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We're not just in Wonderland ..

So Ruby starts her journey through Wonderland and she meets a bunch of little mice, one even named "Little." She meets up with Blake and Weiss after they get stuck upright. After freeing them, she goes to a new location, hears a roar of some far-off creature, and meets a four-legged creature (two and a half legged?) with a tail. After a brief altercation, she's reunited with Yang, who fights with one hand. They make their way to a red field and face danger that only timely intervention from a mysterious ally can save them from. All while following a yellow road. We're not just in Wonderland.. we're in Oz.

(Just watch the whole Lion scene, it's eerily similar to the Jabberwock's entrance scene, down to fighting with one "paw." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y5ZD-QnFJZo)

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cis people really threw trans people under a bus so they could play a video game. and if that doesn't sum up performative allyship, idk what does

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Sometimes I wonder if elephants are closer to understanding our language than we are to theirs

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The thing I want to point out is that many people are mixing "transitioning" with "being trans." Wearing new clothes, being referred to with new pronouns, HRT and surgery are all things you do. Your identity is who you are. Not all trans people choose to transition, not all trans people have the option to transition bc of where they live or another reason. That doesn't mean they're any less trans. You don't need new clothes or pronouns to be trans, and you don't need SRS or HRT to be trans. Trans people who aren't publicly out are not any less trans than those who are.

If you're thinking "I want to be a gender, but it will be hard bc people are prejudiced. I want to be a gender, but it I can't get HRT. I want to try new clothes bc I think I would like it and look good, but I'm afraid of being judged or looking ugly." These are reasons against transitioning, but the qualification is not a pros/cons list. It's not about which makes the most sense or is easiest or has the most benefit at the least cost. The qualification is only about your desires. "I think I would like to be a different gender, or would be more comfortable as a different gender (if the world wasn't so prejudiced sometimes)." That's what questions like the button are trying to get you to think about. If these hardships didn't come with transitioning, would you do it?

I'm sorry we live in a world where discrimination exists. I'm sorry people block transition for people and judge us for it. But I hate the thought more, that someone who is questioning is denying part of themselves, bc other people will make their life harder for it. I think a lot of questioning people know deep down what they really want. But it's hard, it's so hard and scary, to actually confront it and admit it. I've been there. And it pisses me off that those other people are not making this any easier for y'all.

If or when you're ready to admit it, or even if you're not ever ready. Hold your secret close and guard it closely. It is precious, bc you are precious. And we don't deserve everything else making this harder than it needs to be.

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The phrase "what if it's just a phase" has context that usually isn't applicable to being trans, but like the main point they're making is "what if you're wrong but you've already done irreversible changes," right? And it's ironic bc they're saying that you might end up with dysphoria, basically, in a body that doesn't fit, bc you permanently changed it. But like.. you seem to have dysphoria already?

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Idk if this helps anyone but. If you're wondering how you can be sure about your gender. Maybe consider the hypothetical situation where you'll never be sure. And in that situation, would it not be reasonable to just make your best guess and go with that? And upon discovering that you were right or wrong, is there any shame in changing your mind? Is there shame in being wrong?

Bc you're allowed to be wrong about your gender. You're allowed to change your mind about your gender. And it occurs to me that we put too much pressure on being right, especially the first time. Be wrong about your gender. It's ok :)

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Wait new thought. So we know Little uses they/them pronouns. And they aren't a man or a woman, bc they hadn't even ever heard of the word "girl" before. So they're non-binary.

But! They're not transgender? Even though non-binary usually falls under the definition of trans, which is commonly defined as "not identifying as the same gender as the one you were born with" (or similar), and no one is assigned a non-binary identity at first - even if some non-binary people don't use the trans label for themselves (usually bc it's associated with binary trans people so much). But Little and their society don't understand the concept of gender, which means they do identify with the gender they're assigned at birth (loosely described as "we don't have a concept of gender"). And since it matches.. they're a cisgender non-binary mouse!

*And if you're about to tell me that I'm applying our gender concepts to a being that doesn't have the same concept of gender as we do, thus making my whole point inherently not applicable.. shhh ;). Think of it as, if Little had to define their gender in our terms, this might be how they'd do that.

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I'm bringing this back bc RWBY IQ episode 1-3 just proves this sooo much. What's missing? The sound and choreography and animation of the fight scenes. IQ's animation is not bad. It's visually prettier and more expensive. It's also worse.

when will RWBY fans learn that you don’t actually have to concede criticism that isn’t accurate

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About Caleb

So here's the thing. I don't think Caleb was Belos' brother. I think Belos had a brother, but that's not the end of the story.

Let's take a quick look at this screenshot from Belos' memories. It shows, along with other memories in Hollow Mind, that this person whose face is scratched out, seemingly grew up with Belos. But take a look at the height difference. And, in other pictures, he's sort of teaching Belos how to carve and makes his mask for him, someone Belos is looking up to. I'm led to believe this person is Belos' older brother.

From other pictures of memories, we can reasonably conclude that Belos and his brother went to the Boiling Isles at some point, his brother fell in love with someone (presumably a witch), and that led Belos to betray him. Here are some screencaps of right before the fight (using the best ones available so technically not from Hollow Mind but they're the same).

