#I can only handle one in-progress canon I care deeply about in which things I dislike might happen at a time

[elspethdixon]

Even the “trashy” television the people OP is talking about like to judge you for can be too active depending on the person and the situation. If I get stressed enough, I can’t watch new-to-me television shows or fictional tv content in general. Nature documentaries and docudramas about prehistoric life only. “No fannish shows, only this obscure series about a wildlife refuge in Namibia,” sounds smart and worldly, but it’s actually the opposite. “No characters I might get invested in that could have bad things happen to them, no content I’m fannish about that involves emotional investment. It’s time to rewatch the collected works of Sir David Attenborough for the 46th time while fast-forwarding over the stressful bits where people talk about poaching/habitat loss/anything being endangered. Then we can rewatch the BBC Walking With Monsters series again. No need to have anxiety about how humans are destroying the planet and wiping out endangered animals when you’re watching something set before the Mesozoic! Humans don’t exist yet so nothing bad that happens to the fictionalized Devonian and Permian creatures is our fault. Oh look, the orphaned warthog in Namibia was successfully re-released into the wild just like it was every previous time I watched this program, how nice.”

The same applies to reading - when I’m stressed I’ll pass over new fiction on my tbr list in order to read nonfiction because it doesn’t require as much thought/imagination/emotional investment as something with fictional characters and a plot does. Worst case scenario, I’ll just reread the same three books about evolution over and over again. No sci-fi or romance novels, only Donald Prothero’s Evolution: What the Fossils Show and Why it Matters and Nick Lane’s book on the biochemical origins of life for the 14th times

[makeste]

im honestly scared for whats going to happen next. while i have no doubt that bakugou is the one who knows deku best, this is the first time hes reached out to him for dekus benefit. he understands him but most likely doesnt really know how to communicate with him. what they desperately need is an adult to help talk deku down instead of fighting him, but since most of the adults have proven themselves useless in this, I'm worried whats going to happen.

I meant to reply to this ask sooner, but it didn't really come together that way, so my apologies. the manga itself will probably provide a better answer than this within the next 24 hours, assuming the leaks come out as scheduled.

but in the meantime, I do want to say that I don't think there's any cause for worry here. the Kacchan of the past may have had difficulties communicating with Deku, because he never really understood the why of why Deku was doing things (so even though he's always been fairly good at predicting Deku's actions -- "don't come, Deku" -- he never really understood what was driving him to take those actions). but the Kacchan of the present definitely knows what he's doing imo.

there are two important things to keep in mind here. the first is that we know from past arcs that Katsuki is capable of remarkable insight when it comes to finding the right approach to reach out to someone.

what's notable about this scene from the Remedial arc is the way that he anticipates which approaches are not going to work. he's not the one to come up with the final plan, but he is the one to say to the others, "look, if we don't do this right, the kids are going to react like this, instead of like this." definitely something which I'd say is applicable to the current situation as well.

and the other thing to keep in mind is that if this chapter established anything, it's that Kacchan knows Deku better than anyone else.

he knew exactly how Deku was going to react. honestly we might as well have called this chapter "the nice and accurate prophecies of Kacchan." either that or, "I'm fine," after what is apparently Deku's favorite new mantra.

but anyway, so we've established that Kacchan canonically approaches situations like this with great care and anticipation for how the would-be-rescuee will react, and we've also established that Kacchan can predict Deku's reactions in particular with incredible accuracy. so given that, I think it's reasonable to assume that Kacchan has a plan here, and that there's a reason behind his specific choice of words.

"wow, real inspiring! all hail the mighty inheritor of One for All! but tell us this... are you smiling now?"

"do your worst, you All Might wannabe!!"

and this is the part where I was originally planning on writing out a much longer post, but for various reasons it never really came together. so I'll just try to summarize everything with bullet points instead.

the theme here is "OFA is a cursed power." this is something that has been steadily building up and intensifying for a while now. the past OFA users all died young. AFO drives them all into isolation and misery. the Vestiges think of OFA as a power that "is tasked with destroying AFO." Deku is now the last and only one left who can wield that power. it is a massive burden, and Deku believes that he has to carry that burden alone.

Katsuki knows exactly what is running through Deku's head right now, and has been anticipating this for a while. he read All Might's notebook. he knows what happened to all of the other OFA users. and he knows Deku well enough to understand that he fits right in with that legacy. back during the chapter 284 flashback he was clearly worrying about this exact type of scenario.

fast-forward to chapters 318 and 319. he finally tracks down Deku, and finds him looking like a trash bag that got forced through a paper shredder, surrounded by an angry mob of brainwashed civilians and NOT EVEN FIGHTING BACK AT ALL, go fucking figure. so he basically confirms with a single glance that his fears were well-founded, and that in his absence Deku has made significant progress down the path of being a complete dumbass.

Ochako then tries to reach out to Deku through words, just like Endeavor and All Might did before her, but he predictably responds with the exact same phrase Katsuki knew that he would use -- "I'm fine."

at this point Katsuki has heard all he needed to hear. he knows Deku is not going to listen. he knows that Deku believes that he can't listen, because in Deku's mind he has a responsibility to handle this all on his own, and he's afraid of putting anyone else in danger. Deku is fully embracing the "I must walk this path alone" legacy of OFA, just like All Might before him. and so Katsuki knows two things:

in order to have any hope of reaching Deku, he has to get him to understand that the legacy he's embracing is deeply flawed, and that the path he's on right now is one which ends in death and defeat, just like it did the first seven times.

and second, Deku is going to fight them, because Deku is stubborn like that. and Deku thinks that he's doing this for them. and so in order to reach him, they will have to fight back. that's a done deal.

hence the jeer about OFA, along with the pointed remark about him not smiling. and then two seconds later Deku does of course reveal his intentions to fight, just like Katsuki knew he would. and so Katsuki accepts the challenge, and also throws in a bonus jab about how Deku is perfectly emulating All Might now, just as he always wanted -- except that what he's actually emulating are all of All Might's worst aspects. his insistence on carrying his burdens alone; his reluctance to accept anyone else's help; and of course, his determination to carry on to the bitter end until his body literally breaks down.

and that is not the fate that Katsuki wants for Deku. he needs Deku to see that this is the wrong path. he needs to find a way to break past his stubbornness, just like Deku did for him, and for Todoroki, and for so many others. and so he goes on the attack. because, in the same way that Deku is willing to fight them in order to save them, Katsuki is willing to do and say and fight anything and anyone in order to save Deku -- and that includes Deku himself.

so yeah. he knows what he's doing. and I am absolutely positive that everything he's doing and saying here does serve a purpose. he will find a way to reach him. literally all of his character development has been building to this moment. Deku saved him all those times so that now, when it matters the most, he can save him in return, and he's not going to fail him now.

[bookofmirth]

The english side of me REALLY jumped out with this one lol

Possessiveness, jealousy, and overprotectiveness are staples of the romance genre, especially when it comes to paranormal romances, so much so that it’s expected for people to overlook the problematic aspects of possessiveness, jealousy, and overprotectiveness because these concepts in the romance genre are meant to be viewed not only as hot and sexy, but indicators of love and showing that the person cares. Despite their tendency to fall in the yellow flag zone, these concepts are meant to further the romance itself. And when you begin to question these concepts as they appear in different romances, there’s almost always pushback with people saying the books are “just fiction”. But what happens when there’s evidence that shows why these three concepts aren’t always healthy or hot/sexy in a romantic pairing? What happens when the narrative is using these concepts to show how they can be detrimental to a character and those romantically associated with that character?

Possessiveness/Overprotectiveness

In romances, it’s always in the man’s nature to be possessive and overprotective. These two concepts are usually used to show that a character is protective of their partner and we see that happen with almost all of SJM’s endgame ships, but they’re almost always portrayed as good/healthy because of the equal partnership that is present in those relationships. Thinking about acotar, a relationship where possessiveness and overprotectiveness were depicted in a negative light was between Feyre and Tamlin. Their relationship was imbalance and Tamlin’s possessiveness/overprotectiveness of Feyre stood out in the barriers he placed on Feyre when they were together: not letting her leave the house/keeping her in the house; saying everything is for her “protection”; only letting her talk to Alis and Lucien/limiting her interactions with others; telling Lucien to back off from Feyre because Tamlin saw him as a threat and that she could fall for him instead; having Feyre be dependent on him by not teaching her how to fight/learn how to use her powers; controlling every aspect of Feyre’s life at the beginning of acomaf; among other things.

Males in acotar feel an intrinsic sense of entitlement to their mate and are described as being protective and possessive over their mates. When people say that A is exhibiting “mate behavior” towards E, obviously there is a positive connotation associated with that phrase because of how the males act around their mate. But the thing is A isn’t E’s mate. A’s possessiveness of E is treading on the waters of Tamlin-ville because: A speaks for E, which is oddly similar to what some of E’s stans do in fandom discussions (as if E herself reached out of the book to personally tell them things that no one else knows); he makes it known that E shouldn’t help with the Dread Trove, which is an example of A attempting to limit what E does; and he subtly expresses a sense of entitlement over E in the bonus chapter during his conversation with Rhys when he questions if the Cauldron was wrong in pairing E with Lucien. A’s “mate behavior” is completely different from Rhys and Cassian because Rhys and Cassian are canonically mated to Feyre and Nesta, which plays a role in how they act towards them. Also, neither of them attempt to limit what Feyre and Nesta do even if they worry about their safety. To say that A is exhibiting “mate behavior” towards E would have the same effect as saying Tamlin was exhibiting “mate behavior” towards Feyre. I think that the reason A’s actions towards E are described as mate-like is because thinking otherwise calls his actions into question. I assume some people aren’t ready for that conversation because he’s been portrayed as the sad bat boy in the fandom for so long that it’s probably hard for people to come to terms with this not being the case.

When people say A being overprotective of E is similar to Rhys and Cassian being overprotective of Feyre and Nesta, the comparison becomes incomparable because A is overprotective of E to the point where he goes against what E wants to do (E stating she wanted to help find the dread trove, a scene in which A was present and later A said E shouldn’t be exposed to its innate darkness), while Rhys and Cassian know Feyre and Nesta are capable of fending for themselves in dangerous situations. It’s just ironic that A’s overprotectiveness in this moment contradicts E’s “choice” of wanting to help, yet I don’t see that being mentioned in those “choice” arguments.

Jealousy

Jealousy in the romance genre is always meant to further the romance between the love interests and we see that happen with rowaelin and chaorene (and probably other SJM ships too). But when the jealousy and the romance are disconnected from each other, that’s meant to show something about the character who is jealous and what they’re jealous of. On the second page of the bonus chapter, it’s established that A is envious of Cassian and Rhys and that the reason he remained downstairs by the fire was so that he didn’t get swallowed up by his jealousy in his room. Then on the third page, it’s revealed that the reason he stayed by the door at Solstice was because “he couldn’t stand the sight of it, the scent of their mating bond, and needed to have the option of leaving if it became too much”. There is a blatant reimagining happening with A’s bonus chapter to make it seem as though his jealousy is romantically coded when the jealousy has nothing to do with his relationship with E and more to do with him. This reimagining has to be a case of people seeing what they want to see because I highly doubt people are out here failing literature class.

The Romance Genre & SJM

A and E’s interaction in the bonus chapter is frequently compared to Wings and Embers. The only similarity between these two chapters is the sexual undertones, which is part of the reason why I think people compare them in the first place because everything else (the structure of the chapters, their contents, and the amount of characters involved in them) is different. I think people are hiding behind the sexual undertones of the bonus chapter in hopes that it somehow overshadows not only the oddness of A’s interaction with E, but the ending of the bonus chapter as well. And even more than that, A giving away the necklace is compared to Cassian tossing Nesta’s present in the Sidra. Since A is able to give the necklace away that should tell you about the significance of the necklace’s connection to E herself (if A can easily give it away to the next person on the street) whereas Cassian regifting Nesta’s present would probably be meaningless to someone else because it was Nesta specific.

We know that acotar is more romance heavy compared to tog and cc so I can see why people lean more on the conventions of the romance genre as a basis for their arguments. And this is fueled by SJM saying this new trilogy will have one couple per book. However, the downfall of these arguments is that oftentimes the plot, narrative structure of this new trilogy in particular, and individual character progressions are secondary or afterthoughts to the romance they support. These arguments lack any real substance because acotar has proved time and time again that both the romance AND the plot work in tandem, going against the broad strokes of the romance genre formula where the romance is primarily in the spotlight.

Basically, why do you think A’s possessiveness, jealousy, and overprotectiveness of E is romanticized? Why do you think A and E’s dynamic is constantly compared to feysand and nessian? And why do you think people take issue with A being compared to Tamlin?

I think that the reason A’s actions towards E are described as mate-like is because thinking otherwise calls his actions into question.

THIS

I hate the whole discussion of "mate behavior" because the series doesn't even explain that very well. Rhys can't explain why people are mated, if it's for reproduction or being "equals" (in what sense, who knows), the courts all handle acceptance/rejection differently, the consequences of rejection are unclear and make it seem like the woman is beholden to accept on pain of... causing someone else pain.

I agree 100% that people (maybe unconsciously) try to ascribe "mate behavior" to Azriel in order to excuse what would ordinarily be inexcusable. He doesn't have some magical thing making him act this way. Neither did Tamlin, and we know how people view his behavior. And that's another thing with "mate behavior" and the bond. Why would Tamlin and Feyre not be mates, if all it took were these extreme possessive and protective behaviors? Why aren't Az and Mor mates?

And it's not even about Elain! Az acts like this with Mor, and we know there isn't a mating bond there. Azriel has zero reason to behave the way that he does, not in the same way that the mating bond gives Rhys and Cassian an "excuse", flimsy as it is, for the way that they act around Nesta and Feyre. Even that excuse is crap, because we have Rhys out here leaving Feyre's abusive ex alone, and then we have Lucien doing the same with Graysen. The definition of "mate behavior" that some of the fandom is working with... is sus.

The fact is that no matter how "overprotective" and possessive Rhys and Cassian were, they never prevented Nesta or Feyre from doing what they wanted. They might have gotten their hackles up, but then they backed off. Rhys sent Feyre into the Weaver's cottage. Nesta went to war. There is a balance between caring deeply and passionately for these women, and recognizing them as individuals whose autonomy should be respected.

The jealousy is 100% not about Elain. It's not about Elain being with Lucien. It's not about Mor, because we know that it's not really about Mor sleeping with Helion. Azriel has 99 problems, and 98.5 of them are about his childhood and his loneliness. The other 0.5 problem comes in the shape of a snowball.

The only similarity between these two chapters is the sexual undertones

You know I haven't done a full blown comparison between these chapters, but I'd agree. The entire Wings and Embers short was about Nesta and Cassian. There were no other characters and they learned a great deal about one another. What did Elain and Az learn about one another as people in the first third of his POV? Nothing. There was no tension between them other than sexual. Cassian thought Nesta's name over and over, thought about her as a person and her personality and how she made him feel. Azriel literally only thinks about fucking Elain. There is nothing wrong with fucking, obviously, but that's not love. (Maybe I should fully compare them idk.)

It's when we look at everything he doesn't say in conjunction with how he treats Elain and Mor in other scenarios... that's troubling. People can misread our 😬 at his behavior all they want, but the fact is that Az didn't have a single kind, original thought about who Elain is. His POV gave us zero extra insight into who Elain is as a person, which is... startling, if we are supposed to think that they know one another so incredibly well and have such intense feelings for each other. Why would we not get additional insight into her character? We get a lot of insight into Az's character for sure. But following his POV, if he loves and knows this woman so well, we should feel that. We should know why he loves her, what he knows about her, we should... just get some more damn insight into her character, if we are in the POV of someone who supposedly knows her so well!!!!

You know it's funny though, because the Az and Elain interaction in his POV mirrors when Nesta imagined a threesome with Az and Cassian. Close, and potentially pretty hot, but it never really happened because then it would mess up sjm's plans for the future.

Okay now to your ACTUAL questions haha and not just my reactions to what you said.

I agree that romanticizing Azriel's behaviors is the better option for people who ship it because otherwise the alternative is to accept them for what they are, which is not about Elain at all. Az has an even longer history of being all "mate behavior" on Mor, but no one thinks that's odd? I think that some people pick and choose their evidence, which is a big reason why I keep shoving Mor into these conversations. If the "mate behavior" argument was genuine and had a solid foundation, then the people making these claims would still ship moriel.

The whole thing with Az and Tamlin comparisons.... oh boy. I think there is a lot there.

I think that people don't want to see Az as anything less than perfect sad boi that Elain can fix with her love.

I think that people have a difficult time seeing emotional abuse IRL, to the point where even people who experience it directly struggle to come to terms with it, so why would we willingly embrace its presence in fiction? It also flirts with a lot of the ideas you mentioned being present in a lot of romance, though I'd argue a lot of those elements are becoming passé.

I think that Tamlin is Fandom Enemy Number One while Azriel is Self-insert Book Boyfriend Number One, and maybe people don't know how to reconcile those things. (This is quite literally true, I checked AO3 for reader fanfics and compared numbers between the bat boys, Az/reader fics win by a landslide.)

There also seems to be a refusal to see or accept nuance. I'm not even talking about moral complexity because I don't think that either Tamlin or Az intend to behave the way they do. They aren't villains. It just reminds me of people who somehow don't think Nesta was absolutely horrible through much of the series, even though a huge focus of her arc in acosf was coming to terms with how she had treated people. Anyway...

People see "gwynriel shipper" or "elucien 💕" in a bio and just dismiss arguments before trying to understand them

People try to justify their actions of their faves, which I understand!

People don't understand how subtle emotional abuse can be, and how there doesn't have to be clear intention.

