#I kind just used the first season dynamic as reference

[timefospookies]

so. fnaf x bsd anyone?

“A reopened case, huh?”

As Dazai spun around on his chair, scanning the pictures in his hand, Atsushi glanced at the files laid before him.

“And so far out of town!”

“The woman who hired us paid a very hefty amount of money for us to go take a look,” Kunikida stated as he flipped through his own documents. “It’s a missing persons case, from over a decade ago. Children. The victims were presumed dead, though their bodies were never found.”

“And neither was their killer, I take it?”

Kunikida nodded grimly as Dazai puffed out a sigh. The poet offered the documents to his partner and he took it gingerly.

“It’ll be our job to find out who did it, then” the bandaged man said.

“This is terrible,” Atsushi muttered, horrified.

“Tell me about it,”

Dazai tapped on the table as he half heartedly read through each paper, expressionless. His protégé, on the other hand, looked visibly disturbed, and could feel the sweat soaking through his dress shirt. He shakily reached for a glass of water on his desk to swallow down his dread. Suddenly, with an exaggerated groan, Dazai hopped off his seat and whined as he stretched.

“Well, I suppose we should pack and get going then!” 

“Right,” said the poet, as he absentmindedly scratched his lip, “Pack for about a week or so, and we’ll meet at the station tomorrow morning. Be sure to do your research,”

Then he added, much more sourly,

“That means you, Dazai.”

The bandaged man perked up, eyes wide in indignation.

“Huhh? Homework?” he protested, “You’re not a teacher anymore, you know!”

“Shut it!” Kunikida said through gritted teeth, stiffer than usual, "This case is particular because it hasn’t been touched for years. So be sure to prepare properly if you plan to be of use, damn it!”

Dazai pouted but seized to press the matter further, opting to pick up the files on Atsushi’s desk instead. He tapped on the young man’s head with the folder, snapping him out of his absentminded spiral.

“Hey, Atsushi, you free? We could study together,” the man grinned.

“Ah! Yes, of course…”

And so, while Kunikida dedicated himself to his own independent research, Atsushi stumbled after Dazai as they headed down to Uzumaki Café. ---

“Keep an eye out for when we exit the plane,” Kunikida said, “Our client should be waiting to take us to the scene.”

The other two men nodded. Their client, Atsushi recalled, was Kira Breed-Wrisley, an American immigrant who came to settle in Japan with her daughter, Charlotte.

“What a curious choice,” Dazai muttered, back at the café.

Atsushi glanced up from the documents they’d gathered and cocked his head in confusion.

“What do you mean?” 

“Oh, Atsushi, you sweet oblivious soul,”

The boy arched an eyebrow almost involuntarily.

“Think,” his mentor cooed, leaning in, “why would she decide to move all the way from the US to Japan, of all places? Business women weren’t a very welcome sight here back in the 80s, you know? Hell, they still aren’t now… but Dr. Yosano can tell you all about that feminist stuff,”

“S-Sure,”

That’s right. The scene they were sent to investigate…it had been a restaurant co-owned by Breed-Wrisley herself. A family pizza place with friendly animal mascots that wowed the public with their fun-inviting nature. Well, that and the fact that their entertainers were highly complex robots, for the time anyway. 

Atsushi took a second to arrange his thoughts.

“Well, Japan has been known to be very technologically advanced in the past…” he mused, “So, maybe Mrs. Breed-Wrisley moved here so she could create better robots with the best materials available?”

Dazai hummed, satisfied. He plopped back down on his seat.

“Very good,” he said.

From what they found, though, she hadn’t originally intended for her creations to be made for a restaurant.

Dazai read off a news article,

“Upon being interviewed, Mr. Cawthon claimed he ‘saw great genius and value in her work’ and ‘suggested it must be brought to light, so after tossing around some ideas, [they] decided on a family diner’.”

He slid the paper towards Atsushi.

“How charming!” he said, “Englishmen, am I right?”

William Cawthon, also an immigrant, was in charge of the finances of the business, while Breed-Wrisley focused more on the entertainment and management. He was a rather plain man, and single father of two boys. He also has been missing for the last 16 years or so. 

When the three detectives got off the plane their search for their client began. Kunikida tried to reach her with his phone, but didn’t have much luck with the connection. Dazai, on the other hand, would run off every chance he got to snoop around the airport stores, leaving Atsushi in charge of both his and his mentor’s luggage. And babysitting duty. 

“Mr. Dazai, please could we move along? I’ve already lost sight of Mr. Kunikida,” he urged.

He tried to grab hold of the man’s arm, but he was slippery with his movements. 

“Atsushi, look! A survival handbook! Do you think if I reverse engineer it, I could find some new method-”

“Dazai!”

Upon hearing that call, Atsushi wearily looked over his shoulder at Kunikida, who approached them at a dangerously rapid speed. The man zipped past him and gripped his partner’s shoulder with little trouble, shaking the book out of his hands.

“You idiot, what the hell is your problem?!” he yelled, “You can’t go running off! Need I remind you that we’re on a serious case?!”

“Ah, Kunikida, I was planning on buying that…” 

“Enough! We don’t have time to slack off! Now get your luggage and act like a grown-up for once!”

“Having a child-like spirit is quite good for you, you know?” Dazai announced, “If you don’t allow yourself to relax every once in a while, you’ll get chronic conditions at an early age,”

Kunikida twitched with sudden interest, taken aback.

“S-Seriously?”

Dazai nodded slowly and wisely as he gestured at the man’s pocket. 

Oh boy…, Atsushi thought as Kunikida reached for his notebook and began to write it down. Dazai watched over his shoulder with a smirk, when the realization hit his partner.

“W-Wait, why you!”

A swift and hard hit to the head left the bandaged man writhing in pain on the floor.

“Agh! What was that for?! I wasn’t lying!” “You can’t fool me, you little-”

As their squabbling went on, Atsushi felt uncomfortably aware of the amount of people staring at them and began to fear their client might be somewhere in that crowd. He looked at his watch and began to squirm. Had they agreed on a meeting time? Or place? Kunikida didn’t mention either. Could he have forgotten? Could the client have forgotten?

“Um, hey…you guys?” he stammered.

“What?!” Kunikida snapped, holding Dazai limp under his chokehold.

Atsushi swallowed hard as he gingerly pointed over his shoulder. 

“Sh-Shouldn’t we, y…y’know,”

The poet didn’t have time to answer as his phone began to ring. He was immediately on his feet as he tossed Dazai to the side, now completely composed and focused on the call.

“Mrs. Breed-Wrisley,” he said. “Yes, we have arrived. I apologize for not contacting you earlier, we haven’t been able to reach you. Yes. Of course. We’ll be right there, please excuse us.”

As he snapped his phone shut, he looked Atsushi in the eye.

“Let’s go,” ---

“Again, I am so sorry for not planning this out earlier. I’m…not very good with organization,”

They found themselves at the airport café sitting before their client. 

“It’s not a problem, madam,” Kunikida assured her, “We’re here now,”

So this was Kira Breed-Wrisley, the genius robotics engineer. With how much Kunikida insisted they be on guard around her, the woman who sat before them wasn’t at all like what Atsushi had expected. She was so small she looked almost ill, and though she must’ve only been in her early 50s, her braided hair had nearly completely grayed. It was hard to hear her over the airport chatter because of how softly she spoke- each sentence she uttered was accompanied by gentle gestures of her bruised, scraped hands (Atsushi wondered how they'd gotten to that state). He knew it had been years, so of course her physical state wasn’t going to mirror her past actions, but still, if he didn’t already know about it, Atsushi could’ve never guessed she’d just been released from a fifteen year aggravated assault sentence. The only traces he could see in her that could’ve hinted at it was that though she smiled and chuckled during their polite chatter, behind her glasses sat a pair of dull, dark eyes- devoid of light, like they’d seen too much.  

“I can’t thank you enough for coming all the way out here,” she said quietly, “I apologize in advance for every inconvenience.”

“Please, you’re doing us a favor,” Dazai cooed, “It’s always nice to visit new places! So much to see and learn…surely you know a few places?”

He flashed a charming smile and Kunikida eyed his partner as a warning. No flirting with the clients. Or else. Dazai sighed off the telepathic threat and sat back on his chair.

“Harikēn isn’t too eventful I’m afraid,” she replied, “But I do hope you enjoy your stay. The housing offer still stands, if you ever wish to change your mind,”

Kunikida stopped her with a wave of his hand.

“We appreciate the offer, but we wouldn’t want to burden you,”

“You’re too kind,” she whispered with a bow of her head.

She sat up straight and observed the three for a moment. Was she analyzing them? Her eyes seemed so sad.

“I realize I haven’t formally introduced myself to your partners,” she said suddenly, “Though you probably already know all about me. Either way, it’s a pleasure to finally meet you in person,”

Atsushi chimed in with a start.

“Right! I’m Atsushi Nakajima. Nice to meet you!”

“Osamu Dazai, at your service,”

“Mr. Nakajima, Mr. Dazai,” she repeated, “Thank you both. Shall we go?”

“Right,” 

---

They followed the small woman to her equally small car and on the ride to the location, she gave them a little run down of the case (though they wouldn’t dare interrupt her to remind her that they already knew all the details). 

“It was over the span of two weeks,” she recalled, her voice nearly a whisper, “I remember it so clearly…when the news of the first child going missing broke. How the restaurant slowly emptied out...how all those parents cried after the search was called off,”

She shook her head, trying to avoid reliving it all again.

“I never thought...” her grip on the wheel tightened, “No- I never wanted for things to turn out this way. I can’t… I just can’t let this case go until those children are brought to justice.”

Then she let out a grim, loathing sort of snort.

“I’m partly responsible for their misfortune, afterall.”

Kunikida was silent. He sat so tense in his seat that Atsushi could feel that pressure on his own limbs, and Dazai, who had his nose buried in his new survival handbook, seemed lost in thought. 

“It must’ve been terrible,” Atsushi lamented, “Having lost your daughter yourself, I can’t imagine just how…”

“Atsushi.” 

A whisper. Dazai glanced up at him, expressionless, and subtly shook his head in disapproval.

“No, no, it’s okay,” the woman said, and she gave him a saddened smile through the mirror, “Thank you,” 

Then she fell deathly, like she’d left the present entirely. ---

“I should mention that I’ve hired a night guard for the week,” Mrs. Breed-Wrisley called over her shoulder nonchalantly.

As the detectives slid off the small car, the woman fiddled with her keys at the entrance of the rundown restaurant. The afternoon sun served as a spotlight for the display. The windows were scratched and the walls graffitied. Whatever remained of the signs that would’ve spelled out the name of the place instead communicated gibberish. Nature had overtaken the lot, as sprouts of grass peeked through the cracks on the concrete and vines climbed up the grayed walls. 

“And why would that be?” Kunikida asked, vaguely irked at the sudden news but attempting to stay polite.   

The woman didn’t answer as she swung open the gates and soon the glass door. Dazai was the first to set foot inside and though the intense smell of mold on the crusty carpet spoke the truth of how long this place had been abandoned, the place itself…looked frozen in time. The tables were arranged in neat lines, with colorful (though faded) tablecloths. Confetti and glitter stuck to the old checkered floor, with attractive promises of delicious treats decorating the walls. Alongside these, drawings were scattered about the place, painting the happiness of a birthday, of children surrounded by friends and soft animals sharing slices of pizza. Stars hung from the ceiling and arcade machines called for their next player. The curtain of the main stage shone a vibrant velvet and the smaller side stage sparkled purple. Atsushi, though he’d never lived something like this, could almost feel himself in the moment, the smell of freshly made food cuddling the air, the laughter, the lights. But the joy that this place once contained was now stuck to the corners of each wall, caught in the cobwebs, rotting away with time. 

“You said you just hired a security guard?” Dazai reminded her, as the rest allowed themselves to roam the place.

“Ah, yes,” the woman said, “I thought it would help make sure nothing is moved, or stolen”

Who’d wanna rob a place like this?, Atsushi thought. Though it’s nice, there’s nothing of much value here, unless you’d want to sell the mushrooms growing from the carpet…Although, the arcade machines could have a lot of money in them. Not to mention the things themselves are probably worth a fortune.

He hummed, deep in thought.

“This restaurant featured robot mascots, is that right?” Kunikida asked.

“That’s right,”

“Where might they…be?”

Kunikida trailed off as he spotted Dazai, who found himself entranced by a big golden button at the side of the main stage.

“Dazai…” the man growled. 

Dazai straightened up and put his hand to his chest.

“I wasn’t gonna do anything, honest,” he lied.

Mrs. Breed-Wrisley chuckled quietly.

“It’s alright, go ahead,” 

He didn’t need to be told twice. With an excited push of the button, the curtains of the stage suddenly drew back, as music boomed from the speakers and the performers hidden behind sprung to life. Dazai let out an amused laugh as he stepped back to admire the spectacle, resting his arm on Kunikida’s shoulder. A blue bunny waved its hand in front of its guitar in sync to the song, along with a bear with the top hat, whose mouth moved up and down to make it look as if it were singing. On the other side of the stage, a duck of sorts showed off its cupcake, and moved its torso from side to side when suddenly the side stage swung open, and a fox slid out, waving its hook enthusiastically. 

“Wonderful, isn’t it?” Mrs. Breed-Wrisley whispered.

“Yeah!” Atsushi said

But she didn’t seem to hear. Was she talking to herself? When he looked at her it seemed like her gaze was glued to the stage. What was that on her face? Her head tilted to the side and a fond smile plastered on her face. Her eyes shone with the lights. Ah. Infatuation. That’s what it was. The red guitar the bunny held suddenly clicked. It sounded metallic, or almost like a lighter being turned on. Before they knew it, a boom escaped the guitar, causing Atsushi to yelp in surprise. A crackle of light shook the room, as the music slurred and they were all suddenly drowned in darkness. 

“Ah,” the woman chuckled, “They’re a little rusty, I’m sorry about that…”

Atsushi composed himself and joined his coworkers’ sides.

“Their glory days are long gone,” she said.

---

“Atsushiiiiii! Get over hereeeee!”

“Hold on!”

As the boy dried off from his shower and slipped on his sleeping wear, he hurried to exit the bathroom to attend to his mentor’s calls. They had settled in a hotel for the rest of the week. That’s how long they had to solve the case.

“A-A week?!” Kunikida cried.

“I ask that you understand,” Mrs. Breed-Wrisley sighed apologetically, “Lately, I”ve been having trouble keeping the wrecking companies away from this place and…well…”

“We can do it in a week!” Dazai assured her, and Kunikida looked at him with wide-eyed desperation. “You can count on us!”

Now the two detectives laid on their respective futons, each in their own little world. Kunikida muttered to himself as he looked over every word of every document in every file, scribbling his thoughts and theories into his notebook. Dazai, meanwhile, was humming to himself, laying belly down on the futon and kicking his legs while he too scribbled on his own book. His new survival book. 

“Ah! Atsushi, check it out!”

The man waved him over and Atsushi reluctantly approached. He looked down at the page, where Dazai had drawn right over the words into the empty space of the page.

“Wh-Why couldn’t you have drawn it smaller so it would fit on the empty part?” Atsushi grimaced.

“And let my creativity be restricted like that? I could never!”

Atsushi sat down beside him and the man then promptly pointed at his doodles.

“I drew my favorite!” 

He tapped on the drawing of the pirate fox they had seen earlier on the stage. It wasn’t a horrible drawing, funnily enough. A bit on the abstract side, but recognizable enough. The rest of his scribbles consisted of the fox doing several things, such as eating pizza, or being a pirate. There was a doodle of the fox’s stomach hatch, but Atsushi didn’t dare ask why he’d drawn that. 

“Which robot did you like?” Dazai asked.

“You sound like a child,” Kunikida said, still not looking up from his notes. “And, the term, you’ll find, is animatronic. Not robot,”

“Oh, what’s the difference? Isn’t that just the cooler name for it?”

Kunikida snapped upright just to glare at him, but he held the vile poison on his tongue for some other time. As the man shook his head and tried to focus again, Dazai turned his attention back to Atsushi. 

“Well?”

“Ah…eh…”  he thought about it, “I thought the duck was cute,”

“I think it’s a chicken,” Kunikida muttered.

“It looks like a duck,” Dazai countered.

“But it’s a chicken,”

“But it doesn’t look like one,”

Kunikida glared again.

“Must you make an argument out of everything?!”

“Fine, fine, here I’ll make it so we both win,”

Dazai took to his book, the sound of his pen scratching the paper filling the room. Atsushi tried to look over his shoulder, curiosity taking over. Upon finishing and revising it, he proudly revealed his drawing to his partner. It looked like some sort of duck-hen hybrid with the same bib the robot wore and a cupcake on its wing.

“See? It’s a chuck! Or a dicken? Or…”

Kunikida’s mouth dropped to the floor, completely horrified.

“Did you just draw on the book?!”

The bandaged man blinked.

“Oh. Yeah?”

The other stammered. 

“Why would you do that?!”

“I didn’t have any paper,” he stated matter-of-factly

Kunikida’s face transitioned through several different emotions at once.

“Wh-wha-you! You don’t draw on books!”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s! It’s!” the man couldn’t find his words in his bewilderment, “Because it’s practically a crime!”

“Says who?”

“S-Says everyone?!”

The man was less angry and more just. Genuinely confused. And much to Atsushi’s relief, the interaction didn’t lead to a one sided boxing match as his two seniors chattered on about nonsensical nothings. Atsushi felt his chest grow warm as he relished in this strange comfort. It was the first time he’d ever gone on an overnight mission with anyone. To go on one with these two almost would seem like a train wreck, but in this moment he felt grateful to be there. Maybe this was what a sleepover would feel like? The boy barely noticed himself dozing off as he leaned on Dazai’s side and shut his eyes. With a content sigh, he thought:

Tomorrow is another day.

