#<-i mean she's a character in the lore but... i guess it also counts as one of my ocs.??

[kittygamer2888]

Before ya'll say anything

N O -

THIS ISN'T SARAH--

But she is related to her--

I kinda like the way this turned out, even if it was just a concept of a design I was thinking for a certain character in my one of my OC's lore, so I wanted to show you guys, too--

[arolesbianism]

The Joshua section of my oni playlist is looking great so far

[rawliverandgoronspice]

THE GERUDO POST

(aka an attempt at a critique of how gerudos were handled in BotW and before)

Oh no. TOTK being right around the corner, it might finally be time for the Gerudo Post.

(aka half of the reason why I made a Zelda sideblog in the first place)

So I want to preface all of this by saying that, as you could probably tell already, I’ve always adored the gerudos. They have fascinated my small child brain when I was 7; then the obsession made its comeback when I was 14, and now, here we are, almost 28, and I’m still thinking about the gerudos. I think they might be among my favorite fictional cultures for their potential and their understated storyline. I guess growing up in a very Arabic neighborhood, coupled with being bi-culturally latinx (?? does Brazil count?? you tell me), also always made them feel like home to me –especially when I was very young and there was not a lot of cool female representation flying around that managed to involve fiercely independent PoC women, flaws and teeth included.

This whole weird-essay-thing tries to do two things. First: analyze the place gerudos have occupied in the series, their initial problematisms and their subtextual narrative arc during the Myth Era coupled with their relationship to Ganondorf. Second: tiptoe to Breath of the Wild and poke it with a stick to see what happens –and in doing that, explain why I believe a lot of their characterization was defanged in service of smoothing their past with the hylians instead of deepening the culture on its own terms, and why I’m a little apprehensive about what that might mean for TotK even though I adore seeing the best girls at it again.

Those are the uhh terms of service??

And now, we must go back to 1998.

OCARINA OF TIME ERA

There’s so many things about the gerudos that are noteworthy and rich, and they’ve made for a complex piece of Zelda lore ever since their introduction –and when I say complex, I don’t 100% mean it as praise. The very racially charged decisions made about their inclusion have been discussed at length by the fandom, especially when it comes to orientalist and Islamophobic tropes being deployed pretty thoughtlessly in Ocarina of Time (their sigil being literally a crescent moon and star originally, the parallels are pretty obviously there).

We’re talking about a band of amazon-like, big-nosed brown women from the desert ruled by a single Scary Evil Man born once every hundred years hellbent on conquering Hyrule who they apparently worship like a god, characterized primarily as thieves, decked in jewelry and orientalist-inspired harem/belly-dancing clothing, hostile to the white good guys of Hyrule (especially men), unblessed by the Goddesses and so deprived of elongated ears (this is true for OoT –we’ll come back to that), also known as a demon tribe with their deity straight-out described as evil-looking by Navi (on my way to cancel you on twitter Navi you watch out), and secretly led by evil twin witches who can turn into a single seductress and, as two mothers, raised their Scary Evil Guy king who happens to basically be the devil.

In so few words, gerudos are the future that liberals want.

It’s worth notice, also, that Ganondorf’s characterization in this game is… kind of relentlessly uncomfortable to play through, especially before the 7 year skip. The utter assumption of depraved and evil intents from every character surrounded by dialogue that does little to hide its biases in spite of having generally very little proof to back them up –even though, in the game’s context, every character is correct to call his eyes evil and the darkness of his skin a moral judgment in on itself. The scene where Zelda demands that we believe her conclusion that the sole and only brown guy in the entire kingdom is evil and will do harm, and the game straight out refuses to progress until we concede that her dreams are prophetic and that this man must be stopped at any cost even though she has no more proof than her discomfort… hits different on replay.

I’m restating all of this not to pretend I’m making a novel and thought-provoking point, but to bounce back on a tumblr post I saw a while back (that I can’t find anymore!! I’ll link it if I find it again) –and so express what it is that gripped me with the gerudos in spite of their pretty damning depiction… and actually maybe thanks to it.

There’s a surprising amount of texture to Ocarina of Time’s worldbuilding that exists folded within the things introduced and left hanging, or in its subtext –and whether on purpose or not, I believe it is why people keep coming back to this iteration of Hyrule.

What was that about the king of Hyrule unifying a war-torn country? Why did the gerudos break the bridge connecting them to the rest of the kingdom during the 7 year timeskip while still worshiping Ganondorf, and why are the carpenters trying to rebuild it against their apparent wishes? What was that about gerudos imprisoning hylian men trying to force entry into their lands? What was that about the secret death torture chambers right next to the Royal Family’s tomb and connected to the race of people who were, apparently, born to serve them?

Nothing? Oh okay… okay… okay….

The same can be said about this strange depiction of this hostile tribe, consistently described as wicked yet suddenly friendly once you prove you deserve their respect once you... defeat them, so you now have joined them? Ocarina of Time isn’t very consistent when it comes to characterizing them as their occupation (thieves) or as a proper culture, with a king and a strange system of rulership that seem to involve at least 5 people: Ganondorf, the Twinrova, Nabooru and the unnamed random woman who decides you’re now part of the gerudos because you slashed enough of them with your sword and hookshot, which, uhh ok.

They’re but a ragtag and negligible group when discussed next to gorons and zoras and hylians, but they also clearly have their own religion and at least a 400-hundred years old history (probably far longer than this) and hints of a written language of their own. I’m not sure the game itself knows what it wants them to be, beyond: intimidating and hot and cool, but also wicked and, because of Ganondorf and the way you barge in their forbidden fortress (heh) with the explicit intent to dismantle their king, in apparent need to be saved from themselves.

Speaking of rulership and the Spirit Temple, let’s have a quick tangent about Nabooru: I always found her characterization when meeting with Child Link pretty strange. I refuse to mention the promised reward, which feeds into everything orientalist mentioned above, but I always found her moral compass so extremely convoluted for someone coming from gerudo culture. Nabooru says that, despite being a cool thief herself, she resents Ganondorf for killing people as well as stealing from women and children. Stealing... from women. Nabooru. Why are you this pressed that he steals from women!!! This feels so out of place, that the only girl of that hostile culture that betrays her king and befriends you, is the one that upholds moral values that only a hylian could possibly hold.

Either way: the strange unquestioned contempt of the game for them as a culture, mixed with the occasional bouts of heart, friendliness and badassery, makes it hard not to consider their depiction as pretty biased in favor of the hylians finding them at once exotic, scary and exciting, and could hide a more complex reality you might only get one side of –especially when you know there were originally plans for Ganondorf’s character to be more gray and motivated than what the campy final version ended up being. To be blunt: even in the context of a game for children, and maybe because of that fact, it all reads like a reductionist and imperialist/colonialist reading of a more complex situation.

This might seem like A Lot coming from a game where the actual game writing can be this overall flimsy and simplistic due to the standards of the time (it’s rough, it's so rough). But I would have never dwelt on that thought about a little children’s game if not for the mainline entries that came soon after, because... ooo boy.

The sense you’re not getting the whole story was certainly not helped by the introduction of Wind Waker Ganondorf, and the chilling emptiness of Gerudo Desert in Twilight Princess.

AFTER THE TIMELINE SPLIT

(I’m skipping Majora’s Mask, not because I dislike them in the game or think they’re not worth talking about, but because it’s a parallel universe and they’re never even called gerudos and their reality seems extremely different from their sisters in Hyrule so I think it’s okay to call them tangential and not dive too deep in this particular depiction)

Here’s something I want to highlight about gerudos and how they were characterized before BotW came along: their absence. Not only their physical absence, the lack of any gerudo character that calls themselves gerudo, but their absence from the text itself.

It’s not that Wind Waker and Twilight Princess retroactively scratch them off existence: we can clearly see Nabooru’s stained glass art in WW as well as recognize them being mentioned in Ganondorf’s final boss soliloquy, and WELL there’s quite a lot to say about their imprint over the world of TP. They are there –or at least they... were there. But nobody ever talks about what happened.

In Wind Waker, there was the deluge. It’s assumed lots of people died then, and those who survived scattered across the Great Sea. Are they sealed under the waves? Have they drowned? Is Jolene, Linebeck’s ex-girlfriend in Phantom Hourglass, a distant relative of one of the rare survivors? It’s unclear, beyond the fact that Ganondorf is the only living gerudo we see in this entire branch of the Timeline split.

In Twilight Princess, the desert which bares their name is empty. The hylians never mention that it used to be the name of a tribe: they’re not even named when Ganondorf is introduced for the first time, reduced once again to a mere band of thieves. We learn his plans to steal the Triforce in OoT were foiled, and that he may have turned to war. Then he lost the war, and was executed in Arbiter’s Ground: a strange structure in the desert, a mixture between a temple, a prison and a coliseum. What looks like gerudo writing coexists with hylian symbols, which often look much fresher. This dungeon is the Shadow Temple of TP: a prison hosting the worst criminals the kingdom has ever known, now haunted and cursed. Besides the locations, the only character that vaguely look gerudo in the entire game besides Ganondorf is Telma, a character with pointed ears that never seems to identify as anything but a hylian. What happened? Who’s to say. Nobody ever says anything. Not even Ganondorf bothers to mention them the way he did in WW –and though the game’s story is quite focused on another exiled tribe seeking revenge and dominion over Hyrule as retribution, the parallel is never explicitly drawn. So who’s to say what happened there. Who’s to say.

And in A Link to the Past and the games forward? The only mention of other gerudo characters are Koume and Kotake, resurrecting their son in the Oracles games through their own sacrifice and failing to bring anything back but a monstrosity incapable of making conscious decisions. Granted, most games in that extremely weird Fallen Timeline predate OoT and therefore had yet to make gerudos up at all. Still: canonically, between the gap of OoT and ALLTP, whatever it may be, gerudos disappeared here as well.

I think there’s something subtle and a little heartbreaking about the fact that no matter what Ganondorf does, the gerudos always end up dying out. His yearning for Hyrule, its gentler wind and the Triforce blessing its lands always costs him the kingdom that he does have already.

Now, does he care? A lot of people would argue that he doesn’t, that he used them like pawns for his own ambition and saw them as servants more-so than sisters, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it was Nintendo’s official opinion, but… One very powerful thing about most of Ganondorf’s incarnations (focusing on the human ones) is that he never seems to reject his cultural heritage. They could have gone for him wearing more kingly hylian stuff given the whole underlying theme of envy and pride surrounding his character, but never once does he try to look more hylian, beyond the ear situation that seems to be tied to the Triforce of Power? Either way: he is gerudo. Several of his outfits reference his mothers, as well as general gerudo patterning and jewelry. His heritage is something he proudly displays, even hundred of years in the future when there is no one left to remember what it means but him. I think it’s a very potent piece of characterization, an arc that crosses over multiple game and says something pretty intense about this character’s fate and his inherent destructiveness over the things he touches –starting with the Triforce, all the way up to his very own body and mind. His mental breakdown by the end of Wind Waker, when the king of Hyrule himself forces him to give up on the thing he sacrificed everything for, takes a new kind of weight with the whole picture taken into account.

(not to excuse genocide or general egomania-fueled madness and violence, but one thing doesn’t mean the other isn’t also relevant)

Regardless of whether this is a tragedy for Ganondorf as their uhh complete failure of a king, honestly, it is undeniably a tragedy for the gerudos themselves: a once-in-a-lifetime joyful event turned into a never-ending nightmare from which there seems to be no escape, their legacy now condemned to fade to black, leaving nothing behind but a demon boar forever laying ruin upon the world.

One may say I’m taking on the bleakest explication for the gerudos’ absence when there could be others. It’s true! Perhaps the gerudos are just chilling off-screen, completely fine, not interested in whatever is happening in the kingdom nearby and their disaster child having yet another temper tantrum about not being the Goddesses’ favorite boy. It’s possible! But regardless, what little elements we do possess as players doesn’t seem to support this, even if it remains possible –and regardless of actual gerudo lives, gerudo culture is definitively a goner in every single timeline.

Even if they did survive... Hyrule still won its unification war.

(I won’t mention Skyward Sword as they are not really a thing there, except for a butterfly that seems to suggest the Gerudo Province was a thing before the gerudo people –I don’t know what to do with this honestly– and the whole Groose situation, which, I’m not sure what to make of either beyond the fact that he may have gotten cursed by opposing Demise? And then went on to start the gerudo tribe, which ended up being an all-women group for some reason? Maybe? It’s not confirmed? I feel like it’s more of a fun tidbit than a central piece of the gerudo puzzle, so I’ll leave it there like I would a cool rock I brought back from a walk and that I don’t know where to put in my house)

Then, Breath of the Wild happened and changed things.

BREATH OF THE WILD

(Additional short note, but: while I won’t mention Four Swords Adventure, since it’s a weird one that almost nobody has played and severely messes with the Timeline, we kind of see the beginnings of what is about to happen in Breath of the Wild in this game –gerudos coming back without much explanation, then distancing themselves from Ganondorf to become friends with hylians because he was too hungry for power and now they are nice and have good reputation because they are our friendsss)

I was actually so happy to learn gerudos were making a comeback in a mainline Zelda game, and this got me more excited about Breath of the Wild than basically anything else the game involved. And getting to explore the Desert once again, meeting this new batch of impossibly tall buff girls, getting more about their language and their culture, Riju and the rest of the little girls are adorable, the grandmas are so cool, the sand seals??? sign me the fuck up??? And above it all, hanging around Gerudo Town at night and feeling as warm and cozy as little me liked to imagine how freeing it would feel, to stay there and watch the desert behind the safety of their walls in OoT… This was great. I loved it.

It was a huge compensation for the criticism I’m about to make, but did leave me with… questions regarding how their culture was going to be handled moving forward.

I’ll start with something small yet deeply revelatory, then work my way from there.

So... gerudos’ ears are pointy now.

This is pretty significant. Lore-wise, it’s been said that the elongated ears of hylians are there so they can better hear the voices of the gods. It’s considered a sign of holiness in-universe. There's a bunch of really thoughtful analysis on tumblr over that whole Ganondorf ear situation, which is a mess but also very interesting, but the short answer is: I think the absence of pointy ears was a clear design choice to originally signify them as Less Good. Even when Ganondorf gets pointier ears, they never get as long as hylians’. Worth noting: not every non-gerudo character has pointy ears: gorons, zoras and ritos (among others) do not possess this trait, and there are even some humans that have regular rounded ears in the series –though they always seem to be of lesser relevance, if not downright peasants in Twilight Princess. Pointy ears always tended to implied a strict hierarchy in the series: basically, the more pointy, the more Protagonist you become.

(also their eyes becoming green instead of the traditional yellow/golden, which looks more wicked and demonic --and cooler also tbh)

The pointy ears imply two things. From within the game, this could be interpreted in two ways: either that gerudos… converted, for a lack of a better term, and are now considered holy through their worship of the Golden Goddesses and/or Hylia, or that their mingling with hylians through tens of thousands of years had them acquiring this trait out of sheer genetic override (though they have kept their mostly-women birth rates, their big nose, darker skin –for the most part– and red hair). Probably a healthy mixture of both. Design-wise, it signifies something quite simple to the player: they are on hylians’ side now. They are good guys. We can trust them, even if they still have a little spice in them. They aligned themselves with us and against Ganon in all of its manifestations (even if he’s but an angry ghastly pig being parasitic to everything it touches in this iteration). They are on the side of Good, definitively, and will fight evil by our side.

On that note, I think it’s worth bringing out another major change from their initial iteration, which is their overt friendship with Hyrule as a whole, and with the Royal Family in particular. Despite not allowing any voe inside their walls (we’ll come back to this), their relationship with hylians is pretty neat. They have booming trade roads, travel and meet with the rest of the cultures, and are fierce enemies with the Yiga clan, who are renowned for being huge Calamity Ganon supporters. The tables certainly have turned. I want to bring out, in particular, Urbosa’s friendship with the queen and her role as the cool aunt taking care of Zelda and protecting her from evil (to be noted: I am not familiar with Age of Calamity so if I’m mischaracterizing her in any way, please let me know). The gerudo sense of sisterhood has been extended to the royals they used to fight against. I would go on and say the cultures peacefully coexist, but I think that what we’re looking at here is a case of vassal behavior, just like we used to have from zoras (in the non-Fallen Timelines) and gorons. This is a huge departure from gerudos being openly rejecting of Hylian culture in their initial iteration, and something that is worth returning to later.

Okay. Now it’s time to mention the weird obsession BotW gerudos have with romance. I didn’t take notice of my issues with their writing until I realized how prevalent of a theme that was. Now, the reason given for gerudos to refuse entry to males (of every race) has much more to do with preventing young gerudos to make mistakes than anything else, and is actively being put into question by the younger generations –which would make sense. But the amount of NPCs that either lament their lack of match, talk about their husbands (because they marry now apparently) or are invested in romance, and a very limited understanding of romance at that (heterosexual, closed, etc), makes for much more of the population that I initially expected. There’s no mention of what’s going on with their males, if there are new males being born and either exiled or abandoned, or if Ganondorf being technically still alive have have cut them off male heirs. Either way: no more kings, only girlbosses chiefs.

To have the gerudos so interconnected with Hyrule, not only through trade but through extremely coded romance where they have to make themselves palatable to a future male partner and enforce fidelity, was… a choice. The extremely brief and skippable mention of gerudos sometimes going to Castle Town in search for boyfriends in OoT became half of their personality traits in this game. We went from a race that was fiercely independent and mocking of the unworthy men who tried to mingle with them, to… this. Now I’m not saying some of the sidequests aren’t cute, or that I didn’t like the wedding, or that the grandma near the abandoned statue of Hylia (so she was worshipped at some point) clocking us and talking about her love life wasn’t one of my favorite gerudo conversations. I’m saying that the vibes have definitively changed. For the better? I’m not sure.

I once stumbled upon an article that said that Breath of the Wild gerudos were a huge improvement compared to their original introduction, because they were no longer presented as evil and hostile thieves groveling at the boot of a single man, but as a full culture allied with the protagonist and actively involved in the story, while still getting their Cool Girl Badass moment (again can’t find it anymore, I’ll link it if I stumble upon it again). I see where this comes from, but I honestly can’t help but consider it a reading that assumes something pretty major (though through no fault of their own, as the games tend to hammer this down as hard as they can), and that being hylians as the unquestioned anchor of Good.

Which, in spite of what the games want me to believe, I… feel uncomfortable taking at face value.