I still plan on pulling out evidence from the book about times when their behaviors mirror one another. But it's like I've said for months - Tamlin is a cautionary tale. I don't think Azriel will go that far, but the foundation is there. The fact that acotar/acomaf was so, so explicit about how Tamlin's behavior was not okay, and yet people can see that same behavior in another character one book later and want to try to excuse it... sigh. Way to miss the point, fandom.

[sineala]

Is 616 Tony a Democrat or Republican or neither? I’ve seen posts comparing him to Trump (barf!)

Wow. Geez. You don't ask easy questions, do you, anon?

First off, I am going to assume that whoever was comparing 616 Tony to Trump was trying to slander Tony. And I will tell you that we do in fact have 616 Tony's canonical opinion of Trump -- yes, Donald Trump exists on Earth-616 and has been referenced in several comics -- and he doesn't seem to like him much. I mean, this is back when Trump was primarily being known for being a New York businessman. They canonically ran in the same circles and Tony canonically knows him. He doesn't like him.

Here's Tony in Iron Man v1 #227 complaining that Trump bought him out of a building:

And here's Tony again in Iron Man v3 #37 being not especially thrilled when he thinks that the person he is about to meet is Trump:

(The person he is actually meeting is Tiberius Stone, which is also a very bad idea.)

I am also going to point out that due to the way Marvel likes to handle politics in its comics, I don't think we can say anything about the canonical political affiliation of most characters, because Marvel deliberately leaves that undefined. So to the best of my knowledge, we don't have a canonical statement about Tony's political affiliation and we probably won't ever get one.

But we can speculate based on canonical evidence, can't we?

My very long answer is under the Read More.

Your question is sort of framed as "tell me if Tony is a good or a bad person," and I would like to suggest that this is not really a useful framing for several reasons: (1) what the political parties currently stand for is pretty recent, actually, and Tony as a character predates a lot of the modern conceptions of the two parties; (2) the history of the Democratic Party specifically in New York, where Tony is from, is, let's just say, not 100% pure and unproblematic; and (3), when we're talking about someone with the amount of money, connections, and influence that Tony has, party affiliation generally doesn't mean the same thing it would mean for us ordinary mortals. What I mean by that last point is that there is a big, big difference between every one of the following list of statements: "I would vote for Republicans," "I am a registered Republican," "I would give very large amounts of money to Republicans," and "I would accept a political appointment in a Republican administration." For most of us, the last two of those points aren't ever going to be something that comes up in our lives, but they are going to be things that matter very much for someone like Tony Stark. And we have a canonical answer for at least one of those things. We can theorize about at least some of the rest of them.

I'm saying all that because I suspect you're really not going to like my answer.

I think that there is a very, very high chance that 616 Tony is a Republican.

I mean, I don't think he'd be a Republican right now at this exact moment in time, are you kidding me, but I feel like he has definitely been a Republican at some point in the past. Say, before Trump. One of those socially-liberal fiscally-conservative types. With a conscience. Sort of like Mitt Romney. Picture the kind of Republican Massachusetts likes to keep electing as their governor.

Yes, is possible that, since Tony is from New York, he's a lifelong Democrat. It is definitely possible. New York is heavily Democratic in our world, and barring contradictory evidence, that is probably also the case on Earth-616. But I think that, specifically because of the rest of Tony's background and the ways that Tony has interacted with the world of politics in 616, he is most likely to be a Republican. It doesn't mean he couldn't be a Democrat! I have no proof either way! In terms of several elements of his characterization -- say, his commitment to social justice and fighting inequity -- I would say he definitely leans Democrat, because these days that sort of thing is mostly the province of the Democrats, although I suspect that back when Tony was created it wouldn't have been out of character for a lot of Republicans. I'm just saying that Republican seems more likely. If you gotta pick one. I think you could definitely argue for either. He doesn't fit completely into either but his canon interactions with politics push me toward thinking he's a Republican, because he does several specific things that I think it would be unlikely that anyone other than a Republican would be given the opportunity to do at the specific time that he does them.

Yeah. I know.

Right. Okay. Tony is extremely, extremely rich, and even though I know that he is basically the fantasy of The One Good Ethical Billionaire (more on this in a sec), it's probably worth thinking about what actual real-life rich people do with their money in ways that intersect with politics. And the answer to that is, well, generally they give money to politicians who are favorable to, say, helping them continue to have money. Now, yes, as far as I know there is no evidence of Tony doing this in canon -- this is where all the conjecture comes in. So we ask ourselves, okay, if Tony were to endorse particular politicians because of this, what party would he give money to? Who would he want to get in good with? In most parts of the country, that would probably be the Republican party. But, specifically in New York, it's the Democrats.

So, yeah, one of the big points in favor of him being a Democrat is that, well, Democrats traditionally run New York. The class of old-money New York elites are pretty stereotypically Democrats. And that would include Tony. Which is not to say that he couldn't be a Republican, but if he wants to get anywhere with New York politicians, and I suspect he probably does because he is trying to run a series of very large businesses and he owns a fair amount of real estate including several buildings whose permitting processes I can only imagine fall into the category of “probably highly irregular" -- I mean, he has multiple jets that he regularly lands on his house and secret underwater tunnels for a submarine -- he has to cozy up to Democrats. If he gives money to anyone involved in politics, that's who he gives money to. Making superhero bases probably took a lot of money. A massive amount of money. The city planners probably cry when they see him coming.

(At one point I believe they did ban him from keeping the Quinjets in his house. That was when the Avengers had the Hydrobase.)

I tend to assume most people know something about the history of the Democrats in New York, or at least the history of US political parties in general, but the tl;dr version is that the parties haven't always stood for the same things that they do now. They also weren't always the same parties. And historically, in New York, the political machine gives you Democrats. That's just the way it is. The Democratic Party of the past was not really, um, devoted to all the same causes as the current Democratic Party. And it was very hard to get anywhere in New York and not be a Democrat. It still is. If you haven't read up on Tammany Hall, maybe you should. There was a lot of corruption. I mean, yeah, it's not currently a thing, but the Democrats remained in power in New York; it dissolved probably around about the time the Republican Party explicitly decided that the way to win the South was to appeal to the racism of white voters ("the Southern strategy"). Because, yes, before that a lot of white, conservative Southerners were traditionally Democrats. And then the Democrats split about civil rights, and, uh, the Republicans took in the racists.

Anyway! US political history is sure a land of contrasts! Rich New Yorkers are traditionally Democrats! That is a point for Tony possibly being a Democrat, yes. Moving on!

But Tony is not just a random old-money New Yorker. He inherited Howard Stark's money and Howard Stark's company. And Howard was, well, a defense contractor. And so was Tony, until he stopped making weapons. And, uh, being a defense contractor is, um, one of those things that is extremely, extremely Republican. No, I don't have stats to back this up. Just trust me. So, yeah, he's a rich New Yorker -- but he's also a defense contractor from a family of defense contractors. I would be amazed if Howard Stark were anything other than a Republican. Which is not to say that Tony could not be a Democrat anyway, but the job does come with a certain predisposition.

(Incidentally, one of the other things Tony inherited from Howard was his membership in the Hellfire Club, which is one of those things I keep forgetting about until canon smacks me in the face with it every few years.)

We all know that the conception of Tony, as a character, is basically the fantasy of the Ethical Billionaire. He is The Best At Capitalism. He has money and he is not corrupted by it. He has money and he uses it to do the maximum amount of good in the world because that is what he really, deeply wants to do. He supports a large number of philanthropic causes! He has a foundation named after his mother! He funds programs for low-income youth! He runs a homeless shelter for women! Throughout his history, he has been consistently portrayed as a deeply, deeply kind human being, who wants to help people. A lot of people! People who aren't like him! People who might not even like him! That is just... who he is, as a person.

And these days we tend to associate that kind of push for systemic change and caring about social issues and remedying inequity with Democrats, but that wasn't always the case. I think it still would have been believable coming from a Republican, oh, around about the time Tony came into existence. He was created back when you could be an elected Republican and, uh, push social policies that I think these days we would consider progressive. I mean, Eisenhower was the one who started integrating schools, right? The Republicans are the party of Lincoln! It's not like Republicans are prevented from doing good things. And I think we need to keep in mind that Tony dates from the early 60s when socially-progressive was still a thing Republicans could conceivably be.

So, yes, Tony is very kind. It's nice. We all like that about him. But also many of the ways in which he is kind to people are very much Republican fantasies. Like, yes, he's a great boss. He's close to his employees. They're like family. If any of his employees have problems, he helps them out on a personal, individual level -- and that, as an ideal, seems very Republican to me. I mean, he's a CEO, right? He's owned a lot of companies. Are any of them unionized? Combing through Wiki, I find one reference to a union in ToS 63, which is really, really early -- you know, back when unions were more popular. I can't find anything after that. And nothing is coming to mind. So, I mean, yes, we have now established his employees were at one point unionized, but he's certainly not known for, say, running a union shop. Part of the fantasy of the Ethical Billionaire is the idea that Tony's employees don't need unions because Tony is so kind and so generous and so personally selflessly good that he takes care of everyone who works for him. And the thing is, Tony actually does do this. He is fictional and therefore capable of achieving perfection.

Okay. He's a fictional character. Let's step back a little and think about fictional characters, and specifically the way Marvel Comics depicts fictional characters interacting with well-known real people. Many real people from our Earth do seem to exist in 616. Earth-616 is not our Earth in a vast number of ways, but one thing it shares with our Earth is presidents. Whoever is the real-life president when a comic comes out is pretty much generally president on Earth-616 at the time. Yes, I'm going somewhere with this.

Now, for whatever reason, Marvel often does not canonically refer to presidents by their names in dialogue, but the artists pretty much draw whoever is president at the time when someone in canon needs to meet the president. (Captain America seems to get to meet the president a lot. I'm sure you're shocked.)

There are a couple exceptions to "everyone who looks like the president is the president,” namely that Marvel says that the villain who was Number One of the Secret Empire in Captain America v1 #175, who attempted to conspire with aliens to take over the Earth, whom Steve watched commit suicide -- anyway, the official Marvel word is, I believe, that this guy is not Richard Nixon, but Steve Englehart, who wrote the comic, says it absolutely was:

And, yes, this is the incident that causes Steve to lose faith in America and become Nomad. You can kind of see why that would be traumatic. Marvel clearly had some feelings about Watergate they needed to process.

Anyway, I just wanted to put in a picture of that time Ronald Reagan was turned into a snake person. It's Captain America v1 #344:

I love comics.

More recent presidents still make appearances in the comics, and they are the president who was the real-life president at the time. For example, the president who pardons Steve for all his SHRA-related crimes in Who Will Wield The Shield is definitely Obama:

And that means that I must also unfortunately inform you that Hydra Steve also received a presidential pardon:

Though the issue in question (Captain America v9 #8) does not specifically name the president, following the "whoever is the actual president is the 616 president" rule, the president who canonically pardoned Hydra Steve is... Donald Trump.

Let's just pause here to contemplate this. Take as long as you need.

(I was today years old when I learned that Hydra Steve has been dead in comics for over a year. Since the issue in which he was pardoned, actually. Which is an issue I am sure I read the day it came out, but somehow I missed the four entire pages where Hydra Steve is set on fire and burns to death while hailing Hydra with his last breath. I guess it wasn't memorable! I mention because I am pretty sure I am not the only one who missed this.)

Anyway. I do have a point to make here, and my point is this: Tony has received political appointments. Two of them, in fact. In the 2003-2004 Iron Man arc "The Best Defense," Tony becomes Secretary of Defense. He does get Senate confirmation; it's not a deputy appointment. He actually gets unanimous confirmation. And I know that Tony had this job is a fact that everyone knows about Tony, but I feel like a lot of people may not be totally conscious of the timeframe involved here, and by that I mean that he is absolutely, positively, the Secretary of Defense for Earth-616's George W. Bush. Yes, I am sure of this.

Here is Tony with the president in Iron Man v3 #78, being told he got the job:

Yeah. That’s George W. Bush.

Can a Cabinet appointment cross party lines? I mean, sure, it's possible. I am not the kind of giant politics nerd who has this memorized, but there is in fact, a Wikipedia page for US political appointments across party lines. And it looks like there have been five cross-party Secretaries of Defense and five Secretaries of War. So, I mean, yes, it's happened, but it's fairly rare. None of the cross-party Secretaries of Defense (deputy secretaries excluded, since they weren't confirmed, obviously) were ever Democrats appointed by Republicans. And since we're looking at Dubya's administration specifically, it looks like only one of his Cabinet appointees (Transportation) was cross-party. So it looks like he in particular would not have been especially likely to appoint a Democrat to his Cabinet, since in real life he only had the one.

So to me it seems that the most likely party affiliation for Tony has to be Republican, because of this. Sure, the appointment could have crossed party lines. But I feel like it's just... not likely. Being a Republican Secretary of Defense in a Republican administration just seems way, way more possible.

(Also I'd like everyone to remember that Tony is replacing the previous Secretary of Defense because the previous Secretary of Defense was secretly the Red Skull and released an engineered flesh-eating virus at Mount Rushmore. Just, y'know, to set the mood.)

What's more, Tony gets a second political appointment from the Bush administration. It's not a Cabinet position, but he does become the Director of SHIELD in 2007. Here Tony is with the president, slightly earlier, in Civil War #1:

This is not really as good a likeness of Bush as the previous and I guess you could argue that the artist was drawing A Generic Politician but I feel like, y'know, it's probably still meant to be Bush. And Tony may not have wanted this particular job -- we know he definitely didn't -- but he absolutely wanted to be Secretary of Defense. So we know that he is definitely fine with serving in a Republican administration.

So, yeah, that's my argument: odds are pretty good that Tony has, at some point in his life, been a Republican. Maybe not right now. But probably in the past.

Having said that, given the way Marvel handles politics, I don't think it's likely to ever be much of an issue in canon; the Avengers mostly just tend to get to get along with whoever the president is at the time and I can't recall really anything about partisan issues. However, you're never going to convince me 616 Steve was anything other than a New Deal Democrat -- even though I know that in Cap #250 he turns down both the Democrats and the Republicans when they ask him to run for president -- because, I mean, come on. I assume that he and Tony probably try not to discuss politics ever anymore, because we all know how the SHRA went. They probably mostly agree, but when they disagree, people have a tendency to end up dead.

That was probably more than you ever wanted to know about my thoughts on this topic.

[idreamtofmanderleyagain]

Five years ago, the women on this site who treated me like trash over loving Labyrinth and shipping Jareth/Sarah were almost always obliviously consuming Radfem propaganda, or were out and out Radfems/Terfs themselves.

They were the types of people who casually threw the word “pedophile” around against grown women who shipped an adult Sarah with Jareth, aka literally one of the most popular ships for women in fandom for 30 years.

Pretty much invariably, these women had serious sex-negative anxieties, which included a severe paranoia about any and all kink and fetish, and porn in general. I saw a lot of shocking, fear-mongering propaganda surrounding sexual expression. Pretty much invariably, their method of approach involved immediate personal shock-value attacks on anyone they perceived to be “bad.”

Today, you can look at the way some people react to other popular so-called “problematic” ships and recognize the same toxic, fear-mongering rhetoric coming from women who consider themselves regular, trans-inclusive feminists. Sometimes it even manifests in the words of very well-meaning people (including myself here), who feel the need to talk about specific issues that pertain to their own experiences of trauma and oppression.

The people who shit on Labyrinth often seem to not really be able to comprehend that the Goblin King, like the film itself, is canonically a representation of a teen girl’s psyche, a soup of fears and anxieties and desires and dreams. He’s not a literal human adult preying on a literal child, and to read the film that way seriously undermines the entire point of the film. 

When I (and people of many fandoms) say “This is fiction, calm down,” I’m not just saying it’s not real so it cant hurt you and you can’t criticize me. I’m trying to call attention to what fiction actually is - artistic representations of feelings and experiences. The Goblin King is Sarah’s fiction. Therefore, he can be anything she or any woman who identifies with her wants him to be, including her lover when she’s grown and ready for such a thing.

I once took an alarming dive into Beetlejuice fandom to see what content was there (the cartoon was a favorite when I was little). Chillingly, what you’ll find is an extremely wounded fanbase, with a sharp divide between the older women who had long been shipping BJ/Lydia because of their love for the cartoon series (and whom were previously the vast majority of the Beetlejuice fandom), and a massive amount of young people riding the wave of the musical fad who had decided that the entire old school Beetlejuice fandom was populated by literal pedophiles. 

I saw death threats. Suicide baiting. Constant, constant toxic discourse. It did not matter how the BJ/Lydia fandom dealt with any particular issues that would exist in their ship, in fact I’m certain that the people abusing them cared very little to even consider if they were trying to handle it at all. The only thing that mattered was that they were disgusting subhuman scum asking for abuse. If you have at any time reblogged recent Beetlejuice fan art or content from fans of the musical, you have more than likely been engaging positively with the content of someone participating in toxic fandom behavior.

Nobody is really sticking up for them, either, as far as I saw. It’s really hard to imagine how painful it must be to have such a large group of people explode into into your relatively private fandom space to tell you that you are evil, vile, and deserve constant abuse, and also you are no longer allowed into the fandom space to engage in it’s content. But I think there’s something very alarming indeed about this happening specifically to the BJ fandom, and I’ll explain why. 

