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wen-kexing-apologist · 7 months

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Reflections in Last Twilight

Alright, I was not really planning on writing analysis on for Last Twilight, at least not this early in the game. But my dearly beloved @dribs-and-drabbles has called to me like Beetlejuice to analyze the use of reflections in this show. Which means i have been summoned, which means, it is time to bust out the meta.

Now, having just looked back through both Episode 1 and Episode 2, there have not been that many instances of reflections in Last Twilight so far, though the ones we have had already are definitely memorable. So let’s get in to it.

Episode 1

Intro Sequence

I’m not going to talk about the reflections off the fish tank here because the actual scene they are tied to comes in Episode 2 and I think there will be a whole lot more to say then. But I do want to acknowledge that we will be getting reflections at the beginning of every episode, and that Aof is already establishing the important symbolism of fish and jasmine.

The first actual reflection we get in Last Twilight comes in the form of Mhok in the side mirror of his sister Rung’s car.

Rung's car has been sitting in Pae's garage for a year at this point. It would be gathering dust if Pae hadn't spent time over the course of that year meticulously maintaining her vehicle. In fact, that is the very first thing we see happen in this workshop. Pae taking car of Rung's car in her and Mhok's sted. Taking care of this car was not his job, we can assume that he did not anticipate the time commitment that would come with maintaining possession of Rung's car while Mhok was in jail, but he has set himself up to task and gone, in my opinion, above and beyond what was expected of him by continuing to maintain her car.

Pae is surprised when Mhok hands him the spare key and says Pae can sell the car. Mhok at this point is in the anger stage of grief. He blames Rung for her death, and wants to absolve himself of the grief and guilt by maintaining the idea that Rung was to blame and to try to rid himself of any and all reminders of his sister. Mhok, as we know, is incredibly alone. His mother died when they were young, his sister has died, he is no longer associated with his friends/coworkers from his old shop after they all got arrested, and he hides as much as he can from Pae. Mhok has Phorjai and Phorjai only as any sort of support system, and she's his ex-girlfriend, so I don't think we need to go too in depth to acknowledge the complications there.

Mhok wants to forget his grief, his pain, and I appreciate greatly that Pae won't let him do that. That Pae knows Mhok enough to understand that the second that Pae sells that car, Mhok is going to regret letting it go. So he extends another six months grace period to let Mhok actually think it over. Mhok looks over the car, at the bandaid that Rung put on the little scratch she got her first day owning the car, in the glove compartment where all the handouts for her failed budiness are. And Pae allows Mhok a minute alone, in the dark of his sister's car.

At which point we get the reflection. Now, personally I think Jimmy has some work to do as an actor, which means it feels harder for me to accurately read Mhok's face/emotional state. But, for me, here, Mhok looks *tired*, but most importantly, he is trapped in the frame of the side mirror, he is stuck in the dark, and he is alone. In just one small frame, Aof is showing us the aspects of Mhok's character that will help him recognize himself in Day, and tell us why Mhok needs the relationship he has (or will have) to Day.

This is the only actual reflection we see in Episode 1.

But I do want to comment on the end of the episode, like everyone else has, about part of the *The Little Prince* reading that Mhok does at the end. Namely the line "what is essential is invisible to the eye".

I don't think, in a show with going blind as a part of its central theme that we really *need* to look deeper in to the significance/meaning of this line. But because I have been asked to talk about reflections, I want to go a little overboard on the line reading here. Because, day to day we can't see ourselves, right? We wouldn't know exactly what we look like if we couldn't look in to a mirror. Mirrors, reflections, are often a subject of insecurity, providing us the opportunity to pick at every flaw. In mirrors, dancers can watch and correct themselves, their body positions, tweak their choreography based on what they see that they normally would not be able to. Actors can practice facial expressions in the mirror, figure out how they have to hold themselves to make their emotions believable. In horror movies, mirrors show us what lurks in the background, in spy movies it shows us what exists around the corner. And in our deepest moments of guilt or shame, facing ourselves in the mirror becomes a challenge.

I don't want to get too ahead of myself on predictions about this show and what Aof is planning on doing with it, but personally I think the use of mirrors/reflections is a perfect way to show what is essential and invisible to the eye. Mhok is not looking at himself in the mirror here, and if we were standing in the room with him, we would not be able to see his face at all. But the side mirror of Rung's car allows us to see what Mhok is thinking and feeling. But he isn't looking in the mirror himself. He isn't and hasn't started facing or confronting his own grief, isolation, or pain. I don't know that Mhok is as of yet capable of seeing what he needs to change in his own life, because he hasn't reflected on his own life.

Episode 2

The first "reflection" we get in Episode 2 is not really a reflection, at least in the traditional sense, but I do still want to talk about it. I am of course talking about the selfie with Aon.

Mostly because I wanted to acknowledge that to me, a photo is a kind of reflection in that you can both look back at yourself and also reflect on the memory of the time. To be honest, I don’t know exactly how I feel about Aon taking this picture of Mhok, because he takes it for the Society for the Blind. But how are they using it? Is this evidence that Mhok is here and doing what he said he will, or is this going to be used in marketing of some sort? Either way, it is capturing a moment in time that Mhok could one day look back on to reminisce about the beginning of his relationship with Day.

And here Mhok is with someone else, a second person to accompany him where before he just had himself. But this is fake, this is quick, this is right after Mhok has just been shut out of all proceedings between Aon and Day. Mhok doesn’t know what’s happening before he is being told to smile for the camera. And if anyone were to see this photo, they would see a very happy Aon and a decently confused Mhok, but they would have no idea how limited a connection to Aon, Mhok would have had at this point.

The next reflection is a bit difficult to see, but it comes during the conversation Day has with Mhok about the eye drops, where he explains he can see more clearly right after he uses them. In this scene, Day is talking to Mhok while keeping his gaze affixed to the lone goldfish in his increasingly grimier tank.

Mhok and Day have a brief conversation about whether or not the fish is lonely since it is the only one in the tank, and Day brushes it off by saying that goldfish have short memory and that it couldn’t possibly be lonely.

But, whenever we see Day on screen here, we see his reflection in the glass of the tank. And there are a few great moments during this conversation where the goldfish sits directly in front of Day’s reflection. To me it feels like a memory, a ghost, or a projection, and we know by the end of Episode 2, (if we haven’t picked up on it already from the title sequence or how heavily goldfish imagery has features in the promotional material for this show) that the goldfish is a stand in for Day himself.

So I love the fact that we get this wisp of an image of Day’s face in the tank, like he’s trapped inside of it. Because we know that in a way he is. And the other thing I love about this, or rather about the fact that this goldfish is meant to symbolize Day himself, is that watching this goldfish is what brings Day the most joy at the moment.

I love that because it shows me that there is hope and joy still left in Day, if he can just take the time to look at himself a little differently.

OKAY it’s time for the Big Boys.

Our first instance of an actual reflection off a mirror in Episode 2 happens when Mhok is trying to check in with Day after Day runs away from Night’s friends. Mhok has said that he understands Day, and Day Does Not Like That™.

Day’s response to Mhok’s monologue is to say that Mhok has no idea what it is like to look in the mirror and not see your old self. And of course, we see Day’s reflection in his full body mirror. Now, again, Aof is being pretty heavy handed with his metaphors here. But that doesn’t mean I don’t absolutely love the double meaning of these words. Day is going blind so he literally can’t see himself in the mirror anymore.

But also, Day is deep in his grief for the things he has lost. His freedom, his career, his confidence that I think he has morphed in to a completely different person. One who is bitter, and self-conscious, and more comfortable hiding away where he can wallow in misery over his condition and not have to confront the new world he is living in. Day is running from connection, I mean not a minute before this scene Day legitimately ran away from Night’s friends rather than have to explain his blindness.

The scene continues, and Day shuts himself off even further from the world around him, by putting in his headphones. Now he can drown out Mhok’s attempts to comfort him, but in the long run what is that going to do? As @shortpplfedup said to me earlier “the set dressers did not come to play” when it came to designing Day’s room. When the curtains aren’t drawn there is so much natural light in Day’s room. His walls are bright and colorful, there are photos and awards all over the place. Day’s room has so much personality in it, so much life within it. But the mirror shows nothing. It shows Day alone, surrounded by blank walls in grayscale.

The costume designer made an excellent choice of shirt for this scene, by the way. Because the yellow blends in enough with the wall in Day’s room, that (especially) when coupled with the camera’s focus in this scene. The real Day almost fades in to the background, and your eye is naturally drawn to this spot of yellow in the mirror.

The mirror highlights his isolation while at the same time showing the audience how much Day can and does stand out.

AND it parallels the reflection of Mhok in Episode 1 so well, not just in the emotions that we see from Mhok and Day, but in the sense that Mhok’s reflection is in Rung’s car because he is currently trapping himself in the darker, meaner thoughts about his sister, rather than processing his grief. While Day’s reflection is in his room because he is currently trapping himself in the darker, meaner thoughts about himself, rather than giving himself enough compassion to start moving forward.

When Day does not respond to Mhok’s conversation, Mhok is triggered at the thought of his sister’s death and he breaks down the door to make sure Day is okay, and gets fired for it. Mhok does not argue, he does not put up a fight, he does not try to explain, he just honors Day’s request and gets the fuck out. And I love the way that Mhok is already starting to change Day’s outlook. Because we see how mopey Day is after Mhok leaves, and how much hope there is in him when Night tells him there is someone at the door who wants to see him and he so obviously thinks it’s Mhok.

Mhok gives him the gift of the fish slippers, and Day goes to visit Mhok at the market, only to find out that Mhok has spent time reflecting on what Day told him about not understanding him, and making a fool out of himself in the eyes of the other market patrons by blindfolding himself.

Mhok is doing what no one else has really done and is making a concerted effort to truly understand where Day is coming from, the fears that he is carrying, and the challenges he faces as a blind man.

But of course, we know by now that while there are definitely things Mhok is had not or might never understand about the physical realities of Day’s life, he can understand loneliness, and he can understand rage, pain, and anger. There are parts of himself that have grown within him over the past year that recognizes parts of Day that have grown within him over the past year.

And we have already been seeing the impact of Mhok on Day’s life, in the fact that Day has smiled more, Day has left his room, Day has eaten at the table, and agreed to watch a movie. And that singular day where Day did not wallow in his own misery, but left his room, went out in the sun, etc stuck with him because he is in the living room watching a movie the day Phorjai comes to visit.

Culminating in the second real reflection of Episode 2, where Mhok, via the side mirror, sees Day smiling on the back of his scooter. And what I love about this moment is that the focus is entirely on Day. I don’t want Last Twilight to strip Day’s healing processes from him and give them to Mhok. I think it is totally fine for Mhok to contribute to Day’s increasing happiness, but ultimately I want Day to have enough autonomy in this narrative that these decisions that lead to him enjoying his life again are primarily comprised of Day’s own choices. And I think that we can get something visually from that by the fact that we don’t see a lot of Mhok in this reflection, only one small portion of his chin.

Day made the choice to have Phorjai take him to see Mhok, Day made the choice to rehire Mhok, and Day is the one having a moment on the back of this scooter just reveling in the feeling of the wind on his face. I love that this reflection shows just enough of Mhok to show that Day is not alone, while still putting all of the attention in the reflection on to Day and the joy he is feeling.

The idea that Day is no longer alone is reinforced after Mhok makes a pit stop to purchase a companion for the goldfish in Day’s room. And again we get in to some of my favorite instances of reflection in Last Twilight, where we place the boys’ reflections in the fish tank.

And this is where the images from the intro sequence come from. Day looking at Day Noi and Big Mhok interacting with each other in the tank. Here we still have Day alone in the reflection, with the goldfish tying him to this symbolism. But Day’s reflection is so much clearer now that the tank has been cleaned. Now Day’s reflection in the water tank is far more obvious, and hey, since it’s me, I’ll overanalyze this moment to say that as Day has gotten to know Mhok a bit and has started venturing outside of his room more, that Day is getting a clearer vision of himself as a person. Regardless, we as the audience can see Day’s reflection in the tank all the more clearly and that reflection is vibrant and bright, because Day is becoming more vibrant and bright.

“No More Loneliness Little Day” Mhok says and we get MY FAVORITE SHOT OF THE SHOW THUS FAR

The split screen. It’s not even a reflection, but I am talking about it here, because I think the absence of reflection is just as important as its presence, and I love that we have this moment where half of Day’s face is crystal clear and the other half is completely obscured. There is no trace of it. Considering how much Aof has been turning the camera on Day’s vision, we aren’t that far off of what Day sees in this shot. I like that this image has Day straddling these two worlds.

And we get the final reflection of Episode 2, Mhok’s face in the fish tank.

Again, I don’t even know that this is really intentional or it is just the way the reflection happened to have occurred, but I love the fact that not all of Mhok’s face is present within the fish tank. I like that Mhok is slowly encroaching on Day’s space, that Mhok is slowly starting to appear in the parts of Day’s life that Day actually cares about. Mhok is lonely and Day is lonely, and they have finally found someone they might be able to connect to. Big Mhok is there for Day Noi and Mhok is there for Day.

I love that while the fish themselves are able to cross those barriers and that we get to see the fish swimming up and next to each other, that we have yet to see Mhok and Day’s reflections fully together. Even here, Mhok’s reflection in the fish tank is alone, just like Day’s reflection in the fish tank was alone. But they are in the same place, they are in the same room, they are in the same tank, they are in the same stage of their grief (anger) and there is no way in hell we don’t get one or more reflections in the mirror or in the fish tank by the end of this show where Mhok and Day are both fully present.

#last twilight #last twilight the series #last twilight analysis #jimmysea #mhokday #mhok x day #aof noppharnach #gmmtv #thai bl

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anxiety-pickle · 26 days

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Jade and Aventurine analysis pt 2

bc I have chronic can't shut the fuck up disease

I’ve been seeing a lot of rhetoric floating around that we can’t judge (or even get a good idea of) Jade’s character because she hasn’t had her character’s release yet, which I want to address, and I’m going to do so by comparing Aventurine’s 2.0 appearance and Jade’s 2.1 appearance and related context, and why I don’t think it’s going to be a ‘switch up’ situation

This might also count as a Jade + Aventurine design analysis / theory?? I’ll leave that up to the jury

For some context, I started hsr because of Aventurine in 2.0. I started maybe a week or so before 2.1 came out specifically because I was so interested in his character, and by that point I had already made my determination about his character. And let me tell you I clocked him right off the bat. Not a single part of 2.1 was actually surprising to me (as terribly awful as much of his backstory is) and here’s why:

Aventurine’s first official appearance was his debut in “White Night” which turned out to be a direct parallel to his character arc as well as 2.1’s story, with lyrics such as “you’re hosting / a magic show I cannot escape / there’s nothin’ else left for me to do / goin’ to the other side”. This directly references both Sunday’s use of Order on him as well as him traveling through the Nihility to find Dreamflux reef

More importantly for his character however are the following lyrics “There’s no one else left for me to lose / goin’ to the other side, other side / I don’t want to be alone tonight / I’ll bring to you my best disguise / ‘cause you don’t need, don’t need to know the truth”

It tells us BLATANTLY what Aventurine’s character is - we know everything about him right from the beginning, even if it wasn’t clear that the song was about him

Now let’s move onto his design: This is an even more meta discussion of his character, but Aventurine’s design does a great job of telling us everything we need to know about him.

Let’s start with the general card motif. The first thing I noticed was the recurring Spade design which is all over his outfit (and later turned out to be the suit that he applies to himself with his shield). In the Tarot deck, Spades are associated with intellect, action, air, and death, so already we have some morbid connotations with his imagery

Next is his general outfit: it’s very extravagant and superfluous; there’s obviously an element of seduction to his design (both with the choker and the chest window), which is likely a reflection of Aventurine’s views towards using himself as a chip (which I’ll get to later). This immediately illustrates to me that he has no problem using whatever means he has at his disposal to do what he needs to, even at risk to himself (which was later confirmed by his language towards himself in 2.0)

Finally onto the choker and the bracelets. Both are inherently restrictive pieces of clothing. The choker particularly calls reference to a collar (you might notice that Topaz, an indentured servant, also has a choker in her design, whereas Jade’s neck is bare). In Aventurine’s case, the bracelets and choker were particularly noticeable to me after Ratio and Aventurine’s staged 2.0 conversation wherein he’s called a “doomed Sigonian thrall” or openly called a “slave” in the Chinese dub

All this is to say, every element of these character designs are thought out and we can glean relevant information from them

Now let’s talk about Aventurine in 2.0

Initially, he deliberately antagonizes himself by playing up his frustration at the Astral Express taking up time when correcting a room-booking issue, and establishes a point of negotiation between himself and Himeko, who he perceives to be the leader

He ends up giving the Trailblazer his room (which he went to great lengths to get) at no benefit to himself - in fact, it’s a very large inconvenience

Multiple times he emphasizes that we, the player, should feel free to “use” him, once again showing he has no regard for his own life at all

The most damning piece of evidence, however, is that Acheron straight up clocks him the second she lays eyes upon him, “There are people who possess unwavering resolution and faith, even unto death, and they do not wield such conviction for good. One who wears a blade must use it to cut eventually. And when a gambler has nothing to lose on the table, he will surely go for broke and bet it all on a final hand.” (The Youths Who Chase Dreams)

In the ten minutes we see Aventurine on screen, he’s already 1) given up his room (to his detriment), 2) used dehumanizing language towards himself and 3) someone else who’s seen him for 2 seconds went wow that bitch looks suicidal (and she was right)

My suspicions were then confirmed by the following conversation with Ratio and Aventurine (which we now know to be scripted)

When Ratio says “doomed Sigonian thrall” we see the camera pan down to the brand on his neck while also showing the discomfort on his face → and to be honest, the sheer amount of people who weren’t immediately aware that the brand represented something dehumanizing at the least was a little surprising to me, because there were no positive connotations (or even neutral ones) in that scene. It made it very clear that it was something bad, maybe something done against his will / was outside of his control

The last important scene in establishing Aventurine’s character foundation is with his conversation with Sparkle (again, the reception to that conversation made me… a little uncomfortable. The way her comments were received freaked me out a little I’m ngl)

She first makes comments about his eyes, so we immediately know that they’re uncommon

She then tells him that Sigonians belong in the sewers (which is a crazy thing to say) and essentially says all of them are liars and thieves, so now we have real in-world prejudice against the planet that Aventurine comes from. Now we can identify the even more specific prejudice that Aventurine’s ethnic group, the Avgin, experience. Sparkle makes it clear that his eyes are distinctive and can be used to identify him as Avgin, immediately thereafter telling him that he and his “thieving people” belong in the gutters

Aventurine also says that the Dreamscape is “frivolous, vain, and flashy - and that suits me just fine” (Gentleness, the Name of Nocturne)

The worst part imo was when she mocks him, “Did you strip yourself naked, apologize to him on your knees, and promise that IPC would never harm Penacony?” (Gentleness, the Name of Nocturne). This remark is exponentially worse now considering his full circumstances, but it was already bad just as it was stated. A lot of people just took this as a joke, but I can read so I didn’t. There is a very clear power dynamic being established here - between Sunday and Aventurine (which ends up becoming relevant in 2.1), but it also establishes that there’s a power imbalance between Aventurine and the rest of the world. It doesn’t help that Aventurine doesn’t say anything to that - he doesn’t even appear offended. I assume that’s hardly the worst thing he’s ever heard said about him. The backdrop of “all Sigonians being liars, thieves, and social manipulators” definitely doesn’t help that either - playing on the assumption that because he’s Sigonian he must also be a whore

So this is yet another instance of someone (Aventurine or other) making a remark about Aventurine using himself as a tool to get what he wants → so, both internal and external instances of people using dehumanizing language towards him

This informs us that both Aventurine, and the world around him, do not value him

All this is to say it should have been abundantly clear to anyone who was paying attention what Aventurine’s character would turn out to look like: he is very clearly posturing through the entirety of the quest, he is very clearly self-destructive, and his self-esteem certainly can’t be very high

And I was right! I was exactly on the money. So now, using what we’ve seen of Jade, I’ll analyze why I don’t think Jade is in a similar situation as Aventurine (or even Topaz)

Now we don’t have nearly as much Jade content as we had Aventurine content at the time I made my determination about his character, but I feel I have enough material to make an educated guess as to what Jade and her motivations actually are. Let’s start with character design

First thing’s first: the snake. This is very clearly a Biblical allusion to the snake and the Garden of Eden. Broadly, snakes are already symbols of trickery, deception, lies, and sin (all of these having culturally to do with the christian hegemony).

So basically, Jade has THE symbol of sin and temptation

Now, this COULD be a red herring, but so far her actions match up to her motifs - if anything, the snake is a reflection of herself rather than some kind of disembodied act / third-party-manipulation

In her splash art, the snake has an apple in its mouth (representing “sin”) that literally bleeds onto a contract she’s signing. So already we’re not painting a pretty picture here

Back to the jewelry around her neck: her necklaces are in no way as restrictive as Aventurine or Topaz’s chokers. I believe this was an intentional design choice, especially when comparing the “openness” of her outfit to Aventurine’s. Despite his attitude and posturing, he spends much of the quest making defensive gestures (such as crossing his arms or holding his arm behind his back, and largely keeps space between himself and others). He is also almost entirely covered up, aside from the chest window. This could just be due to hyv being weird about women, but I do think there’s something to be said about the relative flowy, open gestures of her outfit - Jade doesn’t dress like a woman who’s afraid

In her splash art, we can see her standing at the bough of a tree (perhaps representing the garden of Eden) and a man crawling towards her, offering jewelry and other valuable items. This man does not seem well, and the audience can extrapolate that he is not doing this of his own free will / there is coercion of some sort at play

Another comparison I’ve seen made of her clothing, and one I have to agree with, is that of a Southern Belle, and given the whip, animations, and the context in which we see her for the first time… let’s just say she’s not beating the allegations

This is a more minor character design choice, but note that her nails are sharp and pointed in her splash art. This is usually done to appear “animalistic” in some way; prescribing nonhuman traits to human characters so that they’re associated with a particular trait. In this case, the pointed nails are likely a reference to either the snake or the “demonic” connotations of “sin”

Her stone itself, jade, has different meanings in different cultures. In Chinese culture it is commonly used to symbolize success, good fortune, and prosperities. In ancient culture it was also believed to connect humans to the divine realm. I find this interesting because Jade herself works as a symbolic “connection” between the rest of the world and Diamond, who might be considered “divine” in some senses as he is an emanator. She says that she is the only person working directly with diamond, so I wonder if her stone was chosen accordingly?

‘Jade’, as in the stone itself, is also a ‘catch all’ term for both nephrite AND jadeite… so, Jade isn’t even an actual ‘designation’ of stone, referring rather to a spectrum of stones. Nephrite and Jadeite can be distinguished by their toughness and translucency.

It’s somewhat ironic that aventurine (stone) is considered a cheap counterfeit (and Aventurine refers to himself similarly throughout 2.1) meanwhile Jade isn’t even its own individual category of stone.

Next let’s look at her in the 2.1 plot

The first time we see her, she’s acting as a JUDGE. That is important to emphasize because people consistently downplay her role in his sentencing. I’m not sure why she was acting as a judge in this case (it might have something to do with the massive amount of money and infamy the case caused, or maybe there just wasn’t anyone else with high-enough clearance to take the case, or maybe she expressed personal interest in Aventurine and wanted to hear his piece in person), but she was literally the SOLE acting authority

I’ve already discussed Aventurine’s suspicious lack of legal options, so we know that Jade is basically the only thing that stands between him and literally dying

Immediately, she’s the first thing we see on screen, and she takes up the entire screen - domineering, pushing Kakavasha into the corner even in his own memory. This establishes another very clear power dynamic between them. Jade is sitting above him in her perfectly styled clothing while he stands beneath her in chains. The first thing she says to him is to assign material worth to his body, and goes on to admonish him for killing a slave owner - so, we know whose side she’s on, basically

Granted that Kakavasha basically just “exchanged hands” within the IPC, that’s not surprising that she’d have such a blase attitude

Here, we also see the shift in Kakavasha’s voice - I’m not sure when the change happened, but I do think he ends up mimicking her (both with the hat and the manner of speech). We already know Aventurine has the unfortunate habit of picking things up from the people who’ve hurt him (eg “all or nothing”)

I think it’s honestly a shame that people aren’t willing to engage with Jade’s character as it’s presented because that incredibly unhealthy mentor/mentee relationship is much more narratively complex and imo worth exploring than whatever it is they’re doing over there

Jade clearly has all the power over this transaction - Aventurine makes her an offer, and she accepts, but it was her choice to do so. She could have just as easily sentenced him to death, but she figured that she could get something out of him - notice how her tone sharpened after Aventurine made his wager. As soon as money was on the table, her attitude changed.