[starreyblueberry]

Timmy Turners fate in the new series is one of the most anticipated/theorized aspects of the new show right now. We have multiple easter eggs towards him being a possible character in the new show, and due to the creator saying that Timmys kids could possibly be Cosmo and Wandas next godkids, I don't think Timmy has kids yet (aka the channel chaser ending might be on its way, but not happened just yet.) He is arguably going to either be a huge hit or miss, everyone has different ideas, fates, what he should be, what would be the best conclusion to his character. The lines between real genuine trauma and gags in the old show are blurry, as well as core aspects of his personality. It’s so hard to actually write him as an adult for the new show purely cause what exactly are you going to take from the show that MATTERS. Will you take the lovingness of his parents from season one? or the neglectful spiteful parents they become from season 4. Will you take the horrible grades as him actuallly being bad at school, or crocker failing him on purpose. Will chole even be his best friend? Or is it back to AJ and Chester? Or will his only friends be cosmo and wanda?

We’re Cosmo and Wanda parents to Timmy, or just godparents.

Its already proven that timmys magic somewhat stayed (aka Peris existence, Dale being a millionare, hell even dimsdale/fairy world being intact) If they will acklowdge that? The school mascot being Timmy turner adjacent, past fairy’s seeming to have remembered Timmy (The tooth fairy having a little card of Timmy, Jorgen hanging out w cosmo and Wanda more CAUSE of Timmy’s adventures etc). He’s somehow a crutal part of almost every piece of the show and he’s not even there. I fully believe they’re gonna explain why a lot of Timmy’s wishes have stayed (in my opinion so many of his changes have made the world in general a better place, and he has saved the universe so often undoing his shit would kinda change the whole fabric of space and time, thus making his magic stay, memories are more… iffy.)

I know a huge thing is also the family dynamic, the fact Timmy is their favourite, hell the HALL OF TIMMY!!! The fact they keep a picture of his room in their house, the fact that they reference him sometimes within conversations with hazel. Never actually spoken his name but implied that’s their Timmy (aside from one time) That the reason the world is right now the reason this problem or circumstance or blessing is happening is because of Timmy Turner.

The amount of pure power Timmy has over the show is something crazy, and I do trust the new writers to give us an ending that will satisfy us. He’s been so connected to many people’s childhoods, showing found family at its core. He’s snarky, loud, smart, kind, and more. People want to see him happy, people want to see him with his family. Who you count as his family is up to you. It’s already been semi-confirmed it’s gonna be connected to the channel chasers ending since most of the general audience has said they wished the show ended during that time ( I have my own opions about it but I digress.) It would be super cool if they did their own take, aka any unconventional Timmy future that we haven’t seen as a concept in the OG show. I know many people are rooting for too remember, for them to be united, and I really wish it happens. We also have to remember this is hazels story too, and we’ll be seeing the end of Timmy’s story rather then the middle of it. A special about him would be amazing though, especially if he’s either the hero, or the villain. Idk!!One day I’ll make a full post about every possible future Timmy and my preferences towards which ones, but for now I’ll stick with my analysis of the OG show.

All I know is that Timmy changed Cosmo, Wandas, and Peris life almost more then any other Godkid, and I like to think the show respects the impact he had. Not only as their godkid, but as their first kid to consider true family.

[purpurussy]

what is all of this like for post-hiatus phannies?

I've been trying to figure out how to phrase this for a minute. The most obvious comparison would be that it's like starting a TV show 10 seasons in, but that doesn't come remotely close to the amount of required reading necessary to understand even 5% of the references. This has not been a problem for me, as I love nothing more than a good all-consuming hyperfixation rabbit hole, but something I'm realizing is that you really just had to be there to fully Understand.

I got into d&p properly in December of 2023, when gamingmas appealed to my emotionally curious nature and then gave me some kind of irreversible brain damage which I'm still trying to process. Since then I've been consuming their back catalogue as though it's laced with cocaine, and obsessively lurking on phannie tumblr until I finally made this blog a few weeks ago.

-

I actually watched Dan's videos for a little while back in roughly 2013/2014, but something about his content back then just wasn't working for me like it does now (I have such a clear memory of watching Reasons Why Dan’s A Fail and thinking "aw man why does this cute little twink hate himself so much 😔" and then going back to watching Jenna Marbles lmao. Funnily enough it did make me change my negative self-talk a little bit). I was very much a brief casual viewer who went off them pretty much after watching a few videos, and after that I was sort of vaguely aware of them as the cultural icons of the 2010s that they were, but I wasn't keeping up with them at all. 

I don't even remember BIG coming out, which is insane because I've always been extremely chronically online and it definitely broke containment as a cultural moment (although I think I was trying to minimize my social media use at that point in my life, so maybe that's why it went over my head). I feel like I must have heard something about it at the time, though, because I knew they were gay when I started watching them last year. What's really strange is that a lot of this stuff is kinda timeless to me. I don't remember it happening 5, 10 or 15 years ago - I just witnessed it very recently. For a lot of you guys, BIG happened 5 years ago, but I just watched it for the first time a few months ago. At the same time, in my mind they've just always been gay, since I wasn't in the trenches of the unhinged online culture surrounding them in the early/mid 2010s. It's so confusing to balance my weird temporal perception of these events with the impressions that I get from you guys. Oftentimes I have to judge roughly when something would have happened based on their appearances - it's not actually a *memory* for me, like it is for you. I absolutely love the dynamic and branding they have now, and the deep dives into their past are more of a curious exploration of how they got here, rather than actually nostalgic (or, I suppose, mildly traumatic) for me. It’s still very interesting and compelling to me, but because I love the current iteration of Dan and Phil, not because I’m emotionally invested in who they used to be. 

Sometimes I’ll be aware that an event happened, but I won’t realize how monumental it was until I see people talking about it (I hate to say it but I genuinely don't fully understand why the BONCAs thing was so earth-shattering, but like I said, I've always lived in a post-BIG universe, and I think you just had to be there). There are also plenty of references to stuff that's just been lost to time, which I have to piece together with context clues, as well as the more unhinged demonic stuff that I just don't have any interest in exploring whatsoever (I think I might have watched the v-day video if I'd been there when it leaked and I was a stupid teenager, but at this point, I don't even feel any kind of morbid curiosity for it. I just feel really bad for them that it got leaked. Plus, unfortunately, I think I've learned all I need to know about it through internet osmosis here). I feel like a lot of these events have a real emotional meaning for you guys, when to me, they're just interesting/funny/insane anecdotes which give some context to everything. Some of the shit that you guys lived through back then is absolutely wild, and I love and appreciate all of you for meticulously archiving and documenting everything and for being so willing to answer the same questions over and over again! Otherwise I feel like I wouldn't be able to really be part of this community, and posting my silly little memes on this blog is so fucking fun. So thank you all for that.

It seems like this is one of the most ride-or-die fanbases I've ever seen. The fact that they could invent the concept of YouTubers doing world tours, successfully execute that multiple times, branch out into several other ventures, come out as gay not fully knowing how that would affect their careers, disappear for several years and then come back knowing that there would be a solid audience waiting for them even after their virality had died down, drop merch every 3 seconds - I don't know who else can really get away with that, for almost 15 years, in the extremely "live fast die young" culture of internet fame. And I think it's in no small part because you all have chronic "unconditionally supporting dan and phil" disease. (While we’re on the topic, I feel very lucky to have missed the hiatus era. There's kind of a compression in the timeline for me between the gaming channel going dark and Dan starting his WAD tour, where it's like that time just doesn't exist in the Dan and Phil cinematic universe for me. It took me a while to realize how insane it must have been when they came back in full force, I can't even imagine how that must have felt.)

Of course, there's a caveat in that I'm saying this only really knowing about the tip of the demon iceberg. I’m aware of people engaging in behaviours such as doxxing them, outing them and stalking their families, which is horrifying in and of itself, but I don’t know how long it went on for or how many people were involved. I think people are generally pretty well-behaved at this point, and most of the drama seems to be between different schools of thought within the fanbase itself. I assume a big part of the reason for that is people's varying degrees of involvement in (and remaining notion of guilt for) the boundary-crossing behaviour from the old days. Living with the spectre of this insanity is kind of strange - it makes me feel nervous sometimes that I’m gonna accidentally say something that hits a nerve, or cross a line I didn’t know existed, because there’s all this history that I don’t fully understand, beyond just the normal unwritten rules for interacting with fan spaces online. 

-

The topic that got me writing this in the first place was the orange heart incident, and everyone’s subsequent meltdown. For me, the excitement in them soft/hard/semi launching is more about me just getting excited about any open, proud expression of queer joy - it heals something inside me every time I hear a man referring to his husband or a woman referring to her wife (excuse the gendered terms, ykwim. gay shit). It's just that sentiment, combined with the fact that I'm parasocially invested in them: I'd love to see that energy from my fave little guys who live inside my computer. I am basically rooting for them to become more comfortable with just talking about gay stuff more openly and candidly, and I guess that would require a bit of a hard launch, although I can understand that they don't want to potentially open the door to excessive questioning regarding their relationship. I feel like it ✨hits different✨ for people who watched them for years before they came out. Like, you guys are rooting for people who you watched in real time struggling with their identities and internalized homophobia for years and years, while to me, they’re just some guys who I’m a fan of. Sometimes I get caught up in the emotional frenzy of their hard-launch breadcrumbs even though I don’t feel quite as insane about it as you guys (I said in some tags a few days ago that it’s like the base instinct to turn around and start running if you see a crowd of people running towards you and screaming in terror, even if you have no idea what’s going on). Anyway, I would love to see them being more gooey with each other, and I am gobbling up the breadcrumbs they're feeding us atm, because I love seeing gay people expressing gay love with no shame 🧡 

I think my perception of them as a couple, or of their sexualities independently, is just kind of an extension of everything Dan said in BIG. I really have no doubt that they're a couple, and I don't feel any kind of weird Catholic guilt in saying that, since I neither witnessed nor participated in the insanity back then. I interpreted (I'm paraphrasing) "obviously we were more than friends, but it was more than just romantic, we're like, actual soulmates" followed by "as for the situation now? we're private people and we'd like to keep that part of our lives private" as him essentially saying that obviously they're a couple, but that their relationship is not part of the Dan And Phil™ Brand. The brand is 2 guys who have great chemistry doing comedy together (5 feet apart even though clearly they are gay and in love). And I think that's a completely healthy decision to make, even irrespective of their history. I think a hard launch would be subtle, and it wouldn’t realistically change the nature of their content that much. 

With that being said, to me, it seems slightly wild for people to adamantly insist they're not a couple, or that it’s “invasive” to assume that they are one (not that that really applies to anyone here, but elsewhere on the internet). If they were a straight man and a straight woman, and there wasn't a huge chunk of people on the internet struggling with this oddly conditioned aversion to seeing them as a couple, then nobody on earth would be insisting that it's weird to assume they're together. Dan confirmed that they became romantically involved around the time they met, and building a forever home with your ex is crazy, that's all there is to it.

-

This is kind of a messy stream of thoughts (it ended up sort of becoming 2 essays for the price of 1) and I don't really know where I was going with it. In conclusion I think that day 1 phannies are braver than any US marine and you have all suffered more than Jesus on the cross, and I'm extremely thankful that I get to reap the rewards of your labour now without having lived through the dark ages myself. I also think some of you are holding onto a bit of unnecessary guilt for dumb shit you said on the internet when you were a kid. And Dan and Phil are gay and I love them and I reeeeaaaallllyyy want them to do a podcast so bad because this is all conjecture and I would parasocially love to hear their actual thoughts on it

[egeos]

a brief look at the history of hulknussen on ao3

as I was writing up my hulknussen fanfic recommendations masterpost I realized that someone coming into the ship just now is probably missing a decently sized amount of lore on their "meta" history - that is to say, how fandom has treated hulknussen and how it has changed over the years. I'm making a post on it that so I can reference it in the aforementioned masterpost, but you can also just read this if you want to know more about hulknussen's position in f1 rpf fic on ao3. they're no lestappen, but they've had their moments

I'll try my best to boil down the key factors that influenced them, dynamics, characterizations, etc for the three - and soon four - "eras" I have determined for their ship.

the oldest fic currently in their tag dates back to 2015, which was about a year after kevin joined F1. there were a few people writing for this ship back then, and it didn't really gain traction until 2017 with the infamous "suck my balls mate/honey" incident. there was a small but steady stream of fics uploaded to ao3 over the following years. around late 2020/early 2021 was when they started getting put into the background of fics, as well as into compilation works a lot more, slowly but surely earning them the status of a pairing with bruce banner syndrome.

around this, I have determined three eras you can divide hulknussen fics into. this is based on when they were written and posted, not when the fic itself takes place. I can write something today that takes place in 2014 but it (read: characterizations, dynamics, plot devices, etc) would still be influenced by things that have happened since.

anything from before hungary 2017 kmag joins the grid in 2014, when nico is in his fourth season. they didn't really interact much, but had some interesting parallels in their career for these years. there really aren't a lot of fics from this era, which is a shame in my opinion. I know I technically can't write something for this era, but I really want to try to play around with the dynamics common for them at this time. both of them are younger (kevin 20-23, nico 25-28) with everything to prove. nico still has more of a heartthrob status, kevin is the young and impulsive new rookie. nico also doesn't hold the "beloved by no one, cheered on by everyone" status he has nowadays. he's just kinda there, doing nothing with a friendly smile and never bothering anyone (as opposed to the rest of the grid borderline trying to murder each other in their rivalries).

the last thing I think you can point out is that it was a lot of au's - and I dont mean canon divergence or what if's, but "hulknussen except one is an angel and the other is a demon" "firefighter", "showjumper", that sort of level of au. it is how fandom used to be. nowadays it's more focused on tropes and "canon" (in quotations because rpf) plays a bigger role than it used to.

suck my balls, honey, and all that it brought this part is pretty straightforward. they had their moment in hungary and it spawned a few hate fucking/sexual tension/enemies to lovers fics. there was for sure an uptick around 2017 and even into 2018, but what this moment did way more importantly was cement them as a pair with both history and a "canon" dynamic at all. think of it; hungary is the first time anyone really saw them interact. for a lot of people that was the number 1 thing connecting these two and was basically expected if they were tagged in a fic.

their portrayals boiled down to two, really: the horny one, and the less-horny one. the first is pretty self explanatory, we got two guys who really don't seem to like each other and we make them bang because it's hot. the latter might involve repressed feelings, "secretly together but putting on an act for others", soulmates and making up because of it - kind of, the typical enemies to lovers trope.

(fun fact I want to include; kevin said in 2019 that he never felt much of a grudge towards nico after hungary and held a lot of respect for him. he also said that nico was refusing to even just look at him, and simply determined that nico must have taken hungary very personally while he himself didnt care a lot. it's one of my favourite hulknussen tidbits that I think can really be played around with when writing fic set in this era/using this dynamic.)

it's also worth mentioning that this was when a/b/o as a whole was going mainstream in fandom spaces (and honestly even outside of them, but I wont dive into the implications of that here) which of course also reached F1/hulknussen. some fics fell into the trap of "uwu bottom" and "strong top" stereotypes as a result, usually with kevin as the omega and nico as the alpha. I'm mentioning it because I think that, like hungary 2017, it left its mark in their dynamic and how people cho(o)se to portray them even outside of a/b/o contexts. I will also be honest and say that it's not my personal preferred interpretation, but I acknowledge that it exists, and I won't even deny that maybe it's influenced my own portrayals in ways I haven't noticed.

up until 2019 most of the fics tagged as hulknussen still centered on them. then around 2020-2021 they started getting tagged as a background, side, etc pairing more and more, slowly taking over their tag. I think it was mainly because they had a (at first glance, anyway) simplistic and familiar dynamic with the archetype of enemies/rivals to lovers. it was easy to slot into the background of a fic, easy to use as a catalyst for the main pairing, that sort of thing.

that doesn't mean there were no hulknussen fics being written. I'm mentioning it because it's a development that has stuck around, and they are still often delegated to the sidelines in favour of younger and more popular ships. the fics that were written about them didn't all stick to the enemies to lovers archetype, however! fluff, making up and fics that simply ignored hungary and kept going like before were still being written.

making up (and making out?), haasbands, "my favourite dane", kevin's defence masterclasses, and probably so much more *you are here they make up sometime in 2022. both of them are older, they have matured. both of them are now married and both of them are fathers. they have survived a pandemic (together, kinda) as well as survived being out of the sport and returning. then they're announced as teammates for 2023. it is, of course, a decently huge deal in the wider F1 community. not everyone knows they made up, and media does what they do best, which is stir shit. they didn't manage to convince everyone that they wouldn't implode and take haas with them, but they proved themselves a decent duo in 2023.

it's 2024 when things really kick off. günther is fired from the team and replaced as team principal by ayao. gene decides to invest more capital into F1 over NASCAR, and somehow haas is the only team on the entire grid that didn't have super misleading wind tunnel analysis results (that's not entirely true; theirs were misleading, but theirs were telling them their car is worse than it actually is, whereas everyone else went into 2024 expecting to be better than they ended up being at the beginning of the season). so, overall, haas is in a good spot and on an upwards trajectory.

cue jeddah 2024. kevin racks up penalties like crazy because the fia is trying to be stricter and punish more harshly by giving out 10s instead of 5s penalties. which, credit where credit is due, it did what they wanted, which is ruin kevin's race, and ruining someone's race is a solid way of making sure they don't become a repeated offender (you would think so, anyway). kmag uses the opportunity to hold back the entire back of the field so the gap between him and nico is big enough to buy nico an entire pitstop. that is a crazy feat on so many levels. that takes slowing down without being overtaken. like, forcing the other race cars to slow down when they could easily go faster, in a race where the entire point is to go fast. he needed to speed off into the sunsent during the straights and slow down crazily fast in the corners, all while managing tyres. and the madlad did it and then gives interviews with a big fat smile, saying he "had to do [his] thing to protect nico". okay, we get it, youre married, get a room

the "enemies to lovers arc" and "haasbands" jokes go mainstream. nico calls kevin his favourite dane and describes their relationship as "[their] little romance". they watch the euros together and post pics of it with them smiling at each other like they are actually married. nico wants kevin to go to audi with him, kevin keeps playing the team game for nico even off-track, spending way too much time defending him and his actions. the haasbands as we know them have been birthed.

