have way too many ideas at this point that I just can't bring myself to leave unexplored.

Azula is still a bit of a mystery, she still has some secrets we have yet to see. I promise it will be worth it and it will make her make sense in some regards that might seem OoC for her as of right now.

There are at least two things coming up in Part 2 that are probably not on anyone's bingo cards. One of them is actually an idea I am deeply enjoying and that came to me like 2 weeks ago? My train of thought was how about... this? -> hm maybe that's a bit weird -> then how about this? -> holy shit I am a genius. I scourged the ATLA AO3 tags and yeah, I only saw it done once.

There is one arc/plot in part 2 that I had planned since I started thinking past chapter 10 and I am deeply satisfied with it, I already had some writing done for it. There is this one scene I particularly love and I cannot wait to put it out to the world one day.

There is this one thing in part 2 that I switched around like 3 times. It will be funny when I'll actually explain it.

I have one title for one chapter in part 2. I do not know WHERE in the story I am putting it yet but I am keeping it for sure. It's 'Bloodlines shall burn'.

The worldbuilding is going to get wilder. Probably.

And last but not least. I don't do random things in this story. I don't drop stuff without a purpose. If you think something is a coincidence, there's a good chance it's not.

And on that ominous note, I think that's all for now.

[n1kolaiz]

"Man fears death and yet, at the same time, man is drawn to death. Death is endlessly consumed by men in cities and in literature. It is a singular event in one's life that none may reverse. That is what I desire."

Character Analysis: Dazai Osamu

Age: 22 || Ability: No Longer Human

I've done a lot of research concerning Dazai's character because of how complex he'd initially appeared to me. It is still a question as to what his personality type is; some say he's an ENTP while others argue that he's an INTJ, and his enneagram would most likely be 7w8 (The Realist), but that isn't the thing I'm going to focus on.

According to general databases and fan analyses, his temperament is dominantly melancholic. A person's temperament is basically how they react to and live in this world. For those of you not interested in such details, don't worry, I'll get to my point.

The melancholic behaviour is characterised by individualism, self-reliance, and reservation. People of the melancholic temperament are described as having been overcome with sorrow and depressive thoughts, which is beyond the feeling of "just being sad."

Nonetheless, they are generally calm beings, with a tendency to hide how they truly feel by keeping their composure, even in events that demand severe reaction otherwise. Other aspects of melancholic temperaments is that they are absorbed in the cruelty and tragedy of this world, and tend to get lost in their thoughts.

Sound familiar?

Dazai is seen to be as the comic relief of the adaptation, and he'd never fail to bring about a sense of lightheartedness to relieve the serious moments; we all know that for sure. Remember the time both him and Kunikida found Nobuko Sasaki in that godforsaken hospital, and how Kunikida asked him about his opinion on the current state of affairs?

But, despite having developed a calm and serene personality, Dazai's dark side was more apparent during the Dark Era. There was a type of intimidating and arrogant flair evident in his behaviour, or even on his face. It was the type of demeanour that came off cold and terrifying to the rather unlucky people he dealt with. In a moment's notice, they could literally die by his hands. And I believe most of them usually did. It was during this time, he was more brutal and vicious. He lacked remorse. Plus, Dazai's suicidal ideations were more dense during this Era, and his suicidal tendencies did not do anything to alleviate the depth of how dark his character was posed to be.

Side note: Unfortunately, people misunderstand this 'depressed' part of Dazai; they minimise his character so much to the point that people use only a single word to describe him: suicidal. He is, in fact, so much more than that. I'll elaborate more on that in a while.

"Hey, Odasaku, do you know why I joined the Mafia? I joined the Mafia because of an expectation I had. I thought if I was close to death and violence—close to people giving in to their urges and desires, then I would be able to see the inner nature of humankind up close. I thought if I did that… I would be able to find something—a reason to live."

Dazai's approach to life is that of an aimless soul, weary of the world's oppressions and exhausted from the concept of living itself. Nevertheless, what he said above about having an expectation made me realise something: he had a goal, which he wasn't that enthusiastic about achieving—seeking for a reason to carry on with life. So he joined the Mafia.

And there, he met Oda Sakunosuke.

Despite how resilient Dazai carried himself to be (especially during the Dark Era), this specific excerpt stands in direct opposition of how he effortlessly embodied all things daunting:

"With every step I take, I feel as though the earth has opened up into a bottomless pit as I fall endlessly. As Dazai pointed to his forehead and approached the muzzle, the look on his face – like that of a child about to burst into tears – had already been branded upon my eyes."

- quoted by Oda Sakunosuke, excerpt from Dazai Osamu and the Dark Era Light Novel.

When I read this, it sent my mind into a spiral of despair and confusion. It was so vague, yet it made so much sense. Dazai was desperate to escape from this life, but part of him seemed to live in conflict with his desire for death. I won't elaborate more on this, because this specific excerpt has personal meaning to me, as I'd expect it to have for others as well; so I wouldn't want to ruin anyone else's perception on it.

