#What is interesting tho

[duncanor]

i'm sorry if this is weird to ask, but i just watched tristamp and for the time being i don't intend on watching the old one or reading the manga (busy with uni :/) so i have some gaps in my understanding of the story still, and since i like some of your "meta" type of posts i thought i'd ask you - i know about vash and wolfwood's sense of guilt and all, and i understand where vash's comes from but i'm a bit confused about what has wolfwood done "wrong" to make him feel so guilty. i don't know if i'm just stupid *cried* but i just can't figure it out please help!

Ah, you are not stupid buddy and it's not weird to ask ! >:]

Trigun, no matter the medium, is quite the complex story. There's many layers to each characters, especially those like Wolfwood.

I would say, in Stampede, the core of Wolfwood guilt is mainly linked to:

1. He's a murderer.

2. He couldn't stop Livio from sharing his fate.

3. 'Betraying' Vash

None of these things are quite his fault nor his choice. It's the Eye of Michael's. Ultimately, Wolfwood is a protector and will do anything to protect his loved ones.

Legato calls him out on it and say his attachement to people is a weakness. He even tried to harm them to 'free' Wolfwood from his attachement to make him a better weapon.

But the reality is, the only reason Wolfwood is 'picking the gun' at all is for the Orphanage. If he didn't have anything to protect, I even doubt he would have made it past the experiments/training. His attachements are both his strength and his shackles.

Because to protect them, he has to follow a really bloody and cruel path on which the Eye put him. His role there is to punish traitors and deserters. (both of which he will become btw). It's to kill.

And kill he has and he will. A lot. This is a bit spoilerly and mostly based off Trimax (for now) but he will have so much blood on his hands he won't even be able to face the orphanage again until he's forced to.

But what else could he have done? It's not like he had a choice from the start, if he wants to live, if he wants the orphanage to be safe, he has to dirty his hands. That's how the world works and he is just a man doing what he can.

Then he meets Vash. The antithesis of everything he lived by and for. Vash who also wants to protect too much, but refuse to kill. He shows Wolfwood another way is possible and it pisses him off. Because if Vash is right, What does that make him? And that's where he's at in season one. At that cross road where he is left wondering if it's like Vash said, is he a good guy? Or is it what Zazie and Roberto said, just a murderer ?

And even if it's not realistic for a mortal like Wolfwood to never kill, even if he will argue and call Vash foolish or naive, it gets to him. It really does. At his core Wolfwood is follower of Vash and the hope he represents. But not the same way Legato is a follower of Knives. Vash and Wolfwood are equals, they inspire each others and they argue, but they never coerce the other's to take the same path. However, because he's a protector, he has to be Judas. He has to lead Vash to slaughter, no matter what.

As for Livio, the guilt stem from his bond with him being the sole reason his brother got doomed to become a weapon like him. If it wasn't for Wolfwood befriending Livio, he wouldn't have followed him to EoM.

So yeah, too much blood on his hands, having to betray Vash and feeling responsable for Livio's fate. That's what makes him feel all catholic guilt in the universe.

[shrews-art]

From the Heights

[tide-locked]

i feel like people forget that sometimes characters in fic are written like that because it's a reflection of real life.

people have sex without setting boundaries. people have unprotected sex without talking about their sexual histories or producing recent sti tests. people play with kink without discussing it ahead of time or establishing a safeword. they have anal without 'enough' prep or lube—they may even prefer it like that.

and none of this is really a fantasy. it's all pretty normal. you can feel that it's inappropriately normalised, and you'd probably be right! but it is normalised: one study found that 58% of female undergraduate students on the campus studied had been choked during sex. 20% of those students said that they'd never been asked if it was ok; another 30% said they'd only sometimes been asked if they consented. fully half! (non-paywalled journal article on choking during sex here, including these numbers.) despite a rise in stis of all sorts, condom use is declining. (pdf link to the full text of this study about declining condom use in the us; aidsmap article about an australian study with similar results.)

even when people do talk about things—sex or anything else—they communicate imperfectly. 'yeah, but don't go too far' is consenting and setting a boundary, and also relying that the person you're talking to has the same metric for 'too far' that you do. for some people, 'the trash needs to go out' is a neutral, factual observation; for others, it's a request that the person they're speaking to take out the trash.

even when people understand each other perfectly, people react unpredictably to things sometimes! we behave irrationally! people laugh uncontrollably at funerals, or get angry at the straw that broke their back rather than the enormous load they were already carrying. they get scared and lash out at people trying to help them. when hurt, most people do not instinctively reach for therapy-approved grounding exercises and 'i feel' statements.

pretty much any bad choice that characters could conceivably make is a choice that people make in real life, on purpose, all the time. people do things that can have catastrophic, life-changing effects because it felt like a good idea at the time, or they're leaning into the vibe, or they just didn't think about it all that much, or an infinite number of other reasons.

fiction isn't intended as a guide on the best, safest, and most responsible ways to live your life, and fanfic isn't any different. it's not a narrative flaw to let characters do things that are messy or harmful or downright stupid—it's a reflection of what people are actually like, and not something that authors should feel they have to apologise for.

[hinamie]

wonder if they know what he's on about

[slicklitsilos]

“Hannibal is a sadistic psychopath who cuts organs out of his victims while they’re still alive to eat them later”

Okay, yeah, and he also cries at the opera so….

[candlebel]

I can't cry... I want to cry... I feel so much sorrow...

[a-scary-lack-of-common-sense]

Putting the Gravity Falls characters into the Trolls universe just because I can

[dailyralsei]

the healer [ 8 / 11 ]

[ p. 7 p. 6 ]

[minnobyy]

side order doodle! based on the first trailer and concept arts from famitsu

i really liked the brown hair color that agent 8 had and the long tentacles that was in the concept art! i really wished we had a long hair style for our octolings 😭

[deathandnonexistentialdread]

Jonouchi leaving his mark on Yami's soul is everything

[sualne]

wolf crier, scapegoat, first on scene, first accused.

[sweetmapple]

Jon should have been allowed to punch him at the panopticon [158] 🙂‍↕️

[justladders]

[nouverx]

Day 1 and Day 2 of RadioStatic Week

First Meeting and Sharing a meal! I like the idea that Alastor is the one who approached Vox first because of how unique he looks eheh

[cozylittleartblog]

lethal company is a workplace comedy

this prank got us All killed. btw.

[opens-up-4-nobody]

Mister Charming & Terrible