#I think there is a whole thesis in it

[bethanydelleman]

This is perhaps a silly question but did couples in Jane Austen's time always refer to each other by Mr./Mrs. Lastname? It's something I noticed with all of them (even Mrs. Elliot who is very liberal in that regard, much to Emma's dismay). And it's not just in company either, Mrs. Bennet does it in front of their daughters and Lady Bertram when she's alone with Sir Thomas. It just seems very cold and distant in modern times.

Yes, it does feel weird to us and yes that appears to be what they do. In addition, many of the children call their parents "sir" and "ma'am". This is a much more formal society. I would feel just as weird calling someone my own age “Miss Lastname”! However, I know a lot of couples who refer to themselves and their spouses as "Mom" and "Dad" instead of their actual names in front of their kids, so it’s not totally divorced from our society now.

Anyway, one of the reasons we don't know a lot of first names of parents is because they only call each other Mr. and Mrs. Lastname. The exceptions are Admiral Croft, who calls his wife Sophy (her name is Sophia) and Mary and Charles Musgrove. John Mullen argued in his book What Matters in Jane Austen that this shows the contempt that M&C have for each other, but they are almost always among family and they are the same generation as Anne, so that might be why they use their first names. Mrs. Croft never calls Admiral Croft his first name back, by the way.

There also may have been a change in manners between the earlier and later novels. We hear women call men “Lastname” in S&S and P&P, but not in the later novels, then only men use that short form. Emma is highly offended that Mrs. Elton would say “Knightley”, though that may have more to do with their recent intimacy than a social rule, and Mrs. Elton does always refer to her husband as “Mr.” even if she shortens his last name into “E.”

What I find very interesting is that if you pay attention to when Mr., Mrs., Miss, and names are used, you can see how one character thinks of another. Fanny Price always thinks of Mr. and Miss Crawford, never Henry and Mary, even when other characters become less formal around them. When Elizabeth talks to Wickham (post-marriage to Lydia), Wickham uses the informal “Darcy” but all Elizabeth’s thoughts use the formal “Mr. Darcy”. Mr. Bingley is just referred to as “Bingley” about 50% of the time, but “Darcy” only about 30%. This probably has to do with the characters disliking him, but also with his station in society. Even the narrator is respectful!

Which is why I actually love the formal names/Christian names dynamic because you can get so much information just by how people refer to each other. Charlotte Lucas, Elizabeth’s friend, calls her “Eliza” and we can understand this as a representation of their intimacy. Yet when Caroline calls Elizabeth, “Miss Eliza”, it is rude, she hasn’t earned the privilege of a nickname. Similarly, Mary Crawford calling Miss Price “Fanny” before she is actually engaged to Henry is too much too soon, especially since Fanny has not extended this right in friendship.

And when Wentworth says, “but if Anne will stay, no one so proper, so capable as Anne.” It’s not just the praise, he says her first name. It is a sign, on second reading, that his feelings for her have returned.

Last note, given how formal Mr. Darcy is and how respectfully Elizabeth refers to him even when they are engaged, they are calling each other Mr. and Mrs. Darcy everywhere except the bedroom! At least that's what I suspect.

[necrotic-nephilim]

what's fun about shipping Tim with Dick, Jason, or Damian is he has, at some point, hallucinated all of them to comfort himself. even when he doesn't like them or particularly get along with them, he has to imagine/hallucinate them just so he has the power to go on. Tim's concepts of the Robin mantle and what it should be is so fun, because he respects the others through the Robin mantle. Tim worships Dick because he was the first Robin. he wouldn't be Robin if Jason hadn't died in the mantle. and a lot of his frustration with Damian is he feels Damian isn't honoring the mantle correctly. when you ship Tim with the other Robins you can't divorce their identities as Robin from it because Tim will always see them as a Robin first and that's so fun and fucked up. like.

batman (1940) #456

Tim perceiving Dick as *Robin* cheering him on, not Nightwing, which is the version of Dick that Tim actually knows? that's just. wild of him. he will always view Dick as Robin first, his personal hero but also the original of the legacy. his love for Dick is shaped by that.