To me, regarding how gerudos are being incorporated in that goodie narrative, this is kind of a case of surface-level feminism trumping over colonialist/imperialist concerns. It becomes more important to perform the aesthetics of being cool and friendly and independent than scratching at any deeper problem that would risk making people uncomfortable. This is kind of Green Skin Ganon all over again: oh wait, isn’t it a little icky to have the evil bad guy being brown while faced by the most aryan-looking ass heroes of all time? Okay, then let’s take the brown guy and make his skin green so we don’t have to feel bad anymore that the conflict has racial undertones!! Solved!! There’s nothing questionable about changing a PoC's features to make it more monstrous and less human, right?

To me, it’s kind of the coward option: instead of accepting the messy reality those initial choices created (and their interesting nuances if taken at face value), let’s just… rewrite the PoC culture’s history to make it feel less uncomfortable for the white heroes. In many ways, it is an extension of what hylians have always done: scrubbing the weird and messy things about the past and shoving them deep down into the spooky well and far into the desert prison and away in alternate hellish dimensions, and then make up a very simple story where they get to feel good about themselves –except this time, it’s the fabric of the games, the literal reality, bending backward to make it happen. Which, in my opinion, makes it much worse than before. Now, there’s no conversation. The fabric of reality is changing their own history so that there is nothing to discuss anymore. Ganondorf was always evil incarnate. He never had any point. It was always 100% his own fault, his own hubris, his own fated wickedness. He was always demonic (and green, very important –having a flashback to people on twitter accusing artists restoring the TotK green skin to the original brown of wanting to make Ganondorf black, and like….. how do I put it gently…..)

And, above all else: gerudo are to distance themselves from his legacy so they can stay in the club of the Good and Just and Holy.

Because here’s the messy thing: as much as I love seeing the gerudos again in Breath of the Wild and as much I love for them to have survived the Era of Myth (??? somehow ???), this… kind of changes Ganondorf’s character arc. No longer do we have the story of a king who wanted more, either for his people, for himself or both, and led his culture to its destruction in his search for absolute Power, while remaining ironically incapable of maintaining what little he already had. This starts from him kneeling to the king of Hyrule in OoT and leads to the deluge, Arbiter’s Ground, his own mothers dying for the sake of his failed resurrection. Breath of the Wild changes this: now, the gerudo were apparently fine without him? They apparently did their own thing and became suddenly and inexplicably disconnected from his actions? I know it’s kind of implied they side with hylians at the end of OoT, but it’s honestly never really explored why they would cheer for the death of their king while never seeming to resent him before except for Nabooru –there are mentions of brainwashing for those who resist him (as well as “other groups in the desert”, tho they are never mentioned again), but it’s hardly a proper plot point for the majority of the tribe, aaaand they still die by Wind Waker in the Adult Timeline, in spite of their potential alliegance…

(again, this shift towards submitting to Hyrule actually started with Four Swords Adventure, getting crisper with each iteration)

There used to be this polite blur regarding Ganondorf’s relationship to them, how much he used them and how much he acted in their name (with arguments for both sides), and I think this messy and debatable question mark was one of the most compelling aspects of his character. Gerudos rejecting their relationship at a near-cosmic, reality-bending level, removes a huge layer of complexity to both parties… all for the benefit of making hylians come out cleaner out of this whole exchange, their moral grayness barely a whisper in the distance.

I’ll kind of go on the record and say that I suspect the addition of Demise to the canon to serve a similar purpose (at least in part): if Ganondorf becomes but the manifestation of a demonic curse, and is no longer an extremely messy character brimming with agency and drive, forcing the heavens to reckon with said agency in a way he was never meant to access, born from a complex set of circumstances from which we clearly get only a limited and biased perspective, then it becomes extremely clear that he’s a Bad in a way that isn’t worth exploring further. Even if he does have some points, he is a Bad. It’s what matters most. Not to say I even hate what this angle can bring to the table or that I want him to become Good (I don’t –I’ll talk more about why I dislike most takes on him being a helpless victim to the curse), but once again, who benefits from adding another Unquestionned Baddie to the equation to rest upon? Not him, and not the gerudos, that’s for sure.

So. Why did I, me, personally, like the gerudos in the first place?

Beyond the inherent coolness factor of their culture and the fascinating mysteries of what is merely suggested, I think… I think I loved gerudos because we were obvious outsiders. Because their rejection of Hylian culture was so sharp and extreme, their value system so different, and their writing, their religion, their relationship to power and hierarchy and worth wanted nothing to do with hylians. They didn’t need hylians, beyond them having potential resources to steal. In fact, the threat of hylians influencing their culture was such that the entry to the Fortress was forbidden to everyone (I don’t think men were ever singled out, by the way, even though they are mocked relentlessly). I think there was something inherently hopeful about this semi-matriarchy resisting the outside world, and especially its notions of what girls were meant to be –it was 1998, and every other girl character in OoT, besides Impa and Sheik that?? is another can of worms entirely, is either helpless or someone to save. For them to reject this narrow vision of femininity was, in my opinion, much more radical than what we got in BotW. Less nuanced, more problematic perhaps? But also much more powerful. Gerudo Valley is home, not to a town, but a Fortress.

Hylians were worth being resisted.

In Breath of the Wild, their refusal to let men enter their town is kind of boiled down to a fading tradition over-focused on romance, a meek little game of chase. Their entire goal seems to be finding a hylian to settle down with. Say what you will about the single man and the many girls (never explored and completely open-ended in its implications, btw), but at least it wasn’t… that. At least it opened the way for different ways for people to exist and imagine culture and civilization, outside of the heterosexual couple, the christian-infused patriarchy and its trickling down implications. What I want to say is: let my girls tell hylians they ain’t shit!! That they aren’t the end all be all of reality! This is what made gerudos so compelling in the first place! Where is that bite now? Where is that self-definition?

It’s gone, because hylians need to be Good. So we tee-hee at the creep running laps around the town, we disguise ourselves to breach their trust and infiltrate their town (though there is nuance to be had there, gender be complicated etc), we watch them pine after shitty dudes and take classes to become the perfect approachable woman and make love soups with ?? strange ingredients honestly, and we witness them get very friendly with the Royal Family they used to conspire against, dying to protect the princess against the manifestation of their ancient king reduced to a raving puddle of Bad Boar.

Hyrule, unified against him.

TEARS OF THE KINGDOM

For posterity’s sake: this post was made before the game was released. I’ll probably update my thoughts on a separate thing later on.

I don’t think gerudos allying with the hylians and burying their own legends about Ganondorf as deeply underground as they can until it blows up in their face is a bad setup at all. It’s actually pretty juicy, and there’s a ton of fascinating stuff that could happen here –even some involving gerudos taking a firm stand against him while still reconnecting with their past and the choices they made once. This is my hope with the title of the game: Tears of the Kingdoms. Let’s examine them all, account for the damage, and decide how we move forward from there with the full knowledge of where we come from.

What I am afraid of (and I already made posts about that) is the scenario where gerudos rallying against Ganondorf, which I expect will forcefully try to take back his place as their king, is used for cheap feminist points that completely fail to examine, well. Everything mentioned above. Where reality bends itself out of the way of the Goddesses, and hylians’ responsibility in any of this mess, so that everything bad is 100% Ganon’s fault and so he must be cast aside and torn away from the Cool Gerudo Girls and this is 100% justified and deserved because we are Independent Women Who Take No Shit from No Men (unless they are the king of Hyrule or any random hylian they wish to marry apparently).

I’ll say this here because it’s been burning my mouth every time I see discourse about Ganondorf and the gerudo: gerudos declared him as their king. To make a really bad comparison that I dislike: he didn’t run around to assemble girls and make a cult around himself, he was born with the cult already formed around him (and it’s not a cult, it’s just a different mode of governance –hylians also revere the Royal Family like gods, don’t they?). This heavily changes the dynamics at play. Not to remove any agency from him to do a little invasion about it, but chances are the ancestors to BotW’s gerudos fully expected him to behave in this way, at least to a degree –in OoT you see very plainly that they value physical prowess, feats of thievery, witchcraft and general violence. It’s more complicated than him being a Bad and making the poor helpless women go along with the plan uwu –even taking the brainwashing into account, AND Koume and Kotake counting as gerudos too, even if they might not be not fully innocent in shaping the culture and the man himself. If manipulation and forced servitude is the explanation given, I’ll be genuinely mad –because, once more, all the nuance and messiness would be flattened for the sake of making Ganondorf Bad and the gerudo Good (= on hylians’ side).

It bears to be said: I think feminism stances that require, not to criticize (which is fair), but to fully dehumanize and bestialize men of color to make any sense are uhhh bad, and it's worth questionning who they end up serving in the end.

The flip side of this would be to make Ganondorf a poor little meow meow that was secretly controlled by the evil Demise all along, and... I’ll be real. I really don’t think it solves our problem at all. It might even make it worse.

My problem with how gerudos have been handled thus far, being mostly connected to how they behave in relation to hylians Good, is that they’ve been systematically defanged not to threaten the status quo as much as they used to. I think it’s pretty clear why I’m not a fan of Ganondorf being a mere victim of cosmic circumstances; I have a post that goes more in depth about this, but to simplify: my man has legitimate grievances. To make him a mere puppet to Evil Incarnate would, to me, be just another attempt to erase the despotism of the Goddesses, the unjust hierarchy of the world, what hylians have historically done to the races they were in conflict with (looking at the Yiga for the most recent example…)

I’m not saying his fight is clean or even legitimate, that he isn't driven by his own sense of self-importance above anything else, or that he should win (he has no plan beyond domination and victory, that's not a future). But I think there’s something really important about having someone being willing to fully consume himself and everything around him for the simple fact that someone should resist the order of the world. Even if that makes him a heartless, cruel, and egomaniac demon-pig. Even if there’s no Hyrule left to rule. Even if his own people despise him, or are long gone and forgotten.

Is it a little heart-wrenching? Uhh yes to me yes most definitively. This is why Wind Waker Ganondorf hits so hard, and remains (I think) his favorite entry in the series so far. But… I still find this fate of eternal resistance more resonant and empowered, and far less grim, than if Hyrule’s lore absorbs his hatred and rage, gives it to another entity that would be Badder (= more opposed to hylians and the goddesses), and scrubs it off anything icky and uncomfortable, rendering it completely domesticated and non-threatening to hylian domination; rubbed of his skin color, of his complexity, of his own emotions, even made... kind of sexy now, in the same way his sisters have been made before him? I am very, very afraid of him being turned from furious and an unapologetic subject in his own legend to a "redeemed" (according to whom??) and palatable object in somebody else’s, that you now end up having to… save from himself.

Again, I want to trust that Tears of the Kingdom can walk that line and preserve everything sharp and contrasting and profound and thrilling about this fascinating setup. I don’t expect a philosophy course, this is a game for children –but it doesn’t mean Nintendo didn’t do an astounding job with similar setups in the past. Again, I’ll invoke the Wind Waker conflict, but Twilight Princess did a lot of great things as well (Zant’s speech, if you can get past the weird stretches and stumping and NNHYAAAs, is pretty fantastic) –and the subtle writing of Majora’s Mask is also proof enough this series can be complex without being impermeable.

So this is where my hope lies. Not really with BotW’s writing, which, I’m sorry to say, but I found to be below what the series has done in the past (I have no problem with the setup and how the story is explored, I think it was a great idea, but wasn’t ever sold on the actual writing the way I may have been with previous titles –it felt… very tropey to me overall, with a couple of highlights). But Nintendo has shown to know how to write compelling stories for children that know where to sprinkle its darkness and how to preserve its hope, and this is this side I’m relying on for this delicate storyline moving forward.

And now? Now… I suppose we wait and see.

(thank you for reading my impossibly long essay what the actual hell, at least I got it all out of my system, see you in part 2 for when TotK comes out I suppose aaa)

[randomfoggytiger]

React: A Late-Canon Reviler Gives the Revival a Try (My Struggle I), Part I

For David Duchovny’s birthday, I put out a poll asking Tumblr which of his projects I should watch for the first time. 

The Revival won. Welp. 

I then, fool that I am, put up another poll wherein I doomed myself by including an option to watch the whole thing. 

And here we are. 

My Struggle I. 

Oh, boy. 

This post will be long because I'm laying the groundwork for the rest of the series.

MY MODUS OPERANDI

I don’t care how cute or cuddly or happy or heartfelt individual MSR moments are, popcorn will be thrown if those scenes are achieved through incomplete, inane, or nonsensical plot points. Give me 1+1=2 or give me death.

The Revival is part of a whole that includes all of Seasons 1-9 and Fight the Future and I Want to Believe. As much as I prefer to distance this series from canon, the reality that it functions as a direct follow-up remains; and it needs to be judged accordingly.

And, as always, I separate the art from the artist~.

...WELP. It’s time to face my doom. 

Let's go!

MY STRUGGLE IV

The intro’s… fine. Engaging, even. 

I did notice, though: the last series and Fight the Future and I Want to Believe began with the same formula: glimpses from what will be an x-files case, then straight to Scully’s perspective. Usually Mulder’s narration and POV didn’t feature until the tail-end of a two or three parter, i.e. Redux or Amor Fati or… well, even then, it was juxtaposed against Scully’s. 

Scully was the voice of The X-Files-- even Chris Carter noted that her report of each episode’s casefile became a motif of the show. Mulder’s narration was rare, very rare, even in episodes that were written to focus on him. 

A definite and purposed choice, to be sure. Mulder as an active agent in his own story. …OR a story that focuses on Mulder’s voice instead of Scully’s. 

We shall see. 

The intro continues; and it’s still engaging, possibly gripping (too bad I know where this leads)... but the music got a bit LOTR there. Is that just me? Seems… mellow, orchestral, a little more fantasy than sci-fi. Am I nitpicking? Maybe. 

The BIBLE references UFOs?? Lol, no. (Unless you count the objects described in Revelations-- the book, not the episode-- but even then, those are largely considered to be drones, not UFOs.)

Chris Carter, I see you. 

(Note from the future: NOW I see why the Bible bit was included-- lots of heavy-handed "God means this, Scully" in order to get her on-board to join the files. Ugh.)

…They’re really doubling down on the UFO lore, huh. All of which evaporated because of global warming, I guess. 

GUYS, why couldn’t this have been about life on Earth after Colonization?????

It fits with the disaster footage, it fits with Mulder’s voiceover, it fits with the character progression from Season 9 (I GUESS), it fits with a whooooooooooole ton of other factors. 

I’ve never been one for wanting Colonization in canon, but it literally would have worked for this series. There wouldn't need to be a complete wipeout of humanity, maybe just a “disaster happened, but the humans are fighting back” scenario. 

And that would fit with Mulder and Scully’s "breakup", PERHAPS-- they spent so much time working, trying to save the world (she in science, he on the ground or with untainted factions who coalitioned post-Colonization) that their relationship cracks would need to be actively worked through. Not broken up so much as together and repairing.

It would also help CC and co. to avoid the tempest of modern US politics and the more mainstream conspiracies that were taking hold at that time-- a broader reach to all audiences, a "bigger picture" for everyone to unite under.

(Guys, they should have let me write for this show. …I take it back, I’d have quit after three days.) 

Also: The show writers spent all their brain power on this sequence and this sequence alone, didn’t they? 

Obiwan Kenobi and Military Man are going on a bus somewhere.  

...On closer inspection, neither man looks like anything like Obiwan Kenobi, but the nickname is staying.

We’re back to Scully at a hospital-- not unlike I Want to Believe’s opening.

Skinner called? Oh. Didn’t know he was “here” this early. 

WAIT. 

Wait, wait, wait. 

Scully just called up Mulder like nothing’s a big deal? He answered like nothing’s a big deal? She’s smiling over his joke from the get-go?

…And we’re supposed to believe they’re seriously broken up. Which the show will insist is the case. 

David and Gillian really said, “Script? What script?” and did what they wanted. I salute them. 

Also, “What’s happening out there, Scully?” is a great line to point to Mulder’s continued isolation… which the series will IMMEDIATELY toss aside because he’s, apparently, not been as much of a hermit lately? (Granted, this could be a joke at his own expense because he’s no longer claimed by ~the darkness~, but…. I don’t think the writing’s gonna be that clever, I’ll be honest.)  

Siiiiiiiiiiiiiiiigh. 

Fine, I admit it. 

I’m loving this so far. 

And that’s gonna make me even angrier later on. 

“Why doesn’t he [Skinner] just call me?”

“He doesn’t know how to reach you, Mulder. I barely know myself.”

Mulder is baffled and a tinge annoyed, Scully is amused and straight shooting. 

THERE IS NO HINT, BEHAVIOR, OR MANNERISM SUGGESTING THEY’VE BROKEN UP. None. At all. He’s isn’t reluctant to answer her call, isn’t sad or withdrawn, isn’t affected by anything she’s saying other than to be teasy or poky. She isn’t hesitant to call, isn’t sad or depressed, isn’t anything other than a little pleased to dangle a juicy tidbit in front of Mulder’s face. 

This is gonna follow IWTB’s ping-pong writing-- they’re fun and in-character, they’re suddenly out-of-character, they’re fun and in-character, they’re suddenly out-of-character, etc. etc. etc.-- isn’t it?

(Mulder taping over his laptop’s webcam is a great touch and not something at all that I’ve done before. At all.) 

“I thought you were done with UFOs-- the ‘stranglehold they put on your very existence’, I believe you put it.” 

“I’m just the messenger, Mulder.”

That’s GOOD, that’s necessary writing. That’s planting the seeds of what happened between them, what led to a cooldown or a breakup or a whathaveyou. AND STILL neither character acts as if they’ve broken up: no melancholy, no sadness, no nothing. 

Mulder’s timbre became a little sardonic while quoting back her words, but that doesn’t mean they’ve broken up. If anything, that points to a bicker and line-in-the-sand between them-- him bringing up UFOs at the dinner table and her reminding him to talk to someone else about it before turning the topic to how the lettuce is growing or something.

Neither actor is performing like one would if pain and trauma and heartbreak and distance were placed between them; and that really complicates things because the breakup is built on top of the aforementioned list of struggles. 

Would Mulder have dug his heels in post 2012, seeing it as a sign that “the aliens” just changed their plans? Yes. 

Would Scully have seen a pursuit down that rabbit hole as a waste of time? Debatable. The Truth S9 Scully wouldn’t have-- the aliens are still out there; and they cost her months of her life, months of Mulder’s abduction, months of Mulder’s death, months of Mulder’s separation, and the ultimate cost: William’s adoption and their life on the run. Post The Truth Scully would have seen this as her quest, too: she won’t give up, she says in the finale, because he won’t. 

IWTB Scully, however, would- and that's a problem. 

I’ve already discussed, at length, how out-of-character Scully was in I Want to Believe (posts here.) Although Mulder doesn’t escape from the same writing blunders, she is really, really scalped: of her courage, of her will, of her determination. 