So, again, my opinion has been thoroughly substantiated by the way she acts: I think she is sinister and cunning, like Aventurine, but in the opposite way - Aventurine makes himself out to be an incompetent fool to trick others into underestimating him, whereas Jade uses a soft, kind voice to lure others into a false sense of security.

We can’t say for sure how Jade perceives herself, but I think that’s irrelevant to the discussion of her character analysis. By this I mean her motives for doing this seem entirely geared by profit, but the reason she seeks that profit is unknown. Regardless, I don’t think there’s a backstory in the world that could make me “switch up” on her. Now I’m gonna move on to 2.3 leaks so if you don’t want to see those be warned

*leaks start here

I’ve already gone through her eidolons (the clearest reflection of her soul) and they all pretty much just reference her position as a loan shark. So, predatory and exploitative in nature

Jade’s kit sucks HP from her teammates

Being a capitalist parasite is literally baked into her kit that is SO funny

Her skill drains 5% of any ally affected by Debt Collector → if Debt Collector is applied to herself, she does not lose HP but she does not receive the associated buff. So, the opposite of the self-destructive behavior we see Aventurine show (who, in his kit, literally applies a higher taunt to himself so that he’ll get hit more often than his teammates)

She may affect enemies with “blind fealty” which prevents them from attacking

She quite literally profits off of her teammate’s suffering. This is so incredibly funny

As for her light cone: THEY DELETED THE LEAKS I FOUND

If anyone knows where to find them. Please lmk. Everything I could find on tumblr, tiktok, twitter, and reddit is literally gone. I had a post saved from 2 days ago that got deleted. Idk where the crackdown is coming from (especially since Firefly’s animations are completely untouched). Maybe they’re fixing her unrendered-ass animations

Anyways, from what I remember I think the light cone is called “Hope is Priceless” or something along those lines, which SEEMS like it should have a positive implication about her character, but if anything it feels… ironic? Maybe even mocking? When compared to the names of all of her talents and eidolons. I’m going to interpret that as “hope is a good investment because I pay nothing to achieve it”. We’ll see how that interpretation goes in the next couple of weeks I guess

Anyways, comparing that to Aventurine’s kit, which literally focuses around protection (once again showing the division between his carefree mask and his actual character), Jade straight up stealing her allies’ HP is just. So funny. Like yeah that makes sense. She’s a debt collector. Taking people’s shit is her whole job and she takes that gig seriously

From what I remember reading on her light cone, she was fixing an orphanage (or something like that? A place with a bunch of small children), and I was getting a menacing sort of vibe to it. Maybe take that with a grain of salt because I literally cannot find it to quote right now. And if/when I do I will edit this but it’s literally nowhere

**leaks end here

Notably, we have no leaks pertaining to Jade’s past or anything like that, which implies that it has no bearing on the plot of 2.3. Especially compared to Aventurine’s pre-2.1 leaks. I’m going to go out on a limb here and wager that Jade’s backstory isn’t particularly important to her character - at least, not the way Aventurine’s backstory is important to his character. At the moment, I don’t think her character or the overarching narrative would have anything to gain from trying to make her seem sympathetic, as they’ve done a pretty good job of painting the IPC workers as a morally gray entity between the IP3. You have Topaz, who is happily complicit in colonization - but an indentured servant to the IPC all the same, and Aventurine, who is unhappily complicit (note also that Aventurine was specifically assigned to the Penacony case because his methods are significantly more peaceful than whatever Opal had planned) and who is property of the IPC. From that alone we have a pretty broad gray-space of morality to work from, so I’d prefer if they went even darker with Jade (as far as motivations go).

Basically, you can’t build a villainous corporate entity off of sad backstories alone, and since the IPC references so many real irl corporations, I think it would be kind of strange if they decided to sob-story everything they’re doing away.

If they were to go down the path which attempts to absolve Jade of her guilt by giving her some tragic backstory, or otherwise shifts the blame of her actions up the chain of command (which also doesn’t really make sense, since that would take away a lot of her autonomy and also the only person above her is DIAMOND), I feel that it would… cheapen her character as well as the story. Gray morality =/= sad backstory!!

I was also a bit confused about why Jade is becoming playable now. Like, we’ve seen maybe 30 cumulative seconds of her onscreen, and we don’t really have many story-relevant leaks right now like we did with Boothill. But Jade actually has a lot of Christian symbolism, which is significant to me because Ena has been associated with Christianity throughout the entirety of Penacony. Now, the snake alone might not have been able to convince me that this was intentional, but the tree/apple/garden of Eden imagery makes it almost impossible that it’s a coincidence. Now, does that mean Jade has connections with the Order? I have no idea, but I do think it’s interesting that she has such strong Biblical imagery right as we’re getting to leave Penacony (and with the Order, an allusion to Christianity and the Christian god)... Maybe she’s intended to be another parallel to Sunday, I can’t be sure yet. I’ll revisit that after her release.

In conclusion critical thinking is a skill and too many people haven’t practiced it

(Sorry for typos/errors/whatever I started drinking halfway through writing this)

#hsr #hsr aventurine #hsr jade #funny that I can write this but not a single paper #this is severely disorganized. but I do not care #hyv fans participating in my descent into alcoholism

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sxtaep · 2 years

Text

INCOMPETENCY - JHS

must be nice sharing an apartment with your colleague after you’ve been on his case all day for fucking up at work.

pairing — hoseok x female reader

genre — angst, smut

word count — 2.7k

warnings/tags — *please note that this is all consensual. do not read if you’re uncomfortable with somnophilia* coworkers!au, roommates!au, dom!hobi, sub!reader, scolding, swearing, a hint of jealousy, explicit smut, somnophilia, fingering, oral (f receiving), dirty talk, spitting (yk saliva..), pussy slapping, finger sucking, the beginning of a blowjob

a/n: i’m so h word lmaooo!!! jackinthebox hobi hitting different 😩😩😩 part 2 maybe?

As you unlocked the door to your shared apartment, you trudged in with a scowl on your face, setting your bag down onto the table as Hoseok followed behind. Neither of you exchanged any words on the way home, and you wanted to keep it that way.

Just as Hoseok was about to lock himself in his room, you started talking, “What was going on with you today at work? You can be honest now since there’s no one else around,” you turn around to face the questioned man, arms crossed and tapping your heel against the floor.

The awkwardness was taking over. He looked back at you, rubbing the back of his neck to ease the growing heat, “Uh.. at work I get tensed up and you often make it more difficult with all the pressure.”

Hoseok looks up at you briefly, expecting to hear you throw a bunch of shit at him, but before you even got to that stage, he continued, “And then there’s that measurements system the company works with here that’s still a little difficult for my head to wrap around. I’m more used to my national standards, so it’s just weird around here.” With every word, he was growing a little more confident, but he’d be lying if he said he wasn’t shifting himself right now. “I would just.. greatly appreciate if you didn’t constantly pressure me, and the other employees for that matter.”

You could only scoff at his words. You weren’t that kind of colleague. You refused to be that kind of colleague. You were merely motivating them your way.. which consisted of a lot of rough language and maybe a few unsolicited, work-related threats.

You cleared your throat and took a few steps towards him. “I understand that you came from abroad, but international or not, you’re meant to know every measurement system by heart, since this company is global. It’s one of the requirements needed to get the role.” You were trying to be smart, trying to find every possible way you could one-up on him by spewing out complete bullshit at this point. “Ha, who did you fuck to get this job?”

It was a strong claim you were making, and you knew Hoseok wasn’t interested in that stuff. The guy literally lived and breathed work.

“Excuse me?” he spoke up, his tone a little more stern than before. Did you really think he was that incompetent he couldn’t get a job through normal means? That the only way he could ever be successful was by getting into someone’s pants?

It was no lie that Hoseok was a desirable man within the workplace; with him working under you, you noticed many hungry eyes that would follow him down the corridors, in the cafe, in his shared office. But you hated it, because someone would always come up to you, asking about his relationship status only because you lived with him. It was exhausting having to refuse 10 girls a day asking for his number.

“I have the required qualifications and a degree in data analysis. That’s how I got the job. I’m sorry you can’t seem to understand, but I’ll let you think what you want.”

It was clear this dilemma was no longer a professional matter. It was off the job hours, and neither of you were on company property. Did it matter how far you went with your comments?

Of course it did. Hoseok was still your friend.

He continues, “If I were to fuck anyone above me for this job, I’m pretty sure I would’ve fucked you by now.”

“I beg your pardon?” You knit your eyebrows at the lean man, seemingly mad but really, you were just trying to fight the urge to let your eyes dip down his suited body.

Hoseok merely dismisses you, turning the knob of his bedroom door, “I’ll work on it tonight and fix it by tomorrow.” And then he disappears behind the door, leaving you to stand there alone, your growing pile of insults only towering on top of one another with nowhere to go.

“I— fuck..” You groan and ball your hands into tight fists, “Fuck you, Jung Hoseok!” you shout, flipping him off with your middle finger. You didn’t know if you were cussing him out as your colleague, roommate, or friend, but all you knew was that you needed to call it a day. The day so far was stressful and exhausting enough, you didn’t need Hoseok to add more to your stress when you were literally in your own home.

You snatch your bag off the counter and storm into your room, making sure to slam the door shut extra loud (loud enough for him to hear) before throwing yourself front-first onto your bed.

For the remainder of the day, Hoseok was glued to his laptop, Excel opened on half of his screen and another tab on the other half showing him the correct measurements he should’ve used first time around. His mistakes were pretty deep, so he scrapped the whole spreadsheet and created a new one from scratch; this time ensuring he used the correct formulas and such so as to not have a repeat of this morning.

He spent hours trying to perfect it, and when he was done, he attached it to your work email address, double checking your status before actually sending it through.

Offline (5 hours)

Good. It meant he could relax a little before you got the chance to scold him for messing up again.

He finally got out of his desk and left his room, with the sole intention to get something to eat, but actually, he hadn’t heard from you since you got back. Normally you’d be screaming your head off on the phone, arguing with someone over purchase orders and invoices, but Hoseok’s ears were met with silence.

He may hate you right now, but he was still a little concerned about you, so he stopped his journey to the fridge and instead made his way to your room, noticing your bedroom door was slightly ajar and the room was dark. Forming a hook with his index finger, he’d knock on your door softly, cautious to not wake up the beast within you (he had the bitter experience of dealing with your moody attitude when you didn’t get enough sleep).

When there was no response from inside, he slowly pushed the door wide open, giving himself room to lean against the door frame as your body soon came into sight. Hoseok stared at you for a minute, arms crossed over his chest as his eyes scanned you up and down. You looked so peaceful; the complete opposite of how you were a couple hours ago and he wondered why you couldn’t be like this more often.

The prettiest.

You were fast asleep on your side, still clad in your work clothes but having already ditched your blazer on the chair by your desk. Your skin tight skirt was partly rolled up your thighs, giving him the perfect view of your pretty panties sitting between your legs and he wondered just how often you rocked up to work like that.

It wasn’t his place to judge though, nor was it his place to gravitate towards your bed, but he was doing it anyway.

“Fuck…” he curses under his breath, diverting his eyes elsewhere, but he always found them landing on you.

Before you were his superior, you were his friend and his roommate. Right now, he just wanted to deal with you.

His way.

Hoseok found himself kneeling on your mattress, his ears picking up on your steady breathing. It was almost silent but he knew you slept like a rock in general, so he had nothing to worry about.

He ran his fingertips along the curve of your body, being extremely subtle with his touch to not wake you up. He waited for you to ease up a little before hooking his finger under the hem of your skirt, pulling it up gently to bunch at your hips so he could set his palm on the flesh of your ass. With his thumb spreading you apart, he had a front row view of your soiled panties practically glued to your heat and he had to resist the urge to groan.

You had to be dreaming. You couldn’t be this wet over nothing.

Hoseok shifted your underwear to the side and almost salivated at the sight of your stripped cunt from behind, glistening in all its glory and he couldn’t wait any longer; finally closing in on the gap between you two and landing a long, needy lick against you, then running the tip of his tongue up and down between your folds until he was forced to stop.

Your legs were closing in on his face and as much as he hated the idea of it, he tore himself away to look up at you; still fast asleep, yet you’re once soft features now looked tense.

Why weren’t you waking up?

To make things a little easier for himself, he placed his hand over your hips, turning you over to lie on your back (which was too easy) so he could be met with you sound asleep; silk blouse slipping down your shoulders, all creased. Your cleavage was peeking out from under the silk material with the added hint of lace accompanying.

He cursed under his breath and diverted his attention to the mess between your legs, leaning in to place a small kiss over your clit before his tongue lapped at your folds. He didn’t miss the way your breathing had quickened and your body shuddered, and it all felt like a dream to you.

A dream you refused to wake up from.

From your bodily reactions, Hoseok could tell you were left absolutely starved. With the role you had, he doubted you had an output for your needs. Maybe he could ease some of the stress for you so he wouldn’t need to deal with your sour attitude once you wake up.

“Cute..” he mutters to himself, trailing his index finger between your legs, spreading your folds apart to blow lightly against you.

You started shifting against the bed, unknowingly edging your hips closer towards him, and it startled him for a second when his finger ‘accidentally’ dipped inside you, earning a breathless sigh from you.

Just that triggered Hoseok to latch his mouth onto your sensitive bundle of nerves, sucking harshly whilst his finger disappeared inside you, enveloped nicely by your soft walls as your quiet moans filled his ears.

“Oh, God.. Hobi…”

Hobi.

Shit, it was the hottest thing he’d ever heard you say, and it drove him mad, now flattening his tongue against your drenched folds as his nose budged at your clit. His finger was pumping in and out of you at a slow pace at first, but once he added a second finger, his pace was ungodly, it left you writhing.

Hoseok licked up all the juices that continuously seeped out of you whilst your mind became a haze. The air surrounding your sleeping body grew hot within a couple minutes and suddenly this dream was feeling a little too real. You were so sensitive, and it was something your fellow roommate wasn’t expecting, and normally he’d go easy, but after the way you treated him today? Easy was not an option. Not when you were dreaming about him with your pussy all out in the open.

“More.. more, more…” you chant softly to yourself, your eyelids momentarily opening only to close shut again as soon as he forcefully gripped your hips with one hand to pull you towards his mouth, giving him the room to leisurely lick upwards as a stream of your arousal connected the both of you.

Both his digits would swim inside you, copping a feel of you clamping down on him greedily. “Like this, huh?” he questions, feeling around your tight pussy in slow circles whilst kissing at your inner thighs.

The gesture was soft enough to wake you up; eyes fluttering open to look down at your coworker with his head between your legs. He expected you to kick him in the face, but the soft pout on your lips said otherwise.

“Hoseok.. what—?”

He spat down onto your cunt, watching the glistening substance trickle down your slit before attaching his mouth around your swollen nub, forcing you to whimper. The last thing he wanted was for you to scold him and he couldn’t take you seriously in this state.

“I think we’ve established our dear Miss L/N, likes getting her pretty pussy ate, when she’s not breathing down our necks,” he teases, plunging two digits into your gaping hole and watching your body jerk at the impact. “Isn’t that right, Y/N?”

The satisfaction was overwhelming for you, having just woken up and still trying to adjust your sight by blinking a couple times, but did you really wanna see the mocking faces he was making at you? You already knew it was Hoseok from all the rings on his fingers glimmering from the light coming through the doorway.

“God, yes..” you breath out, adjusting your position to prop yourself up on your forearms, your eyebrows knitted together and bottom lip all swollen from how hard you were biting down on it.

“You gonna fire me for this, Y/N?” A low chuckle is heard from the pits of his throat as Hoseok withdrew his fingers from inside you, delivering a harsh smack to your oversensitive cunt, and before you could release a cry, he was lying on his side beside you with an arm propping him up, whilst the two fingers that were drenched in a mixture of saliva and slick delve into your mouth in a bid to shut you up.

You didn’t have the powers to fire him (not that you’d want to if he kept treating you like this), God knows you were shamelessly enjoying yourself.

“D’you think I’d get a promotion for this? For getting my hands on my superior and treating her desperate pussy the way it deserves to be treated?” Hoseok’s eyes lingered down to your flushed cheeks and teary eyes, pushing his fingers further into your mouth as your lips wrapped around his long digits.

You did a poor job at avoiding making a mess, drooling down the base of his fingers until the substance dripped down your chin, making it even more difficult for you to respond.

Hoseok revelled in watching you struggle. It made the blood rush to his cock faster than he anticipated and he made sure to rut himself against the side of your hips. “I’ve been up all fucking night doing some bullshit spreadsheet for you, and look where it got me,” he seethes, annoyance gripping at his tone as he pulled his fingers out of your mouth, leaving you a heaving, gasping mess.

You barely had any time to catch your breath before Hoseok climbed on top of you, cupping your jaw and forcing you to look up at him.

“You gonna apologise for earlier?”

“No.” You had nothing to apologise for. Hoseok fucked up, and that was on him. You were merely disciplining him for his incompetence. If he couldn’t handle a scolding, then what the fuck was he doing in this company?

“No?” he repeats your words, now squeezing your cheeks together and leaning down to ghost his lips over your pouty ones. “I know women like you don’t just give out apologies. I’m tired of your shit, so I’ll make you apologise.”

“I don’t need to apologise to you!” You felt much more awake than you were before, and you cocked a challenging brow at him, a little startled when he climbed on top of you, fiddling with the fly of his creased dress pants so he could pull his cock out to let himself dangle above your face.

You didn’t expect him to be so… big, and it looked like Hoseok noticed the first round shock on your face and he chuckled, holding his heavy cock in his hands as he edged his bulging tip towards your lips and almost forcing himself past to watch you earnestly take his cock like he dreamed.

“Better put that mouth of yours to good use, or I’ll end up fucking you raw.”

perm taglist: @aliceaflor5-blog @kookiecrumb @jjkeverlast @prettyghost @kooliv @koobsessed @gimmethatagustd @pb-n-juju @aslias17

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bronx-bomber87 · 7 months

Text

Happy Tuesday evening lovely fandom :) The work flirts continue on and in front of EVERYONE at the station might I add in this one. Like they’re not even trying to hide it at this stage in their relationship. God I love s4. Lets get this started eh?

4x03 In the Line Of Fire

We first catch Tim talking to Grey in the locker room. (Lucy did appear earlier but was for SL don't care about with Nolan ha) Wade suggests a Sergeants aide to him. Tim being Tim sees it as a sign of weakness. Like he can’t handle his workload. He is defensive and says he doesn’t need one. Grey knows where his head is and says it’s not weak to need one. They're short staffed it makes sense to. I LOVE LOVE LOVE Wade suggesting Lucy to him.

He’s not wrong they’re seamless together. They miss riding together (not that either will admit this) It makes perfect sense on paper. You can see the wheels turning in Tim’s head above as he considers this. Now I think his immediate gut reaction is Lucy. Not a doubt in my damn mind. But as he continues to mull it over he sees the cons of it. If you’re not in tune with Tim you might not get his motives for not choosing her right away.

We will delve into that later in the episode. But I know when he thinks on it more it’s because he wants to protect her. On multiple levels by not choosing her. I love this about him. His first instinct is to protect Lucy above all else. Emotionally, her career, you name it he’s protecting it. Love this man.

Friggin Nolan overhears this and jumps the gun. What else is new? Foot in mouth disease is his go to. He is causing unecessary friction because he can’t keep his mouth shut. (I mean it leads to a delightful episode for them but I have to give him shit.) It's setting both Tim and Lucy up for failure with the aide news. Nolan telling Lucy that Tim is going to pick her to be his go-fer with such certainty does just that. Saying he heard Grey tell Tim to do so. Getting her all excited he’s going to choose her.

When Tim picks Webb instead Lucy is CRUSHED. Tim is looking in her general direction too which is even more misleading. Her actions above are screaming very loudly how upset she is. I love how much Lucy uses her hands when she is upset. She fidgets and doesn’t know what to do with herself at all. I’m Italian so I can relate haha I feel like she is going through so many emotions in this moment. Hurt he didn’t choose her, agitated that he chose Webb, confused why he would choose anyone but her and lastly pouting because he didn’t choose her.

Petty Lucy is born in this moment and I love it. It's like being told your crush is gonna ask you out and then doesn’t…. You also know she’s going to be jealous and try and lure it out of Tim why he didn't. Because well Lucy LOL She’s doing all these things while Nolan is catching Grey up about his case. Having a loud pout session front and center for Tim and all to see haha Makes me laugh so much. She is deeply upset and everyone will know about it haha

Lucy gives Nolan more grief (as she should) about misreading the Sergeant-Aide situation. Now she’s in analysis mode. Trying to break down why he did what he did. Nolan stating the obvious that it's bothering her Tim didn't pick her. (Duh. You should be a detective. Oh wait....) Lucy explains why this opportunity would be beneficial to her above. She’s not wrong but she is also refusing to beg. Wants him to come crawling to her. Admit he wants her there not the other way around. Oh petty Lucy you are hilarious to watch.

Doesn’t want to give Tim the satisfaction of having her ask. Or having her fate in his hands again. Wants him to be the one to give in and want her around. To Lucy she’s earned that spot with him. Wants Tim to recognize she should be his aide. Nolan should be smart enough to stay clear of this couples spat. But it is Nolan so…he is dealing with her going off haha Lucy finishes off her rant telling John if there is one thing she knows its Tim is definitely missing her right now.

We cut to Tim having a blast with Webb LMFAO They're talking about the game last night. How Webb has season tickets to both the Dodgers and Angels. That he can hit him up anytime for some. You can tell Tim is having a good time with Webb. If Lucy could see this interaction right now it would break her heart. Not really missing her at the moment haha He’s in sports heaven right now.

The way Lucy is reacting to Webb being Tim’s aide is so funny. She literally stomping her foot like but that’s my Tim and my position. Minute she sees Webb at the food trucks she’s on him. Lucy is so jealous they’re having a good time. The way she says 'Really? that's....awesome' (Sure it is..) Sabotage becomes her next play.

Asking Webb if he’d like to know how to stay on Tim's good side. She checks behind her to make sure Tim isn't catching her trickery ahaha She knows he wouldn't like these 'tips'. Smh. Lucy Chen you are playing dirty…. Transparent as a glass house my dear. They get interrupted by a sniper shooting a car that crashes into their lunch spot. So we don’t get to hear these ‘tips’ of hers. All we know is it won't end well for Webb.

We cut back to Webb and Tim in their shop. Talking about the weird case they have right now. He starts going on about his cat personality. Tim’s face. I’m dying. Eric is the king of expressions and I'm laughing so hard. He is so uncomfortable. When Webb asks Tim what his is? It's then Tim knows where this is stemming from. He immediately asks if Lucy put him up to this? Knows his wife too damn well. Like he wasn’t going to figure that out ASAP. Or maybe that was part of her plan. To torture him and have him know she was the reason behind it. These two are ridiculous and I love it.

So begins the ridiculous childishness that is these two in this episode. (I'm loving this BTW) Well Lucy was already there. Been living there for a hot minute heh. Now that Tim knows she wants the job it’s game on. Because why talk about this like adults? When they can work flirt this to death. LMAO Not only that but torture each other along the way. Be more married you two my god. They clearly miss riding with one another but won't be the first to blink. Their competitive nature not letting them yield any control.

The amount of flirting going on in this scene. My god. And it's happening in roll call of all places. Shamelessly flirting in front of the entire station. Tim calling Lucy out for wanting the job. Her innocently saying 'What?' Like she didn’t just sabotage that man out of insane jealously and pettiness LOL

Tim straight up calls her out on it. Saying the cat personality was ALL her. Lucy continues her clueless act with the hint of a cocky smirk. She’s trying so hard not to break this battle of wills they have going on. Her body language betraying her so badly. Tim is onto her and it’s so damn funny. Tim thinks he has the upper hand in this conversation. Knowing she wants the job and is very aware of her sabotage. Thinks the scales are tipping his way right now.

