#Because of the whole Orpheus thing I guess...

[blackcatanna]

Was feeling emotionally tumultuous last night but managed to fix myself with a jar of pickled herring and Portrait of a Lady on Fire (squeezed out some good tears)!

[burningcheese-merchant]

just watched ES’s trailers, and I wanted a second opinion. Is there anything that immediately resembled Greek mythology to you in either of the videos, because to me I mostly saw biblical stuff like the multiwinged ES.

i guess it makes sense considering her design, but I feel like we got biblical allusions with SM and I’ve gotten so used to Greek-inspired ES that id be disappointed if she wasn’t, yknow?

Yes, actually! Let's pull out the title screen they revealed to show you what I mean

First thing is that little dude on the right haha. Pavlova Cookie greatly resembles Eros (most people know him by his Roman name, Cupid), son of Greek goddess Aphrodite and god of love and sexual desire. A talented archer, he would take aim at gods and men alike and shoot them down with his arrows, causing them to fall in love with who or whatever they're looking at (Aphrodite often had him do this to specific people she told him to, to suit her own goals/purposes. She's a horrifying combination of vindictive mean girl and wannabe matchmaker. Methinks Eternal Sugar employs Pavlova in a similar way)

I know the place gives "Garden of Eden" vibes, which is fair and true (but a little lame tbh). But I personally think it looks just as much like the Garden of the Hesperides, a fabled lush garden from Greek myth where trees bearing fruit that granted immortality grew (and were guarded by the Hesperides, daughters of the titan Atlas). The fruit in question are golden apples. What's that in that little snake's clutches over there, next to Eternal Sugar? A golden apple :)

It's more apparent in another picture (see attached, in the lower right corner), but: the architectural style of the place is very much Greek. The columns are ionic, which is a column design/style created by Ionian Greeks around the 6th century BC. Ionic columns are primarily characterized by the spiral scroll pattern at the top

Eternal Sugar's dress is actually quite Greek-looking. Obviously it's not 1:1, this is a cartoony video game not a historical documentary, but that style is very Greco-Roman. Look up traditional ancient Greek tunics/chitons and other attire, especially for women, and you'll see what I mean

She's actually not holding a harp. That is a lyre, a stringed instrument that's similar to a harp. The lyre is a common and beloved instrument in Ancient Greek culture and myth, most notably played by Apollo, god of the sun and music, and Hermes, god of travelers and thieves (and a lot of other things, he's a bit of a jack of all trades). The former also gifted a golden lyre to the famous Greek hero/protagonist Orpheus, who was a master musician and used that lyre to charm Hades and Persephone into agreeing to let him lead his deceased love Eurydice out of the Underworld (if you know that story, you know how it ends...)

Again, I understand that the place bears resemblance to Eden. Which it does. But aside from that, and aside from the nod to the Garden of the Hesperides, the whole thing reminds me of the island of the Lotus Eaters, a location stumbled upon by Odysseus and co. on their journey back home from the Trojan War during Homer's Odyssey. In that place are flowers that are exceptionally beautiful and even more delicious - but they're cursed. Eating them turns you into an addict almost immediately, and they rob you of your memories and will to do anything or leave the island at all. Odysseus lost a few of his men to them. I get the impression that the foods in the Sugar Paradise are like those lotuses, and Holly and co. run the risk of becoming Lotus Eaters too

To bring up the Odyssey again, Eternal Sugar herself gave me a lot of Circe + Calypso vibes in the trailer. Both are women who fell for Odysseus upon meeting him and trapped him on their islands for a time, using magic to control and manipulate him (Circe is a goddess of sorcery, Calypso is a magic-using nymph). Other people had to intervene on Odysseus's behalf to free him from their spells; otherwise, he would've stayed stuck forever. Sugar seems a bit like them; developing an attachment to Holly (both because she wants the Soul Jam back, and out of genuine sentiment. Remember that the Ancients and Beasts are canonically soulmates) and luring her into her strange, "happy" world and trying to trap her there forever

I'm a little disappointed with the nods to Christianity ngl. I love Christian/Abrahamic lore and symbolism very much, but I didn't want that for Sugar. We already had it for Shadow Milk. I wanted Sugar to be 100% Greek, but... no, I guess lol. Gotta have Eden and those little cherub looking guys and the snake with the apple. It gets boring after a while. Christianity is the most famous religion to ever exist in the history of the world, EVERYONE knows Christian iconography to some degree, why can't we have something different for once. Mystic Flour and Burning Spice were awesome in that they leaned into cultures that don't get a lot of recognition in the West (China and India), you know? Yes, Greece is "the West" as well, but idk. I'm just tired of the same Christian imagery always being used. And I say that as a Christian myself haha

⭐ I forgot to add this lol. I suppose the Christian imagery isn't entirely out of place necessarily, because Greece actually is deeply Christian and has been for an extremely long time (Greek Orthodox. Ancient Greek is actually the first language the Bible was translated into, fun fact!). But even so. I wanted Greek mythology, not Abrahamic religion lol

[kydrogendragon]

"And here we go, Robert Gadling gets ready for his third shot at the pole vault tonight," the announcers call out. Robyn and Orpheus sit on the couch at the Walker's, eyes glued to the television set. Rose, Jed, and Lyta crowd around the living room along with Lucienne and Jessamy and Matthew and even Jo and Rachel. Everyone had come over for the watch party.

"And here he goes. He needs to beat Sam Kendricks's score by at least three tenths if he wants to get a spot on that podium tonight. When we saw him back in Tokyo, he earned himself a silver medal. Let's see if he can earn himself a gold tonight."

Robyn leans closer. He grips the edge of the couch, eyes wide as his father takes a breath and races forward, pole in hand.

"And here he goes! Strong start there, good grip on that pole. Distance is looking good, maybe a bit short and oh!"

Their dad plants the pole down and thrusts himself up, up, up! He curves around the upper bar and...he hits it. He comes falling down, pole and bar alike as he crashes down onto the mat. Robyn deflates.

"Oh. Oh dear. I—" the announcer laughs. "Well, that's just unfortunate. Let's play that back. So you can see here—" the footage pauses as their dad's feet just begin to tip over the upper bar. "—he's got plenty of room here, lots of space up above. Robert is known for his strength and his ability to get good vertical height above that bar. But as he comes down—" the footage continues in slow motion. Their dad curls over the other side of the bar like they've seen him do hundreds of times before. It slows down until it stops right when he hits the bar. Matthew squacks.

"Oh my god!" Rose laughs.

"Oh, he is never living this down," Aunt Jo pipes off.

"So you can—" Even the announcer laughs again. "You can see where he hits the bar. And it's-it's really unfortunate because everything else about this vault was nearly perfect. But it looks like his, uh. Well. His lower half got a bit in the way there."

The camera cuts to their dad standing up from the mat, wincing as he gets to his feet. And then it cuts to Papa in the stands. He's doubled over, whole body shaking, and Robyn knows immediately that he's cracking up.

"Did dad really just hit the bar with his dick?" Robyn asks.

"Robyn!" Lyta cries.

"What! That's what happened, right?"

Jessamy chuckles before patting his head. "Yes, starling. Make sure to tease him about it tonight, okay?"

"There's definitely worse problems to have in life," Matthew laughs.

"Well, I can see now why Dream married him," Lucienne says.

"Please stop talking, I don't want to think about my cousin's junk, please and thank you," chimes Jo.

