#Because THEMATICALLY

[completeoveranalysis]

[4]

AND NOW WE GET PIFFLE CALL BACKS?

Oh Clamp really do love me. This is unreasonably perfect. 

Who else begins the climactic fight of the series with, “Hey, remember this double layered question I posed 135 chapters ago? Let’s revisit that now!”

WHICH IS VERY GENEROUS OF THEM in the way that it signposts an exact conversation for us to think about and realise (without having to reread the whole series yet again) that the whole conversation between Syaoran and Fai in Piffle was REALLY HEAVILY honed in on the secret Lava Lamp crushing guilt and backstory we didn’t know about until now. 

Which is wild in the meta sense knowing that CLAMP planned for that exact sentiment to be the very core of a character we wouldn’t even understand for another 130 chapters, but also on the character level knowing (in hindsight) that Lava Lamp himself was hearing this conversation happen in real time and probably had an absolutely horrible time knowing that they were discussing ethics behind the soul-crushing decision he made that broke the universe and is still suffering AND seeing the consequences of. 

But how absolutely fascinating that after Shara our cloned Syaoran ended up developing such a similar insecurity about messing with timelines and the consequences of doing so completely independently from Lava Lamp. The parallel lives of these parallel people. The hitsuzen of it all. 

AND! Fai gives almost the same advice! 

Last time he said, “You can ponder over that all you want[…] but right now, it won’t do us a bit of good,” and, “If there’s something that you can accomplish if you try, then the thing to do is try. ‘Changing history’ is an idea on too grand a scale for a person to do anything about. It’s also important to accept that there are things you just can’t do.” And he was talking specifically between the Shura/Shara timeline changes at the time, but in relation to Clow? Lava Lamp holds himself accountable for every single thing that happened, but he didn’t do all of that. He was just trying to achieve a goal - which is framed here as a good thing (and is very good advice for dealing with anxiety besides). 

At his core Fai sees this same struggle playing out in each Syaoran and gave them both the same tips - but this time he can reference the previous time and really hammer it home. 

And, deliciously, it echoes even stronger here. The advice is to ignore all the things you can’t control. Just focus on what you want, and do what you can to achieve it.

Lava Lamp might still feel that he ruined the universe, but that won’t help him right now. Like Fai said last time, that’s on too grand a scale for him to ever take on his own. He has one thing he wants to achieve and he should focus on that. The timeline will sort itself out later. 

Which is SUCH a solid Dad moment. Kurogane gets to tell Evil Wolverine to fuck off, Fai and Kurogane get to flirt and insult Evil Wolverine to his face, and now Fai gets to give a touching character moment to Lava Lamp as they all share the final story beat together. It ties the Syaoran experience together (ironically, since the other Syaoran he WAS speaking to is RIGHT IN FRONT OF THEM but may or may not have the soul to remember the moment at all), and ties both sides of the plot together into this one big family moment. 

Though I’m slightly suspicious of Fai last time mentioning that It’s also important to accept that there are things you just can’t do. 

[visenyaism]

correct me if i’m wrong cos i don’t watch dune.. but i’ve seen people call paul a tragic character. except isn’t he a whole white coloniser tricking indigenous poc into believing he’s a prophet to serve his own interests? that’s inherently evil that cannot be a tragic character imo

so yes that is correct that is what happens. the tragedy is that he is a sixteen year old boy who gets a vision of this happening and he is TERRIFIED and absolutely does not want this to happen at all. He does not want the holy war he does not want to be the chosen one he initially very much wants to fight alongside the fremen as equals trying to liberate themselves from their current colonizer without becoming the messiah because they have common political cause.

And then the entire second half of the first book (and the second movie) are about the concessions he makes to himself bit by bit by bit (well it’s the only way to save his mom and sister. well it’s the only way to prevent nuclear war. well he does want his revenge. well maybe he IS special.) Until by the end he has lost 100% of his humanity, fully wants to be the messiah and is willing to manipulate people into thinking so, and has declared himself duke of arrakis in his father’s name and made a play for the imperial throne.

you’re right that it’s evil. the book and these movies agree with you. the tragedy is watching a child who desperately wanted to avoid this slowly completely lose himself to it anyways. i don’t think “tragic” and “evil” are inherently mutually exclusive.