But, look closely. Although this person is similar in appearance to Belos' brother, it's just not the same at all. For one, the face isn't scratched out. Although Belos' mind has scratched out his brother's face, this one is clear as day. For another, the hairstyle is different, although there could be reasons for that. But most of all, this person is young. Not just in height, but in size, and while Belos has a full beard here, there's not a hair on this person's face. This person, I believe, is the child of Belos' brother. And it's this person who Hunter was cloned from. (Keep in mind that while height isn't the only factor for age in real life, of course, the framing matters because framing is a purposeful decision by the creators.)

(Also I'm not sure if Belos mutilated Hunter's ears to be pointy based on the little chip in them, or if Hunter's ears are pointy because the original Caleb was half-witch. Maybe Belos said Hunter was the closest to Caleb because he can't do magic, meaning he's the "most human," while the previous Golden Guard was the "best witch [Darius] ever knew.")

But most of all? The son of your brother is your nephew, and I just think it would make twisted and poetic sense if the lie that Belos told Hunter originally was not really a lie, kind of.

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I think I understand now why I've never liked the idea of Scorpia or someone else (maybe Entrapta) telling Catra, "I don't forgive you." And people who have a different opinion have told me, it would be more convincing that way, bc in real life people don't always get another chance. But that's exactly why I don't like the idea. Bc to me, Catra is a wish fulfillment character. She messes up. She hurts people. But she was put in stressful circumstances and that doesn't erase her responsibility but it does explain it. And she tries. She tries so much in season 5. She's done awful things but she's willing to try and everyone else gives her that chance.

And Adora.. in some ways that's all I've ever wanted my whole life. Not even romantically, but I've always wanted that kind of friendship. (Kim Possible and Ron Stoppable was one of my first fandoms for a reason.) Catra tells the world, "There's no one left in the universe who cares about me." And the camera cuts to Adora as if to say, "I'm always gonna be your friend. You matter to me." Adora jumps head first (and also foot first, off a damn bridge - like mom always said, if your friends jumped off a bridge, would you follow?) into metaphorical hell, and who the heck doesn't want a friend(s) who would do that for you?

In the end, I can't really argue against the people who I disagree with. Bc they're right. People don't always get another chance. Adoras don't always exist in real life. And there are plenty of perfectly justifiable reasons why. But god damn if it's not nice to pretend. Even just for a little.

(If you can guess what this is about. Please. Just let me have this. It's all I have left.)

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Why you should watch RWBY

TL;DR:

Summary: RWBY is an epic fantasy with themes like found family, the struggle to remain hopeful, the younger generation growing up, villain redemption, and systemic evils.

Strengths: RWBY has unique and memorable characters. The show is smart. It has excellent cinematography and animation. It has representation. It tackles hard topics. It’s got incredible music and it’s free on RT’s website.

Weaknesses: RWBY has some early growing pains, specifically volume 2’s finale, as well as budget and polish. Later on, volume 4 is weaker than the rest. Volume 8's finale is extremely distressing for a lot of viewers (and we haven't seen the follow up to those events yet). The fandom can be bad at times.

Misinformation: The early volumes being bad, the racism plot line, and the animation (not the same as “budget and polish”) are not as bad as you may have heard from YouTube.

Suggested viewing order

Red Trailer, White Trailer, Black Trailer, Yellow Trailer

Volume 1

Volume 2

Volume 3

Volume 4 Character Short

Volume 4

Volume 5 Weiss Character Short, Volume 5 Blake Character Short, Volume 5 Yang Character Short

Volume 5

Volume 6 Adam Character Short

Volume 6

Volume 7

Volume 8

(I did my best to make this spoiler-free. When there are spoilers, they’re worded ambiguously enough that someone new to the show would never guess what’s going to happen just by reading this.)

What to expect

The world of Remnant is filled with monsters called the creatures of Grimm. Warriors called Huntsmen and Huntresses defend humanity. Ruby, Weiss, Blake, and Yang go to school to become the next generation of heroes. Together they make Team RWBY (pronounced, “Ruby”)! Joining them is team JNPR (“Juniper”), made up of Jaune, Nora, Pyrrha, and Ren. But evils even more dangerous than the Grimm are ready to make their move, and school quickly becomes an afterthought…

(I mention these next two topics specifically bc they can immediately turn someone away based on bad expectations.) There is a fantasy school setting, but RWBY is not a show about school. School topics are not a dominant idea: it seems to resemble a setting like Harry Potter, but the actual focus of the show rarely touches on things like classes or homework or tests, and we quickly move on. There is romance and it has a role in the plot, but RWBY is not a romance show. On the scale of romance in FMAB to She-Ra, RWBY falls somewhere in the middle.

What is RWBY about, then? RWBY is like an epic fantasy or high fantasy, despite first appearances. Perhaps not every genre convention is followed, but at its core, RWBY is about an epic struggle of good and evil.

RWBY contains themes such as found family, the struggle to remain hopeful, the younger generation growing up, villain redemption, and systemic evils.

Strengths of the show

The characters are unique and memorable. One of the cool things is that they all draw inspiration from a real life fairy tale, myth, or something else. They designs are all top notch. One character who died with extremely little screen time even got so much fandom love, they included the character in a mid-hiatus short later. The characters have unique weapons, too; in the world of Remnant, a weapon is an extension of ones’ soul, and they reflect the variety of their owners. They’re also just plain cool; Monty was famous for following the “Rule of Cool.” And their individual stories are all compelling and interesting.

