#also have vague thoughts about something with Love

[alatismeni-theitsa]

In "KAOS" nothing is anything, and everything is wrong

Two disclaimers: I am no stranger to modern art, and I have no issue with queerness in shows, or in my own mythology (I'm Greek). I am also aware that KAOS is a comedy. It's in the gutter of British comedy, but still part of the genre. At least I laughed every time they said "Oh God!". I don't believe this is the same person who wrote the great and amusing "End of the F**king World"! The premise of "The gods in our modern world" appeals to me a lot, so that wasn't my problem either. My general issue with KAOS is its horrible delivery, bad writing, and piss-poor Greek representation.

This is gonna be long and full of stupid gifs, so sit comfortably, grab a coffee or some popcorn and... pame!

The "ILoveGreekMythology" Kid

Art without context is just a pretty thing to look at. Most of the time, this context can be found within the art piece itself, as the artist has taken care to weave it in. KAOS refuses to connect itself to any context besides the names and a few vague powers. It aims to exist outside of those "boring old stories of the Greek myth" and be entirely "fresh and modern". Something impossible when the entire show and the meanings are based on ancient recorded material. In other words, KAOS is so meta that it ends up being nothing. KAOS cannot stand on its own because you need more than the viewers being familiar with the Greek myth basics to pull such a show off.

KAOS tells us "See? I know all the names of the gods, and what they did, and I know all the locations, so I am qualified to tackle this". More or less like any Western kid who takes all their knowledge from PJO and Marvel and proceeds to unironically hate ancient deities and make a girlboss out of Medusa.

Here's a Greek word for you guys, ημιμάθεια, meaning "half-knowledge". Α Greek saying very well declares "Half-knowledge is worse than no knowledge". The confidence of thinking you know enough often leads you to grave mistakes whereas the humility of not knowing prevents you from touching shit that you shouldn't. When you have no idea what the original myth is trying to say and spit on its meaning, knowing a few names and locations is just smoke and mirrors. I don't believe the audience fell for that.

And don't get me started on the "subversions". A good subversion is intriguing and thought-provoking. In KAOS, every twist was hollow - Greek myth related or otherwise.

"What if Euridice doesn't love Orpheus?" I don't know, babe. What if??? What was the point of that? What did you show us? That women's stories are dominated by men and men don't listen to women, perhaps? And you chose to twist... the love story of Orpheus and Euridice to show this?? One of the best and most tragic love stories Greek mythology has to offer?? You just mocked the myth, you didn't make anything profound out of it.

The Greek Stuff (Nothing salvageable)

I was surprised to see they had a Consulting Producer (Georgia Christou) and an Assistant Script Editor (Isabella Yianni) who happen to be Greek. And I stress that because those people probably weren't hired or utilized for being Greek. We are not sure they were involved in cultural decisions because we have no evidence and because shows with no Greek elements can have more Greeks than that on their staff.

Okay, perhaps they took 5 seconds to ask Isabella about a greeting - which they proceeded to say in a wrong intonation 🙄🤌It's where Poseidon says "ya sás" in the Fates, by the way. How he said it sounds more like "for you (pl.)" than "health to you (pl.)".

Surprise! The only Greek actor present (Peter Polycarpou) has less than 5 minutes of screen time and plays the caricature of an immigrant with a thick (and inaccurate Greek) accent. He has a canteen, selling falafel which is not Greek, and Dionysus buys from him an unidentified tortilla wrap (which... is also not Greek, if you haven't caught up).

For the show they brought in actors of Maori, Nigerian and Sierra Leonean, Pakistani, Black American, Latvian-Jewish, Iranian, Egyptian, Indo-Fijian and Malay descent and you tell me it was impossible for them to seek and find an English-speaking, skilled actor of Greek descent in a show regarding Greek heritage. Sometimes I wonder, do y'all hate us so much?

They considered Greeks only to give us a simple (and wrong) greeting and a stereotype. Crumbs, we are supposed to be happy with. By the way, there are over 70.000 Greek immigrants just in the UK, usually in the urban centers, many of them students or fairly young employees in the corporate workforce. Not the largest minority but not hard to spot either.

Another plague of Anglophone shows: Almost everyone's Greek name is shortened. Yes, we know their full names but we are told that we will use the short ones. Greeks and their "long and difficult" names am I right fellas? Because saying "Ariadne" apparently requires 5 years of Greek language training, and no English word ever has more than two syllables.

