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Because the writing in helluva boss is so sympathetic towards Stolas, for a while he was my precious favourite character who could do no wrong. Despite this, I now realise that both parties in the Stolitz relationship have sins to account for.

What I find interesting about white people writing this show is that they have set up a classism/racism/caste analogy that is by no means one to one but evocative of real life structures, where imps are an oppressed class of people under goetias. It is therefore very interesting for me to see that s2 has been on a journey of woobifying Stolas, the character with more power in the dynamic, and absolving him of any bad decision he has ever made.

He started a contract with an imp that was coercive at best where Blitz HAD to sleep with him in order to earn his livelihood. I know we all love Stolas (mainly because the show does) but what is it actually called when someone has little to know choice in having sex with someone??? Can we be fr?

The argument at the end of Full Moon perfectly shows how privilege and unconscious bias can completely cloud your interactions, even intimate ones. Stolas didn’t listen and when blitz tried to set out how their power dynamic that Stolas set up was abusive and echoed that of the power dynamic that exists in society, Stolas made HIMSELF the victim.

I want to hope that the show sees this and that this writing is clever but the black cynic in me thinks that this is just the writers’ own implicit bias leaking through. We shall see.

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"But this transactional thing we have... it's not right anymore. It hasn't been-- it never was."

HELLUVA BOSS 2.08 - The Full Moon

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out of your control (what's done is done)

Summary:

“I don't understand, why are you giving me this? Am I not like fucking you good enough because I-I can always, I can always do better.” His stuttering, nervous and on edge, shouldn’t endear Stolas as much as it does. He banishes the thought as soon as it comes, physically seeing the apprehension as his dearest worries himself to pieces, looking up at him in crazed desperation. The implication of not being enough, the promise to meet a sufficient standard under the threat of a Goetia. He can see it all clearly now, without the rose-colored glasses, just who had the upper hand, who it had always been. Just another reason why Stolas wasn’t deserving of his love and trust.

Stolas reaches out to stop him, gently grabbing his hand, “Blitz. I’m giving you this because…” He places the crystal on the other’s gauntlet until it fits with its user. In a sense, the precipice he stands on is adrift, as he stares into the eyes of the one he’s been trying to reach. This is it, this is the leap.

“I care very deeply for you. And I have for some time.” Already, it feels like losing a friend.

(Post Episode S2 E8: The Full Moon)

(Aka read it I'm gonna take a nap zzzz)

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PesterQuest Asset Rip MASTERPOST

Here you’ll find a full collection of every sprite, texture, background, and music track found in PesterQuest. Below the cut is a full directory to every post, which I will continue to update. If there’s something missing from the list, let me know and I’ll upload it.

I upload everything to The Spriters Resource

Keep reading

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The Mage of Mind

A Mage is said to Know their aspect and Know through their aspect.

(The design is based on the Ministrife sprites and it’s very difficult to guess it from those, so this could not be canon).

This contains examples of characters from the comic and thus, spoilers. Read it if you’re ready for them.

Keep reading

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Man it’s a little surreal how most high school aus have the betas as popular kids, especially Dave? So many fics characterizing him as a charismatic jock (and also rich?? So many rich daves)

And I’m just sitting here thinking about these kids all being nerds that eat lunch in empty classrooms and Dave would totally be that weird kid that people only know through some well timed jokes during class but no one knows about and generally avoid due to his lack of emoting, deadpan sensibilities, habitual muttering and, let’s be honest, a little stonk. Dave is a kid that does his own laundry and has no one telling him to take showers, that boy stinks till around junior year.

On the flip side though, Karkat is so regularly characterized as a loner/loser archetype when in reality, in a high school setting, he’d be president of like 5 different clubs, demand to organize dances and be the best English partner cause he’ll just write the whole report himself, he doesn’t fucking need you. Like he’s not super well liked by the masses but he knows *everyone* and a lot of people come to him for so many things. He’d have more friends than all the betas combined and probably the trolls too.