(before I go on a tangent any longer about this era, let's actually get to what fics from "then" are like. it's the current state of things, so I can't give conclusive statements, but I can make some deductions already.)

before the hard launch of the haasbands, around 2022 and 2023, their fics went into the direction of slow burns, making up, and (mutual) pining. 2024 shook things up again.

with the 2024 season still going, this is pretty much as close up to date as possible as we can get. the current dynamic that has been crystalizing is what I like calling feral dog kevin and lovestruck nico. it's very descriptive, so, you know, Im sure you can imagine what I mean. kevin's attempts at securing nico points also hasnt gone unnoticed by the mainstream community, and jokes about nico getting his first podium because kevin chose to play pinball with all the 18 other drivers are getting more frequent. there is also the upcoming "divorce", courtesy to both of them leaving haas at the end of the season and haas being the sole reason haasbands exists in the first place (both the moniker and the new dynamic).

I predict we'll be entering a fourth era soon, which is the post F1 era. while I don't like to think about it, it seems less and less likely that kevin will get the audi seat, and it is also the only seat left on the grid currently. nico will stay for some longer I do believe, but even his end is approaching. the number of fics being written will start dying off. I can't really say if a new dynamic will come up; I would think not, unless kevin decides to be unhinged and starts coming to races acting in borderline wag capacity to nico, or both of them move to indy or wec or something.

now, just for self indulgence's sake, the fourth era could also be kevin goes to audi, they turn into… audibands? stakebands? and Audi actually develops a great car and they get off the ground running and kevin can break that record of "most career starts without having lead a lap" while nico gets his first podium and breaks his undesirable record. we get an uptick in fics, the feral dog kevin and lovestruck nico dynamic evoles a bit further to be just a little bit deranged with an edge of codependence to it and then they retire and take their ship with them, if maybe a bit less abruptly than in the first "fourth era" I described.

or, who knows; maybe we don't get a fourth era. maybe their tag has reached the end of it's evolution. we'll just have to see.

[tabithatwo]

it's yellowjackets / jennifer's body parallels time!

hi hello keep reading if you would like to hear about shauna/jennifer and jackie/needy, here's my totally noncomprehensive, very much off the cuff thoughts on this very complex and interesting dynamic!!

(i'm not getting into the basic parallels, i'm gonna assume you know the karyn kusama of it all, the heart necklace, the homoerotic female friendship, the death)

yellowjackets is so brilliant because it feeds you stereotypes and absolutely does not deliver on them. there could be an entire paper on each girl and how this is true for them specifically, but walk quickly with me because i want to get into the nitty gritty gory fun stuff! a brief oversimplified example: nat is referred to as a burnout, some would assume she's a loner based on that, but she cares about the team as a unit more than arguably anyone else. (this is common in real life too, our stereotypes often don't hold water in reality and yj reflects that beautifully!)

now to the jackie/shauna of it all. it would be oh so incredibly easy to look at jackie and think she's the jennifer of the duo. we are set up to see her as prettier, more popular, more demanding. but that illusion falls apart QUICKLY if you pay attention to the things that jackie actually says and does. she's not a mean girl. she's actually one of the kindest on the team. she doesn't pick on shauna, she clings. there are plenty of takes on this on tumblr so i won't exhaust it, my adhd loves to digress and meander but i'm forcing myself back onto the trodden path to this point: people look at the first few minutes of the pilot and they immediately decide that they know who these girls are. the audience typecasts jackie as a jennifer and shauna as a needy. the popular, bubbly girl and her shy, bookworm best friend.

a lot of people, especially casual viewers who don't study this show like its their job (god, wonder what that would be like lol) understandably stop here. but to me the BRILLIANCE of yj is that they don't actually make it HARD for you to undo your initial impressions. the material is there. it isn't hidden. it isn't some deeper self of each character that is unraveled throughout seasons. they push, push, push to see just how far they can carry our deeply held stereotypes/expectations. how forward and violent can shauna be, with viewers still clinging to a shy and sweet girl, who was really their own creation? how kind and honestly pathetic kicked-puppy can jackie be, with viewers still clinging to a mean girl, who was really their own creation? how far will we go to warp the characters intentions, so that we can keep them in the box we understand them in? they ask this of the viewer and of other characters, but AGAIN i digress.

so, while this might sit strangely with some, yes i think that jackie is very much aligned with needy if you peel back just one layer. but far above and beyond that, shauna is so very fucking jennifer.

the overall veneer is thinned immediately in yj. there isn't one girl in the stands and one on center stage. jackie and shauna are both on the team. they go to the same parties, they play the same sport, i would argue that shauna isn't even coded as "less pretty" (please note the word coded, because i'm not saying needy is literally less pretty than jennifer, i am simply saying that we have hair, makeup, clothing, glasses trends that we use to stereotype characters, are you with me?)

so now what? now these girls are both and neither. shauna thinks that she is the needy to jackie's jennifer. jackie wears the necklace and the introductory shots frame her as important. but we're already diverting from that set-up.

our absolute clearest common denominator here is one that i rarely see people mention funnily enough: JENNIFER IS A SUCCUBUS. she CONSUMES. she KILLS. she WANTS and she TAKES.

now before you get TOO EXCITED!!! i see some of you getting ready to say i'm a shauna shipman hater, put the pitchforks down!! shauna is one of my favorite characters of all time. i love her crazy ass so deeply that it's alarming. (i don't hate jennifer, either, for the record.) i love her largely for WHAT she is. i think sanitizing or sweetening her is a disservice. she's amazing and complex and wounded and capable of deep love. but she also, quite LITERALLY, consumes.

her character is sex and desire and violence and obsession and consumption. and it's AMAZING. she's POWERFUL. she's our main framing character (in this dynamic), rather than needy. the scripts are switched. jennifer dies and needy lives, and that's one story. that's clearer cut, simpler, made for a horror film. but here, jackie dies and shauna lives, and that story is deep and rich and goes on to include a whole lot more death and destruction and chaos.

shauna tells us herself that it excites her. she likes it. she is this girl. this woman. she reminisces and she recreates and she covets.

jennifer tries to consume needy, shauna literally consumes jackie.

there's more to this story, obviously. you could deep dive and mine for the intricacies of the set up and fall of stereotype and expectation, or collect all of the exact parallels. but i'll stick with a few, because this is a quick outburst of thought.

a huge one, who is taking whose boyfriend?

here's another personal favorite of mine, just for kicks

is it too complex to neatly tuck away? absolutely. they're different stories with different themes. shauna isn't simply a teenager possessed by a demon. it runs far deeper. as is the essence of this show.

but if you want to look at parallels, look at the one who has been holding the knife the whole time.

[fabuloustrash05]

My Top 5 Favorite TMNT 2012 Ships

5) Mikey x Renet

I feel we as a fandom has come to an unanimous agreement that all the canon romances/couples given to us in the 2012 series are bad/toxic/poorly written/inc3st/etc with THEM being the only exception (I'll talk about that ship soon), however I think Renetangelo is the other exception.

They’re certainly not perfect with their first problem being Mikey kinda “cheating” on Renet with Shinigami (they weren’t together or officially dating so it’s not cheating, but it still felt wrong that it was never acknowledged that Mikey was pretty much a skirt chaser, crushing on two girls at once), but I still really love their dynamic and relationship. Mikey and Renet are undoubtedly cute together, just two silly goofballs having a fun time and enjoying the other’s company with the occasional flirting and kiss on the cheek (which btw SO CUTE). Renetangelo is that couple that I feel works great both romantically and platonically. If you told me they’re best friends, I’d believe it, if you told me they’re a couple, I’d also believe it. That's how well they work off each other. I'm okay with them being a couple or just being friends.

Season 5 also practically confirms they’re together on two occasions with Mikey saying him and Renet are in a long distance relationship in the When Worlds Collide special, and Renet hinting during the Halloween arc that she and Mikey have some kind of future together.

Overall, I really like Renetangelo and I love seeing these two together. From Mikey's puppy love expressions when he sees her to their overall personalities clashing so well together. This ship is very underrated and needs more love.

4) Slash x Alopex

Btw this edit was made by @robins-treasure <33

Yes, this is a ship that exist and I take FULL CREDIT FOR THE CREATION OF THIS COUPLE! I AM THE REASON THIS SHIP IS ALIVE AND SAILING! YOU ARE WELCOME!!

Slash x Alopex (or what I like to call them Slaopex) is my rarepair of the 2012 series and I’m so happy that I’m slowly getting more and more people one board with it. It started off as just a random silly idea of mine, like "What if Slash got a gf?" and then I thought "Well, who could I ship him with?" and then my brain went "What if Slash and Alopex got together? That would be funny". I laughed at the idea, but the more I thought of it, the more I started to like it. I began coming up with headcanons and a story of their relationship, and the more I did that, the more I fell in love with this concept and the potential of this couple. So much that it placed 4th in my top 5!

I fell so in love with them I even ended up writing a short fanfic of how I headcanon they would first meet and the beginning of their blooming romance (you can read it HERE). But in short, Slash runs into Alopex during a late night patrol and helps her beat up some crooks who were attacking her. The two get to talking, sharing a tender moment before parting ways, with Alopex now being the only thing on Slash's mind <3

I also reference this ship a few times in my fanfic Courting a Salamandrian. Consider it a continuation of that little oneshot.

3) Leo x Casey

While everyone else was shipping Jonatello, I was shipping Caseynardo! I was never a fan of Jonatello, I don't hate it, just couldn't get on board nor understand the hype around it, but then one day I stumbled across fanart of Leo x Casey and I thought "Huh... these two actually look cute together!" and quickly sunk into the rabbit hole. Looking up every little bit of fanart, fanfics and edits I could find.

Liking this ship this much for it to be ranked 3rd in my Top 5 favorite TMNT 2012 ships says a lot. This ship really grew on me very quickly, so much so that I wrote a fanfiction on them! I wrote a Caseynardo fanfic before writing a Renetangelo one (you can read it HERE), which is funny cause I've been shipping Renetangelo since the show was airing, and I didn't start liking Caseynardo till long after the show ended! That says a lot about how much these boy effected me! LOL

My whole HC for this ship is that they bonding a lot in season 3 at the farmhouse which led to a mutual romantic attraction. Eventually they secretly date without telling anyone but due to the circumstances and problems going on in Leo’s life, he was unable to keep the relationship going. They agree to just be friends, which Casey promising to wait for him. It’s basically the “right person, wrong time” trope. But I like to headcanon that by season 5, Leo and Casey finally get together officially and made their relationship known to everyone else. The only one not surprised was Raphael who knew about those two since day one, cause he was stuck being their third wheel/wingman XD

2) Karai x Shinigami

I will NEVER forgive Nickelodeon for be too cowardly to make this happen. They'd rather ship inc3st and force Shini to be straight than give us our goth kunoichi lesbians. For shame, Nickelodeon... For shame...

Not to mention that one of the writers of the show, Peter Di Cicco, shipped them! Calling them his "OTP" and referring to Shini as "Karai's girlfriend", and even pitching an alternate ending to the series where Splinter and Shredder make up but the only thing they fight over now is who gets to walk Karai down the aisle during her wedding to Shinigami XD

The moment I saw Shinigami, I instantly thought "Oh that's a lesbian and she and Karai are a thing". I really love their dynamic, their friendship and the potential they have in being a cute couple of childhood friends to lovers. You can see how much they care about each other. The fury in Shini's voice when she confronts Super Shredder, "I will destroy you, Monster! For everything you have done to Karai!". Shini is supportive of Karai and is always the one down to start chaos with you. Makes me wish we could've learned more about these two and their history. I like to think they've known each other since they were little, being childhood friends while training and growing up in The Foot Clan.

My personal headcanon is that Shinigami has had a crush on Karai since they were young, like preteens, and is so loyal to her and willing to help Karai not just because she is her best friend but also because she loves her. However, she is scared to tell Karai how she really feels because she's worried she won't reciprocate and it'll ruin their long time friendship. Luckily, Mikey is there for support!

Not to toot my own horn, but I did write a fanfic relating to this concept that you can read HERE

1) Raphael x Mona Lisa

What have I not already said about RaMona? If you follow me then you know full well that these two are my life. I’ve written multiple fanfics based on them on AO3 (LINK HERE) and have done a few analysis posts about them as well here on Tumblr. They have consumed my life. I love them so much!

Overall, I believe they are the healthiest ship the series offered us, and the best one in canon. I know some complain that they were rushed and how they got together too quickly, but in truth I can understand why Raph and Mona got into a relationship as quickly as they did. They are both warriors with the mindset of "I might die tomorrow" so it makes sense they'd be open and honest about their feelings right from the start just in case something happens to either one of them in battle. You only live once, you know? And I like how open Raph is when it comes to his feelings for Mona. From the very start, the moment he realized he liked her, never once did he deny it. Even when his brothers and friends laughed or scolded him, Raph proudly admitted he likes her with no ounce of shame. Mikey even points out that Mona is "bigger, stronger and a better fighter" than Raph and him responding by saying "Exactly! What a woman..." The boy does not care that she will be the pants in their relationship. He loves that she's stronger than him, bigger than him, a better fighter than him. We even see how excited he gets when she suggests training with him someday. Not to mention how we also learn in the show that these two have written love letters to each other during the course of the season 4 space adventures. Their personailties clash so well together. Both being strong willed warriors who put their loved ones first. Both can be stubborn and jump to conclusions quickly. We even see that Mona can have a short temper much like Raph. Both are ready to kick some ass with anyone who talks shit (Raph defending Mona but then Mona defending herself *chef's kiss*)

It's not talked about often among the fandom/shippers, but the fact that Mona is as much in love with Raph as he is with her is what truly makes this ship great. While the other 2012 ships make it unclear (writing wise) if the love interest truly feels the exact same way towards her Turtle she's shipped with, but for Mona her feelings are obvious. She's the one who makes the first move during all of their kisses/nose nuzzles, she's the one to say "I love you" first" and do I have to remind y'all of the push up scene? XD

These two are obsessed with one another. You can tell and see just how in love they are with one another. Even with only appearing in about 4-5 episodes, they truly left a major impact on shipping in this fandom. I feel it has come to a unanimous agreement that this ship is the best (canon) couple this show gave us. I love them, I love their relationship, I love what these two have done for the show and this fandom. They were able to bring back a classic ship from the 87 series and add so much more to them! I hope we get to see more of this couple in future generations. They certainly aren't a perfect couple, they got their flaws too, but overall they are truly the best couple in the 2012 series. <333

[emotionallychargedtowel]

The psychological paradoxes of Utsukushii Kare, part 1: Covert grandiosity and finding status through idealization

I’ve had some thoughts about Utsukushii Kare bouncing around in my head since the end of season 2. I started to post about them back then but my first attempts stalled out. Maybe the ideas involved were too complex, or I just needed to let them marinate a bit longer. I tried to give up on getting them on “paper,” but they just wouldn’t leave me alone. Eventually I returned to them and everything clicked. This is part one of my attempt to get those ideas down. After a ridiculous amount of tinkering, it seems like the right time to let it see the light of day. Subsequent posts are in different stages of readiness as well.

I wouldn’t have finished this without copious encouragement and feedback from @lurkingshan and specific edits from @wen-kexing-apologist. A kind comment from @nieves-de-sugui was a shot in the arm. And I’m always indebted to @porridgefeast for support, encouragement, and cute animal content.

I’ve written a lot about this series in the past; refer to my Utsukare master post for a continuously updated list. This includes some related posts on pursuer/distancer dynamics and attachment style in the series that have some overlap with what I’m discussing here, but this post should also stand on its own quite well.

A few things to note at the outset:

My focus here is on the series (both seasons), but I will refer to the movie, the novel, and a couple of vignettes when they illustrate points that are consistent with and relevant to the series.

My approach in this series of posts involves viewing fictional characters the way I would if they were real people--a bit like if I were to do a case conceptualization of a potential client. This isn’t always the approach I use, or the best one, but I thought it was a good fit for what I wanted to discuss here.

Quotes will be cited, but general information on sources will be given at the end of the post.

Now, to get down to business.

* * * * * * *

I’ve seen a lot of commentary from other Utsukare fans about Hira and Kiyoi and how much their self-worth–and the lack thereof–impacts their relationship. It’s a clear theme and lots of folks have had salient insights about it. But one thing I haven’t seen in any of the posts I’ve read is a full acknowledgement of the duality at play there–the way that both characters sometimes believe, or at least fear, that they’re irredeemably awful and at the same time believe, or perhaps hope, that they are better than everyone else.