Coincidentally, short names are cool in Anglophone imaginary universes and the "long" names are not. it's so strange Anglophones never make universes where it's cool for Greek names to be spoken in full hmmm... They don't even want to practice saying a whole Greek name for just 2 minutes in preparation for a show full of Greek names. And don't give me that "Greek is hard" shit when we only talk about a few syllables. If Greek kids can learn English since first grade and people here can sing English songs and spell English names, you have no excuse.

They also said the name "Fotis" means light, which is close enough but... ugh.. It's like saying Sebastian means "respect". I am not sure if they asked anyone or what their research was here. If I had the writers in front of me, I'd be like:

(This character from an all-time favorite Greek show is called Fotis)

They also made the flag of "Krete" an alteration of the Greek flag and the local Cretan flag. Which is the stupidest move, because they had to remove the religious symbol of the cross to make the flag fit the universe. These are flags created based on 1) Christianity 2) the Greek Revolution of 1821.

National Greek flag to the left, local Cretan flag to the right:

Flag of the KAOS' "Krete":

The only time they seriously took into account anything Greek, was the time when they decided to remove the religious symbol of our ethnoreligion AND (from what I could observe) keep the nine stripes?? The nine stripes of our national flag represent the syllables in "Freedom or Death". The colors are from the white foustanela of the mainland attire and the dark blue vraka of the island attire, the clothing of the Revolution fighters. (That's more of a meta explanation but the characteristics of the flag were decided during and nearly after the Revolution.)

I think I don't have to explain it more but it's not a homage to put the nine stripes in an ancient era where they have no meaning, and to replace a cross??? Let's... not replace religious symbols on national flags, okay? Thank you.

Another cultural element they changed was making everyone have a dedicated coin to pay Charon. Orpheus has Euridice's coin, "her coin", and he's meant to put it on her before she got buried. In Greek culture, any coin would do. Sorry that our culture restricts your script, dear writers. I guess you had to bend this too, in order to create a cohesive plot with a semblance of a twist.

Finally, the many "Kerberus" dogs were cute and I can understand the creative decision behind that. However, in a show full of inaccuracies, this made me roll my eyes a little. I think the showrunners know that Kerveros is not a breed of dog, and there can only be one of him because he doesn't have any other "Kerveros" to breed with. On the other hand, as demonstrated from art/writing on the internet, quite a lot of Westerners are not exactly aware of how our monsters work, so forgive my uncertainty 😅

Nothing is Anything

Every element KAOS played with ended up meaningless. In the words of a Lifo article:

“Zeus is a paranoid authoritarian dictator in mid-life crisis who fears losing his power and murders his aides to vent. Hera is a promiscuous goddess who repeatedly betrays Zeus and has mutilated mute priestesses for protection. Dionysos is a spoiled and immature zoomer who, apart from pranks, indulges in orgies with all genders. Poseidon a sadistic god of the sea, who tortures the crew on his ship for fun. Prometheus is gay and killed his lover so he could overthrow Zeus. Orpheus is a famous pop singer and Eurydice does not love him. Theseus is black and gay. The Erinyes are tough-as-nails mechs that look like they stepped out of ‘Sons of Anarchy’. The Fates resemble a three-member jury in a talent show. The Trojans are a terrorist group that acts against the gods. Crete is more reminiscent of California than the Mediterranean.”

The "River Styx" is a sea, the "River Lethe" is a lake, the gods are nothing more than spoiled humans, the Moirai are drag queens, the Cave is a club where you have to take a quiz to enter the underworld, and generally everything is modern, flat, mundane and anticlimactic. The producers aimed to achieve a work so meta that a "river" is now a concept, a metaphor, whatever you have in your heart. And those who want to see a river when we speak of a river are probably uncultured swines and don't understand postmodernism. Never mind that rivers are rivers in Greek mythology for a reason. That's not culturally interesting enough to explore compared to the new, cool approach of not assigning meaning to anything. That totally shows love for the original rich and meaningful material...

And the reason behind all this subversion? Probably the shock factor. They brought the characters to a point where they said "We have to save the world from Zeus" - Zeus! The father of gods, heroes and humans! - just because they could. It gives off a certain type of smugness that I personally don't like. I mean, I would like the smugness and cheekiness of KAOS if it wasn't a vapid and practically meaningless show. As nothing symbolizes anything anymore, we are just led from hollow plot point to hollow plot point.

If you cut it out of any cultural influence and see it as a story then it's... okay, I guess. But when you consider that it's meant to derive from certain material and it fails spectacularly, it's not a good story. It forgets its bases and doesn't play with the ancient elements at all. Disney's Hercules did it better, FFS!