and then of course, even when he's hallucinating/imagining Jason cheering him on, it's *still* through the lense of being reminded how Jason failed? subconsciously believing that Jason got himself killed because of his actions, and that being a lesson for Tim to learn from? Jason isn't a person to Tim, he's a moral lesson about how to be Robin. any potential idolization he could have of Jason isn't because he loves Jason, it's because of the lessons Jason's death taught him.

and then, even though him hallucinating TIm is from the New-52, which makes characterization all kinds of questionable, i do think it makes sense for TIm to hallucinate/imagine Damian after Damian's death in an attempt to cope with it.

teen titans (2011) #18

to an extend, he sees Damian's death as in part his own fault. and even hating Damian, Tim needs the comfort from this to cope with Damian being gone. he's angry that Damian even was Robin, and has to learn something from Damian's death and how it impacts the Robin mantle, and teenage heroes as a whole. like, Tim can pretend he hates Damian all he wants, even getting taunted by the image of Damian, but there's still an underlying love to their relationship.

i think that's just the fun of shipping Tim with any of them. you will never divorce Tim's views of them from the Robin mantle and how fucking Unwell he is about anyone else who's been Robin before or after him, to the point he has to hallucinate them comforting him when he's at his lowest. it's always going to be a little unhealthy, a little toxic, and driven by Tim's relationship with being Robin as well. i need more Tim being weird about Robin in these ships.

[glitteratti]

nico di angelo was born in venice. a city made of islands and canals. a city that's half ocean. and you're telling me im supposed to just NOT go insane over percico? youre telling me im supposed to just be NORMAL about that?

[adpndrgn]

best boy in my team :)

[i-dare-say]

You know what I love about Binghe's character? His role in the story and the way it changes our perception of him through the narrative.

We first meet him as this poor boy and we, just like Shen Qingqiu, get swept by the image of the white lotus. He's a teenager, and we're told that at this age he didn't have any of the darkness that would reign over his life after the Abyss. We're only shown an obedient and sweet Luo Binghe. He is the "young and innocent protagonist".

But we know about his future. Shen Qingqiu tells us so many times that the Abyss will corrupt him irreversebly, that he will come back and take his revenge on the scum villain. The problem is that we see the story through Shen Qingqiu's point of view, he is our protagonist, making Binghe our villain. So we read about the disciple days with the constant thought that this boy will one day become the antagonist.

And see, there's a slight difference between villain and antagonist. A villain is perceived as someone with bad intentions, while an antagonist is just someone who opposes the protagonist.

When Luo Binghe comes back from the Abyss, he is both villain and antagonist. He goes against Shen Qingqiu (antagonist), and the story tells us he wants to kill him like the original PIDW (villain).

Then it's revealed that it may not be exactly like that. First, we're shown that Binghe has romantic feelings for Shen Qingqiu (which, yeah, it's obvious to everyone but him, but still), giving Binghe a new possible role in the story: love interest. This immediately reduces the perceived danger of his actions. It brings him closer, it makes him a safer character.

Yes, there are stories with villainous love interests that do horrible shit, but we're dealing with the most common way narratives treat this type of character: generally, the love interest is good. And so, the moment this role is put upon Luo Binghe by the narrative itself, it also influences the reader.

But Shen Qingqiu, and consequently we, don't lower our guard. Despite being the love interest now, we also know that Luo Binghe has conspired to take down his master and organized the sower plague. He's attacked Huan Hua Palace, killed Gongyi Xiao and many others, putting the blame on Shen Qingqiu. By the end of book 2 he's villain, antagonist and love interest.

But it all gets proven wrong. That almost everything that happened to Shen Qingqiu was not because of Luo Binghe. We discover that there are other villains in the shadows.

The sower plague and the the attack at Huan Hua Palace was caused by Tianlang-Jun and Zhuzhi-Lang. Qiu Haitang's involvement and Shen Qingqiu's imprisonment was one of the Old Palace Master's schemes. All of this destroys Binghe's role as villain and antagonist.

