#LIKE WHICH IS IT MAN THE TRAUMA IS GIVING YOU BRAIN DAMAGE

[fellhellion]

It’s time for your hourly tunes thoughts on miguel but like. So interesting to me that there’s an element of self-centredness to his empathy regarding people and situations that hit too close to his guilt and anger at himself.

It’s not as if he’s utterly emotionally distanced from the average person simply by fact of the multiverse; he cries out when the renaissance Vulture strikes the helicopter and sounds genuinely distressed.

But I think the reason he at first denies Jess recruiting Gwen is strictly because of her relation to Miles, since there’s other Spiders around the same age in the society. But I also think the reason he finally relents is because she reminds him of himself when she says in that small unsure voice that she has no idea how to fix this. That’s what his weary response about joining the club says to me at least. And he sends her home because she voices a doubt I think he has himself.

His “Do you want to find out?” response to Gwen’s question of if he’s certain Miles will cause harm by changing canon doesn’t exactly ring of certain knowledge to me, only fear and anger at the possibility of it all happening again.

Regarding Miles as well, I think both the anger and eventual empathy regarding Miles losing his father are both tainted by Miguel seeing himself in each aspect. He’s utterly unable to evaluate Miles’s actions separately his own trauma.

[coffee-in-rain]

Vulnerable Hannibal Fic Rec List

New addition (located @ the bottom of the page) as of 9/24/2024!

On my previous post, people were interested in finding fics where Hannibal is touch-starved and or dealing with separation anxiety post-fall. So here is a small list of some that may fit that theme! The first five fics are mine, but the rest are some of my favorite fics I’ve ever read that feature vulnerable Hannibal in various seasons, AUs, and post-canon. This list will be updated intermittently!

The Ache Against The Wind (Rewritten): He’d sustained a substantial amount of brain damage throughout the last eleven days, Will had been told. Resulting in Post-Traumatic Amnesia. (Hannibal is tortured in the BSHCI via beatings, laxatives, enemas, starvation and the “water curing” method after his toilet is removed. Will saves him).

Pareidolia: Six weeks post-fall, Hannibal suffers from a seizure during dinner.

Je Te Laisserai Des Mots: Six months have passed since Will pulled them over the cliff. Even in light of their progressing relationship, much of Hannibal still remains a mystery to Will. For reasons unknown, he’s begun to pull away. (A sequel to Shrike; my housewife Hannibal fic!)

Between The Hour Of Reprieve:

At the cliff house, Hannibal receives a much-needed-hug. (features crying, touch-starved Hannibal).

Shrike (To Your Sharp And Glorious Thorn): Hannibal feels anxious about the prospect of Will abandoning him one day because he isn’t at all capable of being like Molly. His anxiety only heightens when Will gets a job. (features crying housewife Hannibal speaking Lithuanian).

A Cabin In The Woods by KoolJack1: Hannibal is thirteen and runs away from the orphanage when he feels that a fate of the elements will be better than the fate of abuse. He finds a small cabin in the woods, thinking warmth will be all he finds. He also finds Will. But who changes who?

Recipricol Alchemy by Scifibabe: In the silent echoes of his dreams, Will Graham treads a line blurred between control and chaos, each step drawing him inexorably towards claiming Hannibal as his own. It's a perilous dance on the edge of darkness, where the thrill of possession whispers of a transformation too profound to resist.

Hold Me, Don’t Let Me Go by sourweather: It's a few months after the Fall when it finally hits him. Hannibal has barely been touched in 3 years. And Will won't let it go on for another moment.

Hosanna In The Highest by sainthannibal: During the fall, Hannibal receives the brunt of the injuries, which leaves him unable to care for himself. Will discovers how much he enjoys taking care of him.

You Made Me Soup by itsybitsylemonsqueezy: Hannibal comes down with pneumonia while incarcerated. Will decides to make him some soup. Absolutely no one thinks it's strange that Will comes to give his ex soup when he finds out he's sick. No one at all finds this suspicious. At. All.

The Boy Under The Monster’s Bed by Wr4tttttthh: There were deep wounds that needed healing, new and old, physical and otherwise. (features crying, vulnerable Hannibal).

Delicate Ghost by hannigramcracker & TimmyJayBird: She was different- not the ghost of his memories, but something about this bloodied child ripped right at Hannibal's chest, and left him drowning in a cold snow he thought he had left in his childhood, that he had locked away within his skull. Drowning, with only one hand to grasp at, one body to cling to. One man to work him through the trauma and remind him what life was.

You With Those Nails, Me With This Cross by TheBitterKitten:

Will goes too far.

The Distance Is Quite Simply Much Too Far For Me To Row by softhan: Hannibal is having a rough time recovering from his injuries post-fall, and retreats into himself to avoid confrontation with Will while he's still weak and ill. Having to play happy husbands hardly helps.

Silk and Lace by jonnimir: Bedelia leaves Hannibal and Will a gift at the house on the cliff.

[lovingapparition]

i’ve got a river running right into you.

Pairing: Simon 'Ghost' Riley x Reader

Genre: Hurt/Comfort, Slow Burn

Warnings for descriptions of medical gore.

Ghost gets hurt. Ghost is touch starved. You just want to help. It’s awkward. 

NOT COMPLETE / NO BETA

It's loud in the medical bay. The lights overhead buzz, adding their hum to the sound of clinking medical instruments, shouted calls for supplies, and the pained sounds of the injured. No set of hands are still as the wounded are wheeled in on gurneys or dragged in by their fellow soldiers. There's too much iron in the air to really adhere to the stricter medical protocols, and it's a scramble for everyone to assess and treat the damage in front of them. Each doctor's movements are efficient and practiced; stitching a wound just as a soldier would clean a gun. 

Just another day on the job.

You were hustling from one sectioned off bed to another, caught in the flow of all the action in the medical bay. The thin curtains between beds did nothing to muffle the chaos of the situation. Too many bodies were moving in and out of the area, it was almost dizzying. Your section of the unit had been chaotic for the better part of three hours, leaving you no time to stop and breathe. It seems things had gone south on the recent mission. The details of which were lost on you, but they didn’t matter now.

Stepping behind a curtain, you immediately get to work assessing the situation the soldier on the bed has found herself in, and you set about putting her back together. She's only caught minor fragments of shrapnel in her upper arms and chest. Nothing deep and nothing dangerous. It doesn't take you long to patch her up, thankfully. As you work, your brain vaguely registers that your medical team must be shifting focus to the less severely injured of the bunch.

You and the soldier both breathe a shared sigh of relief as you finish up her sutures. She only needs a few, and you tell her to return in about a week to check in before they can be removed. As you fill out her paperwork with a quick hand, you notice that the sounds of the room have hushed. You must be reaching the end of the torrent of injured soldiers.

Though small, your team was incredibly efficient; working like a machine during frenzied moments like these. Every second counted, nothing could go to waste.

You briskly step into another curtained area to see a broad, masked man on the gurney. The poor bed looked like it might strain under the weight of his bulky frame and plethora of equipment. For a moment, you can't even tell what's wrong with him. Stepping closer, the scent of fresh blood hits you just as you notice the dark wetness blooming on the upper right thigh of his gray fatigues. It looks like he’s used his own belt as a tourniquet. Your eyebrows scrunch down as you move to his side, your gloved hands automatically moving to his mask.

"Are you awake? Hey-" you're interrupted with a stiff, gloved hand gripping tightly at your wrist. Looking through the skull mask's eye sockets, you can see the whites of his half-lidded eyes starkly against his eyeblack. He's staring evenly back at you.

"I'm awake," he rumbles, low in his chest as if through water, "leave the mask." The directive is clear, even through the murk of his discomfort. You're not sure who this guy is, but from his tone he clearly expects to be obeyed. You knew there was a special operations unit active out of the base, and you can only guess that he's a part of it. Those types tended to be.. odd. This guy fit the bill.

The exchange doesn't last long though, and you immediately move down to visually assess the rest of his body as you open a new emergency medical kit. "Can you feel anywhere other than your legs that you've been injured? Have you hit your head at all?" you ask, running through regular questions since he seems to be lucid enough to give clear answers. He watches you intently, blinking slowly and almost lazily when you look at him, trauma shears in hand.

He simply shakes his head, grunting what sounds like a negative response. Great, how very helpful. You sigh as you work the shears beneath his pant leg. Without even looking up at him you slide the shears up, cutting half of his pants away to reveal the mess of both fresh and congealing blood on his thigh. Without a second thought, you cut through his briefs, pushing them aside just enough to allow him privacy as you get a better view of his injuries. The belt stays for now, it’s probably the only thing keeping him from passing out. 

It's not great. He definitely needed to be seen sooner, and you're worried about exactly how much blood he's lost. Some of these wounds are deep and still bleeding. Small bits of metal are visible through the clots. You can see bruising already beginning to form on the skin around the lacerations. The hot iron scent of his blood floods your nose, thick in the air between you.