The show is smart. As a fandom, we generally pick up on the narrative hints the creators are dropping. And our predictions usually come true, but not in a way that makes the show predictable and boring. We very rarely guess exactly what will happen, but we have some similar idea of it. It’s just excellent foreshadowing.

RWBY also likes to play with tropes, as an extension of this. Often it will challenge them, or subvert expectations. In other cases, RWBY uses tropes to avoid showing us what we already know will happen. This occurs in both characters and plot. For example…

SLIGHT SPOILERS FOR VOLUME ONE FOR THE REST OF THIS PARAGRAPH: Jaune’s entire character arc is about trying to be the anime protagonist, and learning that he doesn’t have to do things alone, and it’s ok to be a support main. The show sets up the narrative in a way that looks like, oh of course the direction it will go is him becoming the main character, but then it destroys toxic masculinity instead.

Our characters are smart, too. Plot-induced stupidity generally doesn’t happen. (A few big mistakes or errors in this regard aren’t actually the fault of the narrative, either, but animation and miscommunication and failure to execute. And those aren’t common.) It goes beyond just “not being dumb,” however. The villains’ plans are incredibly clever, and our heroes sometimes even guess at the usual “plot twists.”

The cinematography is just incredible. There are numerous freeze frames with extreme attention to detail that reveal character motivations or arcs or foreshadowing, there are many effective cuts and moving parts, there are soooo many parallels and callbacks, and visual cues such as lighting and color all are used appropriately to convey emotion and assist the narrative. It is one of the biggest overlooked strengths of the show, imo, simply because a lot of people in the fandom don’t notice these things as much for whatever reason, or else don’t give as much praise about them.

The animation is extremely good as well. Budget issues and technology issues aside (which means a lack of polish), the actual animation? The fight choreography, and all the other parts of animation that aren’t just “expensive CGI” are all wonderful. You can have very shiny, polished turds after all, and RWBY is like the opposite: not very polished, especially early on, but very well animated. All the trailers, volume 1 episode 8, the volume 1 finale, the volume 2 penultimate episode, and basically everything else hold up extremely well even today. If anything, the worst fight animation was in volumes 4 and 5 because of Maya growing pains, and those are an example of being more polished, but not necessarily better animated. Animation of faces has always been good, animation of characters has always felt lively. Aside from a few small actual hiccups (that one person running across rooftops for instance), it’s well done.

There are LGBTQ+ characters. The treatment of one of the recent trans characters, in volume 8, was nothing short of amazing. They worked with a VA who was trans. The moment of canon confirmation was important to the character for backstory, because of course that affects the character’s life, but not the only important thing about the character. The representation is not in-your-face or pandering. And there is a split of representation among the main cast and the minor characters, with promises of more to come (notably they’ve said they’re working on more mlm for future volumes, too).

RWBY is not afraid to tackle hard topics. It deals with things like mental illness, systematic racism, and cycles of abuse. It’s not because the show is trying to earn “gritty and dark” points, it’s because those are some of the topics that real people have to struggle with as well. And the show handles most or all of them very well, in a way that shows respect and an honest attempt to depict these things as best they can. (NOTE ABOUT VOLUME 8: THERE IS A VERY DIFFUCLT CONVERSATION CURRENTLY HAPPENING. I am on the side of, let’s wait and see what happens next because the story isn’t over, so we haven’t really seen the fall out. But I understand why this paragraph feels really difficult to agree with if you've seen the volume 8 finale. I trust the track record of the rest of the show, personally.)

As an example, the show has a theme that villains are rarely evil just because. A lot of villains choose to do bad things because they were hurt in some way. Some lived in poverty; some were hurt by racism; many of them are victims of abuse. But the show doesn’t make excuses for them. It’s possible to be both sympathetic and still choose evil over and over again (that’s called tragic). The ones who eventually do try to do good again are not always forgiven, either.

The music is amazing. I can probably count on my hands the number of times I’ve heard someone say otherwise, which is astonishing when you consider this fandom.

It’s also free on RT’s website. (A paid, “FIRST” subscription removes ads and lets you see new episodes one week early, but they all eventually release for free.)

Weaknesses of the show

Early volumes’ growing pains exist, much like most or all other shows. (Even some of the greatest were not immune to this, like ATLA.) In this case, however, it’s a little bit rougher. A large reason why is that this was kind of the first big thing from RT to ever come out. If you remember back almost a decade ago, their only other big thing at the time was RvB, which was machinima. They pretty much started from scratch with everything, from assets to VAs to animation to writing. Imagine if a random twitch streamer, like Ninja (idk who’s popular these days) said one day, “OK let me just direct something that’s intended to be the next great movie series of all time, like Star Wars, with a $4 bill and an iPhone camera.” Then went out and actually made something. Of course it would be rough…but then it turns out the movie is actually really good. And then you get to watch over the next several years as everything gets better and better until it’s honest-to-god comparable to the MCU. That’s kind of what happened with RWBY.

One specific growing pain was the volume 2 finale. Pretty much everything else up until that point, I love about the show. But the finale just fails to deliver on the build up of tension from other episodes. Some of it is because of later plot developments that we didn’t know at the time; some of it is because of just not great writing; some of it is because of just not great animation; and yes, some of it is budget. Regardless, it’s a low point for the show.