This is the moment Shen Qingqiu decides to trust Binghe, pushing the reader to do the same. Because he's just "love interest" now and by the standard conventions, he's good. We trust him to be. Shen Qingqiu himself starts to project onto him that same image of white lotus. Since our image of Luo Binghe was so bad previously, this makes it jump way higher. It lulls us into this much better perception of his character.

The Old Palace Master was a villain and he died, as villains are often destined to. The only obstacle remains Tianlang-Jun, who doesn't harm Shen Qingqiu because of Zhuzhi-Lang's wishes (not an antagonist), but also wants to merge the realms (villain).

So our protagonist and love interest move toward the action, the big battle against the final boss. The villains get defeated easily and after the truth of what happened to Su Xiyan, Tianlang-Jun gives up his plan. His role as villain ends there. But the story has more antagonists to reveal.

Luo Binghe has never stopped being one. The narrative only hid his real motivations and let him cover himself with the role of love interest. And at this moment, he drops the mask and lets all of his feelings out, everything he didn't tell Shen Qingqiu nor the readers. He becomes the final antagonist, the one we've had since the very beginning.

The thing that saves him is his status as love interest, because no, he's not the only one to blame for what is happening. There's Xin Mo, who has fed on his insecurities and negative feelings, and Shen Qingqiu himself. He is the one who has constantly pushed Binghe to the side, believing himself to do the right thing, first by giving Binghe his death and then by trying to keep him "protected" from his father.

In the end, Luo Binghe wasn't a villain. Shen Qingqiu was, and he dies. But since he's not a real villain, he's allowed to come back.

When everything is over, their story comes to an end. The narrative itself leaves them free, to be whoever they want to be.

[communistkenobi]

I don’t like when people ask how many books you plan to read/have read this year one because I think that’s a weird relationship to have to books and two because I think even reading a chapter or a portion of something is valuable. this is especially true with non-fiction but even with fiction I think any amount you read, even if you don’t read the entire thing, is not a failure or ‘incomplete’

[lunar-years]

There are wayyy too many “Roy would NEVER say that, how ooc!!!” and inversely, “Roy Kent is now #canceled and I never want him to so much as look at Keeley ever again” takes and not nearly enough:

“Roy is a flawed human person whose insecurities have always plagued him and tonight they got the better of him once again. He has a lot of apologies to make but hey, tomorrow is another chance at greatness. Also, he should really really go to therapy :)” takes!

[mcybree]

I prepared this ask in the Notes app only for Tumblr to not let me copy and paste the text so here’s a screenshot bc I’m not typing all that again lol

there’s this funny trend i see in trafficblr art, in that, when there’s a lineup of every past winner, most players will be surrounded by symbols that were relevant to their POV, and perhaps drawn with the last emotion they’d felt just before death (or maybe just whatever emotion the artist most associates with the character). The winners might be doing something, or in a pose that reflects how they won—there are a million ways to make a life series winners’ piece. What’s funny about it is that no one ever seems to know what to do with Scott. He’s most often just standing there looking mildly disgruntled. And for the symbols he’s most depicted with, it’s typically poppies, which are only relevant to the first season; last life scott does not place any importance on poppies, poppies dont ever come up beyond a brief interaction in episode 1, and jimmy as a whole is less relevant to scott’s pov in last life than he is in every other season.

not that this is an issue with the art; the pieces are beautifully done, it’s just representative of how little fandom discussion there is about scott’s win thematically. Most discussion I see are about the watchers and how they hate scott for defying him or whatever, but watcher lore is not discussion of the series itself as much as it is a fan creation that is retroactively applied to create meaning.

Scott’s Last Life win, to me, was achieved through accomplishing what Third Life Scott could not.

Scott spent 3L waiting for his day one ally to die. He kept Jimmy at a distance, often fully gearing himself up first before backtracking to help Jimmy along. There’s a funny disparity in episode 5, where Jimmy spends the entire episode trying to get good enchants on his iron armor, while Scott sets up a villager and gets good enchants for the full diamond set that he’d already had in storage, in about half the time Jimmy took trying to accomplish his own goal, iirc. This disparity is also something scott acknowledges with the “I’ll always be more powerful than you” line, but it’s been a while since ive written a post like this so i unfortunately do not have the episode number memorized on that one anymore. But Scott goes on to explain that he’ll always have better armor and weapons, which is why Jimmy could never kill him. This is all to say that Jimmy and Scott do not stand on equal grounds in their alliance, and, more importantly, Scott does not depend on Jimmy. The progress Scott makes in Third Life is entirely his own, with Jimmy as more of an afterthought than a teammate.