"I need help in here- I've got shrapnel, heavy blood loss and I need extra hands!" you shout to your team without looking up, busy flushing his wounds with saline to clear any loose debris. Your hands are practiced and steady, one hand deftly wiping the blood and saline as you work. The man shifts, a strained breath escaping him. You spare him a sympathetic glance, knowing this part made many uncomfortable. Why had no one tended to him? He should've been among the first.

Evidently, so is the man in the bed. 

Before you can ask, your colleague steps in and immediately gloves up before getting to work with you. Together, you clean and stitch the man's wounds. He remains almost totally silent for all of it, save for the soft grunts as he's sewn back together. Even with the local anesthetic, it's still a bit uncomfortable. Throughout it all, he peers at you, his pale eyes flitting between your hands and your face as you work. At one point his gloved hands twitch at his side like he wants to move them. He doesn’t.

Your colleague quickly removes the man’s vest, knowing just as you do that there could be more injuries beneath it. The vest goes in a chair by the bed for later. The black shirt shirt he's wearing beneath it isn't torn or bloody, but you’re aware of your colleague’s intention to begin feeling for broken ribs as you get his IV drip ready. 

His hands catch your colleague’s wrists with a quickness you wouldn’t have thought possible given the amount of blood he’s already lost. “That’s enough,” he hisses. Your head snaps up, and you can only see the tight narrowing of his eyes through the mask. Before you can react, your colleague jerks from his grip. 

"I need to get these pants the rest of the way off, and then we're done. I'll get you cleaned up and finished for the night," you explain, falling back into your doctor mindset and practiced speech to ease the tension. He makes no response to this, so you take his silence as the go ahead. It's not like his pants were salvageable anyway.

"Are you gonna be okay in here? I have to go check on someone," your colleague asks, clearly annoyed. It wasn’t anything new to have a rude patient, but everyone’s nerves were fried after the hectic shift. You couldn’t blame them at all.

You wave them off, tired. “Don’t worry about it. I’ve got him. Shouldn’t be much longer anyway.” They head off, and you turn back to the man, sighing. He’s clearly had a rough night, maybe he could use the benefit of the doubt. You were certain that you’d be a bit pissy after catching some shrapnel. 

"Do you think you can get into a clean bed without ripping those stitches?" you ask tiredly as you remove your gloves. Without looking up, you move to unlace his boot. You swear you can feel him watching your fingers loosen the laces, watching your hand wrap around his ankle as you pull the boot off. His stare holds a weight in it you've never experienced before. When you look up at him, he's ready looking away.

You offer him a fresh towel for privacy as you cut his pants and briefs the rest of the way off and gingerly slide them from beneath him. They go straight in the red trash bin specifically for biohazard waste. You gingerly clean his thigh one last time and apply a thin layer of ointment to his sutures to encourage healing before you wrap his thigh in gauze. He helpfully spreads his legs enough to allow you to securely tape the gauze in place. His skin is warm, even through your gloves.

You blink once, twice, forcing the thought away as you finish up. 

"I can." is all you get out of him. You sigh, it's been a long day. His boots join his vest in the chair, and you roll a clean cot into his room. This one has a thin cotton sheet and a blanket on it. You could almost swear his head is cocked, ever so slightly, with a question, and you answer it without thinking. "You're sleeping here tonight. You've lost a lot of blood and you'll need IV fluids to recover. It's not much, but it's better than that gurney."

He huffs, you can only guess he’s annoyed, but he looks the bed over. The cushioned pad was minimal at best. He would definitely feel it in the morning in addition to whatever pain arose from his stitches. “Look, I’m going to override whatever authority you think you have here. It’s safest for us to be able to watch you, just for tonight.” It’s your turn to leave him without room to argue.

For a long moment, he looks at you indignantly, like he’s not covering himself with a thin towel and your sutures aren't in his thigh. Then the tension slowly eases out of his shoulders, and he nods once.

You don't look away as he slides his legs around to the edge of the gurney, one massive hand still covering himself with the towel for decency. It's nothing you haven't seen before, and you're more concerned with whether or not he's okay to stand without support. You step closer, clearing your throat to cut the silence.

You roll an IV pole to the side of his cot and hand the fluids you’d prepared earlier on it. “Okay, last thing and then I’ll fuck off for the night, I swear,” you tell him dryly. He huffs, a short sound that’s close to a laugh, you think. 

"I'm here, if you need a hand," you tell him, more confidently than you feel. Seeing him standing now you realize he's nearly a full head taller and twice as broad as you. Your hand finds his elbow, and to your surprise he doesn't tell you to back off as you help him ease into the bed.

A low, cut off groan escapes him as he sits tentatively on the edge of the bed. When he eases back to lay down, his shirt rides up just enough to hint at the bloom of a purple bruise draped over his side. His eyes are pinched shut as he slowly settles into bed.

He doesn’t get the chance to try to help himself get comfortable. “Here, just let me. I’ve got it.” You tell him quietly, batting his hands away from the sheets. You gingerly help him maneuver his legs into a comfortable position and tuck the blankets loosely around him. Another stolen glance at him tells you he’s still got that dreamy half lidded look. It’s enough for you to not exactly trust him with getting settled in bed on his own.

“I’m going to give you an IV to replace the fluids you lost and some light pain medication. Then we’re all done,” You tell him as you add more of those shitty military issue pillows to the bed. It’s the least you can do to make him comfortable. The local anesthetic won’t last him the entire night, and you’re certain the rest of his body must be sore from the aftermath of the mission. 

Placing his IV goes without fuss. He's slumped back against the pillows, breathing evenly as you fill out his paperwork for his overnight check in. You'd managed to fill out most of it, but you still didn't know his name or what unit he belonged to. "Hey, what's your name and unit? I need to fill this sheet out for my records,” you ask, not even looking up.

"Ghost. One four one," each rumbling word has you bristling, your face paling. Oh hell. 

"..Thank you sir." Your throat feels like it’s closing up. You don’t even bother asking for his actual name. You’d heard about a Ghost on the base, but you’d never seen him; never thought you would. It was all just rumors, something to shoot the shit about over dinner in the cafeteria. 

You wanted to sink into the floor. How could you have missed the literal skull mask? The hectic rush of the day coupled with your exhaustion must have completely cleared your brain out of any irrelevant gossip, and now it was biting you in the ass. For the last half hour you’d been practically ogling him and talking to him like he was any other soldier on the base. 

The rest of the shift moves by in a blur, it’s mostly paperwork and cleanup since everyone has been seen too. You luckily are not chosen to pass food out, so you’re saved the further embarrassment of having to interact with Ghost even more. With any luck tomorrow morning would be the last you two ever speak, and he could go back to being invisible to you, and you’d be saved from dying of embarrassment.

A low chuckle rolls from his chest, and your head sharply snaps up. You fight the urge to apologize and dig your hole deeper. You can feel your cheeks flush with embarrassment as you realize he’s laughing at you. You had heard rumors about his particularly efficient methods of combat and data extraction from captured enemies; some of the things you’d heard made your spine chill.

You can only smile nervously back at him and tiredly drag your hand over your eyes. You can only cling to the last vestiges of professionalism that you have left. “You’re all set here. Once things calm down someone will be by with some food for you, if you feel like eating,” you tell him, your mouth dry. He hums softly in response, and you figure the pain medication has started to take effect. “I’ll be back in the morning to check in, have a good night, sir.” 

[ar3s-r4t-qu33n]

Idfc if he's real or not, he's still worse written than Eddie. Also the problem is in his fans that are making him no guilty, innocent baby and always refering that Coyle/Eddie/Everybody else im outlast are the same. And if you think it'll work, try to compare Walker (with PTSD after war) with Franco (who is just a sicko). Anyway Barbi's simps are way more agressive than any other fans when you say something bad, what's a fact, about a grown ass man. I feel like those people are just little kids who are getting upset after school and shouldn't play the game ;) When I see all those comments with "He'S mY PoOkIE" I'm getting sick... Ya'll should get a brain

Guys look!! I got one!!

You don't deserve a response, because if you were old enough to be playing Outlast, you would be able to figure out that shaming people for (checks notes) liking a fictional character in a horror series? Is plain stupid.

It would also serve you well to maybe do some spell check before you come into my asks like this. I'd take you more seriously if you maybe drafted this one more time, but here we go:

First of all, you don't know me. You can check out my like, five posts and see that only two of em are Franco related and none of them baby him. In fact, I don't think I've seen a post yet by anyone who says "Franco is a sweet, innocent baby who did no wrong" because... That's the point. He's interesting BECAUSE he's done shit wrong. We are playing Outlast. Everyone is complex and awful and interesting. Just because not every post is marked with a little footnote that says "oh by the way everyone, Franco is a bad, bad man 🥺 I don't support his actions, I'm not a Franco defender, I just wanted to draw him being silly 🥺" doesn't mean we're all out here claiming he's a saint. The fact that he's a fucked up lil guy is why we like him. I feel like that's a given with all Outlast characters? But that's just me after being a fan of this franchise for years now, idk, being able to step back and analyse a community to see what they enjoy about something is quite a fun and easy task, I recommend giving it a try instead of coming into "loser nobody who has been on Tumblr for like a week's" asks to complain to me like I can put all the Franco fans in the corner until they learn to interpret characters the way you have decided is objectively correct.

