#and actually have it be relevant to their lives

[innerfare]

You’re Jealous

 Summary: You get jealous of someone else in his life.

Characters: Luffy, Zoro, Sanji, Ace, Sabo, Law, and Kid

Genre: Slight Angst // Fluff

CW: None // SFW

——— 

Luffy: He never told you Boa Hancock was in love with him, and when you find out, you have to remove yourself from the situation before you have an emotional outburst and start something with the Pirate Empress. The problem is, you don’t even know which emotion will spill out of you. Finding out the world’s most beautiful woman, and a powerful Warlord, no less, is desperate to marry Luffy is a whirlwind, to say the least. Luffy can seem clueless at times, but his emotional intelligence is through the roof, and he picks up on what has you upset almost straight away. He knows to give you some space, and when he senses you’re ready, he approaches you with a handful of wildflowers he picked. He doesn’t really say much, just pulls you into a hug, presses a few kisses into your cheek and temple, and says in your ear, “you’re my girl.” 

Zoro: He didn’t mention Perona was also at Mihawk’s castle for those two years until a few months after the crew gets together. He tells a story that features her, and you realize there was a woman keeping him company. Your heart drops into your stomach. Zoro insists he didn’t mention her because he didn’t think she was relevant; the only thing Perona did those two years was annoy him. He’s actually the one who won’t let it go, not you (even though you are pretty jealous). Whereas you’d prefer not to talk about it, Zoro is wracked with guilt because he’d never considered the whole thing in a relationship context. Him fretting constantly over it actually heals your jealousy because you realize you’ve never seen him panic over the prospect of hurting anyone else’s feelings. 

Sanji: Even with a third eye, Pudding is stunning. And Sanji almost married her. It was before you two were together, but listening to the stories from Whole Cake, hearing how close he came to marrying another woman, knowing she really did fall in love with his kind heart and wonderful cooking, turns you into a little green monster. You know you shouldn’t feel jealous of a woman you’ve never met before, a woman Sanji chose not to marry, but you can’t help it. Sanji is completely shocked that you would feel jealous over his relationship (if it could even be called that) with Pudding, though after thinking about it some more, he does realize why you might be jealous that he had a fiancé. His solution is to bring you a bouquet of roses and walk you through the dark details of his life, telling you things he’s never outright told anyone, so you understand the special place you have in his life. 

Ace: He collects people without trying, and often times, without realizing, either. Ace thinks he’s just making friends, but you see the way the women he laughs and shares drinks with are drawn to him like plants to the sun. He promises them freedom and adventure (and he has a very nice laugh), and you can see how it excites them. You don’t really mind it, knowing Ace well enough to see the way he holds those women at arm’s length, even if he seems close with them (such is the magic of Fire First Ace). But Yamato makes you jealous. It’s not hearing the way they laughed together but hearing the way they fought that gets to you. You know how Ace lives to fight and even just roughhouse, you know how he’s a rough and tumble guy, and you worry you’re not tough enough. Should you be punching his arm when he makes a joke? Should you be trying to trip him out on deck? What should you be doing? When you finally come clean with Ace about what’s been bothering you, he actually laughs. “If I wanted to be with someone who gives me hell, I’d be sleeping in Marco’s cabin every night. Besides,” he says, scooping you up in his arms, “I like being able to manhandle you.” 

Sabo: Sabo is a flirt, and you knew that going into your relationship. It actually doesn’t bother you when he flashes that charming smile of his at someone else or swoops in to save a damsel in distress (a speciality of his) and even serves to entertain, especially on the rare occasions his flirtations are rebuked. What does bother you, though, is his tight relationship with Koala. You know it’s ridiculous to be envious, you know Koala would sooner saw off her arm than kiss the man she considers her irksome big brother, but they’ve known each other since they were little kids, and Koala has been through so much with Sabo that the pair have such a close bond. It’s not the angry kind of jealousy that bubbles up in you when Koala mentions something about Sabo’s past that she assumes you know but you don’t, just the sad kind that you try to keep to yourself. Surprisingly, Sabo notices, though you don’t realize until he hugs you from behind and mumbles in your ear that he’s glad you’re the only one who knows he has a skincare routine, his silly words diffusing your mood and acting as the exact affirmation you needed. If it’s not enough, though, he’ll happily prove his loyalty to you by challenging Koala to a karate match, though.  

Law: Dr. Law and Dr. Robin sure do get along well- so well, in fact, you can’t help but wonder if they are better suited to each other than you and him. Even if they didn’t have such good chemistry, it would be impossible not to feel a touch of jealousy toward the archeologist. She’s intelligent, beautiful, fiercely loyal, a member of the Straw Hats, and has an impressive bounty that she earned even before she became a pirate. Needless to say, you find yourself brooding when the Robin brings him a beer and sits down beside him to discuss the immune systems of fishmen, a topic both are rather interested in. Of course, you’re interested in that, too, thus the reason Law realizes something is wrong when you don’t participate in the conversation. He ends up excusing the two of you and taking you to bed, worrying you had too much to drink, the thought you may be jealous never once occurring to him. You end up not saying anything (many thing in your relationship with Law being unspoken) and just sleeping it off, the fact that he excused the two of you proof enough of his loyalty. 

Kid: He doesn’t ever talk about his first love, Victoria. In fact, you didn’t even know she existed until Killer got drunk one night and began speaking of his dearly departed. What he didn’t mention was that Kid, too, had been in love with her. It only comes up the next night when you mention it to Wire, who mentions it was the death of his first love, Victoria, that put Kid on the war path and united the first four members of the Kid Pirates. Realizing Wire messed up, Heat chimes in to say, “he’d do the same for you.” But you’re not convinced, mainly because Kid never told you any of this. It tears you apart, leaves you tossing and turning for nights on end, until you finally burst into Kid’s workshop one night ranting about how he doesn’t trust you and holds you at arm’s length. “Heat says you’d do the same for me, but-” Kid cuts you off and says, “I wouldn’t do the same, I’d do worse. Much, much worse.” And from the wicked gleam in his eye, you’re inclined to believe him. 

———

Hope you enjoyed it! If you want more, you can check out my masterlist here!

[thenamesblurrito]

so. Transformers ONE was a good movie

i HIGHLY recommend going in blind, i do think it's incredibly effective with as few spoilers as possible beforehand! seeing it on the big screen is really really nice too, i encourage you to watch it in theaters without reading up on it first if you can!

long full-spoiler review and dissection of elements below (i reached the text block limit a couple times oops):

general stuff:

gorgeous. just genuinely visually gorgeous. so many details, colors, textures, everything was so beautiful. the stylization itself may not be my favorite but it was executed so well that i ended up loving it. their optics! their colors! their movement! the way the visuals serve the lore and the story is extremely well done too, i felt like everything i was seeing was deliberate, relevant, and a treat for the audience instead of just "ooo visual noise look at how powerful our cgi rendering is" (which is how i felt about the "live action" Lion King prequel(????) ad they showed before). all the little cameos and repaints and everything in the background? mwah. GORGEOUS MUSIC TOO AAAA THE WAY THAT TFP'S MOTIF IS IN THERE AAAA

the visual effects and action, the way they USED their roboticness/transformation sequences/vehicle modes in fighting and moving and emoting, it was VERY GOOD. Orion grabs a Death Tracker and RIPS THEM INTO PIECES BY TRANSFORMING AROUND THEM AND FORCING THEIR FRAME TO SHATTER. insanity

this is ABSOLUTELY the origin story movie the fandom has wanted. even if it wasn't your preferred origin story, this movie SHONE with love and respect for the franchise and drew on so many influences to craft a powerful version of the beginning we all wanted to see

in some ways i wish we had more, i think it would've been extremely effective to see things expanded upon, especially D-16's emotional descent and maybe some more Quints. actually looking at the content and pacing of the movie though, and the audience it's aimed at, i don't think there's anything they should've cut in favor of other stuff. i understand why it wasn't dwelt on more, but hooooo i would've liked to see Dee breaking apart a little more thru the middle of the film. apparently the novelization has more scenes of this and i would love to read it

i had so much fun watching this movie. it was a rollercoaster. it was a TREAT. i was sitting there enjoying every second both times i saw it because it was a good film that rewarded me greatly for being a Transformers fan, giving me so many easter eggs and injokes, while also being perfectly understandable and fun for a complete newbie. excellently balanced appeal to old and new fans alike

there was no wink to the audience about how stupid and childish a movie about robots is, there was no lampshading of how silly sci fi is, there was no betrayal of the emotional tone of the film. so many stories now kneecap themselves by mocking their very concept, and the audience watching them, in a very cinema sins-style irony poisoned way. this movie never does that. its humor is fitting, its drama is real, its emotion is all SINCERE and i love how i was never mocked by any part of the movie for engaging with it sincerely

this movie loved being a Transformers movie

anyways. specific stuff:

love how Wheeljack managed to explode everything despite not even being a scientist. he's just THAT good

THE INJOKES AND REFERENCES. "you don't have the touch OR the power." calling them Gobots. the corny More Than Meets The Eye bits. "don't be a glitch" is a headcanon swear i've been using for years now and they canonized it!! "High Guard, eject". "paging doctor Ratchet." the new take on "all are one". the really interesting way that the term Transformers is an actual significant in-universe name, and how Orion and Dee ARE NOT Transformers at first!

the sheer number of cameos is ASTOUNDING. what an excellent mix of masc/fem designs too, they really made it normal on this Cybertron which i appreciate! apparently Blurr exists here, his name was on the leaderboard!!!!!! good job Chromia i am so proud of you for winning. and the shots of the bots getting cogs at the end was aaAAA!!! <<33 my HEART! Jazz's little smile looking at his new doorwings!!

I GOT ALL MY SILLY OLD DEMIGOD FAVES I GOT THE THIRTEEN EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM AAAAAA ALPHA TRION MY GRANDPA god i'm so sorry you're dead but i can't believe you showed up on the big screen <<333 you and your rockin rhino unicorn lion alt mode. and your superpowers. god you're so cool. "old timer" NUH UH HE'S STILL BETTER THAN YOU!!!!! using Zeta for the thirteenth was an interesting choice! i did think he was Overlord for a hot second. it's the lips. Solus wasn't fridged by virtue of everyone else died too yippee!! ALSO MEGATRONUS THE COOLEST ONE WOOOO HES NOT JUST A FIERY EVIL GUY!!!!

the way Dee himself was, in a way, the Fallen of this continuity.... 😭

the way Sentinel was handcrafting his downfall with each touch of the blowtorch. carving the sigil of the Decepticons into the one who will kill him. dooming Cybertron in a moment of petty mockery. AND HE DOESN'T EVEN DRAW IT WELL IT'S LIKE A MESSY CRAYON DRAWING CMON

planetformer Primus in a blockbuster movie? CANONICAL EXPLICITLY STATED PLANETARY ROBO MPREG BIRTH IN THE FIRST FIVE MINUTES???? THEY USE THE WORD BIRTH. BORN. we are never escaping the reproductive insanity in this franchise

Shockwave you whiny tantrum throwing wuss. let Elita beat him up more. it's good for him. also love how that could be construed as a ref to her G1 resistance force

CASUAL MIND READER SOUNDWAVE???????

Elita was perfect, no notes. i would not like her if i met her but i respect her so much. she really is better in every way and down to business. Best First indeed

so much cool implications and fascinating timeline confusion. 50 cycles since the Primes were slaughtered? the way Sentinel leveraged their reputation to make himself beloved, casting himself as their peer? the way he didn't choose to villainize them, the way he apparently openly admitted to the loss of the Matrix and how it impacted the planet? when did cog theft start, and how old is Orion since in the novelization it states his entire generation is cogless? who remembers the og Primes? who is in the know about it all?? hoooghhghhh fascinating.

the implication that the High Guard worked with the og Primes?? the possibility STARSCREAM was a loyal guard for Cybertron's DEMIGODS????

okay i was not expecting a backstory for STARSCREAM'S VOICE in this movie but holy. god. the shippers will be going insane over this one. hoogh holy fit. what is wrong with you. the utter contradiction of being both an instigator and a coward when he gets in over his head and immediately backpedals

also obviously this is the I Love Divorce movie and megop shippers will be having a field day but i DEEPLY appreciate just how solid a friendship Dee and Orion have and how badly they fall apart, even thru a strictly platonic lens. i also appreciate how there was no forced comphet attraction/romance!! i was dreading the possibility of it, i mean Oplita was RIGHT THERE but they didn't force it at all thank youuuuuu. i would rather have this dynamic with its zero intended romance than awkward, OOC attraction shoehorned in to detract from the plot

Bee was actually good! like yeah he's def the kid appeal character and i prefer it when he's in a younger gen and not OP's peer, but he was wayyyyy less annoying than i was expecting! i think he fit the movie and did his job in it well, and i absolutely laughed at him multiple times. "i get to work for the GOVERNMENT! :DDDD" bee. please. the fact that he's been going insane and desperate after isolation for so long really helps make his character work instead of being just irritating

Airachnid you are so cool. you are TOO COOL. PLEASE TONE DOWN YOUR COOLNESS. i adore how she is not good at facial expressions thank you evil autism moments. love how her signature move is stabbystabbystabbystabbystabbystabby

Sentinel. god. Sentinel. SENTINEL!!!!!!!!!!!!!

i need to draw him getting ripped in half. it's like they distilled the worst parts of every single iteration and combined them into a SuperBad version. horrifically realistic kind of guy. i love to hate him. real Metro Man from Megamind energy. and megachurch pastor energy. the IRONY that Orion and Dee were probably actually helping him, that he was probably being genuine in the medbay when he said he loved what they did by racing, that he may have been honest when he said he was gonna have them fixed up in his own facilities and had them tour the mines! because them racing increased energon production by 150% and Sentinel needed that!!! he needed that for the Quintessons!!! i think he was being genuine when he first met Dee and Orion and then Darkwing ruined everything!!!