That is until Lucy crushes him with her words and flirting. He’s stunned into silence. You know this man loves it when she does this stuff. He’s mad he likes it. Lucy drives him insane and he goes back for seconds every time. I love how Tim is so caught up in this flirt he forgets where he is. The way he double checks behind him is hilarious. Like she said something dirty to him in public and he’s red baha Also making sure no one else is hearing this convo of theirs. How she just owned his ass during it. Can you spot the married couple?

To continue the petty childish run they're currently on Tim gets back at Lucy quickly. Saying he wants to spread the love. Give someone else a shot at being his go-fer. Her face in that second gif LMFAO. Lucy could not be more smug if she tried. The way she pumps her eyebrows at him. Thinking she has won this battle of theirs. He’s going to pick her. Game over. She's wondering what to him so long. Then he picks someone sure to get under her skin. Smitty…

He makes sure to look her in the damn eye as he says it. The audacity of this man. He knows EXACTLY how to get under her skin. Looks her in the eye, smiles that devious smile, and says Smitty. Such an ass lmao but he’s her ass. Drives her just as insane as she drives him. I’m sure the room is thinking. ‘God just make out already’ LOL Damnit love them so much.

Lucy notes her frustration very loudly. Grey may not totally understand what’s going on but knows it’s something. Calls Lucy out on it. Asking if she has a problem? She is immediately defeated with a ‘No….’and ends with a even sadder ‘sir….’ Tim has won this round and she can’t do a damn thing about it. These two are so ridiculous and I love them for it. It’s like she forgot their little feud was in front of Roll Call and Grey had to bring her back to reality poor girl. lol

Lucy gets her's in the end though. Smitty being Smitty. Tim is regretting his decision so much already. He's telling Tim all the things he can't do. Lucy hangs back and is enjoying the show. Her smugness returns quickly as Tim has to load the war bags cause of Smitty's 'bad back' LMAO

I love how the scene starts with her eyeing him across the bullpen. She come over and asks why Smitty isn’t doing the paperwork? Tim says he claims to be allergic to paper LMFAO. Lucy's smugness continues. Tim tells her it’s not funny.... Leads her right into her convo with him. Saying he should’ve just asked her instead. Tim replying he was trying to do her a favor. That people might view her riding with him again as a step back. Now we can loop back to why he hesitated in the first place in detail.

You can hear the hurt in her voice. The way she feels offended that he would prefer the station to know he’d rather ride with Smitty than her. When its anything but that. I talk about Tim always wanting to protect Lucy. Whether that is physically or emotionally. His first gut reaction is to shield her. That’s what he was doing in this moment. He respects her so much and thinks so highly of her as an officer.

The last thing he would want ANYONE in the station to think was she didn’t earn it. He definitely didn’t want to be a proponent of that either. Tim has seen how hard she's had to work to get to a good place in her career. Last thing he would want to do is jeopardize that with people thinking otherwise. Just because he wants her back as his partner. I love that so much. He’s guarding her career in this moment. Doesn’t want her to endure any unnecessary BS for being his aide. Refuses to be selfish and puts her first.

Also I think he is aware people know of their dynamic. That people will think she got it for unsavory reasons. Reasons he would never allow but people will think it anyways. His intentions are so very Tim Bradford in how crazy honorable they are. Lucy is listening intently and understands why he’s doing it. But she can’t help but fight against it. Saying screw what others think. Voicing how archaic it is for people to just assume it's something untoward cause she's a girl and he's a boy.

Tim saying he’s very handsome boy to her LMAO It’s ok babe she knows you are. Painfully aware of it really. He needs that validation from her and it cracks me up. Not the first or the last time he does this either. Lucy’s ‘oh gag’ Oh please woman. You’d jump his bones in a heartbeat if you could. That look in 5x12 alone when she is checking him out once his shirt is off contradicts this moment so much. Showing what a lying liar she was. But sure let’s pretend you think he is ‘Oh gag’ biggest lie yet my friend haha

This next section is my favorite part. Their battle of wills continues down to the friggin wire. From Lucy calling it aide and Tim saying go-fer. HA Then her battling back with why she wants to be his aide (not go-fer) I LOVE the way he is looking at her while she passionately defends why she wants this. Careful Timothy your feelings of admiration/love are showing. Lucy wants this so badly. People and their thoughts be damned.

She’s impressing him once again and it’s written all over that devilishly handsome face of his. Lucy saying what she could get out of it alone is worth putting up with him and his ways. (Like you don't want to be doing this anyways) D and I talked about how this before. How part of her wanting to be his aide is more than just a promotion. Do I think that is truly part of it? Yes. I have no doubt about that. I also think part of it is the safety and familiarity of Tim.

He supports her in a way she will never get with Nolan. Jackson is gone and all she has left emotionally is her person. Her safe space. So her ‘putting up’ with him again is her really just missing him. Craving that familiarity. They both miss each other and this is a way of getting that back. I think Tim’s initial instinct when Grey brought her up was an immediate yes. Then he got his in his head and wanted to protect her instead of what he wanted. Which was to ride with her again.

Before we continue let’s first note how sexy his biceps and forearms are in this part. The way he crosses his arms in a way that just does things to me. Sex on a stick. Just his arms. Also the forearm porn is fantastic. I’m in a river of drool at this point LMAO Man is so fine it’s unfair really. No one should be this handsome and sexy doing something so simple .*ahem* Anyways I do adore Lucy mirroring his body language. Crossing her arms as well. Still not willing to give into him. Look at the stare down in the third gif.

She is smirking because she's on the verge of victory and knows it. Making Tim be the one to break and go for it with her. It’s funny to think about with S5. Because he HAD to be the one to go for it. They were gonna stay in a holding pattern unless he did. Took the leap and the risk. Just like he does here. He’s contemplating holding out longer. The way he taps his fingers on that delicious bicep deciding. He cracks and says ‘What the hell. Let’s do it.’

Lucy lights up like a Christmas tree. Heart eyes galore for him. Tim tells her to show up to roll call an hour early. That way he can go over new procedures and such with her. Lucy thanks him all smiles and so grateful. She throws down one last work flirt as she is leaving about paperwork. He is just as flirty back with his signal for her to go haha Gah I love these two so much hurts my soul lmao. So much chemistry it blows my damn mind. They’re so into each other and don’t have a damn clue. Ah idiots in love. Truly.

Last bit I adore her shirt ‘Tell your dog I said hi' I would so wear this shirt. Very fitting for Melissa. Love Lucy wearing it. Damn I love that episode one giant flirty moment . S4 truly is a gem. All this suppressed UST/love streaming through 22 episodes.

Side notes-non chenford

I love Aaron and Nyla bonding in this one. I’m so glad she chose James. He was the obvious winner between the two. I love watching them develop they so cute. Aaron fixing things at the end was very lovely.

Thank you as always to those who like, comment (oh how I love the comments) , reblog and such. You are the real MVPs. Shall see you all in 4x04 :)

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krafterwrites · 1 year

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Analyzing Every Shadow The Hedgehog (2005) Sequence Name

If you don’t know, there’s 326 possible ways you can play through the story mode of Shadow the Hedgehog, and all of these ways have names. In this post, I’m going to look at the name of every single one of these and see why they’re named that by looking at what happens in that specific sequence. You might be asking, why on Earth would I do this? Well, I don’t really have a reason, I just want to because the idea popped into my head one day. Anyways, let’s get into this post, which is definitely going to be insanely long

001: Punishment, Thy Name Is Ruin

This is the first path on the list, and also the darkest one that Shadow can take. In this route, Shadow works with Black Doom on every stage (Except for Cryptic Castle, where he works with Eggman). After completing the mission for Black Doom on the final level and defeating Sonic along with Diablon, Shadow obtains the final Chaos Emerald and proclaims that he was created to bring order and justice to the humans, then proceeds to say that he is going to destroy the planet. This ending’s name is relatively simple to explain, Shadow’s line about being made in order to bring justice to humans implies that he believes that humans are worthy of punishment. As the name states, that punishment is ruin, as in him bringing the planet to ruin by destroying it with the Chaos Emeralds

002: Prologue To World Conquest

This one is very simple. It goes the same as the last route up until the final level, where Shadow betrays Black Doom at the last moment. He then says that he is the ultimate lifeform, born to rule over all, and that he will use the power of the Chaos Emeralds to conquer the universe. That’s all there is to this one

003: The March To A Darker World

This is another rather simple one. In this route, Shadow works solely for the dark side up until the penultimate level, where he does the neutral mission instead. This leads to him going to the Black Comet as the final level, which he does the dark mission for. This leads to him gathering all of the Chaos Emeralds and proclaiming that he was created to protect and serve Black Doom, and that the world will become a dark empire, so the reason why this ending has its name is pretty obvious

004: The Ultimate Ego

This path is the same as last time, except Shadow chooses the hero mission while aboard the Black Comet instead of the dark one. This leads to him saying that he and only he knows what is best for himself before (Presumably) killing Eggman

005: Purification Via Ruination

Okay I’m going to be completely honest here, I’m not 100% sure of the meaning behind this name. This route involves Shadow doing the dark mission for every single level except for Central City, where he does the hero mission. Before the level begins, Black Doom tells Shadow that his past is filled with hatred for humans. Since the hero mission involves Shadow saving a lot of humans (By disarming bombs the Black Arms have planted all around the city), and since the ending is the same as Punishment, Thy Name Is Ruin, it makes me think that in this path Shadow thinks that there are some good humans instead of hating all of them. By destroying the planet, he thinks he’s purifying it (Via ruining it, just as the name says). His plan, or my theory, might have a few holes in it though since the planet being destroyed would kill literally everyone, maybe it would leave behind one or two GUN Soldiers on the ARK, but that’s it. There is another way to think of it, though. Maybe the thing that’s being purified is the wider universe, and by destroying the planet, he’s cleansing it of humans and their actions

006: Apogee Of Darkness

It’s here that I’m starting to realize that these sequence names mostly seem to be based on which of the 10 possible endings they end in, which makes this whole analysis less interesting. I’m still going to try though, although all of the stuff that I say will probably be huge reaches because I’m looking for meaning that probably does not exist. So in this sequence Shadow does dark missions for the first three stages, does the hero mission in Central City, and then does the dark mission for Air Fleet before finally arriving at the GUN Fortress and doing the hero mission. This sequence ends with Shadow proclaiming that he’s going to conquer the universe, just like Prologue To World Conquest. Apogee means the highest point of something, so this means that this sequence is supposedly the height of darkness for Shadow. This seemingly only refers to him conquering the universe (Which is indeed a very evil thing), since he does actually do a hero mission twice in this route, which would make it not be the darkest possible sequence

007: True Soldier Of Destruction

The pattern I noticed on the last post seemed to be accurate, as this name seems to refer mostly to the ending of this path, where Shadow says that he will become the minion of Black Doom and help him conquer the planet. Nothing else in the sequence, which has Shadow doing the dark missions for the first three levels, doing the hero mission for Central City, and doing the normal mission for Air Fleet before finally doing the dark mission for the Black Comet, seems to tie into this name. I feel like a lot of the explanations are going to be this, and I’m sorry for that since it’s probably kind of a let down, but even if my explanation every time is just “Yeah this name is just because of the ending of the sequence”, that’s still a lot of effort on my end considering I’m tackling over 300 sequences

008: Believe In Yourself

This one is mostly based on the ending, where Shadow proclaims that only he knows what is best for himself, but I think I can find a few crumbs from other levels as well. In this route, Shadow does dark missions for the first three levels, does the hero mission of Central City, and then the neutral mission for Air Fleet before doing the hero mission of the Black Comet which results in the aforementioned ending. This could show that Shadow was at first influenced by Black Doom and Eggman, but then decided to turn back from them and help out Knuckles (Possibly due to regret, or maybe he realized that working with the heroes could be better for him), and then when he arrives at the next stage and he has to decide if he wants to continue being heroic or defect back to the Black Arms, he decides to do neither and trust in only himself. This is most definitely a big reach, but I’m also probably putting more thought into this than whoever made the sequence names (Sorry to whoever made the sequence names, I’m thankful for your work)

009: An Android’s Determination

This is another one that’s entirely based on the ending. In this sequence, the final level is Lava Shelter, which Shadow does the dark mission for. This results in an ending where Shadow, believing that he is an android replica of the original Shadow, says that he will use the Chaos Emeralds to become even stronger than the original. That’s all I really need to say for this one, the reason behind its name is obvious

010: For Machine, By Machine...

This sequence is similar to the last one, as the ending of it still has Shadow believing that he is an android, although this time he does the hero mission, which results in him planning to use the Chaos Emeralds to take over the Eggman Empire and rule the world with machines. This is another obvious one, Shadow believes that he is a machine, and he wants to make a world for machines by conquering it with them (Sidenote: It feels like the neutral hero and neutral dark endings got swapped, it would have made way more since if you got the neutral dark ending by doing the hero mission at the end of a neutral route, and vice versa)

011: Revenge At Last

Like a few of the other sequences, Shadow claims that he will destroy the world with the power of the Chaos Emeralds to get revenge on humans. This one does have a bit more stuff to it, though, since Shadow does the dark mission for the level The Doom. The Doom is a flashback to the massacre on the ARK, and the dark mission involves Shadow killing all of the GUN forces in the level. This obviously shows that in this sequence, Shadow especially hates humans and badly wants revenge on them, which is obviously why this sequence has its name

012: Ego’s Awakening

This sequence is the same as the last one, except it ends with Shadow saying that he will conquer the universe instead of destroying the world. The Doom’s dark mission being present here ties into it a lot less than it does with Revenge At Last. In fact, I can’t really think of a way it ties in at all. The only meaning I can find behind this name is that Shadow’s ego is at its highest during the ending this sequence concludes with

013: Destruction And Scorn

Like a few others that have been mentioned so far, this one ends with Shadow saying that he will serve Black Doom and help him with his conquest. This sequence also has The Doom’s dark mission. The word scorn means belief that something is worthless or despicable, so this name makes a lot of sense, Shadow is helping Black Doom conquer/destroy the planet because of his hatred for humans

014: The Last Remaining Purpose

The name of this sequence is mostly based on the ending like all the others, but there is a bit of extra meaning that I can dig for. In this route, Shadow does the dark mission for the first two stages and works for Black Doom, and then chooses the neutral mission in the third level. The next level is The Doom, which he does the dark mission for, and then aboard the next level, The ARK, he does the neutral mission. Finally, he does the hero mission aboard the Black Comet which leads to the ending where he declares that only he knows what is best for himself. This specific path taken could be interpreted as Shadow starting off working for Black Doom, choosing to go through Cryptic Castle without helping anyone (Because the dark mission is Eggman in that level), and then reliving a version of the ARK massacre before heading to the current day ARK. The reason why Shadow chooses to take the neutral mission even though the dark mission is given by Black Doom could be because he doesn’t want to destroy what’s left of the ARK (Black Doom’s mission involves destroying the ARK’s defenses), and being requested to do this makes him realize that he doesn’t want to work for/Can’t trust Black Doom either. Since Black Doom was the only one he trusted initially, he decides that the last remaining thing for him to do is to simply trust in himself and nobody else. Or I could be looking way too far into this. Either one

015: The Nightmare’s Insulation

This sequence ends with Shadow saying that he is going to destroy the world with the Chaos Emeralds, although it also involves The Doom, specifically its neutral mission where Shadow and Maria simply try to escape as fast as possible. Because in this path, Shadow clearly hasn’t moved on from the incident aboard the ARK because of how willing he is to work with Black Doom, him destroying the planet could be seen as a flawed way of trying to make himself look better, since after that the only places he could live are alone on the ARK, or on the Black Comet with the Black Arms (I interpret him saying he’s going to destroy the planet as he’s going to literally break the entire planet, like it got shot by the Eclipse Cannon, not just destroying all the buildings on it and stuff). So, him destroying the planet is simply an insulation to the nightmare he’s going through, since it isn’t going to make things any better for him, especially in the long run

016: The Nightmare’s Sublimation

This sequence goes the same as the previous one, although it ends with Shadow saying that he’s going to conquer the universe instead of destroying the planet. The definition of sublimation (other than the chemistry meaning) is the act of expressing strong emotions or using energy by doing an activity or creating something. The name implies that Shadow is conquering the universe in an attempt to make himself feel better or occupy his mind, but like destroying the planet in the previous route, this isn’t actually going to help him

017: The Loner’s Choice

In this route, Shadow works with Black Doom for the first two missions, and then does neutral missions until the end where he chooses the dark mission, resulting in the ending where he decides to become Black Doom’s minion. That’s pretty much all there is for this one

018: Subjugation In Black

This route is the same as the previous one, except Shadow chooses to do the hero mission at the end instead, which leads to the ending where Shadow says that only he knows what is best for himself. Subjugation is the action of bringing someone or something under domination or control, so this name reflects that Shadow is bringing his own destiny under control through dark means (Like killing Eggman, which he does in this ending)

019: Replica’s Depression

In this route, Shadow goes through the level The Doom (A flashback to the ARK massacre) and then ends up at Lava Shelter, which he does the dark mission for. This leads to the ending where he believes he is an android and says he will use the emeralds to become even more powerful than the original. I’m going to stop saying “That’s pretty much all there is” whenever I’m done with my analysis for these sequences now, because I’ve already said that a lot and we’re only at 19 sequences out of 325, whenever I’ve said all that I have to say about the sequence I’ll just end the paragraph and move on

020: Machine, Machine

This is the same as the last one, except Shadow does the hero mission for Lava Shelter instead, causing him to declare that he will create an empire of androids. This is definitely one of the sequence names that’s only based on the ending, since I fail to see how it can fit into anything else that happens in the sequence

021: Disciple From The Darkness

This falls into the same category as the previous one, it’s solely based on the ending, where Shadow says that he was created to serve Black Doom

022: Beloved Clone

This is an interesting one, as it seems to not be based on the ending of the sequence at all. The one level and mission that seems to tie into this sequence’s name is the penultimate level of this sequence, Iron Jungle. In Iron Jungle, Shadow believes he is an android copy of the original, and does the dark mission where he works with Eggman. While he is doing this mission, Eggman acts affectionately towards Shadow, even saying “Those are more of my beloved androids, just like you!” when Shadow encounters Shadow Androids

023: Revenge Upon The Doctor

In this route, Shadow does the neutral route of Iron Jungle and then the dark mission of Lava Shelter, which results in an ending where he kills Eggman. Before he starts Lava Shelter, he also remarks “You’re going straight to the place you created me from!” and after starting Lava Shelter “You’re going straight to hell!”. This implies that Shadow believes he was created from hell, which would explain why he resents Eggman and wants to get revenge on him

024: The Ultimate Replica

This is another one with Iron Jungle and Lava Shelter, and you’d think that it would end with the neutral-dark ending (Where Shadow believes that he is an android and proclaims that he will use the power of the Chaos Emeralds to surpass the power of the original Shadow), but it’s actually the neutral-hero ending, where he says that he will create an empire of androids to rule over the planet. I think this name would have been far more fitting for the neutral-dark ending, but oh well. Also I’m going to stop explaining the endings now, it’s definitely already gotten repetitive, I’ll just use shorthand for the endings like the two names I used in this one

025: Sanction’s Demise

I’m like 90% sure that sanction means a safe place or something similar, but when I looked it up that definition did not appear. I’m going to stick with what I’m pretty sure the definition of it is though, since otherwise this name doesn’t really make sense. Also, I know I just said that I would use shorthand for all the endings, but the ending for this sequence is one that hasn’t showed up until this point, so I will explain it just once here. In this ending, where Shadow does the dark mission for Cosmic Fall, he decides to become the protector of the ARK (Which is actively falling apart, hence the name of the level) and spend the rest of his life there. Shadow’s chosen safe haven is dying around him, which is the reason behind the name of this sequence. Also, for future reference, the name of the ending for this sequence is semi-hero dark

026: Along With My Home

This sequence ends with Cosmic Fall like the last one, although Shadow does the hero mission for it instead of the dark mission. This results in a pretty grim ending (the semi-hero hero ending), where Shadow says that he should have never been created, and it’s implied by the names of several sequences that have this ending (including this one) that he takes his own life. Since this ending takes place on Cosmic Fall, which takes place on the collapsing ARK, this name implies that Shadow will die along with his home

027: The Cleansing Of Darkness

This is an ending that ends with Shadow saying that he will destroy the world (Which is the dark-dark ending). In this route, like all dark routes, Shadow expresses disgust and hate for humans. Obviously he would think that humans are a darkness in this route, so him destroying the planet and killing all the humans on it would be a cleansing of darkness

028: Birth Of A God

This sequence ends with the ending where Shadow betrays Black Doom at the last moment at the GUN Fortress, and then proclaims that he will conquer the universe with the power of the Chaos Emeralds (Which will be referred to as the dark-hero ending from this point on). Shadow probably does have something of a god complex in this ending, as it would take one to say you’re going to conquer the whole universe

029: The Last Soldier’s Grim Fate

This is a sequence that ends with Shadow saying that he was created to serve Black Doom (Which is the semi-dark dark ending). I don’t know what events in this ending or the other levels in the sequence would make Shadow the last soldier, or what his grim fate is. Maybe even with Shadow on their side, the Black Arms would fall and Shadow would be the only one who wasn’t killed by the heroes due to their past experiences with him and the belief that he could change. He wouldn’t go back to their side, though, and would spend the rest of his time just wandering the planet with the group he believes he was created to serve extinct. That’s all speculation, though

030: Isolation and Solitude

This sequence ends with the hero mission of the Black Comet, where Shadow says that only he knows what is best for himself (Which is the semi-dark hero ending). Since he does not join any sides in this ending, he will most likely spend all of his time by himself, since he is the sole person he trusts

031: Archimedes And The Tortoise

This is by far the most out there sequence name, but I think I actually have an explanation for it. This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending, and there is a paradox called Achilles and the Tortoise (Archimedes is a famous Greek mathematician and engineer, which might tie into things since Shadow believes he is an android in this ending. The paradox of Achilles and the Tortoise states that if two beings (one fast runner and one slow moving tortoise) are each moving at a fixed speed and the tortoise has a 100 meter headstart, the fast runner will never overtake the slow tortoise. This is because in the time it will take for the runner to reach the position the tortoise is at, it will have moved forward in that time and will be ahead of that previous position. This means that the runner will never pass the tortoise. This rather darkly implies that no matter how hard he will try, Shadow will never surpass the original (Even though he is the original, but it would still be possibly for him to feel inferior to “the original” since he fully believes that he is an android)

032: Where Is My Happiness?