Speaking of, the budget for the early volumes is super small. The infamous volume one shadow people, the infamous person jumping across the rooftops in volume two, and just production quality isn’t high compared to a major release from some established studio. These are real weaknesses of the show that for some people, make it unwatchable, and if that’s you, that’s ok.

One last weakness of the show, the screen time per episode, especially early on, is NOT a full 20 minutes like you may expect of an anime (or anime-inspired-western-media, for those of you who will die on the “RWBY is not an anime” hill). This is a trend that has stuck with the show, a shorter run time per episode, for generally the entire lifetime. On one hand, it means it’s a little less daunting to catch up or rewatch than the number of episodes might imply. On the other, early on, some episodes have a little weird pacing. It also means the writing had to adjust for this, so while RWBY got really good at telling a story within a shorter amount of time, there’s also challenges with that too. Perhaps one of the notable ones is the pacing, with slower moments sometimes feeling like it takes up too much screen time, or not enough. Volume 4 was a particular struggle for the crew, both because they switched animation engines and also for the story.

Common complaints that I don’t agree with

I don’t agree that the early volumes were actually bad overall. Growing pains, yes, but not bad. I attribute that complaint to overly focusing on one character’s storyline, back when it wasn’t clear there was so much more to come and before people realized the show would challenge the tropes instead of falling into them. It’s pretty much just volume 1 when people say this anyway, most of them I’ve heard admit that volume 2 was a lot better (except the finale) and almost everyone loves volume 3. And looking back on it, I do think volume 1 holds up.

Tying into this, the racism plot line is another common complaint. I don’t think it’s actually executed quite that badly. I think it makes sense for there to be regional differences in the amount of racism we see, it just so happened that we only saw a very small and isolated environment, Beacon, for much of the early volumes. (Incidentally, that’s actually similar the environment I myself grew up in.) It’s not perfect, though. But there’s no doubt that the later volumes do a better job portraying this. Again, I attribute it mostly to people not knowing how long the show would run for at the time, so of course if that’s all we saw, it would’ve been bad. But it’s not. I have a lot of respect for Miles and Kerry for even attempting to handle the racism topic in the first place. And for the faults that DO exist in this plot line, I credit them for learning and growing past that too, and doing better in later volumes.

The animation is not bad. I’ve already touched on that earlier, but people confuse “budget and polish” with “animation.” Give me RWBY any day over Michael Bay’s Transformers: no matter how much polish those robots have, they’re still a confusing mess to try and follow. And the polish isn’t even an issue once we get past the growing pains of Maya and get a bigger budget, because wow does this show look good now.

Between these three complaints I hear about often, I think those are the biggest ones. And they’re all generally done in bad faith, based not on just those but on other more provocative statements people also make with them. That’s part of my issue with the fandom, specifically the vocal but small parts of the fandom, because they’re just repeating these things from early days that aren’t true. But YouTubers gotta get those rage and hate clicks somehow, right? Unfortunately it discredits the show a lot and influences other people’s opinions into not giving it a fair chance, because it’s become a narrative of “RWBY IS BAD” when they all won’t shut up about it. So yeah, fandom can be bad, join at your own discretion. (Of course, all fandoms have annoying parts, and my interactions with the fandom have been good overall, otherwise.)

Onto other complaints, some say the cast is bloated. I don’t agree, but I don’t think this one is in bad faith. I think we get the important characters as much screen time as we can, and the minor characters don’t actually detract from that; one of the differences between good minor characters and bad ones, is that bad ones take up too much time. RWBY has a ton of characters but many of the minor ones don’t actually take up too much time. So it appears bloated, but actually I don’t think it is.

Finally, a small word on the no-no topics. Adam, and Monty. Adam is like the champion of the Monty topic. Which essentially boils down to “Miles and Kerry are ruining Monty’s vision for the show.” Toxic fandom is truly awful and I have no respect for anyone who says anything like that. Shame on all of you. This isn’t really anything negative about the show, but the fandom, and tbf all fandoms have toxic parts. But toxic fandom can be a real and valid reason to not watch a show. Thankfully they seem fewer in number these days, but I think they’ve evolved into hiding behind other characters or topics, so you know. Beware. Again, it's not too hard to avoid them or block them, and my interactions otherwise with most fans have been good.

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yeah this won't be controversial at all

might literally just block the whole tag for the next 9 months or something

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Listen.

I know why a Kiss is on everyone's mind. When Blake sees Yang again, surely that's the best time for it to happen, right? Will CRWBY finally do it? Will we finally be able to say that it happened? (And yes, I know why it's so important for it to happen. I grew up on Legend of Korra. I know about how the studio denied a kiss from happening just because it was gay. I know how important a Kiss is, because it means fair treatment in the eyes of so many people.)

So I hate to be the messenger. But it's not going to happen like that. Bold prediction here but that's just not how this show does things. Not with the history of Bumblebee. It wasn't right at Haven, it wasn't right in Argus, it wasn't right after the Whale. Not with the history of other main cast relationships: when it wasn't right with Pyrrha's sacrifice play, because that was a tragedy; when it wasn't right with Ren and Nora's kiss at the rally, because they split up the next volume. And not with the history the show has with tropes and how it deconstructs them, particularly fairy tale tropes and The Kiss in those stories.