The pop-culture characterization of Beetlejuice, which is heavily influenced by the cartoon series to be clear, has always in my mind been a vaguely ageless being who matches with the psychological maturity of whatever age Lydia is supposed to be. He’s more or less like an imaginary friend, a manifestation of Lydia’s psyche. In fact, I would argue that i think most of us who grew up with the cartoon or it’s subsequent merchandizing before the musical ever existed probably internalized the idea as BJ and Lydia as this ageless, salt-and-pepper-shaker couple beloved by the goth community, similar to Gomez and Morticia. In each version of canon he may be a creepy ghost in the literal sense, but any adult who is capable of identifying literary tropes (even just subconciously) would read cartoon!BJ as an artistic representation of a socially awkward outcast girl’s inner world. Lydia’s darker dispositions and interests, which alienate her from most others, are freely accepted and embraced by her spooky magical friend. BJ/Lydia in the cartoon were depicted as best friends, but to my memory there was always an underlying sense that they had secret feelings for each other, which I identified easily even as a small child. In fact, their dynamic and behavior perfectly reflected the psychological development of the show’s target demographic. They are best friends who get into adventures and learning experiences together, who have delicate feelings for each other but lack any true adult romantic/sexual understanding to acknowledge those feelings, let alone pursue them.

Though I haven’t seen the Musical yet, I’ve read the wiki and I would argue that it embodies this exact same concept even more so for it’s own version of the characters, in that Beetlejuice specifically exists to help Lydia process her mother’s death.

This is not a complicated thing to recognize and comprehend whatsoever. In fact, it looks downright blatant. It’s also a clear indicator of what BJ/Lydia means to the women who have long loved it. It was a story about a spooky wierd girl being loved and accepted and understood for who she was, and it gave them a sense of solidarity. It makes perfect sense why those women would stick with those characters, and create a safe little space for themselves to and imagine their beloved characters growing and having adult lives and experiencing adult drama, in just the same ways that the women of the Labyrinth fandom do. That’s all these women were doing. And now, they can’t do it without facing intense verbal violence. That safe space is poisoned now.

Having grown up with the cartoon as one of my favorites and been around goth subculture stuff for decades, I was actually shocked and squicked at the original Beetlejuice film’s narrative once I actually saw it, because it was extremely divorced from what these two characters had evolved into for goth subculture and what they meant to me. It’s not telling the same story, and is in fact about the Maitland's specifically. In pretty much exactly the same way two different versions of Little Red Riding Hood can be extremely different from each other, the film is a different animal. While I imagine that the film version has been at the heart of a lot of this confused fear-mongering around all other versions of the characters, I would no more judge different adaptations of these characters any more than I would condemn a version of Little Red in which Red and the Wolf are best friends or lovers just because the very first iteration of LRRH was about protecting yourself from predators.

I would even argue that the people who have engaged in Anti-shipper behavior over BJ/Lydia are in intense denial over the fact that BJ being interested in Lydia, either as blatant predatory behavior a la the film or on a peer level as in the cartoon (and musical?) is an inextricable part of canon. Beetlejuice was always attracted to Lydia, and it was not always cute or amusing. Beetlejuice was not always a beloved buddy character, an in fact was originally written as a gross scumbag. That’s just what he was. Even people engaging with him now by writing OC girlfriends for him (as stand-ins for the salt-and-pepper-shaker space Lydia used to take up, because obviously that was part of the core fun of the characters), or just loving him as a character, are erasing parts of his character’s history in order to do so. They are actively refusing to be held responsible for being fans of new version of him despite the fact that he engaged in overt predatory behavior in the original film. In fact, I would venture to say that they are actively erasing the fact that Musical Beetliejuice tried to marry a teenager and as far as I’m aware, seemed to like the idea (because he’s probably a fucking figment of her imagination but go off I guess). The only reason they can have a version of this character who could be perceived as “buddy” material is because...the cartoon had an impact on our pop cultural perception of what the character and his dynamic with Lydia is. 

We can have a version of the Big Bad Wolf who’s a creepy monster. We can have a version who’s sweet and lovable. We can have a version that lives in the middle. We can have a version who’s a hybrid between Red and the Wolf (a la Ruby in OUAT). All of these things can exist in the same world, and can even be loved for different reasons by the same people.

I’ve been using Beetlejuice as an example here because it’s kind of perfect for my overall point regarding the toxic ideologies in fandom right now across many different spaces, including ones for progressive and queer media, and how much so many people don’t recognize how deeply they’ve been radicalized into literalist and sex-negative radfem rhetoric, to the point where we aren’t allowed to have difficult, messy explorations of imperfect, flawed humans, and that art is never going to be 100% pure and without flaw in it’s ability to convey what it wants to convey.

This includes the rhetoric I’ve seen across the board, from She-Ra to A:TLA to Star Wars to Lovecraft Country. We don’t talk about the inherent malleable, subjective, or charmingly imperfect nature of fiction any more. Transformation and reclamation are myths in this space. Everything is in rigid categories. It is seemingly very difficult for some of these people to engage with anything that is not able to be clearly labeled as one thing or another (see the inherent transphobic and biphobic elements of the most intense rhetoric). They destroy anything they cannot filter through their ideology. When women act in a way that breaks from their narrative of womanhood (like...not having a vagina), then those women must be condemned instead of understood. Anything that challenges them or makes them uncomfortable is a mortal sin. There is an extraordinary level of both hypocrisy and repressive denial that is underlying the behavior I’m seeing now. Much like toxic Christian conservatism, these people often are discovered engaging in the same behaviors and interests that they condemn behind closed doors (or just out of sheer cognitive dissonance). As an example, one of the people who talked shit to me about Labyrinth was a huge fan of Kill La Kill, which to my knowledge was an anime about a teenage girl in like, superpowered lingere (hence why I stayed the fuck away from that shit myself). Indeed, they even allow themselves plenty of leeway for behavior far worse than they condemn others for, and create support systems for the worst of their own abusers. 

Quite frankly, I’m tired. Instead of talking about theoretical problematic shit, we need to start talking about quantifiable harm. Because as far as I can tell, the most real, immediate, and quantifiable harm done because of anybody’s favorite ships or pieces of media seems to consistently be the kind that’s done to the people who experience verbal violence and abuse and manipulation and suicide baiting and death threats from the people who have a problem.

[alirhi]

Loki ranting

Okay. I had this thought in my head of like just compiling links of all the Loki shit I've posted/reblogged so far so that when I get into a conversation about the show and how it fucking disgusted me, I can just be like "here. here's this masterlist post, go read all this shit. This is my entire argument, and not only mine, but a lot of stuff posted by people far more intelligent and level-headed and eloquent than I am, whom I happen to agree with." Because the alternative is constantly getting fired up all over again, and that is exhausting.

BUT! I'm stupid and don't know how tumblr works. Apparently I can't just be like "give me all the Loki-tagged shit I've got" I can only search all the Loki-tagged shit on all of tumblr. And I'm not scrolling back through all of my posts. I talk too fucking much for that shit 😂

So, I'll try to remember all of my grievances with how the MCU has treated Loki, and all of the excellent posts made by other, equally upset fans, and put it all together here under this nice, neat little cut for everyone else's sanity and scrolling convenience...

For people who actually read my shit fairly regularly - bless you, you crazy, patient people. I love you! - this is going to be a lot of repetition of shit you've already read. Probably at least twice. I'm passionate and I have a terrible memory lol. Sorry.

Anyway, first, for those who don't know me and haven't been following my explosions of rage for the past couple of months, some quick background: I do not read comic books, so Loki's Marvel comic canon means nothing to me. I know almost nothing about it. The reason I'm so in love with the character in the MCU is because I am an eclectic witch and the deity I've actively loved and worshiped the longest in my life (literally for as long as I can remember) is Loki. So when he was mentioned in The Mask, I squeed. When they named Matt Damon's character after him in Dogma, I cheered.

When Thor came out in 2011, I just about died from happiness. I was hungry for any representation of this underappreciated god, no matter what it was. I didn't even bitch about how underpowered he was, because at least he was there. But I'm getting slightly ahead of myself.

I can hear anyone reading this going "Why Loki? Isn't he, like, evil? Like basically the Norse version of The Devil?" Because I heard all this shit irl all the fucking time. And no. So let me give you a quick rundown of who Loki actually is.

Loki is a Trickster God. He's often referred to as the God of Mischief. He is not and never was evil, simply chaotic and hedonistic. Loki Laufeyjarson was the son of Laufey (that's mama; they changed her to a man for some reason in the movie) and Fárbauti. Right from the start, from his name, we get a sign of how Loki goes against traditional norms of the time, because in Norse culture, families were patrilineal, and surnames were "son/daughter of father" (which would have made him Loki Fárbautitason), not the mother. But Loki's surname is matrilineal. Feminist icon woo! lol

Though he's a Jotunn, Loki is counted among the Gods (Aesir) in Norse tradition. Depending on his mood, he is alternately helpful or disruptive to the other Gods. I'm not gonna sit and teach a whole text class on him lol but I'll use my favorite example of Misunderstood Loki - the conception of Sleipnir!

So, get this shit. This is also part of why I DO NOT follow Odin and never fucking will (a very small part, but still part of the reason). So, the other Norse Gods are petty motherfuckers, and they wanted some shit built but didn't want to pay the dude doing the building. So they were like "okay, if you can get it done in X amount of time, we'll pay you, but if you can't manage it NO MATTER WHAT, this whole thing is free." And they made sure he had NO help, nothing but him, his materials, and his Very Good Horsey. And this guy and his horse were fucking BAMFs. So it was looking like he was definitely gonna get it done in time, and Odin was like "nah, fuck that shit. I'm cheap." and so he sent Loki to distract the work horse. Loki transformed into a mare and lured the horse away, got fucked, got pregnant, gave birth to the 8-legged (for some reason) horse Sleipnir. Odin rides Loki's son into battle. Um. Kay.

So Loki helped Odin be a petty mf, and Odin got himself a new pet out of the deal.

Oh, also, because he's smart af and a shapeshifter and a master magician and genderfluid, Loki "fails" to fit the super fucking toxic and narrow Norse/Aesir view of "a real man". He prefers intelligence and manipulation to solve problems rather than violence, he's not afraid to behave like a clown if it gets shit done, and that grosses the Aesir out, so they constantly ridicule him for being "less than a man".

Loki is the God of the outcast and the misunderstood. The marginalized people from all walks of life. He is the God of the LGBT community. In modern terms, he's pansexual, polyamorous (married to Sigyn and they are deeply in love, but boy gets around and I've never seen any indication that Sigyn gives a shit) and genderfluid.

Okay. Focus, Ali. This is part of why I usually post multiple rants instead of one big long one XD The longer I ramble, the more I get sidetracked and forget the original point.

So. Loki's awesome, and being a Trickster, is powerful as all fucking hell. There's not much he can't do.

And now we come to Thor (the movie, not the deity). Loki's there! 24-year-old Ali is spazzing! All is right with the world!

Oh lord, they've actually done him justice?! Amazing! He's complex and nuanced and emotional, just like the real Loki! I loved this movie. Loved. It. The climactic thing with trying to blow up Jotunheim never really made much sense to me until someone made an excellent point the other day about Loki being raised in a racist society that was racist against his own race, he just didn't know it yet, poor child. Baby Thor was never corrected when he pledged to commit mass genocide, so Baby Loki probably absorbed the lesson then that Jotunns=evil and killing them all will win his father's love. Anyway, 2011 Loki was a beautiful, heartbreaking portrayal of the God I've loved all my life and spent 24 years longing to see depicted on the big screen.

Then The Avengers happened. And I saw another Loki very close to Norse mythology - mainly, how he's treated. In the beginning of the movie, he's sick, exhausted, and in pain. He can hardly stand, he stumbles and needs help when he walks. He was very obviously tortured, and the sickly blue light of the scepter's control is in his eyes. That gets less and less pronounced as the movie goes on, showing Loki working his way free of it, but in the beginning, he's a mess. Because he was tortured and used by Thanos. Marvel directly confirmed this, and that he was under the scepter's/Mind Stone's control. Loki's actions are not his own in The Avengers. He's under both threat and Thanos' direct control. The movie actually shows The Other directly threatening him to keep him on task, because this is not Loki's plan. It is not what he wants. He's being used and villainized... Just like in real life. It hurt to see this done to him, but the accuracy was too beautiful to ignore.

Thor: The Dark World comes out. I've heard people complain that this movie is the weak link in the Thor trilogy. I disagree. I think that's Ragnarok, for a bunch of reasons, but we'll get there. (And for the record, I loved Ragnarok, too. It was a funny movie. Infinity War and the Disney+ series are the only portrayals of Loki in the MCU that I truly fucking hated.) Anyway, good, fun movie. Had its faults, as all movies do, but it still followed Loki's real-life arc in a way. How? By having Loki dragged back to Asgard in chains and imprisoned underground. Again, not super happy that this happened to my love, and having to see it on screen was painful, but at least in the MCU he's not chained to a rock with venom dripping on his face for eternity, so there's that. (poor Sigyn. how tired do her arms get, holding up that bowl? best wife ever, amirite?)

In TDW, we're shown Loki's love for Frigga, who favored him and taught him magic as a child. We see his bravado; his attempts to mask his true feelings, especially grief. We see him slowly coming back to himself after the events of The Avengers, and slowly mending his relationship with his brother. He accepts that Odin will likely never love him, but Thor just might, because they were close when they were young. "I didn't do it for him." No, no my sweet, you did it for your brother, and a little out of guilt for what happened to your mother.

At the end, Loki fakes his death and escapes, taking the throne, and I have mixed feelings about this. Not the writer's choices here; I love that completely! A natural progression in Loki's story. But my joy is tainted by how closely they're following the Eddas now. Because Loki's escape from his prison heralds the beginning of Ragnarok. And Loki will die in Ragnarok. I don't want to see that play out in front of my face. I won't be able to handle the grief (spoiler alert! IW broke me. I almost walked out of the theater. Loki's death was legitimately fucking traumatic for me. I don't even care how pathetic that is. That grief was real, it was intense, and I still shake and cry when I think about it.)

Marvel announces that Thor 3 will be called Ragnarok. The internet treats this as a shocking revelation. I roll my eyes and mumble "duh" to myself and move on XD

Then they say Ragnarok will be a buddy comedy. I throw up a little in my mouth and no longer want to live on this planet. If they're going to make something called Ragnarok, could they at least treat it with even a fraction of the respect they've shown these characters thusfar? Jfc. I mean, I'll see it anyway, because I'm a whore for Tom Hiddleston lol. But come on, people!

I hated that they made Hel the long-lost older sister and Fenrir her fucking pet/attack dog. Those are my favorites of Loki's children! Hel is such an incredible badass that the early Christians named their dimension of eternal torture after her! They were terrified of her, to the point of naming the place that terrified them most after her. That's awesome! And Fenrir's just the best. I love wolves. Those two details, and Odin's retcon of "we're not Gods! ...lol, except your sister. she's totally a Goddess. and def gonna kill literally everything, so... good luck! byyyeeeee" pissed me off royally.

The rest was great. I genuinely liked this movie. Still do. And they finally used The Immigrant Song! That was pretty cool. If they'd thrown in Bring the Hammer Down and Thunderstruck, I might've called this movie perfect. XD

I wasn't totally in love with their portrayal of Loki in Ragnarok. Yes, the falling for 30 minutes line was funny, as was "I have to get off this planet" and "YES! That's how it feels!" And "Get Help" was funny as hell. But also, like... There is no way Loki would have been the dumb one in that first encounter with Hela. Also, he can teleport and project copies of himself and shit, so... He would not have been that desperate to go straight back to Asgard and bring her right along with them. Loki's not stupid. But whatever. Movie's gotta movie.

What I did love was seeing the slow mending of his relationship with Thor continuing, and the badass fighting on the bridge. I also loved that, like Real Loki, Movie Loki helped when help was needed, was quick and clever, and while he was carrying out the main plan, he was also planning ahead and grabbing the Tesseract. Yes, that drew Thanos right to them, but that's a whole other thing. Loki never would have left that thing on Asgard to be destroyed or lost.

And now Infinity War. Hooooly fucking shit. You know what? No. I'm not going into this. He was killed, years of character growth were erased forever, my heart fucking shattered. The end.

Endgame. IW hurt me so bad I didn't see Endgame until this year. I actually watched Civil War first (for context: I had actively avoided all Cap movies until this year because I fucking hate Steve Rogers. I find him insufferable. Did not realize what I was denying myself until I watched CW and finally saw the charms of Bucky. When he appeared in IW, I was so lost. XD I was like "...who dis? Murder Jesus?" also I just... didn't care. I was numb by then from crying through most of the movie over Loki)

So, anyway. Endgame. Loki picks up the Tesseract in alternate 2012, escapes, fans go "yay! he didn't actually die!" I go "yes he fucking did. Five years of his life, gone. Five years of growth and change, erased. Loki is dead. This will not be the same."

I was more right than I could have predicted. Now we come to the point of this rant. Sorry it took so long, but you were warned lol.

The Loki series makes me so angry I actually get sick to my stomach. It was fucking TRASH. When I praised Marvel for following Norse mythology so faithfully earlier? Yeah. I DID NOT MEAN TREAT HIM THE WAY THE OTHER GODS DID. I did not mean paint him as a pitiful clown, a joke, a caricature of who he truly was, with his pain and suffering played for LAUGHS.

This is supposed to be 2012 Loki, newly freed from Thanos' control. The Loki we saw in the beginning of TDW - snarky, exhausted, nihilistic. The Loki who rolled his eyes and said "get on with it" expecting to be killed.

The bumbling clown flipping on a dime from posturing to calling himself weak is not 2012 Loki. That is not ANY Loki. That is Tom Hiddleston in a black wig doing what he's told by a shitty writer who had no fucking idea what he was doing and was salty about his (bad) original script (for something totally fucking unrelated) getting killed.