Whenever Scully gave up, in canon, it was only because she thought she was holding Mulder back, or when she felt Mulder had lost his faith and trust in her. That held true in Season 9-- despite the appalling writing choices there, too-- but didn’t in IWTB. 

The Revival had the perfect opportunity to factory reset the writers' mistakes: portray a wiser duo who continue to fight the fight according to their strengths, like they always have before Mulder ever met Scully. (When Mulder tells Scully to set up a meeting with Skinner, he adds, “Don’t pretend I’m going alone”-- which reinforces my point.) 

But I know that's not going to happen.  

Scully goes without argument-- THAT’S GOOD, THAT’S GOOD CHARACTER WRITING. At this point in the game, of course she would-- they trust each other, they have for years, they’d have reached even deeper levels after going on the run for [insert math] years. All good things! 

The problem: this will create a huge conflict with her actions later.

(I’m already so disappointed.) 

“Uber?”/”Hitchhiking. Relax, Scully, I’m kidding” was a fun modernization of their humor, I’ll take it. 

This scene is starting to highlight the distance between them, which is all well-and-good, but feels tonally different from the previous scene. As in, their two scenes were definitely filmed on different days, in different moods, and with different intents. 

She’s worried about him, with tears in her eyes; he has his walls up; there’s distance, as previously noted. 

“Good for you to get out of that little house every once in a while”/”Certainly was good for you” is followed up with knowing, indulgent, pleased smiles and you expect me to believe these two are seriously broken up. Nope. I’ve seen Scully sad but amused, I’ve seen Scully too sad to be amused, but these two? This moment? Nah.

Tonally dissonant-- the IWTB problem: at-ease and close one minute, at-odds and distant the next. Hoorayyyyyy....

None of this makes sense for a long-term, permanent (as Scully infers later to someone else) breakup. Nor for a short-term, semi-permanent one. Math doesn’t math. 

“I’m always happy to see you,” she says, implying he's the one who permanently pulled away… which will be contradicted later this very episode. 

“I’m always happy to find a reason [to leave the house],” he says, somberly. 

Both of which are odd lines. 

If he’s happy to leave the house to see her… why hasn’t he? 

If she’s happy to see him, always, but says a relationship between them was "impossible" (which she will later), why is Scully staring at him with heart eyes, hoping he gets better so they can continue their relationship? (And mark my words, this tone underscores her interactions with him the rest of this series.) 

Tad’s here. He’s... fine. He represents the overly cautious very well. At least he hasn’t gone full Alex Jones mockumentary (...yet.) 

I’ve heard criticisms that Mulder and Scully don’t act like themselves in this series, but based off the few minutes I’ve seen here… I don’t agree. 

The essence is the same. Truly. Scully’s got the same face that lights up the same way, Mulder’s got the same expressions and young-at-heart humor. Neither are really melancholic. Neither are David or Gillian esque. 

Perhaps that will change. 

(Note from the future: OH BOY. Which Mulder and Scully are we talking here-- OG Mulder and Scully? Nope. IWTB Mulder and Scully? Yep. David and Gillian? Once or twice.)

But, again, their interactions feel… wasted. Hollow. They’re supposed to be broken up, but their breakup doesn’t contribute to their interactions or the plot. They’re supposed to have suffered and are working back to each other… but they aren’t really separated, haven’t seemed to suffer (note from future: except for one scene which comes outta nowhere), and won’t collapse back together on-screen.

They’re supposed to be wiser and more mature, but they’ll still engage in a silly will-they-won’t-they while Mulder eats up the latest UFO or conspiracy slop he’s either already engaged in or debunked [insert math] years ago and Scully clings to her cowardice like a leech. 

First nagging problem: Scully smiling at Tad, Scully excusing Mulder’s mannerisms when he becomes briefly jealous, Scully making nice with a conspiracy nut. 

…Isn’t that Mulder’s job? Didn't she leave because conspiracies were consuming her life? Does this mean she actually does want this life back but is she playing coy or elusive because...?

Furthermore, when Mulder popped a comment off to a witness or informant in the past, Scully never excused him-- just breezed over it professionally with another question. She’s only saying “excuse him” here because she’s taken a shine to Tad. WHY, on this post-2012 global warming green Earth, WOULD SHE?

Tad says Mulder is the X-Files, Mulder says that “book is closed”... WAIT. Wait, hold up--

Pause. Stop. Rewind. 

Mulder wants to believe. Actual proof is hard to come by. 

Tad thinks Mulder is the X-Files. 

MULDER SAYS… *ahem*... Mulder says, “I’m afraid that book is closed.” …Which means he’s no longer into UFOs or aliens, too. SO. why did Scully LEAVE.

If that’s behind him, why aren’t they together again???? Mulder didn’t know who Tad O’Malley was a minute or so ago, meaning he’s been outta the conspiracy scene for a bit. That MEANS his departure from Conspiracyville's been long enough to patch-up his obsession and ensuing depression, I guess.

But then... what about Scully??

Because Mulder wants her to come back (already subtly established in each scene), and Scully is concerned for his welfare; but Scully thinks he’s still into UFO conspiracy and hasn’t come back because of it? BUT SHE ISN’T SHOCKED WHEN HE SAYS “I’m afraid that book is closed” MEANING SHE KNOWS HE’S PUT THAT BEHIND HIM... BUT STILL HASN’T RETURNED?

And both of them aren’t acting as if they’ve broken up, anyway, except for a pointed line of dialogue here and a brief reaction there before they yeet back to the status quo.

They’ve left that behind them, Scully says, for better or worse. And Mulder latches onto that better or worse, making a pointed barb at their breakup, but…. There’s no writing glue, just suggestion and inference; and the suggestions themselves don’t add up. 

Here come the bullet points. 

Season 10 posits Mulder became depressed after the aliens didn’t invade in 2012-- that’s reasonable and logical, his nature is depressive when his expectations are subverted or smashed or etc. 

Season 10 also posits Scully left because Mulder became too much to deal with. That’s… not logical, since her nature is to rescue and nurture, even when Mulder’s being an actual boil on her sittin’ cheeks (ala Demons, etc., etc.) 

Season 10 posits Mulder’s hard to get a hold of-- despite being in the same house the FBI helicoptered to in IWTB-- and posits it might be hard for Scully to get a hold of him-- despite the fact both characters easily got in contact, knew it was each other, and even joked about the fact it’s hard to get in contact with Mulder… which means it really isn't. (The script doesn’t catch these discrepancies, of course, pretending Mulder is very hidden away at the same ol' house he'd been discovered at in 2008.) 

Season 10 says Scully doesn’t want UFOs to be part of her life anymore, that it was a stranglehold… yet she came along on a conspiracy gig without question to… what? Be around Mulder? But then, why warm up to the conspiracy guy-- an embodiment of what drove her and her partner apart?

Season 10 posits Mulder chased Scully off with his conspiracy spiraling YET ALSO states he’s put that part of his life-- conspiracies, UFOs, the X-Files-- behind him. Which implies: A. Mulder’s aaaaaaall better now and B. he put that all behind him but Scully never came home and C. Scully shouldn’t know he put that all behind him if that’s what’s keeping her away; but she does know because his declaration doesn’t take her by surprise, which means she’s still driven away and concerned for him for no discernable reason.  

Season 11 posits Scully didn’t leave because Mulder became too much to deal with but because she, too, had issues to deal with. This point wasn't mentioned or hinted at in the episode that introduces their breakup, which makes that line of reasoning a complete rewrite. (Whatever. I’ll judge how well that’s executed when I get there.)

It doesn’t add up. 

Are we surprised. 

Five seconds after this, I had to listen to a back-and-forth between Tad O’Malley and Mulder on conspiracies and Conservatives and alien beliefs and the O’Reilly Factor and….

This seems out of touch, I’m not sorry. 

When this show aired, Conservatives already had their miles-long conspiracy theories. For Mulder to be ignorant of that fact while allegedly knowing exactly who and what Tad believes while also alleging….

More bullet points!

Fox “I’m afraid that book is closed” Mulder has, supposedly, been out of the conspiracy scene. 

Fox “I’m afraid that book is closed” Mulder isn’t aware that not only did 2015 Conservatives believe in aliens-- despite the fact Tad is a watered-down copy-paste of Alex Jones-- but that there were also Conservative believers in the 90s (who were a fringe in their own group, but.) This was Mulder’s expertise; and his eidetic memory isn’t likely to have tossed that info because it was no longer relevant to his life. 

Fox “I’m afraid that book is closed” Mulder has supposedly not been out of the conspiracy scene-- despite saying he is-- because he does know who Tad O’Malley is-- despite not knowing who he was two minutes ago. 

Mulder is assuming that Conservatives “of your credentials” don’t believe in UFOs or “9/11 false-flag conspiracies” despite people from the Left, Center, and Right publicly believing those conspiracies in 2015. 

Fox “I’m afraid that book is closed” Mulder is supposed to be dismantling Tad’s grift; but he (and the writers) sound uneducated and incredibly out-of-touch during this dialogue-- as if all Conservatives were still Bush-era believers. Most were suspicious of the government by this time (they helped elect a man who ran on a “drain the swamp” campaign, after all.) Mulder’s bewilderment here is old and tired, even by 2015 standards. 

This writing is flashy-- long sentences, quick back-and-forths-- but poorly constructed and badly executed. 

This is also the first segment where David Duchovny is peeking through Fox Mulder; where Scully is swinging wildly between absolutely-fine-with-Mulder and we’re-no-longer-together; and where we, the audience, are being force-fed that only one side of the political aisle believes in aliens-- or the Bigger Question or whatever-- on a show that wants to poke at unfounded conspiracy beliefs.

Oh, look! Scully made a Scully-face, so everything’s good now! 

(UuuuuuuuUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGH--)

Sveta. Aww, I like her--

“You don’t remember me.”

“No, I think I’d remember.”

WHAT WAS THAT. 

Show writers, STOP with the romantic triangulation, it’s NOT. GONNA. HAPPEN. David doesn’t even TRY to make that romantic-ish. Yet you angle on Scully’s face as if she’s supposed to be out-of-the-loop and a tinge jealous. 

WAIT, WAIT, WAIT, hoooooooooooooooooooold up. 

Svetta was a dark-haired little girl Mulder interviewed after her first abduction, meaning she’s set up to be another Samantha. 

So…………………. What’s with the murky jealousy issue, CHRIS. You wedged it in solely so Scully would feel jealous over Mulder? Y’know. Like I Want to Believe? 

And I say Chris Carter because he wanted to play the breakup angle:

"We do it in an interesting way," Carter told The Hollywood Reporter. "We put some of the tension back in that was relieved by them being together. It added to the storytelling opportunities. It's something that I came up with; I had been thinking about it. There was always talk of [breaking them up] if we did another movie."

The first shot canon takes right between the eyes:

Scully being “familiar” with the “screen memories” abductees are given was a cool touch… except she’s never been given “screen memories.” The abductees in Jose Chung’s From Outer Space were given screen memories-- she was returned a blank slate. (Even Mulder didn’t have “screen memories” after his abduction.) 

Scully poking Sveta about aliens taking her unborn fetuses seems a tad (heh) strong except all the alien-related pregnancies have been the result of government testing, not alien probes. So. If this scene followed canon's rules, her skepticism would be warranted.

But this skepticism is still odd. 

Two seconds ago, she was making nice to Tad O’Malley in the car, and now she’s leading the questioning for Sveta. The odd icing on top of this odd cake is that Scully left because she didn’t want UFOs to have a stranglehold on her life, yet here she is leading an interview with an abductee.

Sveta: “I have alien DNA, for sure.”

Scully: “Have you had a doctor confirm that?”

Sveta: “No.”

Me, too, Mulder. Me, too. 

Scully doesn’t question the alien DNA bit, so that’s good. 

…I’ll bet everyone forgets she and Mulder have a bit lingering in their systems from the black oil and his brain thingy and residue from when she touched the ship and and and. 

“Something you can test. Dana.” 

What… what was that. 

Honestly, what was that. Whatever mood David was conveying through Mulder, it didn’t match anything from any previous scenes, let alone this one.

Is he poking at Scully? Why? He’s not jealous anymore (if he even was.) The way he says it and her expression in response implies they have a tense back-and-forth going on, but they don’t. THEY DON’T. 

We’re 13 minutes in and I could make another numerical list. But I won’t. Yet.  

Back to not-Obiwan Kenobi and Military Man. 

That alien’s stupid bad-looking. 

Wait. 

That’s not how canon said Roswell unfolded. 

And the first alien shot on Earth was by Deep Throat’s hands-- that was his whole turning-point backstory. 

CURSE YOU, LACK OF A SHOW BIBLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

(Note from the future: All of that past canon? Fake. Faked. All lies. None of that happened.)

“What have you done??” Not-Obiwan Kenobi yells… and what have they done? 

Back to Scully and Sveta. 

Sveta can move things with her mind-- not all the time-- but at least Scully is listening to her claims without automatically shutting them down. 

But also…

“I can move things. With my mind,” should have IMMEDIATELY had a greater impact on Scully, up-close-and-personal as she was to her son’s abilities. But nope! No reaction! Of course! 

Sveta “You were together but now you’re not” is asking the right questions. I don’t even mind Sveta. I’ll bet this episode’s the last time we see her, though. 

Does she contribute to anything? No. But she’s nice, so. 

WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIT, WAIT, WAIT. 

Scully diagnosed-- wait, hold up, list time. 

Scully diagnosed Mulder with depression. 

That killed their relationship. 

…THAT killed their relationship? After everything? 

The writers are going to have to explain, in detail, why that killed it. 

Why does canon need to explain? Because we have a history of Scully sticking by Mulder during the worst periods of both their lives-- leaving him would have to require a very, very good reason.

And there is no indication, thus far, that Mulder’s depression drove a humungous wedge between them, forcing her to walk away. In fact, there is no indication a wedge exists between them, AT ALL-- only the odd, inconsistent word or phrase here or there that bears no weight on the plot or their ultimate decisions.

Whenever Scully left in canon, it was because she could no longer help Mulder. Season 11 will rewrite Season 10’s initial explanation but setting that aside: we’re not given any indication that she did try to help him; or that his depression was so deep and so dangerous that it drove her away.

And if it were that deep or that dangerous enough to drive her away, Scully leaving would have been the last and worst possible action she could have taken. If Mulder's mental state was in such a massive nose-dive that she couldn’t handle what he was going through, Scully-- a medical professional-- would have had him hospitalized, even temporarily against his will, because she would know (per Demons or Gethsemane or Amor Fati) that this level of depression always manifested in suicidal tendencies for her partner.

But Mulder, as per the rules laid out in this episode, never went that far in his deterioration. (Note from the future: We'll get to that.)

If he had, Skinner would have been aware of his hospitalization and wouldn’t have asked for his help; Scully would have been aware and wouldn’t have passed on the information; and Scully wouldn’t have called from the hospital with a degree of buoyancy when relaying Skinner's request to Mulder. 

In short: Scully leaving = very big, very drastic measure. Mulder suffering from depression = very big, very bad consequences. Scully's nature and past actions = getting Mulder help, even if he resists at first (i.e. shooting him in the shoulder to save his life.) Mulder and Scully's partnership = unbroken, except through distrust or botched writing.

“And you have a child together.”

Wow, that wasn’t clunky at all. 

SCULLY STICKS SVETA HARD WITH A NEEDLE BECAUSE SVETA MENTIONS WILLIAM, darkly saying "That's enough", SO SVETA WOULD KNOW SHE DID IT ON PURPOSE.

I’m… so disgusted. Like, eck. Urk. Awful. 

Telling Sveta to back off, strongly, would be in-character; USING PAIN TO DO SO is…. So wrong on so many levels. Scully never utilized medicine to inflict pain or injury on her enemies.

Wow, this grossed me out. You know why?

Scully diagnosed Mulder with depression and left. At first glance, that seem like an out-of-character action that the writing can salvage later by this or that means.

BUT THEN, Scully inflicts pain on Sveta for mentioning William, leaving the audience with the impression that she’s vindictive. 

Which then connects the dots between “vindictive” and “left Mulder when he was diagnosed with depression.”

And since we, the audience, haven’t been given a stronger reason for how Mulder’s depression got that bad or why she didn’t help him through it, we’re then left with a sour impression of Scully’s character. 

The writers then try to imply Sveta was spilling out Scully’s personal secrets to prove that her powers were real, but that still doesn’t give Scully the right to abuse her power. Especially because a traumatized woman was trying any method possible to be believed.

And the fact that Sveta is also victim of the government weaponizing science and medicine makes me even angrier at Scully.

Ohhhhhhhhhhhh, BOY, another helicopter outside the Unremarkable House, my favorite part of IWTB....

Mulder’s never seen… an alien replica vehicle. 

Oh, my mistake: “No. Never. Not like that.” Covering all the bases, I see. Y’know, in case the writers FORGOT MULDER SAW ONE in SEASON 1, EPISODE 2. 

OH, LOOK, he’s got his wonder face back, everything’s aaaaaaaaaaaaall better now!

Running on free energy they’ve had since the 40s, sure Jan. Whatever you say. 

This just feels so old. Like. Tech we haven’t had since the 40S, GUYS, GET IT, BIG MONEY CORPOS KEPT IT FROM US. Yeah, we got it. 

And the flashbacks to Not-Obiwan Kenobi just walking off with an alien corpse because Military Man didn’t… see… value in studying… it. I guess. 

Scully doing “God’s work” giving kids ears because their biology neglected it.

I admit, that’s an intriguing window into her perspective of God vs. science, and how she sees a person’s biology separate from God messing them over or messing them up just because. I dig it.

(Note from the future: This will be used as a plotline club rather than a nuanced discussion of her faith.)

Mulder being the most challenging relationship she’s ever had-- “and the most impossible”-- is a weird line. Because yes, it’s true that their relationship is challenging; but her fervor at impossible is the only time in this episode we see an adversarial tendency, DESPITE My Struggle I trying to drum up moments to prove TENSIONS still LINGER (they don't.) 

It’s IWTB all over again. Siiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiigh. 

“Yeah. I got that impression.” Tad says, and Scully’s hurt because she thinks Mulder gave Tad that impression of her. 

So. So. Wait. 

Scully lied when she stated “It’s impossible” because she didn't like Tad poking into her private affairs?

But she sounded truly convinced their relationship was "impossible" while saying it.

So, she was either angry or still confused about her emotions-- which is fine, Scully's not always in-tune with her inner workings-- when Tad replied, "I got that impression."

Which explains why she was so hurt at Mulder's seeming rejection.

Because she thinks Mulder’s behavior led Tad to that conviction.

Which means CC just wants Mulder and Scully to be caught in a miscommunication fic.