I’m sure someone reading this is thinking, “Kiyoi is like that, sure. But Hira? Thinking he’s superior? Come on.” I get that it isn’t always apparent. In a genre that loves to portray profoundly smitten, devoted characters, Hira stands out as intensely, even excessively, whipped. But yes, Hira totally sees himself as superior to others in some important ways. Even before Noguchi Hiromi took his inventory about this so mercilessly, there were plenty of other signs.

covert grandiosity and idealization

Our introduction to Hira is his description of the “pyramid” social structure he experiences at school and how he’s at the lowest level of that pyramid (invisible at best, a visible target at worst). At first glance, this seems self-deprecating. But Hira is just describing where he falls in the structure, not endorsing the structure or his place in it. This sets up an important distinction that comes up continually in Hira’s thinking. Sometimes he really thinks badly of himself. But other times, he’s reporting how, in his view at least, others think of him. Sometimes he’s resigned to the ways others see him, but other times, he rebels against them. He doesn’t always make it clear which of these things he’s doing at a given time, but if you know what to look for it starts to be easier to pick out.

Mind you, it’s still very clear that there are ways in which Hira does view himself extremely negatively. His belief that he’s unworthy of Kiyoi is particularly strong. It inspires a lot of demeaning metaphors about himself, like calling himself a “pebble.” His belief in his unworthiness is linked to the belief that Kiyoi can’t possibly return his feelings or that if he does, it’s a bizarre miracle that can’t possibly last over the long term. The most remarkable thing about this belief is its incredible persistence, even in the face of example after example of evidence that Kiyoi loves and values him too and wants them to stay together. But denigrating himself in this context has a different meaning from what it would in others, as I'll get into in more detail shortly.

It’s a pretty universal human tendency to pay more attention to information that confirms our biases than information that challenges them. We’re also hard-wired to be more attentive to perceived threats (including threats to our sense of self-worth) than we are to less threatening things (and ideas). Both of these tendencies contribute to the fact that most of us fail to notice when our negative beliefs are being disproven.

I’ll be discussing this in more depth in part 2, but for now, I’ll just say that resistance to disproving a negative belief is very normal, but Hira’s stubbornness is way beyond what’s typical. He continually misinterprets or simply ignores clear signs of Kiyoi’s interest in and regard for him. I mean, most of us, no matter how poor our self-esteem is, no matter how jaded and pessimistic we are, would, if kissed by someone we’re in love with, at least entertain the possibility that they might like us a little bit. Not only does Hira not consider this possibility, he comes up with the rather bizarre interpretation that the graduation day kiss was Kiyoi’s way of telling him to leave him alone.

So, why would anyone be as stubbornly negative on this point as Hira is? Part of it is the strength of his negative beliefs and the degree of his bias. But there’s another reason as well, one I’m going to circle back to in a moment.

First, let’s look at Noguchi’s assessment of Hira in season 2, episode 4, which is very pertinent here. Talking about Hira’s submission to the Young Photographica contest, Noguchi says:

It was such a childish photo. You should've just chosen an empty place rather than erasing people. Going out of your way to [erase] people made it very clear that you hate this world. What I felt from your photo was tremendous selfishness and disgust. You haven't succeeded at all, but you think you're amazing. But instead of showing it outright, you make a shell by belittling yourself. You look down on this world with youth, stupidity, and ambiguity….You're just like the old me.

(dialogue from Viki subtitles)

It’s a little bit of a stretch, I think, to suggest that Noguchi can really tell all of this just by looking at a single photo (or even Hira’s entire portfolio). I think this partly happens just for the convenience of the story. But if I had to justify it, I’d say Noguchi has this much insight because, as he says, he used to be like Hira, making this a “takes one to know one” situation.

Hira confirms that Noguchi is correct here. “It’s like he sees right through me,” he thinks. So how do we reconcile this with Hira’s apparent negative self-image? Well, first off, it’s not unusual at all for very negative and excessively positive beliefs about the self to coexist in the same person. Take narcissism for example. People tend to think of narcissists as grandiose, thinking they’re amazing and special to a degree that’s clearly distorted. And that is one of the key symptoms of narcissism. But it’s also typical for narcissists to believe that if they aren’t remarkably special, they’re totally worthless. They have a hard time sitting with moderate (hence realistic) beliefs about themselves.

This kind of narcissistic tendency is really strong in people with Narcissistic Personality Disorder, but it’s present in a milder version in a lot of people (I suspect it’s present in most people, to some extent and under certain circumstances). Narcissistic personality traits are supposed to be linked to getting stuck at a developmental stage that ideally gets worked through during childhood. But a lot of us have at least a little bit of unfinished business from that period. I think Hira has a ton of unresolved stuff in this area. I definitely don’t think he would meet criteria for NPD. But I think that when he was in that developmental stage, he came up with some maladaptive strategies that helped him to get through it. As a result, he didn’t get stuck in the full-blown grandiose version of NPD, but he did get stuck with those maladaptive strategies, and they became a part of his personality instead. And he did retain 1) some of that highly polarized idea of self-worth (“I’m either the best ever or complete garbage”) and 2) some degree of belief in his superiority to others, no matter how shameful he finds it or how carefully he conceals it.

It’s also worth noting here that adolescents aren’t typically supposed to be diagnosed with personality disorders and even diagnosing young adults is often discouraged. This is because adolescence and early adulthood are times of intense change and development and the natural process of maturing can cause personality disorder symptoms to resolve even without mental health treatment. So that’s yet another reason to be wary of labeling Hira with any such diagnosis. This points to a major theme of the show, which is the fact that the central characters are works in progress. They aren’t fully formed adults yet, and that gives them a chance to improve themselves before they become set in their ways.

Getting back to Noguchi’s points: Hira is pretty misanthropic, although it’s often shown in pretty subtle ways in the show. This aspect of Hira is more noticeable in the novel. For one thing, the novel establishes early on that the erasing-people-from-photos thing isn’t some new or isolated phenomenon. Rather, the main thing Hira does with his camera at the beginning of the story is to intentionally take photos of populated areas and then carefully photoshop out all of the people. And it’s explicitly because he dislikes, even hates, most of humanity. This tendency still comes through in the series. Sometimes it’s obvious–remember those mass shooting fantasies?--and other times, it’s more subtle. We know that this aspect of the character is definitely still present in the series version of Hira since he confirms what Noguchi says about how his photo shows “selfishness and disgust.” He really is disgusted by many of the people around him.

making a shell - perfectionism and covert grandiosity

What about the part of Noguchi’s spiel where he says that Hira “make[s] a shell by belittling [himself]?” It took me some thinking to realize what (in my view) he meant by that.

This actually syncs up really well with something Noguchi says about Hira in Utsukushii Kare: Eternal. It’s illuminating enough that I’m making an exception here to confining myself to the time period of the series.

In this scene, Kiyoi is scheduled to be photographed by Noguchi on a day that Hira isn’t present at his studio. He asks about Hira and he and Noguchi talk about him briefly. Hearing that Kiyoi was Hira’s high school classmate, Noguchi talks about how weird and confining high school is, a terrible “environment for growth.” He says that doesn’t apply to Hira, though, because he’s “a king in sheep’s clothing.” This catches Kiyoi’s attention. “I was just thinking that you understand him really well,” he tells Noguchi. “I do,” Noguchi replies. “Although he looks timid and weak, he’s actually really strong.”

As Noguchi continues, his comments become more metaphorical and get harder to understand. (I suspect that the metaphors he uses might be idiomatic or otherwise intelligible to a Japanese audience in a way that’s difficult to get across in translation.) The gist is that he sees Hira as “strong-minded,” but that “in his heart” he has a kind of “sanctuary” that he protects from others, and that this could end up either holding Hira back or being something he can use to get somewhere in life. I’m not sure what to make of the sanctuary part, but it’s clear that Noguchi understands that Hira has thoughts and emotions that he doesn’t share with anyone, and that his image as a “sheep” who is “timid and weak” masks an unseen strength and determination, along with a more king-like attitude toward the world than he typically shows to others.

Time for a quick psychological theory sidebar, this time on perfectionism.

Some researchers who study perfectionism have identified a type they call “narcissistic perfectionism.” Narcissistic perfectionists think that they are, or need to be, perfect, and they expect others to be the same way, thinking about them in highly negative ways if they don’t measure up. If you read about this idea, most of the examples given to illustrate it are people who have achieved a lot in their lives, who can point to big accomplishments. But perfectionism doesn’t always result in achievements. Sometimes it keeps people stuck in a mindset that anything but perfection is pointless, making them reluctant to really try to do anything at all. If you’re a perfectionist who has a need to believe you’re special, that you would achieve big things if you tried, actually trying means taking a risk that you’ll find out that when you try, the results aren’t actually perfect and amazing.

According to narcissistic thinking, this would mean that you’re worthless, because the options are either being the best or being complete garbage. Again, I think it’s an overstatement and an oversimplification to call Hira a narcissist, but he has unresolved self-worth baggage that takes a somewhat narcissistic shape. In this way, he shows a kind of perfectionism that seems clearly underpinned by his self-worth issues. Instead of fueling achievements, this perfectionism keeps him stuck, inactive, too afraid to attempt what he thinks he might be able to do while clinging to a fantasy of what he could do if he ever got un-stuck and really tried.

That’s usually a secret. Remember when Hira didn’t make it through the first cut of the contest? He thought, “Even though I always deny it out loud, I did think photography was the one thing I can do. It felt like I was being ripped apart for being conceited" (dialogue from a fansub by @lollipopsub). The fact that he would "deny it out loud" is notable. I also think that he’s still not being entirely candid. If he thought “photography was the one thing [he] can do,” that wouldn’t exactly be “conceited”--it would actually be quite modest (about photography) and harshly self-critical (about everything else). I think deep down he has thoughts that are truly conceited, thoughts that he’s not just competent when it comes to photography, but “amazing,” as Noguchi puts it. Once again, Hira confirms everything Noguchi said with his “he sees right through me” reaction, so he agrees with this assessment.

This conceited side of Hira is never supposed to see the light of day. This is the main reason he’s so intensely embarrassed when Noguchi understands him so well, I think. It’s what Noguchi is talking about when he says that Hira “make[s] a shell by belittling [him]self.” Acting as if he’s the lowest of the low is a defense. It does correspond to the part of himself that fears, at times even believes, that he’s worthless. But it’s also a way of hiding his grandiose side. This is a way of protecting himself from the reaction others would have if they could see how highly he thinks of himself despite not having made enough effort to accomplish the sorts of things he thinks he’s capable of. It’s also a way of protecting himself from his own awareness of his shortcomings and pretensions.

There’s another type of perfectionism researchers have identified, called “covert perfectionism,” in which the person’s outward expectations of others are low and they don’t show their perfectionistic traits outwardly very much, if at all. They’re supposed to be more likely than some types to get trapped in the kind of stuckness I mentioned earlier, in which perfectionism prevents the person from making a real effort at things they would like to do well. In some important ways, Hira’s perfectionism resembles this type as well. You could say that his type of perfectionism has definite narcissistic attributes, but he hides it well enough that it is also covert.

A number of different articles on perfectionism that I looked at cited the same Brene Brown quote about it, from her book The Gifts of Imperfection. I think it’s very salient here. She writes:

Perfectionism is a self-destructive and addictive belief system that fuels this primary thought: If I look perfect, and do everything perfectly, I can avoid or minimize the painful feelings of shame, judgment, and blame.

This is very characteristic of Hira. He doesn’t expect to “look perfect” in most respects (he’s more likely to simply try to go unnoticed). But he is obsessed with avoiding those painful emotions. He has spent his entire life being shamed and judged and living in fear of it happening still more. He’s very strategic and has given a lot of thought to how best to avoid being shamed. In fact, these efforts seem to be part of the reason he is such an avid observer of the social structures around him–learning about those structures is a survival skill for him.

idealization and affiliation: borrowing status

In addition to factoring in his covert grandiosity, I think there’s something else to account for when looking closely at Hira’s apparent self-hatred. Hira’s self-critical tendencies can appear inflated if we lump examples that pertain to his relationship with Kiyoi in with other cases. They should actually be looked at separately, because their meanings are distinctly different. Again, I don’t contest that Hira has a low opinion of himself in a lot of respects. But I think when we step back and look at many of the biggest examples of what appears to be a negative view of himself, a lot of them are focused on where he stands in relation to Kiyoi. That’s not the same thing as his value as a person. And placing himself in a certain role in relation to Kiyoi has a specific kind of meaning for him, along with a specific kind of payoff.

Here comes another theoretical interlude. This time, I’m going to briefly touch on Heinz Kohut’s idea of the need for idealization.

Kohut was the originator of a school of thought called self psychology, a branch of psychoanalysis that underpins a lot of contemporary psychoanalytic/psychodynamic theory and practice. He was also an expert on narcissism and basically saw variations and degrees of narcissism as central to a lot of psychological challenges. (There’s some reason to believe Kohut may himself have had narcissistic personality disorder, which would have made him intimately familiar with its inner workings.)

Kohut’s self psychology departed from Freud’s whole psychosexual development model (basically, everyone’s least favorite aspect of Freudianism—the part with all the penis envy and Oedipal stuff and so forth). In its place, self psychology focuses on how we see ourselves, what our needs are in terms of self-image, and other matters that are very relevant to this discussion. One of Kohut’s most important insights was his observation that even when other people have a big impact on our psychological state, what we’re interacting with isn’t so much the other person themselves but our internalized idea of that person. Kohut called internalized versions of people and things from our external world “selfobjects.” (I’ll be circling back to this momentarily.)

One of Kohut’s most central concepts is idealization. In Kohut’s version of idealization, a person views someone else as basically perfect, maybe even omnipotent. The idealized person becomes a special kind of selfobject. In the best case scenario, the person doing the idealizing has some kind of real, personal connection to the idealized person. But even a mental connection to them via their status as a selfobject can meet a need in some ways.

By feeling connected to, or even just affiliated with, the idealized person, the idealizer feels like they take on some degree of the qualities they see in the idealized person. It’s not hard to see how this tendency would date back to childhood. Children have a particular need to idealize their parents at certain stages in their development. Thinking of their parents as strong, capable, in control, wise, calm, etc. gives children a sense of safety and a sort of borrowed self-esteem.

Once you’ve idealized someone, you feel a real need to continue to see them as special and powerful. Again, childrens’ views of their parents are a good example here. One reason children often blame themselves when they are neglected or abused is because they have a strong need to continue to view their parents favorably. Without that favorable view of their parent, their world would seem chaotic and dangerous. Blaming themselves often seems safer. Here, maintaining the high status of the idealized person is so important that it’s a bigger priority than preserving self-worth.

I bet you can guess where I’m going with this. Yep, Hira idealizes Kiyoi in the Kohutian sense of the word. There are a number of facets of this. Part of it involves viewing Kiyoi as basically perfect–outstanding in every way. Even when Hira sees Kiyoi as cruel, he seems to view this as an ideal attribute for someone like Kiyoi.

Hira not only states that he thinks of Kiyoi as “like a God" in season 1, episode 6, he frequently expects Kiyoi to have god-like qualities and abilities. In one of Nagira Yuu's shorter pieces about Hira and Kiyoi that's told from Hira's perspective, he's explicit about this. "Kiyoi's existence is already in a much higher dimension than human beings," he thinks. "Is he the successful fusion of deity and human? That is the big question" ("Wonderful World," as translated by @sparkling-rain). At points during the series, he expects Kiyoi to have a superhuman degree of freedom to do anything he wishes and to know things that would require him to read Hira's mind. He really does treat him as if he’s practically omnipotent.

Hira's idealization of Kiyoi has a number of implications. One is that Hira misunderstands the social structure at his school. He views Kiyoi as the unquestioned king and doesn’t see that in many ways, Kiyoi makes choices about how to behave in school out of a desire to stay on the good side of bullies like Shirota. This fundamental misunderstanding in turn makes it impossible for Hira to notice or understand all the ways Kiyoi tries to protect him at school. If Kiyoi were really at the peak of the school hierarchy, if he wanted to be nice to Hira, he would just do it. But because he has to maintain a certain image in order to keep himself safe, he has to help Hira in covert ways. For example, when Kiyoi admonishes Yoshida not to order Hira around or use his demeaning, ableist nickname, he makes it seem like he just wants Hira to be at his beck and call, which wouldn’t be possible if he were occupied doing tasks for others. But if that were the case, why would he object to Yoshida using the nickname? For that matter, why doesn’t Kiyoi ever use the nickname himself? (He says it aloud in his exchange with Yoshida, but he never actually uses it to address Hira.) If Hira weren’t so invested in the idea of Kiyoi’s supreme power, he might have noticed these disparities between his narrative and reality within the story.

In season 2, the fact that Hira is both someone who has a relationship with Kiyoi and at the same time is a fan of Kiyoi as a performer points out another aspect of idealization. While I’ve never seen Kohut’s concept of idealization applied to fandom, I think there’s at least a variation of it at play when we feel comforted by, or as if we gain status from, being a fan of a person (or a group, piece of media, etc.) that we see as special or powerful. When we get excited because the sports team we root for does well or our favorite actor wins an award or is in a movie or show that does well, I think we’re experiencing a kind of gratification based on a selfobject that we feel is ideal in some way. Our status as fans gives us an affiliation that feels similar to a real connection. (Parasocial relationships are related to this as well–something that’s likely to resonate with those of us who participate in BL fandom, where examples of parasocial relationships abound.)

So both as a fan and as a classmate, then a (sort of) friend, then a boyfriend, Hira gets a great deal of satisfaction and happiness from idealizing Kiyoi and feeling like he has a kind of tie to him. This is completely interwoven with the love he feels for Kiyoi in the beginning. But it also makes it very difficult for him to acknowledge the ways in which Kiyoi doesn’t actually resemble his initial, idealized selfobject of him. Kiyoi isn’t omnipotent. He was never actually the most powerful person in their high school class. In many ways, he’s actually a better person than his selfobject version. Although Kiyoi isn’t the nicest person ever, he’s not nearly as cruel as the cold, imperious figure Hira paints him as.