In Episode 1, Loki is mocked, imprisoned, stripped against his will, tormented, belittled, and given a flippant summary of all the trauma Actual MCU Loki suffered that this one skipped out on, with no context, no acknowledgement of the trauma he's already lived quite fucking recently, and with the narrative twisted to not only erase all the abuse he's suffered, but to make it all his fault. And this is supposed to make him want to help these people?

And worse, IT FUCKING WORKS. WHAT?! I CAN'T- FUCKING WHAT?! Remember when I said LOKI IS NOT FUCKING STUPID?! So why is he STUPID?

Episode 2, he's a child. Mentally, this Loki is a fucking child. Now we've erased all the growth and development of his entire adult life. He's dopey, impatient, impulsive, desperate for a pat on the back and actually shows it. Yes, abused and neglected children crave the positive attention we never received, and we often grow up to be a bit emotionally stunted. But not all of us, and not Loki. Not as we've seen him EVER in the rest of the MCU. Playful and a bit callous at times? Absolutely! But not a big dumb fucking puppy.

Episode 3, a ray of hope, despite Sylvie! (I hate Sylvie) Loki casually admits he's pan/bi; labels never come up, but he admits to being with both men and women! He sings! Not really relevant to whether I approve of his portrayal or not lol but Tom has a beautiful voice, Norwegian ("Asgardian" lol) is a gorgeous, entrancing language, and I could watch that one bit on loop for eternity and never get bored. And then, finally, we see a glimpse - a glimpse - of Loki's power! He stops a falling building and pushes it right back up! Are we finally getting to see what he can really do? Will the next episode bring us Loki in all his glory?

Nope. 4 and 5 we see him mocked and pushed around and utterly irrelevant. Again. We see tiny reflections of what he could maybe theoretically do in other random Loki variants, but the "main" (lawl. main. it was the Sylvie and Mobius show. Loki was never the main anything.) Loki? Nothing. He wears his heart on his sleeve for no reason, bonds with the man who imprisoned, taunted, and gaslit him, is killed, and continues to be a moron and a joke. Always the clown. Always the dumb one. The one with the bad ideas. The inferior Loki.

Don't even get me started on that finale. I can't. This already took so much out of me. Fuck Marvel. Fuck this fucking show. I just... I'm done.

[ellelans]

You made a tag comment about how Buddie wasn't planned from the beginning. And therefore what we got in Season 2 wasn't (at the time) the groundwork for a love story. I agree completely! Much of it I can see as either a bit of fun (the Christmas elf, the instagram girl) or that kind of hyper-masc heterosexuality that loops around itself and becomes gay (Buck's whole...thing with Eddie in the beginning, the focus on Eddie's body/hotness/physical appearance). But sometimes I step back and look at the whole and I'm all 🧐 🤔.

I don't even know what I'm asking lol. Would just love your thoughts/feelings on the confusing spectacle that are Buck and Eddie in season 2. And when/how/why did the show change their mind?

Thank you so much for the ask and you know what? Let’s talk about it.I recently had an in depth chat about this pretty unpopular opinion with a friend and I tried to explain to her why I don't see buddie as an actual pairing or having any canon potential until early s3 and why I don't believe they were planned from the beginning.This will be long and all over the place of course lol

The first and the most obvious reason is the way 911 deals with main characters and their romantic arcs.They don't actually drag it on for long because there is no need or time for that since every single main character has a strong storyline of their own and any romantic development between any pair as an additional combined storyline. Relationships happen fast on 911 because they are planned ahead and the only relationship that took longer than usual few episodes was Chim and Maddie and they were already kissing and planning a date in 2x11.

Also when shows enter their second season there is never a way to predict how long it will stay on the air and because of that it is impossible for me to believe that buddie was planned as some epic old school slowburn that is nowhere as close to be resolved after 3 seasons.When I say old school slowburn I mean shows that have this one heterosexual romance at the center of the universe that is usually stretched across seasons and builds up sexual tension between characters and it takes literally years for them to finally get together.We have these two characters that where made for each other and you KNOW that they will eventually get together because of some ridiculous pining that will eventually end in a kiss and everyone will scream and cry.And maybe that’s how buddie feels to me now after years of careful build up-but the way I see it they as a potential something didn't happen in s2.

We all joke about how character introduction of Eddie is the gayest we have ever seen and Buck's reaction to him as true bisexual and I do that myself too because I am a bisexual too and tbh its hard to unsee (also I don't want to) but lets remove our rainbow glasses for a second. What really did happened in that scene? Eddie's perfect abs on display,Chim and Hen fun comments on how beautiful he is,Bobby's praise and bragging about getting Eddie and his Silver Star on the team and Buck's insecurities flaring up as a reaction to all of this.Buck immediately feels threatened.At this point we of course have no idea how deeply his insecurities run or why,but as episode progresses we witness Eddie on his first call making a better decision to how to handle a medical situation and backed up by Bobby.It has sort of a devastating effect on Buck,who suddenly starts acting like we have never seen him before.Then there is a that scene at the gym where Buck tells Eddie how he is his problem. And later we of course have the scene in ambulance when Eddie asked what exactly they are measuring. Because that's what it looked like - a usual macho men measuring context. But the thing is 911 doesn’t toxic masculinity when it comes to main male characters and we saw many examples of that already by then,but the biggest one was supposed to be BuckandEddie. Equals,partners and best friends.

911 was already pushing boundaries with cast,characters and relationships diversity and I strongly believe that what they wanted to show us was a male equivalent of what we are used to see in female bffs -a different kind of a friendship between men. Men who care about each other,who talk about feelings,discuss sex,dating or why they don’t,who again openly acknowledge that they find each other attractive and giving advices on how to take a more flattering selfie,who are not afraid of crying, admit they are struggling or heartbroken or loving their kid.Honestly when was the last time any of us saw a male friendship like theirs?Men are not allowed to be like that on TV (I am still shocked that its a Fox show tbh) and especially with each other.We are not used to see such a development so no wonder people started paying attention-which was what writers wanted,of course.

But that also brings us to that important question about queer undertones,subtext and do what we actually see in s2. Are there queer undertones?Absolutely. Subtext?It’s right there but you will probably not get it unless you’re reading between the lines.Before we get to Christmas Elf,there was ‘’He is cute!/He gets that a lot,you should’ve seen his kid...’’ Maddie and Buck scene that is once again reinforces that Buck finds Eddie attractive and it shouldn’t be a surprise because we already know from 2x01 he has eyes - but they mention it AGAIN and that personally made me raise a brow or two.By the time we get to that Christmas episode,we already have Shannon back and Buck finally moved on from Abby with Taylor and then Ali and then we are given another queer coded scene-with Christmas elf.And its very cute and to an average heterosexual viewer its a nice little joke,but any queer watching that scene was probably taken aback a little.

So why imo did Tim&Co do it and when they realized they can actually see where they can take BuckandEddie and when they started becoming buddie?My answer is ship teasing.It’s what a lot of people actually mistake for queer baiting,but we are not talking about that rn.Ship teasing works like charm and if shows can get away with that-they will totally use it to their advantage.It’s usually not always malicious,but it IS always intentional because that brings in a category of people that were overlooked for a long time-online fandom.Now I have seen some opinions that fandom doesn’t really matter,it’s the ratings that count and that is NOT TRUE.You can have your ratings,but if there is no buzz online?Your show is going nowhere.For at least a decade now every self-respecting production has teams to monitor fandom activities because it gives them better ideas about how consumers(fans) are interacting with their product (show).Fandom is important because we generate the buzz.So I do believe that BuckandEddie and that sweet ship teasing were to get a certain part of the fandom pay attention.

I wasn’t here when S2 aired so I don’t know if that was the case,but it is obvious that these scenes I talked about above made fans pay a LOT of attention. And maybe that was the reaction writers needed to start changing course from ship teasing to start building up to something else.They maybe didn’t plan it at the very beginning and on paper,but lets also not forget the insane chemistry between Oilver and Ryan,which imo is another big reason-it's impossible to ignore.

Because S3?Is light years away from S2 in terms of BuckandEddie-they became buddie.In s3 Buck and Eddie become each other’s significant other,they are in a primary relationship. ’’Buck invites Eddie...’’?!!!!! It is not yet romantic and probably won’t be until ending of s5 if we are lucky-but it is in your face,they are not subtle anymore.I personally saw buddie only at the end of 3x03 when Eddie came over and said that there is noone in the world he trusts with his son more than Buck, looking like he did into Buck’s eyes,while ‘Photograph’ played in the background right before Buck’s overvoice about being seen and found and a raft to bring one home. After S4 ending tho...we all know that something is about to happen and its like there is electricity in the air as we are waiting for s5!

Probably a lot more thoughts than you expected,but I have many feelings about these two and when buddie goes canon this post will become completely irrelevant lol 💖 

[elkian]

I was gonna do a “missing the point”-style meme but I’m honestly not sure that would even work tho so:

Harry Potter and My Hero Academia/Boku no Hero Academia have similar issues with introducing and then immediately ignoring ENORMOUS issues re: ableism.

I think these two series in specific come to mind bc it’s ableism within a specific empowered community, and in both cases the series are pretty well-known and the community (Wix/Heroes) are immediately identifiable to many audiences.

[WARNING: Discussions of ableism, child harm, and abuse on multiple levels.]

What’s the problem?

SQUIBS.

[This post got stupid huge SO here is a tl,dr for all you lovely people who understandably have no time for this.

TL, DR: Both Harry Potter and Boku No Hero have a bad tendency to implement or imply a level of disability regarding unempowered people in empowered societies. They then continue on to completely disregard important conclusions to these implications, such as how heavily it is implied that these unempowered people (Squibs) are so ‘worthless’ to those societies that their very deaths are merely a byline rather than an actual tragedy.

This is especially troubling in MHA/BNHA when so many other political and worldbuilding considerations HAVE been planned out, and seems to be less-discussed in the fandom as a whole, so that’s a much larger chunk of this post.]

That’s your tl, dr!

Here’s the Harry Potter angle:

HP has a bit that I’ve seen people discussing already: Neville’s magic was discovered when his uncle dropped a literal child a potenial lethal distance. 

Neville activating his power and surviving is celebrated, and then JKR immediately glosses over the glaring issue this has introduced: the heavy implication that a Squib dying from this incident would have not have been mourned or even really commented on.

The few adult Squibs (and isn’t that a whole new slice of wonderful /j) are generally disliked and ridiculed for some reason or other. Now, while obviously there are plenty of places where the Venn diagram of “disabled” and “asshole” intersect irl, when your ONLY presentation of a disabled character or group is, every time, an asshole or a fool or both, boy! That’s bad!

Neville (who is generally presented as magically, physically, and mentally weak and often treated as comic relief) is a bit better via the POV Character constantly having positive interactions with him, but this is still a mess. Yes, Neville canonically is not a Squib, but it’s not subtle that he’s on the cusp OF being a Squib, and that is a key element of ridiculing him in many situations (also the whole trauma thing multiple times, like if I really get into it I could do a whole double-size post of how Neville was done dirty or nearly dirty by JK all the time but this isn’t that post).

This isn’t even the point of this post. Let’s move to MHA/BNHA

Hero Academia has differing but honestly even worse issues. And I’m aware that different countries handle ableism and accessibility in different ways, but if you think too hard about it this is an absolute clusterfuck.

What is the problem now?

Squibs! Or rather, the main character of the series, Midoriya Izuku.

Deku (a nickname meaning “useless”! Imparted after his disability is recognized! hilarity!!) is also born without powers. Even worse in some ways, he is born without powers in a world where the overwhelming majority of the global population has some kind of empowerment. I can’t recall if it’s outright stated or only implied that someone with a functionally useless (and hoo boy, usefullness to society is its own post nope not today i do not have that much energy) Quirk is still more of a person than a Quirkless human.

That sink in? Okay, let’s move on.

In a narratively not-uncommon turn of events, Deku gains power. This is partially a product of, and directly tied to, his own work and determination, as well as his willingness to help even when physically outmatched.

To an American audience (NOT the intended audience though I wouldn’t doubt it if Horikoshi meant to have international appeal more or less from the start), this is a deeply satisfying narrative. Who doesn’t love an underdog story? And we even learn that the strongest hero of all time (til this point, anyways) was ALSO born Quirkless!

However, from here, things take a nosedive.

The key problem is a combination of story progression and overall thought put into worldbuilding. Horikoshi’s efforts may not be the MOST thorough, but he has put a great deal of work and thought into his creation (he at least understands the concept of implications and sometimes plans accordingly, looking at you JKR). However, that tied with story progression and personal repercussions actually works to the detriment of the matter.

Especially given recent turns of events.

 [BIG MEGA SPOILERS FOR FAIRLY RECENT PLOT

 STOP HERE IF YOU’RE NOT CAUGHT UP

 SERIOUSLY]

 What I mean by this is the current state of events re: two particular recent/recent-ish plot arcs.

First, Quirk Removal, and second, Endeavor’s comeuppance.

Quirk Removal/Loss was the start of my realization to what the narrative was doing regarding Izuku’s Quirklessness and the state of being overall.

This arc was a perfect time to bring up Midoriya’s past! A lot of Western works certainly would have done so! And yes, it may be bordering on done-to-death, but many elements of Hero Academia put new twists on common themes and cliches; it wasn’t unreasonable to hope that he might do it again.

Instead, little to NOTHING is discussed during this time! In fact, iirc I’d go so far as to say Midoriya straight-up never considers his past at any point during this arc!? If I’m wrong then it obviously made little impact.

NOW, not every disabled character needs to incorporate their disability and/or skills gleaned from living with it in every narrative. In fact, it would get tedious and questionable if they did (note: this does NOT mean ignoring/forgetting the character is even disabled when convenient. Like, I’d like to think that’s the obvious point of this post but... *gestures at tumblr*). 

But the complete lack of it here feels really weird. Like, almost hollow. I think Midoriya makes some kind of suggestion to Mirio of his former Quirklessness at the end of the arc, but nothing that made any kind of impact.

Let’s move on.

Endeavor.

Now, the problem with Endeavor’s arc is not the arc itself. Or, rather, it’s the fact that Endeavor’s Comeuppance is pretty good.

This is a problem because someone else should be getting this exact same arc, yet the issue is never even RECOGNIZED, let alone addressed.

Endeavor’s abuse of his wife and children, all in the name of creating a Heroic legacy, is publicized and tanks his popularity. The general public is now aware of what he’s done to the people closest to him, which aside from giving him a more correct reputation, means they can’t trust him to protect them if they can’t trust him to protect his own family.

This isn’t the goal of this post and I’m no expert regardless, but up to this point (around chapter 290) this was handled in an interesting way. Endeavor is humanized and often shown interacting with people in a way that, while often domineering, isn’t always aggressive or abusive. He runs a Hero Agency for crying out loud! But abuse in the real world often isn’t constant, nor happening to everyone in contact with the abuser. So this is a surprisingly good lead up to the reveal, where you can understand how most people never realized this was an issue.

But here’s my main point. Let’s examine some traits and actions that come up:

physically abusive to a child (often dangerously so) to the point of permanent trauma and severe scarring in some cases

target of abuse was weaker (physically and/or regarding Quirk power)

often abused victim emotionally/psychologically, bringing this weakness up again and again

own immense power led to rising in the world of Heroics

comrades, fellow Heroes, UA teachers etc. not aware of prior abuse issues

Who does this sound like?

Endeavor, who has a whole fucking arc dedicated to this reveal and repercussions?

Or Bakugou?

Reminder: This isn’t a hate post. This isn’t a character post, or even an abuse post. This is about ableism.

Bakugou exhibits many, many traits and actions that Endeavor was literally just punished for. So why does the treatment of these characters in-universe differ so drastically?

Two primary reasons I can think of, which feed into each other:

1) Bakugou was a child (still technically is a minor, remember! Still a first-year high schooler!) when this started. This doesn’t mean he’s strictly innocent, but it’s an important point, because it leads us to

2) Bakugou Katsuki’s abuse of Midoriya Izuku is socially accepted.

Reminder of the audience’s first encounter with Katsuki. The very first page with him is him and his grade-school posse picking on a kid that Izuku is trying to protect. His posse is showing off their Quirk powers and mocking Izuku’s lack thereof.

Then we flash forward to late-middle school versions of the kids. Bakugou, in front of a fucking teacher and entire class, is verbally, physically, etc. abusive to Izuku. He trashes his stuff, threatens him, tells him to kill himself (which, as Izuku notes later, is a fucking felony in Japan too).

No one stops him.

No one criticizes him.

We don’t even get a shot of like, some more ‘regular’ students being like “man Bakugou’s kinda fucked up but we’re too scared to do anything about it” NO. NO. Everyone more or less either backs Katsuki up or straight up doesn’t care.

Remember that this started when Katsuki and Izuku were four. Remember that Katsuki’s power is absurdly dangerous, ie. LITERAL. GODDAMN. EXPLOSIONS.

Izuku has scars. He probably has hearing loss! He may have gotten at least one concussion which can cause serious neurological issues and open him up to further risk!

He could have died.

And?

NO ONE. DOES. ANYTHING.

THIS is the point of the post. THIS is the value placed on Quirkless people in this society.

And yet. Despite Endeavor’s comeuppance. Despite All Might and Izuku’s blatant ‘value’ to society through Heroics. Despite so many other political implications and quandaries address in the Hero Academia series.

Nothing. Nothing. Nothing about this is addressed. The nearly-lethal ableism towards Quirkless people in this society is never ONCE brought up properly once Izuku receives One For All.

There is so much potential here! There is so much worth talking about! And yet we’ve moved into what feels very much like the Final Battle without it being addessed, despite numerous, numerous opportunities for a meaningful conversation about it along the way.