Also, why is Tad so sad about this? Were they his OTP, or is he pretending to sympathize to get in Scully’s pants? Because that’d be crummy, Chris, to have her be overly nice to Tad only for him to try to twist that into an opening as the new conspiracy guy on the block. 

On a lighter note, Chris Carter said Mulder and Scully could still get it in their 50s, so there’s that.

HE DID, HE DID SET SCULLY UP TO BE PURSUED BY TAD--

WHAT. WHAT. WHAT WHAT WHAT--

KNOCK IT OFF, CHRIS. 

Poor Sveta. She’s gonna be butchered in this script, isn’t she?

The series is EATING up vast amounts of time with very little scale or grounding. For all I know, a day or a week could have passed. 

It’s so, so badly paced. 

Mulder’s investigating now, without Scully, because he noticed Sveta had a tell during the interview. 

Um. 

Sure, that’s a Mulder thing to do.

Oh, wait. This is the “work of men” realization.   

The dialogue between Mulder’s questions and Sveta’s answers are really disjointed, as if they’re mildly talking past each other-- another aspect of IWTB I couldn’t stand. 

Welp, at least it’s easy to prove they were both written by the same people. 

The second shot-in-the-head for canon: 

“Sveta, who took your babies?” 

“Men.”

“Men? Humans? You saw their faces.” 

Also, Sveta’s babies are referred to as her babies, but William-Jackson isn’t Scully’s baby despite sharing half her DNA but Emily Sim was Scully’s baby despite also only sharing half her DNA.

It’s a mess. 

Well… Mulder doesn’t seem too surprised here that men were involved in her abductions (I mean, he's long since been aware the government was involved from day one, so.) It’d be really stupid if the writing made him surprised about this later, wouldn’t it?

…Wouldn’t it?

Another poorly constructed set of lines:

“I haven’t worked for them [the government] in years.” 

“But you always wondered… if they were lying to you, too.” 

No, he didn’t wonder-- he believed it.

A wonky way to address his old skepticisms, for sure. 

JUST AFTER I NOTED THAT MULDER DIDN’T LOOK SURPRISED AT SVETA'S REVELATION, HE CALLS UP SCULLY AND MAKES A BIG DEAL ABOUT IT BEING A CONSPIRACY OF MEN. 

I knew this was coming, but maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan that was so, so poorly handled.

SCULLY WAS GETTING (sort of) WINED AND DINED BY TAD O’MALLEY??????????????

I HATE IT HERE, WHAT ARE YOU DOING, WHAT IS HAPPENING, WHAT IN THE WORLD AND WHY, HOW COULD YOU BE SO EASILY FLEECED, DANA, THIS ISN’T AN ED JERSE PARALLEL BECAUSE YOU THINK MULDER DOESN’T WANT YOU, THIS IS STUPID, THIS IS THIS IS THIS IS

WHAT. 

I thought Scully had dated Tad O’Malley in the past (sometime after the breakup) but this is worsefarworse. 

SVETA IS THE KEY TO EVERYTHING, I’M SO TIRED. 

“Mulder, where are you going?” sounds exactly like Scully, and now I’m mad Gillian didn’t use that voice for the rest of the show (voice recovery aside....)

I KNEW SKINNER WAS BEHIND GETTING THEM BACK. He just calls up Scully to call Mulder up, then just unlocks the old office when Mulder wants to get back in. 110% Skinner thought this would help his buddy Mulder. And he’s not wrong. 

Wait. 

Did Skinner put in more effort to save Mulder from his mental health struggles (per this My Struggle I episode) than Scully??????

Iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii-- my brain is broken. 

The hold on Skinner’s face while he says “Can you tell me what this is about” was way too long. 

Also, don’t try to play coy with me, Skinman. 

Now the camera’s zooming around and losing its “X-Files” feel by being too… modern. 

Skinner telling Mulder to calm down is the only time in canon where I agree with him. Mulder’s just spouting and demanding and not really making clear sense and this is why you don't let Mulder back into his basement without Scully by his side, Skinner-- don’t you remember that lesson?

Skinner telling Mulder to calm down then saying he doesn’t take orders from him only for Mulder to say “Who do you take orders from?”, ugh.

GUYS, THIS WAS RESOLVED IN SEASON. 2. BECAUSE MULDER KNEW MEN WERE BEHIND THE CONSPIRACY SINCE SEASON 1, EPISODE 2; AND SKINNER SINCE SEASON 2, EPISODE ASCENSION.

BECAUSE SKINNER’S ALREADY HAD HIS LOYALTY TESTED AND THIS IS HURTING MY BRAIN MAKE IT END.

I’m not even 25 minutes into this, help. 

“Why do you think I called you? Because I was looking out for you, because I’ve always looked out for you.” Is… is Skinner the only character who’s progressed? That’s exactly what he would do-- he’s acting sensibly, rationally, and in-character... and more mature, more veteran, than his agents.

I know the Revival is supposed to be “Mulder and Scully all grown-up” but none of their actions have been intelligent, measured, or informed by their age or life experience. It’s a farce that I hope future episodes will rectify. 

“A decade of my life--” Mulder rants and kicks his poster like a toddler AND YOU KNEW ALL THIS INFORMATION FROM SEASON 1, MULDER. NONE OF THIS IS NEW. WWWWWWWWWWWWWWHAT IS THIS. 

I can’t imagine how disappointed philes were when they tuned into this episode. Well... I can because of how I feel; but at least I knew, roughly, how bad it would be going in. 

This is worse. 

Skinner: “You’re blaming me for that?”

Mulder: “No, I’m blaming myself. I’m sure they lied to you, too.” 

This isn’t a revelation, chump. 

At least Skinner confirms my theory: “There hasn’t been a day since you’ve left that I haven’t reached for my phone to call you, Mulder, wishing you were still down here.” 

Feral Mulder is touched. 

“Since 9/11--” OH NO, WHY ARE WE GOING THERE “--this country’s taken a big turn and in a very strange direction.”

Guys. Guys. This isn’t… this… what. 

“Now they police us, spy on us, and tell us that makes it safer--” CAN THE WRITERS GET OFF A SOAP BOX FOR FIVE SECONDS. Of course it isn’t safer to be unnecessarily policed or spied on, but the answer isn't just "boo, the government!" What… why… my brain’s melting, I feel it deteriorating. 

This, again, feels so Bush-era. Like, whoever wrote this didn’t update their mentality. 

Also, the camera shots and cuts are weird. Holding too long, zooming out at “pause and take THAT in” moments, focusing on Mulder’s phone while he silently calls up Skinner to prove a point… it’s supremely unsubtle.

Back to Tad, I don’t care. You did this to yourself, Scully, cozying up only to be used as a name drop on his show. Stupid. 

Is Scully gonna be shocked she has alien DNA? She shouldn’t be. 

But then again, Mulder shouldn’t be shocked this has all been a work of men, so. 

She’s expecting-- no, hoping-- for a call from somebody named Mulder. 

Sure, they’re broken up with hard feelings. Sure. Absolutely. 

Is this old man Not-Obiwan Kenobi?  

Of course.

At least Mulder seems old hat at this informant business. 

But of course, he’s “not even close” to putting it all together. 

Stupid. 

WAIT.

The countdown was WRONG-- Mulder states it began, not ended in 2012, meaning he's believed this theory for some time. Meaning... why was he so depressed after 2012? Why are there still depression concerns in 2015?? Seriously, what's with his depression if the 2012 Colonization was allegedly the cause of it but there is no Colonization and the clock's simply been reset????

WHY WAS HE DEPRESSED IF HE RECONFIGURED THE COUNTDOWN. WHAT.

Mulder: "Not by aliens, not with aliens, but by a conspiracy of men--"

“You’re wasting my time.” Tell him, old man Not-Obiwan Kenobi!

“Ten years ago, you came to me--”

Wait, ten years ago? What, 2005? The guy showed up while Mulder was on the run? And Scully never… knew about this?

There were no aliens lighting each other on fire??????????????????? WAIT, I NEVER HEARD THIS INFORMATION. 

THERE WERE NEVER ALIENS, AT ALL???????????????????? Like, AT ALL????? 

The writers are saying that Scully's experience on Ruskin Dam in Season 5 was not two warring alien factions BUT TWO GROUPS OF MEN LIGHTING EACH OTHER ON FIRE, OR GIVING EVERYONE FALSE MEMORIES OF ALIENS LIGHTING EACH OTHER ON FIRE, OR...??????

hONESTLY. 

Let's be real specific for a second: Chris Carter expects us to believe that the ENTIRE mytharc from the original show was ALL faked; that there were no aliens, ZERO, ZILCH; and that CSM and Deep Throat and all the others created elaborate schemes JUST to manipulate MULDER because the aliens weren't a threat from the start????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? DON’T BELIEVE YOUR LYING EYES. THEY WERE ALL MEN IN SUITS.

Like… do you realize how stupid that is? How actually, unfathomably stupid that is? It’s not just “the aliens didn’t invade because of global warming,” no, it’s “they were never a problem to begin with, we just manipulated Mulder into believing they were because… because he’s so important, I GUESS.”

Roswell’s also a smokescreen, of course. 

Y’know how, during the 90s, DD thought The X-Files was a stupid sci-fi show? If he thought each mytharc plot was as bad as this one, no wonder he wanted to bail. 

Oh, by the way, the global warming explanation is part of a theory: the fascist elites will dominate the world and escape from consequences into space, leading the rest of humanity to die by a globally warmed planet. The aliens weren't chased off by global warming because they were never a factor to begin with.

Wow.

I CAUGHT A CONTINUITY ERROR!

Scully shows up at his place in her uniform from yesterday, panicked, like she’d just run from Tad’s side to see what happened despite her saying over a day has passed.

Going to ignore his “What are you doing here, Scully?” because we’ve ping-ponged back to the out-of-character Mulder that the writers use when it’s time to remind everyone he and Scully are broken up. 

It’s IWTB all over again, I’m so tired. 

They’re talking past each other and he’s touching her shoulders now because he needs her to trust him and yadda yadda yadda. 

It’s soooo, sooooo, soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo highschool, I’m sorry. This is Riverdale. This is [insert whatever teen series you want to watch.] These are teenagers masquerading as adults, for the angst.

None of this holds up, their emotions shift left and right without provocation, things just happen, and there is no strand of continuity stringing anything together.

Scully trying to talk Mulder down from further pursuit doesn’t make sense because, AGAIN, she’s the one who's always gone back to the files even when he walks away; and every time he’s given up, or wanted to, SHE'S called him back and held him accountable and kept him going. 

This is the Scully from IWTB with no gumption of her own, who denies her leaps forward because of plot, plot, plot. 

Guys, I’ve been religiously dosing myself with caffeine (via chocolate), but my body keeps trying to make me go to sleep because it’s so uninvested. I don't even need sleep.

“This is my life, this is, this is everything I believe in--” HOW. MANY. TIMES. Has he said this before. WHEN HAS THAT LINE EVER WORKED ON SCULLY.

But that's beside the point: "this" was no longer his life after Amor Fati, by his own choice. Closure brought him closure, but he was already spittin' walk-away talk by Requiem, chose to leave in Vienen, and insisted Scully stay gone in Alone. In Season 9, it was Scully who had to beg him into hiding to pursue the Truth or whatever; and it was Scully who brought him the case in IWTB and Scully who relayed Skinner's request and tagged along both times until she got uncomfy and decided never mind, too hard.

Y’know? This claim gets to me because it’s a lie. A lie so blatant that 90s Mulder would have thrown hands over it, a lie so baseless that it erases his declaration in the hallway:

“I don’t know if I want to do this alone. I don’t even know if I can.” And every time Mulder yells his “THIS IS MY LIFE”, he erases that part of his past, the part that willingly left the files or the big Truth or the next chase to save Scully’s life or to keep her by his side. 

Chris Carter said Mulder and Scully were The X-Files post The Truth… but I guess he keeps conveniently forgetting that. More accurately, he keeps making MULDER forget that, in spite of all evidence in Mulder’s history and personality to the contrary. 

It infuriates me. 

“Tad O’Malley is a charming man--” get outta here. 

Now Scully’s been played the fool so she’s going to think Mulder’s being toyed around with by a social media sociopath. You’re an idiot, Scully. 

You’re an idiot, Mulder. 

You expect us to be idiots, writers. 

Here’s some ham-fisted “Fate” dialogue for you, *ahem*:

Scully: “How do you know he’s not playing you, he’s a player!” (You would know, Scully.) 

Mulder: “He’s a Godsend!”

Mulder’s not a believer in God, BUT this is also supposed to refer to the God conversation Scully and Tad had in the hospital, which will inadvertently make Scully ~believe~ again.

“What are you talking about?” I’m with ya there, Scully. I’m with ya, there. 

Scully’s trying to insist Mulder's on a verge of a breakdown, which… UGH. 

This scene implies Mulder hasn’t had a breakdown or a break from reality YET-- Scully spends the episode constantly concerned for his health and begging him, here, to watch what where he's stepping because he’s on the verge of spiraling. 

Which means he hasn't spiraled, because she's afraid of what would happen to him IF he did.

MEANING that there wasn’t an inciting factor that made her leave: no alcoholism, no outbursts, no nothing. He just became depressed, probably withdrawn, and wouldn’t change; so, she left. 

Do you realize what that means, per this episode? It means Scully ANTICIPATED a breakdown and left BEFORE it happened. Then hoped he’d get better before it did. 

Which breaks the established morals of her character. If she had been able to help, she would have stayed. If she hadn’t been able to help, she would have found another way to help him, even if it involved calling in a third party against his will. Instead, she withdrew and hoped he would get better BEFORE he reached a breaking point-- essentially, leaving him to an impending breakdown while hoping and praying against it.

This makes her decision to leave a mark of weak character-- not because she was a woman who left her depressed husband, but because Dana Scully, whose character we amply know, left. It checks none of the boxes she'd have to clear first before choosing to take one step out the door.

All the fic I’ve read to justify their breakup-- and make no mistake, CC wrote her to say “as your friend” intentionally--  or time apart or whathaveyou had Scully reach a breaking point. Because, of course! That's logical. But here, in canon-- in black and white-- that didn’t happen. 

We, the audience, have to create a plausible scenario in our minds to justify the steps she took. Because. it. Is. not. In. canon (as per this episode.) 

Now Scully’s gonna get jealous of Sveta, I’m so done. Riverdale, uuuuuuuuugh. 

Mulder just lets Scully walk away because Scully thinks he wants Sveta but “Sveta is the key to everything” and if Scully wants to misunderstand that she should have more trust in him, I guess, and I NEED A RESPIRATOR.

He just says “Scully” once  and lets her huff off.  

TAD’S BACK, GO AWAY. 

WAIT, TAD STOPS HER BEFORE SHE LEAVES. 

Mulder: “I would have invited you, Scully, but I didn’t think you would come.” 

That’s…

That’s….

Let’s break down this stupidity: 

Scully shows up. 

Mulder had Sveta in the house because he was calling her and O'Malley for a group meeting. 

When Scully becomes nearly hysterical over his safety, he doesn’t reason with her, just spouts like a lunatic. 

When she misreads the Sveta situation and stomps off, he lets her go with a weak, “Scully"--

--because he knew Tad was right behind her and was pulling in to stop her from leaving. 

Because Tad and Sveta were invited but Scully was not. 

And Scully was not invited because.  

Because she might not show up. 

I’m just preaching to the choir at this point, continuing on. 

Scully gave in, just like that. Guess she’s not leaving, anymore. 

She’s so, so… spineless. Has been since Season 9, has been a BIT since Season 8 (though that was at least justified and kept to a bare minimum.) 

I’m just. So sick of passive Scully. 

I HATE THOSE STINGER NOISES NOW. 

It’s always, “You can't let this information out because these men work in secrecy”/”What is it?”/”You’ll see”; then stinger; then we, the audience, are immediately shown what it is.

No suspenseful build-up.

Tad: “Then why are you [Scully] here?”/”Scully: “Mulder, what are you up to?”/Mulder: *knowing look*/stinger/next scene.

KNOCK IT OFF ALREADY.

“Implanting of alien embryos”-- so Sveta’s babies weren’t her babies. 

So Scully’s baby wasn’t her baby. 

But Emily was her baby but William isn’t. 

Sure, Jan. 

In spite of this information, the Revival will paint William as their son until it doesn’t; despite, again, stating from day one that the alien babies are implanted embryos and not biological babies.

So, these two boneheads should have suspected that William wasn’t theirs, anyway. 

Even though William is theirs because the CSM timeline doesn’t add up, which they would have mathed in their heads by the time little William was snuggled in their arms. 

It’s all so stupid. 

Why does this feel so fearmongery about the government? And I’m not going to sit here and say the government should be trusted-- it has a VERY bad history, I'm aware. But this is “my first conspiracy” level of worldbuilding.  

Did the writers think it was clever to set O’Malley up as a bad actor then reveal he was a good actor, modeling him after the notorious Alex Jones only to point and jeer, “HAH, you assumed! He’s actually on Mulder’s side!” 

Because that’s not genius, that’s laziness. 

Scully only now decides to inform everyone Sveta has no evidence of alien DNA? So, what, she was never going to tell them unless Mulder kept being, what, crazy? 

“They got to her” says Mulder about Sveta, but Scully LITERALLY SAID she had no alien DNA, so what was Sveta supposed to believe???????? That Tad O'Malley wasn't using her for as a hoax???

Mulder ran all the way to her house, or ubered then ran, or whatever… and she’s gone, of course. 

Poor Sveta. 

Tad O’Malley’s Truth Site is gone, oh, noooooo. 

Look, I’ll always be against censorship. But this is sending so many odd and mixed signals that it’s creating craaaaaaaaaaaaazy levels of dissonance. 

Mulder wrote “Don’t Give Up” in Scully's car dust…. 

Riverdale. 

Mulder presents the global warming = no aliens theory? 

I’m so tired. 

WAIT, SCULLY BELIEVES MULDER'S THEORY NOW THAT HER BOY TAD’S BEEN PULLED OFF THE NETWORK. 

“We need to find her [Sveta], Mulder,” Scully insists. 

Hold on, prediction time: Scully only changed her mind because this case now involves her-- i.e. only extending empathy to Christian (a boy that reminded her of William) and not to the string of missing, possibly murdered, women in IWTB.

OF COURSE. Her results for Sveta ended up being wrong AND HER OWN GENOME HAS ALIEN DNA IN IT, TOO. 

You selfish, self-centered clone of Dana Scully. 

Scully truly hasn’t recovered since… Season 9, let’s be real, where she told Mulder to leave then spent the whole year crying over his absence. In IWTB, she brought Mulder a case then left him when he wouldn’t stop his pursuit (to SAVE. LIVES.) And in the Revival, she called Mulder and the gang crazy until her own genome showed alien DNA. 