[miikpal]

galleria

speedpaint under cut

[kaibacorpintern]

yugioh isn't "good" i.e. its hardly a cowboy bebop or NGE or FLCL or mushishi but if anyone was like "it's bad" i'd be like be quiet. kaiba's about to summon obelisk out of the fucking ground

[transsongtaewon]

[phoenixcatch7]

Okay but it's super interesting how

Din = Power = Ganondorf

Naryu = Wisdom = Zelda

Farore = Courage = Link.

Because Din, in the hylian creation myth, created the physical world. Naryu then created the laws - gravity, time, etc. And Farore finally created life - plants and people.

Din created the body, naryu the mind, Farore the soul.

And the triforce and its wielders so perfectly reflect that.

Ganon is physical power, he is big and intimidating and he breaks things. He is cunning and determined, but that's not what he focuses on. He is might makes right.

Zelda is wisdom and cleverness. She is stall tactics and information and team work. She is a powerful mage with a spine of steel, but that's not how she'll win. She is the pen being mightier than the sword.

Link is courage and persistence. He is the wild card sneaking behind enemy ranks, always moving, plunging into terrifying situations head first. He's a phenomenal fighter with a keen wit, but that's not what will get him through his challenges. He is bravery not being the absence of fear but the triumph over it.

They sit in perfect parallels to each other.

And ganon is reborn through his body - his resurrection is immortality. No matter how low he is cast, as long as he has a body he can claw his way back. He can cling to his power, build it ever higher.

Zelda is reborn through the magic of her bloodline. It's the accumulated knowledge handed down for generations, the unique power she must master, the skills she must develop to survive and get her kingdom out the other side intact. Even her name, the knowledge of herself, is handed down from all the way from the very first. Her ancestors knowledge of her future presence, her stability, is what gives her the edge.

Link is reborn in spirit. He is not bound by flesh or blood. Just like his wanderlust soul he can reappear in any time or place. His variation, his unpredictability, is exactly how he fights. It's what makes him so hard to pin down.

Ganons need to build strength means he can't chase after link. Links impulsiveness means zelda can outwit him. Zeldas stationary predictability means she's an easy target for ganon.

But the other direction?

Fire melts ice, ice redirects lightning, lightning burns fire.

And that's the very essence of the triforce.

[chucktaylorupset]

I think there's something to be said for fanfiction that loves canon in a way that’s rude. Like thank you for this wonderful thematic tragedy made out of this character’s entire arc ending in death, it was emotionally and intellectually moving, but also fuck you fuck you fuck you they live, this time and every time they live, they never died, their flaws are not their undoing, actually they have no flaws, actually they save everyone, actually who cares about a story, any story, where this one dies, actually i cared about that story so much i made a new one, actually i cared so much i unmade the old one, you gave me morals and i left them for the mortal, but they’re mine now and i will never let them die, actually thank you, actually fuck you, strongly worded letter to follow

A kiss for canon and spit in its face all at once, it’s great

[renshengs]

beyond evil (2021) occupies a very interesting space in the larger expanse of crime shows. like, it is a Cop Show. it is undeniably a Cop Show even if the two main characters, who are both cops for very different reasons, are handled with significantly greater awareness and intention than usual.

it is also, impressively, a show that pierces the real ugly rot of 1) police corruption and its overlap with capitalism 2) atrocious real-life lawmaking 3) the poor handling of femicide in stories. i cannot express how abruptly shocked i was to discover that i did not hate the way this show was carrying itself, despite its crime drama genre, narrative about two homoerotic cops, and its murder mystery premise featuring a plot about a serial killer with solely female victims. here is a story that understands its purpose and is so clear-eyed about it that i did in fact tentatively suspend all my wariness about Cop Shows to watch it—and what i got was a scathing response to every serial killer and true crime documentary out there. a narrative that said: enough. enough. look at the way grief rots people from the inside out. look at the way loss ruins lives. do not forget the sufferings of the innocent.