Orpheus turns to Robyn, frowning. "Dad's not getting a medal, huh?"

Robyn sighs. "No. I don't think so. Maybe in one of the other events, though."

"Hm. That's true."

The camera cuts to their dad, where he's standing at the stands in front of their papa. Dream's face is red from laughter, and even now, he's still giggling. Hob's laughing now, too, pressing a kiss to his lips. Hob whispers something to Dream, who bursts out laughing once more.

"Well, at least he seems to be in good spirits," the commentator says.

"As does his husband," the other chimes.

"Unfortunately for team GB, we won't be seeing any medals out of this event. Let's head over to the Men's Vault now."

"I cannot believe this is how you will be remembered, husband mine," Dream says, running his hand down Hob's chest. They're back at his hotel room, away from the villa for the night, much to Hob's pleasure. Those beds sucked.

"Don't remind me. My damn dick still hurts from that thing. I can't believe that happened. Christ." Dream chuckles, pressing a kiss to his jaw

"Well. Now everyone will know just how...well endowed you are. And how lucky I am to call you mine."

Hob shakes his head with a smile. "Guess you're the real winner from all this, aren't you?"

"If I have you? Then I always am."

Hob wakes up to exactly 46 messages from friends and family and co-workers alike, all commenting on his "performance" last night. Half sent him links to various articles, all labeled something along the lines of "Olympic Athlete Betrayed by his Penis."

Dream nearly pulls a stomach muscle from laughing so hard.

[kohabielnin]

Valentine Day Headcanons

I know it took me a while to do this, as classes make it a little difficult for me, this is another gift for someone very special to me, the @kaval0 💕

Norton Campbell

• Incredible as it may seem, he remembered the date and was prepared days before as he saw the children arranging things to give gifts to those they like,

• Everyone in the mansion was surprised when he handed you a flower and chocolates,

• Naib stole some chocolates just to tease Norton, as usual,

• His embarrassed look when he handed you the chocolates was really cute,

• Both Melly, Frederick and Alice wondered if he was actually sick,

• In general, no one in the mansion expected Norton to give you chocolates

Ronald of Ness

• He closed the theater so he could have time with just you,

• I always saw this skin as one of Norton's most romantic skins because he's an actor,

• This man is not very good at cooking, so the one who helped him with everything was Lady Truth,

• He compares you all the time to flowers, especially roses,

• For a whole day, you can wear his hat and mask,

• He called Mr. Inference to boast that he had company on Valentine's Day...

Naib Subedar

• You two ate the chocolates together, it was cute according to witnesses,

• He worked hard to make the chocolates and even harder not to eat them 💕

• Norton played little a with Naib, but he didn't care and ignored Norton,

• He was a little shy when it came to handing over the chocolate, as he had never done it before,

• Eli helped him have the courage to go talk to you and Brooke watched so Naib didn't give up halfway,

• Spending Valentine's Day with him was definitely a lot of fun

Morningstar

• He made his servants make a feast just for you,

• He just loves spoiling you, whether it's a holiday or just a regular day,

• There isn't a day that goes by that he doesn't say he loves you out of fear of losing you,

• He made you a crown similar to his as a gift,

• He himself searched the entire kingdom for the most beautiful rose so he could give it to you,

• In general, Morningstar is a sweet, beautiful, perfect and sweetheart

Orpheus

• This man simply wrote the most romantic poem you've ever seen in your life, along with flowers and chocolate,

• Guess who had a pinky in the middle of one of the letters you received? Exactly, Little Girl,

• You two had a great day together,

• He took the day to listen to you talk about the books you like while giving your opinion about them too,

• He is very good with words, so sometimes he would say something or other to embarrass you, like a compliment in French that he learned from Frederick,

• There was no shortage of tea and cookies in the afternoon for you two

Bonus due to our zap/discord ship in which I am Frederick

Frederick Kreiburg

• Ok... you woke up hearing him playing your favorite song on the piano,

• If you ask him about this, you will only hear: "I feel like playing this song", with an indifferent pose as always,

• On the coffee table, there is a plate with some strawberries covered in chocolate and a handmade letter from him,

• He has a slight difficulty being romantic, but his small acts show that he cares a lot about you,

• He won't mind spending the day playing the piano for you if you wish,

• If you don't want him to spend the day playing the piano for you, he won't mind taking you somewhere relaxing with few people

[varsisdead]

THE MAGNUS ARCHIVES END OF SEASON 3 SPOILERS I GUESS I DONT KNOW MAYBE START OF S4 I DO NOT REMEMBER

Anyways so the whole storyline of Jon saving Daisy from the Buried is awesome I love it here’s fanart of it, lower are my thoughts and ideas that led to actually making it.

I loved the idea of Jon being “tied” to his own rib and the implication that tape recorders Martin brought also helped. The whole scene reminded me of the legend of Theseus and Ariadne’s thread - specifically the version of this legend told in the Percy Jackson books - according to them Ariadne herself had magical abilities so it was actually her personally leading him through the labyrinth. Second inspiration was, of course, the legend of Orpheus and Eurydice and how one tried to save another from the Underworld. So initially I wanted fanart to reflect my inspiration by making character poses and general composition looking like those greek vases with illustrations of myths - with unnatural stale poses and slightly flat rendering. But the idea quickly got scratched since I wasn’t really satisfied with initial drafts and decided that I valued to convey the idea of really crammed space more than greek mythology references. So in the end I returned to more familiar to me semi-realism in rendering and the only things staying from the original Idea ended up being slightly theatrical poses and them holding hands with one of Jon’s being stretched out as gesture of the tape recorder “leading” him forward.

Also, yes, when I was watching this episode in my head while listening I imagined them holding hands almost throughout the entire thing because I like the idea of it being both a gesture of comfort in this dark and lonely place and also the image of one person navigating another through darkness by holding them instead of making them orient themselves based on another person’s voice.

[valyrfia]

i wanna know the max is eurydice agenda in detail please please

A lot of people like to slap Charles with the Eurydice label because I guess that Charles gets feminised/assigned the damsel role in fanon a lot more often (which is a whole other can of worms). But fundamentally, Max is the living representation of the thing (the WDC) that Charles would go to hell and back for. Charles has been chasing Max his entire life, it's not inconceivable he chase him into the underworld.

Charles is also very Orpheus coded, (he shows you the way the world could be in spite of the way that it is).

[lucabyte]

Hello! First of all I love ur art, and because of that I have something to ask you regarding it. This comic has never left my mind for the last year or so since you first posted it and I was wondering where the specific things the characters are saying came from! Even if it's not from anything and you came up with it yourself, I would love to be able to quote the dialogue elsewhere and know who to attribute it to (because the depth of the relatively simple exchange is MASSIVE and I wanna be able to share it with people)

Hiiiiiii :D

Thank u very much hearing that you wanna quote something i made is insane and absolutely go ahead feel free.

and yea! it comes frommmm my brain. i guess attribute it to my username lol?? Unless it's in a context where attributing usernames would be strange in which case uhh dm me im not super precious about my irl name being used i just find it funny to be anonymous. old timey nettiquete n all that I can step you through what i recall my thought process was at least? Lol. I recall it came to me for the most part like, basically fully formed with the exception of flipping the pronoun from 'me' to 'you' happening when i was thumbnailing it.