Bad Writing (pt.1)

KAOS is not without recognizable themes but their demonstration is so juvenile and heavy-handed that it fails to influence a viewer of average intelligence. For instance, "Riddy" says to her religious mother "You dedicated your whole life to Hera, what about me?" Okay, KAOS, we get it. At the same time, this theme nulls itself because it turns out that Ridy's mother was right to do what she did, as she had a greater goal in mind. (And this, kiddos, is called Bad Writing, because your themes and scenes contradict each other)

The biggest theme I spotted was a criticism of religion and religious people who say "Do as I say, not as I do" and create exceptions for themselves. Only, it's not a criticism of anything real, in this case. It's a fact that some people in the clergy tend to preach peace and love and then they do harm, but we don't know, for example, that The Goddess of Marriage is a cheater and yet she pressures everyone into strict marriages. By focusing their wrath on divine beings who are not known for their hypocrisy, the creators missed the mark.

I can give KAOS props for how it handled Trojans to reflect real issues regarding how immigrants and war refugees are mistreated and blamed. I'd argue it was the only (nearly) well-done theme in the whole show because it had the least on-the-nose delivery and some genuine/serious scenes. But that's it.

More Bad Writing!

Jeff Goldblum's Zeus is shit. He'd crap his pants in an argument with a stern Greek dad/uncle his age. Is this character supposed to be intimidating? (Laughs in Mediterranean) That's not to say that Goldblum is not a good actor, but this role wasn't for him. The same can be said for the other actors, too. They are competent but they only give off the air of "The Greek gods if they lived in London, from the minds of people who think beards and body hair are an affliction". In addition to being misplaced, the actors cannot show their talent when following a script that resembles a children's book.

Why does THE GOD Dionysus have the maturity of a 15-year-old? I repeat, The God Dionysus. He's a freaking deity, and a very old one at that. He is not a teenager neither in appearance nor in experience. In our culture, he is mystical, mighty, wise. Why did they downgrade him so? Just for the plot? This is not Dionysus just because you named him so.

The dialogue rarely takes itself seriously to the point it has you wondering at times "Do people talk and behave like that?". In a comedy where everything is meant to be already extreme and parodied. Even in comedies, something must occasionally be serious so there is a healthy fluctuation in tone and the funny moments can hit you. In KAOS very few scenes treated their impactful dialogue as it should be treated.

The queerness and diversity (good elements, in general) were worse off for being in KAOS. Like, I want these elements to be there. I'm just sad about the whole situation. It's not enough that the show is shit, now you also give an additional reason for conservatives to shit on diverse and queer characters because they are part of a stupid narrative.

I'm the type of person who doesn't mind the queerness of Astyanax and Theseus being lovers in the context of this specific show but they're still the oddest pairing to me because they're from the most irrelevant myths and eras. Also, Astyanax in my mind is a baby who died tragically, for little reason if we are honest, so to bring him back and make him a love interest is... ekh.

In addition, isn't Astyanax supposed to be crippled after a fall from the city walls when he was a baby? Sorry to change subjects but the show is so convoluted and with so many issues that it's extremely difficult to stay on track with what's wrong.

To the person who thought this show was a good idea:

Whatever. Bye. I'm fucking done.

[liloinkoink]

hey guys, someone just sent me a weird ass ask claiming my incredibly close friend cherri @cherrifire secretly hate me and is talking abt me behind my back. i was not the only person to get one of these identical slanderous asks. i’ve already blocked the anon but like. open letter to them, and for the benefit of anyone else who gets an ask like this….

1) anon, you’re genuinely fucking stupid

2) hysterical to send this when i was actively chatting w her, while we were in the process of fleshing out yet another renchanting au, something we have done all day every day for… gosh, how long has it been now? nearly two years? i would say that it was really bad timing to send this ask to me while i was actively chatting aus w her but there really isn’t any moment you could have sent this that i wouldn’t have been.

3) if you thought i wasn’t gonna call bullshit and snitch immediately you don’t know shit about me or cherri, which, granted, is evident by the ask in general, but you really are stupid

4) if a gc like this existed—which it does not, bc cherri is not like this and would not do this—i would be in it. this idiot doesn’t even know im cherri’s emotional support writer. do you have any idea how many gcs and servers she’s dragged me into w her.