Darkwing is the curly straw of this continuity

the Quintessons were hoooooooooooooooo. whoooooooooogh. hoohhhhhhhhhhhh. the biomechanical. the shapes. the textures. eugh. icky. creepy. excellent. the way their ships looked like the Nemesis. the way they're STILL a looming threat. i wanted to see more of them but i get why the movie wasn't about them. i hope we see more in the future

the way Orion is the kind of guy who, in an attempt to be selfless, keeps making selfish or thoughtless decisions was SO INTERESTING. it set up the dynamic of his and Dee's friendship very well, with Orion always wanting the best for his buddy but ultimately overwriting or ignoring what Dee says!! the way Dee clings to the social contract of protocol for safety because that's all he knows and his ANGER when it's broken, even when it's Orion breaking it, because that's not SAFE it's an UNKNOWN it has CONSEQUENCES WHEN YOU DEVIATE. and then it's revealed that the social norms have been a lie the whole time and Sentinel has "broken protocol" more than ever and Dee has no safety left because it was always broken. Orion wanted to be more, he could feel there was more. Dee just wanted security

Dee spent so much of the movie complaining and arguing and it was very funny and good characterization but it was also a hint at how much bitterness was under there the whole time. so much of his complaints were threats of violence. he always had Orion's back and then when he learns the truth he abruptly. stops. do you notice he doesn't really have Orion's back after this? he's no longer by his side? he's there, but he's not... there. he was the first to shoot an enemy and took joy in it. all of his emotions were so justified and then what he does with them is what makes it a tragedy. he didn't have to do this. augh

i really, really like the fact that they managed to pull off the ending without it fully turning into a "boohoo if we do anything violent we're as bad as the bad guys waaaa". the specific phrasing of "rebuilding cannot start with an execution" went HARD. and it's demonstrated in their actions too like, Dee was out for REVENGE and it was PERSONAL, Orion was fighting for JUSTICE and it was UNIVERSAL. Sentinel was beaten, everyone knew the truth. it was over. but Dee in his (very justified!) anger and broken trust was too overcome to back down. they were given the power to change their worlds, but Dee was thinking only of his world. Orion was thinking of everyone

ironic that as soon as Orion starts thinking of other people and considering what they need instead of forging ahead, Dee decides to center his own feelings and actions to the point of murder. even after Sentinel was dead, he just kept shooting, he did NOT AT ALL care that some of those shots were clearly hurting innocent civilians/going wide and shooting out into the city/damaging actual important infrastructure and not just Sentinel statues. i believe it's Bee who said "he's gonna kill everyone" and he proves it by attacking Elita and saying "I won't stop until every last one of his followers is dead". THE FACT THAT HE FELL SO FAR AS TO SEE ELITA, HIS PEER AND FELLOW FREEDOM FIGHTER WHO WAS THERE WORKING AGAINST SENTINEL WITH HIM FROM THE START OF THIS QUEST, AS ONE OF SENTINEL'S FOLLOWERS.... by the end of it, Dee really was nothing but blind anger

and the way kneeling was a common thread!!!!! aaaaaaa. Sentinel betrayed the world by kneeling to the enemy. Dee won respect by refusing to kneel. Orion gained followers by willingly kneeling to his peers. hooghh

Orion jumping and stumbling and falling this whole movie because he just THROWS himself into things because he BELIEVES in things, he's the one to take leaps of faith, to take that step out into the unknown! and Dee refusing to save him as one final nail in the coffin, so clearly feeling like Orion jumping in front of the blast was yet ANOTHER way Orion is forcing his hand, corralling him into doing something he thinks is best but did not consult him on, finally FINALLY saying NO and leaning in to the tragedy!! and in the exact same way Sentinel handcrafted his enemy in Dee, Dee has now handcrafted his enemy in Orion!! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA and now that Orion took that last leap of faith and fell, now is when he RISES. ONE SHALL FALL AND ONE SHALL RISE. god. it reminds me of Spiderverse, the way they use falling and rising

the way the tragedy is worse for how well everyone was working together.... for one shining moment, the miners and the High Guard, the rescue mission, it was going so well. they were doing it. they were winning. it didn't have to turn to slaughter. if there was to be an execution it should've been by trial, by the voice of the people, not Dee deciding for Cybertron as Sentinel decided what truth was. augh.

in an abruptly different note, the way they have characters move and fly is so cool. i love the jetpacks. i love how flight is not "flyer" exclusive. it's fascinating and i think really fitting for the general city of Iacon itself. all those towers going up and down

THE TRAINS!! THE MOVING ROADS!! HOW COOL IS THAT!! LOOK AT THAT WORLDBUILDING IM OBSESSED WITH THIS CYBERTRON HOOGH. this movie was VERY good at building a rich, functional world of detail and making it very alien in a way i want to chew on forever. the moving mountains and greebled energon mines. the living planet. the deer!!! ooghghh. PRIMUS LOOKS LIKE A STAR

i do like this Primus actually, yeah it was a deus ex machina but that's the POINT. Optimus himself is an act of god and his presence heralds miracles. Dee couldn't bring justice to Cybertron because justice is restoration. justice is healing what was hurt and doing right by the wronged. yes that often means consequences upon the perpetrator but that's NOT what Dee was doing, he wasn't even THINKING of anyone else!! would killing Sentinel get ppl out of the mines? would it restore their cogs? would it bring equality to a clearly oppressive society? like he LIVED this (cogless bots with limited options, the talk of tiers as if they are social castes you can be demoted from, lower city levels where ppl can be banished, etc) but it was Orion who ultimately addressed this. i'm sorry if it feels like insult to injury to rub his Primacy in your face, Megatron, but stealing a cog just like Sentinel and declaring the age of Primes over, when it was the age of Primes ending that made you cogless and oppressed in the first place, is only an extension of your trauma, anger, and violence, and is not solving the problem!

a cog stolen from him at birth! and then he steals it from Sentinel in symbolic revenge, stolen again, but even that wasn't Sentinel's, it was stolen too! the way he discards the cog from Onyx, willingly gifted to him, to continue the trend of desecrating the dead! man. MAN. the name he took, the cog he took, the symbol he took, all from his hero, the one he looked up to, the coolest Prime, and THEN DECLARED THE AGE OF PRIMES OVER

the gilded pompous showmanship of it all was so gross, the way Sentinel's face was everywhere, the way he had instant access to everyone in Iacon via announcements that took over the media. but this was clearly derived from the previous Primes!! we see their statues, we see their stately tower, and unless Sentinel had all that built in "mourning" (which is totally plausible imho) he was really just setting himself up as an inheritor of that hyperwealthy standard! we don't know anything about the rule of the og Primes beyond that they're favorably remembered and loved (possibly because of propaganda but i think it was also genuine) and that they may have been losing the Quint war (considering that info was from jerkwad supreme i find it suspect) but just by comparison to Sentinel i think they HAD to be better rulers. there weren't cogless bots forced to mine for 20 shifts in a row back then!!! Sentinel is stealing their aesthetic as if that gets him the same power and acclaim. he's trying to steal their legitimacy. he paints himself across the face of Iacon to hide the fact the planet itself went into a coma because of him. he has ALWAYS been rejected. i call him a megachurch pastor but really symbolically i could say he's a fallen angel, and his visual design really fits too

i'm coming back to the deus ex machina thing bc i know it may be considered weak in a plot construction sense but i want to engage with it as literal. like, there is a literal in-universe god in the machine. they know it. they worship it, at least a little bit. i would consider this story to be analogous to Prince of Egypt, in that the deific is a real and tangible character with impact on the plot, and not a meta excuse to save the day. Orion made his choice, and as a result Primus made HIS choice. it's not necessarily a happy ending but if even Megatron acknowledges that GOD mandated this guy to be a Prime and the planet itself responds by COMING BACK TO LIFE.... i keep thinking of it like a cityspeaker, how they're the ones who commune with Titans to know their needs and tell them what needs to be done. is a Prime just the cityspeaker of Cybertron, able to help it remain healthy and functional?

the divine right to rule is REAL on Cybertron. you can like it or not but you have to contend with that when discussing fair leadership, political accountability, and representation of the masses re: Cybertronian government and Primacy

god i'm still so obsessed with the Thirteen i need to see them better i need to look at them. i love them. insane. i really need to invest in a chewtoy

also i know it may be a throwaway line but i'm very curious why Primus had to transform and sacrifice himself to save the universe. Unicron, maybe???

also how did Alpha Trion narrate the archival stuff telling the fake story of how the Primes died and the Matrix was lost. did Sentinel get a deepfake of his voice?? is that part of how he made the transition to power?? AUGH THE DISRESPECT KEEPS COMPOUNDING

Alpha Trion. my blorbo. my old man. holding you so tight. like an ancient rescue dog. im gonna groom you and give you treats and buy the biggest plushest dog bed from costco for you

anyways

good movie, guys

[hermitw]

I've been thinking about this reblog of yours for months and I finally figured out how to respond to it.

I went and read No Longer Human by Junji Ito and it was a very upsetting thing to go through. I don't think I can read it again. However, I came out of it thinking that Gege was probably inspired by it.

When Yozo is first introduced, I noticed that Takaba's backstory was very similar. Feeling isolated from others, he decided to become a clown to gain acceptance from others. (Citations in Image Captions)

And later when Yozo was caught "cheating" (it's in quotes because those women are child rapists), I noticed that her face was really similar to the one Higuruma's client made when he felt betrayed by the trial outcome.

There's probably a lot more to say about how themes surrounding CSA and suicide in this work are echoed in JJK, but I'm not able to make the post myself. No Longer Human is too far out of my comfort zone in terms of graphic depiction to delve into it deeper.

But you seem strong enough to handle it, so... Idk maybe run with this some more.

Ohhh this is so interesting! I could definitely read No Longer Human again - tbh I read Junji Ito's version years ago. This year I listened to the audio book and bought a copy - but it's like, a draft in the author's handwriting (bc I thought it would help me study Japanese and if I had an English translation that I'd read it on repeat lmao). But you're real for that - I forget how disturbed people tend to be trying to read through it, I'm sorry that was rough.

I did go back to read the reblog and idk how relevant all that was - I've reread the manga since and felt like, oh I might have been misremembering some things like Uraume - idk if they actually had a freeze response in ch. 219, since they did tell Yorozu to back off though it took a minute - but it's also interesting how their CT deals with ice. Like to have a fight response, they freeze others? It's so interesting but I can't be sure whether it's there at all. (ik that yap II inspired some more coherent posts, like how it influenced Choso's self-image, etc., I linked but didn't tag you back then bc I felt Annoying especially w heavy topics but I can definitely go back and find them if you'd like.)

On a twin peaks note (without spoiling it), I feel like it inspired jjk to some extent - I've been feeling like the last chapter will end the way s2 did. Or at least - with the weird dreamy themes, "we are the dreamer who dreams and who lives inside the dream", etc...

But you're right - Yozo and the others' reactions resemble more jjk characters than I would think to connect. Takaba's jokes are truly a shield... And now I have an excuse to read Junji Ito's version again? Thank u so much (also isn't it funny how September 28 Uzumaki airs and September 30 jjk ends?).

I think gege gets inspired by the most tragic stories, I wonder how much of that is accurate but I can't always be convinced otherwise.... Especially when anime / manga series that he's confirmed as influences often deal with autonomy in ways that I couldn't handle (Evangelion, the night beyond the tricornered window).

By the way - ik we've mentioned elfen lied before, but in the first episode, you know that coffee mug? How it looks like jjk foreshadowing? Even has snail head Mahito - cut off-, the baseball, Panda, the worm (also cut off).... and later the newborn babies that look just like Yuuji...

I swear that elfen lied, Kagewani, and banana fish influenced jjk. It seems so obvious w those, maybe Vampire Princess Miyu as well.

Sorry for getting off topic - I've been looking into why Momotaro keeps coming up in jujutsu kaisen, and in the end it came back full circle to that damn coffee cup. Invest in a baseball team? A zoo? I'm going insane.

All this to say - rereading Junji Ito's version and seeing if I notice similarities between manga panels is so exciting. Gege even made a note that he asked for permission before drawing - I think it was the Uzumaki CT - So we know he's a big fan of Junji Ito. And it seems like there is a rly good chance No Longer Human inspired him as well (though I feel like characters with similar traumas having similar reactions is inevitable to some extent, if they're written in a believable way, it should be clearer when I'm reading both stories in the same format) based on the stories he has officially referenced.

[valle-de-sombra-de-muerte]

Homestuck Reread: Act 5-1, Part 1/5 (p. 1989-2099)

Read the previous post here.

Well the last post got a much more positive reception than I expected, so that's a relief. Anyway, get the grey face paint ready, because it's time for Act 5-1.

Alternian script is the Daedric alphabet from The Elder Scrolls series flipped upside down, which I'm sure most fans know already. The user tries entering "Turdodor Fuckball" for the planet's name.

Interestingly, the correct name is not "Alternia" but "Trollplanet." Is that what Alternia translates to into English? There's like zero discussion at all about troll language because Hussie did not give a single shit about developing this alien society beyond "grey violent humans with horns."

Right out the gate, Karkat's intro leads with his key character trait: his crippling self-loathing. Everything about him, from how he excessively plays up his competence and knowledge to his naturally angry and defensive disposition, stems from the fact that he views himself as a defective freak that constantly needs to prove himself.

His interests are similar to John's. He likes bad movies, specifically romcoms, which ties into his greater passion for romance and the study of interpersonal relationships as a whole. He also has an inexplicable interest in programming. It's at least implied that Karkat only attempts to learn so he can try to compete with Sollux in a futile rivalry. The reason why John likes to program is anyone's guess.

His greatest dream is to join the Alternian military, which is probably the only viable career path for someone of his pariah status. He's constantly in danger of being culled, so he wants to prove to the Empire that he's more valuable to them alive rather than dead. In order to preserve his life, he's willing to serve them and become a tool they can use to further their intergalactic conquests.

"Trolls think fashion is stupid." A simple phrase that is regularly ignored by people who create fantrolls with garish and elaborate outfits.

A good programmer would have no trouble with this modus, so Karkat forces himself to use it until he gets good. Even though it's frustrating and causes him misery, he's so stubborn to prove himself as a good programmer that it reaches the point where Sollux has to take it away from him. Probably because it has become too much of a hindrance. IDK, we never see much of the trolls' session to find out, which is a fucking shame.

Karkat's stubbornness is also a key part of his character. See also: his trolling scheme of trolling John backwards through time is something he admits is stupid, but he continues to go through with it. He will admit he's wrong, often begrudgingly and self-deprecatingly, but will double down and refuse to change course despite that. Giving up is synonymous with failure, something he is deathly afraid of.

If Karkat is so afraid of letting his blood color become known, why does he have candy-red awnings outside his hive? He might as well have a big sign alerting everyone that a mutant lives there.

Everything about Karkat has to be big, flashy, and important. His huge ambitions compensate for his self-loathing so that others don't view him as the worthless mutant he sees himself as. He has to prove that he is a good programmer, he is a strong leader, and he will be the best threshecutioner in the whole military!