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending. Unlike the last one, there’s no ancient paradox for me to make wild assumptions about, instead it’s just a question to make wild assumptions about. I’m guessing that this is a similar situation to sequences 15 and 16, where building an empire of androids and conquering the planet with it will not make Shadow happy, and might even make him feel empty inside since he will have accomplished his ultimate goal yet still not be satisfied from it

033: Seduced By Taste Of Blood

In this sequence, Shadow does the dark mission for the first two levels, does the hero mission for the next level, and then does the neutral mission for Sky Troops (Which is to get to Eggman’s flagship). Next, he does the dark mission for Iron Jungle (Where he kills all of the GUN troops invading Eggman’s base) and then does the dark mission for the Black Comet which results in the semi-dark dark ending. This path and the name could be interpreted as Shadow starting off evil, becoming heroic, but then becoming bloodthirsty and lured back to the dark side after killing for Eggman to try and gain answers about his past. This bloodlust would ultimately lead to him wanting to work with Black Doom and help him take over the planet

034: A Machine Made For War

The penultimate level in this sequence is Iron Jungle (Where Shadow believes he is an android, which I’m going to also stop stating since I’ve said that several times already) and the final level is the Black Comet, which leads to the semi-dark hero ending. This ending doesn’t involve war as much as the semi-dark dark ending, so this name doesn’t make that much sense to me. Shadow is just going his own way and trusting himself, which I really doubt will involve war

035: Original Definition

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending, and while I was a bit confused by this name at first, I realized what it actually means. Shadow was originally created to be the ultimate lifeform, AKA the most powerful lifeform. Since Shadow believes he is a copy of the original and will try to surpass the power of said original, he’s fulfilling the purpose he was created for

036: Machine Paradise

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending, and that’s all there is to this one

037: Last Will And Testament

This sequence ends in the semi-hero dark ending. What Shadow says to Eggman in this ending is essentially his final will, since he intends to stay on the ARK for the rest of his life. A testament is a part of a will, specifically pertaining to personal property, which also ties into the ending, since he’s now the protector of the station

038: Enveloped in Solitude

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending, but it also has Iron Jungle, so Shadow’s really going through it in this ending (hence the name)

039: Parricidal Savior

This is a very interesting name. Quick bit of context before this analysis starts, parricidal means involved in the murder of one’s immediate family. In this route, Shadow does the dark mission for Space Gadget (Where he destroys the defense systems of the ARK, his old home and birthplace) and then gets the neutral-dark ending where he kills Eggman, who he believes is his creator. I’m not exactly sure what makes him a savior in this sequence though, maybe it’s the fact that he does two hero missions in a row before the aforementioned missions

040: Copy of a Savior

This name has less to it then the last one. It has the neutral-hero ending, so Shadow believes he is a copy, and it has the two hero missions as well near the end like the previous sequence

041: Excess Of Intellect

This is one of the less clear sequence names, but I’m still able to piece something together from it. It ends with the semi-hero dark ending, so I suppose it could be interpreted as Shadow’s knowledge (Which would be a far more fitting word than intellect) being wasted since he’s isolating himself for the rest of his life. That still doesn’t fit super well with the name, but it’s the best I can think of

042: Crystallization Of Intellect

Figuratively, crystallization means the process of something becoming clear. This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending, which means that in this ending it becomes clear to Shadow that his creation caused a lot of death which leads to him believing that he never should have been created. Like in the last one, I think knowledge would be a far more fitting word than intellect, but maybe my interpretation is wrong and the actual meaning fits better with the name

043: The Ultimate Confrontation

This sequence has an ending that hasn’t showed up before, the hero dark ending. This ending happens when Shadow does the dark mission for Final Haunt (The most heroic final level), which takes place aboard the Black Comet. In this ending, Shadow sides with Black Doom at the last moment so he can fight against Sonic and prove that he is stronger than him. Shadow also does the hero mission for Space Gadget prior to Final Haunt, where he races against Sonic aboard the ARK to get to a Chaos Emerald, and actually gets there first

044: Miracle Of Love

This is a cute one! In this route, Shadow does the dark missions for the first two levels, working with Black Doom in both of them. Once he gets to Cryptic Castle, though, he does the hero mission where he helps out Amy, and proceeds to do only hero missions for the rest of the sequence. This even leads to the hero-hero ending, where Shadow defeats Black Doom and says that he will protect the planet like Maria wanted him to. Just like in SA2, in this sequence Amy made Shadow snap out of his villainous tendencies and realize Maria’s wish, and I think that’s really nice. (Just so it’s clear by the way, I don’t ship Sha/damy, I interpret the name as being about Amy’s love for the world and her friends rubbing off on Shadow, which causes him to begin working for the good guys instead of the Black Arms)

045: The World’s Demise

Another sequence that ends with the dark-dark ending

046: The Ultimate Power

Another sequence that ends with the dark-hero ending

047: Dyed In Lovely Darkness

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending. The world will be dyed in darkness once the Black Arms take over it, but since Shadow’s working for them, he’ll find it nice

048: Vainglory Or Abandonment?

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending. Vainglory means excessive pride in oneself, and since Shadow says that he’s the only one who knows what is best for himself in the end of this sequence, this sequence name is asking whether he is making this choice because he thinks he’s better than everyone else or if he’s just abandoning them because he doesn’t trust any of them

049: Messenger Of Ruination

This is yet another sequence that ends with the dark-dark ending, although it does also involve Shadow doing the dark mission for Air Fleet where he attempts to assassinate the president. Despite the fact you blow up his escape pod, he’s completely fine, but if he did actually die then that would be a good message of the imminent doom the planet would face from Shadow

050: Standing At The Summit

This is another sequence that ends with dark-hero ending

051: Controller From The Capsule

This name is a bit frustrating to me, because I know it has to mean something, but I can’t find a satisfactory answer. This sequence involves The Doom and its neutral mission (Which leads into Shadow being shot out of the ARK in a capsule) and the semi-dark dark ending, where Shadow helps Black Doom control the planet. The two pieces for the name are there, but I don’t know how they correlate

052: Beyond One’s Own Power

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending. It doesn’t really fit that well, though, since Shadow isn’t going to try and become more powerful like in several other endings. Maybe what Shadow thinks is best for himself is using the seven Chaos Emeralds to become even more powerful, but that’s never really hinted at, so that’s just my best guess

053: A Clone’s Determination

This is another sequence that ends with the neutral-dark route

054: Machine Utopia

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero route

055: A Toast To The Ruler

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending (Sidenote, the mental image of Shadow and Black Doom giving a toast is actually kind of funny to me)

056: Answer From The Black Comet

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending. I’m not sure what specific event on the Black Comet lead to Shadow coming to the conclusion he does in this ending, maybe him doing the hero mission of The Doom and the dark mission of Iron Jungle made him not want to work for Black Doom anymore. He already didn’t want to work with the heroes since this is one of the darker routes, so he’s probably just working with Knuckles to take down Black Doom since he knows that he’ll be a threat to him. When Eggman shows up and tries to take the Chaos Emeralds he’s been gathering the whole time, it makes him realize that he doesn’t want to be allied with Eggman either, thus leading to him choosing to only trust himself

057: Transcendentalism

Another sequence that ends with the neutral-dark route

058: Imperialism

Another route that ends with the neutral-hero ending

059: The Weight of One’s Crimes

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending. Before Cosmic Fall starts, the GUN Commander tells Shadow that he is the reason that everyone on the ARK was killed, which is most likely why Shadow decides to live on the ARK and be its guardian in this ending. He believes that he’s the reason why its empty and has been left crumbling and unguarded for such a long time, so he’s given himself the job of protecting it. Or, as the sequence’s name says, he’s choosing to live on the ARK because of how much his “crimes” are weighing on him

060: Imprisoned By The Past

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending. Like I mentioned for the previous sequence name, in both semi-hero endings Shadow is dealing with a lot of guilt since he takes responsibility for the ARK massacre. Even if he doesn’t die (Which thankfully isn’t implied by this sequence’s name), he’s still going to feel trapped by his past

061: The Ultimate World Conquest

This sequence ends with the dark-dark ending. There is a bit of stuff that adds to this name, though, since Shadow does the dark missions for both Sky Troops and Air Fleet (Which means he destroys the Egg Fleet and tries to kill the president)

062: Black Angel

This seems to be one of the first names that barely has anything to do with the sequence at all, it ends with the dark-hero ending which kind of fits with the name, but it mostly seems like this name was chosen because it sounded cool. And to be fair, it does sound cool, especially with the context of the ending

063: Under Darkness’ Control

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending

064: To Love Oneself

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending

065: Revenge And Determination

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending, and also involves Shadow doing the dark mission for Sky Troops and the hero mission for Iron Jungle, which both involve shooting down Eggman’s aircrafts

066: Birth Of The Robot Emperor

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

067: Shadow, The Black Android

This sequence involves Shadow going through Iron Jungle, and then ending up on the Black Comet and getting the semi-dark dark ending

068: A Solitary Android

This sequence involves Shadow going through Iron Jungle and then getting the semi-dark hero ending

069: Over The Original

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending

070: Machine Sunshine

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending. It doesn’t fit the ending quite as well as some of the other names sequences that end in it have, but it is a sick name

071: Life Is Guilty

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending, and as its been mentioned before, Shadow feels guilty over his creation in both semi-hero endings since he believes it lead to all of the death that took place aboard the ARK

072: Fallen Angel of Despair

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

073: An Eternal Rival

This sequence involves Space Gadget, although Shadow does the dark mission for it and not the hero mission which involves racing Sonic. It ends with the neutral-dark ending, so it can be assumed that Shadow is trying to surpass Sonic as well as the original. The eternal part is probably because he believes that he’s an android, which means he would live forever as long as he isn’t killed

074: This is Just the Beginning

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending, and it also has Space Gadget like the previous sequence, but it doesn’t really tie into the name even if Shadow did the hero mission for it (Which he didn’t). I suppose the name just means Shadow has even bigger plans than conquering the planet with an empire of androids, maybe this specific sequence leads into the dark-hero ending except with an army of androids instead of just Shadow

075: Crystal Of Tragic Knowledge

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending. At first, I thought this name made sense except for the crystal part, but then I realized that the crystal is supposed to be Shadow. Shadow is full of knowledge of the past, like a crystal formed in a cave ages ago that has recorded everything around it

076: Shadow’s Second Death

Some of these sequence names have had ellipses after them, which I’ve been cutting out since they’re not really needed and make the name look more cluttered. This ending has ellipses and a question mark after it, so it is ambiguous whether Shadow actually dies after this sequence. Since this sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending, I really hope he doesn’t end up dying, because the implications of him dying after that ending are quite dark

077: The Legend of Shadow

This sequence involves Shadow beating Sonic in a race to the Chaos Emerald on Space Gadget, and then getting the hero-dark ending where he turns against him at the last moment to defeat him in a fight and become the ultimate hedgehog

078: Power Of Love

This is another nice one! In this sequence, Shadow does the dark mission for Westopolis, but after going into Digital Circuit and meeting with Rouge, he does the hero mission with her and then does hero missions for the rest of the levels (Except for Prison Island, poor Charmy). This leads to the hero-hero ending just like the last sequence that had a love themed name. Also just like the last time I talked about a sequence with a love themed name, here’s a quick disclaimer: I don’t ship Sha/douge, I think it’s gross. I think the love in the name is based on the fact that Rouge is the person who’s closest to Shadow and cares about him the most, since she interacted with him a lot in SA2 and got him out of his pod in Heroes

079: Deep Black

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending

080: Walk My Way

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending

081: This is Shadow’s Way Of Life

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending

082: A Monarch’s Style

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

083: In the Gap Of Sadness

The ending of this sequence is the semi-hero dark ending. While Shadow’s life has had a lot of sadness in it overall, most of it occurred aboard the ARK. Since he’s living the rest of his life on it, he’s living in the one place that holds the most sadness for him

084: To Be Ignorant Of The Past

There’s two different ways that this name can be interpreted, since this sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending. One, Shadow believes he was ignorant of his past before the GUN Commander and Black Doom told him about it. Two, he wishes he was ignorant of his past, because knowing the truth causes him to feel like he should’ve never been created

085: At Vengeance’s End

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending, although the only part of the ending that’s important to the name is the fact that he kills Eggman. The cutscene before Lava Shelter and one of his lines at the beginning of the level also tie into the name, but I already mentioned both of those earlier

086: Machine Boys

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

087: Reborn Along With Sorrow

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending, and since Shadow is essentially starting a new life of solitude aboard the ARK, it could be described as a rebirth. It’s already been mentioned a lot that Shadow is sad in the semi-hero endings, but something else that might add to it a bit is that he also does the neutral mission for Space Gadget, where he fails in a race against Sonic aboard the ARK

088: With A Fate Of Self-Denial

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending, but the name is a little bit strange to me. Shadow doesn’t really deny anything about himself in this. He’s very sad about his belief that he caused the ARK incident, but he fully accepts it. Maybe this ending means that he’s denying the actual truth, that the events aboard the ARK were not his fault. It could also mean that he’s denying the fact that he was created to be the ultimate life form, since he also loses to Sonic in a race in this sequence, and he refers to himself as “A research experiment gone deadly wrong” in this ending instead

089: I Am Shadow

In this sequence, Shadow completes the hero mission for Space Gadget and then gets the hero-dark ending, so this route involves a lot of competing with Sonic. This is probably in order to prove that he is Shadow, the ultimate lifeform (Or the ultimate hedgehog, as he calls himself in the hero-dark ending)

090: Shining Within Memory

This sequence ends with the hero-hero ending where Shadow fulfills his promise he made to Maria 50 years ago, but that’s just one of the two meanings behind this name. In this route, Shadow also races Sonic for a Chaos Emerald aboard the ARK, which is reminiscent of the events of SA2. Sonic even remarks “This is just like old times!” at the start of the level

091: The Rise And Fall Of The ARK

The penultimate level in this sequence is Lost Impact, and the final level is Cosmic Fall, which leads to the semi-hero dark ending. Simply put, the last two levels of this sequence are the rise and the fall of the ARK

092: Requiem For A Fallen Angel

A requiem is a mass held for the souls of the dead, which has some dark implications, since this sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

093: Ultimate Shadow

This sequence ends with the hero-dark ending

094: For Love’s Sake

This sequence is the exact same as Power Of Love, except Shadow helps Charmy this time around instead of ignoring him, which is nice

095: A Heart Awoken from Darkness

This sequence ends with the dark-dark ending, and involves Shadow doing the dark missions for every single level except for Westopolis, which he does the neutral mission for

096: Destruction From Perfection

This sequence ends with the dark-hero ending. It would make more sense if the name of this sequence and the name of the last sequence had their names swapped, they fit each other better than they fit their own sequences

097: Darkness’ Strongest Soldier

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending, and also involves Shadow doing a lot of dark missions

098: Severed Chains

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending

099: Retribution Against Humanity

This sequence ends with the dark-dark ending

100: To Be Known As Ultimate

This sequence ends with the dark-hero ending

101: Dark Warrior’s Advent

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending

102: Arriving At The Ego

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending, although this name would definitely fit better with a few other endings

103: Determination Of A Fake

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending

104: Path To The Machine Empire

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

105: Demise Wrought By Tragedy

This sequence has The Doom as part of it, and ends with the dark-dark ending

106: Turning Sorrow Into Strength

This sequence ends with the dark-hero ending, and has The Doom as its fourth level

107: The Liberated Soldier

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending, and it does involve The Doom and The ARK as levels, but I can’t think of a good way that they tie into the name. Maybe Shadow destroying the GUN forces during his flashback and then deciding to not destroy the defenses for the ARK brought him some sort of peace about his past

108: Stupefaction’s End

To be stupefied means to be unable to think properly, which definitely happened to Shadow a lot in this game considering how much internal conflict he goes through. This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending, so him deciding to only trust himself is the end of this confusion

109: Humanity’s Folly

This sequence ends with the dark-dark route, and also involves The Doom

110: Surpassing All Else

This sequence ends with the dark-hero ending

111: Soldier Of Grief

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending

112: Reclaimed Heart

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending

113: Fighting Spirit Of Steel

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending

114: Machine Soldier Uprising

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

115: The Devil Born From Betrayal

The betrayal that’s mentioned here is most likely Eggman’s betrayal of Shadow in this sequence. He does the dark mission for Iron Jungle, which helps out Eggman, but he still attacks him with the Egg Breaker anyways. This betrayal leads to Shadow deciding to work with Black Doom in the semi-dark dark ending

116: Beyond The Truth Of Impact

Going to be honest here, I don’t even have a guess at what this one means. It has The Doom, Iron Jungle, and the semi-dark hero ending, but none of those seem to tie into the name at all. Sorry for not giving a real answer for this one, but at least I managed to give answers for about 100 other so far

117: The Immortal Android

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending

118: The New, Coldhearted Empire

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

119: A Singular Atonement

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending, and also has Shadow doing The Doom’s hero mission

120: Spawn Of The Devil

In the semi-hero hero ending, which this sequence ends in, Shadow fights Black Doom. Before this fight begins, he tells Shadow that he created him

121: Black Doom's Scheme

This sequence ends with the dark-dark ending, and also has Shadow working with Black Doom in every mission where he can except Westopolis

122: Subjugating Heaven And Earth

To subjugate means to conquer and bring under control, which fits perfectly with the dark-hero ending, the ending of this sequence

123: Road Of The Dark Soldier

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending

124: Dark Finale

This name is kind of strange for a sequence that ends with the semi-dark hero ending, which this sequence ends with. The only dark thing about it is that he kills Eggman, this name would have fit better with the dark-dark or dark-hero endings

125: Realization While On Board

This name seems to be based on one small moment that happens before the final level of this sequence, where after doing the hero mission for Air Fleet (A level that takes place on a massive GUN aircraft), Shadow realizes that he is an android copy of the original that Eggman built

126: Birth Of A Champion

Strangely, this sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending, and not the neutral-dark ending. I guess being the ruler of an empire that rules the planet would kind of make him a champion, but this still isn’t a very good name for this sequence

127: With The Black Arms

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending

128: The Road To Self-Assurance

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending

129: The Pursuit Of Dr. Eggman

This sequence has Shadow doing the neutral missions for Sky Troops and Iron Jungle, both of which involve Shadow chasing after him to get answers

130: Surpassing His Creator

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending. If Shadow does manage to conquer the planet like he plans to in this ending, then he will have surpassed Eggman just like the name says

131: ARK, Colony Of Pathos

Pathos means a quality that evokes sadness, which is fitting since there are a lot of tragic events that happened on the ARK. This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending, meaning Shadow will spend the rest of his life on the colony of pathos that this name describes

132: Perfection Lost To Darkness

Shadow was created to be the ultimate lifeform, so the semi-hero hero ending being the end of this sequence means that the perfection of his existence is being lost, whether he ends up dying as some of the sequence names with this ending involve or if he just spends the rest of his life depressed and isolated

133: A New Challenge

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending, giving Shadow a new challenge to take on: Surpassing the original

134: The Machines' Coup d'Etat

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

135: A Vow For The Victims

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending, meaning Shadow is making up for causing the death of the ARK massacre’s victims by protecting the station and making sure it doesn’t fully collapse

136: The Truth Of Sadness

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

137: The Destined Sonic Showdown

This sequence has Shadow doing the hero mission of Space Gadget, and then getting the hero-dark ending

138: The Black Hero’s Rebirth

This sequence ends with the hero-hero mission, and has Shadow doing hero missions for most of the levels

139: Truth, Thy Name Is Vengeance

Shadow does the dark mission of The Doom in this sequence, and then ends up getting the dark-dark ending. In The Doom, some of Shadow’s idle dialogue asks if this is really part of his past. My interpretation of this name is that Shadow ends up believing that him killing all of the GUN soldiers aboard the ARK is the true way that things happened, which causes him to realize that his true purpose is to destroy the planet and get revenge like Gerald wanted him to

140: Searching For “Ultimate”

This sequence ends with the dark-hero ending. I guess this ending and the name means that Shadow is searching to be the ultimate being in the universe, and by conquering all of it, he’ll prove that he’s the strongest

141: Reborn Hatred For Humanity

In this sequence, Shadow does the dark mission of The Doom, and ends up getting the semi-dark dark ending

142: A Future Taken From The Past

Shadow does the dark mission of The Doom in this sequence, and then gets the semi-dark hero ending. I’m not sure exactly how the events of The Doom ties into the ending in this case, though. Maybe the crumbling ARK in the present day is still a part of this past, and Black Doom asking him to damage it and allow the Black Arms to invade it made him no longer want to work with him

143: The Devils’ Victory Song

This sequence ends with the dark-dark ending

144: One To Succeed A God

This sequence ends with the dark-hero ending

145: Disappointed In Humanity

Shadow does the neutral mission for The Doom in this sequence, and then gets the semi-dark dark ending

146: Faith Taken From Solitude

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending

147: Planted Memories

In this sequence, Shadow goes through The Doom and then ends up getting the neutral-dark ending. Because he believes he is an android in this ending, this means he must believe that the memories of the ARK massacre that he’s recalling in The Doom were planted inside of him

148: To Unite Humanity

This sequence has The Doom as part of it, and it ends with the neutral-hero ending. The reasoning behind this name is that Shadow probably believes that having an android empire rule the planet will unite humanity, and prevent them from committing atrocities like they did aboard the ARK

149: Isolated Soldier Shadow

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending. My best guess at the reason why he’s isolated is that he rarely works with Black Doom in this route, only doing it once. Right after he does a mission for him, he does the hero mission for The Doom, which shows that he doesn’t completely hate humanity. Because of this, he likely won’t agree with everything Black Doom says and will not have a close relationship with him, leaving him isolated from everyone since he’s working against the heroes and Eggman

150: Answer Derived From Truth

There’s two truths that this name could be talking about. It could be Shadow believing that the hero mission in The Doom is the true way that things happened, or it could be the supposed truth that he is an android. Since this sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending, I’m leaning towards the latter, since Shadow believing that he’s an android would lead to him not wanting to affiliate with anyone. He has no prior association with the heroes, he doesn’t want to work with the Black Arms that much since he doesn’t have an especially strong hatred from humans due to his memories being planted, and he hates Eggman for creating him in the first place

151: A Fake’s Disposition

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending. Since disposition means a person's inherent qualities of mind and character, and Shadow does the hero mission of The Doom in this sequence, this could mean that the qualities he saw from his original grew on him and changed him a little bit

152: A New World Without Betrayal

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending, and also involves The Doom’s hero mission. I would explain further, but I basically stated everything that I would have said here a few sequences ago

153: Together With Maria

This sequence has The Doom as part of it, and ends with the semi-hero dark ending

154: The Tragedy’s Conclusion

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

155: The Day That Hope Died

This sequence ends with the dark-dark ending, and also has Shadow doing the dark mission Air Fleet

156: Dark Destroyer

This sequence ends with the dark-hero ending

157: Diabolical Power

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending

158: For Freedom

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending

159: At Least, Be Like Shadow

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending

160: Seeking A Silent Paradise

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

161: The Lion’s Awakening

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending

162: Identity

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending, and also involves Iron Jungle as its penultimate level

163: An Android's Rebellion

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending

164: A New Empire's Beginning

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero route

165: Bullets From Tears

This is one of the more out there names, but I do have an explanation for it. This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending, and Shadow’s goal is to deter everyone else from the ARK, a mission that comes from his grief that he feels for causing the people aboard the ARK to die. He doesn’t kill Eggman, just tells him to leave and never return, but if somebody tries to attack the ARK or refuses to leave then he might end up killing them to protect the station

166: Journey To Nihility

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

167: Shadow Surpassing Shadow

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending

168: Dr. Eggman’s Miscalculation

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

169: Along With The ARK

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending

170: Requiem For The Heavens

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

171: Sonic Dethroned

This sequence ends with the hero-dark ending

172: Justice Reborn In Space

This sequence ends with the hero-hero ending

173: Steel Ruler

This sequence has Iron Jungle as its penultimate level, and ends with the semi-dark dark ending

174: For The Sake Of The Self

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending

175: Farewell To The Past

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending, and also has Mad Matrix as a fourth level, where Eggman tells Shadow that he has no past

176: Steel Paradise

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

177: The Guardian With No Past

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending, and has Mad Matrix as its fourth level

178: The Ultimate Atonement

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

179: A Fake's Aspiration

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending

180: Machine World

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

181: Twilight Ark

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending

182: Compensation For A Miracle

I’m not 100% sure what this name means, but like I usually do, I have a guess at what it could mean. Shadow’s creation was probably considered a miracle by Gerald and Maria, but this same miracle lead to their deaths as well as the deaths of everyone else on the ARK as well (at least in Shadow’s mind). Since this sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending, whatever Shadow does after this ending is him compensating for the “miracle” of his creation

183: The Strongest Hedgehog

This sequence has Shadow completing the hero mission for Space Gadget, and getting the hero-dark ending

184: The Ultimate Punisher

This sequence ends with the hero-hero ending

185: Voyage Of Reminiscence

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending

186: Wandering's End

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

187: The Ultimate Proof

This sequence ends with the hero-dark ending

188: Punisher Of Love

This sequence ends with the hero-hero ending

189: Messenger From The Darkness

This sequence ends with the dark-dark ending

190: The New Ruler

This sequence ends with the dark-hero ending

191: Dark Soldier

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending

192: The Road Of Light

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending

193: The Machine-Laden Kingdom

This sequence surprisingly ends with the neutral-dark ending, not the neutral-hero ending

194: New Determination

Just as weirdly, this sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending, not the neutral-dark one. I’m almost 100% certain that this sequence name and the last one were meant to be the other way around, and something got switched at one point or another

195: Birth Of The Dark Soldier

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending

196: A New Journey

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending

197: The Android’s Opposition

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending

198: Founding Of The Robot Nation

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

199: The Eternal Protector

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending

200: The Sinner’s Repose

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

201: A Hero’s Resolution

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending, so it doesn’t fit super well, the hero part of the name seemingly just comes from the fact that Shadow does a few hero missions in this sequence

202: The Weapons’ Empire

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

203: Perpetual Voyage

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending

204: A Hero’s Atonement

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

205: Dark Hegemony

Hegemony can mean dominance, so this name could fit with several endings, but the ending of this specific sequence is the hero-dark ending. In this case, the dominance is Shadow proving that he is stronger than Sonic

206: And The Dream Continues

This sequence ends with the hero-hero ending, since Shadow is fulfilling Maria’s dream of the planet being safe

207: Fighter For Darkness

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending

208: The Path I Believed In

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending

209: Determination’s Daybreak

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending

210: Machine Kingdom at Dawn

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

211: Sinful Protector

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending

212: At The End Of The Journey

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

213: Surmounting The Nightmare

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending, and while it isn’t as fitting as some of the other names, it still goes with the ending pretty well. The prospect of being an inferior copy of who you thought you were would be a nightmare to most people, and by surpassing the original, Shadow is getting rid of that problem

214: Dawn Of The Machines

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

215: Wandering For Eternity

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending

216: At Vagrancy’s End

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

217: The Summit of Power

This sequence ends with the hero-dark ending, and has Shadow completing the hero mission for Space Gadget

218: Under The Name Of Love

This sequence isn’t really structured like the other sequences that have love themed names, and since it ends with the hero-hero ending, I’d say that it’s probably based on Shadow’s loving the planet just like Maria did (Although in this sequence after doing two neutral missions in a row, Shadow does hero missions with Sonic for the last two levels, so do with that what you will)

219: Eternally Drifting

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending

220: The Importance Of Truth

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

221: The Beginning Of Judgment

This sequence ends with the hero-dark ending, although it’s not a very fitting name in my opinion, since I can’t find a great meaning for the name with the context of the ending. I guess maybe it’s the judgement of Sonic, and his position as the strongest hedgehog?