Mirio losing his power! Hell, Mirio’s powers’ drawbacks (and pretty much every Quirk’s drawback! if acknowledged properly!) border on a disability-analogue, and even more when Yuga’s laser comes up, and yet again and again we fail to truly engage with the matter in a meaningful way.

At this point, even if it comes up in the finale, I’m going to be disappointed in this particular aspect of the series due to the complete and total shut-down it’s been given so far.

What the FUCK, Horikoshi?

[mochuelovelli]

Lilith for the character ask?

Oh boy, a controversial character! Gotta say, I stan James Charles /J

How do I feel about this character?:

On a real note, I do like Lilith as a character. When we first meet her, she's pompous and proud. Oozing with entitlement, she's easy to route against and you like to see her get worked up and "brought down" to Eda's level as the wild which so eloquently put it. Later on, but not too much later that it feels disingenuous, we really get to see her show that she cares for her sister. One might believe it is *Eda* being ridiculous, as far as the audience is aware, Lilith's offer holds little downsides. Eda would be cured and be afforded the luxuries of the upper class AND keep her magic. All she had to do was be the Emperor's soldier.

As to not get off track by talking about Eda, (im sure Lilith herself would loathe that lol) Lilith's reveal to have cursed her sister over a spot in the emperor's coven was...controversial to say the least. I don't think it's unpopular to voice that, yeah. It could've been communicated better to the audience since I saw plenty of commentators and regular fans themselves either thought Lilith cursing her sister was *needlessly* petty and not at all thought out (which yeah it kinda was).

From where I stand on that issue is, yeah, Lilith's whole reason to curse her sister could've been avoided by just talking to her sister and asking her to let her have this. BUT, I think a lot of people forget that the Emperor's coven would want to limit the number of powerful witches in their coven. Sure, Belos would want to be protected by a bunch of loyal soldiers, but he wouldn't want too much of the population to ever have a much power as him. So limiting the number of members in not just his coven but possible in the other major covens, would aid in controlling that population.

This might be pure hogwash but like, there are a ton of other "lesser" covens. So in my mind, it's more likely that the general population of witches gets sorted into one of the various miscellaneous. If you think limiting yourself to only practicing Illusion magic sucks, imagine only practicing whatever the fuck the "swag coven" does.

Lol gonna add a page break this shit is getting too long

Romantic Ships for this character?:

Hm, it's only s1 and we haven't seen her interact w/ many characters outside of her fam/Belos/actual children. I kinda jokingly ship here with Steve lol. Kikimora and her also have a funny dynamic but in all actuality, I don't ship her w/ anyone rn.

Non-Romantic Ships for this character?:

Her and Hooty lol. I mean Eda is an obvious answer but like, Hooty fucking with Lilith is too funny to not want to see. Her and King would be great too, probably get some good B plots out of it. It would be a good contrast since they both can be petty but in different ways and I think that would help flesh out their characters a bit more and maybe cause some introspection (at least on Lilith’s end lol)

Unpopular opinion about this character?:

Lol. I feel like she is such a divisive character in general that most opinions about her aren’t too out of the main stream. I guess a more meta take is that when she’s portrayed in fanworks, usually fanfic but not exclusively, very...one note lol. She’s usually a pretty flat, boring character in an attempt to highlight the contrast between her and Eda. She’s the straight-laced, “responsible” sibling who has a chip on her shoulder. In fanon, that equates to her characterization to either be like, completely and utterly apologetic to the point where it becomes unbelievable for any person to do. Her apologizing or making amends is usually quickly forgiven by Luz/and or Eda. Sure, Luz is very forgiving person naturally but like?? She’s wasn’t mad in canon too much about THEIR well being (almost getting impaled), she was specifically pissed about Lilith betraying Eda. 

So, if Lilith is a big part of your story (and it’s working in the realm of canon), then this should be a problem which doesn’t get resolved by just ONE big action. I also feel like her being on better terms with Eda would come BEFORE Luz since Eda’s main gripe with her would be about her being annoyed by Lilith’s controlling nature and the fact that she didn’t trust her enough to talk about her feelings back when she was first cursed (also her using Luz against her but I feel like that would probably be a hurdle that wouldn’t really be over come until Lilith in turn would be willing to sacrifice herself for Luz while also making an effort to care for Luz as a person not just see her as a “pet”). Hhhh this section is so long and its kinda bleeding over in the next question so-

Something I wish will happen or would have wanted to happen in canon?:

yall if you are still reading I am so sorry sksk

I want Lilith in general, not to be forgiven by either Luz or Eda. Eda probably early on stating about how she is unsure if she could EVER forgive her sister for what she has done. BUT, critically, Eda would see that Lilith is trying and she is willing to work with her (with a unhelpful dose of teasing) because at the end of the day she still loves her sister. For the relationship they had before everything with south, for knowing her side of the story even though she believes it doesn’t justify her actions. She understands and sympathizes, she’s grown a bit softer thanks to Luz, which is very funny since I want Luz to be the one who is the hardest to convince Lilith actually had a change of heart but more on that later. 

Before I move on to what I want her path towards forgiveness with Luz looks like, I want to bring up a parallel that I haven’t seen many people make. Fans always talk about the parallel between the Clawthornes and Luz/Amity, and rightly so because there is a lot to extrapolate there, but I think another interesting dynamic that might be interesting to see in s2 would be an episode that focuses on lost friendship/sisterhood with the Clawthornes and Amity and Willow. It’s kinda funny that Amity and Willow’s friendship was ruined because Willow was too “weak” while Eda was too “powerful”. In a potential episode, it can show the progression both Eda/Lilith and Willow/Amity are making in rekindling their relationship with each other. For Eda and Lilith this would be a lot more rough around the edges since it both be either the first or one of the first attempts at doing so while Willow/Amity would maybe be further along yet still have some major/minor hang ups with one another. With Willow/Amity, their relationship would either be rounding the bend of fully moving past the “idk how to feel about you stage” or it is stated outright that Willow forgives Amity, (and by forgive, I mean in the “we both know what you did, you’ve actually changed. we won’t have the same relationship that we once had but I’m okay with trying again”). In contrast, Lilith and Eda would reach a understanding and come up with some ground rules on how to handle each other (Eda’s main take away from this “episode” would be what I previously stated in the last question), ones that will be more like guidelines cuz its Eda lol. Also what separates the Clawthornes conflict from the Willow/Amity one (besides the obvious) is that the Clawthornes both know how the other works. Which buttons to push and all that so both of them are going to have to learn to resist doing that, at least a bit, in order to actually progress. 

ANYWAYS, I also want Luz to be the one to regard Lilith the coldest. Luz refusing to let Lilith teach her anything despite probably having more practical/book smarts knowledge on magic theory than Eda because she doesn’t trust her. If they are gonna use that masked dude as a spy, I want Luz to assume Lilith is somehow a coconspirator. This plot thread doesn’t have to be going at 100% the whole time, (in fact I would want it to be a temp thing maybe lasting a couple eps at most or like, just something that is hinted at but not dived deeply until the second half of the season). Really, Lilith has a hard time because Luz straight up doesn’t give her the opportunity to really express her regret/remorse. Lilith probably won’t at first give her a ton of reasons to forgive her as she usually attempts at coming back at Luz’s snide remarks with her own quippy comebacks. Sksk a really angsty end to an attempt could include Lilith saying something to Luz after going on a small talk with her (where yeah Lilith has improved but still needs noticeable work) that she “reminds her a lot of Eda” and Luz bites back with something like “Oh yeah? You going to curse me too? You want another person you can force to do what YOU want?”. 

Hell maybe “parental problems” could have Lilith poke at, either on purpose or accidentally, Luz’s feelings about going back to the human world and Camila. Lilith reminding her, maybe unknowingly, reminds her a lot of her mom and that causes her to blow up on her. Luz would hate that comparison, thinking about how similar her mom and Lilith are to one another. That because she still has such a strong dislike of Lilith, it bleeds over into how Luz views Camila and vice versa. In that, both Camila and Lilith value respect, an adherence to the rules, have a great sense of wisdom (arguably for Lilith lol /hj), and (eventually for Lilith once she gets to know Luz better) a genuine want for Luz to succeed and belief in her even though they are critical of her actions at times. Sure Eda reminds her of that more, motherly protective kind of love, in which she would do anything for her to be happy and healthy. Lilith can be the other side of that, the worry and slight doubt. That familiar way they each go about trying to understand and get close to Luz yet not quite getting it yet would still do whatever she’d ask for her sake. Luz at first would take Lilith being disappointed in her actions as an accomplishment. As they grow closer and the more Lilith reminds her of her mom, it becomes scary. The disappointment hurts and in an effort not to feel like that again and to not want to think about the comparison between Lilith and her mother she will snap back at her. Eventually Lilith would then have to change again and reassure her that she cares and by extent, her mother cares to. It is here Lilith is willing to let go of being so constantly controlling and learns to encourage first (or do some form of the compliment sandwich) and Luz comes to peace with her feelings about her mother and understands her position better. To be able to love herself even if she knows that she will always try to do her best. 

oh my fucking god you made it im so sorry i guess i had a lot of thoughts. fffffff

[anotheronechicagobog]

The Heroic Heralds of the Hectic Hermann Horde -2- What Is It With Janitors Making Meth In School Basements?

written by: @anotheronechicagobog​

Warnings: swearing, coming out, mention of meth lab, canon compliant action, fire safety

A/N: I hope you guys like it, please comment what you think! :)

A/N 2: Can I coin Matt Casey’s disappointed face as the ‘Disappointed Captain America’ face of One Chicago? Pretty please?

Annabelle has a date. With a boy. Granted, she was twelve, and so was the boy who asked her to go with him to the winter dance which would be taking place during school hours with chaperones, but that did not make Christopher feel better. What made it worse was that she hadn’t even told him or Cindy, they had to find out when Kylie came over to see her instead of Lee. Hell, even Lee knew about this boy apparently, so Christopher and Cindy were sitting in their bedroom, completely bewildered, and a little sad that their daughter felt like she couldn’t talk to them about dating and love and sex. Annabelle had gotten the sex talk from school and her mom, she still shuddered when she thought of either, but now her parents were wondering if they needed to go over things again now that she was going ‘out’ with a boy. Were twelve year olds even having sex? They were only in middle school.

Annabelle and Kylie were in the room she shared with Max, going through her clothes. “Do I need to go shopping? I don’t think I have anything good enough. Oh god, what if I look like-”

“Okay, no. Deep breath, calm down. You are very pretty and have very pretty clothes. We’ll find something. I know that the first anything in a relationship is a little nerve-wracking, so just control your breathing and take everything one step at a time. I know that this feels like the biggest deal in the world right now, but you’re twelve, Belle. There is going to be so much time in life for relationships, good and bad, so you don’t need to worry about pushing as much stereotypical perfection as you can into the year before summer ends, okay? Life will and does extend beyond this dance, it’s okay to feel excited but your existence and reality as you know it don’t hinge on this dance. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“Good, now, dress, skirt, or pants?”

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

After settling on a flowy dress adorned with purple flowers and low wedges, Kylie managed to talk Annabelle out of makeup. “Just letting you ladies know that dinner will be ready in half an hour.”

“Great, thanks, dad.”

“So, uh, how are things going up here?”

“... Things have been going well, Kylie was just helping me get some things ready for tomorrow.”

“Right, for the dance. That you’re going to with a date.”

“Yeah...”

“Mr. Hermann, would you mind if we got some privacy? Girl stuff, you know?”

“Uh, yeah, sure, sure, I guess. And you can call me Christopher, if you want, Kylie.”

“Okay, I will.” The awkwardness in the room was palpable, Christopher was changing his weight from foot to foot, clearly looking for a reason to stay. “Dad.”

“Alright, alright, I’m going.” He twisted around and exited the room, his heart fracturing a little. He knew that this would happen eventually, he just hadn’t been prepared for it, and he thought that Cindy would be in the loop. Instead it was Kylie, Severide and Kidd’s foster daughter, and Lee Henry’s crush. “Dad,”

“Yeah, Lee Henry? What’s up?”

“She’ll be fine. I know that you worry, but she knows how to handle herself and I’ve met Alex, nothing bad is gonna happen.”

“How come you knew about all of this before I did?”

“Easy, you don’t understand emojis.”

“Are you saying I’m old?!”

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Annabelle wasn’t out of her room by the time Cindy had to drive Christopher to the station. Something that deeply disappointed them both. “Okay, Belle, they’re gone.”

“Thanks Max.”

“No problem. You look really pretty today.”

“Thanks.”

“Come on, mom made muffins and Lee said we need to get going.”

“Is he going early to meet Kylie in the library again?”

“Yeah. Could he be anymore obvious?”

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Annabelle was jittery all day. This wasn’t just her first date, this was the first time she was going to publicly acknowledge that she might be a lesbian. She was only twelve, almost thirteen, so she wasn’t going to label herself definitively just yet. Her classmates were relatively progressive, so were her parents, but there were still bad seeds and hidden doubts. Her dress was soft and she was doing everything she could to resist bunching her hands up in the cotton skirt, or run her hands through her styled hair. She chewed her lip, tasting the grape chapstick on her lips. The words of her science teacher fell on deaf ears. When the bell rang she jumped out of her seat, she fumbled, embarrassed, for a moment before she realized that most of the class was acting the same way. The only thing left between her and the dance now, was lunch. Her stomach was so coiled and heavy from nerves that she didn’t think she’d be able to eat. She didn’t feel like just sitting with her friends either, they didn’t know who she was going with and Annabelle knew that they’d know something was wrong with her the second she made eye contact. So she decided to sit by herself at the small old desk in the back corner of the library. The usual smell of musty books, old wood, and 80’s carpet weren’t the only ones to greet her. She was also met by sweat and spices. “Hey Belle.”

“Hey Lee... What are you doing here?”

“I know that you’re nervous, and I know that when you get nervous you feel like you shouldn’t eat, but you only ate half a muffin this morning. So Kylie and I thought we’d bring you your favourite takeout.”

“Curry?”

“Of course.”

“I love you guys.”

“We know. You don’t have to be nervous Belle, I’ve met Alex. She’s sweet and very obviously has a crush on you. Just take a deep breath, okay? Everything is gonna go well. Just take a deep breath and eat your food, we don’t need you fainting while you’re on your first date with ‘the most beautiful girl to have ever existed’ now do we?”

“Hey! I told you that in confidence!”

“Lee stop teasing your sister.”

“But-”

“Ha! You heard Kylie, your girlfriend says you can’t tease me about mine.” Annabelle stuck her tongue out and began to eat, secretly delighted in how red Lee’s face turned.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Annabelle was still wracked with nerves but she felt better after eating with Lee and Kylie. Partly because her brother was right and she did need to just eat something, and partly because Kylie helped fix her hair and dress before they returned to their high school a block away. Annabelle walked into the darkened gymnasium. The decorations were cliche, a little tacky, and visibly worn, probably used year after year. She waited in the far right corner, where she and Alex had agreed to meet. As cheesy as it sounded, she felt her heart skip a beat when she saw Alex. Alex looked beautiful. Annabelle had thought about this moment, she thought she’d fumble, be awkward and stutter. Instead, she felt confident for the first time that week. When Alex got close enough Annabelle smiled and wrapped her arms around a shy Alex and kissed her on the cheek. “You look amazing.”

“You too, Belle, wanna dance?” Annabelle nodded enthusiastically as High Hopes started blare through the old glitchy speakers. But neither Annabelle or Alex cared, they jumped and danced and twirled, the skirts from their dresses swishing around them, never unclasping their hands. Smiling and panting they broke off to the side after dancing nonstop for forty minutes. They walked over to the water fountain jovially with their pinkies intertwined. The cool water helped control their hot faces as they talked about their mutual love of the Percy Jackson series when- boom. There was a small explosion below them and everyone was knocked off their feet. Alex and Annabelle’s eyes met, horror and fear building inside of them was interrupted by the fire alarms going off. Annabelle jumped up, face heard and eyes calculated. “Go out the fire doors and call the fire department when you get outside.”

“Belle, you can’t stay-”

“Go Alex, and don’t look back or stop for anything!” Annabelle shoved the other girl towards the door before moving back into the gym to direct an evacuation. She gave orders with a commanding voice and firm stance. She began directing her panicked peers, to prevent trampling, outside through the gym’s fire two doors and through the doors outside of the gym on each end of the hall all of which lead outside. Though the doors at the end of the hall each lead into a small alcove/entryway lined with windows that had the doors that actually lead outside. Annabelle darted in and out of the bathrooms quickly, to make sure there weren’t any stragglers. She knew she was smart to do that when she found three boys from her math class huddled together on the floor. “Get up! We need to evacuate the building!” A couple of the boys scrambled to get up but one had to be dragged to his feet by Annabelle and hauled out the door by her as she led the boys to one of the gym’s fire doors because the door to the exit they’d been closest to was really hot which meant the fire was near. Just as she was about to test the temperature of the door with the back of her hand, uncle Matt burst in, with Gallo and auntie Stella behind him. “Stella take Annabelle and the boys straight to 61. I’ll radio Hermann and let him know she’s safe.” He turned to her and levelled her with his ‘Disappointed Captain America’ face, “you are in so much trouble.”