far too many crime dramas possess an incredibly dehumanizing analytical tone to them that goes, “what if these poor women died in brutal gruesome tragic ways? anyway, look at these men and their heroic journey for justice!” it’s why i can’t fucking stand to watch them for the sake of my blood pressure. while beyond evil is not exempt from using such gruesomeness as a part of its horror aspect, the women in this show, particularly the women who were murdered, occupy such a heavy weight over the narrative that it is impossible to reduce them to what they’re usually reduced to: numbers in files, or cold cases. and because the purpose of beyond evil is to examine the ways grief and loss bring about destruction to people’s lives and communities, these women cannot be seen as numbers. they need to be vivid and real; the audience needs to feel their loss as deeply and gnawingly as the townspeople do. as we would in real life.

personally i’m still surprised at myself for liking a Cop Show this much—because the law enforcement sympathy is unavoidable in a cop show—but then i’m also shocked at how immediately this show establishes its awareness of police power. i don’t mean it gives a passing nod, like a brief disclaimer. i mean that you watch until the end and you’re like: oh! the entire fucking show is about police power and its consequences! this entire goddamn show is about cops’ potential for harm and how it destroys lives! the main character only ever became a cop out of desperation because he realized it would protect him from suffering further at the hands of the police. because he realized it was the only way for him to get access to both the information and the legal power needed to take his own steps to solve his sister’s murder. it’s not radical—it’s a cop show. but it is novel. a cop whose relationship with his own occupation is bitterly resigned at best and traumatic at worst.

this is far from an original thought, but truly i think what makes beyond evil worth watching is that it is so incredibly careful with itself. its meta awareness of its own genre heightens it to a tier above other crime dramas—it knows and rejects voyeuristic perspectives into the lives of people who’ve suffered real loss and tragedy, and so it makes the loss inescapable. every direction you look, someone’s life has been irrevocably altered by the murders you learn about in the story. it gives you no space to push away the murder—no, you need to sit directly in its field of impact. all the fucking time. you are not watching the town suffer, you’re suffering with the town. the story sucks you in and makes you live alongside the rest of them; it's why the first watch hurts so raw. because the story refuses to let you take a true-crime approach. because it refuses to prioritize the narratives of perpetrators over human lives. you are there, and you are hurting.

man. really, if you're going to watch anything, watch this.

[canisalbus]

hello! i've written a short little machete fic, and i wanted to share it with you as thanks for all the incredible art and generous question-answering you've been doing these last few months. i hope that if you give it a look, you enjoy it. <3 keep up all your amazing work! archiveofourown [.] org / works / 50945128

✦ A Voi ✦

[afterthelambs]

i adore Maruki as a character because he's simultaneously the most relatable depressing character that will make you cry with empathy, and the goofiest wettest cat loser in the game like what do you mean youre a licensed therapist and your first response to trauma is to brainwash a girl, project ur relationship issues onto a 17 yr old boy, and then rule the world in a golden leotard? bro went from 0 to 100 so fast??? anyway he's like 30% of the reason why p5r works as well as it does

[ingoodjesst]

have you put the pieces together yet, detective

[beaulesbian]

Shanks vs. Kid, episode 1112 ||| Roger vs. Oden, episode 965

Divine Departure!

insp by @wyvernslovecake 's tags!

[stainedglassthreads]

Saw someone mention something about 'of course Gabriel would get along with a demon, he's an awful person--' and no no no you're missing the point. Like yeah, he does suck and has been awful to Aziraphale, but he's not Uniquely Awful, nor is that the reason he gets along with Beelzebub. He gets along with Beelzebub because they are fundamentally the same, because there is no difference between angels and demons in Good Omens.

One of the things reiterated again and again in the book Good Omens is how Heaven and Hell is fundamentally the same. It's noted that demon wings are not black, but white, and during what while the showdown between Adam and Satan in the series, all the angels and demons actually appear on earth and square off against each other--and the narration specifically says that you couldn't tell the angels apart from the demons. That's why Gabriel and Beelzebub get the same complaints from both Heaven and Hell about how hard it is to get the angels and demons to back down from a war, that's why Crowley says at the end of season 1 that the real Armageddon will be the combined hosts of Heaven and Hell versus humanity. It's why it was mentioned, when talking about season 1, that Heaven and Hell were envisioned as being the upper floors and basement of the same basement--is why the methods to get to both places are always in the same location! The escalators and the elevator!

