#I've seen some shit but this takes it

[lokilickedme]

Filed under: Shit I Had To See With My Own Eyes Today

A middle aged woman rode up to my yard sale this morning on a bicycle.  Not a mountain bike - a kid’s BMX bike.  Full-on Karen hairdo, dangly earrings, high heeled sneakers, shoulder bag.  Rode over to the vacuum cleaner I had sitting near the sidewalk with a $25 price tag on it, grabbed it by the handle neck, picked it up, and rode off with it.  Never glanced at anything else, never looked toward the house to see if anyone would see her, never indicated in any way that she even cared if anyone saw her.

Straight up STOLE MY VACUUM CLEANER ON A BICYCLE AND RODE OFF

I’m sure the cops are laughing their asses off watching the security cam video I sent them.

Who does shit like this??

[starry-bi-sky]

I am absolutely loving your Danyal Al Ghul au. While I have a soft spot for the whole plotline of Danny becoming his canon personality almost right after breaking away from the LOA all because of Jazz, I'm just as much for your take in which he goes through the same character development as Damian.

Now I'm curious. You already tackled his relationship with Dani, will you eventually take a stab at when he, Sam, and Tucker meet Gregor? Given that it's one of my hated episodes as I couldn't stand Sam's infuriatingly hypocritical attitude to Danny's suspicions of him, I'd kill to see your spin on it.

Aw, thank you! Danyal Al Ghul aus are what got me into DPDC first, so I have a major soft spot for them. That being said, uh, its exactly that soft spot that causes me to have Many Opinions about the trope you just mentioned. Like the trope is all fine and dandy, i don't blindly hate it, my main issue with it is that most aus i've seen treat his backstory as an ex-assassin more like a pretty cosmetic accessory rather than something that actually should have had an impact on him. Especially if he remembers being in the league.

Like i cannot stress enough the fact that being in an ecofascist assassin cult (regardless of his standing in it) should've left him, in some way or another, screwed up morally and psychologically because that's just how development works. Nature vs. Nurture is like a game of tug-o-war that never ends, where they are constantly fighting against each other and one side usually has the upper hand or greater influence. Children model the behaviors of the adults around them (ex: bobo the clown doll experiment), and what impacts them in childhood can stick with them permanently.

Like how my psychology professor put it: a baby's brain is like wet cement; if you slap your hand on it, it leaves an imprint, and the cement dries that way. The same rings true for small children.

I could go on, but I frankly have so many thoughts on that alone that I would end up completely derailing from the second half of your ask, and I don't want to be more critical than I already have. Especially since you just mentioned you have a soft spot for the trope.

[Okay, hold onto your hats because this is long. Naturally lmao.]

Gregor! Man, I'll admit I last watched the show back in middle school on a dodgy illegal website (it had surprisingly good audio and visual graphics, and full episodes. But really annoying porn ads.) but I only made it to like season 1 before my hyperfixation faded and I lost interest. So I never actually saw the Gregor episode.

But... it is relatively easy to find free websites that stream Danny Phantom :), so finding the episode took me like. Thirty seconds. Plus the Tv.Tropes recap page because my damn earbuds just died and im out in public as of rn.

I'm not sure if I'll write something for the gregor episode like I did with Dani, since Dani's a bit of a special case in that she's a clone and tends to be a reoccurring presence in DPDC, and I thought the new dynamic with Danyal would be interesting.

Plus, I'm not a big amethyst ocean shipper for the pure reason of I'm just not all that interested in it; its kinda bland to me. I'll admit I've entertained the thought in this au due to the whole balcony scene i wrote, but I would've entertained the thought anyways if it was Tucker in that position instead. Big multishipper, me.

But, if I had to make it official? Danyal is not interested romantically in Sam when the Gregor episode happens, regardless of his relationship with Valerie. Who, speaking of I'm trying to think about how that would go, and I'm torn between including him almost-dating Valerie or not.

Because on one hand it helps point out Sam's hypocrisy (and i love her but i am always happy to point out her flaws and address them in au) in this episode in terms of Danny spying on them, but on the other hand I'll want to include a lot of set up in order to make Gray Ghost work in this au and wow will that take a while.

Especially with the Flirting with Disaster episode because it happens due to Technus' meddling, and Danny is, well, the son of the Batman? A trained assassin? An ex-assassin nonetheless, but still an assassin? A prodigy child in this au? He might not have needed to use most of his skills in the last few years, but like... there's just a bunch of 'what if' and 'well technically...' and 'would he? he could, but would he?' things that is getting in the way of my thought process and making my head spin.