This pretty much summarizes what Karkat wants in life: to overcome caste discrimination and gain prestige and respect.

It's tempting to call Will Smith Karkat's "patron black celebrity" but I won't because 1) that whole thing doesn't carry over to the trolls, and 2) this is actually relevant to Karkat's character and not some bizarre, nonsense """joke""" like with the kids.

I've always been a big fan of "angry/uptight guy" and "goofy dumb guy" dynamics, and Karkat and Gamzee fit that to a T. Even though Karkat is extremely rude to Gamzee, he doesn't ever dispute the notion that they are in fact friends. Their friendship is being treated as an established fact, something Karkat uses an excuse to further whinge about how much his life sucks.

Gamzee drops his typing quirk momentarily. This doesn't happen often in the comic, but it's something trolls only ever do when they're close to someone, if they want to express something serious, or both.

Even before the introduction of quadrants, we see hints of a pale dynamic between them. Gamzee is the perfect sounding board for Karkat's vents, doesn't object to the verbal abuse being slung his way, and is implied much later on to be a somewhat of a calming source for Karkat. Yes of course I ship them pale. I just think they're neat, okay? <> :)

Gamzee very inelegantly changes the subject after mentioning Sollux and Karkat's friendship. Karkat may be Gamzee's best friend, but Sollux is Karkat's best friend. That must be a sore spot for him. But beyond this, we never ever see what Sollux and Gamzee's relationship might be like. It would've been nice if Gamzee was more jealous and protective of his best friend/moirail and not like it when Karkat shows more favor to anyone else.

Gamzee and Karkat's dynamic is something that I believe Hussie wanted to set up throughout the Act so that their eventual confrontation would have a bigger payoff, but he fumbled massively with the execution. Either because he doesn't really give a shit about Gamzee, or through sheer inept writing, I can't say. But it sucks because there's definitely a lot of potential here.

They're the first trolls to interact in this new Act, but they don't really ever talk much after this point. They're only ever seen together sporadically and it's implied a handful of times that they're closer than Karkat is willing to let on, but there's never anything beyond that. They really needed to speak more so their relationship could be fleshed out. I'll talk more about this as I move along because this lives in my brain rent-free.

It's really dumb how Gamzee's "rather obscure cult" ended up turning into a religion that pretty much every purple blood follows, but I'm not going to talk about post-canon garbage. I get a headache just thinking about it.

I do like the Joker Card posters in his room. I had that Riddle Box one in my own room for a time.

He likes to "chat a lot" with Karkat. So I guess they just talk to each other way more than what's shown in the text. Thanks, Hussie.

Gamzee never received a proper upbringing from his guardian and had to essentially raise himself. In the process of this, he became addicted to mind-altering substances. To everyone who says Bro is the worst guardian in the story, I gladly point you all to Goat Dad.

Terezi is being intentionally annoying. I know most of the trolls are assholes, but why do any of them waste their time with Terezi when she makes it a point to be obnoxious? It's even more baffling when people try to paint her as one of the more "well-adjusted" trolls.

Karkat fantasizes about making doomsday viruses, huh? I'm going to keep a pin in this for l8r I mean later...

It's funny how Karkat both admires and envies Sollux. Their relationship is also one that doesn't get a lot of attention, despite ostensibly being the "John" and "Dave" parallels of the troll cast. Oh wait, I guess John and Dave's friendship ended up being really shallow and one-sided too. So this tracks, actually.

Sollux disparages Gamzee's religion and expresses disgust when he suspects Karkat might be a convert. So again, I think there's definitely some conflict between these two. Two of the trolls that Karkat is closest to don't seem to like each other. It makes me kind of wish we got some auspistice action between the three of them.

Even though Karkat is regularly rude to his friends, he still values their company deep down. He might be one of the most personable trolls despite his grouchy attitude. He not only tolerates the obnoxious people in his contacts, he actually considers them his close friends. Gamzee is a total dullard and Sollux is crass and moody, but they're also the ones he's closest to. Out of the main cast of trolls, there's only one whom Karkat actively dislikes and makes no real attempt at being sociable with. I'll talk about that when I reach that part.

"Orchestrating the demise of the wicked" yeah I'm sure John was guilty of being very wicked and dastardly when she sent him to his death.

Terezi has a passion for justice, but keep in mind that "justice" on Alternia is equivalent to sentencing people to death for the pettiest of reasons. So no, she is not at all some moral, upstanding heroine. She's a psychotic gremlin who enjoys killing people if they violate her draconian interpretation of the law. She does not care for defending victims of injustice, she enforces the will of the state.

Part of Terezi's core conceit is that she's this half-assed Daredevil parody. She's 1) blind and has super senses 2) uses a cane to fight, and 3) is a "lawyer." Aside from that, she shares nothing else in common with Daredevil. I imagine Hussie does not know anything about superheroes beyond superficial, pop culture knowledge.

I remember when people loved to portray Nepeta and Terezi as good friends, but Terezi doesn't actually like role playing with her. She treats her like a joke, much like everyone else. Poor Nepeta gets such a raw deal.

In Nepeta's very first speaking appearance, we get a glimpse of her horrible relationship with Equius. Despite the physical distance between them, she's so browbeaten into subservience that she feels the need to ask him for "purrmission" before doing anything. She is scared about expressing her honest desires around him, preferring to skirt around the issue and just blindly hoping that things will work out and he won't get mad at her. It feels like someone trying to wear kid gloves around an abusive partner or parent. Despite Terezi's concerns, Nepeta tries to downplay the issue and pretend everything's fine.

This conversation is honestly sad to read. "But nooo they are bestest friends!" I hear the fans cry as they flock around the flanderized, fluffy art of Nepeta and Equius. Is that why she straight up admits that she's scared of him? Fuck Meowrails. I hate that shit so much. I'm going to spit so much acid every time it rears its ugly head.

We have to constantly be reminded of Terezi's blindness since it really doesn't impact her character in a meaningful way. Sure she can't see, but she can navigate the world around her so adeptly with her super senses that it's a non-issue. Nobody would even notice that she's blind if she wasn't always pointing it out.

Eridan is mentioned as being part of this inner circle that's in the know about Sgrub. Huh.

I'm old enough to remember when Eridan had yet to be revealed and the only information about him was this page. Some people thought he'd be some kind of environmental activist. It's funny to think about now, but I really miss the days when fans would theorize about future updates and unseen characters. All that guesswork and theorycrafting led to some really fun discussions and fanworks. The boundless creativity shown by the fans was what made the Homestuck fandom something really special in those days. And it's something we lost once the comic was finished and Hussie's completed product didn't measure up to the fans' expectations.

I really really miss 2010-11, you guys...

I really have to question the logistics of this convoluted reproduction cycle. If the adult trolls are off-world, how long does it take the drones to transport the genetic material back to Alternia? Are they just zipping all across the galaxy to do constant jizz runs?

None of this really matters because as previously established, the main trolls were not born in this manner. They're all slime constructs born from an entirely separate incestuous slurry from natural trolls. I think Hussie just has an obsession with creatures being birthed from goo or something.

One of the biggest problems with Act 5-1 is this rushed tone it has. It's weird to say because I remember how often people complained about how long the Act was taking to wrap up, but it's true! Hussie really wants to zip through these character introductions without elaborating on any of the worldbuilding he touches upon along the way. It's what makes troll society as a whole feel so shallow and not well thought out.

These characters really needed their own story divorced from that of the kids and Sburb. A story where the Alternia setting could be allowed to breathe and be explored more thoroughly and thoughtfully. I think that would've made for a more entertaining read.

Sollux gets this fake-out intro that's basically a retread of Dave's. Aside from being kind of standoffish and tech-savvy, this parallel doesn't go anywhere. There's little else that connects Sollux with Dave because Sollux is hardly a main character. He is the tech guy who has mood swings, doesn't like to be involved with shenanigans, and has visions of doom that make him depressed. He's a glorified background character.

Okay, "beenary code" is kind of a lame pun, but I do think "silicomb" is clever.

Kanaya lives near the ruins of Alternia's frog temple. Both she and Aradia are kind of the "Jade" of the trolls' session. Aradia by means of doing background plot stuff, and Kanaya through... I suppose theming? Both she and Jade are isolated, considered "outliers" in their culture/friend group, receive regular visions from Skaia, and are the teams' Space players.

It's worth noting how both the "Jade" trolls wind up being the most stoic, unflappable characters of the cast and mostly serve the purpose of being exposition-dumpers and plot devices. Kinda like Jade herself, except instead of being deadpan she's quirky and all over the place.

I feel like this post could've been a lot longer, but I'm limiting myself to only five posts for this Act. I don't want to stretch this project out too long, lest I be yapping about the trolls until the end of time.

[paeliae-occasionally]

hi pae pae!!!

what is your process of designing your maps? and how do you approach lore? how does that brilliant mind of your work to create such fascinating history and complex worldbuilding?

je would like to know the trade secrets pretty pls

p.s. how far along are you on xaeren? if it’s not far enough, im afraid i’m going to have to start protesting soon… 😔

p.p.s. before you say school is taking up your time—understandable. have a great day. keep being brilliant. i just really want more xaeren content.

p.p.p.s. in my head, i imagine xaeren as so mighty fine that there’s an occult in some middle school of a suburban neighborhood with an old classroom turned into a shrine for his feral fangirls to host club meetings simping over him

that’s it’s. that’s all the pspspsppsss i have. miss you! have a great day! cheerios!

Hello Naveena! Lots of questions! We will go through them one at a time.

What is your process of designing your maps?

So with maps I will start by just noting down the history and current function of the city which gives me an idea of style and layout e.g. all of the cities that were part of the Laith’Edrels have lots of circular designs whereas a modern altic city may have more typical alleyways and rectangular buildings Next I plot in the districts of the city, like where the upper class live, where the high streets are etc. I also add any key buildings at this time, like a plot relevant church or a mages tower. Lastly I go back in and draw boxes and house shapes for 2 hours.

How do you approach lore?

A lot of my lore is just a set of stories where I look at a place on the map, or a group of people and go ‘what could have happened here?’ The bigger worldbuilding points like the dissolution came from me wanting to have magical decay from fewer more powerful beings to more less powerful beings, so I needed gods. However it always frustrates me when there are canonically gods in a world who just sit back and ignore the world crashing and burning as one frustrated hero has to fix the problem, so I made a reason for them to be gone

History and worldbuilding

Honestly a lot of my history writing was based off of the large amounts of real life history I read in my free time. Studying how cities and empires develop then putting my own spin on them because magic would change some things. Worldbuilding comes from my maps really. I will label different cultures on the map then come up with myths and legends for that culture, magic specific to them or their ancestors, wars and internal conflict. Then that spirals into pages of notes on the socioeconomic background for Onkairel. It is lots of fun.

“would like to know the trade secrets” she says after writing a whole book with detailed political lore and plenty of depth to the world.

You know the secrets. You also know the secrets to actually writing the book too.

So about Xaeren…

I will be writing the scene where he meets Kell soon so I will tag you in it when I do, but you are right about the school work :( so it may take a little while.

“an occult in some middle school of a suburban neighborhood with an old classroom turned into a shrine for his feral fangirls to host club meetings simping over him”

So you say that jokingly… No, to be fair he isn’t known for his an appearance but he is quite well known in Zairel as an assassin and member of house Hiresias. He is terrifying and intriguing to many because of his unique magic that Lysandri can’t explain so I would not be surprised if there was discussion of him in the lower ranks of Lysandri and Hiresias.

I will write some Xaeren soon. Have a lovely day <3

[pearlypairings]

✨Photocheer Princess Diaries AU ✨

THIS AU IS GENIUS EMPRESSS~

Okay, so....

I think Jonathan would have to be Mia/the secret heir to the Genovian throne. Our outcast emo boy with an eccentric single mom? Works perfectly here~ he'd get a little style makeover (a proper haircut at least lol)!

Chrissy would be his best friend's twin sister, whose been totally crushing on him in secret for years. He's completely oblivious to it because she seems like she'd only be into preppier things since she's in cheer and loves pop music. But she loves his down to earthness, his art, and the way he talks about the world needing change.

Jonathan would really struggle with the transition toward his royal lessons. Having lived on the line of poverty most of his life, the frivolity of these etiquette rules seem ridiculous and out-of-touch with how real people live. This tension would come to a head with his grandmother (Has to still be Julie Andrew bc she's an actual queen, sorry lol) and they'd argue over its relevance.

Joe, the security guard, would still be very paternal and protective of Jonathan. I think it would be actually lovely for him to finally have that male figurehead look out for him rather than always being the responsible one.

annnnd finally back to the romance, Jonathan would have had a minor crush on Carol. Once it gets out there that he's a prince, all the relationship dynamics would shift! He'd have to sacrifice time he'd normally spend with his bestfriend and Chrissy for lessons and events, but also be tempted when his own crush starts inviting him out to parties he's never been invited to before. Carol takes advantage of his position to kiss him on camera for her 15 minutes of fame, upsetting Chrissy and disappointing his grandmother. In the midst of deciding whether or not to renounce his title, he ultimately persuades his grandmother that their country needs royalty that can understand them and relate to them and they host a ball in his honor where he invites the Cunninghams with a sincere apology. Eventually Chrissy does show in a stunning gown where they dance together and escape to a little garden and have a confessional heart to heart about their feelings for each other:))

omg I'm so tempted to smoothen these details out empress....what have you done........

send me a ship and an au

[oflgtfol]

trying to juggle my jobs rn and i just feel so like . lol. like jack of all trades master of none. No i do not have a full time professional career but i work all these weird ass, unique, semi specialized, and not connected at all jobs that make people double take every single time they hear about Any of them. michaels is my most normal one UNTIL i start talking about framing then everyone is like what the fuck. i was telling my coworker at my other job about framing and he was teasing me about how passionate i was getting about like frame anatomy and construction. he had me rating his framing setup for his college diplomas and i was like "well i like the fillet but the mat is uneven and the glass is not anti-glare and also probably not anti-UV" and all his only response was. asking me what a mat was. and then at michaels i talk about my other job and everyone is always like dude that's so cool. they're more wowed by the uniqueness of the job but sometimes they ask me about the logistics too and then i'm getting the teasing about being passionate about some niche nerd shit. i cant even talk about that other job here because it's so weird and specialized that i'd doxx myself. and my internship. i've mentioned it before but i tend to avoid outright discussing it as directly since it also is more high stakes than michaels but its still like, augh? it had me in contact with fucking county executives over both the phone AND email and shit about stuff pertaining to social work and welfare. augh

oh and another point of chaos to all this is also a volunteer opportunity/informal unpaid internship that someone at my other job works at and i saw her hoodie for it and was like omg i totally wanna join. and i definitely definitely cannot talk about what that is cuz that will 100% doxx me as well if i ever were to work there. all i can say is that it is an actual scientific research thing. but like how the fuck do i have time for any of this and why does none of this have anything to do with each other. custom framing for art and photography; social welfare programs; scientific research; [redacted]. there's so many cool and interesting things in the world why cant i do all of it

[bet-on-me-13]

Wes ruins everything

Wes had finally done it, he had finally realized why nobody ever belived him about Fenton and Phantom! It made so much sense now, he had been looking for an answer for years, thinking he was going crazy because everybody refused to see the Obvious!