“The- uh- the doors to exit the building near the track, they have a door to the basement in the same alcove as the second doors that actually lead outside. We were gonna leave that way cause it’s closer but the doors were hot, we didn’t stick around to see if there was smoke.” Her voice was quiet and she hung her head in shame for a moment before following Stella and the boys to ambulance 61. Auntie Sylvie met her eyes and opened her mouth to speak, ask how she was feeling no doubt, but was interrupted by her father wrapping her in a bear hug. “Damnit Annabelle Sarah Hermann! What were you thinking?! Why on earth would you stay in the building?! You should have evacuated with the others-” Hermann cut himself off, tensing and slowly turning to level each of the boys she’d rescued with a glare. “Is one of them Alex? Did you stay in a building you knew was dangerous because of a boy?!”

“What? No, dad, okay first of all, I stayed only long enough to make sure no one was hiding in the bathrooms. You’ve told us a thousand times that people think it’s a good idea to hide in there when it’s really not. Second... Alex is a girl. She, uh, I actually can’t see her... I made her leave first, but I don’t see her- what if-”

“Hey, hey, hey, we’ll- uh, we’ll find her.” Hermann helped her find Alex, she was sitting with a bunch of students on the track field and tackled Annabelle when she came into sight. Their hugging on the ground was interrupted by the principal announcing that everyone was being taken to the hospital because the small explosion came from a meth lab in the basement of the school, and everyone needed treatment from exposure to the chemicals, both from the explosion and from vapours that were created during the process and had been around long-term and explained the increase in asthma attacks at the school. While the staff was arranging for the bus to come transport the students and for the parents to meet everyone at Gaffney, Hermann signed Annabelle out and had her ride with Engine 51 to the hospital. “So... You’re gay?”

“I don’t know, I mean I am really young, but I definitely feel some romantic attraction towards girls... Is that okay?”

“Of course! I admittedly don’t know much about discovering sexualities, but I do know that it’s completely normal. I just, I’d like for you to know that your mom and I love you no matter what and that this won’t change anything.”

“Thanks dad. I love you guys too.”

“... So... Alex seemed nice, when are you gonna invite her over for dinner to meet the family?”

“Ugh dad!”

[gcldveined]

I got this reply in response to a post I made about loving Gwen, and I’m putting my own novel of a response in the tags. Here we go.

Actually, nothing you said about her is fair, and I’ll go into why. While Gwen is a character I hold very dearly, I need to preface this with the fact that I in no way see her as perfect (in fact, I’ll go deeply into why she isn’t), or better than any of the team. As anyone who knows me and my love of Torchwood can tell you, I’m arguably in love with every single member of the team evenly, and with Rhys as well. So I’ll try to hit all the points you brought up here.

The writing in the first 2 series —  Honestly, I’ll start with yes, the writing can be spotty and rough in points. It happens when you have so many different writers with differing views of what the relationships and characters are. For a non-Gwen example, take s1e12 Captain Jack Harkness - it was written by a woman who was fairly anti-Janto (a canon ship) and just wanted to see two soldiers kiss, by her own admission. So it took a very odd turn out of character for Jack to say “there’s no one” when asked if he had someone romantically involved with him. Owen’s development went back and forth from asshole to progress to asshole to progress again. Tosh got next to no attention outside of wanting love. They were all written in a bit of a shoddy manner in s1, when a show with many, many writers was just getting on its feet. Something of a sidebar, but important to note that the uneven writing does not apply solely to Gwen. Gwen being written as condescending and holier than thou - nope. I’m sorry, but no, that’s not what it was at all. Gwen was written as a point of humanity for Torchwood, which was desperately needed, as is evidenced as early as s1e2 Day One. Gwen was not a seasoned veteran of Torchwood, she was a woman who joined the police force because she wanted to help people. On top of dealing with the overwhelming nature of joining Torchwood itself, she first spoke up about morality, and humanity, (as was evidenced and clearly intended by the writers as they dubbed her The Heart of Torchwood) when she heard Carys sobbing in a cell because the poor girl was fighting with some murderous sex alien for control of her own body. Gwen was also written to be a vessel for audience projection, whether anyone likes it or not. And I believe it was necessary; if any of us were to react in any way but concern for someone in Carys’ situation, I’d question if there was something deeply wrong with us.

It was clear that nobody on the team had explained to her what was being done (Jack’s line about the computers running a bioscan on her makes that clear). It is only when he gets aggressive and defensive about it -

“Now, is that enough? Do you want more? Cos it gets kinda boring.”

- that she continues on about it.

“You've been hidden down here too long. Spending so much time with the alien stuff, you've lost what it means to be human.”

This line isn’t about being holier than thou, and it’s not about being condescending. It’s about the fact that she got caught up in the moment with them, laughing and relaxing and eating Chinese takeaway while a girl fought for control of her body and felt as though she was losing her mind in a dingy cell underground. It was a moment of shock at herself and a hope to find that same response in the others. And when they didn’t respond in kind, a realization about what they have done and how they have compartmentalized things in order to do the job before them. She doesn’t go on to build the background on Carys without prompting. She doesn’t go off on a sermon about how horrible they all are. Jack says:

“So remind us. Tell me what it means to be human in the twenty first century.”

and she does. She goes to pull up Carys’ life, as we all know, and in the end — Gwen was right. She was right in needing to keep Carys grounded, in a fight for control, though by the time they come to that conclusion it is too late and she has escaped. Later, she continues to argue with Jack about it, and they have a very sort of tense feeling between them through the rest of the episode. But then we get to the end, and Jack tells her —

“Do one thing for me. Don't let the job consume you. You have a life. Perspective. We need that.”

That’s a bit long winded for that one episode, but this is the foundation of what Gwen does for the team and who she is. Any one of us would be shocked entering Torchwood, finding what they do and how they handle it. Jack knew from the beginning what Gwen possessed — compassion and perspective — and wanted to use that. We see Gwen fall into the more callous and detached side of Torchwood to an extent over the course of the series, but we also see other characters come around to a more caring side.

It’s balance, it’s not condescension. Jack — her boss — told her to keep up with what she had been doing. I don’t know about you, but if I came up with an opinion — much less a controversial one — in my workplace, and my boss told me it was good and to hang on to it, I wouldn’t just drop it. I’d keep at it, like she was instructed to.

What the writers wanted vs. what they portrayed onscreen — We’re going a bit out of order here, but I think this one fits in well here. The writers wanted compassion, an emotional and steadying hand for Torchwood’s detachment, and an audience surrogate. And that is exactly what they gave us. Every show has an audience surrogate; Gwen was simply Torchwood’s. Jack created Torchwood Three to be different than Torchwood One, and especially if you listen to the audios, Torchwood One was extremely callous and detached. Gwen’s POV was essential to the Torchwood Jack wanted, to the Torchwood Jack never stopped working towards. The writers didn’t always handle everything well, but they knew what they wanted with Gwen, and they gave it to us.

Gwen’s infidelity with Owen and Jack — oh boy. This is a topic, because I know Gwen gets a ton of hate for it. Let’s preface this with: she was wrong. Gwen Cooper should never have cheated on Rhys, emotionally or physically. However, let’s explore this topic and how hating just Gwen for it and not Owen or Jack as well is misogynistic and wrong, full stop.

Here we go.

We’ll start with Owen. We’ve established I do not condone it, but I feel I understand her thinking in that, and I think it’s an important to delve into it a bit.

Gwen started Torchwood, as discussed, shocked by the detachment from humanity. She would later fall into that to an extent, as well, and I believe part of her affair with Owen was the beginning. She was stressed, overwhelmed, and scared in a job that demanded a lot from her in every way - physical, mental, moral, and emotional. She couldn’t speak to Rhys about it, since it was confidential. She needed someone to confide in about the stress of the job (as seen at the end of s1e6 Countrycide), and as seen throughout the series in Gwen’s mannerisms, playfulness, and affection, she’s very tactile, hence the physical aspect. But most importantly, it wasn’t emotional. Gwen was not looking for another love — even in her most brainless moments (which they all have), she couldn’t have believed that Owen wanted an emotional affair. Even from Day One, he says:

“I torture people in happy relationships.”

In Countrycide, he gives her this speech while they are inches from making out, about the incredible sex they would have together:

“Doesn't happen with him, does it? You're too familiar. Whereas you and me, we're not cozy at all. We'd be amazing. And that scares the shit out of you.”

Owen cared about sex, and being Owen and the carer he is (though he pretends not to be), allowed her to confide in him about the transition and stress of the job:

GWEN: “And I can't share [the things she sees in Torchwood] with anyone.” OWEN: “You can now.”

That was what Gwen was looking for. A confidante. The cheating was shitty, and the later action of telling Rhys and retconning him was shittier (imho, the writers REALLY fucked that one up, especially by never bringing it up again), but Gwen was not the only person doing shitty things. Owen knew she had a boyfriend. Even referenced him repeatedly in his efforts to seduce her. Canonically “tortures people in happy relationships”. The point of this particular ramble being this:

IF YOU HATE GWEN COOPER FOR CHEATING AND DO NOT HATE OWEN HARPER FOR BEING THE OTHER HALF OF IT, IT IS MISOGYNY. FULL STOP.

Full stop. No excuses. Owen did exactly as badly as Gwen did. They both fucked up. I adore Owen Harper with my whole soul, but you cannot excuse for him what you hate Gwen for. They did it together, knowingly. You cannot cherry pick who you bash for their grey morality.

And on to Jack.

My personal headcanons aside**, we have the same situation. Gwen was not the only one flirting. Gwen was not the only one with feelings. Take s2e1 Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, for example. That scene in the cells, when he finds out she’s engaged to Rhys? That was him trying to seduce her (romantically more than physically). That was his poorly timed and awful attempt at making something out of it (Gwen also reciprocated in this scene. I don’t deny that.) To quote The Four Aces: “love is a many-splendored thing.” It’s complicated and rough, and Gwen had genuine feelings for Jack at the same time as she did Rhys. It’s not good. It’s bad. It’s immoral. It’s not ideal. Jack Harkness also had real, genuine, and complicated feelings for Gwen, too.

**I need to make a side note that I am not a Gwack shipper. My personal headcanons have Gwen’s initial crush on him fading by s1e4 Cyberwoman. I don’t enjoy the forced Gwack storyline, and it was dragged on endlessly, and I really kind of hated it. But we’re going by show canon. So the Gwack flirtation is a thing.**

So the point of this one is the same as the one before:

IF YOU HATE GWEN COOPER FOR FLIRTING AND DO NOT HATE JACK HARKNESS FOR BEING THE OTHER HALF OF IT, IT IS MISOGYNY. FULL STOP.

Full stop. No excuses. Jack was a willing, informed, and understanding participant in their flirtationship, despite her current and longstanding relationship with Rhys.

I’ll make one more point and then end this — it’s beautifully put in this post by @blipintiime​​, aka 1/3 of my heart, but here is this: every single member of Torchwood is morally damnable. Ianto Jones hid a murderous Cyberwoman in Torchwood Three, using the team and Jack to get her there. Owen Harper began the series by essentially drugging a couple for sex. Suzie Costello - well. Suzie. Toshiko Sato invaded each team member’s personal space, their thoughts, their most private recesses of their mind, for days, and then brought her alien girlfriend into Torchwood. Jack Harkness lied repeatedly and continuously to his team, murdered Ianto and Tosh’s girlfriends, killed when he didn’t need to, used an arguably sentient alien as bait, and a whole plethora of other things we won’t get into.

Torchwood is flawed, and that’s the point of the show. Each member is flawed in their own way, and has something brilliant to contribute. Hating Gwen for being the same is arguably misogynistic and unfounded. She is far from perfect. But she is not the fandom’s or anyone’s scapegoat.

Thanks for reading, stop blaming Gwen for things you pardon others for, goodbye.

[himbowelsh]

Your writing is amazing! Could you please add David Webster to the valentines head canon list? 💝

valentines day alphabet  ( accepting! )

A   :   AFFECTION.   how does your muse show affection?

He leaves notes around the house. Sweet things, like ‘I’ll be thinking of you all day’ or ‘I wanted so badly to kiss you this morning’  ---  or even something simple as ‘Left you a smoothie in the fridge, love you’.  It’s a silly thing, and a few have gotten crumpled or swept into the trash before his partner noticed, but it’s just a way for them to know he’s thinking of them. He’s not very physically affectionate, and while he can (and has) professed his love a thousand different ways, words just don’t feel like enough. Notes are tangible, something to hold on to and tuck away to look over on a rainy day.

B   :   BOUQUET.   does your muse like flowers? which ones are their favourite?

Please, his family’s had a personal florist for ages. He might not know how to pick out flowers himself  ---  the best he can do is identify them, but he doesn’t know how to take care of them, or which flowers look good together   ---   but he can order up a gorgeous bouquet for any occasion.

C   :   CHOCOLATE.   does your muse like chocolate? which one is their favourite?

He doesn’t mind it. Milk chocolate only, please, and in small quantities, otherwise it makes him queasy. To be honest, he doesn’t trust himself with boxes of chocolate, so tries to avoid them.

D   :   DATE.   what is your muse’s ideal date? where / who with / etc?

Let’s go out sailing! Oh gosh, if a person hasn’t seen David sailing, they haven’t truly seen him. He’s in his element on the water. Never is his grin broader, his eyes brighter, his shirt looser...  he loves being out on the waves so much. Being out there with someone he loves sounds like heaven. God, he would love to show his partner the ropes  ---  literally  ---  to introduce them to his boat and teach them how to sail. If they handle themselves well on the waves, he’ll definitely fall a little in love.

E   :   EMBRACE.   does your muse like hugs? what are their hugs like?

Depends who the hug is comping from. Web can be picky. Sometimes Hoobler just grabs him and he stays there like a spike in the ground until he’s done  ---  David much prefers seeking out the hug first, at least initiating it. His hugs are gentle, not too intrusive, clearly meant to share comfort rather than offer anything. He’s fond of rubbing someone’s shoulders.

F   :   FLIRT.   is your muse good at flirting? how do they flirt?

David is well-spoken, handsome, and can be profoundly charming at the right moments. He’s probably better at flirting after a glass of champagne, but can usually handle himself. Of course, he’s not always great at reading the room, so some occasional blunders can’t be helped.

G   :   GIFT.   is your muse good at gift - giving or do they struggle to get it right?

It’s definitely a struggle, but David wants to get it right  ---  and he puts a lot of effort into it. While he’s not above just asking, to know point-blank what they want, then he has to get the best version of that thing possible. He’ll search for hours to find exactly the right gift...  and even if he ended up getting a hair straightener instead of curling iron, or a the wrong brand of toy, all that heart still shines through.

H   :   HEART.   is your muse quick or slow to give their heart away?

David is...  that really weird type of impulsive where he thinks everything through, until he doesn’t. Those impulsive moments are his greatest successes or greatest failures. He doesn’t mean to fall in love quickly, but the moment he realizes he’s in, he’s all in. His heart isn’t easily dissuaded.

I    :   I LOVE YOU.   does your muse find ‘i love you’ easy or hard to say?

Words are easy; these three particular words, not so much. He’s really got to fight his way to a place where he feels confident in saying them...  and even then, they’d stall on his tongue, because he’s really not sure his partner will say them back. No matter how fiercely he loves them, there’s always that little shred of uncertainty...  and to get past it, Web probably ends up blurting “I love you” at an unexpected time. It’s not how he planned on doing it at all, not half as romantic as it should be...  but once that wall’s been bulldozed through, and his partner says it back, suddenly it’s easy to say all the time.

J   :   JEALOUSY.   does your muse get jealous in a relationship?

Quite. He just...  doesn’t like seeing other people encroaching on the person he loves, and if he has to make that displeasure known, he will. David’s style is subtle and public. He’ll lace hands or pull his partner closer during a night out, occasionally pressing a kiss to their cheek  ---   just close enough to their neck to give a thrill, reminding them that they’re his, and he’s right here. He’s not really vocal about it, but his jealousy sends a message.

K   :   KISS.   is your muse a good kisser? why / why not?

David is… an inquisitive kisser. He likes to test his partner’s limits, exploring their mouth like a born scientist. He charts the groves of their lips with his own, memorized their taste, sucks gently just to gauge their reaction… and the more encouragement they give him, the more adventurous he’s willing to get. Needs to have his partner close, right against him while they’re kissing. If they get too into it, he’ll start grinding unconsciously; god forbid it gets pointed out, cause he’ll turn five shades of red at once.

L   :   LOVE.   who does your muse love?

Sharks, sharks, sharks sharks sharks  ---  EVERYBODY!    (No, okay, he’s the sort of pretentious to say “my first love will always be my craft” while glowering at a novel draft he hasn’t touched in three months, but...  he really does love his family, no matter how often he bickers with them. Web’s the sort of person who absolutely cherishes his friends, and takes them very deep into his heart. He loves whatever he’s passionate about, be they people, things, or ideas.)

M   :   MOONLIGHT.   is morning or night a more romantic setting?

He loves early morning; it’s the epitome of serene tranquility, the point of existence all humans should aspire to. The sun breaking over the horizon illuminates a person’s truest self. Too bad he’s a horrible morning person who resents dragging himself out of bed any time before 9am. If people are their truest selves at dawn, Webster’s a feral rat who just won a fight for the last pizza crust on the subway.

N   :   NAUGHTY.   what is your muse like in bed?

There’s a lot of hip action; David grinds without meaning to, rolling and writhing on instinct alone. It serves him well when he actually puts it to use, hands locked around his partner’s waist as they roll like a ship on high seas. No matter what, David needs to be holding his partner, anchoring himself — it lets him feel in-control, even in a situation where he’s utterly out of it. A very expressive lover — his facial expressions are obscene, holding nothing back — and a furiously intense kisser. During the act, he loves to be working at his partner’s neck, pressing deep kisses into the flesh there… because meeting their eyes overwhelms him too easily. Good luck getting him to keep quiet. He gasps and moans, sometimes going to the effort to muffle himself against the back of his own hand, but usually not bothering. At his peak, his entire body arches, muscles going tense, and he can never restrain a moan as he slowly comes down.