.

Mmm. Okay. Flirting with Disaster occurs relatively the same as canon with a few exceptions; like Danyal noticing the strange coincidences, and he might take the idea into proper consideration because Sam has a point it is strange, especially out of nowhere.

However,,, he really enjoys Valerie's company, and he does really like her. He's been adjusting to civilian life for the last four years and while he's made a lot of progress, he's still. an ex-assassin child living like a wolf amongst sheep. This is normal, typical teenager stuff, and usually his friends like to encourage him doing normal teenager stuff.

So he's stubbornly holding out on the thought that this is normal, that ghost stuff isn't interfering here. He's a little hurt that his friends are discouraging this, he's not bothered by the fact that Valerie is a ghost hunter and he a ghost -- his mother is an assassin, and his father is Batman, and they still had a relationship. (Granted, he's not gonna tell them that)

If anything, being diametrically opposed to each other but still being in love is part of the family! Granted, usually both parties are aware of said opposition to each other, but he'll make a special exception this time around.

(And man now that i'm thinking about gray ghost, im now thinking about various like. scenes i could write between the two of them. maybe in a reblog.)

Anyways uhhh things relatively go the same as canon. Yeah. I think Sam still has a crush on Danny and still spies out of jealousy with Tucker.

.

Now, the Gregor episode! With that out of the way; the TVTropes recap for this episode isn't the best because it doesn't go into detail about the entire episode like it does with Flirting With Disaster and Shades of Gray.

(which i looked at earlier because I made a section of this post talking briefly about what changes I'd make to the Shades of Gray episode to help set up Gray Ghost, but ended up deleting because it was kinda irrelevant for the matter at hand.)

So I'm taking in bits of the episode clips at a time, I'll try not to get too nitpicky about how each scene goes because then it's gonna take me a longer time to write this.

But! First thing's first; since Danny is not romantically interested in Sam, he is also not jealous of Gregor. He is however, a bit eyebrow-raisey at him in their first introduction, but that's because Gregor is coming off as obnoxious.

Danny thinks he's kinda annoying, and it doesn't take a genius to see that Gregor is trying to impress Sam. But since they've only known him for five minutes he takes the good faith assumption and assumes that Gregor is genuinely trying to show interest in Sam's interests too because he likes her, so he keeps mum. The fake hungarian accent is weird, but it's overall harmless, so he doesn't point it out.

He does do the spying thing when he starts suspecting that Gregor might be working for the GIW. The episode only has this happen twice, but for the au this happens a handful of more times over the course of the week, with Danyal's suspicion steadily rising more and more each time.

Hah, when he brings up wanting to spy on Sam and Gregor because of this reason, Tucker still does his "woah! you wanna spy on Sam?" thing.

Danny immediately turns to him, completely unimpressed, and crosses his arms. "Tucker," he says, deadpan, "you and Sam spied on me and Valerie."

He uses a combination of his ghost powers and his regular stealth ability to spy on them. He's hiding in a tree when they're skipping rocks, close enough that he can use his powers to hear them talk but far enough away that he has a good view of their surroundings.

He's invisible in the cinema, but doesn't accidentally get in front of the projector. He checks the inside of the room for the GIW, and then waits outside the actual room itself, keeping an eye on the area and occasionally flying in to watch the movie out of boredom. It reminds him of being back on a recon mission with the League, but it doesn't end with him orchestrating someone's death.

Then when they're at the mall he stays in human form, blending in with the crowd. He runs into the GIW there, but realizes that they're not there because of Gregor; they're just shopping. They didn't show up at either of the last two locations, and he follows them to make sure they're not also trying to blend in. But they're literally just there for shopping.

Danny is rather pleased with this turnout; so far Gregor isn't a spy, he's just annoying. The next day at lunch he asks Sam how her date with Gregor went, and that's how she figures out he spied on them, because well, she didn't tell him that.

"Have you been spying on me?"

Danny messes with his food a little bit, and Tucker is sinking into his seat with embarrassment. He frowns, "Only last night. Those incompetent government dodos--"

His lip curls up; he gets all 'Shakespeare-y' (as Sam and Tucker put it) when he's insulting someone, "--kept appearing whenever Gregor did. I followed you and him last night to make sure he wasn't a spy."

A roundabout way of saying, "I was worried".

Sam is, as canon, furious. Danny understands why, he knows generally speaking that people don't like being spied on. But he's confused on just how angry she is, and is a little irritated by it.

"Why would you do that!" She exclaims, "That's way out of line, Danny."