5) get your facts right cherri talks shit about me to my face. this is mutual. fake ass fan. if you were a real cherri friend you would know this smh

6) no, actually, you’re right, she definitely hates me. that’s why i met her irl literally like 3 months ago on her invitation, we hung out for a genuine week, spent basically the whole time arm in arm or hand in hand. this is also why we were planning a second meetup last night. you idiot. you fool. you complete and utter moron

anyway, if anyone gets this ask:

it’s complete bullshit. theyre sending this to cherri’s best friends for some godforsaken reason. it’s very weird and deeply cringe. also incredibly poorly planned. idk how many ppl you sent this to, but a few of us are in a gc and we have been making fun of this ask for like an hour (anon, im one of cherri’s friends and she’s been telling a small group of friends about you— lol. lmao even)

anyway like. to reiterate. cherri’s one of my best friends, she’s absolutely lovely and i’m lucky every day to know her. we hang out and chat constantly and we’ve met irl and it was an incredible experience i would love to repeat. i have told her things i have not fuckin told anyone else and you could not otherwise waterboard out of me. i love talking to her all the time and i miss her when she’s busy for even like, an hour. i love writing w her and creating things w her. she’s an incredibly bright spot in my life, often the first person i think of upon waking and the last i think of before i sleep. she is kind and funny and i love her a lot.

i’m a bitch tho so like @ this anon go fuck yourself. you better hope that when you die that the devil finds you before i do. sending this ask to a bunch of our friends, trying to turn the people she cares about against her, and for what? you clearly don’t know her well enough to be talking like this. trying to ruin my friend’s reputation and friendships w a vague as hell and entirely baseless copy paste is super fucking weird. why would you do this? and like, do you think we were born yesterday to fall for this? i’m insulted for her for whatever it was you were trying to pull and i’m insulted on behalf of myself and everyone else you sent this to that you think we’re as stupid as you are. what is your damage. get a hobby.

[stanshikabutromy]

every time i get a comment on my edits saying rogue didn’t deserve remy i actually lose my shit. did we watch the same show?

i have a lot of thoughts about rogue and remy in x-men ‘97 and none of them speak ill about them. first of all, it’s never even confirmed if rogue cheated on remy or not. they’re intentionally vague about it and the only time they’re deliberate about it is AFTER rogue and remy break things up (also on that note they were never official—remy says it himself). also do you really think rogue would get pissed at magneto for asking her to be his queen if they had been cheating the whole time? they just did all that to create tension for the viewers and to obviously add to rogue’s dilemma.

rogue is a complicated character people!!! her character does not revolve around remy—she is her own person!!! we keep forgetting that rogue hasn’t properly touched anyone since she put cody in a coma at the ripe age of 13 (i think idk). it makes sense for rogue to crave touch—a lot of her character revolves around her being jealous of the freedom that other couples have to touch. so when magneto comes along, he’s offering her this answer to her problem. he’s allowing her skin on skin contact and a relationship that wouldn’t avoid normal couple things.

now even with remy’s insistence that he doesn’t mind how things are, rogue is obviously going to doubt. she’s always been insecure about her mutation but she’s definitely ten times more insecure about it when it comes to relationships. remy is a known flirt, he’s know for the countless one night stands he’s had. he’s give all that up to be with rogue. so this leads to rogue feeling like she’s not giving enough in the relationship which leads her to believe she should leave and give him a proper chance at a real relationship. (she has a very singleminded view on relationships due to her seeing her fellow x-men’s relationships.) no matter how many times remy can say that he doesn’t care, rogue can’t help but feel like she’s cheating him out of giving him a real—or normal—relationship/family. which is why she turns to magneto in the end. she wants remy to find someone real/normal and she’s willing to compromise for him. she makes the decision for him as she inevitably believes that remy will do it one day eventually or he’ll end up regretting his decision to stay with her. her choice to choose magneto wasn’t out of her love for magneto but rather her love for remy. there’s a reason why the second after she kisses magneto she almost immediately realizes that she’s better off with remy because she can’t compromise and she’s in love with remy. so fuck all of you in my comments calling rogue a bop or saying rogue didn’t deserve remy. go read the comics or something and then maybe—just maybe—we can have a conversation.

[lover-of-mine]

I know that you've already gotten about a million asks like this already, but I'm also a person who joined because I vaguely heard of the hype of Bi Buck. I kinda joined the fandom at a time and in a corner of the fandom when people were just so happy to have Bi Buck that they were super excited about his relationship with Tommy. But even as someone who had truly zero context besides a few gifsets of them together and some posts, I still thought "oh, so Tommy is basically just Buck's love interest and nothing else? That's kinda sad that the fandom can't get a truly fulfilling queer ship. He's not even that charming, they just have to pretend because Bucktommy is more than they've ever gotten." (again, this is before I knew of Hen and Karen).