Hate this, hate this, HATE this. 

Also, yeah, she already knew she had alien DNA in the OG series, moving on.

Oh, and now they get a call from Skinner just when Scully says someone has to stop the bad guys. 

OF COURSE. 

Remember the God convo from earlier, guys???? GOD. FATE. SOMETHINGSOMETHINGSOMETHING. 

You had ONE good idea to explore-- how Scully views God vs. the aberrations of biology-- and then just... used it as a convenient club to beat in the “God/Fate means for us to do this” instead. 

“Scully, are you ready for this?”

“I don’t know there’s a choice.” 

Can’t someone PLEASE just explore her faith with nuance? PLEASE? 

Sveta's DEAD???????? I’M SO MAD, I liked her!

YOU FAILED HER, SCULLY. 

YOU FAILED MULDER, SCULLY. 

WHY DOES SCULLY HAVE TO KEEP FAILING PEOPLE???????????? 

Skipping the CSM scene because I don’t care, the END. 

CONCLUSION

How does Scully’s mischaracterization keep reaching new lows? 

How does Mulder become less wise with age? 

How is Skinner the only mentally mature character here?

I’m so tired.

[lostworldss]

Blades 3 Crack Theory

Hear me out.

In Book 2 during one of Nia’s romance scenes, she mentions praying to Ellara, Nifara, and the Mother of Grey for MC to come back.

Now we saw the Mother of Grey/Ash Empress in Book 2, and we learned all the lore about her, Nifara, and the rest of the old gods. Nifara is likely to be the big enemy for Book 3.

But how much do we know about Ellara?

I am going to preface this by saying that I’m not good at remembering all the lore/history from the lore tablets or whichever, so please correct me if i’m wrong with any of this.

But I don’t remember learning much about Ellara specifically. With Nia’s context here, I thought to believe that Ellara was a deity. Perhaps a New God since the lore tablets spoke of all the Old Gods and she wasn’t included.

After checking Book 2 chapter 8, I verified that Ellara is in fact a New God.

This makes sense, considering that Nia prays to her and she has the Temple near Riverbend named after her that we explored.

Also, in the first chapter of the series, in the very beginning scene showing the battle against the Dreadlord thousands of years ago, we see a character named Ellara speaking with Xaius (Elven king/Other New God). Not much information is given about her in the scene, except for her seemingly being in a romantic relationship with Xaius. According the the choices wiki, she is a battle mage and Xaius second in command.

I’m not sure when exactly Ellara and Xaius became New Gods, was it before or after this battle? I’m not sure if they mentioned it before in Book 1. But either way, we can assume this character is The Ellara.

I’m really hoping Book 3 goes into the lore of the New Gods more, especially after learning about the Old Gods previously. Maybe the New Gods can assist us in fighting Nifara.

But back to the actual theory part. For a brief second, lets pivot to something else.

Who is the only character in the party whose family lineage/parents are unknown? (Kade could technically count maybe, but not him).

Who’s familial background is a complete shot in the dark?

Not MC, they have memories of their parents before the raid on their hometown. They were also given different deeper backgrounds based on their race in Book 2.

It’s Nia. She was adopted by the Church of Light as an infant, and she never knew anything about her actual family.

Now, maybe it’s just a funny coincidence, but does anyone else find it a bit interesting that her last name (Ellarious) sounds very similar to the name Ellara? Hmm.

But perhaps it’s a just simply a coincidence.

We could also assume that Ellara is a mage of light magic, since we know that she was a mage that would presumably be using light magic to counter the shadow magic of the Dreadlord. And we know this was after Nifara already separated the world into Light and Shadow realms, so the elves at this time probably didn’t know about True magic. And if Ellara is a god, she must be really good at it.

Hmm. Is there anyone else we know who’s naturally attuned to magic, maybe light magic specifically?

And just one more thing. What does Ellara look like in that screenshot? What colors is she wearing? She seemed to be dressed in a lot of white and gold, and wearing jewelry. Red hair. Hmm.

If you haven’t guessed my theory that I’m hinting at, here it is:

What if Nia Ellarious is a descendent of/related to Ellara???

And I’ll be honest I remember the name being similar thing being a thought in my mind before but I didn’t put any connection to it in my mind I was just like “oh they both kinda sound similar that’s cool.”

But let me enlighten you on on more thing. The suffix “-ious” in the english language means “having/characterized by/to have characteristics of.”

Nia’s last name literally means “to have the characteristics of Ellara.”

ITS BEEN STARING US IN THE FACE THIS ENTIRE TIME.

Also worth pointing out that when we first met Nia in book 1 chapter 1, where were Scholar Vash and her heading to? The Temple of ELLARA

Like you can’t tell me All of this is a coincidence (it probably is).

[niqosblog]

Gretchen Wieners is 100% Queer: An Analysis

Spoilers for the 2024 Movie!!!!

Analysis under cut!!!

Exhibit A: Her One-sided Crush on Regina

Her solo song (What's Wrong With Me) is very much just a love song. The lyrics are very much blaming herself for her just because she loves Regina too much to blame her. It's a song of unrequited love, and how she is fully aware she's being used. But she won't do anything because it's the Regina George.

If you're still unconvinced, here are the lyrics of Gretchen's song compared to Aaron's (Regina's ex boyfriend) song:

Gretchen:

Aaron:

As you can see, the lyrics are very similar. Aaron sticks to Regina because he actually likes her and wants to impress her. Guess what Gretchen also does...

Not only are these musical numbers back to back on the soundtrack, they are about the same person and their relationship with the singer. This could be pure coincidence but I do have other points to make besides the songs.

Such as this scene:

In the actual show, Gretchen is actually flattered by what Regina said. And she actually takes it to heart. The only reason why she told Regina about Cady's crush on Aaron was because she was slowly replacing her, and she got jealous.

Exhibit B: Jason Weems

Before we start, this is about their toxic relationship which I do not support and I'm only using for an example. And if you try to argue that they aren't toxic and are just a couple that has a lot of playful banter. The 2024 movie changes her love interest as she sees Jason as sleezy.

Gretchen likes Jason in the movie and that goes for the rest of the adaptations by Tina Fey.

But why?

Jason always cheats on her and hits on any girl he sees. Yet Gretchen keeps going back to him. It's assumed that he only does this to make Gretchen jealous. But he already has her wrapped around his finger, so why bother. Maybe he's just good at pleasing her, but that's not the case.

In a deleted scene in 2004 Mean Girls, Karen and Gretchen have a conversation about Jason. Gretchen saying it's 'the night for [her] and Jason' for Karen to say that they've already done it twice. But Gretchen says that tonight she's going to 'like it'.

This means, the two other times they've had sexual interactions she didn't like having it with him. And why she didnt like it goes unexplained. This ties back to Regina. Like Regina, Jason ignores Gretchen a lot. Much as far as to step over her at Cady's party in the movie when she falls to the floor while drunk. Yet Gretchen still craves attention from him and expects calls and texts back.

She has only shown this behavior toward Jason and two other character. Those characters are Regina and Cady. She yearns for Regina's attention while she's queen bee. When she and Karen go to another room, Gretchen asks to be let in. This leads to the 'What's Wrong With Me' musical number. She loves being with Regina and treasures every little interaction, even if it's through a door.

Now, when Cady is queen bee, she does the same thing. She asks her to make plans so they can hang out. And when she refuses, she uses Cady's crush (Aaron) as a reason to make plans. She's desperate to hang out with Cady and is at her every beck and call.

This could just be Gretchen sucking up to authority, but it's still very similar to how she is with Jason, her on-and-off boyfriend.

Exhibit C: Her Questionable Relationship With Karen

In every adaptation, Gretchen seems to always have a positive relationship with Karen. Which is the only character within the Mean Girls universe she has a positive relationship with (unless you count the Walmart ads as lore and consider her husband to be a character). They have many scenes to the point that TV Tropes considers them to be 'Heterosexual Life-Partners'.

Link:

But from what we know, the two don't have a set love interest. Unlike Cady and Regina who are Betty and Veronica to Aaron's Archie. Their onscreen relationships go as follows from the movie-musical-movie musical

Gretchen: Jason (movie), no one (musical), Kevin (movie musical)

Karen: Seth (kind of), no one, unnamed theater boy

These two do not have a set relationship with boys. Guess which other character this applies to.

Janis Ian or any other variation of her last name.

Janis was only written as straight once. In the 2004 movie with Kevin G. The other adaptations however...

In the musical, her sexuality is left ambiguous but she's single by the start and end of it. And BWW, her Broadway actress, says that she played Janis as queer. Then in the 2024 movie, she's a canonical lesbian and takes her girlfriend to Spring Fling. Meaning that Janis' relationship adaptations looks like this:

Janis: Kevin, no one, unnamed girlfriend

This is very similar to Gretchen and Karen's adaptations relationships. And when we consider how Tina wrote most of these adaptations we can conclude that Janis was at least queer when she first wrote her. And the same should go for Gretchen and Karen.

And the musical and 2024 movie put some interesting moments between them.

This isn't even the half of it, I've heard they've done a gay thigh touch in some productions.

Mind you, the second photo was during Spring Fling after dumping Jason.

As you can see they don't exactly have a straight relationship. Not to say they both are gay and should have been canon in the 2024 movie hahahahaha.. But the two have very obvious chemistry and love each other. Whether platonic or romantic.

And in an interview, Avantika, Karen's 2024 actress, says that Karen is pansexual. And from this analysis, we can say that at the very least Gretchen is some form of queer. Whether it's bi, pan, unlabeled, or even if you headcanon her as lesbian and think of Jason as her beard.

At the end of the day, it's your decision to believe me or not. But it is 3:09 right now (sorry for any typos), and I've been meaning to make this post ever since I saw the 2024 movie in theaters.

Remember, this is all analysis through a queer lens. You can still think of her as straight, or think of the adaptations having different sexuality. I don't want to force what I think onto anyone that they don't believe in. This is just a post by a silly gay person.

[raayllum]

I’m sorry how is arc 2 not about aaravos? Everything about the show leads back to aaravos. The whole lore of the show is centered around aaravos. And it is absolutely titled the mystery of aaravos because it does plan on dealing with the mystery of aaravos in every possible way, and that has infact been confirmed by the showrunners on multiple instances. Aaravos is just as, if not more of a main character than rayllum in the ways that count because everything going on revolves around him. 

And since he’s an EXTREMELY important character, how is it not justified for fans of him to want more screen time of him? 

I’m sorry but not everything about the show revolves around rayllum and you shouldn’t call people out just for wanting to see more of their favorite character.

God forbid something about aaravos is actually about aaravos and not rayllum for once 💀💀

Actually I can and do call people out for wanting to see more of their favourite character when it causes them to be entitled / unfair to the broader story they want to tell. If you haven't been doing those things, then that post wasn't about you, but given the way you put your best foot forward here, I might go out on a limb and guess this might be behaviour you display sometimes, and it may be worth reconsidering.

As a bit of background:

My favourite character in a TV show was once a side character who was in 1/4 seasons, and one episode in the final season, and then he never showed up again. which was Okay, because he was a Side Character and it would've been pretty silly for the show to bend over backwards to include him more. Granted, there were opportunities (him and another character were travelling together, then she showed up at a Plot Relevant location without him and it was never addressed) but the show wasn't bad or wrong for not including more. I wasn't owed more screen time just because he was my favourite character, and while any character can Technically be Levelled Up for more screen time and plot relevance, sometimes characters are just there to serve more minor specific purposes, and that's Okay. It's all about adjusting your own expectations and not being an asshole.

Furthermore, given that I posted my personal opinion on my personal blog and only used my personal tags for it, you had two options for finding this post:

It got sent to you, presumably meaning you had someone else to be salty with in a private manner that would've been far more appropriate

You follow(ed) me, in which case you are more than encouraged to unfollow or block me if I have a post/opinion you find annoying or uncouth. Please do so rather than doing whatever This Is in my inbox in the future, it'll likely save you not only time but also embarrassment

The fact you thought going into the inbox of a Virtual Stranger and getting upset about me not thinking your favourite character is the Most Important Character in TDP Ever — because he isn't — in one (1) post is truly baffling to me in terms of 1) curating your internet experience and 2) interacting appropriately with strangers directly online. I've seen a lot of shit opinions in my day, and I vent in private to my fandom friends about it 99.9% of the time, thank you very much, or post about it in my personal tags on my own blog rather than making it someone else's problem.

In the nature of analysis / debate, though, let me clear what I meant considering 4+ people got their trousers in a twist about the idea that Aaravos isn't a main character.

That said, a few quick disclaimers: Aaravos is a very interesting character to me, and I like him a lot. I've written a fair bit about him in regards to how he's a thematic opposite to Harrow, his view of children, what I think happened to his chest piece, speculation on his banishment, his parallels to Finnegrin, his mythic connections to aspects of the Fae + Egyptian and Greek mythology, his foil relationship to Rayla, his characterization and motifs/symbols. So it's not as though I don't enjoy him or don't think he's important to the story. He is, he's just not a main character nor the most important. Moving on:

Secondly: it seems maybe my meaning of macguffin is getting misconstrued. A story Macguffin is a plot device that drives the story forward. Sometimes it's a character (R2D2 in star wars has to be transported from one dangerous location to safety because he has blue print plans), sometimes it's an object (the one ring, fetch quests, etc). Either way, the story is centralized around 1) characters competing for ownership or safe guarding of said person/thing and 2) through that competition or competing needs, the characterization of the main cast is revealed.

In Arc 1, Zym is the plot Macguffin. He overall has very little personality even once hatched beyond being sweet, occasionally helpful, and scared. He is the titular character, and his existence matters, but mostly because he serves as a motivational point for the characters. Claudia, Soren, and Viren want to stop Zym from getting back to Xadia; Rayla, Callum, and Ezran, want to help him get back.

Zym himself does not drive episodes forward. He rarely makes decisions that impact the main group. His existence or fears cause them to make decisions (they go looking for help because they dropped his egg; Rayla and Callum have to go after Nyx because she stole him) but he is not likewise making decisions for the group. S4 definitely levelled Zym up into him making 1) more independent decisions and 2) having more of his own interior feelings, particularly about his father, but Callum is the one who decides to send him up into the trees; Ezran is the one calling the meeting for Zym to come to Katolis. A couple of exceptions (he has a mini arc about his mom for 2 eps, he has an arc in s2 with Ezran) do not suddenly make Zym a "I'm making decisions that heavily push the plot forward every episode" kind of character.

You'll also note, if you actually read said post you're referencing, that I specified "'the mystery of aaravos' (esp these past two seasons)" and that I never mentioned lore, either, even if I have likewise written about lore extensively (one of my more recent metas on it was about 4.8k words on lore alone, for example).

Aaravos' plot impact was a lot heavier in S2 and particularly S3 than it is in S4 or S5, as he influenced Viren's decisions more heavily and eventually came into more direct conflict with the core protagonists. This is likewise reflected in Aaravos in S2 and S3 being in multiple episodes (half the season in s2, and almost every episode at least a little in s3).

Meanwhile in Arc 2, Aaravos could effectively, unknown to his pawns drop dead after giving Claudia her final instructions pre-S4, and nothing would be affected plot wise, because Arc 2 thus far has mostly been characters fearing his impending release (the main cast) or dealing with the fallout of his actions from S3 (the Sunfire elf plot line). The only thing we'd lose on that level from a "Claudia believes Aaravos is alive and is trying to free him, but he's not actually" is Callum and Rayla's possession plot line, ironically enough given your apparent dislike of them, until the very very end of 5x09 in which he tries to goad Viren into killing SS.

I'm excited for and expecting that to change in S6 and S7, but that doesn't change what S4 and S5 currently are, either. Same thing for Amaya and Janai more so being main characters, Janai in particular, in S4 and S5, but they were not main characters in the first three seasons. That doesn't mean they're not good, meaningful, and important characters for the story, but I'd be a very poor meta writer / have very poor media literacy if I tried to claim that Janai is a main character in arc 1 over say, Callum.

For another example: everything in Avatar: The Last Airbender revolves around Team Avatar wanting to stop Ozai, but Ozai is not a main character in the show. He's there to be a minor character, an endgame big bad, and to affect his children / embody the conflict the characters are up against. The fact that TDP has so many antagonists that are also Main Characters throughout the whole show (Viren, Claudia) is actually pretty rare in media, particularly for children.

The Legend of Zelda games usually revolve around Link wanting to save or free Zelda, and while certain games flesh her out and make her more developed into a main character, the central character of the narrative is Link, because he's the character we follow the most.

Additionally, the Importance of a character in a narrative has no bearing on whether they're your favourite, or even necessarily whether they're a 'good' / 'well written' character. Rayla, for example, is my personal #1 favourite character in TDP. She is a main character; she is not The main character. That's not an insult to Rayla; she's there to be a foil, one hell of a narrative lancer, and our main elven character. But I can't (nor do I want to) magically change her role in the story to claim that it's something it isn't.

The central main character of TDP is Callum. It always has been, it always will be.

He is the character who shows up in every single episode, he's our central mage character in a show all about magic, he has the most developed relationships out of everyone, he is the POV character we follow the most. That doesn't mean he's your favourite, that doesn't mean he has to be your preference, you don't even have to like him. But he is The Main Character. The majority of the story revolves around him and the people in his life. No amount of liking another character more is going to change that, whether you're clamouring for Rayla, Aaravos, Sol Regem or anyone else.

While there are shows where I think the side lining of characters feels off (Gus and Willow in The Owl House come to mind) that's mostly because 1) that sort of side lining usually happens to characters of colour, as it did there and 2) there's no real reason for the story to sideline them considering everyone lives in close proximity and there's a s1 emphasis that the main character has never had friends before and that she desperately wants some. Therefore, she should be thrilled to have best friends for the first time, but we barely see them. See the disconnect?

Aaravos is a minor character and big bad who is well utilized in the overall minimal screentime he has, especially thus far in S4 and S5. That doesn't mean he's not important to the story, and that doesn't mean he can't or shouldn't be your favourite, but your assertion doesn't miraculously make him our main core protagonist of the entire show, because 1) he's not our central pov character and 2) that's about the only requirement a main protagonist has to have, and 3) that's just not how stories work.

I also have no clue why you brought up Rayllum as a ship, given that I didn't mention them in my OG post at all, but given that you seem to think "this character isn't a main character" is a moral or value statement, I'll assume you said it to ruffle my feathers — that doesn't really work, given that I agree with you that not everything in the show is about Callum or Rayla individually or as a relationship, because it Isn't. Even if I hated them as characters or as a dynamic, however, that wouldn't change the fact that they're two of the core 3 characters (alongside Ezran) and that their relationship has the most screentime out of anyone in the show.