He was Cursed!

He literally had an Ancestoral Curse on his Bloodline that made it so that all those born with the gift of Prophecy would be ignored! A Gift of Prophecy that he apparently had.

It was Cassandra's Curse, the one from Greek Myths. Apparently she was his Great×1000 Grandmother and passed down the Gift (and Curse) of Prophecy to him. And he knew how to break it!

All he needed to do was gather the right resources, chant the correct incantations, make sure not to accidentally summon a Demon in the process, and he could just foist the Curse onto some other poor schmuck. Sure it would suck for them, and he would loose his Gift of Prophecy, but Wes had been ignored for Years at this point, he needed validation!

So he did the Ritual, and he didn't mess it up, and he managed to get rid of the Curse.

Now all he had to do was convince everybody that he was right for the first time in his life! This was going to be great!

...

Cass didn't know what was going on.

A while ago, she had started getting these...gut feelings that she couldn't explain.

She would look over the details of a Case her Family was working on, and see a patern that the others were seemingly ignoring. Like when she realized that The Penguin was about to raid the Docks on the East Side, but the others were convinced it was going to be on the West.

But when she had tried to tell them, they had brushed her off. "We've already concluded that he will begin the Raid on the West side, no need to go to the East."

She had gone anyways, and low and behold she had been right. But nobody even acknowledged that she had been right at all, they had just wondered how they had missed the signs, not even questioning how she had known.

It wasn't limited to Cases either. Even small things, like telling her brother's where the TV remote was were brushed off, and hours later they would still be looking, never even having checked where she told them.

It seemed that no matter what, nobody cared about her point of view anymore. They kept brushing her off, telling her she was wrong, actively ignoring her ideas.

And it was getting worse. They were starting to ignore her more and more, forgetting she was in the room, not calling her down for Dinner, even forgetting to check in on her during Patrol.

She knew that there must be something going on, Magical or otherwise, but when she tried bringing it up with her Dad or JLD, they would also Brush her off.

Her Family was forgetting her. And they didn't even realize it.

...

Danny was not okay at the moment.

When he had gone to school a few weeks ago and noticed everybody staring at him, he didn't give it much thought. Maybe Dash or Paulina had spread another Rumor about him again, not too out of the ordinary.

When his name had been called over the Intercom, he hadn't thought much of that either. His grades were falling even more than usual, so he assumed his Guidance Counselor wanted to have another talk with him.

When he walked into the Principals Office to see both of his Parents and some GIW Agents, that's when he realized something big must have happened.

He didn't have much of a chance to react when the Shields went up, but he did react when the first Ecto-Blast scorched the wall behind him. His Parents began to scream at him as they fired their Blasters, something about replacing somebody? He didn't know, he was pretty preoccupied at the moment.

It took more effort than he cared to admit to escape the Room, but a stray shot to the hidden Shield Projector under the Principals Desk proved to be his saving grace. Unfortunately the moment he escaped the Office, he was met with a veritable Army of GIW Agents, all armed to the Teeth with Weapons he had never even seen before.

He managed to get away for a moment, hiding in the Bathroom as the Agents chasing him passed it by. That's when he met Wes.

He obviously hadn't been expecting him, but the moment he saw him Wes put on a smug look. "Oh hi Fenton, trying to get away from the other students?"

Danny had replied with confusion, "What the hell are you talking about?!"

"I finally managed to convince everybody about you, now everyone knows that you're Phantom! I'll bet you're hiding from all of the other Students hounding you for questions right?"

"...it was you?"

"Yeah, so? I finally get to be right!"

"...You absolute MORON-"

That was the last Danny got to say to Wes before an Ecto-Blast launched him through a Wall, seeing his face morph into a look of Shock just before the dust cloud covered it up.

Since that day, Danny had been on the Run. Nowhere was safe anymore now that the GIW knew both his Human and Ghost's faces, but he had to keep running. He crossed state Lines already, and was on his way to the next Ecto-Rich City he could sense, somewhere in New Jersey.

He cursed his Fenton Luck every day. Why had everybody believed Wes this time?! Nobody had ever belived him before, nobody even seemed to acknowledge his existence after a while! What had changed?

Danny just wanted to rest already.

...

Cass had taken to Patrolling alone recently. She had taken to doing a lot of things alone, actually.

After the first month, it seemed that nobody could remember that she was in the room with them, even if she was within their eyeline, she just faded into the background. By the 2 Month Mark they had stopped talking to her entirely, although occasionally she would get a Text or two from her dad. By the 3 month Mark she was completely invisible, and By the 5th she had been forced to get used to it.

She didn't know what was going on, was it a Meta Ability? Magic? Alien Tech? She had no idea.

She had begun to cook for herself after the first time Alfred forgot to set her Plate at the Table. The same with Washing her own Clothes, Cleaning her Room, and Paying her Phone Bills. At the very least the Automated Allowance Payments to her Account had kept up, or she wouldn't have been able to go to her favorite Cafe anymore.

It was bittersweet for her. She used to go to that Cafe every week with Alfred, but he didn't even come on his own anymore. Had he only come for her? Did she really mean that much to them? It hurt, she finally had a family that cared for her and suddenly she didn't exist to them.

She sat alone at a Table, ignored by everyone in the Cafe as usual, when a new face walked in. He looked about her age, a little roughed up, walking with a sort of cautious gaint, as if he was scared of something. His Body Language seemed to agree with her assessment, as his body practically screamed "Worry" in its movements.

Cass stopped watching at that point. Just another Gotham Teen, probably worried over something like getting not having enough money or getting mugged on the way home. It was a Common sight in Gotham.

She attention was pricked again for a moment when she heard a voice speak up. "Uh, can I sit here?"

She ignored it, he wasn't talking to her.

"Um, excuse me? Miss? Could I sit here?" He repeated.

She ignored him again, he wasn't talking to her. Nobody talked to her.

"Hello? Do you have Earbuds in?" He said, and he waved his hand in front of her face.

Her face. He waved his hand. In front of Her Face.

He was talking to her.

She looked up at him sharply, seeming to startle him for a moment before he asked, "So, is that a no?"

"You can see me?" She asked.

He looked a bit bewildered, but replied "Uh, yeah? Why would I not? Are you...a Ghost?". That last part sounded a bit suspicious.

"No. Not a Ghost. But nobody sees me. Ever. Nobody remembers me." She replied. She had never spoken this much to anybody outside of her Family, but in the past few weeks she had been starved for interaction.

He seemed slightly interested, and sat down at her table. He looked her in the eyes, and said "Do you...talk about it?"

She smiled. He could see her.

[giantkillerjack]

You shouldn't get a wheelchair, walker, cane, shower chair, or any kind of assistive technology mobility aid because then you might become dependent on them. Just like how you also shouldn't get glasses if you have bad eyesight because then you might become dependent on those.

For instance, if you end up stuck using corrective eyewear, you could actually lose your ability to tell what things are even when they are extremely blurry! You need to get used to having migraines from seeing unclearly because if you wear glasses all the time, you are basically giving up!! You don't need to see things coming at you from far away! You just need to get good at dodging, and if you can't, then you have no one to blame but yourself!!

For example, I read a really heart-worming article recently about a girl who was stuck using glasses - just absolutely, tragically trapped in her eyewear from dawn to dusk, even though she was good and never ever complained; and I heard she trained herself to discern the blurry faces of her loved ones with 60% accuracy! - she was even able to walk down the aisle at her wedding WITHOUT forcing the discomfort of seeing a woman in glasses on all her guests!!

Sure, she had to give her vows with a splitting headache, and she couldn't see her husband's expression when he said "I do," but overall, SO inspi-ration-al!!! So up-lifting!!

(She didn't even have to use a seeing eye cane, which would have been the worst-case scenario, obviously, because she worked hard to make sure she looked LESS disabled, not MORE disabled!!! Everyone knows blind people exist solely to be a cautionary tale to sighted people!!)

Also, did you know some people get glasses when they only need them a little bit?? How selfish of them! Sure, there's not a shortage, and an increase in demand would result in overall increased accessibility to glasses--but emotionally it's like taking glasses away from someone who needs them more! After all, if everyone who needed glasses got them, then...... um...... more people would have glasses! Which is probably bad!!!!

I also had a friend who was trapped in glasses who saved up all her money for laser eye surgery, and I don't know why everyone doesn't just do that! Sure, some doctors say some people don't "qualify" and it "won't help" those people, but that's why you can't give up!! You don't want to be one of those people!

After all, what's the worst thing that could happen with an unnecessary laser surgery to the face that comes with crippling debt??? It's worth the risk to gain your FREEDOM back, and I'm so proud of my friend!!

Tragically, she did die later that year while driving Uber and squinting at street signs, but at least now I know my friend is finally free from the shackles of her terrible eyesight. #ripAshley #rippedAshley #justripit 😌😌😌❤😇😇😇

And that's why you shouldn't get used to using a mobility aid!! Because, like glasses, they are inherently embarrassing to be seen with; and - like glasses - it is more noble to suffer silently than to depend on unnatural technologies that force you to rely on them; AND - just like glasses - by abstaining from using them, you DEFINITELY benefit SO many people in tangible life-changing ways!!! (Besides, everyone else will be so much more comfortable if you just look normal! 😊)

I hope you learned something today. 💖

[joshuamj]

In Stars And Time? More like In Ace And Gender

+ some alts

[quirkedupkicks]

anime onlys how we feeling this week

[blueberryspyder]

Listening to Rusty Quill Gaming holiday episodes has me like

I’ve gotten into some niche shit before, but this? This is a bit much even for me

[batsplat]

This line made me sooooo insaneeeeee

BUT ITS TRUE

they did not expect it from each other

You mention that after sepang 2015 that marc refused to take it lying down and retaliated, would you say that one some level vale expected him to just take it?

And also could you please recount events in which marc also waged mind warfare on other people after the divorce™ I think that the psychological aspects of his style are so incredibly interesting like how in le mans, bezzechi kind of crashed out and how viñales mentioned in post race interview how " when he heard marc's bike he knew it was over"

Thank you for your very valuable contributions to motogpblr, you enrich the experiences of all

right. right! following on from this post... fair warning: 'what was valentino's plan in sepang 2015' and 'what mind games has marc cooked up over the years' are two questions that don't exactly lend themselves to concise responses, though I've done my best to edit this down to a somewhat more palpable length. so *cracks knuckles*. let's do this

first off, sepang 2015. yes, marc did very much refuse to lie down and, yes, he did instead very much retaliate. I'm not sure if I'd say valentino expected marc to 'take it' exactly, though the hope would have been that it would a) make him more cautious around valentino, b) throw him off-balance, and c) make him more error prone. I mean, certainly you'd have to assume he didn't expect marc to react like that because.... well. otherwise, why would valentino have done it? yes, he has repeatedly alluded to having wanted race direction or dorna or whoever to step in, but those guys infamously aren't particularly proactive. and, let's just pretend for a second here that marc really had been plotting to ruin valentino's title - what are you going to do about it if you're the ones responsible for enforcing the rules? even after sepang, when it was reasonable to suggest marc had been messing with valentino in that race specifically, there was only so much they could do. sure, the main reason they didn't penalise marc was because he'd crashed and had in essence already been penalised. but if you want a more drastic penalty, then you're going to have to show that marc is doing something emphatically illegal. I mean, it's not like race direction penalised valentino when he was racing jorge in what can only be described as a cheerfully malicious manner in motegi 2010, at a time when jorge was close to sealing that year's title and the two of them were racing for *squints at notes* p3. they can't actually stop you from being a little shit, you know

this line of argument might be ascribing too much rationality to valentino's actions - maybe he was hoping race direction would do something. it's worth pointing out that one of valentino's later comments (from march 2016) to my reading suggests that valentino had already spoken to race direction several races before sepang about marc's behaviour, but they didn't listen to him. the sepang presser then constitutes an attempt to publicly force their hand... except it still wasn't enough. and a part of valentino surely must have already known it was going to go wrong after saturday's qualifying. the incidents during the practise sessions that weekend weren't particularly egregious, but they involved two riders who were both clearly willing to play games with each other (including in some towing-related shenanigans). crucially it's not really the type of thing that would happen if one rider had been spooked so badly they're making sure to ride on eggshells around the other bloke. at the end of the day, valentino thought he could unnerve and disorientate and unsettle marc - and if you're being generous you could say he at least picked the right target. marc had broadly demonstrated he could be unsettled that year, which jorge had very much not

if you're being less generous you could say 'but it's crazy he's doing this to the bloke who isn't even his title rival'. which is the whole problem from valentino's perspective - he simply couldn't engage jorge in direct combat (and again, this does make it more remarkable he even got it to valencia given one of his big big strengths in title fights was being completely neutralised). jorge has been involved in plenty of great battles over the years, but his 2015 title was won purely on raw pace and having just enough tracks where he was fast and it wasn't raining for things to work out in his favour. it was marc who valentino was continually getting into fights with, whether at argentina or assen or silverstone or... well, even phillip island, valentino fights marc a hell of a lot more than he does jorge. which makes for a weird championship in a lot of ways, but also makes it a bit inevitable that valentino ends up disproportionately focused on a bloke who isn't actually his title rival

if you want to be even less generous, you can say it was a rather radical misread of marc's character from a man who (any conspiracy theories aside) has always seemed to understand marc pretty well. like, this is the thing right, obviously hindsight is 20/20 and all that but can you really imagine any universe in which marc hadn't done something roughly along the lines of what he did that weekend? in a way, this is probably the bit that bothers me the most about the whole thing, just feels like it couldn't have ever achieved what valentino intended it to. I can excuse breaking the heart of the kid who hero worships you, but I draw the line at being kind of dumb