The Reunion Kiss, the Defeating a Past Demon Kiss, the Other Reunion Kiss, the Sacrifice Kiss, the Solve All My Problems Kiss. The Fairy Tale Kiss. I think the point is that the eventual BB kiss isn't going to be A Kiss. It's just going to be a kiss. We've had so many chances for A Kiss and it hasn't happened, and every time it happens for someone else it doesn't work. A Kiss isn't some fairy tale ending or solution or climax of a plot. And as we just saw with Ren and Nora, who had a great opportunity for A Kiss after their talk, it didn't happen to them either, and we KNOW their relationship is stronger for it.

But when, then, will it finally happen? I'd bet money that CRWBY know how important a kiss is, and how important that representation is, and I have complete faith in them to deliver a moment that's handled just as well or more as May's lines this season. I believe it won't be a big Reunion Kiss. But I don't know for sure when it will happen. All I can ask is that you have faith with me, that it will happen. It just won't be what you're all expecting, so please don't get too upset when it doesn't.

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For the people who are out there “fighting the good fight” and “trying to make fandom a better place,” I have two important questions for you:

1. Is the author dead? x

2. Is your baby in the bathwater? x

What do I mean by those things? Let’s start with #1. The Death of the Author is a type of literary criticism, the extreme cliff notes version of which is that art exists outside of the creator’s life, personal background, and even intentions. I’m using it slightly differently than Barthes intended, but that’s okay, because the author is dead and I’m interpreting his work through my own lens.

In fandom, the author is dead. In fact, the author was never alive in the first place, not really. The author has only ever been the idea of a person, because unlike published fiction, the only thing we know about a fanfic author is that which they choose to tell us about themselves.

Why is that important?

Because it might not be true. Hell, that happens in real life with published authors, who have SSN’s on file with their publishers, who pay taxes on the works they create and have researchable pasts. If the author of A Million Little Pieces could fake everything, why can’t I? Why can’t you? Why can’t the writer of your favorite fic in the whole wide world?

Stop me if you’ve heard this before: “you can only write about [sensitive subject] if [sensitive subject] has happened to you personally, otherwise you’re a disgusting monster that deserves to die!!” Or maybe “you can only write [x racial or ethnic group] characters if you’re [x racial or ethnic group] otherwise you’re racist/fetishizing/colonizing!”

You can play this game with any sensitive subject you can come up with. I’ve seen them all before, on a sliding scale of slightly chastising to literal death threats.

Now, I could tell you that I’m a white-passing Latina whose grandmother was an anchor baby. I could tell you that I speak only English because my family never taught me to speak Spanish, something which I’ve been told is common in the Cuban community, though I only know my own lived experience. I could tell you that I’m mostly neurotypical. I could tell you that I’m covered in surgical scars. I could tell you lots of things.

Are any of these true? Maybe! I could tell you that my brother has severe mental development problems, so uncommon that they’ve never been properly diagnosed, and that he will live the rest of his life in a group home with 24-hour care. Is that true? Am I allowed to write about families struggling with America’s piss-poor services for the handicapped now?

Am I allowed to write about being Cuban? After all, I did just say that I’m Cuban. But is it true? Can I instead write a character that’s Panamanian? Maybe I really am Panamanian, not Cuban. Maybe I’m both. Maybe I’m neither. Maybe I’m really French Canadian. Should we require people to post regular selfies? I can’t count the number of times I’ve had someone come up to me speaking Arabic, and I’ve been told that I look Syrian. What’s stopping me from making a blog that claims that I am Syrian? Can you even really tell someone’s race and ethnicity from a photo?

Am I allowed to write about being a teenager? Am I allowed to write about being a college student? Am I allowed to write about being an “adulty” adult? Can I write a character who’s 40? 50? 60? How old am I?

All of this is to say: you can’t base what someone is or is not “allowed” to write about on a background that may or may not be real. No matter how good your intentions. And I get it - this usually comes from a place of well-meaning. You’re trying to protect marginalized groups by stopping privileged people from trampling all over experiences that they haven’t suffered. I get that. It’s a very noble thought. But you can’t require a background check for every fic that you don’t like.

If you say “you can only write about rape if you’re a rape victim,” then one of three things will happen:

Real survivors will have to supply intimate details of their own violations to prevent harassment

Real survivors will refuse to engage and will then have to deal with death threats and people telling them to kill themselves for daring to write about their own experiences

People who aren’t survivors will say “yeah sure this happened to me” just to get people to shut up

Has that helped anyone? I mean really - anyone??

So now let’s get to point #2: is your baby in the bathwater?

If your intention is to protect marginalized people from being trampled upon, stop and assess if your boot is the one that’s now stamping on their face. Find your baby! Is your baby in the bathwater? Which is to say: find the goal that you’re advocating for. Now assess. Are you making the problem worse for the people you’re trying to protect? Does that rape victim really feel better, now that you’ve harassed and stalked them in the name of making rape victims feel safe?

Let’s say you read a fic that contains explicit sex between a 16 year old and a 17 year old. Is this okay? Would it be okay if the writer was 15? 16? 17? Should teenagers be barred from writing about their own lives, and should teenagers be banned from exploring sexuality in a fictional bubble, instead of hookup culture? Is it okay for a 20 year old to write about their experiences as a teenager? Is it okay for a 20 year old to write about being raped at a party as a teenager? Is it okay for a 30 year old? How about a 40 year old? Is it okay so long as it isn’t titillating? Is it okay if taking control of the narrative allows the writer to re-conceptualize their trauma as something they have control over? Is it okay if their therapist told them that writing is a safe creative outlet?