Back to my point: Odasaku was one of the only characters who managed to interpret the complexity of Dazai's mindset and was able to compartmentalise the specific details of his persona that made Dazai the way he was. Oda knew that Dazai wasn't just suicidal.

"For most things in life, it's harder to succeed than fail. Wouldn't you agree? That's why I should attempt suicide rather than commit it! Committing suicide is difficult, but it should be relatively easier to fail at attempting suicide!"

Others boasted about how he was just a suicidal maniac, and that was only because of how good Dazai was at concealing his own feelings whilst flamboyantly priding himself in new, risky techniques, which he sometimes elaborated on. But Oda, on the other hand, saw through his jokes, and empathised with his friend, never wanting to ever barge into his vulnerability without Dazai's permission, but still trying to be there for him.

"Listen. You told me if you put yourself in a world of violence and bloodshed, you might be ale to find a reson to live. You won't find it. You should know that. Whether you're on the side that takes lives or the side that saves them, nothing beyond your own expectations will happen. Nothing in this world can fill the hole that is your loneliness. You will wander the darkness for eternity."

Notice how Odasaku recognised Dazai's despair, before Dazai even dared to acknowledge his very own emotions? That was why, at Oda's death, he took the initiative to uncover Dazai's bandaged eye to show him that there was no use in concealing his feelings anymore.

Odasaku's last words to Dazai was to "be on the side that saves people," for he was aware that even though Dazai didn't believe there was a clear distinction between good and evil, he thought that perhaps Dazai would find meaning in his life, even if it was just a little bit of purpose.

In Dead Apple, we briefly relive this moment, but I'll write more on that some other time.

And when Dazai joined the ADA, he loses that dark side to him. No, wait, let me rephrase that: he loses a part of that dark side to him. He eliminated the raw sense of bitterness against the world from his face, and instead, he is seen to be a little more passive, and a little more adaptive. No doubt, he still does explicitly state his desire to die, but his wishes are very specific, if you know what I mean.

And a few years later, his journey with Atsushi began.

Atsushi and Dazai's relationship is just one of a kind. I think it isn't a matter of whether Atsushi needed Dazai, or whether Dazai needed Atsushi. It's the fact that they both needed each other. It's the way they both worked hand in hand, and how they sustained each other in ways they were lacking.

The two were polar opposites, but they had a tender kind of warmth embedded in their protectiveness for each other. Atsushi was just as lost as Dazai, but somehow, they worked together just fine. It was like their duality was meant to be. It was the type of symbiotic relationship, where their care for each other was implied, but very deep.

Does this also sound familiar... perhaps, in relation to Dazai's friendship with Odasaku?

Side note: Oda and Atsushi have the same enneagrams, which is Type 2, 'The Helper.'

There is a sort of balance that is brought about by two opposites. Odasaku taught Dazai many things, and I believe Oda learned a lot about a man's life from the way Dazai lived out his life with the innate desire to die. Atsushi sought for the right to live, while Dazai searched for a reason to live; in addition, Dazai validated Atsushi's feelings, and Atsushi was able to acknowlegde the amount of pain Dazai was going through.

Despite how Dazai's perspectives and beliefs stood in contrast with those of Oda's and Atsushi's, a type of inseparable bond connected the man who no longer felt like he was human, to the people who was the most human.

No Longer Human in the Japanese romaji is 'Ningen Shikkaku.' Ningen means "human," and Shikkaku means "disqualified." The late author, Dazai Osamu, wrote the book No Longer Human. He had gone through the rough throes of trauma and wrote this book as a semi-autobiography, whose plot was centred around a man who faked happiness, for he was tainted by the truth that everyone around him was fake themselves. He turned his life into a joke in order to protect himself from the delusions of this world.

This brings us back to the melancholic temperament, where a person was too deeply immersed in the sad truths of reality and the world itself.

And that's what Dazai's character and ability is based on: being disqualified as a human being, because he wasn't well-versed with what being human was actually like. The fabrications of being human sprung up all around him, but he wasn't willing to be fooled by how ingenuine the world truly was.

“I am convinced that human life is filled with many pure, happy, serene examples of insincerity, truly splendid of their kind—of people deceiving one another without (strangely enough) any wounds being inflicted, of people who seem unaware even that they are deceiving one another.”

- excerpt from Dazai Osamu's No Longer Human.

People who don't feel human emotions or don't react to circumstances the way humans do have a variety of ways of explaining how they feel inhuman. They are highly intelligent, which separates them from the average class of humankind, since they've analysed and untangled the truths of life in order to attain understanding, which they value above all else. But, this understanding of the world and its painful truths results in a deep kind of sorrow, which only a few people can seem to empathise with in order to help them out with that burden.

“Pain and suffering are always inevitable for a large intelligence and a deep heart. The really great men must, I think, have great sadness on earth.”

-excerpt from Fyodor Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment.