Sometimes Hira chooses this selfobject over Kiyoi the human being, and Kiyoi knows it. In season 1, episode 4, when Hira starts to get close to Kiyoi but then backs off, protesting that he’s just a “servant” and Kiyoi is his “king,” Kiyoi responds by telling him (in the Viki subtitle translation), “I don’t care if you chase your ideal of me, but leave the real me alone.” This dynamic, of course, is a huge theme in their relationship that continues all the way to the end of season 2 and beyond.

Those are some of the ways in which Hira insists on maintaining his idealized selfobject of Kiyoi. But there’s another way he clings to this idealization, which I think is harder to see at first: in order for Kiyoi to be elevated, Hira has to be beneath him. This is actually one of the most paradoxical parts of this paradoxical structure, because in Hira’s view, he has to be beneath Kiyoi in order for Kiyoi to be exalted, but by exalting Kiyoi, Hira’s status is raised. It sounds strange at first, but it’s not a new idea. The notion of humbly dedicating oneself to someone or something that you uphold as an ideal sounds like an act of self-abnegation, but in the minds of those who take on such a role, by affiliating themselves with this perfect person or thing, some of the magical aura of that perfection rubs off on them.

It’s a bit like members of the clergy in the past (in a Christian/European context), who were known to humble themselves completely, taking vows of poverty, depriving themselves in various ways, even mortifying their flesh. Through these humbling acts, these people were seen by themselves and others as closer to God than an ordinary person, potentially as a channel to God–even as someone who could actually speak for God. By humbling themselves and exalting their ideal, they became something greater than they would ever have been capable of being on their own. Hira’s approach is remarkably similar. In keeping with his description of Kiyoi as a kind of god, he talks about wanting to be a “nun.” (As I understand it, he’s describing a role more like that of a shrine maiden in Shintoism than a nun in any Christian tradition, but there’s enough similarity in those roles to justify the translation.) Basically, if you make your ideal person perfect enough, then even being their servant gives you a lot of status, especially if you’re their most devoted, indispensable servant.

I’m reminded of a passage from the novel here. In the novel version of the story, Kiyoi visits Hira at his new home. A different situation than the one in the series has led to him living alone for the first time, and as in the series, Kiyoi uses his need for a rehearsal space as an excuse to visit Hira there. The situation is somewhat different from the series, but similar in essentials. Hira and Kiyoi have a conversation that leads to an exchange that is equivalent to the conversation that takes place right after the finger incident in the series. In the novel, this scene is portrayed from Kiyoi’s point of view; anything in italics is his internal dialogue. (The ellipsis below is mine.)

‘What am I to you?’

‘The person I love most in the word.’

It was this firm response that gave Kiyoi courage.

‘Then, do you want to date me?’

Kiyoi felt his face burning. Just say yes. If you do, I’ll be able to be honest too. Kiyoi’s heart was pounding as he waited for Hira’s answer, but the answer he got was something that he hadn’t expected.

‘I don’t want to.’

Kiyoi blinked.

‘Why?’

…

‘Because you’re the king.’

‘Huh?’

Kiyoi’s eyes blinked even faster than before.

‘I mean…Kiyoi is like a king, and I’m merely an ordinary person who serves the king; it’s not like I do it out of obligation, but in my mind, I view myself as Captain Duck…Ah, by Captain Duck, I’m referring to a yellow toy in the shape of a duck that children play with in swimming pools or bathtubs, you know?’

–I know, but what does that have to do with it?

Not caring about Kiyoi, who wanted to ask something, Hira continued to explain about the duck. He kept babbling on and on about how Captain Duck once used to float in the sewage and was now proudly floating down a golden river as a prestigious toy of the king, and it was very satisfied with its current life.

(from this section of White Lotus’s novel translation)

Hira is explicit here about the servant/king relationship he envisions for himself and Kiyoi. But the rubber duck imagery is even more telling. Being a cheap toy, an inanimate object of so little value that it’s almost disposable, is more than enough for Hira as long as he can be associated with Kiyoi–if he can be ‘a prestigious toy of the king.’ Just belonging to Kiyoi, even (or especially?) as an insignificant object, equates to ‘proudly floating down a golden river.’ Again, placing Kiyoi in an exalted position and then abasing himself (while maintaining a link to Kiyoi) is Hira’s way of using idealization to achieve a paradoxical kind of status.

The conflict over Hira’s unrelenting idealization of Kiyoi comes to a head in season 2 when Hira fails to understand why his comment about Kiyoi and his parents having “nothing to do with one another” was hurtful.

Kiyoi: Do you not get how I feel right now?

Hira: I don’t!

Kiyoi: Think about it! If you don’t get it, think! [tapping Hira on the head]

Hira: Sorry.

Kiyoi: I don’t want you to apologize.

Hira: But…you’re mad at me.

Kiyoi: It’s always like this. I get mad, and you take the blame. But in reality you just don’t get it!

Hira: No, I don’t! The stars in the sky and the ones watching them will never align!

Kiyoi: What does space have to do with it?!

Hira: Because you and I are completely different! We’re in different dimensions and on different paths. That’s why stars shine so brightly! If I try to touch it or to understand it, all I’ll do is pull the star down to my level! So what I’m saying is…in reality…I don’t…want to understand you.

(dialogue translated by @lollipopsub)

Hira makes this dynamic very explicit here. It’s not just that he thinks Kiyoi is superior and his role is to serve him. He’s determined to actively resist interacting with Kiyoi on an even playing field. It’s particularly clear when he says, “If I try to touch it or to understand it, all I’ll do is pull the star down to my level.” Seeing things from Kiyoi’s point of view or touching him–metaphorically, and in some ways literally–would “pull [Kiyoi] down to [Hira’s] level.” Instead of raising Hira’s status, this would degrade Kiyoi’s. The distance between Kiyoi and Hira–the lack of understanding and meaningful contact–is (from Hira’s perspective) a feature, not a bug. It’s integral to the gratification Hira experiences when he watches Kiyoi as if he were a star–something both beautiful and trillions of miles away.

One sign of the importance Hira places on Kiyoi’s exalted social status is how irritated, even livid, he gets when other people don’t recognize and behave in accordance with his views on the social hierarchy and where they stand in relation to Kiyoi.

For example, when Shirota and his friends make shitty comments about Kiyoi after he doesn’t win the contest, they’re obviously being assholes. But what bothers Hira most is that they are acting as if Kiyoi failing to win a highly competitive national contest means he’s beneath them, when in fact, it’s unlikely any of them would have qualified as contestants, much less made it to the finals like Kiyoi did. To Hira, it’s their lack of understanding of their place in the hierarchy, their lack of recognition that Kiyoi is above them, that is most damning. Which is legitimately infuriating–they’re being incredibly arrogant. But personally, I think it’s clearly more important that they’re being critical and dismissive of someone they claim is their friend right when he has just gone through something very disappointing. That’s not a big concern for Hira, though. In addition to deriving a kind of status from his association with Kiyoi, he also finds some satisfaction in knowing that while his status in relation to Kiyoi is low, at least he can correctly gauge where he stands, unlike others.

And he seems to relish not only correctly assessing his place in the world but also maintaining a particularly lowly role. This isn’t inherent to idealization, though as I’ll talk about further, this combination of factors isn’t unique to Hira by any stretch. I mentioned that Hira’s perfectionism, among other things, is a way of attempting to, as Brene Brown put it, “avoid or minimize the painful feelings of shame, judgment, and blame.” Hira does have some grandiose beliefs about himself, but he also views himself as inferior in many ways. This tension creates the stuckness that often comes with perfectionism, and this blocks Hira from attaining goals that would fuel a more healthy kind of self-esteem. Gaining status through his association with an idealized version of Kiyoi gets around all of these problems.

Hira also seems to view his grandiose thoughts as a sort of jinx, a way of tempting fate. Think back again to his thoughts when he found out that he hadn’t made the first cut in the Young Photographica contest. “It felt like I was being ripped apart for being conceited.” In Hira’s world, having grandiose thoughts–or at least, buying into them–brings punishment. It’s better, and safer, to embrace total abjection. This is one more reason why it seems safest to put Kiyoi on a pedestal while placing himself in the most inferior position possible. At least, this seems safest until Hira realizes he could lose Kiyoi entirely if he doesn’t stop this destructive pattern.

When Hira does finally try to make a shift in how he relates to Kiyoi at the end of season 2, the big gesture he makes toward “look[ing] at [Kiyoi] straight on” is setting, then communicating, the goal of photographing Kiyoi in the role of professional photographer. This is a very appropriate way for him to make this move. Viewing Kiyoi more as an equal means having to relinquish some part of the status and self-worth he borrows from his idealized image of Kiyoi; this is the perfect time, then, for him to find some self-worth of his own by finally putting himself out there as a photographer and making a real effort to test his abilities.

That's it for this installment! I hope to get part 2 posted within the next week. Edited to add, four months later: That was a little unrealistic! But I'm determined to finish it off one of these days.

Edited to add:

Adding an edit here as I noticed what seems like a rather glaring omission. I failed to reference a scene that bears out a lot of what I have to say in this post. It happens when Hira is staying with Noguchi in Eternal. They have this exchange over ramen:

Noguchi: I was just like you in the past. All full of myself and thought that everything I saw was boring. I was always angry and all, "You're all worthless and should disappear!" Hira: I don't think we're alike at all, though. Noguchi: Having too much confidence and having too little confidence, they're two sides of the same paper in the sense that they're both signs of a damaged self-consciousness. Anything could make you switch sides at the drop of a hat.

(Emphasis mine.)

Citations for individual quotes are included with their respective quotes. The following sources were used:

When I quoted series dialogue, I used the wording @lollipopsub used in their (sadly no longer accessible in the US) fansub whenever possible. I lost access to this version so these quotes are from my notes.

I also quoted the Viki subs (which are good, just not quite as good as the ones @lollipopsub made) when needed. On one occasion I used the Viki version because it supported my point better.

When I quoted the novel, I quoted a fan translation by White Lotus featured on a site called Chrysanthemum Garden.

I also briefly quoted a short story translated by @sparkling-rain here.

When I quoted Eternal, I quoted a fansub that (at the subber’s request) will remain nameless.

[batsplat]

☕️ on marc/dani as teammates? bc so many ppl on here especially have such a simplified and maybe even rose-tinted view of their dynamic imo…..

hm yeah it's a tricky one because I do think there's a lot of genuine interpersonal fondness there that was forged in the aftermath of some equally genuine animosity. for me, it's that development that's particularly interesting... what I personally have always found the most appealing about this rivalry is just how ruthless marc as to someone he genuinely admired and considered one of his heroes or 'references'. like, I think it's a bit different from the dynamic with valentino because it's kind of... vale's the childhood hero vs dani as a rider who's ahead of you who you want to directly emulate in rising through the ranks. with valentino, marc didn't really think they'd ever be competing at the top of the sport because of how big the age gap was, but with dani? different story

which does affect the emotional approach, I reckon - you can admire them and still dream of beating them, you know? like, say you're fourteen years old in 2007 and are getting out your customised casey stoner voodoo doll while he's bitch slapping your two guys, what fantasies are you cooking up in your little brain about meeting your heroes? with valentino, it's probably him grinning at you while handing you your tenth consecutive motogp trophy and telling you how amazing you are... how you're his successor, the one carrying on his legacy... lots of daydreaming of him like, hyping you up after he's retired and calling you god's gift to motorcycle racing, etc etc. who knows, maybe marc was also fantasising about beating valentino in epic duels, but he wasn't really expecting to be fighting valentino, right? whereas with dani? oh yeah, marc might have thought he was great... but in an ideal world, he's ripping the crown off dani's head when dani's a three time defending motogp champion! so crucially marc wasn't blindsided by actually fighting him on-track, and was kinda more prepared for that to get ugly? dani acts as a 'direct' reference, where he's just a few years ahead and marc can see how it's done, basically. but what this still means... he'd admired this guy for years, he had posters of him and all that shit, but the moment they're direct competitors and teammates? all that is just... locked away. no interest no mercy, all he cares about is beating the guy. and marc did still talk about using dani as a reference point, about how much he'd learned from him... but of course that scary fast learning of his was all about beating dani

from dani's side... I'm glad he's gotten to a stage where he's at peace with his career, but. god, it must have been tough. at the end of 2012, he's the in-form rider - more so than jorge. he won six of the last eight races that year. incidentally, this is how jorge is talking before the 2013 season:

obviously, jorge is trying to fuck with dani here, but he's also not really wrong. all four of the aliens have got a lot going on early 2013, but if you had to point at the guy who is dealing with the most pressure? well, it's got to be dani, doesn't it. he was the one who still had something to prove in the premier class, who was now being thrown together with the super hyped rookie. this is how dani spoke about marc at the start of the year:

and here:

and then of course marc beat dani at qatar and then won at cota... granted, dani does a good job of keeping his head and regrouping for the next few races - but it was still an auspicious start, provoking a lot of discourse that wasn't particularly kind to dani. so in that first year, you've got all these different elements - you've got how marc is competing on-track, dani's injury, how marc is already attempting to assert himself within the team, how you've got the behind the scenes warfare between their two teams (again, see this article)... and then dani's issues with marc's actual riding (x, x). now, I think it's worth saying that aragon 2013 is not a case where marc has clearly fucked up. he makes a mistake, yes, but he couldn't have known the slight contact he made with dani would lead to that wire breaking and dani's highside. here's what dani said:

this is a case where different racing philosophies clash, right? what dani's saying is that what happened was a direct consequence of how marc approaches riding - that he's always flirting with contact and this time it finally went wrong. it's the kind of riding dani has consistently disliked, and it's something marc is the poster boy for. in this case, this crash essentially ends dani's title bid. he couldn't walk for three days afterwards. dani criticised race direction for choosing not to give marc a penalty (apart from the penalty points) - this was not something he just brushed off

and, look, you do have to bring it up... dani's experiences with sic will inevitably have influenced how he approached the marc rivalry. I mean, it kind of did for all of them - there's elements of that tragedy that will have bled into how valentino, jorge, dovi and dani reacted to marc. with casey, it's one of the reasons why marc never even had an on-track rivalry with him. now, obviously, dani had big, big issues with sic, a lot of tension including harsh comments in the press and refused handshakes and all of that, as a result of sic's very aggressive approaching to racing. dani was also the one who suffered the most as a direct result, in particular after the broken collarbone at le mans. he's spoken after sic's passing about his regret about how he handled that relationship... how it changed his approach to rivalries, that reminder that there might be things he'd never have the chance to fix

the other sic-related element is that of course, there were easy parallels to be drawn between him and marc, and his shadow did at times loom uncomfortably over debates over hard racing during that period. I think you can feel it most strongly in jorge's response to marc... the echoes of when jorge had gotten in a verbal clash with sic at one of the 2011 pressers and his frustration when his complaints were just laughed off by journalists:

this press conference was from the race before le mans, where sic was responsible for dani's broken collarbone. so if two years later, you've got marc publicly shrugging off jorge's complaints in an only slightly more respectful manner, how can you not be at least a little concerned? yes, marc did have a better feeling of where the limit was, he didn't really push things too far, but... this was still a very recent trauma for everyone and nobody knew how far marc would or wouldn't push it at the time. especially not after the kind of reputation he'd gotten himself in his 125cc/moto2 days. (though of course it's important to note that sic's death wasn't caused by his style of racing, and if anything he'd gotten more sensible in the latter stages of 2011). so the influence goes both ways, right? on the one hand, it all feels a bit too familiar, on the other... well, that's actually a reason why you probably don't want to be too harsh on this kid. because you never know

in the end, the tensest year of their teammate partnership was 2013 - because after that title was sealed marc had won. by the end of the year, it wasn't really dani's team any more. his internal position had already been de facto undermined by casey, but not to the same extent because casey wasn't really interested in playing these games - plus the end stretch of 2012 had definitely cemented dani's role in the team. I've already given most of my thoughts here about how marc takes control of that team, which inevitably touches on some of his nastier behaviour. lying about what parts suited him is the obvious example... he's a ruthless teammate, he openly admits to it. and obviously, dani wasn't always just fine with that. who would be? he's accepted that's part of who marc is as a competitor, and at the end of the day he also had to accept losing. sometimes you just gotta make your peace with a status quo, yeah? it's tricky to strike the balance between not losing the competitive edge and not letting losing to your young teammate year after year drive you insane... dani's always been quite good at focusing on himself, even if a lot of the time 'focusing on himself' involved 'recovering from some horrid injury'

so you know, it's nice that their relationship has gotten warmer since they've no longer been teammates, and for the most part they did keep things civil while they were directly working with each other. also, you do just get over things when you're no longer competing with someone... I've said this before, but there's really only a relatively small number of truly burnt bridges in the paddock ecosystem. thing is, it's quite impressive of dani to seemingly not hold any grudges over what marc did to him... but he easily could have, and it kinda would've been justifiable? it's also primarily down to dani that this teammate dynamic didn't get worse than it was... which, y'know, you can argue if that was the right or the wrong approach, but it also meant he increasingly had to accept a subordinate role within that team - become a non-problematic teammate that honda was happy to sign again. and then you've got marc, who spent years looking up to dani and then spent years being pretty vicious to him and never saw the slightest contradiction between those two things, because of course he didn't! and of course he still has some historical fondness for him as a result of once being his fan... which is an element that has gradually snuck to the foreground again after marc increasingly managed to dismiss dani as a competitive threat. overall, then, as teammates they had their early tensions, then they were 'reasonably friendly coworkers', now they get on quite well. over the course of his career, dani's hardly been immune to drama with other riders, but at the end of the day he's pretty feud-proof on the whole. what kind of a nutter would you have to be to start a feud with dani pedrosa, eh

[sunbloomdew]

Tamarack & Qiu about the Forest and the Neighbourhood

Recently I’ve been playing various visual novel games, and I stumbled upon the Our Life series. Needless to say, I am deeply in love with it. While playing the “Our Life: Now & Forever” game demo, I noticed the character’s different opinions about their environment. It’s a simple observation but I really wanted to share it, so here I am!