But even if they are "babying" him and apparently ignoring that this is the Outlast series and Franco is a character from Outlast... Oh no! What horror! Someone is misinterpreting a VIDEO GAME CHARACTER what a terrible and unique crime!

Franco "just a sicko" Barbi was abused and neglected by his father, his mother was murdered, and he only ever received affection after he killed someone. But yeah, he was just born fucked up whereas every other Outlast character earned their trauma and the right to kill the player. What a senseless and just untrue take and I'm sure you know that, you just want to complain because that's all you people like to do. You want to feel morally superior over someone because you don't understand why they feel the way they do instead of just moving on and ignoring them like any other sensible adult would. Because who's actually getting hurt if some people think Franco is their lil Pookie? Is it you? Does it cause you psychic damage? Because last I checked, this is the internet. We are responsible for ourselves, so unless somebody is actually hurting anyone...

Block the Franco tag. You are brave enough to type out this whole message to a stranger online and act morally superior because comparing which video game character deserves the right to kill you is THE most mature thing in the world, so you're definitely brave enough to block the tag and move on.

You are responsible for what you see online, but ESPECIALLY on Tumblr, it is so so easy to hide content you don't want to see, and mind your own business. Quite frankly, I don't care if I come across as aggressive here. You came into my asks about a tag/fandom you clearly aren't in trying to act like you're better than the rest of us. That's pretty damn aggressive, wouldn't you say?

This is Outlast. A game about fucked up guys doing fucked up shit, and we love them for it. If that is too much for you, if the mommy issues gangster is too crazy for you but Eddie and Trager and Knoth and Coyle are completely fine, no questions asked? I don't think this series is for you. Sexual horror is a staple of Outlast. Childhood trauma is a staple of Outlast. You can't be shocked when people respond to a new character in a video game they like.

YOU are not better than me because you like Chris Walker and I like Franco Barbi. I can't believe you need to be told this, we are all in the same uncomfortable freakshow cesspit that is The Outlast Fandom, no one is morally good. No one is better than anyone else. You cannot claim moral superiority over any character because at the end of the day, I can point to Wernicke and say with my full chest that he is objectively the worst because he's a literal nazi, and what then? Are you going to tell me that Franco is worse than a nazi? The debate is over, in the list of "who is the worst of these awful people", Wernicke wins hands DOWN. The point is null because EVERYONE SUCKS HERE!!! THAT'S THE POINT!!!!

Is that enough for you? Or are you gonna keep harassing people through your alts or getting your friends to do it? I can go alllllll day, baby, you ain't making me feel bad about my interests in the O U T L A S T fandom, dear GOD, this is ridiculous. Don't fucking condescend me, telling me to "get a brain" you don't KNOW ME, I am a stranger to you, why do you feel comfortable coming onto my blog harassing me about a video game character? That's not a good look for you and now it is immortalised here. Anonymous or not, you still did this. Whoever you are, you typed that out and sent it to a random person you do not know and felt comfortable enough to do so.

That's weird.

[gelpensoncomics]

Guy Gardner: A Study of Heroes and Head Trauma

SO! It's July, which is disability pride month here in the United States where I live! I figured it would be appropriate to kick things off by talking about a character who has a mixed reputation, to say the least: Guy Gardner, Green Lantern. He's been around since the Silver Age of comics, and his characterization has been through some serious ups and downs over the years! But what if I told you that it's not inconsistent writing? What if I told you there is a lens with which to view his shifting behavioral patterns and at times abrasive and offensive personality that makes it all come into focus and make perfect sense, and it's all already there on the page? I'm here to give you that lens, and it's viewing Guy Gardner as a man who has suffered multiple traumatic brain injuries and managed to heal over time. Buckle up, this is probably going to be a long one, and it's pretty image heavy as I try to back up as much as I am claiming that I can.

So the first thing I will start with is establishing Guy's former baseline. This is not the post where I will go incredibly in-depth on Guy's full family history and his education, I'll save that for another time. Here, I simply aim to sum up. Guy Gardner met Hal Jordan for the first time in the 1991 title Green Lantern: Emerald Dawn, a volume that served as an updated backstory for the Silver Age hero after Crisis on Infinite Earths. Hal was in prison to serve a 90 day sentence for drunk driving. Guy Gardner was Hal Jordan's caseworker.

"What? Huh? That's Guy Gardner?" You, the hypothetical reader ask. What happened to him?!

A lot. A lot happened to him, and it took him from a man who gave the advice to "Use your rage! Don't let it use you!" to a man who is known as the rude angry ginger lantern. First off, he got hit by a bus. No, I'm not being metaphorical or making a joke. See, he quit his job as a prison case worker because he didn't like how the job made him feel, especially after he was caught up in a prison riot and threatened with death at the hands of a prisoner there. So he put his second degree to use and he became a teacher. Specifically, he became a physical education teacher for disabled children.And then there was an earthquake, and he was hit by a bus while attempting to rescue one of the students on a field trip he was running, nearly dying in the process.

Now, I will say: he got better. This time. See, no sooner had he recovered from this incident, as he was filling in for Hal as Green Lantern he was exploded in the line of duty and sent to a parallel dimension. In that parallel dimension he was tortured, and Sinestro used a dangerous and severe form of mind control that, when it was finally broken, left Guy... well, the comics call him comatose, but he is conscious, he is just not responsive to the environment around him or able to care for himself.

For years, he remained in this state, with his care at a top-notch hospital paid for by fellow superheros. And then, during the Crisis on Infinite Earths event, a miracle happened. Guy regained consciousness.

But the Guy who came out of that vegetative state wasn't the same man who fell into it. Or at least, not exactly. He was angrier. His fuse was shorter. Perhaps most upsetting of all, one of the first actions he took upon regaining consciousness was attempted grave robbery.

"Gelpens, what the fuck," you ask me. I know. It's a lot. Bear with me here. See, he didn't wake up on his own. The Guardians of Oa woke him up, using their tremendous cosmic powers to attempt to heal his brain damage so they could deploy him to help during the Crisis.

Sure, Guy got his strength back. He was able to function as a Green Lantern. But he still wasn't the same as he was before his coma. He stayed angry, and confrontational, and was frequently known to make inappropriate comments that failed to fit the setting he was in or the bounds of good taste. He had a constant chip on his shoulder, very different from the man who was concerned about controlling his anger so it couldn't use him.

This all came to a head in a series of events that is frankly infamous in comics circles. Almost every fan I know of who knows Guy Gardner knows about the time Batman got fed up with his confrontational rude attitude and laid him out with a single punch to the face.

The thing people don't remember about that punch is that, seeing as it was the 90s, and comics writers had learned a few things about the brain, they decided to use it to make... let's call it a running joke. See, after Guy regained consciousness, he was much more like the guy he was before all that head trauma. He was polite, cared about being a team player and not trying to prove himself, he didn't go for lethal force!

Of course, this didn't last. No, the whole 'joke' here was that Batman punched him hard enough to rattle his brain, and he would occasionally jump from being a sweet, friendly team player to, in the words of the narration box the first time he got hit on the head again, his new old "thoroughly rotten" self (I know). Slowly but surely though, Guy did get better, and start to stay better. His mood stabilized, he gained more self-control, he started making better plans and he was much less angry as a default. And it's kept going! This train keeps chugging along! He isn't so angry anymore! He has it under control!

And honestly? This moment, right here? This is the crowning jewel in my thesis, I think.

Guy has a Red Lantern ring and a Star Sapphire ring. For those of you less familiar with the extended Green Lantern lore, the Red Lanterns run off rage. The Star Sapphires are powered by love. Outside of willpower, the emotions that are the most powerful within him are his rage and anger, and his love for his friends. And what does he fuel them with, when it comes down to the wire? When willpower alone isn't enough? The thing he hates most is being filled with rage. The thing he loves the most is his friends.

So. I don't think Guy was ever just an angry, sexist, rude asshole at his core. Is he the same as he was before the injury, before all that happened to him? Of course not. Nobody goes through life completely unchanged by what happens to them.

I think he injured his brain and lost his ability to regulate his emotions and impulses for a while. The road to recovery was far from smooth. It just took him some time to heal and be in a place to act like the man he wanted to be all along. But in my opinion? I think he's there now.

[iliveforyouilongforyouvesuvia]

Is it ever explained in the game why the Mc doesn't have their memories post-resurrection?