This is what landed Scott his all time lowest placement. After Jimmy dies first, Scott loses sight of his priorities and dedicates his remaining time alive to avenging Jimmy, rather than focusing on his own longevity (like he’d go on to do in future seasons). And, in that way, Scott’s attitude towards Jimmy (disposable, going to die, unreliable) was an indirect contributor to Scott’s low placement.

In contrast: Scott could not have won Last Life without Pearl. Scott has to rely on Pearl from day 1, having only two lives to start with himself. Pearl gives Scott two lives total. Pearl and Scott are almost always together. They made it to the final four by each other’s side. And that forced day 1 reliance on pearl breaks down the role scott typically assumes (*he’s* supposed to be the person people rely on, he’s supposed to be the one bringing everything to the table) which curbs his tendency to see himself as above others, which then allows for the most genuine happiness i have ever seen him have in an alliance.

The comparison between the way Scott talks to Pearl and the way Scott talks to Jimmy is like night and day. Scott doesn’t compliment or otherwise say anything supportive towards Jimmy (save for the “I believe in you! MCC has trained you for this moment!” during Jimmy’s dare to flare attempt) until after Jimmy has already died. With Pearl, however, Scott is much more open about his care towards her, saying that she’s his best friend and that he loves her as early as episode 2. There’s more examples but between last life and third life, Scott’s attitude towards his primary ally is completely different, and i think it’s symptomatic of Scott allowing himself to love and be vulnerable rather than keeping himself at a distance. And i think that it’s so special that scott won the season where he was so close with his day one alliance, directly because of his day one alliance.

because, to me, one of scott’s defining characteristics is his self reliance. He will have allies, yes, but he often assumes a supportive role and acts as a supplier. He doesnt like taking things from other people. Last Life is different because Scott relies on Pearl, too. It’s also not a coincidence that last life is the only season where scott is normal about jimmy but that’s a different post

tldr yes scott won last life with the power of love but not in the way people say he did (ignoring the boogeyman curse was strategy ☝️)

I SHOULD NOTE, though, that the boogeyman curse was still a fail. Although purposeful, Scott receives the penalty and apologizes to his team. He says he just couldn’t bring himself to do it. I do think that his words here aren’t fully honest— he’d admitted earlier that this choice was fully for strategy. But I also think his apologetic attitude here is genuine. Scott is a perfectionist, he needs to succeed; failing, though purposeful, still hurts. He feels the need to apologize. It means so much to me that his win in last life directly follows the choice to fail on purpose. I’m insane though idk

third life scott embodies scotts flaws while last life scott is him overcoming them 👍 is what im trying to say 👍 last life scott is everything that third life scott could not bring himself to be, in allowing himself to love and depend on other people and overall just be a person.

[danothan]

Just reading some comics and saw a panel I thought you might like. :)

ah fuck, characters reminiscing always get to me ;__;

but i will never ever get over that fond way these two talk to and abt each other. especially when they’re poking fun, you can just hear the love in their voice it’s SICK.

the halbarry love language is annoying each other, but even more than that, it’s being each other’s exceptions

[jesncin]

Caped Crusader fandom actually talking about how whitewashed the diversity of the show is and the gentrification of the 40s aesthetic even within escapist media!

[angelic choir music] media criticism my beloved we are eating well tonite

[elles-home]

sanji’s been suicidal from day one yall, why didn’t i catch this before. like we talk a lot about him offering to take zoro’s place in thriller bark because he sees himself as replaceable. “you guys will have to find another cook” dialogue really showed us this. i’m watching episode 26 right now and this asshole just said “point that gun at me,” when gin had the gun pointed at zeff

he’s always had suicidal tendencies oh my goodness

[lord-squiggletits]

On the MegOP fandom trend of saying "Optimus should apologize to Megatron"

(Speaking specifically for IDW1, though it applies to a lot of MegOP especially ones that do continuity soup with heavy reference to IDW1)

I was talking to a friend in DMs and they mentioned a common headcanon/fanfic trope that I also concurred with, and both of us said it's something that bothers us: a common take in the MegOP fandom goes basically along the lines of "If Optimus had just apologized to Megatron, the war would've ended" (or other variants including "if he'd tried harder to understand Megatron/work in collaboration with him").