Depending on which character we meet up with first when we embark on our paper airplane message investigation, they will express their thoughts on the forest and the town.

(I'll be referring to Qiu with he/him pronouns, as these are the ones that are used for this character in childhood!)

Qiu likes the forest, but prefers the town over it. To him that is the centre of activity in Golden Grove.

He says that aside from the seasons changing it's like time doesn't exist in the forest. The fauna and flora there are all the same at all times, and he finds it weird.

I think that because the life in the forest changes in very subtle ways, he doesn't really considers that important. The plants grow but it's not like they move to different spots. They stay in one place, like the path in the forest.

That's why the neighbourhood and the town, where other people live is more appealing to him. It's much easier to notice when something changes in a more lively space, and those developments tend to be more dynamic too, as such they can appear more interesting. Especially for kids. Since their attention span tends to be short, faster occurring shifts capture their attention better.

On the other hand, Tamarack openly expresses her dislike of the town.

To her, the town is the very opposite of fun. The buildings are old and dusty, and the people don't do anything. As she describes it, they sit around all the time.

Tamarack finds the town stagnant and boring because of that. The buildings look the same and stay in one place. You can decorate them, but they are always structures, constructed with a set purpose in mind.

I can't quite understand the meaning behind these words: "Nobody is going anywhere or doing anything. They just live in this place, sit around, and do that forever." If I had to provide an interpretation of those words, I'd say what Tamarack means by them, is that people have assigned roles in the community and certain habits that make it seem like their life are same, unchanging routine. That does not appeal to her in the slightest.

In stark contrast to Qiu, Tamarack considers the forest a place where everything constantly evolves.

She pays attention to the way nature is alive on its own. The tree may not walk around, but it's bark overgrows with lichen and fungi, that spread, or get eaten, or grow sick and die. The animals collect food, branches to build shelter and move from place to place. Those small changes, that occur all the time, forever, fascinate Tamarack.

As she puts it:

I found it interesting how Qiu and Tamarack focus on different signs of life, and are basically opposites in their view of those two places. To Qiu the town is exciting because there is always something going on there with people, but Tamarack thinks they do the same forever. Qiu may see neighbours talk to eachother everyday and find it interesting because they discuss different topics, but to Tamarack, they are just doing the same activity all the time, which is boring. On the contrary, Tamarack thinks the forest is magical in the way it constantly transforms, but Qiu sees it as a place without any sort of changes going on there, which unnerves him. I find those two views of the same spaces really interesting.

Later when the trio walks to school for the first time, Qiu is baffled when Tamarack states that the forest is the only good place around.

(She says that regardless if MC likes or dislikes the woods. If our character likes them, Qiu says the dialogue above. If not, he will say: "Hey, so, it's kind of funny how you like the woods that much." referring to Tamarack alone.)

While they have different opinions on these places, it's nice that they don't argue over it. Would I have expected this to happen? No, but it's still good that it doesn't.

It's not a groundbreaking observation, but I enjoyed thinking about it and writing this post nonetheless. I'm looking foward to learning more about those two! They are both so adorable. I can't wait to become best friends with them <3

Peace out (❁´◡`❁)

[foundfam2754]

garvez thoughts after cme s17e6, "message in a bottle" (kind of an essay)

yesterday's episode left me with a lot thoughts on where erica and the team is going to take garvez going forward in the show. it left me kind of conflicted. after downloading with another fan-friend of mine, here's a post on how i feel.

please please please don't be mad if you disagree - in fact i'd welcome conversation with other garvez shippers on this :) dm me, reblog or comment!! also, pls note when i refer to us as the audience, or use the royal "we", i'm generalizing.

thoughts (and spoilers for 17x5 and 17x6) below the fold:

-----------

overall, i think it sucks that they're floating a potential new love interest for luke in teresa; it seems like one more step away from seeing penelope and luke together on the show for real and we've already seen this kind of relationship play out with luke & dr. lisa. i'm ready for him and penelope to get together. plus, this frickin' love square cannot and SHOULD not get more complicated than it already is (anyone else who's seen gossip girl getting nate, serena, blair, chuck, dan vibes? everyone's dating everyone).

plus plus shamefully i kinda love the tyler/luke bromance and luke / teresa could put a dent in that

however, and perhaps a more hopeful outlook than most fans have after 17x06, they've never leaned this explicitly into pen and luke as a couple on CM before. s17 feels like the first time. it's been implied, they've hinted at it, they've even gone on one terrible date, but the words (three words, eight letters for my GG fans) have never been said out loud by luke or pen before. so, to have them actually have the romantic and sexual tension between them be blatantly addressed (even if it is by elias) and for luke to say the words "i love her" (in a manner of speaking, of course) is a big deal to me. it's development of this storyline, even if slow. that gives me hope that there could be something that gets played out in the future.

adding onto this, i do think we have to acknowledge that when it comes to criminal minds, they've never done a romantic relationship within the team before (with the exception of spence and jj, but we can all agree that it was poorly done, rushed and abrupt). also, that it's the chemistry and camaraderie of the team and the friendships that go back 15+ seasons that make the show special. so from the perspective of the writers, i understand that they may feel it risky to play with the luke / pen relationship further than they already have. i'm not saying that having pen and luke dating would mess up the team dynamic, but i am saying it's a change and anything can happen. they know that flirting works with audiences (luke and pen, derek and pen), but they've seen that actual romantic feelings may not (spence and jj). overall, i understand if they want to take introducing and establishing penelope and luke as an official couple slowly

(i do understand that for us it's not been slow and we recognized the dynamic between garvez immediately, but s15 was really the first time the show addressed the possibility of a romantic relationship, and for the writers it may not be a long time coming)

i also think that if the writers are playing the long game, a relationship between teresa and luke may be interesting just to play with the dynamic and maybe get penelope to take some action. plus, i think it adds nuance to the love square. in an universe where we believe teresa's destined for tyler and penelope for luke, each member of the group may need to take their time realizing who they really belong with (but i'm still going to harumph at romantic!teresa/luke or romantic!greencia).

this is all to say that, we may have to just be a bit more patient. it can still happen and the eventual outcome may be even better if we let the writers play it out, now that they're actually addressing the relationship. i'm hopeful, in the meanwhile, we can revel the little nuggets of garvez love that adam and kirsten and erica throw our way and the incredible fanfics that writers in our fandom create.

now, pessimistically and on the other hand, it's very possible that luke's "she knows I love her" and teresa's "but she's still into tyler" were said because the creative team has decided that they played around with garvez enough and they're happy with how they are, and luke's ready to move on...with teresa. luke's feelings have been addressed and said out loud, so now may be his time to move forward. add on to this that PG wasn't too bothered by a luke/teresa relationship and that luke and teresa talked about how it's a bad idea to date coworkers, it's a possibility.

so really, my conflict isn't resolved, and i'm not sure on which side i stand. but, i really love this show, these actors, this ship and this fandom so i wanted to share how i feel.

man, i usually hate slow burns, but this show and garvez are worth it.

[ms-cartoon]

HB Western Energy, Rant Review

Okay, imma just go ahead and jump straight into it....

-- Stolas and Stella barking at each other like a couple of high schoolers. Calling each other names n stuff. Even Stella yelling “F*CKISH. IMP. SUCKER!!” Okay... is she mad about the affair or not? I mean, yeah... we kinda learn that she doesn’t care about that and had always hated Stolas (even then, it still doesn’t make sense given how this was written) But she yelled that with such anger in her voice and she keeps calling him things that go along the lines of either banging an imp or being a cheater. She even called a hitman on him while referring to him as a “cheating prick!” All I’m saying is, if she really hated Stolas from the get-go and if she actually doesn’t care about the affair, then make her act like it. I don’t even think she should even care about who he did it with. Even if she was embarrassed about it being with an imp, it’s not that serious. Especially when she already hates him. The writers are just making her unnecessarily petty.

-- Speaking of the bickering, I can’t even take these two seriously anymore with the way they’re fighting. Once again, I feel like I’m looking at immature high schoolers cussing and throwing childish insults at each other. This was not the kind of dynamic I was expecting at all. And this was supposed to be the abusive relationship we’re expected to cry for Stolas over??? The writers were making it seem like Stolas was the sensitive one in the relationship the entire time, afraid of standing up to her. He could’ve thrown her out a long time ago if it was that simple.

-- Man... the C word is being spat out more than the f-bombs in this episode!

-- We see from Stolas’s phone that he’s planning to have a meeting with Asmodeus soon. This is probably about the whole crystal thing to give to Blitzo in the future so he could FINALLY drop the deal about giving the grimoire back in exchange for sex. How much you wanna bet this meeting with Asmodeus is a pointless plot hole waiting to happen until the last minute? I can just tell by the way the scheduled meeting on Stolas’s phone was shown to us in a blink of an eye and it wasn’t even that important.

-- Stolas: Cheating implies there was a betrayal. This woman never gave two sh*ts about me or very much our arranged marriage.” 

Oh jeezus... less than 40 seconds in and this episode already pissed off with the bullsh*t. These writers are seriously telling us “It’s okay that Stolas cheated on his wife, cuz she never liked him anyway.” Well, OF COURSE NOW we know she never liked him! Of course, NOW it’s revealed she abused Stolas the whole time they were married! I mean after all, how else is Viv gonna let Stolas slip by and have him be in the right EVERY. GODDAMN. TIME!!! As if all of his flaws from season 1 to the last episode just never happened and now suddenly, he did nothing wrong and his affair is completely justified when it shouldn’t be. Y’all can see it how you wanna see it, but cheating is cheating and it’s wrong!! It doesn’t matter if Stella never loved him or he never loved her. If he really couldn’t stand her, he could’ve just divorced her when he had the chance too. It’s not like anything was stopping him from before. You could say Octavia was the main reason why he stayed, but he and Stella already fight in front of her!! She was already not happy with this family to begin with since the first season. And besides, how can we even say that cheating on Stella was excusable when Octavia was obviously affected by it?? He may not have cared about how Stella felt, but what about Octavia!!?? His DAUGHTER!??

-- Stella in the first episode of the second season made it seem like the whole divorce thing was gonna be a big deal like it was a whole violation to the Goetia demons and Stolas was breaking a rule, but so far... the divorce did nothing. All we see is her bickering with him more and demanding her belongings back from the mansion. She never even liked him from the beginning anyway, what would make her so upset about the divorce? What does she have to lose from it? The power? The money, the status?? I mean, she would lose her status as a queen... but that’s it. Aside from that, she’s still a noble and she’s rich. She shouldn’t have anything to worry about. And she mentioned her brother as if he wasn’t to be messed with. Like he was gonna be angry and come after Stolas for having the audacity to divorce his sister. But all I see is a pompous peacock who just wants money and doesn’t care at all about Stella’s divorce... Why would they even be asking for money or power????  They’re already rich as hell!!! What else could they possibly want to gain from Stolas?? Just more money???? Wha- do they want the kind of status that Stolas has; a demon prince? Cuz, I don’t think that’s how it works. Even if they did have motives for trying to get what they want, those motives don’t even make any sense. They’re trying to rid Stolas of possessions that they already own. So this whole motivation for keeping Stolas alive along with the conversation that they had is pointless. From where it stands even from the second season, Viv is just making Stella and Andre evil for no reason. She only wants them to be evil without thinking it through and to make Stolas look good.

-- We’re barely a minute in this episode and we jump straight to Striker breaking in, shooting, and kidnapping Stolas! That introduction had no build-up whatsoever. It happened so swiftly, I couldn’t even keep up!! This episode is already so rushed and fast-paced, and Andrealphus didn’t even get a proper first appearance. Like the show showed us Andre spoke for two seconds without a good first appearance. Almost as if he’s already made his appearance before, and this is our first time seeing him in the show and hearing his voice.

-- I find it funny how in the festival episode, Striker was being a little slick in his assassination attempt; hiding in his room before shooting at Stolas from a far distance, which seems like a more clever and cleaner way to go about it. But in THIS episode, he wastes no time just BARGING with his horse through the window, making a scene, and shooting bullets head-on right then and there??? And now he’s just straight-up being messy with it? Plus, now that Stolas can see he’s being shot at, he’s able to dodge every bullet coming his way, making it difficult for Striker to kill him. This wouldn’t have been so hard have Striker gone about it the way he did back at the festival; he could’ve hidden somewhere, shot Stolas, and BOOM mission complete. Why is he being so extra with it??? And he’s supposed to be an assassin??

-- Striker: *Somehow, shoots a bullet through Stolas’s hat.*

Well damn, no wonder this dude couldn’t shoot him. He got no aim.....

-- Why does Stolas keep dodging and flying from Striker anyway? All he has to do is look at him and turn him into stone. Frikin’ turn into a huge demon if you have to. Use your telekinesis to stop the bullets!! Now this so-called “prince” got tied into a knot by angelic ropes that restricts his powers when he should’ve been able to save his own ass. “Oh dear, the is worrisome.” Yeah, no sh*t buddy... 

-- Even though he’s tied up, Stolas managed to pick up his phone and contact Blitzo. His powers are secured, fine. But his hands, legs, and feet are still free. He could literally just jump off of Striker’s horse using his legs and feet while they’re still on the ground and try to free himself with his hands.

-- Stolas: “I seem to have been stolen by that little cowboy friend of yours.”

 Moxxie: “Can you describe him, your highness?” 

Stolas: *Looks at Striker* “Sexy?” 

 Just say his name!!! You already know who he is!! You announced him back at the harvest moon festival! And you’ve seen him there!!! How come you don’t remember who he is all of a sudden??? yeah, “Good memory” my a**! And why is “Sexy” the first thing that comes to mind when you’re describing him?? I guess he doesn’t completely mark Blitzo as a single-target sexuality. And how come Moxxie immediately knows who Stolas is talking about when he was describing him? Does Moxxie think Striker looks sexy??? Like bro, your wife is right beside you!! LOL!

-- Stolas to Blitzo: I think you should come save me.”

Dude... just try to break free from the ropes and jump off the horse!!! Your hands and legs are free!! Stop being such a damsel waiting for your knight in shining armor. This is just another excuse to have Blitzo come and save you when there are other options.

-- Loona doesn’t say a word in this, but I’m not gonna b*tch about it like I do with everything else. Her voice actress’s fiance passed away due to cancer recently I believe, and she’s been going through it. So sorry for your loss, Erica! I hope all is well and you’re doing okay!

-- This whole comedic side plot with Blitzo and Loona seemed a little boring and I barely cracked a laugh. Nowadays, the Brandon Rodgers comedy is much more funny in his youtube videos than him as a cartoon character. There are more f-bombs in his dialogue than there is any character in him. Literally, any time he’s provoked, he pulls out his guns and attempts to murder someone, and it’s usually not even that serious. Not gonna lie, it kinda annoys me at this point. It wasn’t funny to me when they were in Hollywood, especially when he was going through some serious trauma which caused his rampage in the first place and we were supposed to be sad for him, so it definitely doesn’t make me laugh now.  And they try to force a Karen character into this to make it more funny, but- I’m sorry. It doesn’t work for me. 

-- Blitzo keeps complaining that he and Loona have to wait every 5 years to get a shot in the hospital, which I’m assuming is supposed to be a joke saying that all hospitals are a drag and super slow. I’m sorry? 5 years??? That’s a bit of a stretch! As far as my knowledge goes, most hospitals do take the time to schedule appointments for their clients. Even when it does take long, well... fairly enough, they do have a lot of clients to get through in at least one year. You can’t fully blame them for taking their time. It’s not like they’re being lazy. So yeah, I wouldn’t really make fun of that.

-- This little b plot shouldn’t even be in this episode anyway! This whole side plot was supposed to be comedic, but it just doesn’t fit at all when we’re dealing with a serious situation of Stolas being kidnapped and about to get killed. And the fact that we keep cutting away from this plot back to back is even worse! I think it makes more since to give Millie and Moxxie more attention than to continuously show the shenanigans happening with Blitzo and Loona. Either that or save the whole “Loona’s shot” thing for another episode and instead have Blitzo join Moxxie and Millie in saving Stolas. Loona doesn’t have any lines in this anyway, so she doesn’t even have to be in this episode.

-- The lady at the counter says she couldn’t read but was able to find Blitzo’s name on her paper sheets just fine with no issue. Clearly they didn’t think this dialogue through. What, does she have short-term memory? How was she even hired??

-- This whole folk song about Striker is so stupid. It’s honestly pretty forgettable. For real though, how come this dude suddenly has a reputation for being the most badass assassin in the West??? This episode is pretty much showing us that he is very well-known amongst all the demons. But aren’t most assassins supposed to be... idk, secretive??? Plus, if everyone already knows about him, how come Millie’s parents didn’t know who he was before they hired him as a farm hand??? And why is he suddenly a famous assassin?? Wasn’t he supposed to be some random imp who was hired by Stella to kill someone? This is just a whole other retcon. Goddamn it, I am so sick of all these retcons!!

-- I’m so glad Striker shut them up. That was the only part in this whole episode to make me laugh.

-- I honestly forget that Millie and Moxxie are even in this episode. I’m sorry- are these two just meant to be the supporting cast now??? Are they only just there to show everybody how cute of a couple they are? Cuz we already know this!!! So M&M are the ones to go and save Stolas because they have to “settle a score” with Striker.... What exactly is it that you have to settle with Striker? The loss of your fight with him?? Okay, sure, but I still don’t know why they feel the need to “settle a score” with him. It’s not like he did anything that they held a grudge against. Millie’s leg almost got amputated cuz of him, but that’s it. She’s walking just fine, otherwise. And Moxxie did feel inferior to Striker, but it was nothing serious (plus he continues to feel inferior with no kind of build up. So that whole plot alone was pointless). I just feel like there’s not much bad blood between them to settle a score for. It makes more sense for Blitzo to go rescue Stolas while M&M assisted him. And besides, Moxxie and Millie trying to fight off Striker didn’t exactly end well the last time. Blitzo shouldn’t have any trust in them to take care of him themselves. The only reason why they succeeded in this episode is because.... plot.