Like they get the Fool’s body and the fool is like new beginnings and stuff ( I ASSMUE, Tell me if I'm wrong) , but is an actual explanation in the game? Like did they also have to give something up even though the didn't make the deal? Is it because they don't have their original body?

Spoil it for me idc I just wanna know

The Arcana Brainrot Essays: MC's Memories

Hi anon friend! I hope you don't mind the ramble that's about to proceed -

Not only is the magic system of the Arcana pretty vague, when it comes to MC inhabiting the Fool's body, we have six different canon routes and twelve different canon endings, all with different implications.

With MC not being present for the ritual that gets their body back, it's fairly safe to assume that MC is not bound by any deals at the time of the prologue (though there is plenty of space to argue otherwise, given how vague the details are). Many of the routes include other characters reckoning with the deals they made at the time, but MC's reckoning has more to do with the truth than anything else. The best explanation, and to my knowledge, the canon explanation we get across routes for MC's missing memories is "because of the resurrection." That's it.

Here's where I jump from canon stuff to the implications I picked up through the different routes, focusing on the how aspect:

Similar to what other creators have pointed out in the past, MC's amnesia bears a lot of similarities to amnesia caused by traumatic brain injuries or (in my opinion) trauma in general. Based off of the occasions where MC is able to recover their own memory of dying, it seems like in at least some routes, the memories are still in there. They're just suppressed by a mysterious something. Given how the memory loss is associated with strong headaches, how said headaches are triggered by attempts to remember or vivid references to the past, and how attempting to forcibly remember something has led to further damage in the past, MC does seem to be in the middle of a nonlinear healing journey. As several of the routes progress, we can even see MC being able to succeed at mental tasks with lower levels of difficulty when previously it would have resulted in a debilitating headache.

My personal conclusion from all of that is that MC's amnesia is the result of the sheer trauma of dying and then coming back. It's a mind boggling experience simply to process the facts of what happened - let alone the physical and emotional experience. The story picks up with MC having physically recovered enough to live independently, and continues with MC's mental and emotional growth into fully growing into themself (in the upright endings). In some routes, they're able to recall a memory of their own as the story progresses, in other routes, any knowledge MC receives of the past is from other perspectives. Which leads to one of the biggest questions: can MC get them all back?

Some of our best clues outside of MC's personal narrative are the two other characters involved with returning missing memories: Muriel and Julian. (Asra, we know, forgot the details of the ritual itself, but otherwise has all memories intact. Nadia's missing all memories since entering Vesuvia for the first time, but it's never clear how much she gets back.) Julian recovers his memories when he reverses his deal with the Hanged Man, choosing to live as a normal person again with MC so that he can piece together the answer to the Plague. In his case, all the memories come back at once, fully intact.

Muriel's situation is different. He doesn't have any memories missing, he just has the capacity to take away the memories of the people around him. At first, the method for returning those memories is a sensory trigger (myrrh), but as time goes on and the deal loses its effect, the memories seem to slowly return to the people around him. It's different from Julian suddenly having access to the full breadth of his memories again, but the overall effect is the same: the lack of memory is resolved to the point that "normal" functioning can resume.

So, what does that say about MC's case? In short - anything. It really is up to how you imagine your MC, their past, the specific dynamic they have with their specific LI, how their future progresses post canon, etc. There's canon examples of characters regaining their memories gradually over time, getting them all back at once as the result of a deal, or simply learning to move forward and embrace the chance to start anew. And these are just examples of the default apprentice - there are plenty of MCs with gorgeously fleshed out backgrounds whose stories are their own twist on canon, where none of this really applies!

In short, how MC interacts with their missing memories is largely dependent on who your MC is. As to why they're missing - it's written as being because of MC dying and coming back. Whether that's due to the nature of it being trauma/a traumatic brain injury, or whatever other reason you can think of, is up to you ^.^

Cheers friend!

brainrot

[mrblazeflappybird]

I have noone to talk to about this new Helluva Boss episode so you're getting subjected to my ranting

(I'm going to be talking about the end scene with Blitz and Stolas - loved the whole episode though, not my fave but definitely not my least favourite by any means)

STOLAS. MY GOD. YOU SHOULD NOT BE RELATABLE AND BECAUSE OF YOU I SHALL BE GETTING PROFESSIONAL HELP ASAP.

I completely and utterly believe that both Stolas and Blitz need to get a reality check. But whilst I am certain Blitz will in the series (probably multiple times over) I'm worried Stolas won't. The most he might probably get is him getting told by Octavia that "You don't love me, you love him".

Stolas. Needs. A. Reality. Check.

I get that (as a character) his response to everything is trauma based just like Blitz. But the way he's acting is kinda like... you aren't perfect. You are messing this up just as much as Blitz is, possibly more so.

The way he and I are similar is the fact that we both do things so heavily based through our immediate feelings that we just don't take time to think about stuff, especially not in the moment. To the point that we are blind to the damage it causes.

The relationship started as a purely "no feelings" deal. Regardless of them both catching them, that was THE RULE that they both followed most the time. Obviously until they didn't. And whilst its painful and the reasons Blitz didn't do anything is because of self hatred and therapy-needing reasons most likely, he still kept to that rule.

Stolas immediately was like "Nah, I'm changing everything right now."

Yes, yes, please, if you aren't happy and know ultimately this relationship is hurting more than bringing happiness, end it. But he can't just expect Blitz to immediately understand what's going on and what to say. Its such a huge backhand that's so unexpected by Blitz that ofc he's gonna be confused and think its something its not.

But like.... Stolas just didn't listen to Blitz, didn't really let him make sense of everything, and when Blitz jumped to the (unfortunately) logical conclusion in his brain - which is both trauma AND because of this relationship's nature - Stolas was just done.

And like... I get it?? Because that's me. Bruh. Will be and have been changing my behaviour in the future. I'm aware of my flaws and thank you to my wonderful girlfriend for giving me my reality check. Very glad that I managed to listen to her... UNLIKE A SPECIFIC DEMON.

I understand that the yelling and the slamming doors down the corridor complaining about how shitty you are reminds you of your abusive ex wife, and honestly whilst you should have listened to him in an ideal world, getting yourself out of a situation you can't handle is understandable and valid. BUT - and this is important - YOU NEED TO LET HIM HAVE SOME TIME TO PROCESS. AND LET HIM TALK.

Blitz was justified in yelling in my opinion. Stolas was also justified in teleporting him away because he yelled in my opinion too. But they both need serious reality checks.

I just don't think Stolas is ever thought to be in the wrong with any of this. He should have listened and not be so impulsive with his actions. He never really thought of the reality behind it (seemingly) and was so certain that because *his* emotions and feelings change and adapt quickly along with his, like, reality and wants and needs(???), it doesn't mean Blitz's will too.

Anyway sorry for the rant lmaooooo. Was not expecting Fizz in that episode I love that little robot imp man favourite character yayyy

[natureboy96]

My journey through the Court of Thorns and Roses series

It’s been roughly a month since I started reading the ACOTAR series, and let me tell you, it’s been one mad ride. I’ve had a lot of thoughts on the books, and I needed to put them down somewhere to hopefully stop them from rattling around in my brain for much longer (success tbd). While I am writing this more for myself than anyone else, I wondered if anyone else went through a similar journey that I have, and perhaps help understand why people view the series as they do. I’ll be going book by book to break things down.

(Also might be worth mentioning that I am a gay man in my thirties, which definitely impacted how I read certain parts of the books..)

ACOTAR

Having come into the series with absolutely no hints as to what it was about (besides the back blurb), I actually found this first book… kinda boring? I was surprised, I suppose, to see it was a Beauty and the Beast retelling, but that actually made me look forward more to where things actually deviated from the script (I texted my sister it was around chapter 30 that I felt things really getting interesting).

That’s not to say I didn’t enjoy parts of it - the more intimate moments between Tamlin and Feyre were what I liked most, like them dancing together after he played, or him appreciating that painting that made him not feel alone, moments like those. A bit stilted writing, perhaps, but fine.

When we went Under the Mountain, though, that’s when my interest picked up. I felt the fear that Tamlin and Feyre felt, knowing one wrong move could be their last. I felt terribly icky at the things Feyre was manipulated to do; maybe I can see how people might think her dancing black out drunk in a napkin could be a sexy fantasy, but it definitely didn’t do it for me, nor the bone twisting. The trials themselves felt… underwhelming (the worm was some exciting action that our Feyre’s skills to use at least, but the second one was kinda meh), but I was interested in seeing a story where the main character actually experiences some lasting impact of trauma, something I feel a lot of books gloss over. Seeing what Feyre and Tamlin were willing to sacrifice for each other also helped solidify their relationship for me. I went into the second book excited to see how it was handled, and to see what kind of character Rhysand proved to be, after his UtM admissions and actions…

ACOMAF

I was into this text a lot quicker than the previous one, no doubt because of what I mentioned about seeing actual consequences for trauma. I didn’t expect to see so much of Tamlin’s trauma as I did, but I appreciated seeing even a high lord couldn’t walk away from something like what happened without damage. I definitely felt the tragedy of what happened to their relationship, seeing how trauma warped and changed the way they were to the point where they no longer fit, and I was glad Feyre was able to leave.