And if the show decided to tone down their screen time to give other characters more time, I'd be okay with that — because I don't need my Personal Favourite to be the most important character in the source material / screen time ever in order to feel secure in liking them, thanks.

[canon-can-fight-me]

Self insert lore post (under cut) / sketch dump

So I am deep in the honeymoon phase right now and I’m doodling this ship like a middle schooler with a crush, so here’s a lore dump about my ultr.aman s/i 💖

Vera, otherwise known as SoVeryKitty (Kitty), is a streamer/ vtuber who has a large following and social media presence

She moved from her home country to Japan for college, got her degree in animation, and started working for an animation company. She started doing streaming on the side to make more money, and found great success.

Her face isn’t really a secret but she is more known for her vtuber identity, but feels a pressure to maintain a certain image that doesn’t fully align with who she really is.

The first time she meets Ken she has no idea who he is. Zero. (She’s seen him in ads and around town but she is a homebody and literally never paid him any mind 😭)

Which is very funny because he actually watches her streams and has even donated subs before 💀 but because of her disregard of who he is, he decides to play down his identity.

Honestly I think they count as the “I like you for you” trope because even when she does find out that he’s a baseball player she’s like oh. okay cool I guess

Meanwhile there’s this subplot where she forms a friendship/crush with Ultr.aman, all while having no idea of his true identity. It’s one of those tropes again but I love the secret identity trope, I absolutely eat it up.

💖 Post dating lore

Vera absolutely ADORES Emi (Ken’s adopted ka.iju daughter). The same way how Emi becomes interested in baseball after watching Ken play, she also finds Kitty to be so cool. She even wants to do her makeup like Kitty does and Ken has to explain that she can’t because 1) she’s literally 10 months old and 2) they don’t make block makeup for 20 feet tall people. Vera makes up for this by getting Emi and a custom made block makeup set complete with an appropriately sized mirror. Agh their relationship is the cutest I love Emi 🩷

Vera also gets along with other characters such as Mira, Ami, etc I just haven’t thought about their role in her life yet!

Vera’s relationship with Ken is kept secret, for the sake of both their careers (at least at first), but they’re also not super great at being sneaky. I mean, one of them literally goes to visit his crush as a 130 foot tall giant, if that clues you in…

I’d add more but this is already so long, but this is what I came up with so far.

[coco-bee]

COCO'S REVIEW: LACKADAISY INGENUE (Ft. @thesilliestofallqueers)

Welcome to Coco’s Review! Where I review and breakdown episodes, movies and etc and overthink every tiny detail  and/or give my thoughts and opinions :D

Today I'm discussing Lackadaiy Ingenue (ft.Robin)

Yes I’m a fan of Lackadaisy! I haven’t been there since the start BUT I have been following the series ever since the animated pilot- I’ve also read a handful of the comics but I wasn’t able to read everything. But I have a good idea of the characters and their lore. I’m very happy to revisit this series through Lackadaisy Ingenue! So to start things off I want to define what ‘Ingenue’ means for those who don’t know (like I did). According to google, “An Ingenue is an innocent or unsophisticated young woman, especially in a play or film.” which makes a lot of sense since this short focuses on Ivy when she was a little kitten (I’m assuming she’s around 6-9 here), and I guess this short technically counts as a film. New word to add to your vocabulary ✨ So the short opens with Ivy’s father, Reuben Peppers showing off a car to Atlas (who is confirmed to be Ivy’s godfather in the description). Btw Reuben sounds INCREDIBLY young in my opinion, I didn’t even think he was her father- I thought he was her older brother or something but nope, that’s her dad. Confirmed in the description!

We aren’t even a minute in and I’m already asking questions- mostly with how close Ivy and Reuben are. With “I like it when it’s just you and me”, it got me confused since it IS just them traveling. I’m going to assume maybe she prefers private trips with her father over using public transportation where others can hear their conversations. Which really shows how close they probably are if Ivy really enjoys one-on-one time with him. 

So as Reuben greets Mitzi, Atlas, Viktor and “Joe”. Reuben and Mitzi have an interesting conversation… “What happened to New Years?” “It’s Effie, she's uh.. We’ll talk later” The look Reuben gives Ivy might imply that “Effie” is Ivy’s mother or just a relative of the Pepper family since Reuben doesn’t want to talk about it with Ivy listening. But that's just me- So that’s totally not suspicious :D 

I also just want to mention the nice hug Atlas and Reuben have- it really does seem like they’re very close. Which is probably why Atlas is Ivy’s godfather- Atlas seems pretty comfortable around Reuben too! From what I can tell Atlas was more of a “show more, talk less” kinda guy but that’s maybe because this is my first real introduction to him before he died (lmk if he appears in a flashback in the comics). He doesn’t have any lines in this episode too so I just thought that’d be interesting to point out. And that's why I came to that conclusion.

Upnext is Ivy meeting Mordecai for the first time I’m assuming. So this seems to take place when Mordecai used to work with Lackadaisy before switching to Marigold. This also confirms that he was the bookkeeper for the daisy cafe to which if you don’t know- a bookkeeper oversees a company's financial data and compliance by maintaining accurate books on accounts payable and receivable, payroll, and daily financial entries and reconciliations. They basically take care of the finances of the cafe. This scene also highlights the gun Mordecai was trying to hide, which I guess adds more evidence for Ivy to what these people actually do for a living. In the description it seems that Ivy is not very aware of what her father does for work. At least at the time. Mordecai having a gun despite being “just” a bookkeeper gives her an idea of what they might actually do other than running a cafe.

Also the “I subtract numbers too” line is fucking hilarious I’m sorry 😭 Now we have the scene where Ivy and Viktor’s bond seems to have started! I would eat up their interactions in the comics istg I LOVE THEM<33 Victor becoming that one chill uncle 

Viktor lying about how Mordecai broke his arm is fucking hilarious too- I’m now requesting a short comic of Mordecai trying to rollerskate but failing miserably! ANYONE PLEASE- TAG ME IF YOU DO THAT (Rob ik youre an artist pls /j)

I don’t have a lot to say about this scene- I just love Ivy and Viktor’s dynamic smm! I gotta talk abt them in one of my Dynamic Duos episodes! (getting ready to go through so many comics) After their interaction Ivy notices a broken car door with bullet holes on it. It looks very similar to the door Viktor was replacing while he and Ivy were talking. That’s when Ivy pieced it together, Mordecai’s gun and the bullet holes? Yeah it became obvious to her that these guys are criminals-

You can tell that was her conclusion with her asking Viktor directly if they were robbers or gangsters while also assuring that the secret is safe with her! 

I’d just end my breakdown here BUT YOU SAW THE TITLE! I would like to welcome my first guest ROBIN!!! Aka TheSilliestofallQueers :D I wanted to bring them in because they know more about the extensive lore of Lackadaisy so I feel like this’d be a perfect time to have them featured! SO I GIVE THE FLOOR TO ROBIN!! 

HELLO YES THIS IS ROBIN!! (@thesilliestofallqueers)

I’m not as obsessed with Lackadaisy as I used to be back when the animated pilot was just released (I had a friend who got me into it, thank you for that Breezy) but I still know quite a bit so I’ll be putting a few footnotes to this already extensive deep dive into the animated short

Apologies in advance but this is just going to be me analyzing / ranting about Viktor and Ivy’s interactions since Coco didn’t!! (ITS SPELLED WITH A K?? -Coco fixing her typos) (YEAH ITS VIKTOR LMFAOOAOAOAO -Rob) Now first of all, I found it so endearing that Viktor almost immediately warms up to Ivy and starts joking with her / trying to cover up what they actually do with lighthearted / white lies. 

As someone who has read the comics I always knew Viktor was fiercely protective of Ivy (He beat up her exes because he thought they were no good lol) but Ivy almost always responded to this by being annoyed with Viktor (specifically in the instance of the ex boyfriends, she got mad at Viktor for it)

So seeing her as a kid getting along with Viktor so well was refreshing and sweet (Also this short implies that these mfs are OLD AS HELL -Coco) (YEAH IT DO DUNNIT LMFAOAOAO -Robbobin)

Now they keep getting along until Viktor suddenly tells Ivy that she shouldn’t be there in the middle of her telling a joke, and you can SEE his expression shift from fond to worried as I guess he realizes that if he keeps being nice to her, she’ll want to stick around. Therefore putting her in more danger than if she was kept away

He slams the car door as he yells at her to go, and she does, but not before giving him one last angry look because dude WHAT THE FUCKK WE WERE SO CHILL LIKE 5 SECONDS AGO

And then Coco details the rest of what happened 

SORRY IF MY PORTION WAS SHORT I JUST WANTED TO EXPAND ON WHAT COCO DIDNT LMFAOOAOA (also there wasn’t much to go off of since it was short + coco covered most of it in detail already) THANK YOU ROB FOR YOUR INPUT!! Tbh I was struggling with finding words for Viktor and Ivy’s scene so thankfully Rob did the job! Please go follow Rob on their page! And that concludes our breakdown of Lackadaisy Ingenue :D  Huge respect to Tracy Butler and her team for their amazing work on this because the animation is GORGEOUS and the storytelling is super clever! I’m so excited to cover the future episodes of the series when it eventually comes out !!

This is Coco and Robin typing... thank you for reading!

[aangarchy]

Netflix atla live action review ep 7-8

Home stretch baby. I figured since i love the source material i should just be able to enjoy it, or at least be entertained by it somewhat. But even that was just not possible. I pirated it after the first three episodes just bc i didn't want to give netflix the satisfaction of a view.

It's not so much the acting, the costumes or even the bad/mediocre cgi, it's the writing. It's an absolute shitshow, a mess of the highest caliber. For someone who claims to love the source material, it really seems like Albert Kim didn't understand why a lot of the things in the original worked the way they did. Things that are important for character growth got removed, and lore that we normally don't see til later on in the show (or even in a completely different story within this universe!!) got crammed in. For no good reason too bc it doesn't really add anything, just gives us another obstacle or useless exposition that's supposed to explain another useless thing they added.

Both of the last episodes take place in the north pole. This makes sense somewhat because in the original all three of the last episodes took place there. The reason they did this in the original is to have room for all of the stories that still need to take place (pakku, zuko, spirit world, koh, waterbending training, sokka and yue etc.) However in this version, even though minutes wise we have more time, we have less story. Like way less. Also episode 7 proportionally is much shorter than 8 and it really gives issues with pacing.

Let's start with what annoyed me most. Where is the waterbending training? Where is it? The season's title is Water and Aang bent ZERO water this entire season unless he was in the avatar state. Katara "trains" yes, but it's mostly practicing moves she found on the scroll (which gran gran just gave to her? Why didn't this woman give it to her sooner???). She gets NO guidance from anyone, and the way she gets better at bending each time is because a BOY told her encouraging things. A BOY. In the OG we get Pakku saying "raw talent alone is not enough", which makes sense because bending in this universe is an extension of martial arts, and you have to train to become good at martial arts. This LA show however treated bending like a magic power, basically giving some mumbo jumbo about balance and a clear head and think of the people you love to become a better bender. And while yes, your mental headspace also is important (as highlighted in the original where zuko couldn't bend anymore bc he had no aggression left) it wasn't the only factor, it wasn't even the main factor.

When we arrive at the North Pole, Pakku and the chief of the North both expect Aang to help with battle strategy in order to stop the attack bc they're already aware it's coming. Aang tells them he doesn't really know how (wtf were they even expecting it mean that is a whole 12yr old) and they turn away going "guess we can't count on the avatar" like? Dude?? If they have such good intel that they already know the fire nation is preparing an attack, and that the Avatar is alive, how tf did you not hear that the Avatar is also 12 years old and far from a master of the four elements? Idk this weirded me out.

They removed the deserter episode, which means Aang doesn't renounce firebending, which means we get no storyline of Aang dealing with his conflicted feelings surrounding firebending because fire gives life, not just destruction. Katara also doesn't find out she can heal naturally. We just get told that healing is just a thing all waterbenders can do if they train for it. Katara's necklace has no significance at all in the story currently. Yugoda doesn't recognize that Katara is Kanna's granddaughter. Katara's gran gran being from the north originally doesn't play part in the story at all. Katara doesn't even once utter the words "this necklace used to be my mother's". Idk why that bothers me so much but it does. They also removed her rage at not being allowed to fight. Sure this show's Katara also goes to fight Pakku, but literally everytime she speaks she just sounds reasonable. She fights him not because she's So Enraged at not being allowed to become the master she's meant to be, but because the script demands it. She says it so matter of factly too. She's like a mellowed out shell of who Katara is supposed to be. I feel like this overall for her character in this show btw. I don't blame Kiawentiio bc i saw clips of her performance in other works (anne with an e notably) and she's good. This genuinely just seems like poor writing and directing. They removed all of Katara's passion. She's not warm, she's not feisty, she's not angry, she's not nurturing, she's also not flawed at all. I hate to say it but in this version she's giving Mary Sue, especially bc she just learns waterbending on her own, and then gets called a master out of nowhere. That's not how that's supposed to work. You're supposed to earn the term master.

Let's talk about Yue. Amber Midthunder is a great actress, but damn, that wig. Their budget was over 100 million dollars and yet they couldn't give my girl a lace front? Her wig was so structured and stiff, and if it were any other context like cosplay or a drag show this would have been perfect. Now it just looked really unnatural and instead of the hair being platinum it was gray. Yue's character got given more to do here. They changed the story to have her break her own engagement, but it's implied that the reason she did this is bc she met Sokka in the spirit world and... fell in love? Idk it was a bit weird. Both Suki and Yue were inexplicably entranced with Sokka. In the OG it's implied that Yue likes Sokka bc he's so different from the boys in the north, kind of like a city girl falling in love with a country boy. But here it feels different, he doesn't stand out at all compared to the other boys, and Hahn isn't a dickhead like the OG. I will say i like that Yue is a stronger character here. She takes charge of her own destiny and she is the one to realize that she can save the moon spirit, and wasn't told by someone else that she could do it. I am confused by them making her a waterbender, but i'm not mad at that change per se. I liked her sacrifice scene, her own acting was great. Sokka however... i genuinely burst out laughing, like so loud. The zoom in on his face, the expression, it was too much and too little at once. Overall, Yue's story was okay. Was it better than the original? Debatable. But it wasn't bad and that's a win.

We get Avatar Kuruk way earlier than we originally got him. I'm still kind of confused about the whole "you can talk to past Avatars but only in their shrine with their statue" thing, because if that's the case how in the hell is Aang ever gonna ask advice from Roku (or Kyoshi, since the writers clearly have a bias towards her and want to make her the main Avatar guide ig) without having to travel all the way to the shrine? Can they only talk in the one specific shrine or can we take a miniature set of Avatar action figures with us just in case we ever need advice? Also this lore abt the shrines and statues is flawed at best bc later on Kuruk shows up for Aang during the fight, while they're not present at the shrine. Either way, Kuruk was far from the go with the flow Avatar he was characterized as in the original. I know that we got some insight into Kuruk's story in the Kyoshi novels, and turns out it's a lot darker than expected, but Kuruk never let that change his character. He always remained chill, or at least kept up the facade, and i don't think OG Kuruk would be the type of man that is angry about how his life turned out. In this version, Kuruk is this scared, mean, bitter man who is really unsatisfied with his destiny, which he lashed out at Aang for. He seemed really angry at Aang to for no good reason. We're also not supposed to know this part about Kuruk's life yet. It's too much information and de waste time learning about his life story, the only reason we learn it in the first place is to explain the Special Spirit Killing Knife. Also the actor for Kuruk.... yikes bro. Idk which hallmark movie they pulled him from but he and his stupid polar bear hat looked like ass the whole time.

So there's this weird part about Kuruk having a Special Knife that is able to kill spirits. Idk if this is a thing from the Kyoshi novels that also made it into this show bc truth be told i haven't made it far into those novels yet at all, but it was strange to me. Somehow Zhao has this knife. We don't know how he ended up getting it (did the fire sage give it to him? I didn't see it but i might have missed it) and we pretend that this is the Only Thing that can kill spirits even when the spirits are mortal. Doesn't that negate the fact that the spirits are mortal, if they can only be killed by a Special Knife? Also there's this weird convoluted part about how the spirits actually live in the spirit world and only cross to the physical world once every ice moon to know what it feels like to be "mortal" and choose a different "mortal" form each time and this time they happened to be fish. But still, they can Only Be Killed By The Special Knife. Huh? What's the purpose of this added extra lore? I saw someone say the underlying point is that it shouldn't be this easy to kill spirits but.... that's the whole idea behind the Ocean and Moon spirits having permanent mortal forms? Them being mortal and choosing a form as insignificant as a fish, constantly circling each other to represent the precarious balance between Ocean and Moon, a balance that can be thrown off very easily. The whole point was that they're fragile so why add all this extra exposition for no reason? Why make the spirits harder to kill if in the end you're still just gonna have a guy stabbing a wet bag and not some rough spirit killing battle?

Zhao also just gets told by the fire sage that killing the moon is a thing he can do. I don't like what this changes about Zhao's character. Zhao is supposed to be this cunning man. He's scary, determined, strategically inclined, but alas overconfident and willing to go too far which ends up being his downfall. His ambition is what led him to do his own research by visiting a spirit library to find any weakness he could potentially exploit, and that's precisely what he found. In the original, Zhao always fought for his own career. His own accomplishments got him the tools to try and beat Zuko in the Avatar race. But in this version, Zhao just keeps getting handed things. He's a slippery snake that plays friends with Zuko and then tries to steal the glory from under his nose. He gets handed the archers, he gets handed the information on the moon spirit, he gets handed a war balloon (which completely ruins the surprise of the fire nation suddenly having air power at the invasion), and he gets helped by Azula of all people. It makes him look a bit chumpy in this story, and it really worsens his villain qualities.