And that's why Gabriel and Beelzebub got along. Because they were in the exact same position experiencing the exact same difficulties and complaints, and because they the exact same amount of actual care for Heaven and Hell--precisely zero. They fell in love because they're similar, but at the end of the day, all the angels and demons are 'similar', because the demons used to be angels too! Which we are reminded, when Crowley correctly analyzes angels like Muriel, Heaven as a structure, and guesses that they STILL haven't changed the passwords. Crowley recognizes that Heaven and Hell are the same, and are plagued by effectively the same problems, and so he rejects both. He rejects Beelzebub's offer to become a Duke of Hell, even if it would protect Aziraphale. He rejects Aziraphale's offer to become an angel again. Crowley knows that both sides are rife with systematic problems, and so he goes all-in on our side. And on humanity's side.

[b4kuch1n]

same teacher, different lessons

transcript

[branwinged]

seeing some prophecy discourse which has once again reminded me why i personally find the prospect of dany as the prince that was promised really compelling. and it makes the targaryens so much thematically richer. like, they only survived the doom through the power of prophecy and then the visions marked them forever and this thing, this blessing which gave generations of targaryens some existential meaning eventually morphed into a curse which brought so many of them great misery—"my brothers dreamed of dragons too, and the dreams killed them, every one." (aemon, affc) and in due course almost ended their line once again with rhaegar. but then dany happened.

almost four hundred years since the doom when prophecy saved them and nearly killed them again on the trident, dany was born. dany who carries echoes of all her targaryen ancestors within her. she's aegon the conqueror come again but she's also maegor the cruel when she promises the khals who had hurt her khalasar would die screaming. she's rhaenyra in her struggles to wield power and establish legitimacy as a woman, she shares her sense of egalitarianism with egg, and she drinks from the cup passed from rhaegar, i.e. inherits (what he once thought of) his narrative destiny to help defend the realms during the long night.

dany who is both their beginning, since she's the first targaryen created and introduced to us on page and the narrative end point of their dynasty. which reflects all the way into her arc being cyclical by design as it calls back to the foundation of the valyrian empire in essos—during the fifth war the freehold torched old ghis with dragonfire so nothing would grow there again and centuries later this girl, the last dragon, is going to help plant trees there again. it's not about retreading old ground or rejecting her house words but about redefining what it means to be the blood of the dragon. which is not to say all that came before her was meaningless since this recontextualisation is only possible through the three centuries of ancestral history weighing on her. and dany's very existence echoes back in time because the prophecy itself has influenced the lives of generations of targaryens. three hundred years of history, all the glory and the horror concentrated in this one person-point. the prince that was promised not simply as a figure of the long night but as someone who is the apotheosis of their house. dany as both their beginning and their end, because the iron throne is presently a symbol of stagnation, a world in stasis, and it has to go. no restoration, instead the old world dying in fire and a new world being born in the aftermath.

[inquisitor-apologist]

Thinking about how, at the end of the day, at the fatal moment, the sunset of the Republic, it wasn’t Yoda, or Obi-Wan, or even the Chosen One himself standing in the way of Palpatine. It was Mace Windu.

Mace Windu, the inventor of Vaapad and Master of Form VII, the Jedi's strongest duelist, the only person to ever defeat Palpatine in combat. Mace Windu, Master of the Jedi Council and the youngest Master ever appointed to it, the revered leader of the Order. Mace Windu, who forgave even those who tried to kill him, who risked his life over and over again for his troops, who, after 3 years of desperate war, tried to negotiate with battle droids. Mace Windu, who knew the clones were created by the Sith and chose to trust them, who saw every Shatterpoint in the Republic, and loved it still, and fought for it until his last breath, until he was betrayed by Anakin, who he believed in and trusted despite everything.

Mace Windu, High General and hero of the Republic, the embodiment of the Light, the last and greatest champion of the Order, the best Jedi to ever live.