Later, I started to watch the show from the beginning and saw a few posts about Buddie and I was hooked from the first edit! It's wild to me that anyone can ship Bucktommy over Buddie past the initial joy of representation. Personally, I'd choose the friends-to-lovers, slowburn, matching each others' freak, having each others' backs, and whatever the entire shooting arc was over "at least they're currently canon" every day.

Honestly, it's kinda sad the way people just settled for rep for the sake of rep when the show does have good queer representation. And honestly, we are staring at what could be one of the best slowburns of network procedural history, you're dragging me off this ship kicking and screaming, settling for something just because it's canon when everything that buddie is is on the other side is so ????? to me.

[kimpossibly]

symptom of life | rain carradine

pairing: rain carradine x fem!reader

warnings: mentions of blood (that’s not actually there)

summary: in the middle of her journey to yvaga, rain discovers r’s cryopod has opened.

author’s note: I LOVE RAIN CARRADINE I LOVE RAIN CARRADINE I LOVE RAIN CARRADINE THAT’S ALL :) send me rain requests if you want! i’ll be writing about her either way lol also this was supposed to be smut but I changed it last minute LMAOO, lmk if that’s something you guys are interested in seeing!

The first breath felt like a splash of ice cold water.

She was bathed in light the moment her eyes opened—white light, the kind that seared your eyes like staring directly into the sun. Sun. Rain.

Her hands stretched out and found the cold, hard, top of the cryopod. All it took was a little push and, with a hiss, the door swung open. Warm air flooded in. Like a creature reborn from its mechanical pod, she slinked out of her chrysalis and left, leaving only the vague imprint of a body behind as proof she was ever there.

As for Rain, she was on edge the moment she heard clanking from somewhere in the ship. At the sound, her heart nearly leapt into her throat, her toothbrush frozen in midair. At once, her mind was flooded with horrible realities—another Xenomorph had made it onto the ship somehow and was now lying it wait to sink its teeth into her. A parasite had crawled into the ship and was waiting for the perfect moment to spring on her and do its dirty work. Either way, she was screwed. Even worse, so was Andy. So was Y/N. Rain’s heart clenched at the idea of the two of them, helpless, locked in cryopods, oblivious to the terror around them. Even worse, she could picture the moment they awoke to find Rain a cold corpse.

No. Quit that.

Abandoning her toothbrush, Rain crept into the hallway, her fingers itching for a gun or a stick or some kind of weapon. Anything, really. But no, she was on her own. She should be used to that by now. Slow step by slow step, she followed the direction of the clanking, every movement a cautious twitch. She willed her heart to slow, but nothing would help. Eventually she entered the wide room where Andy and Y/N’s pods sat. Except now, something had changed—one of them had opened. Her body went cold.

She practically threw herself across the room to the still closed cryopod, and found Andy’s peacefully sleeping face in beneath the glass window. She let out a breath.

“You’re okay, you’re okay,” she whispered in relief, both to herself and to him. She looked to the empty pod, half expecting to see a bloody mess where Y/N was lying. But she saw nothing of the sort. The pod was just…empty. As though she’d gotten up and walked out of her own accord.

At once, Rain’s head was on a violent swivel, searching the room for her. She dashed out of the room and down the opposite hallway, her breath coming hard and fast. She was here. She had to be.

“Y/N!” she shouted, her voice sounding starkly unlike her own. She turned corners and searched rooms quicker than she ever thought herself capable of.

After a few minutes she was worried she was going to run herself in circles. She walked and walked and walked, barely keeping track of where she'd been and where she was heading. She searched like a madman, scanning every corner for her. She’s in here, she kept repeating to herself. I just have to find her.

“Rain?”

She froze. The voice was soft, gentle, like the voice of someone who didn’t believe what they were seeing. It made her arms cold and her face heat up all at once. She turned, and there she was, standing at the end of the corridor, her left arm still wrapped in a thick bandage like it had been when Rain put her in that damn pod. The sight of her caused her chest to seize, her eyes to burn, and her heart to pound in her chest.

Y/N, on the other hand, picked up her bare feet and ran at Rain the moment she saw her.

It was less of a hug and more of a desperate attempt to hold on and never let go, their chests colliding with such force that the air was knocked out of both of them. Rain wrapped her arms around Y/N and squeezed, ignoring the burn in her arms and the tears that cropped up in her eyes. Y/N’s shoulders shook with tears that she didn’t know were coming, but in an instant they were there, tracing warm rivulets down her cheeks.