And firstly, this is incorrect for a number of reasons:

There were attempts at peace negotiations during the war, but they fell through. So Optimus WAS trying to work with Megatron to the point of participating in formal diplomatic meetings.

Optimus tried multiple times on page to convince Megatron to just stop fighting and work with him for peace (Autocracy, Chaos Theory) that Megatron rejected. Given that these on-page examples take place at the start of the war and at the end of the war respectively, it makes sense that Optimus asking Megatron for collaboration is something he was trying/willing to do the entire time. So again, Optimus was always willing AND ATTEMPTING to work with Megatron and find a joint solution

Even before the war when Optimus was still Orion, he was very explicitly inspired by Megatron's writing and names Megatron as one of the people who "opened his eyes" to the wrongs of Cybertronian society. So how is it that people claim "the war went on for too long because Optimus never tried to understand Megatron" when OP literally named Megatron as one of his biggest idols, thus implying that OP does understand Megatron's ideals

But the primary purpose of this post wasn't to defend Optimus, actually. Even though I personally think Optimus did plenty (dare I say, everything) to try to end the war, there are some who may still think otherwise, so instead of arguing about whether Optimus did "enough", or who should apologize to whom, or who "deserves the blame" for starting/continuing the war, I'd actually rather talk about this:

No matter who is most "to blame" for the war, it's my firm belief that neither Megatron nor Optimus would even expect/demand the other to apologize to them at all.

On Megatron's side, he would never seek to judge Optimus negatively for the decisions to the point of saying "you wronged me, apologize." Whether it's evil Megatron who doesn't care about atrocities and revels in an opportunity to expose Optimus as a hypocrite, or post-war/Autobot Megatron who knows that his own evil actions are irredeemable, the idea of Megatron judging Optimus and demanding an apology for the war specifically strikes me as out-of-character. Why would Megatron demand or even want an apology from Optimus when Megatron knows fully well that he has his own sins to bear, he prolonged the war for his own selfish/material gain, and that he is responsible for an untold amount of suffering? Demanding an apology would imply that Megatron sees himself as the wronged party and Optimus as the wrongdoer, but by the end of the war, Megatron is too aware of his own part in the war to ever demand such a thing of Optimus. Even if he DID think that Optimus was "equally to blame" for the war (which he doesn't/wouldn't, btw), Megatron's own feelings of guilt would prevent him from trying to seek the petty satisfaction of the moral high ground or making Optimus beg for his forgiveness.

Additionally, Megatron knows Optimus very well as a person: he knows that the position of leadership is full of "loneliness [and] agonizing self-doubt" for Optimus (Chaos Theory) and that "when Optimus hurts others, he hurts himself" (MTMTE). Another reason that Megatron wouldn't demand nor want an apology from Optimus is because Megatron knows Optimus so well that he already knows that being a war leader fills Optimus with immense guilt and suffering. Given that Megatron knows about Optimus' self-doubt and guilt, why would he even need an apology when he already knows how much Optimus regrets the war and desperately wishes/wished for it to end?

Then, as established in the previous paragraphs, Optimus is too full of guilt for his part in the war (both before it started and in being unable to stop it sooner) to demand an apology from Megatron. Again, demanding an apology would put Optimus in an implied position of moral superiority and/or victimhood, but Optimus doesn't see himself as morally superior or as a victim (or rather, he sees himself as being responsible for these bad things happening and internalizes this as a duty to do better/fix wrongdoings). In other words, Megatron and Optimus both share this view of themselves and each other: Their hands are so dirty, and they both feel such guilt over this, and they know each other well enough to know that the other feels this way as well. Because both of them feel blame for the war and are acutely aware of their own flaws/part in suffering, both of them feel far too responsible for the war happening for them to ever blame their archnemesis for "not trying harder" or "being responsible for the war."