That brings us to what I thought was the best point, seeing Feyre get the space and patience and support she needed to heal, from Rhysand and the rest of the Inner Court. Like the first book, some parts felt a bit stilted to me, but seeing her gain back her confidence and work through the pain Amarantha had dealt was with satisfying. Having her find a group she came to care for and a place she felt safe was wonderful.

I couldn’t say I saw the end twists coming, and I was definitely shocked to see Tamlin siding with an evil king who wanted to bring back slavery; after what I knew of him in the first book, it felt to me like there had to be more going on, and I immediately started the next book after finishing this one in 3 days.

I was also quite interested in Elain and Nesta’s changes too, I hadn’t expected them to be big characters after the first book, but it makes sense to tie them together - and give some fun stuff to work with in the next book.

ACOWAR

Unlike the last book, I finished this one in two days :p

I enjoy a lot of politics and intrigue in my books, so I enjoyed hearing about a lot of the planning that went into preparing for the upcoming war. I enjoyed hearing Feyre’s thoughts and plans for the Spring Court, and I was glad Lucien was able to escape with her - I haven’t mentioned him much but I have enjoyed his character quite a bit. I loved getting to meet with the other high lords and see the Dawn Court, though I found it odd how easily everyone seemed to lose their temper at what was supposed to be a diplomatic meeting. I read Tamlin’s words as being sheer bitterness, but I was glad to hear he hadn’t betrayed everyone blindly and had a plan.

The end of the book was a bit of a shock twist page after page, and I couldn’t put it down. Dads coming out of nowhere with an army only to die a few pages later? Monsters joining the fight only to get murked? Elain pulling an Arya Stark stabbing on the big baddie? The only surprise I had been expecting was Akeem’s transformation; I felt the biblical angel clues were strong enough to expect an angel of death when she changed.

I didn’t like the fakeout Rhysand death. It felt like it was tacked on for a bit more milked drama, only to be undone moments later. What I did love was how the end of the story gave Tamlin the chance to save both Feyre and Rhysand, despite everything that they had done to each other. I had hoped it was the chance for them to start healing that rift, not expecting them to be friends or in love again, but respectful at least..

Also some questionable choices for sexy scenes, but again, I kinda didn’t read too much into em, not my thing.

ACOFAS

This is where something changed with my thoughts on the text. I thought it was a nice “Christmas” story, and I enjoyed seeing where and how people were preparing for it with each other. I felt for Nesta, and as hard as it was to see where she was I didn’t feel she was ready for healing from her trauma yet, and was interested to see where it went. Wasn’t as big a fan of people talking down to Lucien, but that wasn’t the real issue I had here…

Rhysand’s visits to Tamlin may have been brief, but they struck a really unpleasant note in an otherwise nice little story. I had come to see Rhysand as a good person over the books, over what he had said and did. I couldn’t like that up, though, with the way he treated Tamlin in this book. I didn’t expect them to be friends, or even like each other, but I couldn’t understand how Rhysand could be so cruel to a person who had saved not only his life (even though I could have easily seen him not doing so), but Feyre’s, Elaine’s and Azriel’s lives too, and in doing so played a crucial part in saving the whole world. How could someone see this person who is clearly broken and so alone, and beat him down further? And then to come back and see what state he was in, and essentially suicide bait him while making him a steak? It was such a harsh and cruel thing to do that it took me right out of the text, and I took some time with that thought in my head.

AFTER READING

I had been planning to jump into Silver Flames right away, but the sour taste of how Tamlin was treated in the last book was really bothering me, and I needed to share my thoughts with someone. None of my friends had read the books, so I turned online to see what people thought, and… I have to admit, I was shocked at the level of sheer vitriol directed in Tamlin’s direction. If this was after the second book, I could see some of it, but undoubtedly most people who were sharing their dislike of his character had read all the books, even past what I read. It didn’t make sense to me, that someone we knew was a kind and good person in the first book, who was warped by trauma and bitterness in the second but helped save our main characters in the third, only to be kicked while he was down, was so incredibly hated? The more I read, the more confused and honestly frustrated I started feeling. It was as if there was nothing good in his character, who quite objectively did quite a few good things!

Until I had read ACOFAS, I had taken everything as it had been delivered to me, through Feyre’s thoughts and words. Hell, I was so into it after the second book I went and bought the coloring pages and some very expensive pens! After, though, I began rereading parts of the texts in a more critical lens, trying to somehow connect the cruelty I’d read and felt with people’s words online, with what I thought was the point of the text, of healing through trauma, and how I has liked the various characters.

It was around then that I found I wasn’t the only one who had similar thoughts and feelings towards Tamlin’s character and how he was treated in the narrative, and the fandom. I noticed some things I had missed before, where Feyre’s perspective of Tamlin had shifted to make his character from the first book worse in the second and third. Not even inconsistencies in terms of character traits changing, but points where events in the first book were quite blatantly retconned in a different view entirely, and then for people to ignore the former for the latter because it made Tamlin worse. The more that I started looking, the more issues I started picking up, issues of characters being held to different standards by both the character in text, and the people reading them.

Now, a month out from reading the books, I think it’s become very clear that the author intended for people to strongly dislike Tamlin’s character, and for a lot of people, the author’s intention is enough to accept that view. When it comes to writing, though, an author’s intention ends with the words they put down, adding clarifying statements afterwards can help show their intention, but the intent is the same. Readers, then, are free to interpret a text how they will; not everyone is going to get the same experience from a story as everyone else, because people are individuals with their own outlooks on the world they bring to a text. Just because one agrees with the author’s intention with a text doesn’t make other’s differing interpretations less valid. People don’t have to like Tamlin’s character for all the reasons the author tells you, but that doesn’t make criticism of the view wrong, or bad. People who criticize the author’s choices and the actions of characters in a text are as valid as the author’s choice to write them in the first place. I’ve come away from this feeling Tamlin’s character has been “done dirty”, whether the author intended for me to have that opinion (she clearly didn’t). That doesn’t make my viewpoint less valid, just different, and based in the same text other interpretations come from.

In the end, I’ve come down from the obsessed high I had with the series, and I’ve settled on having very mixed feelings overall. Once my interpretation of the earlier texts had changed, it kinda rusted some of the luster the books had had in my mind and added a more critical, negative undercurrent to things I had seen as entirely good before. For me, that actually makes them more interesting, and I like the idea of talking about and debating points of a text and how they can be interpreted. I don’t know if I could recommend the series to other people, though, what with the feelings I’ve had towards the actual texts and the fandom around them. I will probably be invested still for a time longer, though - whether I read Silver Flames (the takes I’ve seen online are veeery mixed, but perhaps my take would be different than what I’ve seen) or the next book afterwards, it’s been a real and novel experience diving headfirst into it all.

[caffedrine]

Having played both routes for Gilbert, do you think Emma's feelings in the end are genuine or more like Stockholm Syndrome?

TL:DR Gilbert and Emma have a very unhealthy relationship. It should not be idealized or emulated by anyone, healthy or even unhealthy. Strive to be a better person than Gilbert, if not for yourself, then at least for those around you.

So, I went down the rabbit hole of Stockholm Syndrome, which has some very interesting articles, including those that suggest it has a misogynistic basis. Essentially, the concern is that it is a catch-all to silence victims’ voices. What the victims say doesn’t matter, because they’re all delusional, their own thoughts and sense of agency are meaningless because they’re suffering from Stockholm Syndrome. On that note, can anyone name a man who is an example of someone suffering from Stockholm syndrome?

While I do want to give a definite answer on whether or not Emma is suffering from Stockholm syndrome, I worry if the question itself is the right question to ask, and if it ignores Emma’s sense of agency in Gilbert’s route.

One of the reasons I appreciate Gilbert’s version of Emma is that she has a strong sense of agency and the ability to make her own decisions. While she has no choice but to entertain Gilbert as his ‘friend’, she chooses to be genuine, and try to make peace between Rhodolite and Obsidian possible. When she is confronted with being sent into exile or sent to Obsidian as Gilbert’s hostage, Emma decides to confront Gilbert head-on and go to Obsidian. She has a line that it’s not about what he’s promised in the treaty they are finalizing, but one last opportunity to see her ideals through. While in Obsidian, Emma continues to make rational decisions, even though I personally don’t agree with all of them.