Is your author dead?

Is your baby in the bathwater?

Now let’s take a hardline approach: no fanfiction with characters who are under 18 years old. None. Is the 16 year old who really loves Harry Potter and wants to read/write about characters their own age better off? Should they be banned from writing? Should they be forced to exclusively read and write (adult) experiences that they haven’t lived? Will they write about teens anyway? Should they have to share it in secret? Should 16 year olds be ashamed of themselves? Should we just throw in with the evangelicals and say that the only answer is abstinence, both real and fictional?

Let’s say that no rape is allowed in fiction, at all. None. What happens to all the hurt/comfort fics where a character is raped and then receives the support and love that they deserve, slowly heal, and by the end have found themselves again? Are you helping rape victims by banning these stories? Are you helping rape victims by stripping their agency away, by telling them that their wants and their consent doesn’t matter?

Is your baby in the bathwater?

Fandom is currently being split in two: on one side, the people who want to make fandom a “safer” place by any means necessary, even if that means throwing out all of the marginalized groups they say they want to protect - and on the other, people who are saying “if you throw out that bathwater, you’re throwing the baby out too.”

The whole point of fandom is to be able to explore all kinds of ideas from the safety and comfort of a computer screen. You can read/write things that fascinate you, disgust you, titillate you, or make your heart feel warm. This is true of all fiction. People who want to read about rape and incest and extreme violence and torture can go pick up a copy of Game of Thrones from the bookstore whenever they want. Sanitizing fandom just means holding a community of people who are primarily not male, not straight, not cis, or some combination of those three, to higher and stricter standards than straight white cis male authors and creators all over the world.

There is nothing you can find on AO3 that you can’t find in a bookstore. Any teenager can go check out Lolita, or ASOIAF, or Flowers in the Attic, or Stephen King’s It, or Speak, or hundreds of other books that have adult themes or gratuitous violence or graphic sex. The difference is that AO3 has warnings and tags and allows people to interact only with the types of work that they want to, and allows people to curate their experiences.

Are these themes eligible to be explored, but only in the setting of something produced/published? Books, movies, television, studio art, music - all of these fields have huge barriers to entry, and they’re largely controlled by wealthy cishet white men. Is it better to say that only those who have the right connections to “make it” in these industries should be allowed to explore violence or sexuality or any other so-called “adult” theme?

Does banning women from writing MLM erotica make fan culture a better place?

Does banning queer people from writing about queer experiences make fan culture a better place?

Is M/M fic okay, but only if the author is male? What if he’s a trans man? What if they’re NB? Who should get to draw those lines? Should TERFs get a vote? What if the author is a woman who feels more comfortable writing from a male character’s perspective because she’s grown up with male stories her whole life, or because she identifies more with male characters? What about all the trans men who discovered themselves, in part, by writing fanfiction, and realized that their desires to write male characters stemmed from something they hadn’t yet realized about themselves?

How can we ever be sure that the author is who they say they are?

Who is allowed to write these stories? How do we enforce it?

Is it better for none of these stories to ever exist at all?

Have you killed your author?

Have you thrown out your baby with the bathwater?

[rainbuckets8]

i should be going to bed but instead i think i am going to talk about how despondos is a metaphor about accepting your sexuality and coming out of the closet 😌😌

quick recap the first ones and the horde both represent evangelical christianity (not gonna get into that right now ldkfjdljf just trust me ok). mara led a group of rebel fighters to try and stop these empires from destroying etheria. but the rebels were losing so mara did the only thing she could to save everyone–she transported them to an empty dimension, away from the war… but also away from the magic of the stars and the rest of the universe.

i think the reason they included “friends of mara” as a nod to the old-school gay euphemism “friends of dorothy” is because mara’s rebels are meant to represent older generations of the lgbt community. we were fighting back then too but we also had to hide, as an act of survival against a society and religion that hated our existence. and that’s how it was for centuries.

she-ra is the story of a girl who grew up in despondos.. literally and figuratively. her community (the fright zone) taught her to suppress her personal desires and hide in the closet. then she finds the sword and things only get worse as light hope reinforces these ideas, training her to repress her emotions, especially her sexuality, in order to be a heroic sacrificial christian who would follow the “destiny” that god (the first ones) had planned for her.

what im trying to get at is that despondos is actually a big-picture metaphor for adora’s emotional state throughout the show. s1-s4 she was trapped in an empty dimension, a closet u might say…. then the stars return, etheria is brought back into the wider universe just moments before she breaks the sword. its one of many examples in she-ra where the setting contributes to character development and here it creates a beautiful backdrop that emphasizes that theme of breaking free of religious oppression.

one of the final shots of s4 shows adora gazing up at the stars, a visual of how tiny and lost she feels after losing her faith – but also the wonder of having the whole universe opened up to her after a lifetime of staring into an empty void.

of course as soon as etheria is transported out of despondos / the closet, horde prime is there waiting to attack. 

the war is obviously an important part of adora’s coming out metaphor as she fights to reclaim her desires and write her own destiny, and she doesnt /fully/ embrace her sexuality i think until 5x13 but its still all painted on this setting of etheria returning from despondos.