the way I'd break it down is by looking at why he was in a headspace in which he wasn't making good choices, and then consider what his actual thought process (however irrational) might have been. so on the one hand, you've got all the contributing factors that explain the poor decision-making process, that explain why he wasn't thinking clearly. on the macro level, you have the arc of his career and what this title meant to him and how it fits into his desire to win on his own terms and prove everyone wrong and all of that. you have the pressures of that specific season and how it had gradually gotten more and more intense post-assen, the influence of the people around him and how they had allowed/contributed to him getting increasingly distracted from the actual riding as the season went on. this factor obviously includes the man who actually presented valentino with the phillip island telemetry and had seemingly been badmouthing marc for more than two years. you have the arc of valentino's relationship with marc, his belief that marc was a sore loser who only played nice with valentino while he was winning and who valentino thought he had been more than generous to in response to marc's lack of composure earlier that season. this eventually coalesced into a mental list of all the times that year valentino felt marc had fought him differently than he would anyone else, from argentina to assen to silverstone to misano to, of course, phillip island. you have the compressed time scale - four days from the race at phillip island to the presser in sepang, at a time at which valentino will have been at his most exhausted and spent after the travails of first motegi and then phillip island at the closing stages of the toughest season of his career. it's this that creates the sense of urgency, the need to do something now to stop the opportunity from slipping away. and then, of course, on the micro level you have the actual details of the supposed conspiracy that relied on the specifics of how the race at phillip island ended up unfolding... of tyre management and seagull murder and fluctuating lap times and suspicious late race pace and a perfect last lap

which, okay, I think it's fairly obvious that valentino wasn't thinking clearly. but he still must have been intending the presser to do something, something that was different from what it actually ended up doing. now, the way this works in my head is that valentino basically did the equivalent of pressing a big red button labelled 'chaos'. if you do what he does in the presser, that's the inevitable outcome, right: you're ensuring this entire weekend is going to be a complete mess. in theory, you're the one person who's had the chance to mentally prepare yourself for that mess, because you're the person who's pressing the button. you're hoping everyone else will be off-balance, distracted... to some extent it's less about wanting to intimidate marc per se (bad idea!) and more about making sure he has other stuff to worry about. maybe you're hoping marc's going to make some mistakes, crash in ways that aren't caused by a movement on your part that looks suspiciously like a kick, be a little out of it all weekend. I mean, marc did have a tendency to hit the deck when under pressure that year. the hope is at the very least he's going to be a little more cautious, so worried about ruining his reputation that he's not going to attack you too hard. basically, hope he does anything other than what he actually ended up doing, aka throwing himself at you again and again in the race in a sort of agonised fury that paid no consideration whatsoever to his reputation, ruined or otherwise

this is where the sepang 2004 parallel is at its most instructive to me. you're giving everyone something to talk about and you know it's going to be the centre of attention that weekend and you just kind of have to hope that the chaos ends up creating an opportunity. and, for a hot second there, it did look like valentino might have been onto something. he qualified on the front row for only the fifth time that season (y'know his qualifying actually got a fair bit better in 2016, presumably because he just wanted to maximise the number of awful vibes pressers) and he outqualified jorge for only the second time that season (again I don't mean to be rude but, jorge, how the fuck did you almost lose that title what were you DOING). it's pretty unfortunate that the very start of the sepang race played out in the exact perfect way to allow dani and jorge to escape while marc and valentino started divebombing each other. this is the thing right, there are lots of ways that race could have unfolded and it basically could not have gone any worse - and it's helped make valentino's initial decision to blow shit up age particularly horrendously

the other underlying explanation is a somewhat more opaque one. people want to feel good about themselves, they want to have a positive sense of identity along several different metrics like self-worth and moral virtue and so on. it doesn't feel good to lose, and it especially doesn't feel good to lose if you've tried really, really, really hard. a lot of sports psychology is about the challenge of managing vulnerability. there is something inherently vulnerable about competing in the public eye: you are trying hard to win but there is always the possibility that you will lose. if you lose with other people watching, you are making your inadequacy public knowledge. this is why athletes search for explanatory mechanisms - maybe they make a public show of how they weren't actually trying hard, about how they don't actually care that much, or maybe there's something they can blame like the machinery or injury or the team not being on their side or whatever. maybe there's someone to blame. a narrative of sabotage allows you to preserve belief in both your own ability and your own self-worth; it is the perfect explanatory mechanism. and to some extent, this type of thing is necessary - you're not going to be able to compete well unless you have high self-belief to the point of delusion, which means you do have to tell yourself all kinds of things to keep the faith. but paradoxically, these explanatory mechanisms are also incredibly dangerous, because you cannot compete to the fullest extent of your ability if you are not throwing yourself into what you are doing in your entirety, without any restraint or self-defence. you have to be open to experiencing the pain of defeat in its rawest form to be at your best. you have to be willing to go to those infamous 'dark places' within yourself to win. the moment you are thinking about how you will explain your defeat, chances are you've already lost

but hey, I've never competed in a motorbike race before, what would I know of the psychology of it all? let's get the words of someone who should know a little more than me:

Looking back, what I said about wanting a bike that could win at Welkom, well, that was a way of boosting morale, an attempt at wishful thinking. You can't demand something like that. And even if you get it, there's no certainty you'll win. But then again, we riders always say all sorts of things. Sometimes we believe what we say, even when it sounds crazy, other times we're just being hopeful and, still at other times, it's all an exercise in self-delusion. We try to convince ourselves of something, because ultimately, every time you step on the track, words don't matter, and it's just you, the bike and your opponents. In fact, that's the only time you really have a clear picture of things. When you're actually on the track, racing against your opponents. That's when you know where you are and where the others stand. You know how your bike is doing and how those of your opponents are faring. That's the moment of clarity. Then, you can say whatever you like to everyone else: your chief mechanic, your mum, your girlfriend, the press... but, deep down, you know the truth and you know it with crystal-clear clarity. You can tell people you fell because the bike didn't follow the trajectory it was supposed to follow, or tell them that you're actually really fast, but the bike simply isn't. Inside you, however, you know the truth. You know you fell off because you made a mistake, or because your opponent is simply faster than you. And the opposite is also true. Deep down, you know whether your victories were deserved. You know if you won races on the turns, when it's down to your ability as a rider, or on the straightaways, when it's all about the power of the engine. You know the others are looking to make excuses when they say you beat them just because the bike was better. I always knew the truth behind each of my victories, and behind each of my defeats, too. I knew exactly why and how I won or lost. And so, at the end of 2003, after winning everything in sight with the Honda, I was certain I could win with another bike. But, of course, until I actually did it, I couldn't be truly certain. Thus, I set off on my journey, in search of that place where certainty meets truth.

(sidebar: I find it funny how the bit about straight line speed reads like just an extremely obvious dig at casey in his ducati days but, published in 2005, your honour he's innocent)

what valentino describes in that passage is the awful, inescapable secret at the heart of all competition: at the end of the day, you do know. you can only do so much to protect yourself from the truth. you have to tell yourself a story, even if it's crazy, engage in all manner of self-delusion to throw yourself into the field of battle again and again and again - where inevitably you are going to lose, again and again and again. any great athlete has to start out at least a little delusional, for there is something inherently insane about thinking you will be one of the very best in the world in your field. eventually, much of that delusion may turn to reality for the chosen few, but the delusion never completely goes away because there is always more to win and always more losing to do along the way. when the delusion stops, so does your career. valentino's endless capacity for storytelling and self-delusion is inherent to his success - he would not have been as good as he was if he had not found all these stories to tell himself, all these reasons to believe, to keep motivating him, to wring special performances out of himself when he needed them most. he told stories that were ridiculous until he turned them into reality. if valentino were anyone other than the person who killed his tenth title in sepang, he would not have won the other nine in the first place

and yet, chances are, valentino already had lost headed into sepang. chances are, he knew as much. chances are, he chose the kindest possible story to make sense of it all. at the very least, what he wanted to do was expose the truth as he saw it - make sure that everyone in the world knew what marc had done to him even if it didn't end up saving his title campaign. but in exposing one truth, at the same time he managed to obscure a different one. because in the end, certainty never did meet truth in 2015, because we'll always have a question mark about what would have happened if valentino hadn't said what he had said in that press conference, what would have happened if marc had reacted differently, what would have happened if race direction hadn't handed out penalty points or if marc hadn't been so hurt and angry he was unwilling to take risks against jorge in valencia. yes, of course it's likely that jorge would have won anyway, but we don't know that. it's 2006 all over again, isn't it? there's a likely winner, there's maybe somebody who should be winning, but there's never any certainty. that's why we line up on sunday, or so the cliche goes. the main lasting success of that press conference is that it has cast a shadow over the whole championship - not just in the sense of making the whole thing unpleasant to think about, but in the more literal sense of concealing the realities of that title fight, of generating ambiguity as to how it all might otherwise have played out under more 'normal' circumstances

except, of course, valentino has told us himself that he does know the truth about all of his victories and defeats. of course he knows jorge was faster than him that year, which is why he wasn't trying to win that title on pace. by any reasonable standard, there's no shame to that, not at that stage of his career and not against that level of opposition. there's plenty of ways in which valentino was the stronger rider that year, still, somehow, and enough sliding doors moments that would have given valentino just enough points and granted him a completely deserved title. but of course it was still frustrating, and it was frustrating to be reminded constantly in the paddock - including by marc - of how jorge was the faster of the two of them. valentino knew he couldn't beat jorge on pace, which is why he never tried to, but it still wasn't easy. it still required him to just... put away his ego, ignore all the snide remarks about his speed, ignore marc's digs and jorge's cockiness, and just devote himself to winning the title in the only way he could. that's the heart of 2015: it's all about valentino suppressing his worse instincts right until the moment he doesn't. it's the pressure, it's all the blows his ego has taken that year...

and of course, it's also marc. at the end of the day, it'll always come back to that - the fact that marc had made himself into someone who had the power to genuinely hurt valentino and how he then managed to make himself a target of valentino's suspicions (topic for another post). going into sepang, valentino already knew that more likely than not he was going to lose the title, and he decided he blamed marc. at the very latest during the race, he knew he was almost certainly going to lose the title, and now he definitely blamed marc. that's how it goes, isn't it... valentino's reasons for saying what he said in the press conference were complicated, but marc's actions then proceeded to simplify everything. any uncertainty, for valentino, was removed by that race. it was stripped away even further, if possible, by how marc approached the valencia race and his decision that he wasn't going to risk anything - not when it could help valentino. their whole tragedy, of course, is that if you had placed valentino in marc's shoes that weekend at sepang, he would have done the exact same thing

which is unfortunately as smooth a transition as I can come up with to stop discussing valentino's psyche and starting discussing marc's. let's talk mind games

the first point that's worth stressing is this: most of the mental pressure that riders exert on each other happens on the track. I think this is where 'mind games' becomes a bit of a tricky term, because inherently the connotation there is that you're doing something a little sneaky, a little underhanded to get under the skin of your opponent. but valentino has said it himself: you need to be performing on-track for any of this to work. and it goes beyond that - the on-track performances are key in determining what kind of psychological pressures you are exerting on your opponent. ideally, this is a symbiotic relationship where, as valentino puts it, the off-track 'work' that makes the opponents 'suffer' is used to... well, just back up what you're doing on the track, to make sure they're getting the message. to just play with them a little in a way that is conducive to bringing about further on-track success

so, in the interest of not getting bogged down in semantic debates about what exactly counts as playing 'mind games', I'm going to throw out the term for now. I think it's interesting in itself that this phrase is how people refer to that kind of behaviour, something about how it comes across as just a little derogatory, a little suspect... but we're going to ignore that. it's completely useless to discuss 'mind games' as this kind of ethereal higher-plane tactic that only happens in press conference rooms and on three hour long podcasts, as if it's somehow disconnected from the reality of what's actually happening on-track. (on-track behaviour is also at times referred to as mind games - but less frequently, and it tends to be used more for behaviour in non-race sessions.) it's also a bit of a sleight of hand: there's not anything inherently more 'honest' or 'straightforward', anything less 'psychological', about deliberately bullying someone on the track versus saying something snide about them to the media. what we are interested in here is the question of mental pressure, how riders exert it on other riders, and how riders go about working on the suppression of their rivals. basically, for a more fun term, think of anything you'd consider to be psychological warfare and go from there (the ask does actually specify mind warfare, which feels like a happy middle ground)

and just to reiterate this, the vast majority of the psychological work valentino himself did on his opponents - including in ways that marc has gone on to emulate - was done on the track. a race like laguna seca 2008, which relies so heavily on tactics and valentino's assessment of casey as a person and what message valentino decided to send casey that day... well, it may have had its effects reinforced off-track, but fundamentally that's still a heavily 'psychological' victory that enraged and unnerved casey through what valentino was doing during the race. and if you're assessing valentino's 'mental game' while leaving out laguna 2008, you really might as well not bother

so what we're looking at here isn't going to be exhaustive, but it's still going to hopefully cover most of the major aspects in a way that gives a sense of that integration between the off- and on-track. now, coming up with a list of examples isn't all that easy, because first of all... man, marc's been around for a long time by now... if we recounted every minor incident with another rider, we'd still be here by the time twenty to thirty years have passed and valentino finally gives marc a call. second of all, marc does undeniably leave less of a paper trail than valentino. partly he has objectively gotten himself involved in fewer feuds (though I'd argue there are also circumstance-related factors there), partly he's also been warier of how he approaches this kind of thing as a direct result of sepang 2015, and partly it's just a question of personal style

valentino tries to suffocate you with the paper trail, leveraging his skills at manipulating the media to make your life unpleasant, to throw distractions in your direction, at times to make sure you are overwhelmed by the frenzy and the noise and the chaos. all this, obviously, he does in addition to making your life on-track as miserable as possible. marc prefers a slightly quieter approach, maybe an indirect dig here or there, a habit of letting you know on the track if he's decided he has a problem with you. which means that a lot of what people consider marc's 'mind games' basically go something like this: a) rider does something to piss marc off (this can just be 'beating him'), b) marc does something dubious to them on-track, c) rider complains about marc, and finally d) marc goes ?? idk why they're saying all that but not really my problem :) and goes along his way

but that does make it a little tougher to actually provide a good overview of what he's doing - because, at the end of the day, I too can only be so certain that he's attempting to fuck with rivals. that's the nice effect of it, right, you get these statements from other riders where they're complaining about marc and broadly speaking I do believe them when they say he's being a little shit again... but it's a little harder to prove that this is his intention. which means they also end up engaging in a form of shadowboxing, where they think he's messing with them and they say he's messing with them but it feels kind of one-sided and silly and like maybe they're simply imagining things. which must be just... incredibly annoying. god

in a way, the best proof we have that marc regularly fucks with his opponents is that everyone in the paddock is more or less agreed in their belief that he is constantly engaging in psychological warfare. you've got other riders saying that marc is continually dabbling in 'mind games', you've got journalists on their podcasts saying that marc is always messing with people and is an awful teammate to everyone who isn't his brother etc etc, and you kind of assume they'd be the ones to know. though, if anything, this can mean they sometimes have a tendency to overshoot, which is how we got endless speculation at the start of this year on whether marc was lying to people or sandbagging or whatever when he was busy adapting to a new bike. sepang isn't irrelevant here - marc became more closed off and private and secretive and circumspect about his real feelings as a direct result of how bad that whole experience was for him. sometimes it feels calculated to unnerve his competitors, and sometimes it does seem more about just protecting himself. but that's the thing, right - if you acquire a reputation for "mind games", then people will think you're fucking with them even when you're not. which can be useful! but, as should be obvious, it demonstrates that just because somebody is accusing marc of engaging in gamesmanship, doesn't mean it's actually true (which is also of course the case for valentino)