On choking: Yes, that was total bullshit for Gilbert/Cybrid. Still, after reading how Emma responded afterward, I don’t think she was traumatized by it (even if she probably should, for her own safety). She appears to still have her own sense of agency and makes rational decisions that I do not necessarily agree with. The feelings of love she has for Gilbert don’t seem to arise from a need to cope with her situation or appeal to Gilbert to keep him from hurting her. Rightly or wrongly, Emma sees their similarities and thinks she understands Gilbert’s motivations. Whether or not you agree with her, whether or not you think Gilbert is worthy of them, I think this Emma's love for Gilbert is genuine.

There is a scene where Emma doesn’t divulge all the information about Obsidian/Gilbert to Chevalier. I think this is not her being hostile towards Rhodolite, but her accepting her role as someone who is on Obsidian’s side and has to safeguard the country first. I don’t think this is a trauma response.

So, overall, I don’t think that Emma is showing signs of Stockholm Syndrome.

That isn’t to say that she and Gilbert are in a healthy relationship.

Gilbert has most of Cybird’s classic yandere traits: He’s possessive of Emma’s time and attention, he gets jealous when she spends too much time with other people, he has been making Michael stalk her since they were teens, and his emotions for her are all twisty. He loves and hates her, he’s repulsed and attracted to her, just to name a few. It's impossible for him to be in a healthy relationship at this point.

Don't you just love the yandere?

A quick note about choking:

It’s never acceptable for your partner to do this to you, or for you to do it to your partner without permission. Even with permission, it should not be done; choking someone has been shown to cause micro seizures in their brain, damaging it. In short, even surviving choking has lasting detrimental effects on the victim’s outcome, some of which may take years to manifest.

[spiderh0rse]

freeman's mind notes part 9, e41-45

e41

all lasers all the time

sees a warning sign and promptly tries to obstruct the laser

wants to reflect this very dangerous laser through a disco ball

he'd love to let the laser gradually burn a hole out of the building

gravity hates him so bad

he'd want a big room with a trampoline

insulted by some guy and promptly abandons him

MIND. PLEASE STOP BEING ABLEIST

thinks the sirens would be a good alarm clock sound

actually shows concern for a guy who's been shot

SO relieved to be outside

it looks like an anemometer but it is Not

HATES being beeped at by the turrets

thinks there may be a meteorology department

the science team makes their own explosives

has read The Art Of War

considers being exploded not a terrible way to go

"whoo hoo hoo!"

ALMOST feels like he doesn't need more stimulants today

he doesn't think his suit can stop mortar shells

e42

mentions a rocket launcher....

damned dam

ICTHYOSAUR ALERT

[gibbering]

"BOMBS BAD BAD BOMBS BAD BOMBS BAD"

just plain ol rambling in fear out here

just in love with saying "damn" and "damned" every chance he gets here. He is on a dam

still struggling to stay afloat

"underwater 'ah-hah!'" GSIIENDKD

flooding the canyon would make him feel better

air is for losers

"wahhhhh gahhhhhh"

checks a corpse for money or snacks. will Not give the man fare for Charon

growls :grins:

slur count six. It's not the r slur but hey. Variety.

needs a surface to air missile

curse of formatting :/

e43

jiving with the idea that some unnamed force wants him dead

he thinks that he was MEANT to die in the test chamber but since he didn't (due to being "hardcore") reality is slowly unravelling. I just played a Friendsim route where this was a plot point.

he concludes that this makes him the most important person in the universe

gordon freeman has become Based (thinks there is too much money funneled into the military)

says an incorrect plural of "cactus" and corrects himself

this is subtitled as [screaming] but it's more of a "mnnnyeaheaheah" noise

he does NOT look like a helicopter

he likes math. No tolerance for bullshit. Math works or it doesn't. Clear defined rules that stay clear and defined. Some of these comments are mine and not his. I like math.

he doesn't smoke!

does clarify he doesn't smoke tobacco. peyote, yes. Mulls over other methods of taking it being better though

straining noises

YAAAAH AAAAAH WAAAAH

doesn't seem to recognize the tentacle. He definitely has brain damage between the head trauma and repeated electrocutions.

the desert tricked him. The desert.... THE DESERT....

yells all silly at some headcrabs

implies he yelled all silly at some scientists to claim his lab space for work. Didn't need a shotgun for that

the first situation in two days in which a grappling hook would Not solve all his problems

sand in his suit :(

e44

new intro. First surface portion of the game.

he feels like he's escaping from prison

seems pro-union

notices that going outside just makes stuff worse for him every time

wonders, perhaps sarcastically, f the planes are gassing him

turret beeping is a DEATH SENTENCE for it

echo! :D

he's got the best comeback of all. A spas-12.

he doesn't mind people talkin trash about him if they get shot after

doesn't much like heights

would love to slide down that big ol pipe

no breakdancing on the cliff

"dahdahdahdahdah..." Followed by a growl

[whimpering]

he can't read his mind

he hates the tin foil hat people. Not because of the conspiracy (owls) but because of their means of defence

bad bridge... Wants a grappling hook so bad but admits it may not work here

[breathing heavily]

the CLIFF is following him- no. Nevermind.

didn't realize Black Mesa was built into the mesa proper

no longer trusts catwalks

afraid of spiders

he could SLIP on these SHELLS

"is that..? Oh my god, it's a rocket launcher." You can HEAR the awe in his voice

he just sounds as calm as he ever sounds all series

interloper!

so happy to have used a rocket launcher :)

"whhuuuh"

a universe that entirely wants him dead wouldn't give him a rocket launcher so some part of the universe wants him alive

knows a fair deal of greek mythology

screams at a near miss with a cliff edge

he just wants a helmet :(

put the water park on the cliff edge

e45

we know this one.

he can't see where he is on the gps trackers

his water park! It's here! No wish needed!

HATES the military theme to the park

modern major general :D

this was where I would put Gordon's Hal. IF HE HAD ONE (don't worry about that if you don't know Hal, for my tumblr fellows)

complains about mmg being dated but that is actually the point of the original song. The idea was to just talk to fast no one would question that it was all common knowledge

that said it's impressive that he's memorized it and can sing it while he's running and shooting people

the new lyrics too are solid. Some syllables are. Questionable for the tune, but overall quite fine

"Ah."

I think some fans got mad at him for calling the tank an Abrams when it wasn't. Whatever!

buttons!

"nyyeehhhhh,,"

valley girl mind

he wants this tank so much

astounded that bullets managed to EXPLODE a tank

his knees are wobbly again. Methinks he's recovering from the adrenaline of the past five, very hectic minutes

if he were a general facing someone like Freeman and soldiers didn't work he'd just use nerve gas on the guy

[red-black-aesthetic-bout]

Round 2: Match 24

Scott Summers/Cyclops (X-men) vs. Edward Elric (Fullmetal Alchemist)

Scott Summers/Cyclops (X-men)

- At 15, Scott Summers became the first X-Man and first leader of the X-Men after a childhood filled with so much trauma that it would be ridiculous if it wasnt slowly added over a period of roughly 20 years. Having friends for the first time in his life and then immediately being put in charge of their lives in Xavier’s child soldier program has pretty clearly further traumatised him and left him with some serious control issues, especially when combined with his mutant powers that he can’t control cause of a brain injury and that could cause enormous damage if he was careless for even a second…Through it all, Scott tries his best to stay in control and help mutants everywhere. Also he’s about as close to canonically autistic you can get without it being canon, as in at least one writer has written him as autistic but they don’t have the power to make it explicit. If you’re at all interested, check out X-Men Marvel Snapshots #1, it gives a good overview of his character. readcomicsonline is your friend here :)

Edward Elric

- This boy had his two of limbs taken away personally by God and he decided that he’s agnostic. Also he was willing to fistfight God, which tracks for a 15 year old. Also he has cool robot prosthetics to replace the arm and leg he lost… - such dedication to the aesthetic that he makes sure he has his signature red coat before the final fight - Fullmetal Alchemist

mod notes: tried to type in 'magic' as a bridge between alchemy and mutant powers but 'magnet' came up and I like it more. and then I started putting in two emojis for the flexibility and so ed gets a leg

[highlifeboat]

(About Max falling down the stairs) "He is suffering brain damage and nobody seems to notice."

👀 Go on.

Okay, alright, so, just a reminder, Max fell down a Servant's Staircase, which were dark, steep, usually skinny staircases, with uneven steps, that looked like this:

Also known as "Victorian Death Stairs" for... obvious reasons.

When Max fell down these particular stairs they fucked him up. Bones were broken, blood was spilled, it's probably the closest he's been to actually dying. As you can imagine, everybody kind of freaked out over it. They had to allow Miranda to help him, because the Dimitrescus didn't have the supplies to help with broken bones or any internal injuries he might have had.

Now, obviously, he hit his head more than once in that fall, and something like that is going to jostle the brain around. As decent as Miranda is, she's not really equipped to examine the brain (nor did she really want to, let's be real) for things like trauma. When he eventually came too again she basically said "(He) probably has a bit of a concussion. Give (him) some pain medication and (he'll) be fine."