222: This World’s Guardian

This sequence ends with the hero-hero ending

223: Light Born From Darkness

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending. Eggman is a pretty evil guy and created the Shadow Androids (And lied to Shadow about being an android in this path) for his own goals, and I guess wanting to surpass the original in power is a noble enough goal, so this name fits decently

224: The Order Of Steel

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

225: Solitary Journey

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending

226: The Fall Home

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

227: Sovereign Of All Creation

This is definitely one of the weirder names, but it still makes sense. Sovereign as an adjective means possessing supreme or ultimate power, so this name is implying that shadow is the most powerful thing to have ever been created, which makes sense because this sequence ends with the hero-dark ending

228: I Shall Be The One To Judge

This sequence ends with the hero-hero ending

229: Gone With The Darkness

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending

230: The Ultimate Choice

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

231: I Am The Strongest!

This sequence ends with the hero-dark ending

232: Justice’s Awakening

This sequence ends with the hero-hero ending

233: Prelude to Ruination

This sequence ends with the dark-dark ending

234: A World United By Darkness

This sequence ends with the dark-hero ending

235: The Pulse Of Darkness

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending

236: To Just Be Myself

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending

237: Punishment In Jet Black

This sequence ends with the dark-dark ending

238: The Ruler’s First Cry

This sequence ends with the dark-hero ending

239: Darkness’ Conspiracy

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending

240: The Faint Light Of Tomorrow

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending. While I haven’t been providing explanations for a lot of the names, that’s mainly because they’re easy enough to figure out and as such it’s kind of pointless to do it. I will explain this one though, since it’s a little less straightforward than the others. Shadow’s probably not 100% confident in his decision to only trust himself, in his mind he knows it’s the right thing to do, but it’s going to be a rough road ahead since he doesn’t have anyone else to work with. Since he’s sure this is the right way though, he’s also sure that he’ll make it to tomorrow. It could be thought of in a different way, since he doesn’t know what tomorrow holds, so the light of it is faint to him

241: Time Of Departure

I really don’t know what this one means. I guess since Shadow’s only goal is to become the strongest, he’ll likely depart from Eggman’s base soon after the ending and begin just roaming around. This sequence also has the neutral mission for The Doom as one of its levels, meaning its a flashback to when Shadow departed from the ARK and his old life.

242: Rise Of The Machine Kingdom

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

243: Despair’s Quickening

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending, and has The Doom as one of its levels. Once again, I can’t figure out the exact meaning of this name, and I can’t tell if that’s because I’m kind of tired right now or because at this point in the sequences the developers started to run out of names that made a lot of sense

244: The Beginning

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending

245: Setting Out In The Morning

Another sequence that has the neutral-dark ending with a leaving related name, am I missing something? It also involves The Doom, but once again, I really don’t know what this name is supposed to mean in relation to the events of the sequence

246: The Weapons’ Dawn

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

247: Pure Ark

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending

248: Making Up For It In The End

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

249: The Coming Of The Dark Time

This sequence ends with the dark-dark ending

250: The Throne Of God

This sequence ends with the dark-hero ending

251: God Of War

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending

252: Howl Of Solitude

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending

253: Proof Of Existence

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending. This one is decently clear, but I’ll explain it anyways. It’s already been stated a lot that Shadow was made to be the ultimate life form, so by surpassing the “original” version, then he will prove that the ultimate life form does exist (Since he thinks the original died), and that he is it

254: Ardent Vow

Ardent means passionate, so that means that in this sequence, Shadow is making a passionate vow. This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending, so it does kind of fit, since Shadow promises to create an empire of androids that will rule the planet (A goal that he will have to be extremely dedicated to in order to actually achieve)

255: A Deal With The Devil

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending

256: A Reason To Live

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending

257: Induplicable Thoughts

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending, although strangely it doesn’t have The Doom as part of it. Maybe that’s why it has this name, the memories aboard the ARK that the original had couldn’t be duplicated and given to any of the androids. Or perhaps whatever thoughts couldn’t be duplicated are the reason why Shadow wants to become stronger than the original

258: Steel Struck With Flame

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

259: A Heart Bound To The ARK

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending

260: Tears Shed By The Stars

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

261: Imitation Complex

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending

262: Steel Combat Boots

This is probably the silliest (affectionate) name in this entire list. This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending, so it’s actually a pretty clever play on words

263: Protector Of The Ashen Moon

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending

264: A Demon Drifting

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

265: The Ultimate Pride

This sequence ends with the hero-dark ending, and also has Shadow completing the hero mission of Space Gadget

266: I Know The Will Of Heaven

This sequence ends with the hero-hero ending (Sidenote, this is an extremely cool name)

267: Ego Dyed In Black

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending

268: Isolation By Choice

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending

269: Faith Without Falsehood

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending. The falsehood could be two opposite things, it could either be Shadow thinking that him being the original was a falsehood, or Eggman telling him that he has no past in Mad Matrix (A level in this sequence) is the falsehood

270: Machine Empire

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

271: The Eternally-Closed Door

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending. Shadow and the ARK are both eternally closed doors, since the ARK itself is sealed off from everyone except him, and he’s never going to leave it

272: The Sealed-Away Ark of Sin

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

273: Silver Emergence

When I first saw this name on the list, for a split second I internally went “:O Silver!”, but this game came out in 2005, so Silver didn’t even exist yet. Anyways, this sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending, so I suppose this name is a cool way of saying that Shadow is emerging as an even stronger being than the original him

274: Pulsating Supercurrent

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending, so I’m guessing this name was chosen because it sounds cool and like something that would be part of a giant computer system, which is what Shadow is like in this ending since he’ll be controlling a whole empire (And possibly the planet)

275: The Reason I Was Born

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending

276: The Dark Part Of The Galaxy

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

277: The View From Atop The World

This sequence ends with the hero-dark ending

278: Maria’s Testament

This sequence ends with the hero-hero ending

279: A Genius Scientist’s Lineage

This sequence has Lost Impact as a level, and also ends with the semi-hero dark ending. Since Shadow does the normal mission of Lost Impact, which involves him going to Gerald’s laboratory to check on him, the meaning of this name is obviously that he’s carrying on Gerald’s legacy by guarding the place where most of his inventions were created

280: Distorted Truth

This sequence has Lost Impact as a level, and ends with the semi-hero hero ending. Because of this, the meaning might be that Shadow doesn’t believe that the events of Lost Impact happened as he remembers them. Or, the name could only be based on the ending, and that the truth he believes in the ending is distorted

281: A Counterfeit Existence

This sequence has Mad Matrix as a level, and ends with the hero-dark ending. My interpretation of this name and the events of the sequence in the context of it is that Shadow is worried about the implications of him apparently having no past, so he fights Sonic to prove that he is still the ultimate lifeform, and not just a counterfeit

282: Beloved Memories

This sequence ends with the hero-hero ending, and has Shadow doing the hero mission of Lost Impact

283: Birth Of A Devil

This sequence ends with the dark-dark ending

284: A Dark Myth’s Beginnings

This sequence ends with the dark-hero ending

285: Black Thunder

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending

286: The Torn Away Necklace

I really don’t know what this one is supposed to mean. Since this sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending, I guess the necklace is supposed to represent Shadow’s destiny and his control over it? It was originally torn away from him by everyone trying to get him to work for them, but then he finally takes it back from them at the end. I don’t know, that’s just my best guess

287: A Soul Sheltered By Iron

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending

288: Steel Nation’s Decree

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

289: Coronation Of Darkness

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending

290: Opened Eyes

This sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending. Since Shadow works with the heroes at first before doing missions for Eggman, and Eggman betrays him by trying to steal the Chaos Emeralds (and attacking him with the Egg Breaker after Iron Jungle, the final boss fight is probably the specific thing that leads to Shadow opening his eyes and deciding to only trust himself

291: The Doctor’s Lie

This sequence has Iron Jungle as a level, and ends with the neutral-dark ending

292: The Uninvited Successor

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

293: The Closed Pandora’s Box

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending

294: A Heart Bound By Sin

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

295: Courage From Turning Gears

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending

296: Fullmetal Prince

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

297: Time’s Watchman

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending

298: Galaxy’s Requiem

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

299: Charm Of The Chaos Emeralds

Since this sequence ends with the hero-dark ending, the meaning behind this name is that Shadow was tempted by the power that the Chaos Emeralds he was collecting could give him, and decided to give into those temptations by using them to become even more powerful than Sonic

300: Promise Of A Far-Off Day

This sequence ends with the hero-hero ending, I think that the meaning behind this name is that Maria wished to one day live on the Earth, which is probably part of the reason why she said that she wanted to protect it along with Shadow (She says this in the final story). By protecting the planet from Black Doom, Shadow is being reminded of that far off day that Maria wished for

301: The Grim Reaper’s Horn

This sequence ends with the semi-dark dark ending

302: A Flame Extinguished By Fate

Since this sequence ends with the semi-dark hero ending, I guess this name means that Shadow’s potential to be a great force for good or evil has been extinguished by the events that lead to him deciding to only do what he wants to, since he’s probably not going to do much that affects anyone except himself after making that decision

303: Shouting At The Morning Sun

Another morning related name that goes with a sequence that ends with the neutral-dark ending. I think I might have figured out what this means, although I’m not completely sure of it. I remembered that another one of the neutral-dark endings was called Determination’s Daybreak, so the sun rising is symbolic of Shadow’s past and what his goal is becoming clear to him. As for why he’s shouting at it, well, I don’t really know. It just made me think of characters in DBZ and how they scream when they power up since Shadow is trying to surpass the “original him” in power in this ending, so that’s my answer because I can’t think of anything better

304: Iron Ambition

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

305: Sleeping On Hallowed Ground

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending

306: Explanation Of The Truth

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

307: An Android’s Dream

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending

308: Metallic Quickening

Quickening means to stimulate (One meaning of which is development of or increased activity in), which is fitting since this sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

309: Funeral Procession In Space

This may seem like the name of a sequence that ends with the semi-hero hero ending, but it actually ends with the semi-hero dark ending, and it is a fitting name for it. This is because Shadow is guarding the ARK because of his grief over the victims of it, so he’s essentially living through a funeral procession for them by spending all of his time on the station and thinking about their deaths

310: Lost To The Universe’s Abyss

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

311: Destiny For Two

This sequence has Shadow doing the hero missions of Westopolis and Lethal Highway (Both of which he works with Sonic in) as well as Space Gadget, and then gets the hero-dark ending

312: The Spun Threads Of Fate

This sequence is the same as the last one, except it has Shadow doing the hero mission of Final Haunt instead, meaning he does the hero mission with Sonic in all 4 missions that he appears in (And also does the neutral missions for the levels that Sonic isn’t the hero mission partner for). This name, as well as the last one, implies that Shadow and Sonic are fated to interact with each other

313: Ark Of The Heavens

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending

314: Ghost Of The ARK

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

315: A Pair Of Shooting Stars

This sequence has Shadow working with Sonic twice in Westopolis and Lethal Highway, and ends with the hero-dark ending

316: The One Who Maria Entrusted

This sequence ends with the hero-hero ending, and has Shadow doing the hero mission of Lost Impact with Maria

317: A.I.’s Enlightenment

This sequence ends with the neutral-dark ending

318: A Dying Empire’s Cry

This sequence ends with the neutral-hero ending

319: Moon Of Atonement

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending

320: Tear-Soaked Hometown

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending

321: Sparks On The Horizon

Since this sequence ends with the hero-dark ending, I guess the sparks represent Shadow’s true power (Or the Chaos Emeralds that give it to him) being visible on the horizon ahead of him

322: A Use For A Saved Life

Shadow’s life was saved by Eggman after he presumably died, and this sequence ends with the hero-hero ending, so the use for Shadow’s saved life was saving the planet

323: Coffin Of Memories

This sequence ends with the semi-hero dark ending

324: The Self-Imposed Seal

This sequence ends with the semi-hero hero ending. It could just fit with Shadow sealing himself away from everyone else because of his depression, but I figured I would mention an idea that I saw somebody on Youtube mention as well. Their idea of what could possibly happen after this ending is that Shadow would willingly go into GUN custody, which would also fit well with this name

325: Pretense In The Mirror

The word pretense can mean two things. It can be an attempt to make something that is not the case appear true, or it can be a claim, especially a false or ambitious one. This sequence ends with the hero-dark ending, so that means that Shadow is telling himself that he is the ultimate lifeform and stronger than Sonic, but he doesn’t fully believe it. This is why he sided with Black Doom to fight Sonic, to prove that it was true and it wasn’t just a lie he was telling himself

326: A Missive From 50 Years Ago

Here it is, the final sequence in Shadow the Hedgehog, and the most heroic one you can take. A missive is a message, so Shadow’s heroic actions in this sequence are him following the message Maria gave him 50 years ago: To protect the planet and the people on it

And with that, I have officially analyzed the name of every single sequence in Shadow the Hedgehog. If you read this through all the way to the end, thank you so much, I appreciate it! Sorry that I wasn’t able to give a satisfactory answer for every single name, but considering there’s more than 300, I think I did a pretty good job overall. Let me know if you have any solutions to the names I couldn’t figure out, I’ll add them to the post if I think they’re better than the explanations I gave

#Sonic #Sonic the Hedgehog #Sth #Shadow the Hedgehog #Idk what to tag this as bc I don't want to tag it as krafter talks #But I don't know what else to tag it as #Maybe I just won't tag it as anything

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astheswarmitcalls · 5 months

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PART 1: THE FOUNDATIONS OF DECAY

This is the first part of my 4-part analysis of MCR5, the Masterpost for which can be found here. Link to next part found at the bottom of the post. If there's something I missed, or you'd like to add your own spin/elaborate on something I brushed over, by all means I'd love to hear it!!

Although The Foundations of Decay was released as a single, I still believe it has heavy ties to MCR5 or has the potential to be re-released as part of the album. I’m going to go line-by-line through the song and dissect the language that links to the narrative and themes of MCR5:

“See the man who stands upon the hill

He dreams of all the battles won”

‘The man’ is referring to a leader, perhaps a general or the President. The hill he is standing on isn’t likely to be an actual hill, but maybe a stage, or a ‘hill’ of bodies, innocents killed in the fallout of war or bodies left behind in the wake of his power. He dreams of winning battles as either a political move to crush his enemies, or he hopes that the battles he wins will grant peace for his nation. OR ‘the man’ is a survivor, standing on the hill of bodies of those not as fortunate as him. He dreams of battles won so he may have peace. I’m thinking now it may be the latter because of the subsequent lyrics.

“But fate had left its scars upon his face

With all the damage they had done”

This may be referring to physical injury that he has suffered, or the fact having suffered war, his trauma reflects on his facial expression. He has been weighed down by the acts he has witnessed or has committed himself. As either a political figure or a survivor, these lines can also be linked to 9/11, which is referenced later in this song.

“And so tired with age, he turns the page

Let the flesh submit itself to gravity”

This man is old and grows tired of the conflict, and in turning the page he tries to move on. I can see these lyrics also mirroring the band’s journey; MCR formed over 20 years ago, and they’re ready to turn the page to a new era. ‘Let the flesh submit itself to gravity’ can refer to letting people fall/die as he cannot find it in himself to save them/take action OR again, linking with 9/11, he is stuck in the towers as they collapse and he, like many others, seeks escape by jumping out.

The opening verse ties into the events in which the album will reference heavily/explore the fallout of. This makes sense for a concept explored post-MCR reunion; they’re revisiting their origins, recontextualising the events but exploring the themes of anti-war in a contemporary manner. They’re walking the line between iconography and narrative that feels familiar, close enough to form, but still modern in its ethos. The attacks on the World Trade Centre, happened over 20 years ago but war and terrorism does not let up. If anything, we have been seeing much more war in the past few years, overseas and political war in our streets.

“Let our bodies lay, mark our hearts with shame

Let our blood in vain, you find God in pain”

‘Let our bodies lay’ may refer to letting rest one you are refusing to let go. This is a plead, a request, from MCR to let its old self lay to rest to make room for this new era of creation. People will hold onto that nostalgia, that desire for a return to what’s familiar, but what’s comfortable for the psyche might not always be what is healthy for the individual. ‘Mark our hearts with shame’ likely rings true to all the people demanding for the ‘Old MCR.’ The shame may also refer to survivors’ guilt, survivors of war or terrorism etc. ‘Let our blood in vain, you find God in pain’ War generates corpses, martyrs, and in times of hardship, when so many are dying needlessly, people often turn to religion. ‘Let our blood’ also brings forth imagery of bloodletting, the medical technique of age old where patients were drained of a large body of their blood, and it was believed it would purge them of illness. Obviously, this practice is done in vain, because bloodletting does nothing to aid in healing.

Allusions to religion/Catholicism are not new to MCR. ‘Thank You for the Venom’ and ‘House of Wolves’ both refence religious settings in their lyrics. With reference to God and use of ‘shame’, ‘canonized’, ‘saint’ and ‘altar’, we’re getting subtle nods to Catholicism. I am not Catholic and don’t have experience with a Catholic upbringing, but for what I can infer there’s a lot to be said about Catholic guilt, the belief we’re all born sinners, that if we suffer it’s God’s will. Gerard Way has said that being raised Catholic is ‘some scary shit,’ and I don’t believe they’re Catholic anymore. Here’s what they had to say in 2013 via Twitter:

“I was raised Catholic, which turned me off from religion because I had a very bad experience. Then, as a young adult, a death in the family resulted in a lot of anger and an even greater distance between me and faith, though I had always acknowledged I received my artistic gifts from God.”

I don’t believe for this song to be a critique on Catholicism, but more so alluding to those beliefs in a way that ties into the ethos of the album. First, with rebirth, like redemption. Redemption in the eye of God, repentance? Second, the whole ideology around suffering. We are not born sinners, and we don’t have to suffer to be granted a spot in heaven; likewise, you don’t have to be all fucked in the head to create good art. Gerard Way spoke of this, of having to feel depressed to make good music, which isn’t true in the slightest. You don’t have to torture yourself to create meaningful art. You deserve healing, and to pick yourself up from that debris and continue to create with a newfound perspective. Suffering and worthiness are not inextricable, people deserve to heal.

“Now, if your convictions were a passing phase

May your ashes feed the river in the morning rays

And as the vermin crawls, we lay in the foundations of decay”

Hope for those who betrayed their values/promises (political leaders) to burn and have their destruction create a foundation for progress and healing. WE ARE THE VERMIN!!! We swarm and infest and refuse to die. We eat rockstars alive. We feed off the decay in which our very same are trying to rise from. The Foundations of Decay is about rising from the rot, reanimation, using your own discarded remains to rebuild and grow from. This ties so beautifully with the ethos of MCR’s return, as well as the narrative surrounding the businesswoman, which I’ll get into later. Gerard Way you insane motherfucker I love you.

“He was there the day the towers fell

And so he wandered down the road”

Pretty simple here; Gerard Way witnessed 9/11, and that prompted them to start MCR and make positive change in a world that had been uprooted by terrorism.

“And we would all build towers of our own

Only to watch the roots corrode”

I believe this to be a direct reference to My Chem’s journey and eventual breakup. Initially, they were this scrappy, punk rock band from New Jersey with one goal in mind: to spread their message that it’s okay to be a little fucked-up. The commercial success that would follow each album was unheard of from a band of their background. These ‘towers’ refer to the name they had built for themselves at the height of their career, but those corroding roots wouldn’t be able to support them. A multitude of factors were at play in My Chem’s breakup, and ultimately the break would be vital for the health of the band.

“But it's much too late, you're in the race

So we'll press and press 'til you can't take it anymore”

Clear statement of resistance; ‘you’ve brought this upon yourself, we are unhappy, and we will make sure you know it.’ ‘We’ll press and press’ brings imagery of crowds, masses,,,, some may even say,,,, swarms. I’ll say it again, we are the vermin! We are the swarm! We are the infestation that runs rampant over the decay.

“Let our bodies lay, mark our hearts with shame

Let our blood in vain, you find God in pain”

Same as before.

“And if, by his own hand, his spirit flies

Take his body as a relic to be canonized

Now, and so he gets to die a saint

But she will always be a whore”

A political/military leader has died as a fallout of the conflict. A corrupt man dies and the nation mourns. Maybe not even a prominent figure, just a man. ‘By his own hand’ may refer to his martyrdom, dying by his own hand as he had fuelled the conflict that would kill him. Canonization is the act of declaring a dead person a saint. This man is held in high regard in his death, but the woman? Here we have these little inklings of character that tease the potential for MCR5. I’m going to revisit this character, this woman, a little later (a good 10,000 or so words to be exact), but she isn’t held in the same regard as the man because she’s a woman. She may be a survivor, but ultimately, she is just another tragic woman to be objectified and mythologised. He is a saint, but she is a whore, she is impure and unfaithful.

(Would like to add here we hear the line ‘You look stressed out!’ I think this is directed towards the woman, probably from a coworker or her partner. More will be revealed in due time.)

“Against faith (cage all the animals)

Against all odds ('cause the message must be pure)

Against change (you can wander through the ruins)

We are free (but the poison is the cure)”

We’ve got two opposing viewpoints; the hopeful resistance and the oppressors, the symbol of war.

The resistance fight back against the odds, against faith and against change. They fight back against control and war. Are we the resistance? The rats and vermin and swarm? The swarm runs rampant, in a sense we may have the most freedom. Also what Gerard said on tour “That may be true (that they’re unhinged/crazy with the new outfits), but I am free”. The lyrics in parenthesis are the words of the oppressors. ‘Cage all the animals ‘cause the message must be pure.’ WE ARE THE ANIMALS!! THE VERMIN SWARM!!! We are polluting the message, the belief we need war, with our resistance. We carry disease, probably. ‘You can wander through the ruins but the poison is the cure.’ They’re telling us we can try to rebuild from our own decay, but we’ll find solace in what has hurt us. We don’t need war! Poison and cure also tie to the theme of healing. Anti-venom may be used to treat exposure to venom, that much is true, but it’s not the same. Poison will not cure you if you have been poisoned. An antidote might, but ingesting more poison on top of poison will just kill you faster. This ties into Gerard’s psychology in the early days of MCR, that you have to torture yourself to create art. I’ll explore this more in the next part.