Thought process below if u want it. it got long and is kind of a ramble but wheee. idk if this would Ruin the Magic or not but i usually enjoy hearing the reasoning of artists so. ?? sure

so. despite being listed as "alt title:" that joke was actually the starting point. I had been thinking about that one tumblr post that goes "one must imagine sisyphus pokemon puzzle challenge gbc" riffing on the whole one must imagine sisyphus happy thing.

and like ive already rambled about the Bonus Depth that siffrin being named for sisyphus has. The whole thing where the *reason* sisyphus got trapped with the rock in the first place was because he cheated death & in the process stopped death for everyone else too. (though. siffrin did that on accident and sisyphyus was. a rascally and intentional little scamp about it. what with the corpse desecration and all (don't get me started on a potential siffrin/loop reading of sisyphys' time spent seperated from and then returning to his gross rotten body. but im sure we could do something there too.))

so id been thinking abt siffrin-short-for-sisyphus for a while and that obviously makes loop the boulder. and the "one must imagine sisyphyus horny" thing is funny and had been in my brain since. i had been thinking about that post.

then it kind of combined with a disguuuuuustingly mushy train of thought . (spurring from *another* previous joke of mine about how siffrin was >on a boat >looked back >shouldn'tve >this is an orpheus) where i had been batting back and forth an exchange in my head of the two of them (postcanon) arguing in circles who suits orpheus/euridice better and that "well you hardly Doomed me by looking back, you saved me." "I could say the same for you!!" which is just. so sacchirine its embarrasing. (so when i used it for this i cut it off at the 'doomed' part for the mid-canon fight implications.)

And then there's just the. like viciously obvious narcissus stuff. Like loop's design is literally inspired by a contemporary piece of art of narcissus. Howeverrrr I had also been thinking about the part of the narcissus myth everyone forgets. Echo. Whose name literally went on to be Our Fucking Word for a copy (with undertones of being a Hollow Copy!!!) which is obviously supposed to be bleak irony re: narcissus falling in love with his reflection. and because i was being blorbobrained i was like hmm. a Copy falling in love with someone whos infatuated with their Reflection. Being so in love with them despite their utter ignoration that both wither and die? Yeah thats . that could be sifloop

so i come up with that first panel's dialogue due to having these three trains of thought in a relatively close timeframe. But its in like a sappy "eaugh too cute while still being oddly nihilistic" manner. The two of them using a rotating list of greek myth allusions as weird pet names for each other wistfully type shit. Again so saccharine i kind of want to not tell u this but i am being soooo honest right nowwww. but yeah i kind of rotate it in my head for a while, while im just wandering around the house doing nothing.

and then as im scolding myself for "oh come on now. three? three *different* greek myths? not everything is your scrimblo bimblo shipping fuel dude." the second half of the dialogue forms in my brain just kind of unprompted and i go "oh . or it could be fucking baller. hold on" and i think i like. made this in only like 3 hours or something scary like that. just got posessed by how sick as hell my wording was and yknow what? i was right it fucks like hell. glad i pounced on it.

but yeah there's the thoughts. overall it was very meandering and disjointed as always lol.

i'm a little mean to myself for calling my readings "surface level" since like. well nah dude they aren't *that* surface level. im just a horrid stickler for Artistic Integrity and Intent. and like as i point out above yeah. there's plenty implications to read into outside of the surface stuff. Narcissus and Echo dying unfulfilled despite being right next to each other, Sisyphus' seperated body and spirit thing & stopping death for *everyone* (and sisyphus being a king. i am never not on sisyphus being a literal king. What A Choice.), and Orpheus and Euridice being a tale of how You Can't Help but be worried for the people you love, how you'll love so much you'll go against the 'rational' thing to do. Very siffrincoded. Also boats. (Also that part where orpheus gets torn asunder by a pack of women. uh. maybe not that part. hmm. maybe that can be mal du pays (<- JOKING))

Honestly there's a major treatise to be said about like. how even though im talking sifloop here i keep implicating the party (the other people sisyphus stopped from dying, the 'loop as orpheus and the party as euridice' read) because they're kind of so viscerally inseperable- especially loop- after having so much other identity discarded that this becomes their Whole Purpose. However best i can really do is just gesture at it ?? and go ????

this kind of mapping is good to do though especially in a deeper sense. a friend of mine still has an outright *biblical* reading of The King up her sleeve that she may or may not detail someday. so . yknow this kind of drawing back to mythology is where my head tends to be at. anyway narcissus was real for that #1 self love king get it dude (watches him atrophy) uh oh

[neverbeentokansas]

O'Dessa: A Review

This is a preliminary review, right after I watched it for the first time, and there are SO many things to say about this movie, so let's dive right on in.

The costuming and design was stunning. Seriously. I loved how O'Dessa's character drew inspiration from Elvis and Bowie, although I think they could've gone ham with the lipstick for the climax and done some cool facepaint. Maybe not Ziggy Stardust's exact lightning bolt, for costuming reasons, but I think that would have been stunning. And Euri served LOOKS, in EVERY scene. I would like to give the costume team a crisp high five and an academy award. They really managed to capture such a queer feeling even in 'straight' relationship. Euri's heels, his masks, his HAIR- with costuming alone they made it very clear that he was not only the Eurydice of the story, but emblematic of the problems so many queer people face. Sexual violence, most of all. O'Dessa's look tending towards no makeup and simpler clothes really emphasized her role as a herald of the real roots of punk. Everyone forgets punk was born from poverty, in that those in poverty could, and would, change the system that oppressed them. Punk says 'fuck the world, we deserve a good life' and I think O'Dessa (the character) really represented that. Her country roots, irish name, just, ugh. O'Dessa is what punk is supposed to be.

The set design is great too. All the swirling colors reminiscent of oil, they hypnotic screens... very obvious about the anticapitalist and environmentalist themes, but the aesthetic slaps. I'm not sure about the hypnotism as a plot device, because as much as our technology is designed to addict us, we are still in control of ourselves. And I guess everyone in the movie could theoretically, as well, but it was almost too heavy handed, too much like 'ooh a spooky plot device you can't escape.' I would've liked to see someone (maybe Roach!) exemplify the agency everyone has, or maybe even have her pull O'Dessa away at some point. O'Dessa's character could have benefited form that, because as it is, she seems almost immune to it because she's the 'chosen one.'

Speaking of chosen one's and prophecy... I wasn't a fan of the prophecy. I think we could have had the exact same story without it. O'Dessa could have come from a long line of ramblers (preserving the idea of the seventh son), who had a spiritual encounter, carved the Willa, and received their mandate to ramble and change the world. All without the idea of a chosen one. She could have chosen herself, and I think that would make her character more accessible, more applicable to the world now.

Now, as for the story? I actually like this interpretation of Orpheus and Eurydice. It's not revolutionary, by any means; the whole movie is something of a mix between Hadestown and the Hunger Games, with a 'rock opera soundtrack' (although I think there should be a country in there somewhere.... just saying). It draws on the idea that Hades did trick Orpheus from the beginning, instead of the more classic approach to 'loving is looking back,' but I think that works really well. It's ultimately a story about the evils of capitalism and exploitation, so it fits: those in power will not give you a break. It just doesn't happen.

The whole idea of the reality show contest for a final wish really illustrated that point. Because ultimately what everyone would have wished for was a better life, and maybe (maybe) one person could have gotten it, but the whole thing was a scam for entertainment. The contest was a carrot on a stick. And honestly, a lot of reality shows *are* like that! They will exploit young, talented artists for profit by pitting them against one another. And when O'Dessa wished for something that was antithetical to the way Plutonobitch controlled everything, that thin veil of promise, the wish, was stripped away. If you can't tell, I really liked the ending.