"How? You spied on me when I was going on dates with Valerie." He narrows his eyes, and points his fork at her, "I'm not blind, I noticed."

"That's different, we told you why we were suspicious. And we don't have ghost powers like you do."

"I don't need ghost powers to sneak around, Sam, you've seen this firsthand. And I just told you why I followed you, I thought he was working with the guys in white--"

"So you think someone can only be interested in me if they're after you?" (this is a paraphrased quote, folks ;D)

"No! If that was the case I would have voiced my concern the moment I thought it. I don't get why you're so angry, you spied too."

Iiits.... a mess. Sam storms off with Gregor, Tucker tags along because okay, yeah, maybe Gregor isn't with the GIW, or maybe last night was a fluke. Either way he ends up tagging along. Danny overhears that conversation between the GIW and Mr. Lancer, and maybe he's right, maybe he's wrong; but something is up.

I've gotten to that scene in the locker room where Gregor tells Danny that he knows he doesn't like him, and I've paused at Danny's reply to say this: Danyal doesn't even bother trying to deny it.

"I know you do not like me."

"You're right; I don't."

"Ah, let me finish. I know you do not like me because you want to protect your friend, Sam, and I respect that."

"...That's correct."

"Good! Because I am going to ask her out."

"I had a feeling you'd say that," he stands up, claps his hand tight on Gregor's shoulder, and leans close to him with a threatening smile, "so you understand me when i say; if you break my best friend's heart, you're as good as dead, right?"

"Ah,, yes. I am so glad we got that cleared out of the way, and now I hope after we can.. how you Americans put it, hang out?"

In the episode he hugs Danny and gives him a la bise (which is that french greeting where you kiss someone on the cheek two or more times) after they end their conversation. But here, when he goes to do that to Danyal, Danny leans away, points an accusatory finger at him, and says; "Absolutely not; we are not close."

The next scene after that is like, end of day. Sam, Tucker, and Gregor walking away. Sam looks over her shoulder to glare at Danny, then gets forlorn. Tucker looks back and just looks forlorn.

(When did I start narrating each scene?? Eh, I'm writing this in brief spurts of time throughout the day. Don't fix what's not broke)

After that there's this whole scene with the two GIW agents that have been chasing Phantom all episode. They're there because they have Tucker's PDA that Skulker took, and it's got the information of their purple backed gorilla assignment on it. They've been going around seeing who Tucker associates with in hopes of catching Phantom.

Uhh ahaha and that is where this gets a little interesting imo, and also allows me to mention that im retconning Danyal's (already) redesigned ghost form. Which I've wanted to retcon even before this moment bc it was just too busy. I'll get to that in a moment.

The GIW suspect Gregor for being the Phantom because of his white hair and green eyes, which is all fine and dandy until you remember: Danyal (and by extension Phantom) has that very noticeable, rather identifiable facial scar that goes across the middle of his fucking face. The GIW could easily suspect that Phantom hides his scar with makeup if he's in disguise, but if they meet a kid with a seemingly identical facial scar and similar disposition? Hoo boy.

Solution? I've got two: Gregor is canonically a kid from Michigan who faked everything to impress Sam. Considering he knows she's gothic and knows that she's ultra-recyclo vegetarian? He probably watched her from afar or got information on her somehow. His hair is dyed, his eyes might just naturally be green, but if he notices that she's got a crush on either Danyal or Phantom? A little sfx makeup could help him recreate a similar looking scar.

My second solution that's gonna happen anyways bc its that suit redesign; Danyal does hide his face as Phantom. Ghosts are emotional creatures and its a popular headcanon that their interests, ambitions, etc, influence the way they look as a ghost, not just their death. A big reoccurring theme of my au is that Danyal did not leave the League unscathed, and that being an assassin is an important part of his identity.

So i'm discarding the hazmat suit look entirely and leaning into the 'assassin' thing. But the general (stylized) feel is like, white ribbon/cloth vambraces that he has used as a garrote at some point, a hood, a gaiter scarf-type thing. I'm keeping the cape. I did a doodle a few days back that's not the official redesign, but a redesign for Phantom. I may reblog this post with that attached because it's got the general feel down. There's very little white involved, but the inside of his cape flares out and looks like the night sky.

Now, the hood and gaiter scarf gets rid of most of the problem, but Danny's hood doesn't stay on all the time, so the GIW have likely seen the upper half of the scar. :] Gregor's own drawn-on scar doesn't have to be 1:1, but it looks close enough, right? A small scar cutting through the edge of his brow and ends right below the corner of his eye. A 'cool, badass' one opposed to Danny's 'garish' scar.