“Hey…” Rain whispered into her shoulder, her voice choked, “you’re okay, baby. You’re alright.”

“I didn’t know w-where you were,” Y/N sobbed. Her voice was muffled in Rain’s shoulder. “I-I thought—“

“I know, I know.”

Y/N pulled away, cradling Rain’s face in her hands. “Are you okay? Where are we going?”

“I’m okay,” Rain said, smoothing Y/N’s wild hair out of her face. “We’re heading for Yvaga.”

Y/N’s eyes widened at that. She sucked in a breath, almost afraid to ask, afraid to jinx it. “Yvaga?” She breathed. “We made it?”

At that, Rain’s face broke out into a small smile.

“Yeah. We did.”

They were heading towards Yvaga. After everything they went through, all the shit that they survived, they were finally getting what they wanted. They weren’t going back to Jackson’s Star, they didn’t have to worry about being forced to work until the day they both died. For once, they were going to see the sun.

Y/N leaned in, pressing her lips to Rain’s. She wasn’t sure how long she’d been in that pod—hours, days, months—but it’d been too long since she’d been able to feel like this.

Rain kissed her hard, grappling onto her waist like she’d lose her if she let go. She pulled away from the kiss, leaning her forehead against Y/N’s, her breath coming hard and fast.

“I love you,” she breathed, “so fucking much.”

Y/N felt tears sting her eyes—not the ones of fear and loss that she’d been used to lately. Real fucking tears. Happy ones.

“I love you too.”

[punkranger]

i have so many ideas that i wanna draw but most of them require panels and while i've gotten more used to that i kinda just wanna work on one piece and have it done without any need for follow-up or repetition...

[alyona11]

The duality of man is when you love Hadestown so much that you hate Hadestown

[ilovedthestars]

here's the thing. yes, some pieces of art are "better" than others. there are many criteria you can measure that with--technical skill, creativity, clarity, conceptual depth, successful execution of the artist's intentions, etc., and i do think it's useful to clarify which ones you're using as a measuring stick. but like, of course you can evaluate art. of course you can be critical (in the "art critic" sense) of art. (among other things, that's one of the most important ways to get better at making art yourself.)

however. when it comes down to evaluating what gets to count as art. what art even gets to have a seat at the table. i will go to bat for the thing that isn't as "good" every single time.

you can say you think a piece of art is bad. you can say you think it lacked technical skill, or clarity, or conceptual depth, and you consider those important elements of a successful work. i might even agree with you. but if you think that means it doesn't matter, someone is going to die on this hill and it isn't going to be me

[mildcicada]

[kazumasougi]

im gonna be real for a second. if fantasy can only be enjoyable to you when removed from any and all real world implications then is it even good

[kingdomoftyto]

...BIG FEELS AND BIG PLOT DEVELOPMENTS AT THE END OF THAT BOOK, HUH

[rawliverandgoronspice]

Desperately trying to write Ganondorf as someone capable of desire, like it was one of my goals going in these stories (I'm aroace and trying to challenge myself on this front creatively as I have a super hard time writing romance and attraction), and......... the more I write and the more I see him sliding further and further into the ace spectrum and I'm like....... this is just.... beyond my control isn't it

[crimsongrimoire]

ayo boothill come home. ill replace your cooler. Freak

[intertexts]

unrebloggable because id krill myself if this started getting notes but a brief summary of my thoughts on the matter !!! also kind of obviously this is just irt headcanon & such. obviously the most hated "fandom activism" or whatever is frequently just folks pointing out the stereotypes or shitty choices textually in the media & saying "hey maybe think critically about this for more than two seconds" & often receives backlash from people who r incapable of holding multiple ideas in their head at once!!

[laesas]

There's something to it, being pulled under the surface. Saying "it's safe to kiss me, safe to love me, here under the water, where we can't breathe"

[silentspectres]

You mentioned Gale Wyll and Karlach having a positive influence on Mercury, would you elaborate? I am very normal about Gale

That's so fair, I have a friend who is also very normal about Gale (he constantly tells me about his need to relentlessly bully him <affectionate> + I am genuinely surprised how much he grew on me too)

thank you once again for being interested in my strange tiefling, by the way!! I love getting the chance to talk about Mercury

I wrote more than I intended so everything's under a read more!