^'who's most likely to play mind games in a press conference?' winning here! alex rins hands on hips we will get to you in a bit

all that being said, we do have plenty of fairly clear examples of the ways marc tries to fuck with his opponents, so let's get to those. here are the elements I'll focus on: 1) an explanation of how the on-track exertion of psychological pressure works, in races as well as outside of them, 2) intra-team dynamics, and 3) some specific examples of how the on-track and off-track tactics are integrated. again, far from exhaustive - the examples are supposed to be more akin to illustrating marc's approach rather than definitively listing every instance in which marc has exhibited a particular behaviour. the streamlined approach, if you will

so, let's start with the actual racing. the aspect you bring up in the ask: the intimidation. bez doing his sad little crash out of p2 in the le mans sprint, maverick thinking it's so extremely over the moment marc came too close in the main race. I've edited this section down a lot to avoid getting too into the weeds here, but let's just give the brief sparknotes version of how this intimidation works:

speed: if you are not capable of performances that unnerve your opponents, obviously you will not unnerve your opponents. no shit. marc's sheer pace is terrifying in its own right... it makes you wonder if that cushy gap you have to him is quite as cushy as it looked a lap ago. how often he seems to be able to access something special, how it piles on pressure in the context of a title battle to know that he is fast pretty much everywhere. the speed does a lot of his work for him in the intimidation department, nothing fancy required

circumstance: so, say you've got an alien behind you. not to name any names... but there are some aliens where, if they are having a good weekend, they wouldn't be behind you in the first place. that doesn't mean the alien can't still be plenty scary... but when they're at their best, they're dominating out front and so are less 'threatening' when they're sitting on your rear tyre. when things aren't going their way in a given weekend, you maybe don't have quite so much reason to be worried. marc (similarly to valentino) is a lot more flexible in how he wins his races - which might mean he's looking very ominous from say p5 at the end of the first lap. there's less possibility of respite, less chance that if he qualified badly, he has the decency to still be slow come sunday. if you find yourself on the same bit of track as marc... that's probably not great news for you in any weekend

aggression: the obvious one. marc isn't as afraid to crash as everyone else is, he's willing to go for it if he's given half a chance - which he never fails to remind people of. he said it about half a dozen times at le mans this year, including with his competitors in the same room. convenient when you have such an immutable character trait you couldn't do anything about even if you wanted to, which also just happens to make you terrifying to fight with. sometimes he mixes up this rhetoric a bit - e.g. in 2016 after his messy 2015 he did talk plenty about his newfound maturity. still, not bad if his opponents are constantly reminded of how unyielding he is... which is of course part of the reason why he bangs on about it so much

(on the flip side, while it is obviously in his best interest to barely say a word against hard racing because it would make him come across as a massive hypocrite, marc has this nice little habit of reframing his opponent's moves as just not being particularly sensible in that situation. look at how he talked about the pecco portimao crash this year - sure, it's a racing incident, but it also wasn't "necessary" to fight like this for fifth/sixth place given pecco had a championship to consider. pecco's move was "too optimistic" - and, my favourite bit, he would "learn" from what had happened. which is nicely condescending, and a good way for marc to criticise aggression in a more circumspect manner: don't call your opponent dangerous, call them an idiot instead)

tactics: linked to the second point - part of the reason why valentino instantly recognised himself in marc and has always acknowledged what a clever and tactically astute rider he is. the other aliens to varying degrees tended to prefer the 'start fast and fuck off' approach to winning races. by contrast, it's hard to really pinpoint what an 'average' race win would look like for either valentino or marc. they are capable of the 'dominate out front' victory (marc historically more so than valentino), but they also have a bunch of other ways of winning races that all produce their own psychological effects on their opponents. to give a few brief examples, you've got the 'stalking and studying' approach, closely tailing opponents and gradually ramping up the pressure while you analyse where they're strong and where they're weak before eventually making your move. you've got the 'comeback ride', which is frustrating in how it means the field is basically never guaranteed a break from these assholes - this is all about relentlessness and generating a sense of inevitability. you've also got the 'fucking around before fucking off' approach, where you get involved in a scrap for much of the race and it looks like you and your opponent(s) are on equal footing... before suddenly pulling the pin and disappearing off into the sunset. there might be good reasons for marc and valentino to stick around that don't just amount to 'playing with their food' (though there is that too) like tyre preservation or figuring out grip levels in the wet or whatever. nevertheless, it's intensely demoralising for the competition, because it almost feels like the whole thing was a lie, an illusion of a fair fight... they've been tricked into thinking they had a hope of emerging victorious. obviously, all these different ways of winning are also investments for the future, so that next time your opponents are in xyz situation you generate uncertainty and doubt and preemptive frustration in their minds, as they wonder whether they can really get the better of you this time

now, obviously a lot of this is just about marc's natural strengths as a rider - but the point is that these operate on the psychological level as well... and you can gently encourage this with a little bit of extra off-track 'work'. what you say about your own aggressive riding, what you say about your opponents' aggressive riding, any impression you want to reinforce in the minds of your competitors. there's a lot of long-term reputation management involved here. (a little more about these reputations in the context of argentina 2015 in this post.) most of the 'intimidation' happens on-track, and it's also a result of deliberate riding choices that aren't just about winning any given race. of course, it's helpful if you are particularly adaptable to different race situations, if your flexibility allows you to reinforce the impression that you are always a threat. if successful, you can make sure your opponent is already mentally beaten by the time they know you're coming for them. (I'm not personally massively a fan of the term, but this kind of thing is what generally counts as the 'aura' an athlete has.) ideal, really - to be so intimidating your opponents can't even put up a proper fight

then, of course, there's the stuff that happens outside of races but in practise and qualifying instead. a perfect opportunity to be a dick to others on-track without the stresses of a race. which means... well, look, we can't ignore marc's habit of sitting on other riders' rear tyres when they're attempting to hook together a fast lap. the towing thing radically escalated when the honda was at its least competitive post-2020, but marc was definitely very much already at it before that. (incidentally, one of the cuntiest things he has ever said was when he pointed out in 2019 that he was leading so many laps in the actual races that he wasn't getting much chance to study the other riders there.) nobody really needs me to list every single towing-related controversy marc has involved himself in over the course of his career, but it might be a good idea to get the thoughts of somebody who knows a thing or two about fucking with his rivals. valentino himself has gotten the towing treatment a few times over the years courtesy of marc, and both pre- and post-sepang his stance has generally been 'listen it's a dick move but smart play, gotta hand it to him'. take this from catalunya 2019:

and y'know, he gets to the heart of the whole matter rather nicely -thanks to the local marc marquez understander for logging in years before the discourse about it became such a big thing. marc follows other riders around because it's a great way to study them and he also does it because he knows it's extremely annoying. it's annoying both because you know you're helping out another rider who you don't want to be helping out, and because it is just quite distracting to have someone that close to you, being able to hear their engine, etc etc. one thing that changed after 2019 was how necessary it was for marc to do this... marc went crazy with it at a time when it was often the only way he could put together a decent lap (and also because it played into the strengths of the honda, for a given value of the word 'strengths' - he's spoken a fair few times this year about how he finds it harder to follow other bikes on the ducati) (not for lack of trying). but valentino is also spot on in that marc is excellent at choosing his victims, how marc understands you have to pick someone who needs to put a good lap together and has no choice but to drag you along with them

I mean, think about why he just couldn't seem to leave poor pecco alone for a while there. first of all, pecco is fast, and marc clearly feels quite comfortable following him around. secondly, pecco tended to put himself in positions where he really needed a good lap because he'd gotten himself stranded in q1 or only had one more shot at a lap or whatever. plus he was fighting for championships, so he couldn't afford to fuck marc over out of sheer spite. thirdly, pecco has been fighting for titles for the past few seasons, making him one of the riders to beat. which means that marc was motivated to a) study him, and b) fuck with him - both of which were investments for a future in which he could fight pecco properly. makes complete sense! insanely irritating if you're the victim, which is half the point. also helps that pecco very obviously found the whole thing frustrating and tiring and really hated being asked about it, but also was equally obviously adverse to kicking up too much of a fuss about it for various reasons. the perfect victim

on the flip side, marc has been known in the past to be quite careful about who he is giving a tow, like for instance this from brno 2014 (ironically the first race that year marc did not win):

The two front row slots for the Ducatis were a problem for Rossi, dropping the Movistar Yamaha rider down to seventh, and the start of the third row. Rossi joked darkly about Marquez’s strategy, claiming that he was giving the Ducatis a tow to put them in between him and his main rivals. “For sure he is clever,” Rossi said. “He doesn’t pull Jorge, me or Dani, always a Ducati.” Marquez laughed at the suggestion, admitting only half of Rossi’s accusations. He certainly didn’t look for Ducatis to give a tow, but he would not give one to his rivals, he said. “It’s your decision to close the gas,” Marquez told the press conference. “If it’s Dani, Jorge, or Valentino behind me, for sure I will close the gas, but if it is another rider, it doesn’t matter.” That is in itself an admission of just how little competition Marquez sees. He is prepared to give anyone a tow, except for the other factory Honda and the two factory Yamahas. In effect, he is dismissing the threat from any other riders. Harsh, but fair.

and, y'know, if it were so easy then everyone would do it. you need a certain level of skill to actually pull off the towing bit, which marc is clearly very good at. you also need to have a good feel for picking your moments, who to bully, when to slot in behind them, all that kind of thing. and, lastly, you also need the sheer power of shamelessness on your side. which, that should more or less cover it... there are some real gems like mugello 2019 where marc accused ducati of ordering pirro to shadow him and then played a complicated game of chicken to catch a tow from dovi and snag pole, or mugello 2021 where marc was so determined to follow vinales through q1 that he was even alert enough to dive back into the pits with him as vinales tried to get rid of the small train of guys following him... but overall, I think valentino did a pretty good job at summing up the main points for me, so let's leave the towing discourse at that. returning to catalunya 2019, obviously it is also extremely valentino that he then had a sneaky little look at the honda's dashboard 'just out of curiosity'. truly a meeting of the greats, those two, we'll never find their like again

let's move on to intra-team fuckery - which is all about suppression of rivals. your first job is to beat your teammate, and the first arena of trying to fuck with your opponents is what happens within the team. my general assumption here is that marc's particular approach is less inspired by valentino and more just the result of his natural competitive instincts (which, to be clear I do think is true for much of the tactics described in this post). it's also not something... I know the ask specifies post-2015, but I don't think it's something that changed after sepang, except insofar as marc had won the most important teammate war of his career and didn't need to be quite as aggressive towards dani any more. given the continuity between the intra-team situation pre- and post-2015, I'm not going to make much of a distinction here and just rattle through some details about the intra-team dynamic from the start of marc's time in the premier class

so, the first bit of context that has to be acknowledged: a lot of the dani/marc war wasn't really fought between the two of them directly. both of them had... well, rather drama-happy managers, who a) were willing to do a lot of the mudslinging on the behalf of their charges, and b) were pursuing agendas of their own to establish themselves within the honda hierarchy. I think it's fair to say that not all of what they were getting up to was necessarily just about acting in the best interest of their riders - and it is an internal power struggle that could've had pretty disastrous consequences for marc in particular. here's a longer write up I quite like about the situation within honda in 2013, which came to a bit of a head with the phillip island fiasco (when marc was disqualified as a result of failing to change bikes early enough). just a few excerpts (though again I'd recommend reading the whole thing):

(gabbarini is pecco's crew chief these days by the way, small world.) so obviously a lot of this is kind of dumb, not least because marc came very close to losing that year's title to a yamaha rider as a result of all this behind the scenes bullshit. it also is just the kind of thing that happens when you lock a bunch of big egos into a small space within a competitive environment - and is a nice little insight into the early year machinations that were going on as marc and his team attempted to establish themselves within honda. which they did in part by pushing through key personnel changes that replaced anyone too closely associated with the old regime... and there's also the less pressing but interesting question of whether (as casey believes) marc's team pushed casey out the door because they felt 'threatened'. this sort of backroom manoeuvring is part of the game, albeit an unsavoury one, and great athletes do have a tendency to be ruthless in asserting themselves within team environments

of course, by 2014 marc was asserting himself ever more on the track. dani might not have yet fully accepted the number two status, but he was increasingly pushed into a position where he knew he had to play along, to not kick up too much of a fuss in his own best interest. did that perhaps play a role in how all those 2013 complaints about marc's aggressive riding - not least when it caused dani to crash in aragon and effectively ended his title bid - died down a little in the following years? who's to say! of course, marc has been pretty open in admitting his abrasive approach to the teammate dynamic, which he was kind enough to shed some light on more recently in marc marquez all in. I assume pretty much everyone reading this will have watched marc marquez all in, but for reference I've still included a transcript of the relevant bits of marc marquez all in. here's marc talking about the teammate relationship:

Dani and I, now we get along great, and he's an amazing person. But in 2013, 2014, there was a lot of tension. He was the king, the number one. People listened to what he said in the box. Everyone expected something from him... The team was focused on him. And out of nowhere comes this kid. A kid in his first year after Moto2. And well, first race and... boom. Second race, boom. And it's a hard pill to swallow. [...] I've never been a nice teammate. I've always liked to... You've got to make your teammate's life impossible, if you can.