There's one more thing I think they could have added. Priscilla, the Persephone of the story. I think it would've been interesting if she was Euri's sister, or at least knew Euri's sister, and gave O'Dessa her chance because of it. I think it would've emphasized how she, too, was a prisoner, which would have contrasted with Plutonovitch's behavior backstage and reinforced that the 1 percent really, really don't care. And if they act like they do, it's because they want something.

Anyway, that's all! I really enjoyed the music as well, but that's not my expertise. I think it's worth a watch, Sadie Sink and Kelvin Harrison Jr. were exceptional actors, and the queer themes really hit.

[teatraps]

Been driving myself insane trying to figure out what the other 2 perfume bottles are, somebody HELP ME!

My best guess for the 3rd one is that it’s like an inverse to regular Euphoria that brings memories back. Margie brings up that the perfume has a damp smell and when she starts to hallucinate about her past she’s floating in water. Also from a symbolic standpoint, Margie is always trying to run from her past so since she disliked the scent of the 3rd perfume it could be an indication that she also dislikes the smell that takes her back to the past. And lastly, with her past at lakeside, a damp smell would be familiar to her and also something she dislikes and wants to escape cause she hated her life there.

As for the first one, I don’t even know. I genuinely have no clue what that could possibly be. I know lily of the valleys have really positive meanings and I know Margie liked it, but I haven’t got any idea what that could mean. Vera brings up a reeky floral scent of a lily in her 2nd letter so that could be something but I really don’t know.

The middle one is obviously Euphoria. Iconic purple bottle and everything. Could even go further and say the scent of “wood burning” is symbolic for Margie and escaping her past with the fire from the circus. Could also be that fire has the ability to completely destroy something and turn it to ash with no trace of what it used to be. To top it all off, when Margie starts stressing she immediately goes for this bottle because it relaxes her. This is also why I’m hesitant to say that it was Euphoria that caused her hallucinations in the room. Euphoria has always been tied to relaxation and taking away painful memories so unless there’s a drawback to Euphoria that brings memories back in full force (which we haven’t seen any mention of as far as I know) I don’t think Euphoria caused it.

Going back to my theory about the 3rd bottle, I wonder why Vera would make something like that in the first place. Vera wants to escape her past, so why make a perfume that brings memories back? Also, damp smells aren’t all that pleasant in general and Vera has a particularly sensitive nose so I can’t imagine her wanting to make that. My best guess to that is it could be a character arc thing. Her 5th letter already mentions this whole mission to erase her memories thing isn’t fulfilling her. Maybe she turns around and makes a perfume to bring her memories back since her portrait does say her true nature is “opposite of what she once fantasized about.”

I could even tack on the fact Vera acts way different from how her deduction model theorized she would. Making a perfume that brings memories back could be a part of that since Orpheus might’ve underestimated her ability to face her past at some point and even go as far as to use the provisions he gave her to break out of the plan set for her in the deduction model for game 5 (small reference to Judith the dove using the key Murro gave Vera to trap her and turning it around to liberate herself and the other actresses)

I don’t know, I’m scraping for game 5 scraps in an event that has almost nothing to do with them and I know game 5 isn’t getting an event like this until I’m probably a junior in college (being generous). I am desperate.

[quincyhorst]

Inazuma Japan Appreciation Post! ⚡️

Hello, I was wondering, but is there anyone in the fandom who's also a fan of the japanese representative?

I know that out of Block A they aren't the most popular team, but I can't deny I've been so interested on them. Their only relevance was on episode 102, when Red Matador goes to visit them for a practice match. The whole episode was focused on the team getting massive culture shock from all things japanese, that they accidentally forgot to give actual screentime to the actual selection. You can even compile it in a quick video! (Excuse some of the odd cuts, the spanish wouldn't stop commenting every two seconds 🤪)

Unfortunately after this episode they never get to appear again, which sucks a lot knowing captain Endou's promise of a rematch :(

I'm also not the biggest fan of how the fandom treats this team. Every so often I'll see people making fanarts of Orpheus and Unicorn yet leaving Inazuma Japan behind, and the amount of times I've seen people call them ugly is frustrating. Their designs aren't the best but come on, you just can't look at Sakuma and not think that's a top tier design.

The treatment from the japanese themselves is super weird too. I understand having your main representation be PENGUINS is strange, and to this day I'll forever wonder what Quinto Nivel was thinking while designing some of the characters (One has dreads and other has donut lips...). But I dislike that the only time they seem to aknowledge this team's existence, is only to use their pictures whenever irl Japan wins a match :/

So as to change this, I'll make some comments on them! Feel free to share yours below, too!

The most relevant players on this team are the keeper, Endou, and the trio that perform the hissatsu Koutei Penguin Nº3; composed of Kidou, Fudou and Sakuma.

I can't deny that on the few scenes he appears, Endou gave me the impression of being cocky. But after the match its shown he's quite the nice guy! I really wish we could have seen the dynamic with his team, I think he'd be friendly with all of them.

Also, wonder why his hissatsu is called "The Hand" is there's no actual hand on the first place. YOU HAD ONE JOB QUINTO NIVEL!!! Seriously!

Kidou is a character that's sorrounded in mystery, and the fact that this is his only appearance stresses me so much. Maybe he's a showoff? I dobut it, because he seemed too nervous over something. Maybe its the upcoming final match against Orpheus, and with a reason. Both teams got eliminated off screen :(

Also, Nº3? I know that later on the series we're shown that Brockenborg knows some Penguin Moves, but only the Nº2. There's also the in-game Nº1, which Jens and Sakuma seem to have. Can't deny the description for this move scares me, as it calls it "forbidden". Yet another plothole left unanswered! When I get to write a fic about InaJapan, I will make sure to adress that.

Either way, Kidou and the other two seem to be super close, just like our beloved Slingshot trio. I also can picture them having a similar origin: Sakuma and Kidou have a close relationship though were rivals with Fudou at some point, who'd start to warm up to them as they played the FFI together. Classic.

There's also this one manager that seems to be very keen on recording Red Matador. His name is Megane, apparently! It's never explained why he records Spain, but unfortunately we never get to see him use the information he got.

AND WAIIIT I ALMOST FORGOT SOMEOKA!! He's iconic to me because of his manga cameo. Even if he was there just to be Juan's 100th catch, I'm happy the two got on well at the end. Do you imagine what could happen if the teams were swapped? I like Samuel, but there's no way in hell he'd be like that to Endou...

I really want to ship him with someone, and all the 5 fanarts I've seen on Pixiv ship him with this one bencher called Fubuki. Dunno why but I APPROVE! 😍

I guess I could also comment on Tobitaka since he stops Joan's move. He has a nice hair. I think he'd be one of those people who REALLY puts a lot of love to it. His appearance also reminds me of the stereotypical japanese delincuent (Clever choice!), so I like the headcanon of him having a gang back at Japan.

One last thing, but shoutout to the female managers!!! THEY'RE ARE SO CUTEEEEEE 😭 Outside of Spain and Germany we don't get to see other managers in the FFI, so knowing the japanese do have some too is comforting. If only we knew their names...