Anyways tl;dr if allowed in a high school enviroment, the betas would be invisible nerds, Dave would be a dirty, painfully awkward, weird kid and Karkat is more involved and socially recognized than all these kids combined.

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Thinking now about Dirk loving puppets because Alpha Rose lets Alpha Dave know his interests so Alpha Dave contacts the Jim Henson company so that baby Dirk sees him acting alongside Muppets for his PBS style educational videos. Alpha Dave also putting together a "making of" for when Dirk is older showing how even he had trouble remembering the Muppets were actually puppets and not costars, showing little bloopers of this adult man trying so desperately to put together a curriculum for the apocalypse. One tape has Elmo doing the lil "Elmo loves you, Dirk! :D" and then it's revealed that it's the only Muppet voice Alpha Dave could get right so that's him saying that. No one fucking look at me

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2009:A Strider Odyssey

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take them

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non verbal dirk... save me non verbal dirk... I love this concept so much (dave knows asl as well while john is very confused)

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HAPPY 4/13!!! So happy to finally unveil the HSPRZINE's second video project!!! [S] VRISKAGRAM REDRAWN! Heres two of my panels for it :3 you can see the rest of mine and a collection of absolutely spectacular artists renditions of the panels in the full video! (that I edited <3)

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john has only been in the same place as dirk twice and in both those instances dirk managed to do only two things:

shattered a giant glass beaker and then climbed inside within his first 5 minutes of being alive

let himself get physically corrupted by the broken artifacts of a ruined world and turned into an unrecognizable mess of garbled noise

dirk at the end of the comic doesn't remember either of these happening. what was their first actual conversation like

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I think about these two too much help me.

What!!! If they!!! Ended up grouping tgthr!!! Because literally everyone has their couples at literally any meeting together!!! As an obligation!!! Kinda?

And a lot of unresolved issues too!!!! Please!!!

"Nggh, too loud." "John, I'll probably be leaving fi-"

"we'll leave together."

That's Dirk's crush revelation too ueuueuuu. Dirk is not Dirk without his "I will fix him", except he wants to make him worse and accidentally fixes both of em. I think.

And John having his crisis over not being able to decide if he'd want to deepen their relation, plus quite a bit (a lot) of gay thoughts

"i'm not even sure what he likes" "well. besides horses, that is." "..." "what if he's only topping?" "i'm not sure i'm ready to get smth in the butt." "..." "..." "fuck, what if he has a horse d- EWWWWWWW"

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Striders meeting their other selves super quick doodles!!

Aaaand a bit of trauma. Hey, it's not me if I dont do that shit!

(don't look too hard into this upper one i messed up a lot)

We need comfort! And hurt!!

Dirk would probably spiral again.

Not a good thing to show a kid who hates himself the bad version of him.

Not. Good.

Hope he won't think it's best to cut it all out now *shrugs*

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the "labru chapter" is the kabru chapter

this is a dungeon meshi love manifesto, but not in the way you think. sorry not sorry for the labrubait

what makes chapter 76 so amazing is kabru’s desperation has little to do with laios specifically. it’s not just about kabru being obsessed with laios and making sure he doesn't cause tragedy, either. I think this chapter emphasizes kabru's struggle with the concept of love and companionship. the point of this chapter is that every critical part of kabru collides at once and renders him useless.

(disclaimer: this post includes a lot of projection/speculation but it's to understand kabru's character arc i promise. for clearer analysis and examination of how kabru's ideologies are constructed, check out this really great post)

kabru is a lone visionary

in ch 76, kabru’s threatened by lycion exposing his true intentions to laios not only bc he wants to prevent laios from joining marcille in her destruction, but also bc laios is also from a short-lived race and kabru needs an ally in his power struggle against elves (esp when the chips are down)

but has kabru really accepted his need for allies in his plight? kabru has spent his adult life suppressing a human urge to connect meaningfully with others. he even keeps rinsha et al. at arm's length in the name of achieving his masculine hero complex/survivor's guilt goals. he's already quite disillusioned bc most adventurers don't have the same goal as he does. so he uses people and gets on their good side for systematic support. he’s well-intentioned and takes care of his party. but the idea that an ally could also protect HIM and make HIM feel safe as well doesn’t really register with him until later on in the narrative bc camaraderie and allyship, at its core, is about acknowledging intimacy. kabru struggles with intimacy sub-textually (his self-neglect and social insincerity) even though he knows how to simulate it to gain others' trust.