“You must fix your heart

And you must build an altar where it swells”

This prechorus goes so insanely hard. Fixing your heart, healing yourself and giving yourself the space to care about other people alongside yourself, and building an altar referring to protecting/cherishing that connection. Honour your emotions, honour your empathy, honour your capacity for love. All this ties back into overarching themes of rebirth and healing.

I’ve got more to add to this; I just started reading the MCR biography Not The Life It Seems, and I’ve found an excerpt that really strikes me:

“In order for us to make something great, we have to give up normality,’ he said. ‘I certainly feel you have to suffer for your art. I feel that if we don’t suffer, then it’s not going to be sincere and honest. If we don’t suffer then the songs don’t come from a real place. The songs are always about extremely dark things; we can’t fake that. I guess the chaos that comes at us and surrounds us and occasionally tries to tear us apart is maybe self-created. So I guess there is a little masochistic side to us but it is the willingness to suffer for our art that’s more important. We don’t feel like we’ve made true art unless we’ve suffered a great deal. Only people who have suffered a great deal have something to say.”

There’re multiple instances of Gerard voicing these thoughts, the belief that you need to be suffering to create something worthwhile. ‘You must fix your heart’ I believe is a direct response to that. You don’t need to tear yourself open to create good music, you should cherish yourself first and foremost. The themes of healing are intrinsically tied to the fabric of the band’s return. Instead of ripping themselves apart to write music, they’re writing music that is cathartic and healing. I cannot stress enough that this era of MCR is my favourite. Their previous albums have had so much cultural impact and have saved lives, but in my mind the health of the band comes before the music. I’m so glad they’ve returned now and that they’re not slicing themselves open to create art.

“When the storm, it gains and the sky, it rains

Let it flood, let it flood, let it wash away”

May be reaching a little bit, but this seems too overt to not be a Noah’s Ark reference. With so much reference of decay, destruction, war, rebirth etc. this can’t not be a nod to Noah’s Ark. In the story, Noah is instructed by God to build a massive boat as he means to flood the entire earth, purging it of evil before starting again and it’s his mission to save all his followers and the animals. We are instructed to let the flood come, let all the evil in the world be washed away and revel in their destruction. We’re heading much more into rebirth territory, and is this song, the reunion, not a form of rebirth for the band? Gerard also said to ‘embrace the plague, embrace the unfair, embrace the absurd.’ Embrace the storm, embrace the change.

“And as you stumble through your last crusade

Will you welcome your extinction in the morning rays?

And as the swarm it calls, we lay in the foundations”

These lines are directed towards the oppressors. The crusade is another biblical/religious reference, men who, on a request to reclaim holy land (that wasn’t theirs for thousands of years either), left destruction in their wake in the name of their God. Welcoming extinction in the morning rays being metaphor for the new age, a new world that is anti-government, anti-war, anti-capitalism. ‘We’re entering a new era, are you ready to say goodbye now that you’re unneeded?’

“Yes, it comforts me much more

Yes, it comforts me much more

To lay in the foundations of decay

Get up, coward”

This outro lies on just the right side of unorthodox, but I love it. It’s comfortable to concede, to lay in your decay, it’s ultimately the easier and safer option. ‘Get up coward!’ Is a call to action, likely to the song’s narrator themselves (I’m guessing the Businesswoman but I’ll get into that later). ‘I’m sure it’s comforting to lie in your own rot but we have shit to do!’ Again, marrying into those themes of rebirth, a plea to come forth from the decay and build something from those foundations.

The Foundations of Decay tells the story of MCR’s own conception and rebirth, but also carries such explicit themes of anti-war sentiment. There are the explicit ties to 9/11 and the subsequent conflicts scattered throughout the verses, which tie into MCR’s origin but also gives us background on some of the characters that may be introduced in the concept album. The allusions to biblical stories further build upon these reoccurring themes of rebirth and purification. Us, the resistance, against the poisonous pro-war rhetoric, are the swarm that infests the decay and refuses to die.

NEXT PART >>>

#mcr #my chemical romance #mcr5 #mcr5 theory #mcr5 is real #btw this whole thing took about 3 weeks to write and edit #I ask kindly you don't let my efforts in vain but also it's cool if this is just Here yaknow?

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damiansbioshockblog · 8 months

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A little analysis I wrote about Cohen

One of the most beloved characters by the fans has always been Sander Cohen, the demented, sadistic, artist originating in Fort Frolic, the eighth level of the first game and he is the main and most recognizable example of homosexuality in the BioShock series. He is confirmed to have had several amorous relationships with multiple men throughout Rapture, including but not limited to four out of five of his disciples. Those four are Martin Finnegan, Hector Rodriguez, Kyle Fitzpatrick, and Silas Cobb. Voice lines and audio diaries paint an interesting picture of what Cohen’s relations with these men looked like to a degree, and it isn’t pretty.

Quotes like: "The things that man had me do…” (Hector Rodriguez)

“I used to love you. I used to think you were a musical genius. You know why? Because you paid my rent, you ancient hack!” (Silas Cobb)

"This one's for the fruit!" (Martin Finnegan when attacking)

"Oh Cohen, you sick fuck, let me out of this!" (Kyle Fitzpatrick)

Show each of these former disciples talking about Cohen in a truly disturbing and manipulative light. Kyle calling him sick, Silas saying the only reason he looked up to or respected Sander was because he was the reason he had his rent paid (illustrating an unhealthy power dynamic), Hector outright admitting that Sander had him do things he was not comfortable with. He seems to be still disturbed by them.

Sander Cohen used power over these men, whether that power came from a financial aspect or giving them the ability to pursue their passions he manipulated each one for less-than-savory reasons. On the surface the idea is great. He is a perfect villain for the setting. Rapture is a gritty and power-based society where a lot got swept under the rug if you had the power to make it happen. And especially in Fort Frolic where suggestive music, dancing, performance, and outright erotism are commonplace, you’d expect a level of that to be twisted in the main threat of the level based in said area. But if you look at it from a meta-perspective something about it doesn't sit right with me.

It would make sense for a character like Cohen who is so close to the theater to be queer in some way. Homosexuality and the stage go hand-in-hand and have for years and years, from cross-dressing to flashiness that doesn't fit “masculinity” to challenging ideas through the artistic medium so I’m not shocked or against the fact that Sander Cohen is gay, though I have something against the way it’s treated.

Sander Cohen is the main and only prevalent character in the first game who had many serious examples of sexual manipulation and as laid out, he is one of the only front-and-center characters who is part of the LGBT+ community. That feels like an odd choice to me. I could be overthinking this decision, it could just be an unfortunate mix of characteristics for Cohen that paint Ken Levine’s writing in a bad light but it feels weird to me that the only character whose sexuality is not straight is also the character who most of his crimes and immoral acts involve something sexual.

I’d much appreciate other thoughts, arguments, and points in the replies or re-blogs. Thank you for reading this, it was just a thought that interested me. I do not have anything against BioShock or Ken Levine, I don’t know enough about Levine to claim he is a morally bad person and I’m a massive fan of the BioShock series.

#bioshock #sander cohen #bioshock 1 #LGBT #queer #rant #analysis

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ellascreams · 1 month

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I’m a poet and I’m bored, I’m going to over analyze the lyrics of the I Expect You To Die 2 opening credits. Spoilers. (Note, I couldn’t actually find the official lyrics anywhere, so the placement of the line breaks are sort of just me guessing. It shouldn’t affect my analysis much but it might annoy some people.)

From the spotlight I can see you Play your cards right, Kill your stage fright, This could be you Murder pun! Huge fan of the ABAAB rhyme scheme btw. I think this could definitely be a reference to how Zoraxis immediately knows that you’re involved, you get noticed in Stage Fright, which is when Juniper is literally in the spotlight. Juniper is also the one who first figures out you’re the agent from the Death Engine.

To me the most notable thing is that it immediately established the fact that the entire world is focused on Juniper, but he’s the only one focused on you, even more than the other Zoraxis agents are. It also foreshadows Phoenix’s rise to fame. Juniper is a celebrity, the whole world is focused on him, but if you play your cards right and stop his evil scheme he falls out of the public’s view while you suddenly become famous for saving everyone.

If all the world’s a stage, let’s set it on fire So you’ll be the spy and I’ll be the liar

Moving on to a simple couplet, AA rhyme scheme. The imagery of the first line is absolutely sick and I love it. There’s the obvious meaning in this line of Juniper’s evil plans, emphasized by the music video’s visuals of the nukes. Digging a little deeper, I think it’s interesting that Juniper really does seem to think of the world as a stage. He thinks of himself as the star and Phoenix as an extra, he thinks of his plans as scripts, his lies as roles, it’s his real egotistical view of the world around him and it’s what Zor exploits to get him to do what they want.

From the background You can hear me Highest billing, Makes a killing, They revere me

Switching to more of a ABCCB now but I don’t mind. Another murder pun! I honestly love those. Paralleling the first verse, once again calling attention to the fact that you’re hiding in the background while Juniper hides in plain sight, this also parallels Juniper noticing you. He’s paying attention to you more than anyone else is, and you see him for who he truly is more than anyone else does. You’re both aware of each other and you both know each other.

That beautiful mask you wear is all I desire So you’ll be the spy and I’ll be the liar

Great imagery once again. One thing they put a lot of emphasis on in this game (or at least the song and trailers) is the fact that spies are inherently liars or at the very least disguised. As he’ll mention more in some later lines, Juniper wants to defeat you, partially by getting past those disguises and lies. They’re your main defense. Once they’re gone he’ll have a better shot at winning.

He mostly just wants to destroy your disguises, but the video does show him stealing a mask, I think that’s because he can also use them to an extent. With the mimic mask, people’s faces become his masks. He uses the Handler’s voice to trick you. He could maybe use your voice and face to trick someone else. At the very least, something or someone in the Agency would probably be useful to him.

Face to face to face again

Because you’re both two faced. Probably my favorite line, it’s just such fun wordplay.

And through the camera lenses we ascend

This line could be taken a few different ways I think? First of all, it’s just cool imagery again. Secondly, it could be taken as breaking through lies. By breaking the camera lens, which would also be breaking through the fourth wall, you’re breaking through the unreality that is trapping you. As I mentioned earlier, Juniper really views the world as just another stage, so this could also definitely represent breaking through his plans and lies.

The final thing I noticed is the use of the word “ascend.” English as a language tends to view being placed higher, or at the top, as good while being placed lower, at the bottom, is bad. There’s a whole bunch of phrases related to it. It’s one of those little quirks of language. My point is that “ascending,” getting higher, can be seen as some sort of victory or success. This is somewhat emphasized by the music itself, with the instruments from the success score playing, and the actual success score itself being played a bit later.

I also think it’s worth quickly mentioning that these different meaning aren’t mutually exclusive. A line can mean several different things at once, that’s part of the beauty of poetry and language.

You’re a minor part I’m the major star Ha! The credits are more than just the end

Once again with him thinking of the world as a stage, thinking he’s the star, the most important person in the whole world, while you’re just an extra. As he says “the end” the success theme plays, which is just a neat detail, and it could be connected to the “ascend” line as I mentioned earlier. I also think it’s important that it plays while he’s talking about credits and endings, since that theme plays at the end of successful missions.

I might be overthinking it here but I also think this whole verse has some parallels to his monologue. You properly meet face to face for kind of the first time actually, you break through his film set, then there’s the obvious one of him calling himself the star and saying you’re just an extra, and then he calls the peace summit your final scenes but they’re just the beginning of Zor’s rule.

Cause the truth is I despise you I will tear apart All these works of art That disguise you

Love this verse. The voice actor is absolutely great by the way. When he says “I despise you” it really sounds like he means it. Juniper really does despise you too. That’s one of the things that makes him such a fun villain to me, he truly hates you, possibly even more than Zor and Prism hate you, because they at least respect you as a skilled adversary. Juniper doesn’t. He thinks you’re pathetic but you somehow keep messing up his plans anyway. To him, you’re like a pesky fly that won’t stop buzzing around his head and tripping him up.

This is also furthering the themes of the second chorus. Being a spy as you are, you’re protected mostly by disguises. He wants to destroy those disguises. He wants to tear apart the things that protect you. And this is once again described using masks because the mask imagery really is so central to Juniper’s character.

I’m making the final cut, it’s down to the wire So you’ll be the spy and I’ll be the liar And I’ll be the liar And I’ll be the liar And I’ll be the liar!

Another potential parallel to safe and sound, I think he quite literally tries to make “the final cut” once you burn down the set. I think now’s the best time to talk about the repeating phrase, the game’s namesake, “you’ll be the spy and I’ll be the liar.” I especially like the fact that the final verse puts extra emphasis on the liar part, because that’s ultimately the game’s main theme, lies and breaking through them.

From what I can tell, even the puzzle solving in this game has a lot more emphasis on seeing through lies and people actively trying to trip you up then the others. Like Jet Set, where you have to actively ignore almost everything Juniper tells you to avoid the death traps, or the notes the Fabricator left telling you to just “enjoy the show” in Stage Fright, you even have to distrust your Handler in Safe and Sound.

One very important thing for this theme is the parallels between Phoenix and John Juniper. They’re both liars hiding behind various disguises. That’s again represented by the gameplay, you go undercover fairly often. The big difference is just that Phoenix hides in the shadows and Juniper hides in the spotlight.

This theme and parallel is also super noticeable in the last level, Rising Phoenix. In order to stop Juniper, Phoenix has to reveal themself to the world. In the end, all the lies and disguises are gone from the EOD and Zoraxis, but for the EOD it’s mostly a good thing, and it’s very bad for Zoraxis. This is also when Phoenix sort of takes Juniper’s fame. And there’s another layer to the lies with Zor’s betrayal.

Wow ok so I went off on a tangent there. I just wanted to fully explain myself because it seems like a lot of people don’t understand the title. I think the repetition and connection of the spy and the liar helps showcase those parallels. The way it’s used makes it almost sounds like a common phrase, but it’s not, and that makes you stop to think what makes spies and liars related to each other. How are they similar? How are they different?

I like how in the song Juniper specifically says “you’ll be the spy and I’ll be the liar.” It reminds me of agreeing on roles before acting out an improv scene together or something similar. It once again highlights Juniper’s view of the world. In the title, and in most of the song and game, it acts like spy and liar are what you both truly are. What’s left when you take away all the lies. But with Juniper telling you that these are the roles you’ll be playing, it adds another layer of doubt and disguise. Are you really just the spy and the liar? Maybe. But maybe it’s just another act.

#I might analyze the other openings at some point if I feel like it #lyric analysis #ieytd #ieytd2 #john juniper #tw death mention #tw bomb mention

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running-tweezers · 8 months

Text

Ok, I’m finally doing it.

The Damien/Huxley Pining Playlist

I am well known amongst my friends for my Far Too Thought Out Playlists. I have one for like, every D&D character I’ve ever made, and have written full Google docs about each song and why it’s there.

Combine that with my voracious love of DamiHux and pining? We get this.

So if you just want to listen without reading an essay, I will put my annotations and thoughts under the cut. (But it will probably enhance your listening experience tbh)

Congrats you’ve entered the

MARISA ANALYSIS ZONE

Welcome. You’re my kinda people.

First the basics, this playlist encapsulates Damien and Huxley's entire pre-confession relationship, from their first meeting, through Inversion, to the confession itself. It alternates POVs, I’ll label each song with a color to make it easier to follow. Cool? Let’s go.

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Stray Italian Greyhound - Vienna Teng

Kicking off the playlist with one of my very favorite songs on it. First song, Damien’s first impressions of Huxley.

The denial was REAL. Those initial feelings were met with a “OH NO, OH GOD, OH FUCK” kind of reaction. Damien was totally unsure of what to even do with what he was feeling. After all, he isn’t the kind to get so mushy and sappy over a little crush! Especially on someone he literally just met! He’s far too cynical for something like that. So he just tried to push it down, ignore it.

But it “won’t sit still” “won’t do what it’s told”. Huxley came into his life and changed EVERYTHING. In a way that feels incredible, but makes things complicated. And he’s going to have to deal with it eventually.

But not now.

Enchanted - Taylor Swift

Putting this song on this playlist is part of where my “Huxley is a Swiftie” headcanon came from. It was a joke at first, I swear.

This is Huxley’s POV of their first meeting at the bowling alley. The “forcing laughter, faking smiles” really plays into where Hux was at that point, still putting on a bit of an act and not letting people see past the surface level. But he met Damien, they hit it off, and Hux was immediately feeling some kinda way.

I’m convinced this big guy had some giddy, twirling hair, kicking feet energy about Damien. Thinking about him for days after they met. Hoping that they would continue to be friends and get closer. And that this was the beginning of something that could be amazing.

Trouble - Troye Sivan & Jay Som

You can’t deny it forever, Damien.

This is Damien coming to terms with the fact that yes, he does have some feelings for Huxley. He’s now got a group of friends like he’s never had before, and that’s changing his outlook a little bit. He doesn’t want to live like he’s been living anymore, focused entirely on school and grades, and hurrying to the future he wants for himself.

And one of those friends felt like something different to him and he can’t deny it anymore. As scary as that was.

THATS WHAT I WANT - Lil Nas X

I think we as a society do not talk enough about how lonely Huxley was.

Huxley was the kind of guy who was friendly with everyone. He was liked by pretty much everyone. He was liberal with hugs and willing to give every ounce of love he had to other people.

But he was still guarded. Playing the version of himself everyone expected. Afraid to be himself. All that friendliness and love given away didn’t translate to anything substantial.

He wanted someone to love him back.

And now he had friends! Which was amazing and made him a lot less lonely. But one of his friends, again, was different. And he desperately wanted a different kind of love back from him. One he was more than happy to give, but afraid he wouldn’t receive in return.

Out of My League - Fitz and the Tantrums

First of all. God I love Fitz and the Tantrums.

We know that Damien doesn’t think he’s good enough for Huxley. He ESPECIALLY thought that in this stage, around the time of Friendsgiving.

Damien knows he’s easily annoyed, loses his temper quickly, and doesn’t think he’s much to look at either. But Huxley is so patient, is a calming presence, and is incredible to look at as far as Damien’s concerned. Huxley is so wonderful, and so far out of his league that he really thought he had no chance.

But that doesn’t stop him from daydreaming. Hoping someday he might be more than just a dream.

Golden - Harry Styles

Damien might think that he’s not good enough, but Huxley would definitely beg to differ. In a lot of ways, Huxley thought Damien was too good for him. Too smart, too bright, too driven to be interested in someone like him.

So he decided to keep his feelings to himself. Because he knows Damien isn’t nearly as open with that kind of thing as he is.

Also I think this song’s bright, firey, sun-coded imagery being seen as something to be admired and adored is really in line with Huxley seeing everything Damien thinks is bad about himself and loving him for those exact things.

Line Without a Hook - Ricky Montgomery

This is the one. I could do a whole lyric by lyric breakdown of this one. But I will attempt to keep it brief. Bc I’m obviously so good at that, just look at this post

Immediately after the Inversion, Damien had some very complicated feelings. About Huxley, about himself, about everything. This song encapsulates all of that.

Huxley saves his life in several ways that night. Both by being a support during his breakdown, and physically, literally saving his life when he exhausted all his magic. And he still feels like he can’t reach out. They hasn’t spoken at all. I can’t help but think that maybe he feels like it’s better that way, like it’s his fault, like Hux doesn’t want to hear from him. After all, Huxley was so emotionally mature about it all and he was not.

Combine that with his feelings of inadequacy, looking back at the night and wishing there was some way to take back some the the decisions he made. He would’ve helped Hux the same way Hux helped him, if he had just done things differently.

So he’s throwing himself completely into training. Maybe if he just works hard enough, he can make up for it. And maybe those complicated emotions will go away.

Also. Two specific lyrics I feel I need to point out. “I need you here to stay” is an excellent counterpart yo Huxley’s “right here” and we all know how I feel about a fuckin motif. And of course “all my emotions feel like explosions when you are around” is almost literal in this case’

(I have so much more to say about this one, but perhaps another time)

Heat Waves - Glass Animals

Though Huxley seemed to handle the aftermath of Inversion with a calm maturity, that doesn’t mean he didn’t have his own struggles.

As he went home to be with his family and deal with things, his feelings for Damien stayed. I do wonder what he was thinking during that time, when Damien wasn’t talking to him after everything they went through. I think that maybe he also blamed himself a bit. Maybe they weren’t as close as he thought? He felt like no matter what he did or said, it wouldn’t help Damien, no matter how much he wanted it to.

Also like. “Heat Waves” is too perfect a concept to not use in this playlist.

Delicate - Taylor Swift

After things start to return to some kind of normalcy after Inversion, Damien’s feelings for Huxley are stronger than ever. There’s no denial anymore, he really likes Huxley. He’s thinking about Huxley a lot. He wants to be with Huxley.

But things are different now, whether they like it or not. Inversion changed things, and everyone is still working through that night at their own pace. So there is a lot of hesitation on Damien’s part about what he should and shouldn’t do about the feelings he has.

By this point they’re hanging out together more, just the two of them. And Damien is really wrestling with whether or not to let Hux know how he feels. There’s a fear that he might upset the delicate situation they’re currently in, as friends who have been through hell together and are still healing from it.

Dandelions - Ruth B.

At the same time that Damiens’s so concerned about what moves to make, Huxley has never lined harder. He is firmly in “lovesick puppy” territory. He’s gotten even closer to Damien, and know him on a deep level now. He knows the parts of Damien he doesn’t show most people. And he loves them.

Damien just makes him so happy.

This song’s imagery is so good as well. It gives vibes of lush, green earth and flowers and something just so Huxley imo

In My Head - Joe Serafini & Andrew Barth Feldman

I am incapable of making a playlist for anything without including at least one musical theater song, and this is no exception. Through this not from an actual musical, it’s more theater adjacent, let’s call it.

We’re into right before the confession territory, a song for both of them, a duet. This song perfectly illustrates the awkward stage they’re in, as friends who both desperately want to be something different.

So much of this song feels so perfect for them specifically, it’s like it written for them, I swear. Huxley’s worries about being too much, Damien feeling like he’s not good enough, the gym line, it’s all too good honestly.

Right Here - Betty Who

And the playlist caps off with this one, the song that Erik Redacted himself said was their song. And it really is perfect, especially with that “Right Here” motif carried through their relationship that I love so much. It’s just so damn soft and so am I. I love them your honor.

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HOLY SHIT this took so long. I sincerely hope you got something out of all of the ravings of a mad man that this ended up being.

Also @redactedbloop dinner’s ready, eat up!!!

#redacted asmr #redacted audio #redacted huxley #redacted damien #damihux #if anyone actually reads all of this??#we’re best friends now I love you #it took a lot for me to actually feel comfortable putting all my thoughts out so thank you!