Daniela, who was mainly taking care of him, noticed he was groggy and unfocused, and that he slept a lot which was... concerning, but she (and everyone else) chalked it up to the pain meds just keeping him sedated because he eventually came back around and seemed completely fine (mentally speaking). There was no slurring speech, or vomiting, or uneven pupil dilation, nothing physical that indicated anything particularly wrong. Once he was all healed up nobody thought twice about it.

Max... doesn't remember any of that outside of muddled talk that's basically background noise. He remembers feeling scared, but nothing particularly distinguishable.

Ever since then his short term memory has been... pretty fucking bad. He'll repeat things he's already said, or things needed repeated back to him, if someone asks him to do something he's likely to end up forgetting about it if it's not written down for him. He'll suffer the worst migraine or headache, and get incredibly sensitive to light/noise to a point he just won't get out of bed (or if he does he's incredibly irritable the whole day)

The family is also so used to Max being irritable and "hungover", so the fact he'll whine about headaches and get snippy sometimes isn't really new to them. They just take him repeatedly asking "What?" when they talk to him or him not doing something they ask is him not listening to them.

Daniela teases him about forgetting stuff (lightheartedly) by saying he's an old man. And because it isn't a consistent thing and he doesn't seem to be getting worse she doesn't hold any real concern for it.

Even Max just brushes it off as "Maybe I have been drinking too much." because the fall happened so long ago at this point he doesn't think there's any lasting effects from it. So he just assumed he's killed off braincell by chugging wine.

[scottxlogan]

Random Thoughts

Random thoughts. As much as I am an X-Men fan I’ve been thinking lately about X-Men Apocalypse and how that film did such a HUGE disservice not only to Oscar Isaac, who in my opinion was HORRIBLY wasted in that film, which blows my mind given that he’s such a talented actor. Like seriously how could you not want to showcase him and let him run with being such an iconic villain and deliver a story for him to sink his teeth into? *sigh*, but that’s not what I’m in the mood to talk about right now. My BIGGEST complaint about that film is the characterization of Scott Summers. It’s something that’s troubled me from when I first saw the film. 

Now let me preface this by saying that I have nothing against Tye Sheridan. Before Apocalypse came out I went and saw Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse to familiarize myself with the actor because so many people were talking about how he was such a fantastic actor and how he would be PERFECT for Scott. I was skeptical, but willing to give him a chance because Scott Summers is my favorite character. Has been for a very long time. In Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse the character Tye Sheridan plays is so much like Scott that I was hyped to see him in the role until the movie finally came out and I realized that the character he was in X-Men Apocalypse aside from crushing on Jean Grey was most certainly NOT Scott Summers. (For those who want to see Tye in a Scott type character, I’d recommend the film that I mentioned above as he was more Scott there than he was in Apocalypse.) Scott is NOT a bad boy, rule breaking, smart mouth snot. I’m sorry, but that’s never been Scott. He’s not the ‘cool dude’ or Alex’s hip little brother who is edgy like Alex is in the First Class films. 

To those who don’t read the comics, I’ll just toss this out there. In the comics Alex is the younger brother and Scott literally gets brain damage saving his brother from the trauma of jumping out of the plane when their family is being attacked and their parents ‘died’. It’s such a tragic, interesting back story that leads to the ups and downs of Scott through the years with psychotic ‘father figures’ who experiment on/torture him, force him to use his powers for evil purposes until Charles saves him. The bond between Charles and Scott is one of the strongest ones in his life even if Charles has become a bit of a tyrant over time in how he manipulated Scott to do this bidding, but that’s another story for another time. Scott’s young life before the X-Men was loaded with pain and trauma where Alex was off adopted by a family and Scott was the obsession of a madman who for some reason was obsessed with the idea of breeding the perfect genetic mutant with him and Jean Grey...again another issue here lol.

That being said though Scott is shy, awkward, a lot of people have speculated autistic as well and there’s so much about Scott in his social awkwardness and his inherent self doubt/loathing as a teen that defines the man he becomes in the future. His rise from the shy, awkward kid too afraid to admit his feelings to Jean Grey or feel he was worthy of the role of leader that Charles bestows upon him to the strategic powerhouse he becomes is lost in Fox’s lame attempt to make someone that might be marketable to an audience who thinks it’s fun to see a a bratty fun cool guy who can come up with mischief. Now I love Scott. I do, but he is neither a bratty fun guy or a prankster. His sense of humor...well, really isn’t most of the time. It doesn’t fit who he is. Bobby was a prankster and a practical joker, but Scott is very serious almost to the point where he knows he’s not the popular guy that people gravitate to. He’s not the fun guy who is the life of the party, but rather he’s the guy who gets the job done and saves the day. He’s the guy with plans for his plans, etc. and he fights for his people with all that he has taking what he’s learned through the years and applying that knowledge to doing right by mutants and humans alike. 

In a lot of ways Scott’s almost like a blend of Charles and Magneto as he’s evolved into his own man. I cannot stress enough that there is so much to LOVE about this guy, who by his beginnings had what could’ve led him to be a villain as that’s the kind of backstory he had, but regardless of the struggles and angst he became a hero and a leader. His story is so inspiring and really gives the character depth which is why he’s my favorite. Fox NEVER got that.

In the first three X-Men films, they minimized Scott’s appearance to showcase Logan, but James Marsden was a fantastic casting choice (height aside). He brought so much to the character with what little was given to him to work with. His performance is always overlooked, but James expresses so much emotion without the benefit of his eyes, which is a difficult task for actors. Some popular actors who were offered the role in Apocalypse originally turned it down for that very reason of not being able to use their eyes. James more than delivers and is very underrated. Now, none of the first films will give a casual non-comic reader the full story on Scott, but I hope that those who haven’t seen the first films take the opportunity to at least look at those films and that Scott to see a glimpse of who he is and not the character with Scott’s name and his powers that doesn’t display who he is. Now I know some people liked the version in Apocalypse, but it’s so disheartening to know that those who never read a comic or saw the old films will ever understand what makes Scott so great. He’s truly the underdog that ended up saving his people and becoming one hell of a leader. The complexities of his relationships are another dynamic of what makes him great. 

There is so much to love about Scott and it makes me sad when I see so many fans who never were able to see that because Apocalypse was their first and only view of him. They were truly cheated and to this day it always makes me want to flood the blog with information and reference to Scott so people can see just how amazing he is as a character. Heck, even X-Men Origins which has a lot of problems in it did a better teen Scott than Apocalypse is so if someone wants to see a teen Scott that shows signs of who he will become, I would recommend that film as well for that alone. Like I cannot stress enough how much I hate that so many fans will never know how great he is. I literally went back and forth with a professor about how great Scott was, but with Fox not delivering it was so hard to share to only a film goer why my favorite character is so amazing since all people see is what little inaccurate crumbs that Fox gives. *rant over* Sorry it’s just sometimes I feel like letting this out because I hate how Scott gets overlooked or changed because those in charge don’t care enough to give the guy what he really deserves in a story especially in the film world. I do hope that the MCU does better. 

[spindrifters]

zo i see your director’s commentary ask and i’m dying to know how you came up with marginalia. like…it’s so well thought out i can’t even comprehend where this idea would come from. give me all the fun facts i will eat them up xx

my brain started buzzing in about seventeen different directions when I saw this and I think the unifying answer is...

this is a resistant reading of the original books.

joanne created the foundations of some really interesting worldbuilding, and then expressed zero curiosity about it. there's just no interest whatsoever in unpacking the cultural shorthands she reached for. the eugenics of blood purity. the magical capital of who's allowed a wand and what wizarding society says about their personhood based on that. (I stg that scene in goblet of fire where winky gets sacked is a foundational trauma of my childhood.) magical theory. the otherness of werewolves and giants and those pushed to the margins. there's no curiosity about unpacking any of that because her pov character, harry, is inherently uncurious. because he doesn't need to be. he really isn't affected by these things in any way, and his perspective on those who are is... benevolently neoliberal. he's living in a really comfortable position, all things considered, and he's rewarded at the end by a narrative that says an ideal outcome is a return to that status quo. (which ultimately is going to just lead to the rise of the next fascist movement. they've already had 2 in under a century. after all, voldemort is a product of his environment.)