-- Of course, we just have to have some other pointless conflict that happens and is concluded in a blink of an eye. So Millie puts a cowboy hat on Moxxie and they stop to get gas. While Millie walks around and asks questions, some random a**hole confronts Moxxie about the hat he’s wearing and assumed he stole one of his simply because it looks like the one he’s wearing. Did it ever occur to this moron that most hats just look similar to each other? Why is he getting his d*ck in a twist over some stupid headwear?

-- OH F*CK OFF WITH THIS!!! So now Moxxie is suddenly a strong badass and could brawl with more than two people twice his size!!??? Where the hell was THIS when he was fighting Striker the first time or in the last episode!!!?? Like, can he fight or not!!??? This just does not make sense to me, especially when his whole character is about him not being a very skilled fighter like his wife or Blitzo. Not only is Millie an on-and-off fighter when the plot wants her to be, but so is her husband? Gimme a break!!

-- Stolas: “Wouldn’t a holy bullet have sufficed? Or could you not afford those?”

Stolas is technically bringing up the fact the imps are the lowest ranking and hardly have any cash on them. The show keeps telling us that imps are the poorest of the poor, but they sure as hell aren’t poor enough to own a whole circus (*cough* Blitzo’s dad *cough*). Not to mention Blitzo had a pretty high-paying job and could rent a whole office. Seems like to me that the imps are living pretty average for a species being the lowest rank. 

Wait... Is Striker an Imp or a snake?

-- Striker: I was paid to give you the real royal treatment.

Mm, no... You were paid to just shoot him (yet another retcon). All you’re doing is pointlessly dragging this mission by torturing him when you could literally just pull the frikin trigger and put a bullet in his head. Shut up with the edgy monologue and kill him!! 

-- WTF!!!

-- Stolas decides NOW to try to turn Striker into stone... That should’ve been done already, buddy!

-- Does this kink really get turned on in bed by getting painfully tortured, having his limbs broken and impaled n sh*t?? WHY DOES BLITZO STAB STOLAS AND BREAK HIS BONES WHILE HAVING SEX IN BED????!!!! LIKE Y’ALL, I CANT-

-- Why they gotta make my girl Stella so dumb in this show? I’m not surprised in the least (though I was hoping it wasn’t the case), but it honestly just irritates me more with what they’re doing to her. So Andrealphus reminds her that if she get’s Stolas killed, she would get nothing. But why does Stella have to be told that?? She should already know this! And why is she being all “Tee hee hee” and childish about all this anyways?? Yeah, Stolas gets to die and that’s what she wanted, but she’s being all giggles about it and she turns into a little brat and whines when told she can’t kill him and I can’t even take her seriously. I was expecting her to act much more sinister and serious. What happened to her hot-temper that could easily get provoked?? Idk that just rubbed me the wrong way.

Andre: When Stolas dies, his duties, his possessions, his legions, it will all pass to... Via.”

-- Okay... so what? It’s not like Stella even cares about that, as far as we’ve seen. All she ever did was throw parties and talk sh*t about Stolas. She doesn’t care at all about fulfilling any duties Stolas had to take care of. She’s never even been interested in the book. What exactly has she done that was even remotely Goetia-like? Ma’am just hates her ex and wants him to die.

-- Okay, first off.... eww! What is this?? Like dude- back up! What is this incest sh*t I’m lookin’ at? I don’t like this. Viv, plz don’t!!

-- Andre: I say we bide our time, and wait for the chance to gain the upper-hand.”

B*tch, what are you talkin’ about! You already had the upper-hand. And you’re sister clearly doesn’t care about Stolas’s possessions or power. She doesn’t even care that her daughter gets to obtain that. She just wants him dead. If anything, it just seems like YOU want what Stolas has and is only controlling your sister.

-- Can we PLEASE stop going in and out of Loona and Blitzo and just focus on the fight scene with M&M vs Striker! The stupid side plot doesn’t even fit with this episode! This is supposed to be a serious moment with Striker kidnapping Stolas and keeping Moxxie and Millie out the way, yet at the same time were expected to laugh and giggle at Loona escaping the wrath of a frikin needle!!!??? And the stupid girly pop music doesn’t even help!

-- Why her butt?..... Out of all the places to give her a shot??? 

-- Striker: “Oh I remember how easy you are to choke the life out of, little one.”

Moxxie: *Getting choked by Striker* Harder!

Umm, excuse me, sir? WTF!!! Is Viv making these little jokes a trope now!!? Why does Moxxie have a kink!?? He’s not even a very sexual person!! I dunno if he was just doing that to throw Striker off or somethin, but WHAT IN THE HELL!!?? And why did Striker immediately let go, feeling disgusted!!??? Bro, you made a statue with a literal stick-shaped boner???!!! This should NOT have caught you off-guard so easily!!!

-- When something is falling and is about to come crashing onto you, you do NOT, under ANY CIRCUMSTANCES walk forward! You could literally just jump to the side.

-- I don’t know if Striker is dead or not, but if he is, Then way to go, Viv! You may have just killed off a character that was even slightly interesting. If you're gonna make a character and have him get this popular only to kill him off, at least venture him a little bit first!! This was only his second debut in the show and we hardly gotten anything from his character! There wasn’t much backstory to him or anything. Just that he was a bigot who was hired to kill Stolas and HATES nobles!  And Striker even mentioned that there was someone he cared about taken away from him by the upper class. It raised wonders why he felt so much hatred for the rich folk and we won’t even get to explore that cuz he may have possibly died. I may not care much about him, but there were still some things I noticed about Striker that I found interesting and they needed to be explored. 

With him and Moxxie, I still feel like there wasn’t much score to settle between them. To me, they don’t have much of a dynamic at all, and they were supposed to be rivals. In fact, their second meeting felt rushed. The second Millie and Moxxie barged in, Moxxie just went ahead and pulled a trigger on him without saying a word. We don’t even get to hear any dialoge between them. It’s fighting, fighting, and more fighting. There wasn’t even much of an enemy relationship between them. Actually, Striker seems to have more of an adversary with Blitzo. And what about him and Blitzo??? The writers made it seem like Striker had a pretty big impact on him; from when he tried convincing him to join forces because they were so similar in certain ways to Blitzo hallucinating him in his trip dream. With the conversation they had at the festival, Striker was manipulating his insecurities. And that apparently affected Blitzo, because an episode later, he was dreaming about Striker tormenting him, along with Moxxie, Verosika, Fizz, and Stolas. So yeah, was kinda expecting to see some more interactions between those two. Neither of them didn’t even get to speak to each other this whole episode!! Its like I said, Blitzo should’ve joined Moxxie and Millie in Stolas’s rescue.

-- So Stolas is injured and is rushed to the hospital. Blitzo finds out about the and asks the most stupidest-a** question to have put have ever been put in this dialogue....

-- WHAT. DO. YOU. MEAN!?!?!?! 

Of course he can get hurt!!! You already know that, you stupid d*ck!!! Why else did you point the gun at Striker before he killed Stolas back at the festival!! You obviously knew he would get hurt if he was shot!! What did you think that Angelic Weapon was made for??!!!! Whatever happened to that weapon anyway? We don’t ever get to see that again at all? Judging from Moxxie’s reaction, the gun seemed like a very rare weapon in hell and is impossible to get. How did Striker even get his hands on it? We don’t even get to explore that?

-- So, as it turns out, the aftermath between Stolas and Blitzo in the Ozzie’s episode actually did occur....

......through text messages *face-palm*

Jesus christ on a bicycle..... The way this was addressed was a literal blink and a miss!! I HATED IT!! I didn’t even realize this was the aftermath until I saw it on twitter!!! So you mean to tell me we don’t get to explore what happened with them after Ozzie’s ON SCREEN at all???? They never even directly talked about what happened??? Are you for real, Viv?? Like- i-is this your way of shutting us up? Like you knew we were curious about what happened between them and decided to half-ass your way out of this by showing a bunch of text messages and moving forward?? Are you THIS lazy!!!!??? They’re not even fully conversing through these messages. If anything, Stolas is the main one doing all the talking while is Blitzo barely responding to him.

-- Dear lordy.... and reading messages don’t even make it better. Stolas is dumbed down deeper than his ex, bro!!! Obviously, he didn’t learn a DAMN THING!!!

Stolas: “You seem very upset and you took off so fast. I’m sorry if anything I said or did may have offended you tonight.”

F*CKING WHA--!! He says it as if he has no clue why Blitzo was mad at him or if he was upset with him at all! Um, b*tch... HE TOLD YOU WHY!!! Like to your face, he said, “Don’t act like that what we have is anything but you wanting me to f*ck you. You make that pretty clear all the time.” And you invited him in your house to cuddle with him knowing damn well he wasn’t in the mood!! You should already know why he’s upset! 

Im sor- Is this another retcon or something?? Were we supposed to see it how Stolas saw it? That Blitzo was upset for some unknown reason and we just can’t figure it out? Are we just gonna act like Stolas had done absolutely NOTHING wrong and he’s just an oh-so-innocent uwu baby bird? Are we gonna act like Blitzo didn’t just call out Stolas, spelling out the exact justified reason why he was mad?? Cuz that’s exactly how this text message scene is acting like!! Like their dialogue only revolves around what during their date and not what happened after that. Why is Stolas even talking about what happened at just Ozzie’s?! There was much more to the situation that affected him after he was dropped off. He was crying on his porch when Blitzo pushed him away. But now the show is not even gonna have them explore that in their messages. And now Viv is not even gonna have Stolas be considerate of Blitzo feelings and know why he’s mad? As if all they did was go their separate ways without saying a word instead of Blitzo dropping Stolas off at his house!!

And he goes on to say this-

“I’m glad that Ozzie’s is not the case of you being upset. I wasn’t upset either. I actually thought it was funny. It didn’t embarrass me at all.”

Okay... first off, what happened at Ozzie’s DID make him upset. YOU were just another one of those reasons. And you ain’t find sh*t funny, you were embarrassed just by BEING THERE with him, hence another reason why he’s mad at you! Like- Seriously?? What is happening right now?? Are all of us watching the same episode!!!??? Why is Stolas acting like such an oblivious and clingy idiot with the long-ass at paragraphs??

-- Okay yall... I’m done.

*Sigh* Okay.

This episode was... well it was somethin'. I'm not gonna say whether I like it or not, though the latter might be obvious enough.

I say the only thing I liked a little about it was Stella. Which is why I'm SUPER disappointed with how her character was written so far. If she were to actually be a character, I would like her more without going, "Oh Jesus... how are they gonna butcher her this time?"



Stella is as one-noted as ever! And there were a couple of traits they added to her character that is just so irritating-- Like, I can't take her seriously anymore. Viv doesn't change a thing about Stella.  Her whole character is, "I hate my ex and I want him dead!" And that's all there is. That's all Stella was worried about this episode. Like- ma'am? Could you just get over it!!? We get it, you hate his guts. And we don't even know WHY she hates him so much! Why does she want him dead, so badly? What could possibly warrant her hatred?? This is like her 4th appearance in this show, yet we're still not given her backstory. Nothing is hinted on why she became such an evil Darla Dimple. At first, in the first season, it seemed like Stella was only angry that her husband had an affair and cheated on her. So angry, she even called a hitman on him. Though it was rather harsh to want someone dead for that, you'd understand why she would be angry. I mean, who wouldn't!!! My husband cheated on me and it greatly affected my family!! That's how we saw it (or at least that's how I saw it). You can't even tell me that Stella never loved Stolas, because it was hinted that she initially did care about him. At least, according to Octavia who said that things used to be decent between them.

But now, since season 2 began, Viv suddenly just slaps us with the fact that Stella had always hated Stolas for no reason?? She just likes to make fun of him and talk sh*t while laughing at him?? She didn't care at all about the affair, but she still insist on tormenting him.... cuz she's evil??? And that excuse is not even justified alone, cuz why is she so evil??.... Because... she was just born that way???

Tch, yeah, alright Vivzie... whatever.

It doesn't even make sense why she's married to him if she's always hated him. Why did she even stick with him if she was just going to keep talking bad about him and complain about being married to him??? Yeah, I know there were arranged to marry, but they're adults now. No one could tell them what to do! She could've just divorced him. And clearly, nothing came of it. She could've left him WAY before now. You could say she only stuck around for the riches and the power, but she obviously doesn't care about that! All she ever did was throw parties. She didn't show off any riches or power she had when she was with him. And again... why does she want him dead?? What was her final straw here?? It was already established she didn't care about the affair and she already hated Stolas. What, was it because he embarrassed her by doing what he did? Well, like I said, she doesn't care about the affair, so why would she care about the embarrassment!? I just don't understand---

And I've already mentioned this, but I also didn't like how childish and giddy they made her about the whole thing. I didn't like to see how excited she was about her ex finally dying. I mean, it's nice to see she has no regrets and is proud, but in cases like her behavior about it-- it just doesn't seem to work for me. I was expecting Stella to be... stone-cold. Like just a soft-spoken, strict, and sinister woman who is somewhat secretive of her wicked ways and is tricky, but doesn't hide it fully. And despite knowing what she's doing, she doesn't care at all about the effects of it as long as she gets what she wants. Almost like Lady Tremaine from Cinderella, Ursula from The Little Mermaid, or Mother Gothel from Tangled.

But instead, I experience this-

I don't even like the way she acted when she was told she can't continue going along with what she wanted. She started to whine like a baby, crying "Aww! But I want him dead so badly!!!" Like, miss-- how old are you?? I would expect for her to be all "harumph!!" and begrudgingly agree with her brother after arguing with him a little. Not this immature little princess who will cry if she doesn't get her dolly back!



Another thing that bugged me about this episode, of course, was more Stolitz. It's pretty clear up to this point that Viv so DESPERATELY wants to make these two endgame. She doesn't care at all about how fast, how rushed, or how unplanned she makes this show as long as Stolas and Blitzo become a couple in the end. But just by rushing the show and not planning it, she doesn't really do a great job of showing us these two are good for each other. It just gets more toxic, especially with Stolas acting like he always cared about Blitzo when he obviously didn't and just becomes more selfish and oblivious to his feelings. Hell, he continues to be a flirt after Blitzo pretty much calls him out on it! And Viv tries to show us that Blitzo had always cared about Stolas and secretly wants a relationship with him, but considering the blank responses and the passive-aggressive behavior from those text messages, it's clear Blitzo does NOT like Stolas and doesn't care at all about him! Even when he reacted with disbelief over him getting hurt, he still gave him a short-worded text!! Like-- Blitzo just doesn't like Stolas, okay Viv. 



Ugh!! This show has officially broken me with the stupid sh*t, y’all. I still have some things I wanna say about it that I may have left off, but I’m to tired for now. They can be saved for another day. I-I cant anymore-  The only reason why I’m even going along with this is because I’m curious to see how these eps will turn out. Like, I’m still curious about Fizz, Verosika, and Barbie. And you best believe I’m waiting for the last episode where we get to hear Octavia finally go off on her dad. It’s a literal challenge at this point, but bring it on. And It’s ironic, cuz I love critiquing shows, whether I like them or not.

[seventeenlovesthree]

Digi Dynamic Shipping Game

Send me two names among the following 12 and I’ll write a short analysis post about them:

Taichi Yagami | Yamato Ishida | Sora Takenouchi | Koushirou Izumi | Mimi Tachikawa | Jyou Kidou | Takeru Takaishi | Hikari Yagami | Daisuke Motomiya | Miyako Inoue | Iori Hida | Ken Ichijouji

Whether canon provides input on them or not.

Boy, do I love to refer back to "Butterfly" and how it basically framed Taichi as the male main character and Sora as the female main character throughout. One might argue that this is a combination that has been occurring in quite a lot of anime - particularly kids and Shounen related - back in the 90s and early 2000s, so... Asking whether or not canon provides input on them is like asking if water is wet. They've known each other since elementary school, have been in the same class ever since (and will continue to be classmates until graduation) and even attended the same football club for a while. They start the series as "almost telepathically connected" football club duo (basically a novel quote right here), adventurous and hands-on plot drivers, the courageous leader and the tomboyish but caring voice of reason right by his side. You instantly get the impression that they are familiar and close with each other and it's a theme that continues throughout the entire first season; not only because they consistently jump into action and call out, care for and protect each other, but because they, their bond, their loyalty and development are basically responsible for the fact that the kids get through everything alive in the end.

Trying to describe the extent and depth of their relationship would probably end with me writing a whole novel, so I will try to keep this brief, because... You know them. Similarly to Taito, Koumi and Takari, Taiora has been a staple in the shipping scene ever since the conception of Digimon Adventure back in 1999 - and for good reason. As mentioned, there used to be - and still is - a trope to pair up the main boy and main girl with one another and this case is no exception, considering how well they play off of each other, supporting and saving each other time and time again. Digimon Adventure is a special series though - a series whose creators intended to break through tropes and stereotypes, turning those on the head whenever possible. So while Taichi's and Sora's bond may be so significant that the idea of them ending up together seems inherently plausible - this is not how their story ends.

The tomboy, who struggles with her sense of femininity and identity, cannot deal with her best friend gifting her a hairclip - and while they seem thoroughly devoted to and on each other's minds, they develop in different directions. There is a theme of miscommunication between them as they grow older, little quarrels here and there - but at the same time, there is still an incredible sense of mutual fondness and protectiveness that, despite a growing physical distance, never completely vanishes. "If you love someone, let them go", is a quote that may come to mind when you take a look at the screenshot above and are aware of its context. Whether that kind of love was romantic or platonic at this point? We may never know.