On a completely other note, this LA seems to have a thing for making adults yell at a 12yr old Avatar for leaving the world behind, and it doesn't make any sense, because in this story Aang left on Appa for a joyride to clear his head. Aang didn't purposely leave. He had every intention of returning after an hour. Yet every adult in this show, even the past Avatars that know damn well Aang didn't flee from his responsibilities, yells at him bc he accidentally got encased in ice. And somehow this Aang gets made to feel worse about it than OG Aang even though he deserves it way less bc this Aang didn't actually run away! I don't like what this changes about Aang's character. In the OG, Aang has one fatal character flaw and that's avoiding responsibility. He runs away, and has problems with taking accountability for what his actions cost the world. He goofs around, plays games and likes to have fun to avoid having to face his destiny, all while carrying the guilt and blame for the century war. It's a huge part of Aang's character journey. The guilt he feels isn't misplaced bc Aang knows he ran off, and he knows that the world is in its current state because of his decision. In the end he takes responsibility by showing up to the fight with Ozai alone. In this LA, even though by all means Aang shouldn't feel responsible, he ends up taking responsibility right away. He goes to Kyoshi Island, not to goof around and ride giant koi, but because he knows he can talk to Kyoshi there. Kyoshi yells at him for leaving (again, why? She knows he didn't run away) and gives him a vision about the watertribe getting destroyed. Instead of panicking about it (like OG Aang did after finding out abt the comet) he just accepts that he needs to go and help. And while this Aang does get to have fun moments (i especially loved how in the first episode he sees playing watertribe children and immediately joins them, that was quintessential Aang), he just seems very down and serious a lot of the time. He's scared of people getting hurt and is very worried abt the safety of his friends to the point where he agrees with Pakku and tells Katara she shouldn't fight. It's not Aang at all bc OG Aang was rooting for Katara when she fought Pakku. To sum it up: i think the casting for Aang was perfect. A cute southeast asian skater kid that loves to have fun and genuinely just looked the part? Brilliant! I am genuinely not upset at Gordon's performance at all (although sometimes i wish he'd enunciate a bit better). But the writing messed up the character so much that i couldn't even feel the joy for having the perfect looking Aang. I will say Koifish Godzilla (Koizilla if you will) looked dope. What did confuse me abt the Koizilla scenes is that sometimes there was no music (which is a choice i often like bc it gives the scene extra gravitas) and then sometimes there was a majestic score playing in the back, like they couldn't choose how they were gonna execute it and just picked both. I know that's nitpicky but it bothered me nonetheless.

Speaking of Koizilla. Wtf was that thing they added about Aang "succumbing" to the ocean spirit and being "lost"? They didn't even explain it at all, but both Yue and Iroh talked about how Aang would be lost forever now. We don't get a why, we don't get a how. And "lost" is such a vague word for it too. Like would his spirit be lost and only his body remain? Would he be completely swallowed up by the ocean? Would he remain Koizilla, forever rampaging at the ice wall? They added this for extra tension i guess, but it doesn't really work when only minutes later Aang is able to return no problem bc Katara talked him out of it, so we don't even get to find out what "he'll be lost forever" means. Also: the scene with Katara talking Aang out of it was cute, but the execution was weird. Originally Katara gives this speech when Aang goes Avatar state at the southern airtemple. I like that they still kept Katara's speech to Aang bc it highlights their bond which is especially important for later on in the show, but I don't like how now Katara had to give this really heartfelt emotional speech to Aang in front of everyone else at the northern watertribe. It's supposed to be quite an intimate moment between her, Sokka and Aang as a new family, they're supposed to promise they won't let anyone harm him, which eventually calms him down. Here though Katara's just yelling these words at him in front of everyone and all the intimacy is gone. It also doesn't work as well bc we barely got any time of the gaang bonding. They spend episode 3-6 apart most of the time, so really they shouldn't feel this bond towards each other just yet. Because this LA removed a lot of the side adventures, we don't get the feeling that these kids have known each other for months.

Another thing they removed is Appa and Momo as characters. In the original they each get their own moments, we even got one whole episode with Appa as the main character (which won an award btw). Here though, Appa is solely used as a transportation animal and Momo... honestly i don't even remember what he does but i think it's mostly a small comedic bit? Also he hands the acorn to one of the characters. This is a bad change bc in these episodes Momo gets hurt so bad he nearly dies, and it has no emotional impact at all bc he's just an accessory in this story. I felt no emotional attachment to Momo and he just has no personality. I wonder how this choice is gonna play out when we get the kidnapped Appa story bc so far it's not looking good.

Anyway, for positives. I warmed up on Dallas's performance a lot, i wasn't that mad at Ian Ousley's performance and there were moments where he genuinely made me laugh. The cgi for the creatures was decent, but for the backgrounds it looked horrible. I liked that they showed how devastating the Seige of the North ended up being, with the unnamed kid and Hahn both dying. I liked the effect showing those two had on our main characters. I liked when Aang, Sokka and Katara all worked together taking out that one firenation ship. I liked the way they showed Sokka and Yue bonding. I really warmed up to the costumes as well, i still wish they dirtied it up a little to make them look less new.

There's probably some more positives but they're really minor compared to the negatives and also my brain is just done atp. I'm never gonna rewatch it for more analysis either bc i don't think i'll survive it lol. I might make another post abt my opinion on the show as a whole? Like an overall summary? Bc this shit is VERY long and i do apologize. If you made it this far, uhm. Thanks for caring abt my opinion so much that you sat down for like 10 minutes to read my angry yapping? I appreciate it.

Anyway bye

[inkdemonapologist]

Thoughts on the BatIM books not being canon?

Originally typed up an answer based on the one TheMeatly tweet about creators being given “freedom to make things their own” when telling stories in their world, and that the games decide the canon. I thought that “the books aren’t canon” would be a bit of a reductive takeaway from that – like, I read it as the idea that the books don’t determine the canon, and aren’t beholden to some grand future plan to make sure they fit with the games, so they aren’t a trustworthy predictor of what’s going on in the games and in the case of contradictions, the games win. Like, the books can’t be counted on for theorycrafting, but that doesn’t mean Buddy or Abby are “noncanon” Bendy characters – just that they’ll never intersect with the games. But recently Mike Mood tweeted that “if it’s in a book, it’s not canon” pretty directly, so I guess Adrienne has just been writing a Bendy AU all this time??? Lmao.

I still think this is sort of not surprising after BatDR. Before BatDR actually came out, I was advocating pretty enthusiastically for little references to book characters – I know this was sort of controversial at the time, because people were worried about the idea of making the books “required reading” and references you don’t get if you don’t READ UP ON THE LORE – but I don’t think this would be necessary. If you give Dot an audiolog that’s like “I may just be an intern here in the writing department, but even I can tell there’s something fishy going on. I’ve got to investigate. Wally’s always losing his keys in [hint for the player], I bet I can find them” then if you’ve never read the books, that audiolog tells you everything you need to know, isn’t tangled up in any Book Lore, introduces the character as if she’s new, while also being a fun chance for the book readers to be like YOOOO MY GIRL IS HERE. Even just a schedule that says Joey has a meeting with Abby Lambert, or Ms. Lambert’s name on a desk somewhere in the art department, or a couple of animation cells on desks with characters from Crack-Up Comics, would be a fun wink to the book readers EVEN IF you want the canon to not be tied up with the books. Heck, you’ve got the non-audio-log memos in this game, you wouldn’t even have to give book characters a canon voice.

But, when BatDR had NOT ONLY no acknowledgement of the books, but also….didn’t even seem to be going in the same direction? I think the writing was sort of on the wall --

-- the people writing the games aren’t taking the books into account and the books aren’t going to be referenced here. The only question was whether the books were written with the plans of the games in mind and… I’m gonna be real. The idea that the Bendy franchise doesn’t really have Plans as such and so the books are just guessing and theorising, but the games reserve the right to go off in a completely different direction if they want to is, uh, not that surprising either. Bendy and the Ink Machine has never really seemed like a thing that had a grand plan, to me, it was just fun to pretend that it did – and then when the books were actually GOOD, it sold the idea of trying to puzzle that world together even more.

So there’s a cynical part of me that’s annoyed about this being mentioned now, you know, after 3-4 different books have been purchased by fans who were interested in learning some lore while waiting for BatDR, and now that BatDR’s out it’s like “oh, well, we’ve never felt this was CANON canon” when before it wasn’t really sold that way. If this has “always” been true, then all the “is Joey gay” questions could’ve been so easily dodged by admitting that the books were doing their own take rather than determining canon, but that fans are free to accept that interpretation. Adrienne answered one AMA question about what would become of Dot in a way that implied she didn’t know, as if she’d created this character who now existed in the world and it was up to the creators of that world to determine her fate. All of this combined with that one clarifying tweet about how EVERYTHING IN THE ORIGINAL BATIM IS STILL CANON before BatDR’s release creates the picture of intentionally selling on original BatIM’s love of theorycrafting and lore-collecting because that’s what would keep fans engaged. Either they were carefully Not Mentioning that the books aren’t canon during a time when they needed the books to sell, or the decision to treat books as “noncanon” is more recent than TheMeatly claims.

But despite my complaining, I do think this is like… wise. BatDR makes it clear that writing a Mystery With Deep Lore isn’t really what they want to do with this franchise now, if it ever was, and so now that BatDR has done reasonably well they can go ahead and admit it. If they want to be able to just hand a comic project to some comics people and not have to collaboratively run every design through their own art department to make sure it’s one they’d be willing to use in the games if that character ever appears, then it’s nice to go ahead and tell fans point blank that these designs are an interpretation by a third party, not The Canon, and should be treated as such. I think it’s not a bad way to run things, to give these other creators freedom to do their own thing with the material.

But, well, as for me and my feelings… I liked the books. I got into this franchise backwards, from a fansong and fanfiction that made me care about characters from a game I’d neither played nor watched, and then finding the concept of Sammy’s ink addiction in DCTL compelling even if I’d only heard bad things about DCTL at the time – I started writing Taste of Ink in hopes of getting this out of my system so I could move on, haha. And then Illusion Of Living came out, this incredible picture of everything I wanted from the franchise, and unfortunately nothing else has ever quite measured up. Maybe that makes sense; a lot of Bendy fans had a hard time getting through TIOL. I think I wanted a different franchise all along, and back when there wasn’t any new content in the True Game Canon, it was easier to play out the thing I wanted in the leftover ruins of this one. But then the original creators came to restore those ruins, and it was a cool thing they built, but it wasn’t anything like the ruins I’d had so much fun in anymore. I’m… genuinely proud of how much I contributed to this fandom, and so thrilled that people have enjoyed what I made here. If you weren’t following me a couple of years ago I really do recommend looking back through my blog because I made A LOT OF CONTENT………. Early on I got an ask of “does ur back hurt from carrying the entire bendy fandom,” which obviously I couldn’t post because there were definitely other creators carrying it with me, but tbh there were very few of us back when I fell face-first into this obsession and I have to admit that ask gives me some warm fuzzies to this day, haha. Like, there was a little stretch of time when the version of BatIM that I imagined helped to keep the fandom afloat! But it, like the books, was never the direction that the franchise was going to go. The BatIM I loved was was collectively dreamed into existence by people who found that game’s premise compelling.

I still love Bendy. I don’t think I ever will stop. This franchise made such a huge impact on me for reasons that are still KIND OF MYSTERIOUS LMAO. I still care a LOT about this world and these characters, but I don’t know if I’ll make much more canon-adjacent fanstuff here. Cthulhu AU is giving me the human batim content I crave and several of the AUs I’m involved in have sort of become their own thing. Maybe someday I’ll figure out how to capture whatever it was in BatIM that took over my brain so intensely for more than 3 years, but I don’t know if I’ll find it in the franchise anymore.

[all-things-skylanders]

Could I request some boom bloom headcannons and share one of them (she’s bisexual )

Yeah, looking her over, I can definitely see that Boom Bloom has Bi Energy. This is actually the first requested character I don't have in my collection, so I'm relying on the wiki alone.

Updated Lore:

Boom Bloom was a sentient tree at one point, helpless and yet peaceful. She had no name, and yet everyone in the grove knew her, and she knew everyone else. Of course, that was because her only neighbors were other sentient trees! Boom Bloom lived for over a thousand years, meaning that she had watched the fall of the Arkeyan empire at the hands of the Giants, though she had never learned what it was like to meet the fabled Tree Rex.

After nearly twelve-hundred years of life, Boom Bloom found herself growing increasingly bored of the status quo. She had counted the leaves of every tree in sight a thousand times over, watched blades of grass wither with unwavering focus, and survived locust attacks for generations.

When change finally came, it was in the form of an Ent Ninja and his apprentice. The ent was the supposed Guardian of the Forest, though he mostly stuck to the more populated areas. The grove however, was the perfect spot for him and the little elf girl with him to train. For years, Boom Bloom watched as the elf grew into the future warrior, Stealth Elf. Boom Bloom herself watched the ninja training every day as well, soaking everything that she needed to know up, unlike the other trees who didn't care for learning such frivolities that they would never use.

When Stealth Elf graduated and moved on, the status quo set back in, but only for a short while. The villanous Dr. Krankcase dug up the entire grove of its trees and brought them to his lab for experiments, mutating each of them into what were intended to be his minions. The trees didn't take kindly to this, and were quick to rebel with their new bodies. All of Boom Bloom's old friends quickly were destroyed, as they knew nothing of using their physical forms, but Boom Bloom had learned of combat through watching the ninjas train, so with the help of her mutated powers, she destroyed Krankcase's entire laboratory, where the villain only escaped by a hair.

Boom Bloom's ancient wisdom and prowess rivaling the most decorated skylanders in the team, Boom Bloom was quick to become a Sensei when she sought out the famed Master Eon, teaching giddy recruits in the pursuit of patience.

Other Stuff:

Boom Bloom is Bisexual, though not towards other creatures. Boom Bloom has been caught flirting with flowers and shrubs around the academy, and has yet to exhibit any attraction to something capable of returning those feelings.

Due to their pasts as mutated trees, and similar ages, Boom Bloom and Tree Rex share a connection, and are commonly paired as duos when big guns need to be called in.

Boom Bloom sees Stealth Elf as something like a daughter, and tries to go on bonding activities and hang-outs, only to confuse Stealth Elf more and more, since the elf herself never knew Boom Bloom had been watching, and therefor felt none of the bond that Boom Bloom did.

Boom Bloom has next to zero social understanding. While she talks very formally and is seemingly polite at first, she can be blunt, emotional and easily confused, since she knows very little of her world beyond what she eavesdropped. She also has next to no concept of mortality and time, so she's given quite a few skylanders existential dread over their short lives.

Boom Bloom has severe survivor's guilt, as she knew her grove mates for nearly twelve centuries, and now she is the last one left. On late nights, she may be found in the middle of Life Zones, mourning her kin.

WOAH! That was a lot more than I expected to write, Boom Bloom really spoke to me a lot! She has a really solid concept that lends itself to my favorite brand of angst quite well, so I guess I kinda went overboard.

That's what I could come up with for Boom Bloom. Do you like it? I'm always down for feedback, as long as it's polite ^^

[sethmp3]

Just A Game?

a/n: also available in wattpad.

“For God’s sake please just play it–”

“Fine I will, just don't expect me to play it everyday.”

You sighed, admitting defeat. Your friend has been bickering as you work in your bakery. Something about a game she found in the app store. You continue to serve customers as she rants on how you should download the game.

“Finally, you know how many days it took to make you download the game? I mean can't you see how all the characters have a unique design and lore?! It's just like Dead by Daylight but less scary I guess?” They bickered, as they took a bite of some of the pastries you baked. Relishing the flavor.

“I love you and all. But can you not shout? My customers are starting to get disturbed by your loud demeanor.” You whispered in their ear, pointing a bit to the people who were staring at you. You muttered sorry to them and looked back at your friend.

“Ah right…Sorry. But still the game is so good! The skins are amazing and you can decorate your room here..!” They shove their phone at your face making you back away a bit. You see one character and a room that you're guessing your friend decorated. Making you a bit interested now.

‘Is it that good that I have to play it too?’ You wondered, chuckling a bit. You watch her show other characters and explain the game's mechanics and such. You clean your bakery while you listen to your friend. Humming a little song as you sweep the floor.

“Say…You should hear me out on the characters…I mean look at them!” They giggled, making you raise your eyebrow and look at them curiously. You scoffed at their comment and sighed.

“Do you really think I'm gonna hear you out? They’re puppets! I'm sure if you see them in real life you would not like them not one single bit.” You said, looking at her unamused. You finished sweeping the floor and put your broom and dustpan at the corner of your bakery.

They groaned, rolling their eyes at you. They grab the coffee they ordered and take a sip looking at you with a deadpan expression. 

“You're still as boring as ever.”

“At least I'm not delusional and desperate.”

They rolled their eyes again as they finished their cup of coffee.

“Besides, you shouldn't worry about me not playing the game. You should worry that its your last days of college. You're also gonna have to go through finals week. Maybe you should study rather than playing Identity V.” You said taking their empty cup to wash. You look at them as they widen their eyes after realizing the finals are about to come, making you stifle a chuckle.

“Oh crap I forgot about that! And I haven't studied! I'm gonna have to make a review…unless…” They look at you with puppy eyes.

“Y/n, My friend, my love, the most attractive person i have ever met will you–”

“I'm not making you notes. I'm not even in college.” You sighed, looking at them with a stern look.

“Well it was worth a shot.” they mumbled, they grabbed their stuff and put them on their bag.

“Welp, I guess i won't be playing Identity V for a while.” They walked to the exit of your bakery. You follow them to wave goodbye.

“I'll be going now, I have to take notes and make a reviewer because you don't wanna make a reviewer for me you meanie.” they pouted, you rolled your eyes unamused.

“Yeah yeah… Bye bye now, I promise I'll play that game of yours once I close the shop.”

You get back at the back of the counter and continue to serve customers.

‘I wonder what's so good about that game..?’ you wonder to yourself as you hand out the last pastries and clean the place to close.

____________________

After a few hours of cleaning the bakery, grabbing some disinfectant to clean the dirty tables and windows, while changing your menu up a bit to add tomorrow's special. Counting how much money you just earned for the day. 

As you were counting the money, you saw a woman in the corner of your eye. Making you raise your eyebrows in confusion.

I clearly switched the sign to say closed. Did she not notice? You questioned yourself. You approached the lady with a tired smile.

“Dearly sorry ma’am, but the bakery’s closed..! Maybe you should come here tomorrow–” You said pointing at the sign where it clearly said closed. But the lady interrupted you, shushing you with a slam on the countertop. Making you flinch at the lady’s sudden demeanor.

“Do I look like I care? Come on, bake me some pastries! Unless the people who recommended this runned down of a bakery lied about this having customer satisfaction?” She said sternly, glaring at you like knives stabbing your body. She has rather long black hair, with a luxurious outfit that you always dreamt of having, she had many jewelry complimenting her pretty looks. You narrowed your eyes a bit at her, realizing that this woman probably has a high status or is born from a rich family.

You were quite bothered by the lady, wanting to kick her out from having the audacity to even barge in and order you around. You calmed down taking a deep breath, you looked at the lady with a calm demeanor.

“well  ma’am, I guess I can take one more customer…what pastries would you like me to bake?” You said, faking a smile. You grabbed your notepad to write down the things she ordered.  You look up and down at the lady to see if she was joking. She indeed was not.

“Bake me ten croissants, fifteen creampuffs and eight donuts that are in various flavors, make sure they're filled with your finest cream and fruits! Make sure they're not too big, not too small, not too bland, and not too flavorful! Also bake me a cake with three layers, butter cream and white fondue. Also deliver it to my house in five days!” She demanded, making you widen your eye in surprise.