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mikesbasementbeets · 1 year

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I disagree that bi mike wouldn’t make sense within the show’s canon. I strongly believe it would make MORE sense within the show’s canon for many different reasons, and that 99% of the evidence gay mike truthers try to twist to say explicitly confirms gay mike can coexist and be used to support bi mike without much adjusting. I think when you carefully analyze seasons 1 through 4 it’s pretty clear that mike had genuine romantic feelings for El at the beginning of the story. And there’s a lot of subtle things that support a bi mike reading. I think a significant portion of aggressive anti-bi mike theories are rooted in either biphobia, a misunderstanding of the nuances of what it means to be bi, or a desire to avoid having to accept mike’s early canon romantic feelings for El (enshrined into the scripts) cause that would mean accepting that it’s a love triangle. I think gay mike makes sense but it is in no way the only sound theory. And I’m not talking about headcanons, I’m talking about the text of the show

ok i know i said earlier i would respond to this in full but honestly there is WAY too much i could get into and this topic has been discussed to death at this point and i’m not interested in starting discourse again, so i’m really gonna try to be brief (spoiler alert, i failed). first of all, here’s my own gay mike analysis from months ago, back when i personally hadn’t seen any actual analysis about it yet and decided to just go through and analyze the show myself. many others have written much more thorough and articulate analyses, so i encourage anyone to seek those out if you’re really interested in developing an informed opinion about it. but if you’re already convinced one way or another, i’m probably not going to change any minds here, because this has all been said before.

the one thing i’m actually going to try to address here is the claim that mike was at some point genuinely romantically attracted to el, because as far as i can tell, that is the ONLY actual argument FOR bi mike. i haven’t seen anyone ever give evidence or try to argue that mike has shown attraction to any other specific woman or to women generally. if i’m wrong about that, please point me to that analysis (don’t tell me about bi flag colors around him though bc those three colors show up together everywhere in the show and are not specific to mike in any way, i don’t think that’s relevant “evidence”). also, i’m not looking at the scripts here, because i’m really only interested in ACTUAL CANON and the literal content of the show itself overrides any partial, text drafts of it, which is what scripts are. they are written for the specific purpose of filming the show and do not provide full and complete context (and what we are TOLD in this show does not always line up with what we are SHOWN).

just to be absolutely clear, i think that (disregarding the mountains of both textual and subtextual evidence of his LACK of attraction to women) mike having shown genuine romantic attraction to even one woman would be enough for him to be legitimately canonized as bisexual, but in all my understanding and analysis of the show, he has not.

from what i understand, bi mike truthers believe that mike had genuine romantic feelings for el in the earlier seasons that either faded over time or just never evolved past the initial childhood crush stage. i’ve addressed the latter idea before (in a post i can't find rn), but to sum up, crushes on people of a different gender, especially in youth, and during times when one is unsure of or figuring out one’s sexuality are COMMON among gay people. having a childhood crush is not the same thing as having genuine romantic feelings, and therefore is not valid evidence toward any particular sexuality. the insistence that it is concrete evidence of bisexuality is rooted in homophobia and a fundamental misunderstanding of the nuance of gay identity.

the first claim though, that he did have genuine romantic feelings in the beginning, but they faded over time, is what i’m going to focus on. i touched on this in my analysis linked above, but i’m going to try to explain again here. mike’s feelings for el have always been demonstrated with extreme consistency throughout the seasons. after their initial meeting and once mike learns to trust her, each time mike has been in a position to tell el how he feels about her, from season one all the way through to season four, he has behaved in the exact same way: he has struggled to put his feelings into words, refusing to outright claim romantic feeling or intent, and ultimately failed to communicate with el in a way she understands.

similarly, when faced with expressing romantic affection toward or about her, he has behaved with confusion, discomfort, and outright rejection of others’ assumptions of his romantic feelings. (read the analysis for more specifics on this)

each of these times is also rife with familial coding and parallels that subtextually explain WHY he is struggling to either voice or demonstrate romantic attraction. for just one specific example, in the first season, right before their first kiss, mike begins to excitedly describe the relationship that the two of them are about the have with each other (in not so many words) as one of a brother and sister. when el correctly infers this implication from his words, he grows confused, because he had been told previously by lucas, dustin, and even nancy, that his feelings for el were romantic. but he relents, and agrees that that is what his description meant. immediately after their first kiss, during which el is dressed in his sister's clothes, and which mike initiates when he can't find the words to express romantic attraction to her, his first word is.... "nancy." and later, when el is weak from killing the lab people who've been chasing them, mike repeats his earlier promise: that when all this is over, his family will become hers.

this is one thing that i genuinely can’t understand when it comes to the idea that mike ever truly liked el romantically. almost (if not) ALL of their interactions, especially in season one, have some sort of parallel to a familial relationship for one or both of them, on top of many of their interactions blatantly referencing the concept of the two of them being like family to one another. the absolute volume of these instances and the unyielding consistency of this pattern, again, beginning from the very first episode of season one and continuing all the way through season four, means that it is undoubtedly intentional. with that in mind, i cannot see any reading of their relationship that leaves room for genuine romantic feelings, when ALL of the subtext, FROM THE VERY BEGINNING, overwhelmingly presents them as family.

i’m not going to get way into the subject of compulsory heterosexuality because i could go on forever and i don’t want to, but the timeline of events in el and mike’s relationship arc makes it very clear that that's what’s happening. for el, her arc of independence is (not solely, but still) intrinsically tied to her relationship with mike. for mike, his struggle with his sexuality, specifically his lack of attraction to girls concurrent with his present attraction to boys (MOST presently Will), coincides directly with his relationship arc with el. i’m just going to link a couple of my screenshot posts where i've attempted to demonstrate this, bc i can't find it in me to explain all the nuances of comphet and the complex way these three characters' narratives have been intertwined (i'm bad at tagging so i can't find many, but here, here, here)

you might want to argue against my above points with scenes like the snowball dance, where he calls her beautiful and kisses her, or the make out scene in season three. but both the familial coding/parallels and the overarching themes of forced conformity (aka compulsory heterosexuality) associated with the snowball in my view completely changes the context behind the surface narrative of a “sweet romantic moment,” especially when you consider the coinciding narrative of mike’s relationship with will and the subtext of what that dance means for both of them. similarly, that make out scene, which can also be read as further evidence of mike’s discomfort with physical affection with el, as well as the overall arc of their entire season 3 relationship, is presented to be directly relevant to (specifically, in direct contrast with) mike’s evolving relationship with will, which IS genuinely romantic.

when i say that bi mike would be bad representation, this is what i mean. his “attraction” to el is consistently directly related to and contrasted with his relationship with will, coding his feelings for girls (most specifically the one girl for whom he has ever shown potential for romantic attraction) as lesser than his feelings for boys (specifically will, but ALSO OTHER MEN). bi rep that prioritizes and values attraction for one gender AT THE EXPENSE of attraction for another feels like an extremely problematic representation of bisexuality, if that's really what they are trying to portray. and this is not even getting into the countless subtextual clues that mike specifically DOES NOT LIKE GIRLS. (our son with a girl?, it’s not my fault you don’t like girls, el? sorry not interested, disgusted face next to “women in science,” blatant lack positive of response to “phoebe cates only hotter,” women’s room GET OUT, boys only, blatant and continued confusion over lucas and dustin’s attraction to max, "trying to solve the mystery of the female species" *LOUD BELCH* etc etc these are just off the dome and these are things that DO NOT WORK as queer coding if mike IS attracted to girls but VERY MUCH DO if he is gay. and there are SO MANY of them. more than that, if he is attracted to girls, then they are examples of the show consistently belittling that attraction, which again feels like a pretty shitty way to do bi representation)

god there’s so much more to this, but i can’t get into every little thing because it would take forever. literally there is SO MUCH evidence against it that i genuinely feel that the narrative would not make sense anymore if mike were revealed to be bi in season 5.

just to address a couple other things you said: i think the reason anti bi mike theory might sometimes come off as aggressive is because when one actually analyzes the entire content of the show, the evidence for specifically gay mike is OVERWHELMING and the claim that there is just as much evidence for bi mike remains unsupported, unsubstantiated, and at a certain point comes off as just willfully ignoring canon and even, at times, homophobic. i always see claims that some gay mike analysis is biphobic, and yet i have never seen any evidence of this. the claim that mike is not attracted to women, despite having been in a relationship with one, IS NOT biphobic. the claim that he is not bisexual, despite many people believing he is and wanting that representation, is NOT biphobic. the claim that his feelings for el have always been platonic and not romantic is NOT biphobic. it is an analytical conclusion based on the content of the show itself. i don’t doubt that some gay mike truthers have been biphobic, but i have not seen any actual gay mike ANALYSIS that is specifically biphobic (if you can provide concrete evidence, i will recant this, but i know that i and others have been careful not to resort to any sort of stereotyping or attempts at “analysis” that are rooted in biphobia). conversely, the claim that mike being in a romantic relationship with a woman and behaving romantically with her is PROOF that he is bisexual IS inherently rooted in homophobia and again, a misunderstanding of the nuance of what it means to be gay. i know (or assume, i guess) that most bi mike truthers aren’t outright thinking this way, and really believe mike’s romantic feelings to have been genuine, but as i and many others have tried to explain, when you do what the show is constantly telling you to do and look deeper than the surface level narrative, all of the canonical evidence from mike’s relationship with el actually explicitly and unambiguously points to the fact that his romantic interactions with her were NOT a result of genuine attraction, but rather a result of compulsory heterosexuality and a part of the natural process of figuring out his sexuality.

you also claim gay mike theorizing could come from "a desire to avoid having to accept mike’s early canon romantic feelings for El" but the fact is that it's not a desire for mike not to have had feelings for el (that assumption playing into the idea that gay mike truthers simply don't want him to be bi, hence the claims of biphobia) but what's actually happening is analysis that leads to the conclusion that he canonically did not have romantic feelings for el. the misconception is that gay mike truthers are simply projecting their own desires onto the text instead of what they're actually doing: critically analyzing it. i'd argue that bi mike truthers are the ones who want to avoid having to accept mike's lack of attraction to women, despite all of the evidence for it.

i've read a lot of analysis on here, from a lot of different perspectives, and i can truly say that every single comprehensive, good faith analysis of mike’s character i've ever seen has come to the same conclusion. he’s gay.

#not tagging this w anything bc again i don't want to start discourse and i'm done talking about this for now #i was gonna add a bunch of screenshots but i'm tired and this is enough i'll make some ss posts later and maybe link them #i have a couple in mind i've been meaning to make #mikesbasementasks

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averywiseanimatedcat · 10 months

Text

I’m back with another ridiculous over analysis because I have issues.

I want to talk about the end credit elevator/Bentley scene.

Because there’s something BOTHERING me so much about it and other than coffee theory (which I don’t believe) I haven’t seen any explanation for it.

So to address Crowley first…his expression doesn’t really change he through the whole end credits. Which is on brand, he isn’t processing. You can see he’s on the edge of a breakdown but he won’t let it out. From the moment he gets in the car he is stonewalling. He hardly even reacts to A nightingale sang in Berkeley square playing, just calmly turns it off with a tiny lip twitch and drives away. He’s just staring blankly ahead while he drives and his face hardly even moves. All in character.

But Azirapahle…he is doing a whole lotta processing in that elevator. Sis is going through it.

At first he’s still recovering, looks like he’s about to have a breakdown to. He looks heartbroken. Devastated.

Once he gets past the initial heartbroken stage his expression is changing to a more determined look. He’s doing a Crowley shoving those feelings down. In my mind he’s planning a way to get Crowley back. Or he’s telling himself that Crowley will comeback on his own like he has before. He’s telling himself he is in the right and it will all be ok because he’s a bit delulu and he’s still in shock about what’s happened. Pretty normal and in character.

Then it gets WEIRD

These last few seconds are driving me insane.

This does not look like Aziraphale. At all. And this is the only reason I would consider coffee theory could be true BUT only if the brainwashing didn’t kick in until he was in the elevator. Because I cannot fathom what on earth would posses Aziraphale to smile like this.

This isn’t the smile that he does when he’s trying to be polite or pretend he’s ok. And he’s not smiling at the Metatron, he’s smiling at himself.

It’s not his determined ‘I’m going to fix everything’ smile.

It’s definitely not his normal genuine or excited smile.

Someone more insane than me might be able to correct me here but I don’t think we’ve ever seen Aziraphale smile like this before?

The smile isn’t IN his eyes (they’re dead asf) but it IS reaching them because it’s taking over his whole face. He looks like a serial killer and I cannot wrap my head around it. I cannot fathom that he would be smiling about the job at this point. That’s just weird and doesn’t make sense.

Either Micheal has made this acting choice or he was directed to do it for a very good reason. And it coming at the end feels like it was just dropped there as a hint. I’m not sure if the hint is plot related (like Coffee theory), or it’s just a hint as to what Aziraphales headspace will be like when we pick up in S3.

But can we all agree this face is CREEPY. It’s giving super villain vibes and I hate it. I feel like he’s going to appear in my sleep paralysis tonight and I’m scared.

Anyway.

The explanation options I have at this point are:

1. Something like coffee theory where some kind of outside influence is effecting him in the elevator (but not beforehand in the bookshop). This face does remind me of Gabriel’s weirdly overly happy expressions when he was Arc Angel

2. He’s in shock

3. He isn’t as good at hiding his feelings as Crowley is, so maybe he’s just over compensating to prevent a breakdown infront of the Metatron

4. He has convinced himself that Crowley will come back and is experiencing a weird mix of delusional excitement and pain

5. He’s having a complete mental breakdown (same)

#good omens #crowley #aziracrow #aziraphale #good omens s2 #good omens season 2 #crowly x aziraphale #ineffable husbands #ineffable divorce

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ghostjunksickness · 6 months

Note

The Medium Character Analysis at long last!

Oh man this one was slippery one.

The Medium is a shape shifter both physically and narratively, and is very difficult to pin down as a character.

Luckily, we can catch glimpses of what’s going under the surface through a few of the characters, mainly Aiden, Nowe, Ghost/Jan and briefly Erich.

Starting with Aiden, I don’t think it’s an accident the cyclops is our first “medium” for the Medium. Ghost definitely screwed Aiden up in his attempt to help him, but I have a very specific theory of what was driving him so crazy. Rereading that chapter, I strongly believe Aiden was already living an analogous life style to that of the Medium. All he cared about was eating, and Aiden’s inner monologue / possibly the Medium themself chastised him for squandering his second chance. I think Ghost, in attempting to break the deal, accidentally put a bit of the Medium into Aiden. My evidence for which is the following:

The presentation and transition of the word bubbles.

The physical mutation going on i.e. extra pupils and the blood grappling hook.

The knowledge of what Vahn’s tattoos are and finding them irritating (more on that later.

And, ya know. The sudden urge to eat people.

Which if this is true, tells us a little more about what being the Medium is like. We already knew they liked eating people. But whereas before I thought they were doing out of spite towards their mom the Crane Women (permanently taking away the mortals she loves so much), dude might not even have a choice in the matter. The Medium also probably lives a very solitary life much like Aiden. Their only long lasting companions are the Crane Woman, with whom they have mommy issues, and Huko, with whom they have everything-else issues. While that sort of isolation shouldn’t (and doesn’t appear to) be bad for a normal Immortal, the Medium isn’t an Immortal. They’re an immortal Mortal.

(Thanks mom)

And Mortals kind of need a certain level of physical and psychological maintenance to be functional or happy. Which I somewhat doubt the Crane Woman thought of let alone provided.

While it’s been moved around, there’s a brief interaction between the Medium as Hadar and Erich that tells us a lot about the Mediums mental state. Both of them are creations with some sort of obvious tell that they are something else. The Medium seems to project their own upset feelings onto Erich, but when Erich tries to reach out, the Medium freaks a bit. The Medium has had untold eons to learn how to read people and play the stage as needed. The Medium loves to act as wacky over the top characters but doesn’t seem to know how to be a person.

Which brings me to the big part: The Mediums relationship with Nowe!

When I made my first theory on the comic, I thought Nowe got the Mediums character nailed from the get-go. A cosmic loan shark, a trickster that’s three steps ahead and already knows what you’ll do next. And then I reread the comic with a fine toothed comb and formed a new theory:

Nowe and the Medium have one thing in common and it’s that they both suck at their jobs.

To be fair to the Medium, I haven’t really been given any examples of what normal successful deal is supposed to look like.

We’ve got:

Aiden, who’s deal was broken by the Ghost.

Trigger, who made a deal to fix a problem I’m pretty sure the Medium honest to god caused by accident.

And Nowe, whose first deal had to be nullified because while the Medium is powerful, they sure as shit aren’t omnipotent in their current state.

Which following up on that last point, we haven’t seen much of what a normal deal entails but I can’t imagine the Medium getting dressed up in a maid outfit and baking Trigger muffins. A significant part of this analysis was just working out why the Medium is so kind and supportive to Nowe. The deals been struck, they technically don’t need to do more than what they’ve already promised. If Nowe can’t deliver then that’s on him and the Medium gets a snack. Except, this time the Medium wants the agreed upon outcome of the deal. With Aiden, what the Medium wanted was to eat him, but they need to go through a whole song and dance first to get there. Being paid back as much as they give is normally a net zero gain for the Medium. They want to eat people so they want people to fail their deals.

The deal with Nowe is different because this is probably one of the few, if not first times the Medium has ever wanted something from somebody. The Medium is asking for help in the only way they know how (or maybe even can). I don’t imagine this is a familiar predicament for them so the Medium is being extremely kind to Nowe because technically, Nowe is doing something incredibly kind for the Medium. And the Medium gets a Snack.

Lastly there’s Ghost/Jan, whose in the iris of this mess.

If I had to guess on how the Medium actually lost their heart, they probably gave it to Jan thinking it would “release them from their mortal bindings” before later realizing “oh shit I actually need that”.

My reasoning here is that every flashback we see of the Medium depicts them in bandage like bindings, placed there by Hoku. Ghost is perpetually wrapped in bandages himself (just realized we never got pronouns for them, was/were maybe?) and is presumably the test subject aka sacrifice used to make contact with the Medium. Jan took the Medium’s heart and bindings but also took a good chunk of their power to.

When Dr. Yaromir said Vahns brands were the key, I think he was right but for the wrong reasons. It was Hilo’s powers that locked the Medium, it’d likely be the same power to unlock the bindings now on Jan.

TLDR: the Medium is a hungry theater kid with mother issues and struggles with introspection

This was a blast to read, thank you so much for all your thoughts!! Being the Medium is a strange predicament for something as you said, an immortal mortal. There’s pain points in being in the middle of these omnipotent beings that cannot possibly understand the agony that comes with having a human heart and when it suddenly disappears. When that particularly desperate mortal comes along with just enough power and drive to do just about anything… You don’t let him go!

#Ghost asks #spoilers #GJS spoilers #The Medium

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p-artsypants · 4 months

Text

Paint it Black (17) Testing

Ao3 | FF.net

Starfire awoke suddenly. A hand violently smacked against her face, and an elbow collided with her stomach. Given her natural resilience to physical blows, they didn’t so much hurt as startle.

She sat up quickly, quickly orienting herself. She was in bed, next to Black, where they had fallen asleep together while talking.

Now, he had his eyes clenched shut tight as he tossed and turned in agony. A grimace pulled at his lips as he bared his teeth.

“Robin?” She shook him gently.

He thrashed involuntarily, kicking and whipping his arms around, knocking a pillow off the bed.

“I will take you to the medical bay,” she declared, grabbing his flailing wrist.

The touch seemed to hurt as he cried out in pain.

“I’m sorry,” she sternly pulled him to her body, pinning his limbs. “I can’t allow you to hurt yourself.”

He continued to jerk and wriggle as they swiftly traveled. He moaned and whined, but didn’t scream, which she was thankful for as she didn’t think she could handle it.

When they arrived at the med bay, she made quick work of getting him onto the bed, and restrained. “It is not ideal,” she apologized. “But it is only temporary, and only so you do not hurt yourself. I will return shortly.”

As a girl on a mission, she zipped through the halls. Cyborg’s room was the closest, so she entered and awoke him.

“Many apologies for disrupting your sleep cycle, but I believe the time has come to perform Robin’s blood test.”

Cyborg blinked his human eye at her, blearily. “Oh, gotcha. It’ll take a second for my system to start up. But I’ll meet you there.”

“Very well. I shall go inform Mr. Batman.”

At Robin’s room, where Batman was staying, she knocked once. He answered fairly quickly, making her wonder if he was even asleep.

“He’s ready?” Bruce asked, by way of greeting.

“I believe so. He is in the medical room. He was unresponsive and his body moved against his will. I have restrained him.”

“I see. Good work. I’ll go tend to him. Why don’t you let the others know? They might want a chance to see Robin, if he’ll make an appearance.”

“Yes sir.”

—-

When Starfire returned to the med bay with Raven with her, Cyborg, Bruce, and Alfred were hard at work.

Alfred was the one taking the blood sample, while Cyborg and Bruce held Robin still.

Starfire and Raven took up their places and helped.

“Unfortunately,” Bruce began, “we might end up having to take a few tests over time, depending how much fentanyl is in his system.”

“And we can’t give him Narcan?” Cyborg asked.

“There would be no point. At this stage, he’s not under the effect of any opioids, and giving him anything would further mess with the test.”

“I have a sample,” stated Alfred, capping off the IV port.

“I’ve got the computer all ready for analysis,” Cyborg gestured, leading Bruce into the next room.

Robin continued to moan softly. But his movements were less erratic and spaced farther apart. He was sweating profusely.

Starfire wetted a washcloth with cool water and gently wiped his face and neck.

Shortly after, Beast Boy arrived, still in his pajamas. “Sorry I’m late,” he yawned. “Did I miss the test?”

“They’re analyzing it now,” Raven provided.

“Cool. I hate needles. How’s Robby?”

“Unresponsive,” Starfire lamented as she dabbed his face.

“What did he say when he came to you?” Raven asked. “Was he a little responsive then?”

Starfire blushed slightly. “It was several hours ago. He could not sleep and he came to me to tell me of his time in captivity. Eventually, we both fell asleep.”

“That’s not really a conversation most people would fall asleep to…” Beast Boy smirked.

“You are correct, but I believe he felt…relaxed. I took notes, and I will share with those who wish to know. I will caution, it is not easy to hear.”

Bruce and Cyborg returned a minute later. “I think I'd like to get another test in about an hour. There’s trace amounts of fentanyl in the system that will throw off the antidote formula. In the meantime, the computer is at least compiling a list of components to counter the poisons.”

“What do we do in the meantime?”

“We wait. As long as someone sits up with him, the rest of you can go back to sleep.”

“Ugh,” groaned Beast Boy. “After all that? Boooo.” He morphed into a cat and jumped up to curl up to sleep on a chair.

“I shall stay up with him,” Starfire stated.

“I’d stay too,” said Cyborg. “But I’d like to finish charging my batteries in case of an emergency.”

“I’ll make some coffee,” said Raven.

“I shall assist,” offered Alfred.

After they all left, it was just Bruce and Starfire left behind. The room turned rather quiet, as the only sounds were the beeps and boops of the medical equipment. Robin’s groans of pain had calmed down considerably, though he didn’t appear to be any more comfortable or relaxed. His face was tight as his mouth twisted into a grimace.

Starfire frowned harshly as she wetted the wash cloth again and put it on his face. It was so unfair that he had to be in all this pain and couldn’t even have any medicine to help.

“When I came to Earth,” Starfire said aloud. “I had just escaped a Gordianian slave ship. Prior to that, I was held captive by the Psions and experimented on to satisfy their sick curiosities.”

Bruce had the impression that Starfire liked to hold conversation, but this wasn’t your average small talk.

“I have seen many horrible things. Human morality is not the standard across the universe. Many fellow prisoners were killed over scraps of food. Pain was an expectation. Out of my friends here, I believe I was the most prepared to hear of Robin’s time in captivity. Even then, some of the things he said made me sick to my nine stomachs. There is causing pain because you do not care about the people around you, only your survival. And then there is causing pain because it gives you great delight and pleasure.”

Bruce narrowed his eyes, giving her his undivided attention.

“I used to believe that the Psions were the most evil creatures in the universe, because they caused pain for curiosity's sake. But even that can have an ounce of good in it. But what these men did…”

Bruce closed his eyes, all too familiar with the torture she had probably been told about.

“Humans are so complex and nuanced. I stayed on Earth because its inhabitants are beautiful creatures,” she delicately pushed some of Robin’s hair away from his face. “But this was a side of humanity I wish I never knew existed.”

“The Joker is an exception. His depravity isn’t the norm. It does happen, and has happened if you look over the span of human history. But those actions are largely considered abhorrent. Don’t lose sight of the beauty in humanity. We need more people like you, Starfire.” Bruce said this with such conviction and ferocity, she didn’t expect it.

“But…”

“In our line of work, it is so easy to become jaded. To think that humanity is beyond saving. Especially in Gotham,” he chuckled mirthlessly. “That place is a cesspool, and I often find myself wondering if my work will ever be done. But then I see parents out with their kids, or a student walking a dog, or teenagers laughing and eating pizza. I see lives that are complex and full of nuance, and they need our protection from the exceptions.”