O   :   ODE.   does your muse have a way with words?

Absolutely  ---  though he thinks he’s a lot better at love poetry than he actually is. It’s a work in progress. David is an eloquent and spellbinding speaker, especially when his words come straight from the heart. He’s excellent at expressing what he feels.

P   :   PARTNER.   what does your muse look for in a partner? looks / personality?

He’s drawn to very vibrant people  ---  people who seem to light up a room when they walk in, people with a slight current of energy to them. Like any artist, David craves inspiration...  so he seeks out people who can provide him with it. Maybe someone who enjoys reading, who can carry on intellectual discussions with him  ---  but also someone who can debate and challenge him when he’s too set in his own ideas. Someone with an adventurous spirit. Someone who can play nicely around his parents, and looks great in formal wear. Caring about the environment is a must. Someone who...  will take an interest in the things he’s passionate about, but also has their own passions which they care about deeply.

Q   :   QUESTION.   would your muse ask the big question or expect their partner to?

The problem with David is that...  he thinks. Too much. Overthinker extraordinaire. He wants to consider all the possible alternatives before making a big life decision, which often leads to him not making that decision at all. Pretty much every big leap he takes is on impulse, and he handles the fallout later. He’s never expect his partner too, but, frankly, would be better off it they did. When he does drop the question, it’ll probably be impulsively, with some grand poetic declaration, and possibly a ring improvised with whatever’s onhand. He’s got a rich family, they’ll get a nice diamond later.

R   :   ROMANCE.   is your muse a romantic or a cynic?

He’s got a romantic soul, even if acknowledging it makes him feel like a fool. He knows better, after all. The world is not a kind place to those who leave their hearts open, inviting happiness like sweet deliverance when pain so often disguises itself as pleasure...  but he likes the idea of love. It would be nice. He wants to fall in love, he wants to be in love, and he wants to finally understand what so many writers are obsessed with. He wants the sort of love you fill books with.

S   :   SWEETHEART.   did your muse have a childhood sweetheart?

If you subscribe to the “kids only bully other kids because they like them” line of thinking...  sure. Lil’ David had  t o n s  of admirers.

T   :   TRUE LOVE.   does your muse believe in true love?

I reiterate: “He wants the sort of love you fill books with.” Maybe it doesn’t exist anywhere outside of fiction, and in the minds of some...  very questionable historical lovers  (Bonnie and Clyde, F Scott and Zelda, Percy and Mary Shelley)  but he’s open to being proven wrong.

U   :   UNREQUITED.   has your muse had their heart broken?

Everyday, by the unrelenting oppression of human cruelty. And the fact that sharks are nonironically viewed as monsters by the general public. And the fact that people don’t see knowledge as the bright light illuminating the path to the future? Or the fact that people don’t realize that if you don’t remember your history you’re doomed to repeat it? Or the fact that some people genuinely like pineapple on pizza  ----     He’s a sensitive boy.

V   :   VALENTINE.   how does your muse feel about valentine’s day?

It’s a capitalist scheme to sell a frightening amount of chocolate boxes and prey on the vulnerabilities of single people. He’s against it on principle. Couples can have romantic dates any day of the year, what’s so special about this one?  (Still, get him roses, he’ll be thrilled.)

W  :   WEDDING.   would your muse get married? why / why not?

He...  goes back and forth. It’s what his parents really want for him, which is almost enough reason for him to never want to...  but he’s got a sense of obligation, too, so maybe. But what if it’s a mistake? What if he doesn’t truly love the person? What if he thinks he loves them, but one day wakes up and realizes it was all an illusion? What if they fall out of love with him? What if ---

He wants to, deep down. Once he finds the right partner, all those anxieties will fade away. It’s really just the not knowing what to expect that worries him.

X   :   XOXO.   does your muse use / like pet names?

He’s not excessive about them   ----   “darling”  and  “sweetheart”  being his biggest offenses   ---   but also isn’t above literary allusions.  “You’re the Hermia to my Lysander” / “The Isolde to my Tristan” / “The Zelda to my F. Scott”, at which point he’s earned any eyerolls he gets.

Y   :   YOURS.   does your muse get protective easily?

Definitely. How willing he is to fight over it is directly proportional to how much alcohol is in his system, or how egregious the offense is   ---   some things will send him feral, alcohol or not. Like insulting his partner outright, or grabbing at them? Web doesn’t stand for that. While he’ll usually try to diffuse a situation just by taking his partner and ducking out, or maybe trying to talk it through, if he sees shit like that, he’ll snap. There’s a lot more fight in him than one would assume at first glance.

Z   :   ZZZ.   how many people has your muse slept with?

Well, he’s had a few girlfriends back in college, but nothing obscene. David really keeps to himself. He’s had maybe… two or three partners beforehand, so it’s not like he doesn’t know what he’s doing, but he doesn’t really know… all the ins-and-outs yet. (Make of that what you will.)

[ardenttheories]

On Princes and Knights

There is a significant connection, within the comic, between our canon Knights and Princes - certain parallels that intrinsically intertwine and affect both parties. As an in the works theory, and something I cooked up while wandering around the house, I’m tentatively suggesting that the best way to handle a Prince is to provide him with a Knight, and the best way to heal a Knight is to have him work on a Prince. 

In Homestuck, we see two significant Knight-Prince matchups; Dirk and Dave, and Karkat and Eridan. There is a lot more focus on Dirk and Dave, and thus we will start with them and focus primarily on their connections, but there is something to be said about the latter pair as well - predominantly “what if”s, but evidenced ones. 

It has always been of my opinion that Princes must be surrounded by people in order to grow. It is when they are isolated or alone - such as during the Epilogues, when Dirk actively isolates himself prior to losing his shit; or during Act 5, when Feferi not only dumps Eridan (who otherwise has no-one else he is close to), but refuses to be his friend - that their negative attributes come to the fore. These moments of isolation are all it takes for the Prince to fall into the trap of his Class, and lose himself to the destructive nature of it. 

When surrounded by people, it becomes easier for Princes to remember why they can’t blindly destroy. They can’t justify “a means to an end” when they can actively recognise that their efforts would seriously hurt the people they love. Consider Dirk’s development from the puppetmaster to an active team member; he openly talks about his friends, what he thinks (in a positive way) of them, and how good they are as people more and more throughout this transition. He wants to avoid destruction as much as possible for fear of the harm he’ll cause to them - of the harm he was causing when he wasn’t keeping himself in check. 

A Prince without this backup starts to lose his sense of connection. He might, to some degree, start to lose his sense of reality on a personal level; like we see in the Epilogues, after his isolation Dirk has no qualms of spearheading the narrative and driving it towards his own goals. He sees them as people he loves, yes, but they lose their humanity to him. He no longer worries about stepping over the boundaries, even to the degree of completely ruining Jake’s character for the sake of petty revenge, and tries to force Dave to kiss Karkat before he leaves. This is not the work of a man who recognises the people around him as real, living things.

However, I think there might be more to it than that. Princes need people around them to tether them down to reality and remind them what they hold back for, yes - but I think they might also need a Knight to hammer the point home. 

This is where we come to Dirk and Dave.

Dirk and Dave share Aspect themes. Dirk is the Alternate Universe self of Bro; this is a Time-related phenomenon as well as a Space-related one, and essentially makes Dirk a “younger” Bro - a Bro back in Time. Likewise, the connection of them being brothers (or, more aptly, father and son) provides the Heart-based connection between the two. While it certainly leans into the realm of literal Blood, the fact that Bro is, in essence, a splinter of Dirk, stands more prominent - as well as Dave’s more Heart-aligned disposition (how much more emotional he tends to be, how romance plays a significant part in his life/development).

This connection becomes more apparent when the two of them have their rooftop talk. When Dave talks to Dirk, it’s about what Bro did, and thus what he went through. This is a conversation that heals them both. 

Dirk’s constant struggle throughout Homestuck is the inevitability of his destructive nature. His splinters, what they say about him, his actions, whether or not he’s a good person, and how he can do good if he’s so obviously bad. Talking to Dave about Bro shows him exactly what the extent of his negative nature is; an abusive man bridled with Rage and toxic masculinity that is completely blind to the harm he causes for the benefits that wait at the end. He even admits that it’s refreshing to be presented all of his flaws so critically, and it gives him the chance to reflect on that in a healthy way.

It also provides Dirk with the opportunity to actively say “wow, that’s really fucking bad, and you never should have gone through that”. To admit that Alpha Dave was an inspiration to him, and that he’s glad he had that inspiration, but that there’s a disconnect from the people they were that is good for them. That they don’t need to be those people now, and it’s for the better. That he’s glad he was told all of this by Dave - someone he has a good relationship with, and who he connects to good things.  

This moment gives Dirk the worse-case scenario. It shows him what he could become without him actually becoming it - and it gives him the resolve to never, ever become what Bro became. It gives him the chance to work this through with someone he deeply cares about - someone who’s always played an important role in his life and upbringing - in a way that he admits lets him do it healthily, properly, without the self deprecation. 

In turn, it gives Dave a chance to work through everything he’s never truly spoken about to the person it most relates to. It’s his way of accusing Bro without actually accusing him; of facing his abuser without being in danger; of telling him it was fucked up and being validated for saying it. 

It also provides Dave with the confirmation that he doesn’t need to be some grand hero to be worth something. Alpha Dave was a hero, was grand, was cool - but the takeaway from that conversation is that Dave is just as good, if not better, than Alpha Dave to Dirk. That he’s real in a way Alpha Dave was not, and that, despite everything he’s been through, he’s come out the other side significantly stronger than anyone would have ever thought. That, to at least one version of Bro, he’s worth something more. 

This conversation is vital to their character arcs. It shows Dirk slipping into the role of the Realised Prince, and Dave into the role of the Realise Knight. 

I thus posit that every Prince must have an associative Knight, and that part of their growth is the acceptance of themselves through one another. 

It’s no coincidence that the Knight and Prince happen to be in the perfect position to help one another, imbued with the Aspect of the other. Dirk is exactly what Dave needs to heal as a person, and Dave is exactly what Dirk needs to reject his future potential. Had this conversation not taken place, with them in these exact circumstances - and with them holding such specific Classpects - Dave may never have gotten closure, and Dirk may not have become so self-aware. After all, it’s their specific connection as alternate universe brothers and Dave’s specific Heart-based struggles that make this work so well.  

Knights face trials and tribulations at the hands of highly destructive forces - forces that their Princes represent. Knights also have a duty to Protect their Aspect - which influences the Prince significantly. 

What we see here, then, is a Knight standing up against the representative of the thing that caused him to pull up his facade, and a Prince being protected from the concept he struggles with most. 

This intrinsic connection is deeply important. If we assume that Knights and Princes are made to reflect one another, then a Prince will almost always represent that which the Knight fears most, and the Knight will represent everything the Prince needs to accept. 

(Again, using Dirk and Dave, that means their Classpects and situations were specifically engineered by SBURB to ensure that Dirk, as a Prince of Heart, held the potential to be the destructive force that Bro was in order for Dave to safely stand up against the memory of Bro, and that Dave, as a Knight of Time, was able to show Dirk that his various selves are not predictions of the future)

This is thus where we turn to Karkat and Eridan. 

Eridan is a representative to everything that Karkat is fearful of, and has suffered because of; blood, the hemospectrum, and specifically, murderous highbloods in positions of power (especially those that are steadfastly against progression). 

In return, Karkat within the comic acts as a last Hope to Eridan. Their interactions, though brief, often come down to the same thing; Karkat helps Eridan feel Hope in the ways that everyone else neglects, and remains a single, strong bond post-Feferi that even he refuses to destroy (Karkat is, after all, the only troll that Eridan doesn’t kill during his “rampage”, despite him being frozen in fear the entire time).

Karkat is exactly what Eridan needed to be a better troll. Eridan suffered a severe disconnect between his true self and his outer self, and while that chimes true with Heart, a lot of the reason behind his disconnect was because of his inability to Bond with people. 

His Hope had previously been destroyed by his friends laughing at his Belief, and he never truly recovered from it to form the sorts of Bonds he needed to become a Realised Prince. Arguably, he may never have had those Bonds to begin with - and instead of trying to form Bonds that could become useful to him and his understanding of the real world, he isolated himself among his theatrics and Historical dramas in an attempt to become something he thought would command respect. 

Standing as a facsimile of the old ways of Alternia, Eridan would have been safe for Karkat to stand up against in order to fully transition into his Realised state. Likewise, being both a lowblood and a mutant, Karkat would have been in a perfect position to challenge Eridan’s views and help him regain his Hope - as well as more than capable of teaching Eridan how to form new Bonds.

Part of the reason this never comes into fruition is the Failed nature of their session. None of them except for Vriska manage to attain God Tier, and they don’t fully grow by the time they initially finish the game. There was simply no chance for them to viably reach this point, as much of this growth occurs within the Meteor; either Eridan would have had to live much longer than he did, or this development would have had to happen within their session - and thus, the session would have had to have lasted longer. Or maybe Hussie should have just focused on it in more detail.  

Much like Dave and Dirk, Eridan and Karkat likewise share Aspect themes. Hope is as prevalent in Karkat as Blood is within Eridan. The things they represent perfectly reflect one another - and may actually be why, when I first read the comic, I thought they were going to become moirails. This Prince/Knight combination has a natural coexistence that seems akin to moirailegence, and may even be engineered this way by SBURB to ensure that there is some way for a Knight to stand up and a Prince to step down that is beneficial (and healthy) for both, as well as natural (as in, not forced by a Sylph). 

And, on a lesser note, since this came to mind: Latula, as a Knight of Mind, would have been the perfect foil to Kurloz as a Prince of Rage. Someone who is specifically brainwashed alongside someone whose Classpect focuses entirely on the protection of the Mind? Had more come out of them, I can definitely imagine Latula being able to help Kurloz slip away from that harmful mindset (and his assistance to Lord English), while Kurloz would provide her with the Rage-based determination to reveal her true self. 

In essence, since this came out weirdly wordy and pretentious,

Our canon Knights and Princes have an odd Aspect connection that makes them perfect for helping one another. Their circumstances reflect perfectly what the other needs to grow - the force that the Knight struggles against, and the concept the Prince needs to understand/accept - in a safe and healthy way. Their connection is likely facilitated by SBURB, and specific Knight/Prince Classpects are likely assigned in such a way that a Knight and a Prince will always be able to help one another. 

Whether or not they do, or are able to, help one another is entirely up to the session itself, but nonetheless it seems always present as an option. 

[squidproquoclarice]

I'm the anon you replied to about Ch XIII - ok, now I get it and thanks for taking the time to explain. It's obvious now and I think it was always obvious to most people. I just saw what was to me inexplicably low chapter number and panicked. Sorry! Anyway if you care to elaborate on this:"Honestly, the more I look, the more flaws I see. Some very weakly written chars." I'd appreciate it. Replaying the game, I am noticing so much more than the first time.

Hi again, friend!  Nah, I get how it’s confusing, and even the chapter vs Chapter may not be easily straightforward.  We’re just gonna blame R* for using “Chapter” on this.  ;)The thing is, when you start looking hard at any media you love, you’re going to start seeing some of the seams and thin spots.  Me maybe more so than most given how long-term and extensive and canon-adjacent (if I can use that term?) a project Sunrise is--I’ve spent a year now looking pretty damn hard at the game.  No matter how masterful a piece of media is, there are going to be spots that don’t hold up well under scrutiny, and a huge project like RDR2 is definitely going to be prone to that due to so incredibly many moving parts.That is to say, this is not be going “The game is shiiiiiiiiit”.  I love the game, but there are flaws I see now that I didn’t before.  It doesn’t take away my enjoyment, but it does make me rethink some things of how to handle writing this sequel/alternate ending thing.I just did a bit more of an Arthur’s death-based endgame critique again in one of my posts over the weekend, so I’m not going to reiterate that, but I do think it’s not a terrible ending, but it’s almost exclusively RDR1 driven, and not the ending it could have and should have been for a rather magnificent and still progressing char arc.I also critiqued what I felt was a mismatch between deeply thoughtful storytelling and forced endgame regardless of char actions, and the repeated endless murdersprees of the late chapters.  For example, I’ve had to scale back death numbers some in Sunrise when I refer to those events, because hundreds of people couldn’t have been killed, and also having Arthur and Sadie deal with the incongruity of continued massacres while also trying to do some pure and selfless things.  I honestly consider the Epilogue kind of a narrative hot mess after the tour de force that was Chapter 6 and feel like it plays a lot more logically if you imagine Arthur as the PC rather than John, but that’s a whole ‘nother long meta.Charwise, since you asked specifically, balancing that huge a cast means some chars get short shrift.  I’ve remarked before that Molly gets nothing in-game, but in a way, that marginalization fits her tragic plot arc, and Molly still makes for a haunting figure.