but he can’t crack laios, he can’t get him to listen. for lack of a better world, kabru is spoiled by the fruits of his superb perception and emotional intelligence. he also doesn’t cope well with failure (bc his goal is too valuable to ~not~ devote himself to) he puts too much value in conquering laios and when he thinks he's failed, he basically crashes out. the real problem is he still doesn’t understand his true feelings--not feelings for laios, but the root of his desire. the root of his goals and the endless search for companionship.

kabru is a strategic historian

at his core, kabru is a storyteller. he tells himself a variety of stories about his trauma and his goals, which serve as motivation and to some extent, self-protection (as shown in his conversation w mithrun). he deeply understands the role of storytelling in regards to the construction of history and drastic shifts in power.

as an utayan, he understands that the tragedy that overcame his people was not random, but resulted from elven negligence of a disenfranchised people. it is imperative for kabru to cement himself as a voice for otherwise voiceless people. in his story, he has no choice but to handle the hero, if not become the hero himself.

kabru even has a story about his pursuit of laios, mainly that laios is currently the most capable person of defeating the mage and that he must do whatever it takes to ensure laios doesn’t fuck it up. his instincts are right, sure, but at first, he places special value in laios’ capabilities that almost seems unearned… like yes he’s studied the island adventurers with frightening expertise, so it makes sense he would have a good idea about who is the most equipped to succeed. but his early suspicions of the toudens seems to complicate my perception of his knowledge by adding emotional depth and a layer of tinhattery so to speak.

canonically, kabru has been rebuffed by laios multiple times (which is so... lolll) when he's talking with his party, kabru hides behind the excuse of dungeon but he’s been trying to get his attention this whole time. to me it reads like he's got a bruised ego from being ignored and is being a hater about it (so real lol). it's funny bc kabru is usually great at taking shit from others (esp elves) if it means nobody suspects/interrogates his true intentions and he can keep the peace. so why does laios tick him off so bad? now we have to get into the psychoanalysis of it all!

kabru is a cynic

first and foremost, kabru’s cynical philosophy about humans is challenged by the touden mission. but plenty of people don’t care about the impact of their actions, so why does kabru obsess over the toudens at the start? I figured kui changed gears with kabru's characterization following his introduction, but I want to try to connect it to kabru's unresolved survivor's guilt. kabru is the sole survivor of a catastrophe caused by negligence and oversight. he criticizes the negative impact of the toudens' generosity and naïveté and confirms his cynical worldview (the road to hell is paved with best intentions), but still maintains a level-headed perspective. on the other hand, kabru's interactions with laios are tinged with irrational jealousy/resentment/desperation, even prior to kabru learning laios' character/intentions as an adventurer. I cannot emphasize enough that I am employing a neutral definition of jealousy here--it seems kabru is jealous of the freedom to not care the way laios does not care about the fate of the island. this isn't to say laios doesn't care about humans, he does, but he seems so singleminded compared to kabru esp in ch 76. kabru sees laios going to the literal end of the world to save his sister. laios gets to be human selfishly, kind-natured but ultimately self-prioritizing.