(The scenes with them and Isaac were rather awkward, however. I also wish Virgina was here to intereact with them instead, but oh well, she had to visit her cousins anyway)

That's all for now, everyone! In the future I'll post more stuff with Inazuma Japan, and if anyone's interested I'd like to also do stuff for Unicorn and Orpheus :>

I sometimes wish there was an alternate universe were these three had more relevance... What if there was an entire trilogy centered about Endou instead? I'd gladly go there if it existed.

I've heard rumours of my city's obelisk hosting a plant-alien thingy that can transport me to another dimension, but I'm not sure how it works. Guess I'll pay it a visit today.

See ya!

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AND HAPPY APRIL FOOLS!

[androdetective]

Jefferson is one of my favorite characters. Whenever I think about his fumbled potential, I experience agony. He gets set up with a simple backstory. At age ten, he saw his mom get killed by vampires, it's later revealed she was also assaulted by the same group. I'm assuming this is to reference the 80s horror trope of women being randomly assaulted for shock. Ironically enough, even the scene where that was revealed felt like it was there for shock humor. They didn't even try to subvert the trope like they do with other tropes, but that's asking too much for the show.

Because of that that's why he's dedicated his life to being a vampire hunter. Specifically, a "Blacula hunter." For whatever reason, but I guess they're doing that since Blacula was one of his character inspirations.

That's all pretty fucked up. We do see him direct that trauma to killing (all shown as aggressive) vampires. That seems like a good thing. And he does it because of his love for his mom. The closest we have to a black female character on the show. Black women are almost non-existent in the show, and the shows closest connection to one being through a man is. Rough. But it's the closest there is.

At the very least it's not a woman who's existence hinges on her romantic relationship to a man. Rather, a mother/son relationship. For vbros, that's progressive. We've barely seen that in the show, compared to father/child relationships. And it's shown in a positive way. Her impact has shown to have made him a better person compared to other characters. Especially compared to other characters who don't have positive relationships with women.

The show has a theme of mom/son relationships. Particularly, of course, with the boys looking for their bio mom through the course of the whole series. There's the moment of kid Rusty and Bobbi meeting and it being this important thing. It was a moment when Rusty had a caring adult, the closest he had to a good maternal figure. Those are just the main guys, though.

The few times a mom/son relationship is important to a side character is with Jefferson. We know a lot of his drive is because of her. He was permanently affected by her death. So much so that he mentions it a lot. However, that leads to the question. Why does he only mention her death and not any other memories with her?

I get the trauma memories being neverending, but how come we never hear about how she was? I find that really unbelievable. The fact we never hear about how she was or any stories from a loved one. The only thing we know is that she was a good mom who got killed. It feels like they barely gave thought to her. She's just a tragic figure who's barely relevant. She's the woman in the fridge trope, and that's all she was to the writers. We never got a design for her. We never even got a name for her. It feels like each time he mentions her dying its the writers trying to remind themselves what his character backstory was.

Other (white) characters get more character exploration, and it is so jarring when you see how underdeveloped Jefferson and his story actually are. We didn't even get more backstory to him until the movie. He used to live with this vigilante group in the 90s, and even then, he still hunted vampires. Which I guess shows his determination, but what else has he done? What else does he do even?

This specific scene always comes to mind when I try to analyze his character. I'm pretty sure it was the episode with the monarch wedding. Orpheus and Jefferson were talking and Jefferson says something like "there's a lot of things you don't know about me". He then says that he takes care of baby pigeons, then follows it up by saying he used to be in the military. This is the closest thing to more stuff for his character and they made him a former military guy. His whole thing is hating blood suckers why would he join a different group of them!! My only guess as to why they added that was to reference Jefferson's va, Charles Parnell. Who seems to have done military acting roles before. Even then, I'm still not a big fan of that character fact.

We don't know shit about his hobbies or anything else. Like, sure, you can add fun facts like he's diabetic and likes Nik-L-Nips, but they feel so hollow when his character doesn't get explored to his full potential. We know he loves his mom but it feels almost laughable when you realize the show unintentionally makes it seem like he doesn't give a fuck about his other family for no reason. He loves his mom, but what about the rest of his family?? Literally what about his dad?? Was he raised by him after his mom's death? Did his family console him with the trauma/grief? Has he gone to therapy? We don't know because the show never said shit. He's never even mentioned family other than his mom. And as sad as this is, a part of me is glad they didn't mention his dad because they would have easily done an absent father joke.

It's like, Jefferson is a fun character, but he would've been better if the show started caring about him before the movie. Many people like his character and want to see more of him. They want to know more about him. That really shows his potential for greater things. He's got the character setup and one of the show's coolest designs. I'm still glad he got his time to shine in the movie. I just can't help but crave more of that.

[deer-with-a-stick]

Idk if the people complaining about the BG3 endings are D&D players or not but like...this does feel like the ending of a campaign y'know. Sacrifices are made, people are stubborn and time is short so sometimes you have to choose between npcs who could have worked together but won't, and the thing with character arcs.

If you finished them, the companions' arcs are complete emotionally I think (except for Karlach rip, although I hope Larian does make up for it. Late-addition I guess :/). Lae'zel breaks free of her indoctrination, Shadowheart discovers who she is and now has the choice to decide who she can be, Astarion's learned enough things about himself that he's almost a completely different character by the end of it, Gale's gotten over Mystra and over his constant need to be better and stronger (this is all assuming the "Good Endings"), Wyll's broken his pact with Mizora and it makes sense for his character to keep trying to help people, whether that's by becoming the Blade of Avernus or otherwise.

Life goes on after the campaign ends. Characters move on, and for characters like the BG3 ones, where it ended at level 12, it makes sense that they wouldn't settle down in a place to chill and have a fairytale ending. They have the last tiny part of their stories to complete.

I think the reason it funnels a little right at the big moment (where it ends up being "Choose Orpheus or the Emperor," and "Choose who to become the illithid or let Gale explode") is because for these big last boss fights, there tends to have to be a sacrifice. I know there might be some bugs or whatnot, or people wanted more knowledge about what was going to happen to everyone else, but this is still a roleplaying game? Should I remind you that in BG3, you are, in fact, roleplaying as Tav/Origin Character?

That's the reason why you learn more about what a companion does after defeating the Netherbrain if you play as them and why if you play as Tav, you don't know what comes next.

For the few D&D campaigns I've played, at the end of it, it's always just been the players deciding individually what happens to the characters. Sometimes, they've died. Sometimes, they've continued adventuring and end up making appearances in the next campaigns, and sometimes they just had their fairytale ending. (From what I've seen the ending is quite a bit bugged and once Larian fixes that it'll probably please a bunch of people. My thoughts are incredibly disjointed right now but hjkrhlakjsdfh)

Those open-ended endings are good, I think. Lae'zel's always been a fighter, regardless of whether it was because of Vlaakith or not. She's always been steadfast in her beliefs and will stop at nearly nothing to make sure she accomplishes what she's set her mind to. She's got a code of honor, even if that code might skew towards "evil," so it makes complete sense that she would want to return to the Astral Plane to stop Vlaakith. What becomes of her and her mission, we don't know, because Tav, in that moment, is not in the Astral Plane with Lae'zel.

Shadowheart's arc was about reclaiming herself, so to speak. And that's hard when you've been brainwashed by a goddess for the majority of your life. Ironically, the whole theme of "Loss" is always prevalent, whether it's because she serves Shar or because she's let her parents go. Unlike Lae'zel, her purpose now is something vague: live your life. She doesn't know what exactly to do, so she heads off by herself. She doesn't know where she's going exactly, and so therefore Tav wouldn't either.