This is the story of two close long-term friends, who were not meant to be together - wrong time, wrong place.

... Which doesn't mean that there isn't a potential "right time", right...?

Whether I think why and how they’d work.

What I mentioned above seems to be somewhat cryptic and what I'm about to outline may or may not break canon to a certain degree, but HEAR ME OUT.

While this headcanon is, for now, nothing more than a headcanon, but I am a big supporter of @dutchforstrangers' interpretation of the epilogue, leading to the idea that Yamato and Sora might not remain together/married. This post is not meant to be Sorato slander in any way and I will not go into detail here as to why I think this is a valid headcanon - just know that there are a few subtext aspects in regards to their behavioural patterns and body languages that leave room for speculation. And that's all there is to it: SPECULATION!

The point I am trying to make here is, once again, that Taichi and Sora may not have been ready to be in a relationship early in life - because they first had to come to terms with themselves, their real dreams, aspirations and needs. They had to become comfortable with themselves (particularly after the loss of their Digimon partners) to bridge the (physical and emotional) distance that had festered between them through the years. Because if you think about it, due to their underlying insecurities, they both chose the same approach in their early twenties: Isolating themselves from the rest of their friend group. And I feel like they both have to come to the conclusion first that this is a state that could never bring them long-lasting happiness. They're both social beings that shrivel when they're left alone for too long. (They may also need the encouragement of their friends - particularly Mimi, Koushirou and Hikari - to get there though.)

So it may take a while, weeks, months, maybe even years, to reconcile, step by step. Rekindling their bond, making up their minds about their true passions and career paths, rediscovering old and finding new hobbies and similarities along the way; whether it's about their shared love for their friends, football, adventurous and sporty activities, probably therapy???, whatever it may be... Until they'd reunite with their partners and, with a gleeful but weary smile on their faces, realize that they just had to grow up to this point to eventually find each other as well.

Whether I’d prefer them as platonic or romantic ship.

In case the way I've been talking about them hasn't made it obvious yet - I do love Taiora a lot. While I hadn't started actively shipping Digimon characters until I started watching Tamers, I always had an incredible soft spot for them and up to this day, Taichi and Sora are my second favourite choice for each other. You could say that, in every possible universe in which Taich doesn't end up with Koushirou, he WOULD end up with Sora if I had anything to say. It's also no secret that Taikoura is my absolute favourite OT3 and I really think they COULD work out beautifully together. In the end, both romantic and platonic Taiora is absolutely beautiful to me - especially because it brought some very special, wonderful people into my life. Long story short: As long as their closeness persists in any way, shape or form, I'll be happy.

I also still maintain that the reboot timeline could potentially go there, but I will not get my hopes up... Yet.

[shit-talker]

I'm gonna go through the "confirmed storylines" from the lone start wiki because I have thoughts;

1. Owen's brother - literally don't care, they added the character that they could have fleshed out way more before they killed him off, the only slightly intreasting thing that could come out of this is if Tyler (Owen's dead brother) becomes something of a plot point - does TK know about Tyler? Does he know where his name comes from? Is TK nicknamed TK because Owne found it hard to call him Tyler?

2. It's giving the main 911 show, which I love. Btw, I'm telling you, the 126 member who "might get injured" is either going to be Tommy, or TK. I'm willing to bet my life. I'm leaning more towards Tommy but this show has a habit of putting TK in damger soooo

3. That's an interesting one. I know that it's gonna be between Paul and Marjan, but honestly, Paul should get it. He's more experienced, and Marjan is known for making reckless decisions. Though, I think it'd be funny if Mateo is somehow pulled into the chaos because of his stint as lieutenant.

4. Yeah, is this is just referring to Wyatt becoming a dispatcher? Unless they introduce a whole new character? See below.

5. I take this as a clue that Tommy is going to be out of commission for a bit, which makes me think she'll be the one hurt with the train stuff. It will be cool, especially because TK is her partner and has historically challenged Nancy in the past. I want them to be the bestest of friends, give me more of their friendship. Also, if Tommy is not there for a bit, and Nancy takes over as captain, that means they'll probably need a new paramedic, which could be the new member of the 126 that we'll apparently love? I mean, I feel like it needs to be someone we already know because introducing a brand new character seems risky, especially if Tommy is going to come back as captain and they'll have to get rid of said character. The only character I can think of is Pearce, though. Which, considering his character in S3 could be a possibility.

6. I'm hoping to God this has something to do with Nancy. I know that Tim wasn't killed by an asteroid, but if we could touch back on the impact it had on Nancy, especially if she's a captain in charge now. Maybe TK or the new paramedic (?) gets injured or close to being injuried in this and she freaks out. I want a bonding moment between Tommy and Nancy. I want the med team to be a little family.

7. I have a lot of feelings on this, but for the most part, I love it. It was sort of obvious that was the direction they wanted to go after Wyatt got hurt, and I love it. I love the dispatchers in the 911 universe, and having the first main dispatcher be a guy for the first time is fun. I do wonder how they'll deal with Grace no longer being in the show, especially because her character won't be in it at all. Also, it'll be a fun dynamic when Judd returns to the 126 (which he will, unless Judd's character is also leaving this season, which I doubt (please don't take him away from me))

Also, gotta talk about tarlos because I have THOUGHTS.

The person from TK's past will be interesting, I know a lot of people think it'll be Alex, but at the same time, what would the point be? Why would he? I don't think it'll be Alex. I also saw a lot of people saying it'll be Enzo and Jonah, which I can see but "from his past" kind of inplies it's someone he hasn't talked to or thought about for a while, and we know he keeps in contact with his brother and Enzo. Though, It would be really REALLY fun to actually meet Enzo (come on, it's time to meet him, he's been mentioned so many times). I'm really hoping it's either an old friend from his addict days or someone he used to work with in New York.

Also, Carlos solving his father's murder will be fun. I'm hoping we get to see more of the Reyes family. I want the Reyes sisters, and I want them now. TK will also totally be freaking out, and I'm hoping for a bonding moment between him and a member of the 126 that ISN'T Owen. I want either Tommy or Judd, saying they've both been married and also can you imagine TK going to them for relationship advice? Adorable.

[jemmo]

utsukushii kare really said we’re going to take two of the most fascinating, interesting, well-characterised characters to have ever been written and not just stick them in the same show, but put them in one of the most incredible relationships to be seen on screen and i cannot thank them enough for it. seriously, if you consider the fact that at this point we’re at ep 8 of a 30 minute runtime show; that’s 4 hours. i’ve watched other bls, heck even other ordinary shows, that can’t even cram enough characterisation into a character that hira or kiyoi have in their little fingernail. im not joking. and nothing shows that better than kiyoi in this ep.

i love that we’re already getting an episode from his perspective. we had to wait all the way until ep 4 of season 1 to see things from his side, and that was such an amazing twist and reveal and still to this day that ep makes me cry. but im so glad we get to see his perspective sooner. bc we don’t need that shock twist anymore, instead it serves as a good balance to see where both our characters are at in the first 2 eps. and yet again, seeing things from kiyoi’s pov just opens up the absolute treasure trove that is his character. there are so many stand out points from this ep that i wanna mention but I’ll wait until my big ‘favourite parts of utsukushii kare s2 ep2’ post to list them all. what i wanna say here is that every bit of his character we get to see in this ep comes together so well to create such an interesting, multi-faceted and well-rounded character that it’s kind of astounding. we start off with his softness and vulnerability that’s countered perfectly against hira’s timid reaction, and then we jump back to high school to see this full on longing and the frustration that comes with that, waiting to be confessed to. i wanted to say this about the first season but this serves a good opportunity too; I find it so interesting how they portray hira and kiyoi’s ‘seme and uke’ dynamic (im gonna use those terms bc i can’t think of any better way to describe it, just know im referring more to a more dominant vs more submissive personality, like the confesser vs the confesse, and not anything sexual). You could so easily watch this show, hear the premise, even see the characters, hira and his chronic shyness, kiyoi and his undeniable popularity, and easily place those labels; hira the uke, kiyoi the seme. but in reality, kiyoi so clearly wants to be the uke, and very much is the uke. he begs in his head for hira to confess his feelings fo him, half bc maybe he needs hira to be brave where he can’t be, but I think also half bc he just wants to be confessed to. He wants the boy he likes to tell him he likes him, just like he wants to cuddle in his lap and be looked after. it probably stems from this want to be loved, chosen to be loved, and be cared for where he felt he wasn’t before, but it’s just so refreshing and such an interesting subversion of expectations, to see inside cool, popular kiyoi’s head and it’s just him begging for this shy, nobody kid to like him, and say it out loud.

and then I’ve touched on this before, but you get to see his earnest drive and passion to do what he loves. the cool kid that should fit the stereotype of never caring about anything, pushing to do the thing he loves, putting himself out there. I just can’t describe how excellent of a subversion that is. and the way he is with people at work, with Anna, polite and cordial and sweet, it’s such a reverse of kiyoi’s tsundere shortness and bluntness with hira that it not only shows us that yes, we weren’t hallucinating, there really is an infinite pool of softness within kiyoi that pours out more and more every time we see him, but also shows us that kiyoi is maybe only his true self with Hira. he’s not this polite, nice boy, nor is he this cool, cold popular guy, he’s somewhere in the middle, a fascinating mix of both, that only hira gets to see the full extent of, and I think that says a lot about how comfortable he is with Hira, and how much he trusts him. as much as it may be bad that hira will never find fault with kiyoi, it also makes him his sanctity, his true safe place, where he can breathe and grow and truly be whatever he wants, soft, angry, cute, cool, vulnerable, hira will take it all and adore it no matter what.

and then we get his jealousy of koyama, his protectiveness and possessiveness of hira. it’s kind of endearing how he still feels these things when hira shows him such endless devotion, it’s a testament to how normal he sees their relationship compared to hira, and how he therefore allows himself to feel normal relationship things, including possessiveness. but also in this scene i really love how kiyoi is let’s himself doubt himself, and only when it comes to hira. i feel like we’ve only ever seen him been unsure of himself when it comes to the things he loves, namely his dream of being a performer, and hira. he only looses confidence when he doesn’t do well in the competition in high school, and is only ever doubtful when it comes to hira’s feelings about him, and how he is with hira, maybe bc they’re the only things he truly wants to last forever. so what does he do, just like he does with his acting career? he puts in sincere effort. he humbles himself taking that recipe from koyama, and despite his cluelessness and clear lack of skills, he still tries his absolute hardest to do something for hira. he cooks him a meal, one of the most ordinary and sincere expressions of love. and his shy smile the whole time, him waiting excitedly for hira to come home, it’s such a fantastically endearing contrast from the cold, removed kiyoi we know early in s1 that you almost can’t reconcile them as the same character, and yet the steps that got us here make it clear that they are in fact the same person, that both those people live inside kiyoi and that’s amazing. and of course something as ordinary as cooking a meal for your boyfriend can never be normal for hira and kiyoi but the chaos unfolds is what makes them absolutely them. it mirrors what kiyoi says at the start of the ep about Hira, ‘if it wasn’t disgusting, it wouldn’t be hira’. It’s the same for kiyoi, and the same for their relationship. they don’t want to change it fundamentally, don’t want to take away the things that make it them, they just want to find a way to take this thing they both want and love and build it, strengthen it, so it can last. and i’ll say it until I’m blue in the face, but that’s why kiyoi’s personality, his bluntness, works so well for hira. it provides this iron wall of reassurance based in truth that he needs. I think ‘im not dating a pebble’ might be my stand out line from a bl in 2023 already but it’s also so ridiculously laced in meaning. Kiyoi doesn’t see hira as just some rock, some insignificant thing on the side of the road, that’s not what he’s dating. He’s dating hira, the person. And I think this push for hira to see himself as a person is only something that kiyoi can do because, in a way, hira was the one to see Kiyoi first. I’m a different way, because of the complex hira still has around kiyoi, he may not be a person yet, but hira still saw him in a way no one else did because he cared enough to look and keep looking. He stared and stared at every bit of kiyoi, including the uncool parts, the embarrassing parts, the sweet parts, the upset and angry parts, he’s the one that saw it all and never once looked away. The invisible kid made him feel seen. And I think for someone that’s always looked at but never seen, that’s what you really want.

So yes, this may have collapsed into another ramble, but I hope I can just convey some of the sense of how whole of a character kiyoi feels, even just by the points in this ep. And I just love that he’s allowed to be it all, be chaotic and messy and imperfect and a work in progress while still helping hira along too. I’ve never seen a bl couple that feel so much like they’re growing together, figuring themselves out as people and as a couple and it’s just so fucking refreshing and interesting and beautiful to watch and i will never ever shut up about it

[room-surprise]

Delicious in Dungeon Anime Season 1, Episode 2 Review

Spoilers for season 1, episode 2 below the cut! There may also be mild manga spoilers so proceed with caution.

This episode was great! I think it was a big improvement on the first. Honestly no real complaints... I do kind of wish both Marcille and Chilchuck could have had stand-alone episodes dedicated to their character development, to allow for a deeper focus, but I understand why they didn't do it, and the pacing was still excellent. I do still sometimes feel like the show is in fast-forward at times, because with 3 meals in one episode, it feels like the characters finish eating, and we jump cut to them saying that they're hungry again, without anything to help really impress upon viewers that time has passed. Makes it feel a bit like we're reading a collection of short 4-panel gag comics instead of a continuing story… which, early Dungeon Meshi DOES have that as part of it's format, but it changes with time, as we get into longer individual stories.

During the Basilisk/Doni and FIonil section, I really do miss some of the dry humor from the manga. ("Hurry, he's getting cold!" "Move him closer to the fire!") The hilarity of slowly preparing a meal while someone is dying of poison has unfortunately been lost, which makes Doni and Fionil much less memorable characters…. But it benefits the other 2 stories in the ep to have more time so I think it was the right choice to make. It also gives people something to go back and read the manga for, since it's a little different! If you're reading this and you're an anime only, consider reading the manga while you watch the anime! I promise it's worth it. I'm excited about next week because I think they'll devote the entire episode to Laios and the living armors, which is me and my spouse's favorite early DM storyline, and the part where we both said "Oh, I LOVE this manga..." and got really invested. It's 2 chapters in the manga so it could be an entire episode…. which also would make sense, if that's why they needed to crunch 3 chapters into episode 2. Just like the first episode, animation was fantastic, and as usual the weakest points are when characters are just walking or talking and not doing much. Everything more dynamic is just bouncy and adorable and full of life. Very rarely is anything animated in a dull or flat way. They're doing their best to use "move a drawing around" or "zoom on a drawing" for comic effect and I think it's working well so far. There's some great animal animation in this episode, the bat flying around and the basilisk chasing Marcille in particular. Translation was better this time around, no dumb modern or game references in the dub ("newbs" "as if" etc.) … But there are differences between the subtitles and the dub script that change how easy it is to understand what's happening. When Senshi tells Chilchuck to cut up the giant bat, the subtitles make it hard to understand what he's telling him to do, and the dub makes it a lot clearer. In the subs when Senshi calls Chilchuck a half-foot child, the subtitles say "I'm not a child" and the dub says "I hate it when people call me 'kid'"… The latter is more interesting for keeping the mystery going for things that happen later in the story. If the show continues like this, I think the English dub may be the more satisfying way to watch it (even though the Japanese performances are great), mostly because the subs are very literal and sometimes miss things that the English dub somehow manages to include. And for some reason Netflix isn't including translation of Japanese signs on-screen during the subtitles, but they DO provide them when you watch the English dub. A lot of Dungeon Meshi's humor is sometimes in those background signs so completely missing out on them sucks. Anyway those are my thoughts for this episode! See you next week Meshiheads.

[pitafish]

Ain't rlly an ask but I just think that you do the best job predicting/drawing what their relationship platonic/romantic would look like after the first seasons end, also your art really resembles the characters, and I'm glad you didn't just reduce them to their main points like some people do. Where they make Raymans only trait being a murderous alcoholic who has mental breakdowns and snorts coke, and bullfrog his emotional crutches. I rlly like seeing how the series would effect bullfrog. And a lot of ppl don't expand on that. So thanks 👍👍👍 you rlly are shrimptastic 💯💯💯💪

That's very sweet of you to say. I've had plenty of practice drawing things like toons, Moomins, and muscular frogs, so these two weren't difficult for me to approach. I'm also quite comfortable conveying facial expressions, and I use the art book scans for reference on the bits I can't quite get right just yet (like Bullfrog's assassin gear). That said, with the current exception of the guilt comic and the song comic I'm currently working on, I cannot take credit for the writing in my other Rayfrog drawings. This comic was adapted from dialog in @xnightmare-eyesx fic "Glowflies in the Darkest City," and this adapted a scene from @y2kbugs "Seed of Hope" fic. If I'm getting praise for how I draw or approach these two, then these creators, alongside people like @fermentedgutz, @biframes, and @velichorus-k, need to get a nod as well. They're all excellent, and these are the people whose interpretations of the Rayman and Bullfrog (and Dolph!) dynamic I personally enjoy. But I understand where you're coming from with the concern of caricature and Flanderization. That happens, and I'm not going to dunk on how people choose to have fun in the fandom space. The thing I bear in mind is the balance between these two characters. Rayman/Ramon is anger and self-deprecation and he is compassion and gratitude. Bullfrog is justice and wisdom and he is self-sacrifice and violence. And they are both kind. The men have layers. Anyway.

I don't want to make this any longer than necessary, but thank you for the compliment. I appreciate it very much. :D