kabru correctly assesses motives (besides his own maybe). falin said she’d do anything to protect laios and marcille. laios has been socially rejected by people his whole life, and at first, he only cares about his sister and monsters. kabru has survived horror but only by accident… he doesn't agree with their pov and more importantly, it doesn’t exactly compute with him. the toudens are wholly unaware of their impact, which does not sit well with kabru at all, who understands the impact of negligence better than anyone else, esp how it ends up harming the less fortunate and extremely marginalized in society. it's reminiscent of the age-old trolley problem. while kabru has been the victim of senseless pain, I suspect kabru can’t yet make sense of senseless love. he gets to look down at their cause and call it selfish because it directly contradicts his lived experience.

kabru is an ethicist with a heroic streak

it's easy to glean that kabru wants to be the hero utaya should’ve had. while he's hardcore and intense, but not paranoid enough to do something rash. he uses violence as a means of achieving peace. he's self-aware enough to know his skill limits, which seems rational at a glance but the pressure he puts on himself suggests he views himself as inadequate until he achieves his goal. the races of humans are so split up and he sees that this is a matter of power first and foremost.

with the canaries, kabru submits to political pageantry to make a separate case for innocent people. senseless tragedy is unforgivable, but so is the "too little too late" reality of the canary system. he takes on the impossible task of rallying people together to save the dungeon. one read is that he's saving his childhood self from trauma perhaps by saving those like him… he's wishing someone did something before it got bad, wondering why nobody intervened when they had every opportunity to step in. it’s deeper than a sense of duty or fairness, this is about betrayal and retribution.

throughout his life, kabru struggles with the material inequity and limits of love. the human population is fundamentally segmented into a hierarchy due to lifespans and access to power/resources. his mother was the only one who loved him in utaya and she was ostracized because of his appearance and then she was killed due to senseless tragedy. his frustration with the elves encapsulates this idea perfectly, because he is aware of of the limits of their empathy as a long-lived race and adjusts his strategy and rhetoric accordingly. I think milsiril’s love for kabru is genuine, but still infantilizing and smothering due to the racial imbalance. this continues to inform his politics, as he views their perception of short-lived races with contempt. the worst offense is that their bigotry is nonsensical, meaning their hearts cannot be reasoned with.

dungeon meshi is a story about power and politics, yes, but genuine love and acceptance are the catalysts of change and equality. the "invisible gulf" that marcille is referring to is the inability to view other races with love and care. such is the essence of camaraderie. kabru's backstory, family history, and beliefs/motivations raise two important questions for me: who gets to be loved enough to survive, and then to thrive?

kabru is a monster

the emphasis on distinguishing between humans and monsters is quite interesting too. of all sentient beings, who qualifies as worthy of "human" treatment? who deserves empathy and acceptance? kabru seeks these answers to fix the world, but also to justify his place in it.

kabru's lack of self-worth is evident here, but what’s more interesting is he knows many humans suffer worse fates than some monsters. the dehumanization/neglect of fellow humans does not compute, if the premise is humans are superior to demi-humans/non-humans because mutual empathy and understanding. he clings to the superiority of humanity as an appeal to ethos to those in power despite what he might actually believe about himself. to kabru, the true injustice is that humans won’t even save “inferior” humans despite being the same. his unclear heritage manifests as guilt, as he feels directly responsible for his mother's suffering because he is monstrous. then here comes laios, a human who somehow can find it in himself to love monsters.

kabru doesn’t want laios to love him, per se, but laios’ love for monsters and for falin reveals life-altering possibilities for kabru: there is a world where someone could love him even if he were a monster. there is a world where somebody would go to extreme measures just to save him. kabru does not know the extent of laios' trauma but recognizes a sort of kindred spirit but inverse. taking off the ship goggles here--it has less to do with laios specifically, and more to do with what his beliefs/abilities represent for the trajectory of the world (because kabru studies how beliefs/abilities manifest into material reality, after all)

kabru is seeking the power of love

in a different story, kabru would be laios’ archnemesis. they would have a disastrous battle of opposing worldviews in their struggle for dominion. kabru has every right to want to take laios out bc while his affinity for monsters is sympathetic and even charming, it is still a natural threat… kabru has the true hero pathology. he believes he only deserves to live if he can save people for a variety of reasons/traumas. he should do whatever it takes to exterminate laios. but the expectation is subverted in chapter 76 bc we see kabru’s curiosity and ongoing quest for understanding win over his worst fears.