But! Back to the episode scene. Canon Danny gets written off as being 'too prepubescent' to be Phantom, and honestly it'd be hilarious if Danyal was written off for the same reason (he's calling them idiots in his head if they do). But instead -- leaning into the GIW's incompetence here -- he gets written off as being too mature or too talkative. Or something equally as absurd.

Sam breaks up with Gregor for canon reasons, but when Gregor does his "i really like you, but, come on-!" and gestures to tucker, he adds on "and that scary friend of yours too, seriously!"

Things go relatively the same as canon after that. Danny does end up apologizing for spying, however. Sam does it first. Sorrows, prayers, all that.

.

Things usually end up changed or different when I actually write it down, so I'd likely add more or adjust different scenes according to the flow of the oneshot. This is just like, a general vibe of how things would go, and where some of the more obvious changes would be if I did write this oneshot.

Hope you enjoyed! Thanks for the ask :]

[noodlesarecheese]

Full disclosure I'm a couple episodes behind in WWW, so I'm not 100% on every thing that's being discoursed about, but I've seen enough that I just want to remind people/beg people to remember:

You are watching The Nuance Show, DMed by Mr. Philosophical Nuance and played by Notable Lovers of Nuance.

[salvidida]

Funny how people will be so weird about fma 03's Scar design, citing him being younger/'bishie' compared to the manga and Brotherhood versions as a negative against the first anime adaptation because, let's be real here, a lot of people see this design decision as "feminizing", making him weaker or more palatable at the expense of the role he's meant to play.

Meanwhile 03 Scar, unlike the manga and Broho counterparts, not only is more staunchly anti-military and consistently uses violence and strategies against the system throughout his entire arc, he straight up has a kill count so massive it would make manga + Broho Scars blush (and manga + Broho Elrics have a full existential crisis).

My man never once becomes an Amestrian reformist, never once celebrates the militia (he would have laughed Miles right out of the room if he tried to guilt him for not licking military boots for a scrap of acceptance; in canon he fully declares he has zero pity for soldiers PERIOD) and goes down killing well over 7000+ soldiers and state alchemists in his entire run.

Need I remind everyone that he draws a city-spanning alchemic rune, by himself, with a boulder and a chain to drag it? And lures in the Amestrian invaders by dropping Kimbly's freshly murdered carcass (his doing of course) that he carried with his teeth to the top of a building, while armless and bleeding out? Drawing them further in while dodging gunfire on foot. Iconic. Awe-inspiring. Pure 100% platinum-grade badass.

03 Scar never loses sleep about killing the pigs of a fascist nation, never cedes any ideological or material ground to them, and he could never be shamed out of actively fighting back. Unfortunately we can't say the same for the defanged mangahood Scars. Because despite their more overtly gruff and 'tough' character designs, they're so thoroughly cowed by a small mob of Amestrians who use basic shaming tactics to stop them dead in their tracks and join their side, never to kill another jackbooted hog.

03 Scar clears manga and Brotherhood Scars, easy

[punk-pandame]

when you post about all trans people's issues and not just your own so your askbox is like "why do you think men in dresses issues are more important than Born Wombyns™️ issues" followed immediately by "are you a transandrobro truther" and shortly thereafter by "nobody has ever been harassed for looking masc you're fucking lying" and then instantaneously by "i am going to correctively rape you" followed by "oh what so there's 3/4/5/6/infinite genders now?" and "let's dose you with T (against your will) and see how much you really want to be a man" and "forcefeeding you estrogen until you remember your place. bitch" and "kill yourself tranny/faggot/dyke/some combination thereof" forever and ever until you fucking die

[sukibenders]

Me, after seeing people say that the Bridgerton love stories were better in the books than the show following seeing all those chapter screenshots on Twitter:

[ssaalexblake]

dw is a mid kid's sci-fi tv show and it's quality level has been mostly entirely consistent (mid, basically, with the occasional very good episode to balance out with crimes against humanity it sometimes produces) the whole reboot, and anybody acting like the Only thing going into peoples opinions of the characters are writing preferences are either Deeply naive or are trying to hide something they know people will not take kindly to.

[angele-midnight]

Why are so many people on Tumblr/Twitter claiming Hazbin Hotel and Helluva Boss are bad shows??? "They're not mid shows guys they're just bad" can y'all give me one concrete reason they're bad besides debunked "controversies" or things that other people told you were bad about em?