and dani's take:

Those years there was a lot of tension because we were fighting for the same thing. He knew about my potential. That's why he always tried to stick to me, so I had no space to really take off. [...] He's very competitive. That's his strong suit, how competitive he's always been with everything.

and then at the end of that segment, marc says the following:

It is true that after 2015, 2016, everything calmed down, and we had a good, normal teammates relationship. After a while, I think you learn to accept the situation, right? It happens, and I'm sure it'll eventually happen to me too.

which I suppose is a fairly diplomatic way of saying the relationship got better when marc had won the war and dani had to 'accept' his lot in life. the king is dead long live the king, etc etc. intra-team competition is perfectly natural, but of course that doesn't mean all riders approach that dynamic in the same way. dani's "I had no space to really take off" is a nice way of putting it I feel, how he talks about marc 'sticking' to dani, marc's determination to just continually work away at his teammate... to suppress him, to smother him, to ensure that not only was marc winning the war but he would keep winning the war. marc made that team his own and he ensured that dani's continued presence in that team was happening on marc's terms. a job very well done

marc is also remarkably open in describing one of the specific tactics he utilised to achieve the desired effect in suppressing his teammate. in marc marquez all in, he admits to intentionally giving misleading bike feedback when it could give himself an advantage over dani:

But back then we had a great bike, everyone worked well. So if a replacement piece worked for him, I didn't like it, "This doesn't work. I want this one. I want this replacement piece, since I'm leading it. I want it. Don't give him this." "You want to try it?" "Yeah, sure." But I didn't want to.

now, listen, I'm sure this kind of thing does happen. that being said. marc, come on, not everyone is engaging in this degree of underhanded behaviour wherein you're intentionally hampering your teammate's efforts to improve the bike just to ensure you continue to have an edge over them. let's make a casey stoner comparison, given that I am legally obligated to mention him in most of my posts. he is actually relevant here though, as dani's pre-marc teammate and the bloke who would have more likely than not been marc's teammate if he hadn't retired. casey talks a bit in his autobiography about working with pedrosa at honda, mentioning how it was nice to have a teammate with a similar pace so they could actually develop the bike together. he also says this:

I never felt threatened by a teammate because I have never had one that I felt was consistently quicker than me and throughout my career our biggest competition always came from outside the garage. Still, I have great respect for Dani, our partnership was a fruitful one and I think we worked really well together to help Honda build their best ever bike in the RC213V.

while I do quite like the implication that casey would have felt 'threatened' by any teammate who could match him, I think it's fair to say that this is a pretty different approach from what marc's describing above. of course, casey could be misleading us... but, call me naive or gullible or whatever, I really just don't think casey was pulling that kind of shit on his teammates. I'd go so far as to say that this kind of thing is maybe not quite as widespread as marc portrays it as being. it might also be worth quickly bringing in casey's thoughts on such a combative style of teammate relationship (from 2009):

probably for the best we never got to see how that particular teammate dynamic would have played out! also, luckily enough, we do actually have somebody who can corroborate that casey and marc behaved differently as teammates. let's get the thoughts of dani himself (april 2023, so after marc marquez all in had been released):

“At least in the team we were in, HRC, it was like this: the one who goes the fastest is the number 1, the one who chooses the parts and the one who determines the direction a bit. “When [Marc] arrived, I was in that position and with the races and the championships he took that position and decided in his own way. When I was directing more the evolution of the bike I had the parts first and I never thought in [my] own way.  “My way has always been to do the best for the team, and if I have the best parts to make the bike the best, I'm not thinking about my rival right next door, but about Yamaha, Ducati... whoever the rival was, because I consider myself part of the brand. Later he had that other way of doing it.  “I don't think I was missing [the same way as Marquez], because my way of being was that one. For example, before Marc came in, with Casey Stoner, he never played that game either."

so, yeah, maybe not completely universal behaviour. I don't know, I do find it kind of charming that marc has this very 'ah well everyone does it' attitude. now quite honestly I personally would not admit to this sort of behaviour even in confessional amazon prime documentaries - and it's fascinating what kinds of things he has a filter about and at what times he just decides to be, uh, very candid. I mean, I suppose this is a nice way of publicly forewarning any teammate who isn't your brother that you're going to try and make their life miserable. so that's something. anyway, marc did obviously win the internal war - which is the kind of thing that does matter if you're trying to impose your will on bike development... even if you're just doing so to fuck with your teammate. so by 2016 you reportedly had a situation where marc's direction was being followed to the extent that it harmed all the other honda riders:

But Pedrosa claims he had no input in the decision, and is now paying the price of having to compete on a bike built around Marquez’s preferences. The 30-year-old also said that he knew he would be in for a difficult time in 2016 as early as the Valencia test last November. "In the end we didn't have many specs [of engines], but out of the ones we had I wouldn't have chosen the current one,” Pedrosa admitted. "When we picked the bike I already knew things would be very hard. I already knew how the bike handled in November. But it is what it is. The choice of bike that we have was [Marquez's], I had nothing to do with it. For the moment, he's ahead and he deserves to be. He likes the bike, he adapts better to it, while I struggle more. That's obvious, you can see it in the results and in the way we ride." Pedrosa said the poor performance of Honda’s satellite bikes this season in comparison to previous years was yet further evidence of how the RC213V has been designed around Marquez’s needs. Cal Crutchlow’s sixth place at Catalunya has been the best result for a Honda rider besides Marquez and Pedrosa of the campaign so far. “You have to think of the team, not only about yourself,” Pedrosa added. “If you look at the rest of the Hondas, they are a lot further behind than two or three years ago, when you had [Stefan] Bradl or [Alvaro] Bautista finishing fourth or fifth. Now they are 10th and further [back]. So we have to try to get the other teams to work too."

obviously, to some extent teams following the lead rider and prioritising their feedback is completely natural and even wise - they're the one who is winning for you. it does also end up being a bit of a self-perpetuating cycle that makes the rider already winning more likely to continue winning, which helps explain why these riders are even so invested in their internal bickering. all that being said, of course it's worth noting that different riders conceptualise that teammate relationship differently, and the extent of intra-team cooperation can vary drastically. marc has a very particular understanding of that relationship when he is paired with anyone who is not his brother - one that is generally speaking pretty far along the combative end of the scale

unfortunately, we never really got to see how bad the whole marc and jorge (also not the easiest of teammates) situation could have gotten. in 2018, their relationship was definitely better than say 2013, but also jorge was still perfectly happy to criticise marc - whether after argentina, or that whole aragon incident they had

(marc did call jorge afterwards to check in on him, which jorge did appreciate.) but jorge never had the pace in his honda days to threaten marc, so nothing really got going between the two of them. if memory serves, the closest we ever got was catalunya 2019, where they had a bit of a coming together in practise - incidentally the first (and in retrospect only) weekend that season where jorge had potentially dangerous pace

But Lorenzo’s apology seemed to clear the air. Marquez explained that once he “was calmer” and the fear of dropping outside the all-important top ten had subsided, he could see the #99’s point of view. Marquez also noted how he was twice penalised in 2018 for similar actions to Lorenzo’s in FP3. He then pointed out how neither his team-mate, nor Joan Mir, who blocked the reigning world champion at one point during the Mugello weekend, were punished. Speaking to Spanish journalists after Saturday’s press conference, Marquez, said, “He [Lorenzo] apologised to me, because he was in the middle of turn three. While people can say it's only free practice, it was the third one, in which the last laps are like qualifying. “I was so angry because I knew that my lap was the one to enter Q2 directly. In the end I finished ninth, the worst classification of the year. It’s clear that last year I was twice in the middle of the track and on both occasions I was penalised. At Mugello I came across [Joan] Mir, we touched and everything and then at the end of FP3 it happened again with Lorenzo. But this happens... When it does everyone has to be judged equally. There is no difference. He simply apologised. Logically [after the session finished] I was calmer and I understood, because no rider waits in the middle of the track – or at least I hope they don’t."

obviously, this isn't like, a big deal, but in the moment it was one of those 'oooh maybe this'll go somewhere' incidents and the eternal drama enthusiasts in the commentary box were talking about it at the start of the race. like I said, that was jorge's first honda weekend where he was showing actual pace, so it felt like this might be building to something. except then, uh, jorge decided to skittle all of marc's rivals in one go in the race itself and somewhat hilariously managed to just miss marc. and then jorge got injured again the next race and it all just kinda fizzled out after that, so we never really got to find out what dramatics could have been possible there

and that's it as far as teammates prime!marc had in the premier class go. childhood rival pol espargaro took on the mantle for two years in 2021-22, at a time in which there was much kerfuffle about honda's development direction and whether they'd followed marc's path for too long. espargaro did attempt to assert himself in that team and they did try to develop the bike in a way that suited all the riders better rather than just marc, which *gestures at honda post-2020* worked insofar as marc also ended up in the trenches. that being said, pol was never a particularly serious threat to marc - aside from that one race to start off 2022, which maybe prompted a little bit of needle from marc (based on what the podcasts™ were saying at the time in any case) but nothing dramatic - so, y'know, that was kind of that. in those two years plus the year where marc had joan mir as his teammate, of course you can go into the weeds and dig out minor disagreements... but apart from the conversations around development direction and how marquez-centric honda should be going forward, it's just a bit of a different vibe when you're beefing for pee one million or who gets to be the leader of that year's crash rankings. of course, if you really want to stop marc from tormenting you, maybe you should just try being his literal brother. pecco, if you want any more useful advice like that: I offer very reasonable rates, just give me a call and we can hash something out

so, we've covered how the on-track stuff works and looked at the intra-team dynamic - what's next? time to explore a little more how marc goes about unsettling his rivals, how he attempts to give himself the decisive edge over his opponents... and also, what purpose this all serves when it comes to his own psychology. intimidating rivals typically has another underlying goal: it's about motivating yourself. it's about proving to your rivals just how far you'll go to beat them while proving as much to yourself in the same breath

again, at times we're a little light in terms of an actual paper trail of this intimidation... given that marc does like to take on the role of the aggressor in on-track disputes, often he doesn't even have to be the one to comment - and instead the onus is on his rivals to voice their dissent. there's also the issue that marc did have a paucity post-2015 in terms of 'serious title threats over the course of multiple seasons' - which, I don't know, this does feel like a thing somehow, you just don't really build feuds in a single season. even valentino, known feud enjoyer, always needed a little longer to really get something going. looking at marc's career, obviously you do have dovi, with whom he had a very cordial rivalry between 2017 to 2019... but the only year in which dovi was a serious title threat was in the first year of that rivalry, in 2017. after dovi's poor results in the first half of 2018, that title bid was essentially dead on arrival, and the 2019 title fight generously lasts until catalunya when jorge skittled the field minus marc. there's a couple marc rivalries with young challengers that looked like they were just about to kick off after 2019... but, well, we'll never find out how those would have played out. and it might be worth pointing out that in his prime, valentino's disagreements with riders who weren't serious threats to him winning titles didn't really go beyond what marc had going on with assorted other riders from 2016 to 2019. it's a bit of an open question if you want to attribute marc's lower number of feuds primarily to his actual personality and how it differs from valentino's, or whether you think it just reflects their respective competitive situations. the boring answer is that it's probably a combination of both of those things

that being said, obviously you can engage in a wee spot of psychological warfare without it escalating to feud level. now, let's get the obvious out of the way: marc and valentino were still very much at it post-2015. of course they continued to be deeply invested in their attempts to undermine and mess with each other. but, let's be honest, they're their own special little thing and it's just going to derail this post if I pay too much attention to them. there's a certain level of feuding where it becomes increasingly detached from any sort of actual competitive calculus and is more about a fraught relationship between two people who have managed to severely hurt each other. that being said, it's worth pointing out that marc was perfectly capable of using that feud to spur himself on. for the easiest evidence of that, just look at some of his misano performances... in 2017, valentino had just nerfed himself out of the title fight, whereas in 2019 he was no longer a serious threat to marc on-track. and yet despite how valentino wasn't the on-track rival marc should be concerning himself with, in both cases marc ended up using his valentino-related rage to find that little bit extra within himself in order to steal the victory

^from the marc (+ dovi) race rec post

there's plenty to be said about the misano 2019 qualifying incident, but let's set aside the specifics for now (though, speaking of towing-related drama, marc had again during fp3 shadowed valentino around the track, which... why are you hounding this man in misano of all places, marc). the whole kerfuffle certainly didn't hurt marc's race performance, and it's fair to say he seemed particularly thrilled with that victory. obviously, these were pretty pointed celebrations, very in your face, big fuck you to the nation of italy and valentino rossi specifically. celebrations like this are important in both what they're signalling to the enemy and what they're signalling to yourself. if there's one thing you can learn from valentino, it's that a celebration is a public message, and can function as a statement of sorts about what the victory 'meant'. what's the story you're telling with your victory? what do you want to take away from this race? what do you want your opponents to take away from it?

misano that year had come after marc's struggles in last lap duels, with the two races directly preceding it featuring last lap losses to dovi and alex rins respectively. now, on the one hand it's not always catastrophic on a psychological level to be constantly losing last lap duels... because in marc's case they did help reinforce just how dangerous he was, where even at his weaker tracks he would hound his rivals until the very end. on the other hand, obviously it's preferable to have a reputation for winning last lap duels as opposed to losing them - not least because it adds to how intimidating you are when you are locked in another last lap duel. valentino of course had a reputation for being lethally effective in that sort of situation, and it's nicely helpful if your enemies assume they're fucked when you're in their postcode with around three laps to go. I discussed this dynamic a little bit in how it relates to the sete rivalry here and here, which links back to the discussion of how you exert psychological pressure on the track. some relevant excerpts, plus some of my race notes:

marc is obviously more than capable of adopting similar tactics in his racing, but the sete rivalry still holds up as a really good demonstration of the kind of rewards you can reap through a steady diet of psychological intimidation. this is why it's so important to keep an edge over your rivals: you want them to be haunted by the ghosts of all your past on-track encounters whenever you're fighting to the point where it's detrimental to their actual riding. anyway, let's quickly check who marc was actually fighting with during the last lap of misano 2019, and whether that might have had anything to do with why marc was so thrilled to get the victory. oh, the rookie revelation of 2019 and the guy marc quickly identified as the big big threat of the future, you say? poor little fabio quartararo who still hadn't won a race yet, but who marc managed to dramatically deny on two separate occasions that year on the final lap? getting in early on the mission of building up some crucial psychological baggage, are we now?