My biggest beef is with chars I feel are largely stereotypes to begin, and then don’t really have any char arc besides.  Swanson as the dissolute feeble clergyman is a stereotype, sure, but after Hosea dies and the flock needs a new shepherd, he steps up in a big way to become the man he wants to be.The ones that probably frustrate me most are Mary-Beth and Charles, because I feel like they deserve more.  Mary-Beth wouldn’t feel out of place at all written as an ordinary farm or city girl of the era, but her pie-in-the-sky romanticism and naivete feels out of place for a young woman who was supposedly orphaned and living on the streets, forced to become a pickpocket to survive, and generally was out of options enough to fall in with the Van Der Lindes as an outcast.   She just feels very sheltered, I guess, for me to buy her supposed backstory and place in this gang, and it’s like the devs decided they needed the “sunny good girl” to balance off the other women and forced that on her.  Then she has no real development.  She’s a dreamy, romantic writer in 1907 just like she is in 1899--the only thing that’s changed is she’s successful and published.  For Charles, I’ve critiqued how bizarre his Epilogue experience is and how forced it seems (and all the things he magically heard about in detail in Canada is nothing short of remarkable).  He’s a biracial man who’s oddly seen only as Native--his black heritage is totally ignored by everyone, even in the epithets he’s insulted with.  He comes across as a “stoic Indian” stereotype, which is really shitty given he could have, and should have, been a fantastic char with a lot of potential for numerous directions of development in a char arc.  Instead he’s more of a stereotypical plot device there to assist Arthur and then John, and that’s really, really disappointing.So yeah, stuff like that.  It’s not game-ruining by any means, but it’s just bringing different eyes to the thing, and does make you think about things a bit more, that’s all.  I’m sure I’ve made my own share of mistakes and pitfalls in Sunrise, so it’s hardly like I can claim any kind of high ground here.  ;)

[ghostmartyr]

Historia’s Position as a Queer Character

This is... not a post I thought I was going to write. This is also not the introduction it had when I first started typing, adding to my hesitance.

There’s a lot of bitterness to it I couldn’t remove while keeping the honesty I felt I needed. Also personal Feelings that, obviously, no one has time for (politeness really was attempted).

However, I wanted to talk about how Historia Reiss’ queerness should have an impact on how her portion of the story is being received. In doing that, I walk through a lot of personal frustrations that I do understand are personal, not universal, to get to some concerns with the story that I feel should be more widespread than they are.

...Y-yay?

On a strictly personal level, the progression of the Attack on Titan fandom has sucked for me. Which is entirely my problem, don’t get me wrong. Sometimes the way you like a thing is not the popular way to like a thing, and you’re just out of luck.

I got into it because two girls were in love.

...Yeah, that’s already a tell that it’s not going to be a pleasure cruise.

The girl I cared about wasn’t the more popular half of the ship, but they were acknowledged and loved (except for the every other week commentary about how the relationship was abusive or one-sided or [insert invalid complaint here]), and even recognized as an essential part of the story.

Several years later, everyone in that fandom is too angry to really be invested in the series at large. Everyone so pissed that half the gay ship is said to have been killed off-screen that if they are still involved in the fandom, it’s a bitter edge that keeps coming back.

While the half of the ship I love that I care about, the pretty blonde one, is in the center of pregnancy drama.

Again, this is a personal relationship with a fandom I have said, repeatedly, that I hate. Because I am a dramatic brat about some things. But I’ve come to notice, over and over again, how when someone nowadays shows interest in Historia, I immediately want to run away. I avoid everyone, of course, but there’s a special urgency when I see people expressing perfectly normal, honest interest in her character.

Because at this point, my association with the fandom’s image of Historia is that if you still care, you don’t care that her only canon love interest is female.

Is that fair? Proooobably not. Do I care? I probably should, and should probably do better, but my relationship with fandom at this point is destroyed beyond recovery for personal reasons of being emotionally irresponsible. This is just about me and my sad feelings. Followed by things that actually matter.

The thing that began my love for this character is a thing that I haven’t felt defines her fandom in years. Even when Ymir fans weren’t furious and gone, Historia was the tagalong member of the ship (every ship has this problem; one is always getting top billing over the other, and Ymir’s a butchy bad girl, so... you know).

What continues to frustrate me is that Historia is queer.

Canonically.

Her love interest is a girl.

Ship what you want.

I will continue to say that, and I will continue to mean that.

But certain things canon has done, and fandom’s reaction to those things, have been somewhat alienating for someone who really wants to enjoy her queerness.

Let me put, as plainly as I can, my complete frustration with this.

A canonically queer female character

in the aftermath of her female love interest being fed to Nazi analogues off-screen

is convinced to procreate with a man for the good of her people’s future.

Now I’ll take a breath for a second.

Because of how flagrantly offensive and infuriating I find all of the above, and because the author of this work in general has treated his characters’ internal characterization well, I do not often bring up how fucking fucked it is for this story to perhaps be going this route. I bring up how that numbered list doesn’t have to go through steps 2 and 3. I choose to have trust, and optimism, and not spend every single day I write about this manga on fury.

What that has come to mean is that I’m not spending a lot of time discussing how completely fucked up this is.

I will talk about how I think the writing going this route is badly set up. I will talk about how the perspectives of this route are in the wrong place. I will talk about how that suggests to me that things aren’t as bad as they seem.

Here’s the thing, though.

Here’s the thing that made me retreat to my cave.

As presented, it is bad.

I personally believe it’s a red herring in many respects. I believe the story is lying to us, because I believe there are holes in the writing the support it being intentionally misleading. I believe that the story has more going on than it’s willing to tell us at the moment.

That isn’t a popular fandom theory.

One popular theory is that the male protagonist impregnated our breathing, canonically queer character.

This will get sighs and eye-rolls from some people, impassioned theorizing from others, shrugs and we’ll sees from further others--but as someone who has done everything I possibly can to steer clear of anyone talking about this series besides myself, it’s still one I’ve seen.

So here. Let’s redo the list.

A canonically queer female character

after her female love interest is fed to Nazi analogues off-screen

pursues a sexual relationship with the male main character off-screen.

Writing, writing, writing. Hell, it feels like all I’ve done for the past year has involved shouting over my mental screams about writing.

That’s not the part of this series that gets me, though. And I don’t think that’s the part that turned a fandom space I used to love into one that’s at its most vocal when it’s dissing another ship instead of throwing praise on ours.

I can be a relatively neutral audience member. I can be someone who wants to be told a good story. I can be that, and only that, and let the repressed emotions of everything else eat away at me. I don’t want to let the emotional side show on the internet, because that’s only going to be used to eat me alive. I don’t want to get into the heart of what really pisses everyone who cares about this off.

I don’t want to talk about this stuff.

This stuff I keep putting numbers in front of like it will protect me from all the angry messages this is going to get.

I have not, and still don’t, have the nerve required to look at the vast space this fandom still covers, point to Historia’s arc, and say that any critical discussion of what’s happening to her that doesn’t bring up her queerness is fundamentally failing to appreciate the magnitude of wrongness in her arc.

I am not a person who knows how to stand my ground on that.

I believe too much in people taking from fiction different things, and absorbing it different ways. I’m too insecure to ever strongly believe that my way of looking at things could ever be the Right way.

So I outside of a few barbed posts, I’ve kept my mouth shut on the social ramifications of this arc. What’s the point? What’s the point in getting a bunch of angry posts and people yelling at me? What’s the point in inviting that into my life?

What is the point of getting into this?

Everyone in this fandom is familiar with the many popular posts from outside the fandom that paint our series as Nazi propaganda. They are familiar with the concern the Korean fandom has about certain language. They are familiar with the concern the Jewish members of the fandom have about how certain things are being handled.

They are familiar with the concept that certain things touch the real world, and they should be handled with care.

Unless it has to do with queer people.

We can understand wars between countries leaving certain topics taboo. We can understand using the shorthand of an atrocity everyone recognizes might step on people’s toes.

We might not agree with the intensity of the feelings the manga’s content generates, but in general, we get it. The world is a big place, and these are big topics, and big topics are going to have in them a lot of hurt that is more personal than perhaps the story intends.

War and genocide are not easy things to bring up in any medium.

Stories do them, though. This story is doing that. Not delicately, in some regards, but it is endeavoring to have a discussion of all this horror in its plot.

Now here’s the one piece that I, personally, have needed to be acknowledged.

Historia Reiss is of royal blood.

As a story figure, many people took it for granted that she would one day be forced to bear an heir. That’s just what royals do, personal taste aside.

That’s a whole... separate thing I don’t want to get into, but that was always the casually accepted idea. The kinkmeme probably had multiple prompts for just that floating around. We’re fandom. It’s what we do.

But here we go.

Historia is queer.

A queer female character is coerced into having a child for the future of her people.

I don’t care where under the queer umbrella you headcanon her. It doesn’t much matter. Queer is queer is fucking queer.

In every gayngsty story you’ve ever read, probably, the idea of children has come up. The idea of being normal, having a normal family, procreating. Gay men marrying women and having children isn’t a strange story even a little. It’s even encouraged; if you can hide who you are well enough, you can still fit into society.

Societal obligation forcing you into a relationship you do not personally want is a story that resonates very deeply with queer experiences.

A canonically queer character is being put through this storyline.

It is a queer storyline.

Maybe the narrative won’t be woke enough to notice that. I don’t know. Many things are up in the air surrounding this particular piece of the plot.

Historia is a queer character, and given the larger view of her plot by the general fandom, she is a queer character who has been coerced into pregnancy. That is the story most of the fandom is interacting with.

Being critical of problematic material means something different than it used to. Tumblr has made everyone rather twitchy about how harsh to be about media. You don’t want to agree with the people losing their temper at every little thing, so you chill out and maybe let things slide and maybe just focus on the things you can speak good words about.

I’ve personally done a lot of twitchy, ranty posts about the topic that mostly end with me saying that I’m done with the manga emotionally if it’s doing this, and etc.

But here is a plot thread that I think it’s very worthy to be critical of.

If Eren being the father is considered a legitimate theory, the writer creating a story where the only breathing female queer character fucks the main male character after her female love interest dies off-screen is a legitimate thing to criticize.

Being less specifically mean about that, let’s just roll back to the initial thing.

Queer female character’s love interest commits suicide and gives the Nazi analogues a new weapon. In the aftermath, breathing queer female character is coerced into bearing a child.

Forget what I think about writing quality.

As a queer member of the audience, I get to be pissed.

It is an enraging storyline as it’s provided.

Even if you drop the coercion, we get to talk about how of two queer female characters, it’s the one who makes good breeding stock that gets to survive and prove it. Which is another queer tale as old as time: you only get to live if you can go back to fucking guys.

I always talk about the writing.

Most posts I’ve accidentally seen talking about this in the past year have been about the writing. The story. How different the many shades of tragic shine. Everyone wants to talk about the story. This is escapism, not reality.

Then shreds of reality make their way through to decorate the background.

The big ones get mentioned.

The one where a queer girl is made to get pregnant for the good of society continuing the way it always has been?

As far as I know, the only people angry about that have been too angry to say it.

And it’s frustrating.

I don’t care if you want Historia to be bi or pan or some queer identity that leaves room for her to enjoy a relationship with a man. She is still queer, and being personally amenable to multiple sexes of partners doesn’t change the fact that society is constantly pushing for the straight option. That loss of choice because society doesn’t want to hear about the parts of you that don’t fit its idea of normal is a universal queer experience.

This part of the story has writing problems.

It is also a queer story, worth being considered through a queer lens.

I would like the manga to realize that. I hope it does.

What killed me after 107 came out was that the parts of fandom I saw didn’t.

So then, you know. I stopped talking to everyone and locked myself as deep within my corner as I could, never to step out and even try to explain myself. Because that would make it all better.

Okay. One last thing before I go.

The last time I brushed close to this, I got some responses I couldn’t deal with. I’m fragile. I can’t deal with most things. I’m aware that people hated me before I made this post, and more will hate me after. Because internet.

There’s a decent chance I might ignore responses to this. Too much of it has been boiling away in my head to have a graceful release valve, and there’s honestly a limit to how much I trust myself with things I believe should be handled with care. This was my best attempt at making myself heard on this point. I’m sure it falls short. In the future, I might be able to do better.

But even though, yes, internet, I still want to say that this isn’t written with the intent of winning any arguments. Just with the intent of making a pain I don’t think has been well represented in this fandom a little more heard.

Though I’m sure it’s not perfect (and likely unfairly bitter and paranoid in places), I hope it managed a piece of that.

[classpect-musings]

Mage of Heart? Thanks!

Classpect Analysis - Mage of Heart (Meulin Leijon)

Active or Passive: Active

What they do: Mages understand their aspect, often by suffering through it. Heart is the aspect of self (the soul), personality, bias, emotion, standing out, and passion.

Passive equivalent: Seer of Heart

Inverse: Heir of Mind

Seers tend to learn about their aspect through second-hand accounts and in symbolic ways. Mages, on the other hand, directly learn from (and suffer from) their aspect. That way, when worst comes to worst, they can jump in and say, “I know all about this, let me handle it!” whereas a Seer would advise their teammates on the situation.

A Mage of Heart could suffer from Heart in a variety of ways. This is honestly a kind of tragic title since Heart often represents the self. So this Mage would likely get some backlash as a result of their personality or uniqueness. They stand out in some way instead of blending in; this might make them a target for bullying. Because they suffer from themself, essentially, they might be extremely self-deprecating and make jokes about themself a lot. On the flip side, they might be completely narcissistic and absorbed in only their own feelings, completely consumed by themself. There is also the matter of ‘splinters’ when it comes to Heart players; maybe this Mage gets attacked by their own splinters, like if they made a robot of themself and it attacked/annoyed them (cough, cough– Dirk), or maybe they have an alternate passion for roleplay or cosplaying and get attacked by others for it.

Heart is also the aspect of passion and feelings. The Mage of Heart is likely outspoken about their personal biases and has suffered as a result. They care about a lot of things and people, maybe too many, and it affects them in an unhealthy way. They are a person who feels deeply and allows their emotions to guide their decisions. Heart can represent impulse (as opposed to Mind and planning), so their emotion-based decisions combined with a lack of forethought will make for someone who isn’t the best at planning anything out, at all. The turbulent emotions this Mage has might also manifest in the form of extreme mood swings that leave them cheerful one moment and mournful the next. Consequently, they could be the type to fly off the handle in a passionate rant or just straight up sob whenever certain things happen.

Another thing Heart can represent is romantic feelings and pursuits. This Mage is definitely out of luck when it comes to love…ouch. They might be a hopeless flirt who gets turned down every time. On the flip side, maybe they’ve only experienced one or two romantic relationships, but they have ended in disaster and a lot of gut-wrenching emotions for the Mage. It’s likely that these relationships were abusive and emotionally manipulative. The Mage of Heart is pretty likely to get manipulated in general by people who play on their sympathies.

One last note: We’ve seen our two canon Mages lose a sense (Sollux, seeing; Meulin, hearing) at the hands of someone else, though it loops back to their aspect in some way. Just because this is a Mage of Heart we’re talking about doesn’t mean they have to lose their hearing like Meulin did, but keep in mind that they’re likely to lose one of their senses in general.

As the Mage of Heart progresses, they learn from their experiences with their aspect and apply it to their life as well as the lives of others. They learn their own identity through and through and can therefore help their teammates discover their true selves and feelings as a result. In order to reach this sense of satisfaction with their identity and emotions, this Mage will probably need to do a lot of introspection. They’ll also learn from their mistakes with romantic endeavors and learn what defines a healthy relationship, which will make this Mage an expert shipper. Another concept this Mage must learn about is impulse and how they cannot always allow it to drive them, but it can be very useful, as well as passion. And finally, they’ll understand bias in individuals and what makes them partial to certain things.

For a land for the Mage of Heart, I suggest the Land of Hats and Cacti (or Cactuses, whatever you prefer). LOHAC is a desert world made up of pink sand and giant cacti. The consorts each tend to their own grove of cacti and care for them in a unique way, resulting in cacti that all look very unique. However, the consorts are all afraid that the other consorts will judge them and their creations, so they all wear large cowboy hats in order to hide their identities. The Mage of Heart must learn about the consorts’ emotions, biases in the way they tend to their cacti, and true identities. In the process, this Mage will learn to understand themself and their emotions and bias. Only then will they be able to help all the consorts take off their hats and feel comfortable with their true selves.

The Mage is an active class; however, it is one of the knowledge/understanding classes (besides Seers) so it’s likely they won’t have powerful offense abilities once they ascend. However, this does not make their role any less important! They’re a mediator in the group capable of empathizing with anyone and using their compassion to help. They are also great at getting pairings together, ending any awkward romantic tension the session has almost instantly. On top of that, they’d be able to see someone’s true identity and biases as well as how they feel. This would be very helpful when it comes to players who bottle up their emotions (Knights and sometimes Rogues) as well as chaotic players who, when they have their emotions all over the place, will probably do some serious damage to the session (Princes and Thieves, sometimes Witches and Bards). So basically, they keep all their teammates in check to make sure nothing is going completely haywire, emotionally speaking (whether it’s relationships, emotions, or impulses). They also understand their teammates’ biases and therefore will be able to help determine what any of the players might do based on their own preferences.

Seeing true selves will also help the Mage to discern whether or not there are any traitors in the session with harmful intentions. This Mage additionally knows themself through and through, so they know what they are (and aren’t) capable of, which would really help keep their impulsiveness in check. They express themself in a unique way, unashamed to be themself.

As far as cool offense powers go, they might be able to astral project. This could be used for obtaining information from the ~spirit world~ or their unconscious self, but in the spirit realm they’re also able to kick some ass. I also think that they might have some abilities similar to the Monk class from D&D– they can use their own soul power in order to bolster their attacks. (Though this should be used sparingly, as the utilization/weaponization of Heart goes more into the territory of Page and Knight powers.)

As for a weapon, Mages’ weapons have been pretty varied (psiionics and throwing stars, maybe claws for Meulin?) whereas Heart players tend to use sharp handheld weapons (claws, katana). So the Mage of Heart’s strife specibus is pretty open for interpretation, but it’s probably something relating to Heart and/or unique to them in general. It could be something relating to their hobbies, but with some sharp spikes/edges; for example, a Mage of Heart interested in baseball would have a bat with a bunch of wicked spikes on it.

Thanks for the request! I hope you found this helpful.