A smile, however small and sad, graced Starfire’s face. “I suppose you would be correct. You have been doing this much longer than I have, so you would know. I shall take your advice to heart.”

Bruce didn’t say it, or even let any part of his face convey it, but he was glad that Robin was around Starfire. She was a good influence, and would bring better healing than he ever could. Instead, he said, “thank you, for telling me about your past. I understand you better now.”

A genuine smile painted her face.

“Star?” A small voice spoke from the bed.

“Robin?” She perked up slightly, and leaned in to tend to him.

“Star? Starfire?” He asked again, his head lulling back and forth.

“I am here, my dear Robin.” She undid the restraints that bound his wrist and took hold of his hand. “I am right here.” She spoke softly.

Robin tightened the hold, almost like he was checking to make sure she was real.

Bruce quietly got up to let the others know that he was awake.

“How…do you feel?” He croaked.

“What? Why do you ask such a thing? I should be asking you.”

He moved his hand up to touch her neck. “I hurt you, Star…I hurt you…”

“Oh Robin, that was not you. And I am fine. You know it will take more than that to damage me.”

“I’m sorry,” he sniffed. “I’m so sorry…”

“You have been forgiven.” She petted his hair. “Do not fret, dear Robin.”

“I hate this. I hate all of this,” he cringed as a wave of pain rolled through him. “I can see you, when Black is in control. I can see you, I can hear you…but I can’t do anything else.”

“We will have you fixed soon. They shall take another blood test and create an antidote for the poison.”

“I can’t wait,” he winced. “Because this sucks.”

Beast Boy shifted back from a cat. “I thought I heard Robin’s voice, is he…?”

“H-hey Beast Boy…” Robin managed to smile.

“Hey buddy! Good to see you! How you feeling?”

Robin shook his head slightly. “Not...not great.”

“Yeah…that’s fair,” Beast Boy gave his leg a pat.

Robin swallowed thickly as he met Beast Boy’s eyes. “I’m so proud of you.”

Beast Boy startled at the sudden compliment. Robin didn’t hand them out very often. “For what?”

“My puzzle. It was the only thing I could think of that wasn’t suspicious…and someone on the team would figure out.”

“Well, Raven was the one that figured out that you were picking songs on purpose. So I can’t take all the credit.”

Robin’s eyes crinkled with something akin to mirth, “I’ll have to thank her too, then.”

“Looks like you can do that right now!” Starfire chirped as Raven and Alfred came into the room.

“What is he doing?” Raven asked.

“Thank you for helping Beast Boy–” a wince, “solve my code.”

She sat beside him and held his hand. “Anytime.”

He squeezed her back. “I’m sorry I yelled at you…I was so relieved…when you made it inside my head. Having this…disease with Black is like my captivity is still going on. Even now, when I can finally speak, I know it won’t last.” He sniffed.

“It won’t be much longer,” Starfire comforted. “But Robin, we do not place any fault or blame on you for this situation. I have been studying psychology in an effort to help you. From my understanding, Dissociative Identity Disorder develops from shocking events as a coping mechanism. Children that had something traumatic happen during their childhood are at a higher risk, and from what we heard of your past…”

“Dissoci–is that what this is?” He cringed. “That’s what they call Multiple Personality now, right?”

“I am far from qualified to confirm a diagnosis, but it seems fairly obvious to me.”

“Agreed dude,” said Beast Boy. “I don’t even know what Dissa–Dia–Diablo Dent—”

“Dissociative Identity Disorder.”

“Yeah, I don’t really know what that is, but you definitely have two personalities.”

Robin clenched his eyes shut as the pain and disappointment rolled over him. “Then…they were successful. They did it. I’m…I’m just like Dent.”

“Not quite,” Bruce said from the doorway.

Robin turned to look at him, mortified. Of course, he had known that Bruce was in Jump, but seeing him in person, after everything he had done, was a different story. “B-Bruce, I’m so…so sorry…”

“Hey, Dick, calm down.” The man said as he sat by his IV port. “It’s okay.”

“I messed up…I messed up so bad.” A tear ran down his cheek.

“You couldn’t have known they were in Jump and responsible for this. You noticed something was wrong at the psychiatric unit and acted. Messing up would have been brushing off all the signs I taught you and letting them disappear without a trace. So stop beating yourself up.” He prepared the next vial for a blood sample. “Starfire is right that your secondary personality is a coping mechanism for trauma. But how stable or powerful it is without that poison in your system, that is yet to be determined.”

“And the opioids,” Robin whispered.

“And the opioids.” Bruce worked quickly to get another sample. “We’ll see if this one is good. If it is, we’ll get you a drip with painkillers in it.”

Robin’s lip trembled. “Just sedate me. I don’t…I don’t want him to talk anymore. He needs to die.”

Alfred responded, “We have the means and knowledge to patch you up, but anesthesia is another matter entirely. One I am not comfortable attempting with all that is in your system.”

Robin scrunched up his face as he was filled with more pain, anger, and humiliation.

“I’ve been treating it like you’re drunk,” said Beast Boy. “Not that I hang around that many drunk people, but you know how they say crap they normally wouldn’t say when they’re sober? It’s kinda like that. Except you actually remember the stuff you say, so that’s a bit of a bummer.”

Robin coughed, and a little black spittle splattered on the sheets.

“Looks like visiting hours are over,” Bruce said determinedly. “Get him hooked up to the fentanyl. I’m going to run this sample. We’ve waited until the last possible second, so this is as good as we’re going to get.”

Things moved quickly then. Beast Boy went to get Cyborg, while Bruce and Alfred got to work. Raven stood by Robin’s head and used her healing powers to calm his mind.

While Starfire sat by his side, holding his hand, and feeling helpless.

Once the fentanyl was administered, they waited with bated breath to see what would happen. After about twenty minutes, Robin looked more relaxed and his complexion cleared.

“He’s asleep,” Starfire noted.

“As I would be,” said Alfred. “He was in pain all day. He must be exhausted.”

Beast Boy returned. “Cy’s helping Batman with the antidote. How’s he doing?”

“Better, it seems,” said Raven. “He’s resting. We haven’t seen Black reappear.”

Beat Boy sighed. “Then I feel like I can relax. It was really hard to sit by while he was in that much pain.”

“Indeed,” said Starfire, never once taking her eyes off of Robin’s sleeping face.

About an hour later, Robin was still asleep. Bruce and Cyborg came into the room, looking cautiously optimistic.

“We’ve got the formula for an antidote,” said Bruce. “I’ll need to talk to one of my connections to get some of the components, but I think we’re good to go.”

“Wonderful!” Starfire chirped, slightly floating.

“But,” Bruce interrupted them before they could begin celebrating. “There’s still no guarantee this will fix him. If this really is a case of DID, a shot of chemicals won’t fix it.”

There was silence before Beast Boy, before anyone else, stated, “well, what’s most important is his physical health first, right? This should keep him from putting himself in danger to get a fix, and he won’t deal with the poison pain, right?”

Bruce nodded. “That’s my hope. From here out, we’ll have to be looking for what triggers his personality. Maybe moments of stress will make that other personality come out. Maybe it will fade entirely with the poison neutralized. We have to be prepared for anything.”

“That’s kind of a risk of the job, isn’t it?” Cyborg mused. “Stopping crime is fun and feels good, but there’s always a chance you are irreparably damaged. You just have to roll with it.”

“One more thing,” Bruce crossed his arms. “If Black wakes up before we administer the antidote, we shouldn’t mention what its goal is. If he realizes the poison in his body is what lets him exist, he may become uncooperative.”

“It’s probably best he stays in here until it’s administered, then,” stated Raven. “And we should keep the restraints on his legs.”

Starfire landed on the floor again.

“So, playing the waiting game again, huh? My favorite…” Beast Boy morphed into a cat again and resumed his nap.

“Is any of that coffee ready?” Bruce asked Alfred. “I’ll take a cup in the office. I have an email to write.”

As everyone filtered out, Starfire was left alone with a sleeping Robin. She sat on the bed, and just watched him. Watched as his chest rose and fell with deep breaths. Watched for any sign of discomfort, but he was still.

Disease. Irreparably damaged. He needs to die.

Starfire didn’t know how to feel. Black was an unstable, volatile character that was unpredictable. But…he was a friend. And he was part of Robin. A coping mechanism. She didn’t really like him as a replacement to Robin, but on his own…

Would it feel like curing an illness? Or sacrificing a person?

Ultimately, it wasn’t up to her. It was Robin’s choice. And Robin was trapped, and needed to be free. There was no point in considering alternatives. If the antidote killed Black, then so be it.

Carefully, Starfire laid down on the bed, right beside Robin, and rested her head on his chest.

“I’m sorry.”

—

“It’s done.”

Bruce set the tray down on the table next to the hospital bed. Inside the tray was a set of syringes filled with a pink liquid, and the kit for administering it. “Fomepizole, potassium phosphate, prednisolone, and good ole Sodium bicarbonate.”

“But is it bubblegum flavored?” Black asked.

“Yes, but you won’t be tasting it,” said Bruce. “We’re injecting it right where we took your blood sample last night.”

“Then why bother flavoring it?”

“Because I knew you’d ask.”

There was a pause before Black nodded knowingly. “You’re joking. That was a joke.”

“I’m chock full of them.” Bruce took a seat and snapped on the gloves. “Now, the antidote has to be administered in steps. Because it neutralizes the poison in your system, a chemical reaction will take place. The chemical reaction could cause some adverse side effects if administered all at once.”

“Like what? Will I turn purple?”

“In a way…” Bruce said vaguely, not elaborating. “We’re going to give you the first dose, then in an hour, then next. I can’t guarantee it’ll be a pleasant experience either, but once it’s over, you should be all free of the pain of the poison.”

Black looked highly skeptical as he frowned and bit his lip. “I suppose I don’t really have the choice in backing out now, do I?”

“Not a chance. We went to a lot of work to make this.”

“Fine then.” Black grumbled, but relented. “Bottoms up,” then he turned to look at Starfire. “That’s what people say when they take a shot.”

Starfire squinted her eyes in confusion, but decided not to ask for clarification.

Bruce pushed the first dose of the antidote, and gnawed on his tongue while he waited for a reaction.

“Ohh, that burns. Not as bad as the poison they gave me, though,” Black wiggled his fingers as a heat traveled up his arm. “Okay, it’s getting a little…worse…” His eyes began to droop as his head tilted forward. His skin flushed and his breathing became heavy.

“Just relax,” Bruce gently pushed him back so his head rested on the mattress.

“I’m…burning…fuzzy burning…”

“Yep,” he hooked the saline drip back up. “That’s what Lucius said would happen. You remember our friend Lucius Fox, right?”

“...ears…and a tail…”

Bruce shook his head and looked at the Titans. “We won’t really know how it worked until we’re all done with the dosing, and that will take a few hours. Until then, he’s likely going to be in and out of consciousness. If he’s awake, he won’t be coherent.”

Beast Boy gave a long, exaggerated sigh. “And so again, we wait…”

Like divine providence, the alarms sounded, muted slightly in the med bay, but flashing red lights all the same.

“Or not,” Beast Boy perked up.

Bruce removed the gloves. “How bad is it?”

Cyborg analyzed the report on his arm. “Looks like Billy Numerous.”

“Is that bad?”

“He can divide himself into an army of clones. He has a limit, but it’s in the thousands.”

“And he has an annoying accent,” added Raven, under her breath.

“Master Bruce, I am perfectly capable of finishing this on my own,” said Alfred. “You should aid the Titans.” He took Bruce’s seat. “You could use the distraction.”

“Fine. Sounds like you guys could use all the help you can get with a villain like that.”

“I call shotgun in the Batmobile!” Beast Boy damn near screamed.

#fanfiction #teen titans #robin #starfire #robstar #paint it black #dick grayson #koriand'r #dickory

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fumifooms · 1 year

Text

Mozu character analysis - Power & Security

[pics: first is from here, second is from here. First is the official translation but second can also reinforce details imo] Tw for: extensive discussion of parental physical abuse and trauma. Violent demeanor and also implied sexism & objectification.

Mozu’s a really interesting character that Dr. Stone barely scratched the surface of with the prodigy discussion with Hyoga, and I’m just unhinged enough (and my college semester just ended) so that I’m going to write an essay about his psychology. Rejoice, autism be upon ye. It’s under a cut bc buckle up everyone this is gonna be long. Oh also, this is just a fan analysis so of course I can’t and don’t claim that this is the ultimate universal “right” reading of his character, but I do think it’s a solid reading with what canon gave us. Also I have to confess that I didn’t read all of the Treasure Island arc… I mostly skipped chapters except the ones Mozu was in lol, for that reason I might very well be unaware of some aspects.

The way his backstory affects him

Here are the main points of canon to keep in mind for this:

1: His father was abusive, and when he started being violent with him, Mozu almost killed him when he retaliated.

2: He’s lived all his life on Treasure Island, and is its lead warrior, very high-ranked.

3: He’s a prodigy that supposedly was born with an innate incredible physical strength.

Now I’m a nurture over nature kinda gal, so we’ll spend a long time talking about how his environment shaped him. We’ll start of by clarifying the father situation as much as we can: it’s rare that someone/a relationship goes from 0 to 100 like that, I think it’s safe to assume that even before he started hitting him his father was still very much unpleasant and abusive in various ways.

So let’s get into it. 1: Do I even have to talk about how much having an abusive parent fucks you up. That kid probably developed hypervigilance and survival instincts early on at home, that tends to happen when you have to make sure your father isn’t going to take out his anger on you, and calculate what you can do to not get punished, more on that later. You know, like that post of someone talking about how someone angrily folding a sock at you makes you tense and adrenaline rush. Things become warning signs to defend against, anyways I’m getting slightly sidetracked- I’m sure his father taught him a bunch of shit ideology by his actions and words. Just even how he sees himself being a prodigy: being as strong as he was is how he was able to defend himself when his father became physically abusive, maybe he could have even died. That alone could explain for me why he values the innate qualities such as strength and beauty in people instead of training and earned skills, because in his case if he hadn’t been born strong or whatever he wouldn’t have been able to come through the way he has. He’d be in deep shit. And that’s why he sees innate strength as the only thing that distinguish people of value. Just getting beatings alone, without the extra backstory of retaliating, could have very well “taught” him that strength is the way the world runs, making him see it as the ultimate thing to possess. The human brain focuses first of all on survival and safety, whatever wrong things you learn or do come in second to that, especially when you’re in a developmental stage like a kid.

2: I think we can all agree the system on Treasure Island is hella tyrannical. Ibara can pretty much do whatever he wants, and the only untouchable people are the one who are high-ranked (pretty much only warriors) and… Yep no that’s it. Mozu became the highest ranking warrior besides Kirisame thanks to his strength and that’s what keeps him secure and generally comfortable, with his access to the harem girls and ressources, as well as being generally respected and feared. His strength is what gave him that, and his strength is what ensures he’s safe in the hierarchy and in general. Once again, his world view about innate strength being the most important thing is reinforced by the whole Treasure Island system and society he lives in. What can he do, flee Treasure Island? Hah, good joke. So he follows the system and takes advantage of it as much as he can, even shooting for becoming the chief at some point.

3: Soo the reason he’s 1: alive and safe, and 2: in a good place in the society hierarchy, ensuring him safety and comfort, is that he’s a prodigy, that he was born with that strength. I’ve already mentioned it in the other points, but yeah at this point there’s nothing that can prove to him that his world view, about innate strength meaning you deserve everything you want and deserve to rule over the weaker, is wrong. It’s very much a "survival of the fittest" mindset with a focus on eugenics. That’s where Hyoga comes in, kicking his ass, but that’s for later on.

I do feel like the way he deals with conflict is very telling as well. When Mozu realized he knew who the invaders were, he sat back and watched over to see how the chaos would unfold. He stepped to the sideline and let things happen, so he could later strike when the opportunity presented itself and he could side with whoever is going to win in the end. That *cough* sounds like *cough* a strategy someone who lived in an abusive home would instinctively develop, make yourself scarce so no attention is placed on you when things are bad and shit is brewing, then take the opportunity to grab power if it’s safely presented to you.

So. I think it’s pretty much canon subtext that Mozu seeks power as a trauma response. Power in his life has meant safety and control of his life. Literally just self-defense and survival instinct/self-preservation. Not only power in status, but also innate, believing that the attributes with which you were born are what gets you to where you deserve to be in life, strength (and beauty just as a collateral product of what he considers to be innate qualities). In that sense, like any other unhealthy trauma response, it’s something he should unlearn to heal, and to stop being a piece of shit also.

There are also other aspects of his character that support this, that’s kind of all his character tbh, but for example there’s just how much he doesn’t blink at, and even thrives in, violence. There’s how he was very trigger-happy when it came to killing the science crew, almost playful in the way he treated their lives like lottery. He’s cold hearted and sees killing someone you can defeat as a right, and he doesn’t assign value to lives at all, except when he can get something out of it, power mostly (letting the science crew live so they can get the medusa out of the picture, with Kohaku getting informations on the invaders).

If you think about it, he’s also a lot like Denji from Chainsaw Man… Just look at this post. He just seeks quick instant gratification through sexual affection. Has he ever even had any positive relationships? Does he even know how to express and receive affection? It is after all well known that hypersexuality can be a coping mechanism born from trauma. All of the relationships and interactions we see him have with others on Treasure Island (apart from the harem girls) are professional in nature. It’s implied he has no friends from the lack of counter evidence. We don’t see him just hanging out with anyone, no one speaks of him with any sort of fondness. It’s also lowkey implied he doesn’t seek out the same harem girl multiple times, so there’s very low chances of him having formed a connection or friendship with any of them. So, he’s got no friends, no family, no romance. The only validation and affection he gets is in a professional sense because of his feats (which is in turn due to his innate strength) and from the “special time” spent with harem girls. Iirc we don’t even know if the harem girls like him or not, they might just be doing their job… So, like. Yeah, the only positive attention he gets is from maiming people and from sex, so that already paints a pretty picture doesn’t it. Edit: Ok so I found it too much of an assumption to put it in initially but I always think about it again so, with the way Treasure Island guards frequently have to turn dissident people to stone or worse, I wouldn’t be surprised if Mozu’s apathy when it comes to killing or even murderous tendencies kinda come from the fact that he was pushed to do them + it’s very normalized there. Like… Mozu lowkey dissociating to get into a killing mood or when thinking back on it and trying his best not to dwell on it is a concept that has got me going. Not mentioning the systematic murdering and how that might affect him negatively being the one that has to carry it out would just be a missed opportunity from me.

Motives & other traits

His biggest motivation for becoming chief of Treasure Island, if we’re to believe his own words on the matter, is that he wants the harem…? Yeah well, I’m sure that’s part of it, gratification and possessions for a type of pleasure that he does value, but I do think the power part of it is understated a lot. He’s obviously a character that cares a lot about power, and so I think he just didn’t talk about that part much because it’s just obvious. He wants to become chief because chiefs are at the top of the hierarchy, and why would he not want that. In part, I do think he doesn’t realize just how much the chase for power drives him. He seems to kinda just be doing whatever he wants to do at the moment, which to me seems like it means that Mozu’s craving of power is a subconscious thing to him. To him, it probably all just sounds like the natural thing to seek. Oh and that does bring me to another point, I think freedom is really important to him. The freedom to meet with harem girls, the freedom to be at the top of hierarchy, the freedom that comes with being the strongest around, the freedom that comes with everyone having to listen to you if they don’t want you to kill them, he wants to have no limits and be fully unrestrained. Comes with living on a small island you can’t leave that has a super strict system that treats you like shit, tbh. The negotiations with Gen were very interesting for me because of this, when he had the knee-jerk reaction to demand he keeps the medusa after their alliance because Gen said he couldn’t. He wants the freedom to choose to keep the medusa or not, even if he doesn’t actually really gives a shit about it because he’s the strongest without it anyways, so he decides he’ll keep the medusa as a show of power, simply because he can and the science gang can’t go against him. Phrased differently, the negotiations with Gen also confirm he’s pretty contrarian in general, wanting freedom and pushing for it thoughtlessly regardless of the practicality of it (he didn’t seem like he cared about getting the petrification beam. It’s just a power move, because that’s what he wanted: unconditional power).

He’s a veryyy proud character, we we know this, big ego that thinks he’s hit shit with the ladies and the strongest and that means he deserves everything he wants on a whim, but he does react very badly when someone talks about him negatively or otherwise challenge him (Kohaku when she said he had no integrity or appeal lol, making him go “you’re no longer cute, let’s fight to the death now”). He takes rejection really bad. Maybe that can show that his self-esteem is less strong than we think. Not that it’s completely a front, boy no actor is that good, but certainly, Mozu could get triggered by someone insulting him or confronting him with his flaws, insinuating that he’s anything less than worthy of his success or whatever else. His strength and, eh, beauty, are the only things he has going for him after all, he might get touchy with them being put into question, or rather having their worth put into question the way Hyoga does by claiming people can train and become better than Mozu if they have enough trained talent. It can also be less personal, that just as someone who hasn’t been used to people refusing him anything for a long while and being contrarian himself having someone just straight up provoking him or insulting him makes him see red. Whatever, cool excuse for bloodlust, bro.

He’s also not as impulsive as one would assume with his horny jock archetype tbh. Rather, he’s very observant and calculating, which was pointed out a significant amount of times. I do feel like it’s often overlooked that he didn’t just want to keep Kohaku alive because he wanted to sleep with her, but that his end goal was for her to spill the beans. It’s a threat as much as it’s unappealing flirting, a power move once again. He likes to do a lot of them, to be sure. That’s why he bragged about lowkey wanting to kill the science crew in front of them. Anyways- Yeah, in the end even with Kohaku, everything he did from A to Z in the Treasure Island arc was to actively further his own agenda. Also he’s sneaky and light in his feet, rather than being super loud or even attention seeking tbh. (Watching people quietly & noticing things/spying, sneaking into the cave without anyone hearing or seeing him arrive, the whole cloaked surprise attacks thing)

Redemption & healing

So. How did this fucking murderous selfish piece of shit become this?

Well… Errr, an off-screen redemption arc?

It’s very much swept under the rug, the difference between the climactic battle he had with Hyoga and later on after he got unpetrified to become a part of the science kingdom is staggering, and unexplained. The manga wants you to assume that his last conversation with Hyoga explains his change of heart enough. Which… It kind of does? Like, canon if you could have spent like 1 panel telling us that Mozu has been training with Hyoga and getting along well with the crew and acclimating peacefully it’d have been cool but whatever, we can piece it out pretty well on our own. My best guess for his off-screen redemption arc is that the whole Hyoga speech and defeat humbled him enough to reconsider some of his life philosophies (pretty much the canon reading, especially since he confirmed he’d like to train, aka an acknowledgement that he’s not the best he could be + shows him learning some work ethics). But, I like to think that what makes him become much more of a team guy rather than wanting to be above everyone, is that being away from Treasure Island and the tyrannical system that was there, his agression and need for hierarchy subsided because in Senku’s group there is safety. There is no struggle for power, working for one guy that just wants to be powerful and take advantage of that (Ibara. Which ironicalky is what Mozu himself wanted to become, since he had no example of what else there is than exploiting and being exploited), instead there is a community that is very open and humane, one that values the life of even their worst enemies, one that doesn’t treat you like shit even if you contribute less to the working force or have unconventional qualities. He got fricking humbled, and he found that there were other ways to live. So, he mellowed out. That’s kind of the only realistic explanation I can make for it, so in the end I do think that supports my reading that his resorting to violence so automatically and all o’ that is a trauma response. The epilogue chapter showed he got a happy ending with plenty of chicks so like, lol, things are working out for him ig.

And that’s how you turn an horrible irredeemable-seeming villain into a comedy relief character with minimal exposition and redemption arc.

In conclusion

[last pic source: https://www.tumblr.com/9009l3/658963831138238464/mozu-flower :) 💖]

Also I made a spotify playlist for him bc I’m cringe, here it is if ya want it: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/79AEoXTRT3GTYVGlUONGol?si=ag6wl-CnT569OCM5CGWnhw

#dr stone #dr. Stone #manga spoilers #mozu #moz #dcst moz #dcst mozu #dcst #character analysis #analysis #dcst analysis #trying out new tags idk #character playlist #spotify playlist #it’s at the bottom of the post

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