For some background context: Mercury didn't do relationships of any kind before the events of BG3. They maybe held some people close when they were younger, but after a rather striking betrayal they suffered from, they cut people out. As a young rogue who was quickly getting used to underhanded tactics, this was easy for them to maintain, especially since things were much easier to do while fully anonymous (masked + cloaked) and solo. This habit carried over post-tadpole and it took several days once the full group of companions were gathered in camp for any single one of them to even know Mercury's name, which Mercury only offered up because they had previously made a deal with Shadowheart whenever they met again on the beach post crash. (I do have more context for this I can share sometime)

Mercury's isolationist attitude and well-guarded nature played a huge part in their early dynamics with everyone in camp. They kept to themself and humored the people they were traveling with (choosing to help them with their problems) only because they were smart enough to realize dealing with a mindflayer tadpole alone would be tantamount to death. It was well into late late act 1/ early act 2 before Mercury came around to actually caring about anyone in camp, and even though they had people who would freely call them "friend" by that point, they still kept their distance and mostly sat alone from the rest. (The isolated overlook in the camp at the mountain pass was a favorite spot of theirs) At this point, I think they spent a lot of nights reflecting on how they got tangled up in being involved with people again and being just generally upset that they actually care to have a stake in these people's lives and issues. It was difficult to grapple with the idea of accepting vulnerability in the form of caring about others and being cared about in return, especially because the main reason Mercury stayed away from interpersonal relationships was because relationships are messy and complicated and they invite the possibility in of being hurt. Trusting is not something that comes easy to Mercury, but they learn to exercise it.

So, Wyll, Karlach, and Gale were the largest contributing factors to getting Mercury to that point. I don't think any of them realized the effect they were having on Mercury (at least not the extent of it), especially since early on Mercury never spoke more than they had to and didn't even join the group at large around the fire whenever dinner was made more than half the time. They have darkvision - they're perfectly content to eat alone somewhere the fire isn't shining on them. Gale (resident camp cook) was never going to let them go without eating, though, so I imagine he tried to keep an eye on them whenever they did not join the group for food

And in general, it was little touches and nudges like that that softened Mercury. It's something that happened so gradually they didn't even consciously clock it as happening, otherwise they would've reinforced their walls and made more of an effort to keep others out. On an individual level, Wyll, Karlach, and Gale each offered something different that Mercury - ever the mirror they are, albeit one shattered and stained in crimson along the broken edges - ended up reflecting back.

Wyll struck a particular first impression with Mercury as they met him while he was play sparring with a tiefling child in an effort to teach him something of self-defense. Mercury encouraged the kid and treated Wyll with respect - not suspicion or coldness - pretty much immediately out the gate. They were more reluctant to hear him out about his father since they have a complicated history with the city and definitely had a harder time giving him the time of day about some of his heroic tales, but it never really stopped Wyll from treating Mercury as an equal or even favorably, and the turning point of their relationship (which could've definitely broken the tentative trust forever) was whenever Wyll confronted Karlach. Wyll chose to stand up for his principles - helping those in need, protecting those who are vulnerable - even in the face of losing his soul for it, and that left quite the impression on Mercury in the long run, especially because Wyll faced Mizora for a tiefling who clearly wasn't what she had been made out to be. Mercury needed a good role model like Wyll a lot sooner, honestly, but seeing that someone out there was still willing to fight for what they believe to be worth protecting in the world directly challenged Mercury's apathy toward others and set them down the path of wondering if things could be different than how their life had ended up becoming, if they just tried again

Karlach's influence is a lot easier and more straightforward. She didn't really do any one thing per se - she just was. She's loud and friendly and cares so much! All the time! She took one look at Mercury, asked, "Is someone going to be their friend?", and didn't wait for an answer. Their dynamic definitely feels like an older, tired cat (Mercury) begrudgingly putting up with an energetic kitten (Karlach). Her sincerity and the way that she lives completely differently than Mercury (to the fullest vs barely living at all, especially when you know the further context that Mercury absolutely didn't even want to be alive anymore during the first two and a half acts) wore down Mercury's defenses over time. She became one of Mercury's traveling companions at first out of necessity (between two rogues and a wizard, someone had to be the brawn), but she's as radiant as the sun itself and definitely made the trips more enjoyable. She definitely pushed boundaries the hardest, I feel, because she constantly tried to keep Mercury included, and her constant pressure to rope them back into group activities and mindlessly including them in conversation is 100% the reason they eventually started coming around willingly. It's like when you introduce a new cat to a household and have to have them sniff the other cats through a door, except with a strangle little tiefling who for some reason kept eating alone in the dark and is really good at pissing off gods.