Astarion's ending pissed people off, and I do kind of wish that if you kept Gale's True Resurrection scroll, you could cure him, but it makes sense I suppose. If you kept him from becoming Vampire Ascendent, it signifies that he's finally free of Cazador and that he's finally free of his near all-consuming quest for power. The ability to walk in the sun is a power, and when he burns after the tadpoles die, it's because he's given up that power earlier, but is a better person because of that. I believe that if you do an Astarion Origin ending, it turns out that he heads to the Underdark to lead the vampire spawn because he's taking responsibility. He's becoming a leader where Cazador had been a tyrant

For Gale, his entire storyline is just him walking on a knife's edge. He's somewhere between desperately trying to live and trying to find some convenient time to die, between loving Mystra and hating her, between wanting more power and being content with what he has. The end (find the crown, give it to mystra) is a fitting ending I think. I honestly don't think Mystra's a very good goddess to hold the attention of, but he realizes that a) he's got a little obsessive and b) he doesn't need more power and that he'll be content just to be Gale Dekarios. So it makes sense for him to quite literally just settle down somewhere. He doesn't have the urge to make himself stronger and better constantly, and he won't end up killing all of Waterdeep. He's free to live at home, do wizard things, and have Tara yell at him for poor life choices.

And Wyll's Blade of Avernus ending makes sense (even if he didn't sell his soul to Mizora forever: I think you can get this ending if you save his father anyway). He's got his hero complex. His daddy issues aren't so much a problem and the pact is gone (you can break the pact and then hurry to the prison I believe), but he's going to keep fighting, keep being a hero. If Karlach's dying, he's definitely the kind of person to jump at the chance to help her, even if that means going to Avernus. Besides, he can keep killing demons and devils there.

I will agree that its a bit annoying (because again, I definitely think that Act 1 is the most thought-through and polished piece, and there are bugs abound in Act 2 and 3) but seeing Larian's response so far (we've got Patch 1 and 2 confirmed already, with the possibility of a DLC not off the table), people who were disappointed should still have hope.

Just be warned that the perfect fairy tale ending probably isn't possible, but your companions will still be happy. This isn't new: take LOTR for example. Faramir's father and brother are still dead, but at the end of everything, he'll still be happy. He'll have some more action when he cleans out Minas Ithil, but in the end, despite everything he's lost, he'll be happy. Frodo is heavily scarred by his experience, and perhaps it's not the best ending per say, by the end of the day, people and life move on, and we know that Frodo will be happy in Valinor.

(This is unfiltered rambling I'll probably edit or delete this later)

(This is also probably because I love the bittersweet endings, although I understand that most people probably hate them)

[artinventor]

Cloud & Aerith are Orpheus & Eurydice

An Analysis:

Hello! I wanted to share my analysis on how Cloud & Aerith represent the Ancient Greek legend of Orpheus & Eurydice, one of the most well known tragic love stories. I love this game and I love this legend and after seeing connections I wanted to share it with others. This is my opinion. if you disagree, you can keep scrolling, and have a nice day <3

There have been many different variations of this story from Hadestown to Moulin Rouge. I will reference the broadway show Hadestown a lot, because I’m a huge fan of the show and it represents Orpheus & Eurydice’s story very well. With this analysis, I’m going in with the belief that Hollow and No Promises to Keep are Cloud and Aerith’s songs that are about each other, who those songs are about is a whole different argument, but to ME, it’s obvious who they’re about and I’m using them to push this analysis further.

In the Greek legend, Orpheus & Eurydice fell in love, and one day Eurydice died from the bite of a viper. Orpheus was so ruined by grief that he traveled to the underworld itself to find Eurydice and bring her back. Orpheus sang about his love for Eurydice to Hades and Persephone, who were so moved by it that Hades gave him the opportunity to bring Eurydice out of the underworld, he just has to take the long walk out of the underworld with Eurydice behind him, and he cannot look back at her the entire walk until they are out of the underworld, or else she will be sent back down. Towards the end of their walk, Orpheus is worried that Hades had tricked him because he could not hear Eurydice behind him. He loves her so much that he is driven mad by the fear and doubt that enter his mind. So much so that he ends up looking back at her, and she is sent back to the underworld.

Now for the comparison to Cloud and Aerith.

Obviously, much like Orpheus and Eurydice, we see their relationship become a precious and cherished thing, until Aerith is suddenly killed. If you really wanna get into details, guess who has eyes like a viper, Sephiroth. The one who kills Aerith.

Now Cloud is not a singer or a poet, but he does have a theme song called Hollow in the Remake. This song is heavily theorized to be about Aerith, and makes the most sense to be about her. It describes how lost and hollow he feels without her, which is so unbelievably Orpheus of him. In the lines;

“Bloody and bruised, Brought to my knees

When beaten down, When broken up

You would appear, Reach out to me,

Heal every wound, And make me whole”

It makes me think of a scene in Hadestown, where Orpheus gets beaten up while in the underworld trying to get Eurydice back. Persephone is inspired by Orpheus’ determination to get Eurydice back, his love for her and determination to get her back keeps him going even when he’s beaten down.

Throughout Hollow, he says a lot of words like “Guide me to you” “I’ll never let you go”. He still wants to find her somehow after feeling so empty from her death. Again, very Orpheus.

Let’s look at the lyrics for Wait for me that Orpheus sings in Hadestown;

“Wait for me, I’m coming

Wait, I’m coming with you

Wait for me, I’m coming too

I’m coming too”

Before Aerith even dies, she is kidnapped by Shinra, and Cloud makes it his personal mission to go get her back. After she is kidnapped in Remake, he has a vision of her, where he tells her,

“I’m coming for you”

In Rebirth, after she “dies” he tells her “I’ve got this” in English, but in the Japanese version, guess what he really says?

Wait for me.

There’s also a play called Loveless in FF7 Rebirth, where Cloud and Aerith play Alphreid and Rosa, whose story is very reminiscent of their real story. (I’m aware of how Rosa’s part can also be played by Tifa and Yuffie, but the story of this play fits Cloud and Aerith’s real story the most, as well as Rosa’s character fits Aerith the most. So I wanted to include it)

There is a line that Alphreid tells Rosa;

“You needn’t promise that you’ll wait. For I know that I will find you here”

Key words: Wait and Find

In Hadestown, Eurydice sings a song called Flowers. And guess who in FF7 is a flower girl? Aerith.

The song talks about how Eurydice regrets becoming a worker for Hades (in this version she is very poor and hungry, and Hades convinced her to sell her soul for the safety of it all) but she misses the world above and remembers Orpheus and her happiness with him in the fields of flowers.

Aside from the obvious flower connection, this almost makes me think of how while Aerith had a responsibility in dying and saving the world, she may have regrets since all she wants is to be happy with Cloud (we see her wishes on her dream date with him, spending time with him is how she wishes her life would be without the burden) and in the Advent Children script, when Cloud rides his motorcycle by a field of flowers where her ghost is standing and watching over him, it describes her feeling lonely.

Another thing to note, in Hadestown, a flower is used as a symbol for the whole show. Most notably for this analysis, Orpheus uses it as a reminder of her as he travels to the underworld and tries to give it back when they reunite. And guess what happens when Cloud and Aerith meet? She gives him a flower that represents the reunion of lovers.

In Aerith’s song, No Promises to Keep, Aerith describes this burden she has of being the last Cetra while also saying lines like,

“Till the day that we meet again

Where or when?