I feel like I’ve been projecting a lot but bear with me... a huge part of kabru’s character is him trying to figure out how to matter to people, or figuring out why people matter to others in general. it’s not to say he doesn’t matter to his friends or milsiril, but why else would he bother with all the manipulative people-pleasing? it would be less meaningful if he had ulterior motives like greed or power, but he plays into people's expectations/desires for a disastrously noble cause. he’s still actively living in his trauma as a deeply traumatized adult. it’s pure serendipity that laios can send him right back to his past and then pull him right out again. I don't think it's crazy to say kabru (correctly) projects a lot of shit on laios bc he doesn’t know how to deal with those injustices and barriers between people himself.

this is also why I believe kabru's beef with laios is as personal as it is strategic. we have to consider the trajectories of their character arcs (their big missions, respectively) in relation to one another as foils. if laios' love for falin can move mountains and do impossible things, kabru is subconsciously drawn to the magnitude of that love like a magnet. his response to cognitive dissonance is quite remarkable as well. at the root of his unbelievable capacity for understanding and curiosity is the deep wound of being unloved and unprotected. kabru does not avoid or run away from his fears, he quite literally keeps running toward them and follows it down to hell. he wants to identify the true source of his deepest wound.

to me, this omake connects his childhood curiosity to his search for love, almost as to ask “is there enough room for me to be loved?" and the same can be said for marcille's character arc/ backstory. her biracial heritage has caused her great existential pain and social isolation.

in dungeon meshi, the issues of protection and justice continue to be interpreted through love. if kabru were to go back in time and save utaya, he would’ve needed incomprehensible magic, a supernatural power to save himself, his mother, his hometown. in contrast, laios' mission to save falin is just one manifestation of the surreality of love, all of the impossibilities it permits. the touden party wade through invisible gulfs to save falin, but also each other. kabru doesn’t hate their story, he just can’t fathom it yet.

kabru is a skilled strategist and communicator. and does not listen to his heart or body until he’s absolutely forced to do it. he has insane goals and expectations for himself and will go to great measures for those goals. as cerebral and cold as he might seem, it’s critical to understand that his character arc is about love too. in my opinion, it’s almost as if he’s trying to change his reality in hopes of finding love. my favorite thing about kabru is that he has all the narrative makings of the perfect misunderstood villain who self-destructs at the end of the story. but kabru is too smart for that, too focused on the big-picture impacts and the historical trajectory of the cause. instead, kabru finds the wherewithal to stand down once he understands that laios is capable of loving humanity like he does, or that he could help him see the value in humanity at all.

to love is to understand, and then to surrender.

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two emotionally repressed nerds walk into a bar etc etc

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Canonically, Zim is an absolute monster.

He is cruel, narcissistic, delusional, and incompetent. He is responsible for many deaths both accidental and purposeful and even other Irkens rightfully consider him a terror and an embarrassment. His situation, sent to a distant planet to die alone, is a light sentence in the face of his crimes and were it not too dangerous to bring this walking explosion before the Control Brains he would have been executed years ago.

You absolutely should not feel sorry for him.

But, at the same time... there is something deeply tragic about Zim.

He is a pathetic little thing, paranoid and prone to depression. He is an outsider from every angle, desperate for approval from people who hate him, his only companions being broken robots and a nemesis hellbent on his dissection. He is so deep within his own constructed reality that he can't even see the indignity that is his life.

Could things have been different for him? Is he just broken, a faulty line of code that became a virus? Or is he the product of his environment, all the empire's ideals collected into one body and shown for the flaws they truly are? My guess is both.

There is no redemption nor forgiveness for a creature like Zim, but could there at least be closure? Could there?

You absolutely should not feel sorry for him, but you cant help it.