the crew has also mentioned before that the stars in she-ra are kind of a larger metaphor for the current political situation in the U.S. The lgbt rights movement here really gained traction only a few years ago, and for the first time in modern history our community is starting to feel safe enough to share our identities. but that openness also feels really scary and vulnerable. ik i dont have to remind anyone about the anti-lgbt stance of our last administration–who were elected by the christian right as a sort of retaliation against recent social progress. every day there seems to be some new headline that treats our existence like a controversy. in a way, it feels like /we/ have just been transported out of despondos….. out of a false sense of stability and now we’re facing a war with a giant horde army lmao. ofc other countries may have it better or worse. there’s still a lot of fighting ahead but we’ve seen the she-ra finale so we know how it ends right?? 🌈🌈💘 [queue she-ra theme song we must be strong we must be brave!!!!]

ok one more little fun fact and this could just be a coincidence but… this is the first thing anyone says right after etheria goes through the portal, and it parallels dorothy’s famous line when she first arrives in the land of gay oz. so if you’re buying into my absolutely wild theories here then despondos = kansas and the wider universe = oz and basically she-ra is a wizard of oz au lsdjkdjldjkfkl

mind blown???? no ? ok 

in conclusion despondos is so cool i love it, even without analyzing the details you can kind of intuitively understand its metaphor. the setting really underscores a lot of different themes in the show especially adora’s arc, so much so that it feels like a character itself, which i think is something every story strives for but few have done as well as she-ra imo. i’ll never not be amazed by the writing in this show. ok its 2am hopefully i can fall sleep now thx for reading!! 💖

[rainbuckets8]

watching the latest RWBY episode like

wait a minute where have i seen this before

a former villain in the belly of the beast, who has allied with a supreme evil being far nastier than anything they could have imagined, chooses to defect and escapes with a hero who is transforming into another person and they have conflicted feelings about that transformation, only to accept it when all things look lost. with the help of the hero's friends, she escapes the big floating base of operations. upon meeting the rest of the hero's friends, she's still awkward around them because of past misdeeds, and when one of them goes to attack her, the hero steps up and defends her by saying that she's on their side now.

TLDR: Emerald is Catra (don't read too much into this, shippers)

[rainbuckets8]

Settings in She-Ra

Today I will talk about setting and how She-Ra uses its settings to do some very cool things with its writing. I didn’t even notice all of these things until a recent rewatch because it’s so subtle and yet so brilliant at unconsciously making you notice things. TL;DR: The two major characters, Adora and Catra, are reflected in the show by a few major settings. And in this essay I will -

To understand settings in She-Ra, you need to understand that writing is rarely a cause-and-effect endeavor. Writing decisions and choices don’t just happen because something is the most likely to happen in the world of the story; things happen because the author writes them. So when something takes place in the Whispering Woods, it’s important to remember that was a deliberate decision for some event to happen there, not just because it’s a logical outcome. Following this, I will make a guess that She-Ra’s major settings are like an extended metaphor for the thoughts and feelings of its two major characters, Adora and Catra.

What tipped me off to this was a recent rewatch, when Adora and Catra confront each other at the end of Season 3. And it occurred to me just how often they confronted each other in the Whispering Woods. Seems odd, right? Another thing is that Adora goes on her own Hero’s Journey. The Hero goes into the Unknown, a supernatural place, and encounters challenges, only to grow past them and emerge a changed person, and returns to their life. Adora definitely changes; she literally transforms into She-Ra for the rest of the series, and She-Ra even changes again when Adora gets a new transformation.The Whispering Woods can certainly be defined as the Unknown, in a literal sense; even the princesses and native Etherians treat it with caution and confusion, because it’s so ancient and mystical. The Woods also exist as a boundary between the Horde and Brightmoon, a middle ground. If Adora’s journey begins in the Horde and ends in Brightmoon, she has to go through the Woods, the Unknown, in order to complete it. Adora’s journey is centered around her inner thoughts and feelings as much, or even more, as it is about winning a war. And these challenges to her thoughts and feelings usually take place in the Whispering Woods, which is a metaphor for her sense of self. Or else, they take place in First One’s ruins, which are in the Woods, and represent Adora going deeper into her thoughts.

No post of mine is complete without numerous examples, so let’s take it from the top. Adora and Catra leave the Horde, their home, to enter the Woods, and Adora encounters something strange and new there. Adora goes back, and Catra stays behind, metaphorically because Catra isn’t ready to start her own journey yet. Glimmer and Bow enter the ruins with Adora, and she slowly learns to let them into her life and they become her close friends. Adora gets to Brightmoon but enters the Woods again when she is unsure of what to do, and gets advice from Razz. (Which is really advice from herself: “You’re a smart girl. What do you think?”) When Adora next encounters a problem she can’t handle, healing Glimmer, she retreats to the Woods again in search of answers. She goes deeper and finds Catra in the ruins in Promise. After making the major decision to essentially cut Catra out of her life, to “let go,” the Woods end up destroyed in the process of the Battle of Brightmoon, much like how Adora’s own thoughts are conflicted.

The next major conflict in the Woods happens in the Season 3 finale, in the false world created by the portal. Adora confronts Catra yet again, not just once but twice, and firmly makes a decision: I can’t be friends with you anymore if you keep acting like this. We also get a nice look at Adora’s theme of destiny and how that relates to Glimmer and Bow leaving her alone, and Angella sacrificing herself when Adora initially believes that’s her destiny.