This next part about Gale might be needlessly long and I'm so sorry about that, but he is, bizarrely, the catalyst of what finally broke down Mercury's resistance to being actually involved with anyone, and honestly he came to be who Mercury would consider their first friend of the group. (Friend in the sense Mercury returned the sentiment; Karlach's friendship was one-sided until Mercury finally warmed up to her fully and Astarion doesn't count because he + Mercury decided they just. couldn't be normal with each other for so long)

What sets Gale apart in particular is that he is extremely earnest. Mercury was off-put by him for a long time for a variety of reasons (found him in a rock, he speaks so much and is So weird about it, he is direct and honest) and to be completely honest, he was the companion Mercury trusted the least due to the fact he was so open and honest about things. Early on, Gale was by far the person who was the most talkative with Mercury and was the first to ever directly approach them for something, even if it was to cryptically tell them that he desperately needed to absorb magic from artefacts they find. Mercury obliged, tried not to ask too many questions, and somehow hours later they found themself still in conversation with Gale about one thing or another. I'm only slightly exaggerating - a lot of their early dynamic was Gale deciding he absolutely needed to tell Mercury something immediately and Mercury stood there listening to him speak, wondering why they're still listening and why he's telling them about how he fucked a goddess (which they think was a horrible idea + situation), and wishing he'd stop telling them about any new random topic of conversation that popped into his head. They thought he was so strange (as if Mercury isn't) and they didn't understand why he was so insistent to tell them virtually everything about himself, but yet they did always end up listening to him about it. This coupled with Mercury's distrust toward him for how earnestly he spoke about matters and his own feelings meant Mercury especially kept him at a distance - they humored him because it was easier than avoiding him, but they absolutely did not want to be dragged into his whole mess. And yet-

So, at this rate, in the transition of going into act 2 (the mountain pass/the underdark), not only had the party started to get along and grow closer with each other, but all the little influences of Gale actively seeking Mercury out as a conversation partner, Karlach making sure Mercury was included and treated with the same warmness and kindness as she did any of the others with no hesitation to the matter, Wyll providing insight to a way of living for others Mercury had never humored, Astarion starting to just barely come out of his shell (causing Mercury to start to realize he's genuinely really fun), and the others (Lae'zel/Shadowheart) starting to relax, too, in this group dynamic that is so foreign to them, had set Mercury firmly in the position of being comfortable. And they hadn't realized that, yet. That realization came later, when the first major crisis posed to one of Mercury's party members presented itself in the form of a wizened, old wizard: Elminster.

This is why Gale became the catalyst of Mercury realizing they had let themself become comfortable and start caring. Elminster showed up to send Gale a message from the goddess of magic herself - the very same goddess Mercury can't help but think has always taken advantage of Gale, regardless of if he does or even can see it that way - that said "you will be forgiven if you kill yourself for me." Mercury has always had an issue with the gods (for reasons I haven't quite pinpointed yet), and it genuinely upset them that a goddess would offer a convenient 'solution' to multiple issues she could solve herself if she really cared to, all the while masking punishment behind forgiveness, and Gale just accepting it like it's not only normal but the correct thing to do. It was the first time Mercury had felt protective over someone in a long time, which is something they didn't even know they had it in them to feel anymore, especially after years and years of survival instinct dictating that they must care about themself above all else. This, coupled with Karlach leveling with Mercury she's not so sure she'll make it because her engine has been actively getting worse, as well as Mercury realizing their previous discomfort over learning what Astarion's scars said didn't make them uncomfortable just because it read like an infernal pact, but rather because they actually personally cared about the position it put Astarion in, leads to Mercury having a looooong couple of days where they have to grapple with the fact they've gotten themself way in over their head and there's just no turning back now. At least they had plenty wine to keep them company.

I hope this sufficiently answers your question! I uh. didn't mean to write a whole essay, but I think about my character's motivations and growth over the story constantly and I'm always more than happy to ramble to anyone who wants to hear it!

Also as a bonus because you are normal about Gale, the awkwardness of Mercury not knowing how to deal with Gale early on (act 1 - early act 2) was only intensified later when Mercury realized Gale had fallen in love with them at some point? They had to sit down with him and level with him 1) that they would never be with someone romantically (that wasn't a lie at the time, they were genuinely blindsided by falling in love with Astarion) 2) please find someone who deserves you 3) have better taste and I think about that constantly because there's something so funny to me about Gale looking at Mercury, who is an absolute disaster of a person who can barely function socially, and deciding "yeah I'm into that"