Hell, if you even look at the socio-political climate of Cybertron before the war started, neither Megatron nor Optimus were the ones who put this conflict into motion. The corrupt legacy of the Primes, Functionism, class issues-- all of these things existed before Megatron and Optimus did. Even once they started doing things like writing about social issues (M) or fighting against the Senate (OP), both of them were "underlings" in sense that they weren't leaders:

Megatron's writings may have inspired the Decepticon movement, but that movement existed as an independent entity with its own leaders and speakers long before Megatron became the "official" ruler of the Decepticons. He wasn't even the leader of the 'Cons until he took control of the gladiator arena and the nonviolent sections of the Decepticons were (presumably) subsumed into the underground, exploitative battle culture that Megatron created.

Optimus-as-Orion was a police officer to start, but even once he started going against the Senate, he mainly worked in collaboration with others like Senator Shockwave and Zeta (later Zeta Prime), who he either saw as his idols or who were literally superior to him in rank due to government/military structures.

So with this in mind, even from a social level, while Megatron and Optimus may have been "catalysts" of a sort that caused the war to escalate to an outright planetary/galactic level, the scenario is too complex to solely lay the blame for the war at either of their feet. I'm not confident in saying that Megatron/Optimus would explicitly think of this when talking to each other, but what I'm trying to say is that M/OP were just catalysts in a long chain of brewing tension that exploded into a war. Even if one could claim that one of them "started" or "escalated" the war, the social issues that caused the war and the positions of power that allowed them to become leaders in the first place were falling into place before either of them actually BECAME leaders.

In other words, this shared fate of being the final reaction that exploded a societal conflict into outright war... Megatron and Optimus both have that in common. And because of this, I really don't think either of them would even think to ask the other to apologize because they're both in such similar positions, with such similar feelings of guilt and responsibility, that they understand each other's feelings without words. To demand an apology would be akin to taking that shared vulnerability/guilt and stepping on it, attempting to claim that one is right/superior and the other is wrong/inferior, and that the inferior one needs to grovel and take responsibility for the bad things that happened.

[antisisyphus]

i keep thinking back to a quote by some architect who was arguing that the most sustainable architecture is the architecture that doesnt get torn down bc we will be (hopefully) constantly finding newer, cheaper, more efficient, ways of being "sustainable" so trying to make the most sustainable building is a moot point. in 5 years it will be outdated & if all it has going for it is "was once a very sustainable building but isnt anymore" well. that isnt much. the point was that the architect was saying that classical/romantic architecture (often considered very beautiful & worth saving which i could get into but that a whole other thing) is sustainable bc of its beauty. bc of the value we put on it. bc we dont want to erase or tear down things we find beautiful or important. i dont really have an end thought but im just musing on the importance of beauty & how aesthetic value can extend itself into material value & also how beauty (infinite) is hoarded by the rich as if it is a finite source. inch resting

[good-sci]

I can be trusted with unsupervised access to Nier: Automata

[allthngs]

ok SEND ME GOOD VIBES cause tomorrow i have a really important exam that will probably determine my thesis so i have to make a really good impression and idk how cause i’ve been shitting my pants the entire afternoon

[cupiidzbow]

frowny face. i’ll be honest actually do think it’s kinda concerning how people can’t just. sit down and take characters or media with a critical eye sometimes on here, like there’s stuff idgaf abt like i don’t care that you like a character that was a murderer or corny villain or something that literally doesn’t matter. that is literally the least of my worries i literally do not care. it’s more of like. being in infatuated with characters that are like egregious racists, literal nazis….. slave owners .. actual oppressors who hate minorities very loudly IN their media 😭 and the people backing you up and supporting you very loudly that u like them. like idk if it’s bc I see fandom spaces in a different lens already bc ( gestures to self ) black person. any ounce of criticism you give to someone is deflected with tears or wanting pity for liking the media they like cause they ‘can’t help it’ and I’m like. is. is this really how you live your life .