Don't you think that this deep sorrow that lies in the heart of the intelligent, makes them the most human of all? They're too human, to the point where they don't feel human. Perhaps, it is a type of defence mechanism, where the mind numbs the heart from feeling normal human emotion, because logically breaking down such concepts is easier than feeling them. But it comes at a price. The heart is willing to recklessly comprehend and fathom any sort of emotion, including pain in its true form, but the mind bears more pain in understanding such concepts because it seeks to decipher every single agonising detail of how complex human emotions are. The mind thinks, the heart feels. There is a clear distinguishing factor between the two. Whether feeling hurts more than thinking, or thinking hurts more than feeling, or whether both these processes work hand-in-hand to make up the reality of life itself, is up for an individual to decide.

Only a few people can seem to empathise with intelligent people who are deeply sad at heart, in order to help them out. As for Dazai, it was Atsushi and Oda. They never took away the pain, but they made him grow from it; it worked vice versa, too.

Of course, there are less tedious and more appealing aspects to the concept of Dazai's intelligence. Dazai was seen as a threat to his enemies because of how manipulation and his keen skill of deduction made up how sharp his mind was. Besides, no one could commit '138 murders, 312 cases of extortion, and 625 cases of fraud, along with various and sundry other crimes,' without having a certain level of intelligence, right?

Dazai had the moral alignment of 'chaotic neutral.' He was more focused on using his intellect to achieve the desired end results of a predicament, and he wasn't afraid to use the wrong means. A famous example was when he deflated the airbags of Ango Sakaguchi's car in order to gain the assured protection of Kyouka Izumi.

Justice is a weapon. It can be used to cause harm, but it cannot protect or save others.

Another example was when he blew up Chuuya Nakahara's car.

Just kidding. That was just a simple pastime (；・∀ ・)

His moral alignment points to what Oda said about him: the part where he mentioned that Dazai didn't really see any difference between good and evil. As long as his ends were achieved, especially if it were in the benefit of his fellow colleagues, he wasn't afraid to exploit, threaten, or endanger others' wellbeing. Because, at the end of the day, the end result triumphed the morally bad methods utilised to achieve it, correct? He always had a reason for his motives and actions, even if those actions were evil and inexcusable.

(eg. action: the psychological abuse he bestowed upon Akutagawa Ryunosuke.

motive: to enable him to hone his own ability favourably and to curb his arrogance)

But the consequences of one's actions will always catch up with a person, no matter what heights they've achieved.

Okay, we're reaching the end of my rambling very soon, I promise.

“If I had to go, I’d like to go out just as beautifully.”

“I’d prefer you don’t go.”

This part of the post is highly inspired by iwachuwu!!

An important factor of Dazai's development is highlighted BSD Wan's episode 10:

I'd like to appreciate that this scene focuses on how much Dazai actually means to Atsushi. When Atsushi responds with "I'd prefer you don't go," he said it lightheartedly for he thought Dazai was joking. But he wasn't. And once Atsushi absorbed the fact that Dazai meant what he said, he was overwhelmed with anguish at the thought of ever losing Dazai. Dazai, on the other hand, had a sense of longing on his expression. There was that look of pure desperation on his face. He was so desperate, yet he knew he couldn't act on his desperation due to a promise he'd made to someone dear to him. But keep in mind, Dazai is unpredictable, so we can never be sure of what's going on in that headspace of his.

Nevertheless, this time, Atsushi recognised Dazai's suffering, as no one usually cared to do, and Dazai didn't put in any effort to hide how he truly felt, as he habitually did. And this mutual emotional connection happened countless times during all the times Oda spent with Dazai as well.

To summarise,

Dazai's character had been carefully wired and patterned out in a way only a few would put in the effort to understand. Dazai was more than just suicidal; he was a being wandering from place to place with no specific aim. He was too smart for his own good. Dazai understood too well of how the world worked and deemed it void of any sort of hope.

Side note: Yes, the truth does come at a price, but it all comes down to how a person understands the truth. As for Dazai (both character and the author he was based off upon), well, it was quite tragic. But that's the way it is for some people, I suppose. But everyone has a different path to travel on, remember that.

His transition from working with the Port Mafia to the Armed Detective Agency was proof of how well-executed his character development was. It was two different personas morphed into what he is today: a womaniser with questionable morals a person who is still standing even after the rough refining process endowed upon him by the realities of this life.

However, he had people along the way come and teach him a thing or two, which perhaps made his life a little more interesting. Perhaps these people were passing clouds that hid the void out of sight for just a moment, and Dazai was always seen to be grasping on to these moments, and letting them go whenever it was time to let go.

His outlook on life makes his intellect look all the more intriguing. It shows that not only does his intelligence contribute to his own wit and shrewdness, but also the practical sense of realism that explains how tired he is of the concept of living because of the truths there are to bear.

However he's enduring the pain right now is by far the most bravest thing a person could commit themselves to doing. It takes courage, and it takes strength, but only a few would ever take the time to recognise such efforts.

Dazai has one of the most beautiful character developments, but I do hope that the development doesn't reach its end anytime soon.

fanart credits: @S7dOZPN3jWBB6cW on twitter

“Now I have neither happiness nor unhappiness.

Everything passes.

That is the one and only thing that I have thought resembled a truth in the society of human beings where I have dwelled up to now as in a burning hell.

Everything passes.”

excerpt from Dazai Osamu's No Longer Human.