Our next major glimpse of the Woods comes from Mara, actually! Mara herself goes on a little brief journey, and learns new things from Razz in Hero, in where else? The Woods. Mara, being the She-Ra before Adora, as a predecessor figure, emphasizes that the Woods have some mystical connection to the mystical She-Ra - and the exposition for the audience doesn’t hurt here either. Season 4 ends with another major conflict between Adora and one of her parental figures, Light Hope. We go as deep as we’ve been yet into the First Ones’ ruins, and it ends with Adora rejecting the concept of her destiny.

Finally, in Season 5, when Adora gets back to Etheria, she retreats from Prime to, where else, but the deepest part of the Whispering Woods. However, much like how Prime’s chips can take over a person’s thoughts, so too do the chipped people take over that camp, corrupting a safe haven for Adora. Shadow Weaver worms her way into the new camp in the Whispering Woods, and in the next episodes, Adora starts letting Shadow Weaver’s incorrect arguments about repressing her thoughts and feelings worm their way into her head. But then Adora goes as deep into the ruins as she’s ever been, the literal center of the planet. Glimmer and Bow turn back and trust Catra to go deeper, with Shadow Weaver. It’s in the tunnels where Adora rejects Shadow Weaver one last time, and Shadow Weaver dies, and Adora can start to get closure on that chapter in her life. And then Adora accepts her love for Catra. How cool is it that this place is called the Heart? Not just a heart, as in the center of Adora’s self, but a heart as in the symbol for feelings and wants. And how it’s both of those, suggesting that feelings and wants are the strongest and most central part of her mind and self. (If you’re familiar with my other ramblings, insert the “magic, especially She-Ra’s magic, is love” metaphor here.)

As an aside, the two parts of her mind, the First Ones and the natural Whispering Woods, can be read as an extension of this metaphor; she’s torn between two groups. While Adora is technically adopted, based on the themes of the show, this isn’t so much about literal feelings about adoption as it is “found family vs birth family.” So the First Ones don’t represent adoption in a negative light, as much as they represent some of our birth or immediate families. And how the family Adora found and chose, is so much better for her than the families that were chosen for her (either Light Hope as a representation of the First Ones, or Shadow Weaver as someone who takes her in).

Whew, ok. How about Catra? Catra’s self is reflected much like Adora’s. Catra’s major setting is the Fright Zone. She wins most of her major victories there. She defeats Shadow Weaver, and she defeats Hordak. But she also loses her friends. She stuns Entrapta. The two pivotal moments of Scorpia leaving her happen in the Horde: when she confirms she would destroy Emily, and Scorpia calls her a bad friend; and when she discovers the note Scorpia left behind. Double Trouble confronts her in the Fright Zone after she fights Hordak. Unlike Adora, the Fright Zone is portrayed as an unhealthy place.

Catra only starts her own journey when she enters her version of the Unknown. If Adora’s version is the Woods, then Catra’s supernatural place where she doesn’t feel at home is Horde Prime’s ship. She tries her games again, to make her way up the ranks, but it’s clear Prime isn’t falling for them. She confronts her inner thoughts and feelings: “Adora means something to you.” She sees what she’s always known deep down, in an irrefutable way: the Horde, and Prime, is super unhealthy. She makes her pivotal decision to change when she rescues Glimmer. And let’s talk about that, because there’s something super neat about Adora’s reflection of her deepest thoughts, the ruins, and Catra’s reflection of her deepest thoughts, the Velvet Glove. These are the only two places where there are diegetic flashbacks, and only for Catra and Adora. (Diegetic means “in the world of the story.” Characters can see or hear a diegetic thing. So background soundtracks are for the audience only, that is non-diegetic music; Sea Hawk’s shanties can be heard by the characters and the audience, that is diegetic music.) There is an explanation in the world for Adora’s: it’s tech, either by Light Hope, or a leftover. But there is absolutely no reason that Catra can see the exact same style of flashback aboard the Velvet Glove, in Corridors. Why only these two places, that just so happen to be the two places that reflect each of their deepest feelings? Speaking of Corridors, it’s an exceptional episode for all its imagery and it’s here that the setting reflects Catra the most. It’s here when Catra reaffirms her deepest fears. “All I do is hurt people. There’s no one left in the entire universe who cares about me.”

But she’s wrong! Because although Adora and Catra are each reflected in their settings, they are also deeply intertwined with each other. We see this in Save the Cat, when Adora goes into the Velvet Glove without even being able to turn into She-Ra, ready to make the worst tactical decision ever, of all time, to try and save Catra. We see this in Promise, when the two deeply confront each other about their innermost feelings, and the settings become intertwined: we’re in the ruins for Adora, and at the same time in a simulation of the Horde for Catra. We see this in the Woods in Season 3’s finale, when they confront each other yet again. We see this in the tunnels in Heart, Part 1 and Part 2, when Adora sees Catra in simulations and Catra makes her way into the deepest part of the Heart to save her. Think about the number of times they have been alone with just each other in any of these settings. Think about who gets to be in these settings with them, and how that usually or always reflects who has the most influence on these two as characters. (Remember Prime isn’t so much about who he is, as what kinds of thinking he represents.)

The settings in She-Ra not only reflect the two main characters visually, but also metaphorically. Adora is the Woods and the ruins. Catra is the Fright Zone and the Velvet Glove. The characters enter each other’s settings many times, and they argue and fight. But, throughout all that time, they’ve still held the other near to their heart. As Catra says to Adora: “I love you. I always have.”