Like I'm halfway convinced all of these people claiming these are such bad shows and are annoyed about em haven't actually watched them - "I don't need to watch a show to know it's bad" pretty sure you do if you want to have an informed opinion, that goes for everything actually.

If you're annoyed by the hype and the fan culture?? That's fine we all got our things but that doesn't make the shows themselves bad I think y'all just like having someone to poke fun of without feeling like a bully and honestly?? That seems like a miserable way to live.

[third-doctor]

I feel like I'm going insane. That episode read to me as a lot more tragic than other people are reading it. Yeah they were racist and rich and spoiled and awful but they were just kids. They were all just kids. Lindy was absolutely terrified throughout the whole thing and clinging desperately to what she knew, which was terrible. They could've had the chance to learn and become better but they chose to go die and it's infuriating and tragic because nobody deserves that. Nobody deserves to be eaten by slugs or die of exposure in the woods. Nobody deserves to suffer like that. But they chose it rather than let the Doctor help them because they'd rather stay in their rich white supremacist bubble and he just wants to help and there's nothing he can do.

Maybe it's because one of my core beliefs is that nobody deserves death and suffering. Nobody. Even the worst person on earth can learn from their mistakes and come back and change and everyone deserves that chance. There's no such thing as too late. But they're never going to get that chance because they actively rejected it and to me that's still very, very sad.

[pennamepersona]

WHAT DO YOU MEAN KAZUMA'S FUCKING DEAD????

[pineapplesaresweet]

Sometimes i think about all the wires that were apparently down Ranboos throat in genloss. Where do they lead to?

[heckling-hydrena]

have u guys seen the new paw borough cat creation demo because I've been having fun with all the new options + updated art. I love the venus prowler pose so much. the deviantart warrior cats oc reference stance <3

[wildflowercryptid]

kieran seems to unfortunately be joining my collection of faves that get treated real fuckin weird by parts of their fandoms for being ppl who exhibit their struggles with mental illness in less than appealing ways.

[seventh-district]

not even gonna tag this properly bc i don't wanna get Involved but i do have some Thoughts i need to get out into the void so here we go

(aaa quick edit: CW for mention/discussion of Boothill leaks)

[molinaesque]

Something I find funny is how some people hyper focus too much on the new Scrooge and how attractive he is... As if attractive people can't be bad and horrid, and how it's 100x easier to dunk on someone when they're ugly and grotesque (this change already adds a different spin/conversation to the massive pile of other adaptations that are essentially the same). Like if you watch the movie, it doesn't change the fact that Scrooge is STILL an outright asshole of a human being (like the dude threatens to call the cops on some old ladies and performers on top of everything else). You'd have to be absolutely dense or purposely obtuse to just gloss over all that (the movie from what I've been told goes even further in making Scrooge meaner in some aspects as well). I see people just throw around the word "woobify" when the movie doesn't pull any punches in making Scrooge an absolute piece of work (insulting poor children at the start of the movie) and also making him face and realise that a lot of his misery that's been done as result of his actions in the past, are STILL his own actions. Him being a silver fox doesn't change ANY of this. They never make a reference to his appearance other than Past noting how attractive his younger self was and her saying "what happened to you?" as a commentary on how ugly and horrid he's become AS A PERSON, which I find to be a great moment. This being just ONE adaptation that decided to take this approach amongst a countless myriad of more "accurate" adaptations (which is funny because its still practically the same beats, Scrooge is just designed attractively) isn't going to somehow erase all that and frankly isn't the end of the world.

Also I find it hilarious when people say they're woobifying scrooge... when isn't the whole point of his redemption story THAT?? That ultimately his character is woobified in the end in lieu of becoming a good guy?? But no... People just assume they're going to absolve him or somehow misplace him being the villain in the first place JUST BECAUSE HE'S ATTRACTIVE LMAO. Like WOAH how could we possibly forget that the main character of a super famous story that has a surname used as a reference point for being a miserable human being? WOAH, he's handsome?? OH NEVER MIND, MY BAD. I CANT FUNCTION ANYMORE OH NOOOOOO!! HELP ME! I'VE FALLEN AND I CAN'T GET UP FROM HOW HANDSOME HE IS OH NOOOO!! Might as well just say "I want bad man to be ugly and stinky looking so I can keep track of how I should feel about said character throughout the narrative because I'm so focused on tying morality with physical attractiveness".

[risingsunresistance]

twitter is entering their "rts > likes" phase now that likes are private after they spent years calling us ungrateful for being demotivated by ratios lmao