“P-pardon?! I'm sorry but I just can't–”  you tried to protest, but she interrupted you.

“You dare try to talk back to me?! Do you think I came here just to joke around? You better bake or else!” She shouted, slamming her hands on the counter, making you flinch.

“I'm sorry but I can't just bake that many pastries so suddenly! I might have to close off shop because of your order!” You explained, trying to resolve the conversation between you and the lady. You were sweating a bit from nervousness.

“Does it look like I care?! Do it or else ill make sure this bakery of yours will fail! I will make sure your career will end. Am I clear?” She threatened, her last sentence making you shiver. 

You were speechless, you didn't know what to do. You don't want your bakery to fail because of not fulfilling such an absurd quest. Your family had this bakery for generations and you were not gonna mess up because of this lady. You were definitely not gonna let this woman humiliate you like that.

You sighed to keep yourself from not shouting.

“Alright then, here's my contact number so we can talk about it. Ill be sure to deliver these pastries in time. You said with a small smile, giving her a small slip of paper with your number.

“Hmmp, ill make sure of that! Now I will be going now. Do not disappoint me.” she walks away, and goes inside her car. You continued to smile until she left, and when she left you groaned.

“God this lady is annoying! This is infuriating. The next time she bosses me around I'm pulling her hair out” you mumbled angrily to yourself. You decide to make the dough before closing, you want to finish this as quickly as possible and go back to your happy life.

When you go back to your clean kitchen, you can still smell the scent of dough and baked pastries. Making you calm down a bit. You grab one of your bowls and decide to make the dough for croissants first. You grabbed some all purpose flour, some granulated sugar, fine sea salt, some cups of warm water, dry yeast, cold unsalted European-style butter you grabbed from the fridge, and some whole milk.

You decided to use your phone to play some music, your music playlist was rather random. You didn't have the time to organize them and you don't really mind if the songs went from sad to happy.

You first start to mix the dry ingredients, you set them aside and pour in warm water, yeast and a teaspoon of sugar and let it stand until foamy. You grabbed some butter and microwaved it on high until melted, you added the melted butter and milk to the yeast mixture. While the mixer was running at low speed. You gradually added the flour mixture to the yeast mixture. You beat the dough until it's smooth, elastic and tacky. You shaped it into a ball and flattened it slightly. You place the dough on a lightly floured large plate and wrap it tightly in plastic wrap. You shoved it in your refrigerator.

You stared at the notepad where you wrote the lady’s order. You sighed, rubbing your eyes from exhaustion.

“This is gonna make me go home at night…” you whined, you quickly grab other bowls to make the other doughs.

____________________

You finally locked your bakery, putting the keys in your bag as you walk home to your house. You take a deep breath taking in the cold air.

Winter is finally coming, I'm gonna have to buy some food and drinks to keep me warm. you thought to yourself looking around at your familiar surroundings. You've been in this town ever since childhood, making you smile slightly from nostalgia.

You decided to help your friend with their exams, you were feeling guilty a bit from not helping them. You also decided to try out the game, she recommended you.

After some time, you finally reached your house. It was a normal house, nothing special about it. But you didn't care. You grabbed the keys and unlocked your home, you removed your outdoor shoes and put them on the shoe rack. You put on your slippers and turned on the lights. You went to your room and lay down on your bed. Laying down a bit more to take a rest. 

After a few minutes, you grabbed your laptop and downloaded Identity V. As you wait for it to completely download, you decide to call your friend.

You hear a few beats until you see your friend making you smile.

“Hey..! Y/n! I'm telling you I hate this! Why the hell did I even choose pre-law?” your friend groaned, banging her desk on the head, making you laugh.\

“Hey you chose this path, you gotta finish it.” you said encouragingly, looking at her with a tired smile.

“Hey…you seem tired..? You alright? Was there an annoying customer?! I'll beat them up!” the said, straightening their back. You nod.

“Yep, some rich lady barged in my bakery and proceeded to make me bake so many pastries in five days.” you rolled your eyes at the thought while your friend frowned.

“Are you serious? Does she think you're a robot or something? Want me to help?” they said with worry.

“It's fine…besides I don't wanna burden you. You're already stressed about exams.” you said, reassuring them. They sighed at your remark.

“God, you never let me help. You're always like this.” they whined, making you chuckle

“Either way, want me to help you make your notes?” you questioned them, which they shook their head.

“It's fine! I already made one. I felt bad since you always make notes for me every semester.” They awkwardly chuckled.

“Wanna play Identity V?” they said, wiggling their eyebrows. You rolled your eyebrows.

“Alright alright…but dont i have to progress the story to even play with you?” you said tilting your head.

“Oh darn…you're right! Well, share your screen. I wanna help you. I'm a pro at this game!” they said proudly, making you look at her unimpressed. 

“Alright alright” you share your screen, you play through the stories. Your friend guiding you on who the characters are while also making some off handed comments.

You were quite interested in the characters, you find them all to be unique and have some diverse looks. You had to admit they looked cool.

When you were done with the story. You and your friend decided to play a match together. With some stock knowledge you picked your most comfortable character and played with your friend. Least to say, you were decent at it. You've played games like this, preferably Dead By Daylight and Flee The Facility. You also realized what terrorshock is, your friend cackling when you were confused how you immediately got downed when you were vaulting a window.

Both of you were having fun, you played as hunter and you were getting destroyed by your friend. They kept stunning you, annoying you a bit, but you terrorshock them, making you laugh.

After a few hours you both decided to sleep. You closed your device and went to your bathroom to brush your teeth and clean your face.

You lay down in your bed and sleep. Your eyelids slowly get heavy, succumbing you to sleep.

.̶̼̃̋̎̓̈́̔̕.̶̧̧̜̤̱̦͔̤̼͗͋̎̑̃̑̍͝.̴̘͖̀͑͐͠.̵̦̈́͒͆̓͗̓͘͝͠.̴̠̀̋.̷͍̙̏̓̍̃͘t̵̢̘̩̠̩̙͔̲͈͆h̸̛̺̯͂̂̏͘͝e̶̛͎̟͚͔̥̓̎̇̀́͑͌͘ͅ ̴̥͎̙̠̙̣͍͙̳͗̎̚͘̕͝͝<̷͖̝̻͉̖̽̍̕͘̚y̷̯͊̋̚<̴͓̒ͅ|̶̹̲͍͑̉̈́͋̇͊̓͊͝3̴̛̟̺̪͔̆̆͘͝ ̸̛̠͖̌͋͗͆̇̕͝1̷̨̧̠̱̣͕̓̐̀́̈́̇̔̕ͅ3̵̛̛̬̱͒̒͐́̋̃ ̸̡̡̝̳̖̩̞̤̔̀̔̐͆͐̐͐̒ͅ3̶̡̪̮̻̺̥̘̠͍̿͑͛͘̚͝T̷̗̜̮̺͔̄̈́̐̒͆͘ͅ@̶̫̪̠͉͇̼̇͛́̕͝r̵̫̪͔͒̐͊̈́̐͠͝ť̵̫͙̳̜̃̆̈́̎̀͋̃͗|̶͕̺̼̻͈̳́̒̋͆̕^̴͎͍͎͇̂g̷̼̤͍͙͉͔͑̒͝ ̵̢̘̫͈̤͉̾͜@̶̖͎͈͂̕g̸̯̞͙̗̟̙̦̦͙͒͝͝@̵̢͙͎̳̹̈́̓̀̌̚͝͠ͅ1̷̻̤͚̞̝̄̆͂n̵̯̂̋̓̈́̓̋̌͒.̶̧̢̰̦̜̗̰́́̇͌͗̌̃͒.̵̦͑͑̇̽̽͑͒.̶̨̘̫̪̦̝͆̈́̒̍̀͆̈́̚͝.̸̼̿̃̋̄̽̎́̋̓

̷̢̢̥̜̯͓̫̹͛̈́́̀

̷̧̛̝̳̥͎̱̀̃̀̀̓̏n̷̞̙̘̖̜͕̥͓̈́͆͂̿̂̋͘͝0̶͎̓̈̃̂Ţ̷̲͉̝̺͇͒̆̂̒̀͐̓̏͠ ̶̤̖͚̞̇͐͑@̵̨̨̰͍̻̺̺̄͂̀̐̓͛̚͜͠͠ģ̵͈͔͕͔̤́͜͜ͅ@̴̨̘̽̄̈́̈́̈̚1̶̣̤̲̟͇̰̿̈͆̽̄͆̔͘̚n̴̰̬̖̠̜̼͑́͛̈́.̶̪̩̳͍̱̹̦̀̄̅̽̀͠ͅ.̷̢̛̥̪́̄̒͛̊͝.̵̭̯̭̰̽͛͒̃͝

[incorrectbrawlstarsquotes]

Do you have any favorite ships?

Yessss been waiting for a question like this one!!

I honestly have a lot of bs ships I love, but for the sake of keeping this post brief I’m gonna limit myself to the 4 that currently take up the most space in my head (that are, of course, very subject to change)

Shelly x Colt

Duh. They’re basically the vanilla icecream of Brawl Stars ships and like, my go-to brawlers for lovebird quotes.

Though that certainly doesn’t mean it’s a boring dynamic. I could think of half a dozen interesting places their relationship could go and reasons why their dynamic could be real complex (not promising anything, but an idea i have for a longfic that may or may not be written does include a lot of Sholt in its outline).

Still, these two definitely take up a good chunk of all the quotes, and I bet if you count them all up Shelly and Colt would be the two most common characters I use. Doesn’t mean I’ll use them a lot less or I’ll stop taking Shelly/Colt quotes, but it’s definitely a trend I’ll want to keep track of to give other brawlers the chance to shine.

Bull x El Primo

Been my favorite crack ship for the longest time and genuinely I could not tell you why.

(Edit: Scratch that, they’ve actually been in quite a bit of official art and animations together. Technically, by BS lore standards Bullprimo is about as much of a crack ship as Sholt 🤔)

I’d assume it’s something to do with their equally excessive machismo vibes and how easy it is to interpret that as a doomed attempt to completely and utterly repress The Gay™.

Anyways, I have a post queued up using the “planning a hypothetical divorce” quote as a base and it stars these two. It’s honestly been one of my favorite from recent memory, so when it boils down to it I guess the main reason is that they’re just two really fun characters to play off each other. Macho men 4 life <3

Also, shoutout to that one Bullprimo fan account that follows me (you’re the goat!)

Rosa x Bea

My read at least is that this is the classic example of “Girl who only looks like she’ll just kill you, but in reality she’s also memorized every element of the periodic table” in love with “Girl who only looks like she’s memorized every element of the periodic table, but in reality she’ll also just kill you” In other words, what’s not to love? They even have an adopted robochild! A lot like:

Belle x Sam

Is it cheating according to tumblr ship culture if these two are already just a married couple? Hell if I care, this himbo and girlboss pairing has real quickly become one of my favorites in all of brawl stars since I came back. Plus, them being Colt’s freaking parents is the cherry on top that makes them super interesting lorewise and adds way more to their dynamic.

(also, another hint about that same longfic idea: these two would also probably play a huge role in it)

[modmamono]

Fun Puyo Puyo Fact for you power scalers out there.

The more Ls one takes one after the other the stronger they are. Because in general, the loser gets exhausted after losing, meaning they don't have it in them for a rematch. So getting back on their feet is impressive.

Lemres, Possessed Klug, Satan, Ecolo, Ex, Marle, and Squares all operate(d) on this.

Squares in particular was on steroids, like 8 losses so close to each other. The one time he did one Marle was holding back.

To be fair the last few weren't hostile but he's still outdoing Satan.

Satan's highest losing streak was either 4 or 5 in 20th's final story. It's legit nothing to him. He can keep on playing until you're exhausted at winning. (Someone turn that into a comedy fanfic, please... or a dramatic one.)

Doppelganger Arle I guess is a glass cannon retroactively. She took one defeat and bolted out of there. Which is a little amusing.

And Rafisol perhaps shouldn't be judged by the same standards. She's a final boss in an RPG. The numbers she has should speak for her. Though it was 3-v-1.

The point of this post is I just find it funny that you can tell who's strong overpowered if they lose and go "That didn't count, let's go again!" It's inherently oxymoronic.

But in most if not all cases it does show it shows those guys are decent people.

Satan usually just leaves it at one match. Despite him being the one most capable of abusing it, it is often casually implied he is the strongest there is after all. Nobody comes close, even steroid Squares.

Possessed Klug loses one after the other, it's just Sig and Raffina bolt out of there before he can get up and rechallenge them. And maybe PKlug could have another go if Amitie didn't go:

He is brought down on his knees 3 times though. But that could mean anything.

I think Lemres reached more than his limit after all of the Fever 2 Waku Waku Courses because he's absolutely wrecked. He Puyo'd too much in the sun.

The Squares gauntlet is more about trying to de-escalate him than actually fighting Squares. But also demonstrates the BS "that didn't count" thing to its logical extreme. Satan could be that if he wanted too, but unlike Squares he isn't attempting to do something evil.

Only about 5 or 6 matches Squares partakes in are actually serious. He is successfully convinced he did a bad eventually, and the final few matches aren't antagonistic as a result.

Honestly, now that I think about it. The fact losers are kinda drained by a losing a Puyo match, and Squares almost exploding because he had too much power, would imply the final battle, a skill battle, is everyone Puyo-ing him at once to curb his powerful tummy ache. (I mean that's always stated, just I have more clarity now I think.)

Besides maybe Tee I think everyone else just doesn't rematch after a loss. They are consistent about this.

I'm not into power scaling persé, I don't like rating things like that and deciding who or what is only worth my time. That's reductive and dumb taking things with personalities, experiences, stories, and lore into account especially.

But I think it says something about these strong characters that's more than "Satan could beat Goku".

Ecolo and Satan, the two most recurring ones that can pull the "That didn't count" but usually don't tells us a lot about them.

That and as I said I find it funny. This is like so funny, flies in the face of logic. The more you lose in quick succession the stronger you are.

Also it's a Puzzle game, Satan may have the highest AI, but that still put him on equal grounds with Onion Pixie.

[fantomette22]

Also do you ever have a feeling like 'damn, this is a cool idea and I wish I used it instead, but now it feels too late because I dug too deep into my current idea to change things'? Or you are fully satisfied with your ideas as they are? (For me I have at least two alternative variants of Rom I sometimes wish I used instead, but I've gotten too attached to my current portrayal fdshsh Bitter 40+ years old hard smoker Willem's wife Rom and Rom as a kid with down syndrome, you are unused but not forgotten)

Ah yes I can understand that XD Also yes but actually no? let me explain jbfbfb

I mean if really I got a super mega idea/ better than smt I had envision before for my fic/main interpret, I could change it I guess. Or had it in some way. I am bad at choices for a couple of things.

But you see in my head I have like 5 different parents pairs possible for Maria for exemple. (I did write a little about it in the Maria hc post I will try to finish it tomorrow or after tomorrow!).

Some are like, compliant with each others and would fit anyway with my main timeline. (like everything is the same except 1-2 details) but with for exemple Gehrman or Laurence (or Evelyn) being related to her/her dad that just don't work and that would create a complete different timeline! (yes with dad gehrman it's a normal familial relationship!)

I know it could feel weird to some people I guess?? Maybe?? because people often have like ONE interpret ? (no I don't count multiships it's another thing XD)

I tell myself they would say : "wait so in your main story this characters have like this relationship and then you have another story where they are family instead? wtf girl?!💀" Well sorry I have like different folders with different types of papers who are clearly separated stories in my head!

Idk but for me those versions of the characters & timeline are really disconnected from one another! Instead of like two persons coming up with 2 difference versions it's just my crazy brain 💀

Like the characters, even with the same base, aren't the same (the boys became freaking blonde lmao and you know normal family relationship) not the same age, very different lore timeline events etc. They have similarities for personality traits etc but they aren't the same actually, they are very different characters from each others. Even Maria isn't the exact same characters/interprets between those.

That's why I still love many different interprets and reading peopke ones!

I know you guys are gonna ask what are all my versions then? Well I guess it's time... :

Main one/fic : Maria is Annalise's cousin, her mother is the late queen sister (Alternative one where Maria she had a sister too?)

Maria is actually Anna sister. Children of king & Queen / another mini half version where it's half sister? (could be compatible with the first one... but I think it's too much drama). I have one where they have other siblings too (they are lat least 4 hfbfbk)

Maria was the queen daughter and Annalise is like her aunt?

Gehrman & Evelyn are Maria parents

Laurence is Maria's father (if the cainhurst portrait is Laurence lmao)

Gehrman was a servant of Maria parents who where other nobles / distantly related to the royal family etc

Help I finally say it💀 (so yeah between my main and those alternatives concerning gehrman it's really like bot the same characters at all. not the same relationship at all) All of those are so freaking drama fuel too

But to be clear my main interprets/ fic verse I have imagined and written in my head like 80%+ of the entire story compared to probable 2-5% of the other I speak about here. It's just mini ideas like oh what if? But I din't really thought in depth about it. the timeline, different events etc I thought of almost nothing compared to my main.

Another exemple would be concerning Ludwig & Maria for exemple. Like were they friends/ horse besties /contemporain of each other like in my main? Did perhaps Ludwig was a child/teen when Maria passed away but knew her? Was he born after and never knew her but heard about her a bit? We'll never know how really it went. I think all could be very interesting! (we could even had did mico knew x or y characters etc but you get the point with those exemple)

So yeah your Rom's ones are amazing too! I didn't really thought of it in depth myself but you and crow (& faree) ones where they are siblings are hella cool as well! I love reading interprets.

I think what matters is to create a good and compelling story right? Something that people enjoy, are engaged with, smt you like, something with lot of DRAMA AND ANGST!!!!! (sorry XD).

Put something that would fit the story you want and want to tell!

It's up to us, to be left with what we wanna tell and what would be better to fit in. Anyway you can choose anything guys! There's so many possibilities! Why just choose only one and stick with it forever? When you can create dozens of different story that will all tell something interesting. And ultimately not one versions will be "superior" I believe they all can have a chance to tell something and to be great.

(also even if I tried to make my fic very canon compliant I knew the real canon would always be a bit different. Sometimes when you make stories adding stuff just for the stories make a better story in itself. That's why I added so many "little adventures" for the characters. That would just be a bit annoying without u_u like timeline are there but to make a story you need stuff to happen all the time! not just a handful of important lore events 😭 details too

oh and I am not even counting the absolutely non canon/AU with my ships brain rot XD)

So yeah in the end I am mostly satisfied with my ideas! I guess I wish I could just make more than one but it's complicated. And sometimes I am hesitating for little things.