I wish I could say

But believe know that you'll find me“

Also:

“Still I hope someday you'll come and find me“

This just screams Eurydice waiting for Orpheus in the underworld, knowing he’ll come find her. Shes saying, come and find me, while he’s saying, guide me to you. Pair that with how Cloud keeps saying Orpheus lines like “Wait for me” and “I’m coming for you” Hollow and No Promises to Keep are such Orpheus and Eurydice anthems, even without the context of FF7 or Cloud and Aerith, those songs fit Orpheus and Eurydice so well. A man feeling hollow without his love, a woman trusting the man to come find her. *chefs kiss*

In the original FF7, Cloud gets a glimpse of Aerith after the final battle, and that’s when he says:

“the Promised Land...

I think I can meet her...there.”

Now we don’t have a clear answer as to what exactly the Promised Land is. Since Aerith is dead at this point when Cloud says this, it makes you wonder if it’s related to where you go when you die, or maybe just where Aerith goes since she is a Cetra. Regardless, she is still dead and Cloud still wants to find her, much like Orpheus when Eurydice dies.

In the Advent Children film that takes place two years after Aerith dies, Cloud himself is dying from geostigma, and sadly enough, is pushing away his friends, accepting death rather than fighting it, seemingly searching for Aerith amongst it all with how he sleeps in her church. Orpheus was known to have never been the same after Eurydice died, completely swallowed up with grief until he had the idea to see her again in the underworld.

Another interesting detail in AC, when he has visions of her, Cloud cannot look at Aerith because of his guilt until the very end where he decides to keep living on.

In the FF7 Remake, it takes a little different approach than the original FF7 did. There are multiversal aspects that have made people question if Aerith’s fate is final this time. Since we don’t know how Part 3 of the trilogy will play out, some of this is theorizing. But what I believe is that there was a new timeline where Cloud saved Aerith, it’s not the current timeline that Cloud and the rest of the party are in, but Cloud knows of this other timeline where Aerith is alive because he is the only one that can see into that timeline.

No Promises to Keep plays when they part at the very end of the game, the same song that talks about how she wants him to come and find her, just like he did when she was kidnapped by Shinra. This makes me wonder if maybe he will try to cross between different worlds (much like Orpheus with the underworld) to try and get her back. If this will be successful or not, we will see, he is Orpheus after all.

There’s another song in Hadestown called Road to Hell, about how even though Orpheus and Eurydice’s story ends in tragedy, the people in the musical keep singing it over and over hoping that one day the story will change and that one day they’ll be reunited.

“It's a sad song

But we sing it anyway

'Cause here’s the thing

To know how it ends

And still begin to sing it again

As if it might turn out this time”

A common theme with the Remake project is defying fate, repeatedly saying it’s not set in stone, that maybe it can be changed, so we’ll have to see if it’ll turn out this time.

I am one that does not mind either way if Aerith lives or dies by the end of this new trilogy. Simply because the tragedy of their romance was already great, it would be emphasized even more with this hope that maybe we can get her back. Both we and Cloud actually see a possibility of her being alive with these parallel worlds. There’s a chance he can get her back. And if he in fact still does not get her back, it would hammer in their original idea of this tragedy even more, making it more tragic. And if he does get her back, I feel like It the original idea would still be there (since we DID still see her die) but it would transcend both OG and remake that after all this time he finally found her, and maybe he’d finally be happy for it, I know people would be mad and say that it cheapens the purpose of her death or whatever but personally it would be beautiful to me. Getting that hope then getting the same result is very reminiscent of Orpheus and Eurydice. But I will say I am hopeful that Cloud can defy fate and get his Eurydice back, I would love to see them happy together by the end.

[determinedowl23]

Hadestown West End 12/30 notes

Act I

The Lyric is such a tiny theatre, it’s so cute

Melanie La Barrie as Hermes is actually the best thing in the world

RACHELLLLL QUEEN OF THE WORLD (she’s done nothing but sit on the balcony so far)

i love it in road to hell when Hermes introduces Orpheus but has to remind him to say hi to the audience and he waves like the autistic boy he is it’s wonderful

one of the workers is missing an arm and she’s just rocking the choreo love that <3

Eurydice is INCREDIBLE omg her voice is so raw and powerful

SCOTTISH ORPHEUS ‼️‼️ they replace every “yes” he has with “aye”

RACHEL PERSEPHONE YIPPEEEEE!!!!!!!! She ATE livin it up on top- also she and Hermes were besties during her whole time on the surface

ME WHEN THE VIOLIN SOLO IN ALL OVER EVER KNOWN OUUYGHHGHDHWISJSIJSJSJD

Persephone has the most worried and pained expressions every time she dances in Way Down Hadestown, it was so sad. You could tell that she had no control over herself in that moment. (also im just a sucker for puppet choreography)

Scottish Orpheus holds Eurydice at the end of Way Down Hadestown bc he notices her becoming tempted 🥺

HADES BUILT THE WALL BECAUSE DOUBT CAME IN THAT PERSEPHONE WOULDNT COME BACK BRO I HATE THIS SHOW

TURNTABLE JUMPSCARE- since I’ve only seen the tour which obv doesn’t have turntables, so all the choreo with it was new to me and it added so much

Is this Hades a baritone? Or even a tenor? He sang Hey Little Songbird way higher than Patrick or even Nickolaus did

I feel like at some point between the obc and now they switched up which fates sing which lines and have which instruments 

HE STARTS SCREAM SINGING IN WAIT FOR ME LETS GOOOOOOO!!!!!!! If there’s anything I’ve learned this week it’s that more pathetic white boys should scream sing in their big numbers (thank you Dylan Wood and Jac Yarrow)

Scottish Orpheus’ voice is just so powerful in general. He hits the high notes beautifully and belts his heart out in other parts.

The walls receding is genuinely the coolest part of the show it’s awesome

At one point during Why We Build the Wall, Hades looked back at Persephone. To make sure she was singing along. Because he doubted.

Literally the MOMENT the door closes, Persephone turns around and asks “anybody want a drink?” Like, no hesitation frame one personality shift

Act II

Hermes and Persephone are actually the best duo in the show- they walk on arm in arm and Persephone tries to kiss them lol

RACHEL DID THE CRAZIEST OPT UP ON “there’s a crack in the wall” THE ENTIRE THEATRE CHEERED SHE WAS SO ELPHABA I HELD SPACE FOR IT THATS WHY SHES MY BESTIE!!!!!!!!! 