I think a lot of what we do as a fandom is dive into those queer slippages anyway, giving perspective to those who are affected by the conditions jkr created, whether she was aware she was doing it or not. (I tend to think not). but I started wondering what happens when you push that to the extreme and say the quiet part out loud. there are a lot of 'voldemort won' AUs that do this, but I couldn't be less interested in canon era, which is how we ended up with this timeline and obviously my boys remus and sirius as our point of view into it.

and then things got funky. in my little writer brain this was going to be all remus's story, but then I was like. well shit. I need sirius's perspective, too, so this doesn't come off as stockholm syndrome. and very, very quickly it became obvious that this was two intertwined stories about breaking cycles of abuse and trauma recovery. I started digging into the ways that systems of oppression damage everyone, including those purportedly at the top of the food chain. and then because I'm a maximalist at heart I was like hey let's explore print culture and traditional education and deconstruct the myth of the great man while we're at it, because these are all things joanne glorifies in her books that I have got feelings about.

ask me for the director's cut

[justanothersyscourse]

Hi, I like your blog and really enjoy the articles and data you publish it’s very interesting. I wanted to pick your brain about your stance on psychiatric abuse for DID. Like, how do you feel about kluft because he is the bane of my existence. If you really wanna get into it I worked with colin ross in person who was the head of the international institute of trauma. Hes horrific. I think the thing that bothers me the most is I belive at some point i stumbled on a psychiatric guide for therapists on how to handle DID written by kluft (it was older, thank god, maybe 1990?) that said it is a-okay to hypnotize a paitent without their consent in order to gain access to alters.

On another note, I typically don’t do syscourse but from your stuff comes off to me as similar to the issue otherkin have with “kinnies” or kin for fun. Where theres a group of people who absolutely do not seem to give a fuck about a label and use it anyways. Even if it damages a legitimate community. I’ve met plenty of fine endos myself but. Yeah. Ive seen the other types around to.

Cool blog! Just wanted to bark at you /pos

OOOOHHHHHH my god, listen, I spoke with Colin Ross once to discuss some of his papers with him, and that man

That man

First-- thank you, hi, nice to meet you, welcome

Second-- I just want to put correct information out there so people can more easily figure out what they're experiencing ):

Third, have a rant of sorts, the last couple lines are about Ross, because I know that's what we're all waiting for

I am psych critical, there are good doctors and there are bad doctors, and then there are very bad doctors

The field of psychiatry is not the issue-- the field is good, the goal is good, the treatments are good when applied at the clients' request and with their consent-- IE, all treatments have merit (save for a select few "programs" that just flat out go against human rights), but not all treatments will work for everyone on a personal AND practical level-- both of which are required to make a treatment plan work

The doctors are where the issue is. And not all doctors are bad-- like any kind of relationship, people aren't going to mesh with everyone. Any doctor is good, provided THAT SPECIFIC CLIENT finds their treatment methods and approach to be both personally and practically effective.

Let's take the example of a Catholic therapist. Not conservative, just religious, and he uses that in his sessions-- not pushing it on his clients, but using it as a tool to help him and maybe try to bring a certain kind of positivity into the sessions. Me, being very unreligious, would be on the edge from the first mention. Depending on how he handles that reaction will decide whether he is a good or bad doctor for me. If he's a good doctor, he'll adjust his behaviour and approach accordingly, without a second thought. If he's a bad one, he'll ignore that reaction, and continue using his own methods, and I'll be off to try another therapist (easier said than done for most, I know, I was lucky to be born in Canada).

But here's the thing-- he's a VERY good therapist for the religious person in his next session. They find his approach to be empowering, they mesh well in the relationship, they're comfortable with each other and with bringing faith into the sessions. The client finds the methods used to be easy to utilize in their everyday life and simple to understand, and makes overall improvement. And that's what matters.

Now, if he's pushing his religious beliefs onto his clients, now he's a very bad doctor, and should not be licensed, and I will personally find him and drop kick him in the gender neutral tit.

And this can be extended to any doctor that performs any nonconsensual or unethical treatment on his clients. Psychiatric abuse happens far more than it should, and we should all be aware of it, and learn what to do when we see it (this will differ, depending on where you live).

In the case of research by doctors, it's a case by case basis for everything. Van der Hart abused clients, but that doesn't make a good portion of his research and work obsolete or wrong. He worked with two other doctors who weren't accused of anything, and the research is building off of others' work.

There's still viability in that specific research, despite what he did and despite what a shit doctor he was. Both can coexist. Knowing what he did, we need to be very critical when examining ALL his work. Did both Ross and Kluft put both good AND bad research into the field? Yes. Did they also do and say questionable things? A loud, resounding YES. No question. Should everyone be critical of their papers? Absolutely, always.

I have a "begrudging acceptance/hate" relationship with a lot of the big names out there. I'm critical of their actions and their work, but the validity of each and every individual article/book/experiment needs to be examined and compared against other (often questionable) research to decide whether there's any basis of use to it.

Do I think governing bodies need to be more proactive and stricter on those kinds of offences? Hell yeah. Do I want see doctors that do that crap held accountable? Fuck yes. Can I probably find a dozen other papers making the same point and stop using their names? If I can, I certainly will.

NOW COLIN ROSS

Has an ego

And continued to email me after our (very strange) conversation about different shows I could find him in and "fangirl" over

Yes, he said fangirl

Yes, I was shook

I desperately want to hear more about what it was like working with him, come back, tell me stories, please

EDIT: hold on, bear with me, I'm rethinking whether I actually know any useful Kluft articles

[pansy-placebo]

About me

Hi! Call me Pansy, or Bo.

I don't know what this blog will be yet, so it'll be a lot of reblogs for the time being. I'd like to make some friends here, though.

Content warning: brain damage, drug use, trauma, sex and rape mention, mental illness, er... politics? Also the DNI section includes a lot of difficult topics, I need to mention stuff to be sure to ward away assholes, sorry.

I'm mlm and polyamorous.

I'm a very gender little goblin man, I'm a drag artist with a couple shows under my belt. Said shows are very rare at the moment, so the drag I do the most is just dressing up lol. I'm really considering making a drag society/club in my local town- I'm Welsh, and re-learning the language since I went to live in England for a few years and completely forgot how to speak it.

My pronouns are he/him or xey/xem.

I have a degree in fine art, but got some brain damage (oops) which means my art production really slowed to a halt for the past few years. I still occasionally draw, paint and make jewellery though. At the moment, I'm too disabled to have any kind of job but I hope over time those issues will get better and I'll be able to support myself on my art again.

I have ADHDtism, here are some special interests and hyperfixations, some of which are active, some have passed and just left a lasting impact on my psyche:

goth music

nutrition, digestion, and diet culture (which is a scam btw)

art and art history

human anatomy

aquatic life, especially aquatic snails

religions, particularly shingon

sexual paraphilias, the more niche the better (that one lasted a decade) and I won't be posting about it here because honestly wtf is my brain

I write. So far this post has been a truly terrible showcase of my writing skills, because my brain is very blob-of-goo-sloshing-in-a-bone-fishbowl right now, but I used to produce mass amounts of poetry and I still write occasionally. Maybe I'll even post some of it from time to time, who knows!

I'm ok with some nsfw stuff, but I won't be reblogging or posting porn, and I don't want any of that on my dash please. PLEASE DON'T PUT PORN ON MY DASH.

I'm very mentally ill, but I'm reticent about it because I'm still feeling out the culture here. For now let's just say I have a lot of trauma in my past and sometimes my brain says "fuck you, lmao" and takes all my memories out of their filing cabinets and lights them on fire.

I'm also a drug addict, which exacerbates the amnesia, and a former alcoholic still wrestling with the bottle.

My politics: I'm very left leaning and very aware of societal issues. I'm somewhere in the arena of socialism and communism, and I've read enough theory to know I don't know how to correctly pick a precise label for my politics in that area. Initially while writing this post, the political section was super long and then I realized that this is not the point of this blog, so fuck that. You get the idea. I give a shit.

DNI:

porn blogs

SWERFs

transphobes, "gender critical" people, transmeds

aphobic people: if you think ace people are not discriminated against, you are included here, so DNI.

racists, nazis, islamaphobes, antisemites: for example if you think white people/culture are under attack, you are included in this section, so DNI.

discourse-havers: I mean the people who will bring the discourse to my dash. I mean a sensitive topic discussion which devolves into a screaming wall of reductive rhetoric and contrived logic where everyone who disagrees in any way is a bad person and people just start attacking each other for having the wrong opinion instead of having actual conversations about the subject at hand. I was on twitter for years, and I learned early on that The Discourse was never something to engage in, and I'm aware that it happens here too. Keep it off my dash. Thanx.

Pedos, MAPs, lolicons and their supporters.

ableists, anti-self-dx people. Do you think you can tell when people "aren't really" disabled, or that there are a hoards of people out there claiming to be disabled for the money? if so, DNI.

if your blog has a lot of self harm, gore or rape content

people who think doxxing is generally okay. I don't think it's okay in most situations

classists: Do you think poor people deserve to be poor, that they have done something to "deserve" poverty, that they should just spend their money better and stop being poor? do you never give money to homeless people because they'll "spend it all on drugs"? if yes to any of these, DNI.

Do you think people with eating disorders should just "eat a sandwich?" if yes, DNI. EDs are complex, I won't want to interact with people who belittle ED havers.

can't currently think of anything else to add here but yeah i think you get the idea.

See ya,

xxx

Bo / Pansy