Scottish Orpheus enters from the house right audience and climbs a scaffolding to get back on stage and does a little happy dance when he goes “it’s me!!” obsessed

Hermes just spends all of Act II (and even the second half of Act I) looking so sad- makes sense, since they knows what’s going to happen but it’s still so sad

Scottish Orpheus scream sings again in If it’s True, both when he’s mourning Eurydice and when he’s rallying the workers I’m so obsessed with it

Ok so Hades sang low again in How Long- guess he’s a baritone who wasn’t comfortable enough with the crazy low notes of Act I but could rock Act II 

I love the lights at the end of How Long where the blue light shines on Hades and the orange light shines on Persephone- it feels like an inversion of their colors (Hades is more warm colors while Persephone is cool colors)

Persephone looks so proud of Scottish Orpheus and the union- new headcanon: Persephone is now Orpheus’ second (third?) mom

Before Epic III, Hermes ruffles Scottish Orpheus’ hair, grabs his arm, and squeezes his hand. They leave to go, but he holds onto them and doesn’t let go- Hermes had to pull themself away 😭

Hades and Persephone looked so happy once they started dancing it was adorable

Scottish Orpheus and Eurydice both had such raw voices that they blend so well together omggggg

Historians will say Mel!Hermes and Rachel!Persephone were best friends omg Harold they’re lesbians

Ik I already mentioned Hermes looking sad but ohmy GOD it’s worse in Wait For Me Reprise bc they are center stage watching Orpheus lead everyone away, knowing he’ll fail but hoping he won’t 

The way it’s pitch black during Dout Comes In is actually terrifying, it really feels like you got transported into Scottish Orpheus’ mind

Literally how did it get sadder the second time I’ve seen it what 😭😭  

I need Rachel to sing We Raise Our Cups to me every day bro 

In summary: this show is incredible!! Thought it was amazing when i saw it on tour but it’s even better in an environment where it’s meant to be performed. Love Scottish Orpheus and Rachel Tucker owns my entire heart I can’t believe she’s real

[swordsandarms]

i know you just tend to lurk (me too) but your fandomised rhaegar thoughts are very validating lol. ive always thought blue roses are symbolic of a child born from love, not symbolic of a woman. like lyanna has the roses cause she's jon's mother and rhaegar's love, not because they're her "thing"? never thought that was far fetched til coming online lmao.

OK, this was in my drafts for like a decade.

The roses aren't really the child or the woman, but a representation of the (tragic, but bittersweet) love itself. Though, of course, Jon as the "fruit"/"proof" of it is still at the centre of it all.

Used to hate the concept of "tragedy" and not understand how that can be compelling/satisfying. Turns out a lot of tragedy is badly done, hence the feeling of meaningless/pointlessness of it all some of them give you. Look at HOTD. The problem with the writing is that everything is made meaningless, not that your "favourite" isn't winning everything. It is the fact that it's all bitter and no sweet at the end of the day. (Not the book version, which is also a matter of how much better ASOIAF handles the "continuation" of the tragedy better than GOT).

I see Rhaelya as a representation of the concept: "The love was there. It didn't save anyone, it didn't change anything, but the love was there."

Once you get to look at it like that, it becomes very annoying when people in the fandom sound like a broken record of "what's nice about this?? EveRYoNE dIeS". Yeah, that's how tragedies work, but look at it as such and you'll see the nice, too.

It's not about how "oh, why would you think the author is trying to paint Romeo and Juliet as a romance when he liked Rosaline before, and now suddenly her overnight?"/"oh, it's all about how they are dumb teenagers messing up"/"oh, isn't Orpheus the dumbest for turning round".

Romeo and Juliet are young people finding a shiny thing in a shitty society that creates generational cycles of pain and hate for stupid reasons. The ending is satisfying not because the love is successful but because the characters - and readers are meant to - finally get that. Orpheus turns round because he loves Eurydice and if you did you would, too.

Westeros is a hellscape of ambition, heartlessness, and corruption. Everyone is stabbing everyone's back for a bit more of land, a bit more of wealth, a bit more political influence. Selling and pawning their loved ones for a corn chip. (Controversial opinion, neither Elia or Lyanna should have been in that position, but that's the reason why, "loving families" and all. Even more Controversial, Rhaegar shouldn't have been in that position also. And that's the "good" people - as Controversial as people might think that statement is for Rhaegar. But also OH, you mean selling off Cersei didn't work out well cause she was meant to be a pretty object and didn't have to be taught about armies and resources, just vanity? Or Lysa for some reason wasn't all that grateful to papa to give armies to the great alliance when they needed them, for reasons of keeping the one "trueborn child" she had sheltered, cause that's the one thing you promised her she could get if she did your bidding?) Looking away from what is fair when it is "lawful" according to the status quo (and fandom finds it easy to pinpoint it when it's someone deemed hateworthy, but will be 1000% lenient towards a Ned Stark, and will even hold characters they hate accountable when putting FAIRNESS ABOVE LAW).

And the thing about ASOIAF fandom is THEY LOVE THIS SHIT. They love to romanticise it all. But there's the paradox of it all. Romanticising comes with this idea of unrealistic wistfulness, I guess. If a character lives in "the cruel real world", the romanticised ideal is nice to think about. If they actually reach for ideals, they are fools who should get real about living in the "cruel real world".

Oop, I ventured far from the point. But I just love the whole CONCEPT of the blue rose at its roots. 💙 It literally means just that at its roots. Something wistful but unattainable.

[writing-for-life]

Give me your head-canons:

How do you solve the Orpheus problem?

[And as always: Send me asks about everything Sandman-related!]

As in: It’s the elephant in the room in so many canon-compliant or -adjacent fanfics I read (we obviously don’t need to talk about coffee shop AUs) and Orpheus either keeps on existing somehow (and no one cares, because Dream and whatever love interest just literally fuck off into the sunset and pretend everything’s okay), or he gets killed by someone else who quite strictly wouldn’t be able to kill him.

Is it a solvable problem?

If he keeps existing as a severed head, it’s honestly a bit shite for him, isn’t it? So these are the fics where we keep on visiting severed heads. I don’t know, I find that… dissatisfying.

If Dream kills him, it’s over. Unless he stays in the Dreaming and lets the storm blow over. Will it though? I mean yeah, he could sit there for all eternity (groan), not take Death’s hand and make sure he doesn’t conveniently leave so the Kindly Ones get in and start ripping the Dreaming to shreds. But that doesn’t really sound like a solution to me either, because the problem won’t go away. Also: Probably no meetings in the waking world with you-know-who ever again. Plot hole, people, it doesn’t work that way.

If someone else kills him: Who? Please don’t say Hob, I know he’s immortal (so was Murphy), but the very idea is that no one can kill the poor kid because he made a deal with Death, which she apparently can’t revoke. Is there an entity who could? Which links in to the question: Why could Dream (somewhat rhetorical question)? Could any similar entity do it if they also had to grant him a boon? But don’t forget: Can’t be one of the Endless, they’re all family. Unless one sacrifices themselves. I mean, I think I’ve seen Death doing that in a fic somewhere, I think the assumption was she’s okay with dying a mortal death, but I also felt that’s not quite right, since it’s just not the same (also: in her mortal form, she wouldn’t have those powers). Does it have to be The Presence/Glory? Why would they care?

Yeah, he could use the Saeculum I guess, but really? If the problem never existed, it would also feel… wrong? Plus, we all know that changing the past always has implications on the future that go far beyond the thing we want to change. Plus plus: I honestly think it would be a bit OOC for him because he’d feel there’s not enough at stake (like a whole universe imploding) to ever justify that. So no, that’s, IMHO, making him into someone he really isn’t (can of course be an option in fanfic I guess).

Same goes for the Dream of a Thousand Cats Spiel. Someone who is so wrapped up in his duty just wouldn’t do that for his own personal gain, and not even for one loved one (he also wouldn’t be allowed to kick it off by telling anyone, and what 1,000 dreamers would dream that? I mean, WE all would, but that’s a bit… meta?😂). I said what I said.

Or is it some sort of magic? Like, he’s still a severed head, but we make him *think* he isn’t, give him back a body (in his own mind, or maybe even for real)? But that’s also… not great and feels like gaslighting him. Really not keen.

So what say you?

Is this just a case of: Unsolvable problem, hence we might as well pretend we solve it in some ridiculous way or pretend it doesn’t exist in the first place?