obviously, and pretty tragically, this future investment on marc's part has ended up being completely irrelevant (unless yamaha wants to do something so so crazy for me and build a functioning bike before marc's hair goes grey), but equally obviously none of us knew that at the time. and fabio was able to take away some positives from the misano experience:

“I knew he would try something, but you never know with Marc,” said the Frenchman. “He can overtake and pull away because I really don’t know if he really saved his tyre. “The good thing was I could overtake him back, and this going home gives me a lot of confidence, to say ‘he’s a seven-time world champion, but we can overtake him’. So, he’s a human like us.”

because that's what it's all about, isn't it. giving the opposition the impression that you're not even human - and, even if fabio is saying the experience gave him 'a lot of confidence', imagine how much more confidence he would've gotten if he'd won. also, check out fabio's comment about not knowing whether marc had been saving his tyre. that's why the 'fucking about before fucking off' approach to races is so effective: because of how it generates uncertainty, it generates doubt, it makes your rivals wonder even during races whether there's a chance you're just toying with them

we do have a bit of a sample size issue here when it comes to assessing marc's celebrations, in that his two last lap duels with fabio came a) in valentino's backyard, and b) when marc sealed that year's title. it means that if the celebrations seem excessive, there's still other plausible explanations for why marc was so happy to get one over the rookie that aren't related to trying to bully fabio into submission for as long as he still could. did marc really use them as a way of reminding everyone, including fabio, including himself, of who's really in charge? again, you'll have to draw your own conclusions

I'm doing my best not to cover anything that's happening this year too much, since this is the stuff I'm assuming people reading are basically familiar with. but of course, if we're talking 'pointed celebrations' then there's also a few from this year that stand out. this isn't to say that marc's joy at his ducati successes have been anything other than genuine, that he isn't happy or relieved or revitalised by his current season... but, well, part of being revitalised is also being back in the game where fighting for titles is concerned. take the jerez celebrations, ecstatic in spite of losing a tight battle, openly loved and adored by his home crowd. look at how he's done his thing repeatedly this year of engaging with all these crowds, getting them to celebrate with him specifically. a cynic might say it's a way of reminding his opponents that they might be winning right now... but they should never forget who the crowds have really come to see. which would be charmingly valentino of him. while marc (probably wisely) never went too far in mimicking valentino's unique style of celebrations, he is an avid enough student to understand the importance of the theatre of victory. like in his third ever premier class race (from the jerez post):

racing is one thing, but it's always important to consider how you're reacting in both defeat and victory. like valentino before him, marc prefers not to openly show his rage. like valentino, more often than not he will be publicly magnanimous in defeat. like valentino, he's not adverse to twisting in the blade a little further in victory. like valentino, he's very much aware of when a camera is watching him. with marc, you can also observe how determined he is to appear unaffected and unbothered by the effects of sepang 2015 on his public image (except in displays of very carefully managed vulnerability like marc marquez all in). there's plenty of examples of this, but most relevant here is how marc concerns himself with not being openly affected by fans booing him. take blowing kisses to the misano 2017 crowd after his warm up crash... which, looking at his post-race presser comments, whatever he may say clearly (and understandably) did bother him. likewise, see the glee of the misano 2019 celebrations. with those celebrations, he's trying to tell you that not only does it not bother him that they're booing, but instead he relishes it. the more they do this, the more he will win

one more case study before we wrap this post up, this time using a specific rival to illustrate some of his more common tactics and how the spats he gets himself involved in generally play out. said rival is alex rins, who especially in 2019 had emerged as one of marc's prime challengers. now, before we talk about any disagreements between those two, I do have to mention that rinsy has a bit of history with the marquez family (this from 2016):

in the end, dani stayed on for another year and was replaced by another ageing spaniard marc felt confident he'd have the measure of while rinsy signed for suzuki - so it's very unlikely marc had to play any active role in blocking him from taking the seat. that being said, obviously the main takeaway is the bad blood stemming from alex marquez's moto3 title campaign and how alzamora organised that team around the younger marquez. god knows how rins felt about this by 2019, but I doubt he'd just forgotten about it. there's also this from 2020, which to me reads as a little dismissive about someone who was your teammate in moto3? I don't know, judge for yourself:

anyway, back to marc. the 'biggest' incident between the pair of them was a coming together in qualifying at brno 2019 (one of the all time great qualifying performances from marc by the way, well worth a watch):

During qualifying at Brno, cameras picked up the end of a tense tussle between MotoGP champion Marc Marquez and Suzuki's Alex Rins. The pair were caught putting some close passes on each other before pulling into pit lane, where they continued to 'duel' - until Marquez reached out with his arm to put some space between their machines. Marquez then over swapped to slick tyres and romped to pole position on the drying track, with Rins claiming sixth on the grid. "It's a tricky thing because for sure [Marc] is now one step in front of everybody. He put the slick tyres and he was super-fast. But I think he has no respect for the other riders. He is riding on his way," said Rins. "I will explain to you what happened: On Corner 5, he went a little bit wide and behind him was Miller and me. When he went wide, he looked back and saw Jack and me. Jack passed him, but then he went back onto the line and sincerely he disturbed me. I was pushing. I was not super-fast, but I was pushing. "So on the next left corner I tried to do my line. He opened a little a bit the door and I go in. I touched him, but I think it's his fault; if he is riding slow he needs to open the door and that's it. But anyway, then on the last corner he braked super-hard to overtake me [back]. Then when we were coming into the box I was in front of him and I go straight and he has no space to go by my side. If I was him, I would cut the gas…" "I ran wide at Turn 5 and Jack overtook me because I checked behind and I only saw him, so I tried to follow Jack because I know he had good pace. Then I went a bit too wide and there was a small space, but enough and [Rins] ran into me…" said the Repsol Honda star. “The funny thing was when we entered the box and the tyre wall was there [in front of me] and I didn’t have the space [to get through] because he was going that way. I don’t know if that was intentional or not, but for me it wasn’t important. I lose zero time on these sort of things.” Told Rins had said he had no respect for other riders, Marquez responded: “Of course I don’t agree with this, it is his opinion." "It's not the first time," Rins had explained earlier. "Everybody knows Marquez and everybody knows that he has an incredible talent, but also what happened in FP1 with Vinales was more-or-less the same. Marc loves to play this game and try to get in the head of other riders. But in my case I'm really calm. I just tell the truth and that's it." Asked if he thought he needed to try and get into Marquez's head, Rins responded: "No, I don't think so…. For sure if I'm fighting for the world championship with him I will try to do something, but he's 80 points in front of me - maybe he's scared, I don't know!" Austin winner Rins, who has fallen in the last two races, is fourth in the world championship.

their most significant race clash was in silverstone 2019, where alex got the better of marc in a very dramatic last lap duel. I've heard journalists make vague reference to marc not taking that loss particularly well, though... again. hard to actually pin him down on a lot of this! but we do have more extensive comments rinsy provided in early 2020 to work with, and he at least seems to agree with that assessment:

"Marc is so good at these mental things, he plays a lot with all the riders," Rins told the official MotoGP website. "For example in Brno last year, I was on a fast lap, he looked behind at me and opened the line a little bit, but not too much. I was on the dry line and I touched him. I lost my lap, but I continued pushing. Then in the last chicane he overtook me so closely, we were so close to a crash, and then he went into pit lane. From that moment, I said to myself, Marc is considering me as a rival." Rins - who declared "Marquez has no respect for other riders" immediately after the incident - got his revenge in the form of a thrilling last-corner victory pass on Marquez a few weeks later at Silverstone. "Marc is the man to beat and the rivalry is so high," Rins said. "More in 2019, because I shared more moments on track with him. For sure whenever he finishes just in front of me, I'm a bit angry, I want to beat him. But also for him. I remember when I beat him in Silverstone he was so, so angry." Rins added: "I like this because it means that I'm doing a good job. Marc is an incredible rider, winning a lot of races and championships, and if he thinks of me as a rival, it means I'm there fighting him." Rins took two wins on his way to a best-yet fourth in the 2019 MotoGP standings.

now, yeah... the problem is that this is all very much hearsay (but no more so than plenty of similar comments valentino's rivals made about him!) and rinsy could just be lying about this or misinterpreting it or whatever. we are very low on actual evidence for the stuff he says here. if you watch silverstone 2019 and the aftermath, you will not see a marc who visibly looks angry - of course you won't, because he almost never looks visibly angry. unfortunately, we don't have the chance to grill alex on why exactly he was left with this impression. at the end of the day, like with valentino, when it comes to evaluating the honesty of a lot of these character references you will just have to make up your own mind. like with valentino, some of these men will either be exaggerating the extent of the harm or just straight up making shit up. then again, like with valentino, the number of people who do seem to have the impression marc was fucking with them maybe suggests that there is something to these allegations

just a few things to note here... to highlight some of the common features that tend to crop up in these marc incidents:

there's the accusation of lack of respect towards other riders - valentino is the one who most infamously made that accusation in the aftermath of argentina 2018, but of course he's far, far from alone in making comments along those lines. marc certainly has a tendency towards being... uncompromising in his approach, shall we say, which can at times lean towards treating his competitors mainly as obstacles and inconveniences

the anger that's being attributed to marc. which he doesn't tend to directly express towards his competitors off the track! but if he is angry, it may instead... seep into how he approaches instances where they share space on-track, as well as affect his general demeanour towards them

there's rinsy suggesting marc is known for playing these games, that he does it a lot, and he's also known for being very good at them... which again is often something we only hear about indirectly, but of course it's interesting if that's the general paddock consensus

there's also rinsy's insistence that marc's games don't bother him at all - he's just calmly noting that marc's engaging in them! again, it's quite hard when you're familiar enough with valentino's oeuvre to not be slapped in the face with the similarity in some of the rhetoric their rivals use. doesn't mean all of these different dynamics are directly analogous, but it does speak to how determined the rivals in question tend to be in... y'know. telling themselves that they're above the whole thing. unfortunately, sometimes it is just very, very hard to be unaffected... and sometimes you're already losing by talking about it, because it shows you've been thinking about it

which, check out marc's response. 'oh, obviously I don't agree I lack respect' 'ah, I lose zero time on these things' (for another example of him using similar language, you could of course look to his comments about bez last year in valencia). this is marc's go-to - he generally quite likes to deny the existence of a problem, makes it sound like the whole thing is very one-sided... he keeps his distance and can maintain his poise and this veneer of neutrality, where he is not causing any drama. maybe the other guy's just imagining things! that's really not marc's problem, is it now

lastly, you've got this notion of marc messing with other riders selectively, and specifically doing it when he's identified you as a potential threat. again, maybe you think alex is reading too much into it! but equally, it's worth noting that we have as much evidence for marc messing with rinsy as we do for, say, valentino messing with casey in practise sessions in 2006 (as casey's autobiography claims). it would have been completely competitively reasonable for marc to identify alex rins as one of his primary threats in the future... and it would also not be hugely surprising if marc wanted to maintain a psychological edge over him

incidentally, at 2020 jerez rins and marc had another little run in during a practise session - where alex was left 'visibly frustrated' after marc was slowing down on the racing line while rinsy was completing a flying lap, which he ended up having to back out of. this denied rinsy direct entry into q2 (though marc didn't end up being penalised for it). of course, marc's jerez race reached an unhappy conclusion and rins was too injured to even start it, and after that they've never been even remotely close to fighting for a championship. though there's still a little bit of needle between the pair of them, mainly resulting from how rinsy ended up joining lcr honda in 2023 after suzuki departed the scene. there's marc's reasonably innocent comments in 2022, on a day in which rinsy won another last lap duel for the victory in phillip island:

"I will not give any advice," said Marquez. "For me it is another opponent. It’s good that joining Honda is one world champion [Joan Mir] and one rider that is winning races with another manufacturer.  "Like this we will see exactly the level. I’m working really hard for the 2023 project with Honda and they are working really, really hard too. I don’t say I wish [him] the best. Let’s just go and see. He is another opponent, if not it would be fake’."

or here, take this from before mugello 2023, again mostly innocuous:

By contrast, Marquez believes Mugello is one of Rins’ best tracks and he wasn’t surprised to see the COTA winner at the sharp end. “No [I’m not surprised], because Rins, even with Suzuki, had 5-6 circuits where he is very fast and then others where he struggles more. Normally here with Suzuki, he was very fast and very consistent,” said Marquez, whose only premier-class win at Mugello was back in 2014. “He is really good in fast corners so, for example, in Le Mans he was struggling more than me and here he is very fast. It is good for Honda and Honda riders that someone is faster because like this you have more chance to look and compare the things.”

love being told I have "5-6 circuits" where I'm very fast. or take rinsy's innocent surprise that marc didn't end up winning at the sachsenring, and how he suggests it was maybe because of all the pressure marc had been feeling:

"It's hard, it tastes very bad to me because Marc has a fucking talent and it's not being easy at all,” Rins was quoted by DAZN. “But hey, in the end you have to turn the tables, you have to win, you have to build a winning bike. "Damn, I thought that Marc would also win in Germany. What happened? I don't know, I have no idea. Pressure, extra pressure, I have no idea.”

and then, of course, there was always that little hint of tension that came as a result of rinsy being honda's only race winner that year, at marc's beloved cota of all places... which became a bit of a discourse point (not always propagated by rinsy) to say that, hey, maybe the honda wasn't so bad after all... anyway, here's what marc said when rinsy signed for yamaha:

Repsol Honda rider Marquez was asked about Rins’ departure and answered: “I had an interview, they asked me about this rumour. I said ‘I don’t think so’ because Rins won a race and he said ‘it’s a good bike’.  “So I didn’t expect this move. But then the day after! I’m happy for him, it’s a good move, he’s moving from a satellite team to a factory team. Yamaha has power and energy from the past.”

marc had said 'surely not' but then the very next day he was left shocked and taken aback! he'd thought rinsy loved the bike so much! he'd thought rinsy felt it was actually a good bike! he'd thought rinsy would never want to leave! how unexpected this whole thing was to him!

(there was also talk about rinsy's unhappiness at how honda treated him and his development feedback - but as there is less than zero evidence marc had anything to do with that, let's leave it there)

did marc really behave differently towards alex rins because he saw him as a threat? probably! possibly? probably! but he hasn't really felt the need to say as much. sometimes, you can fuck with people by staying silent, and sometimes you can fuck with them just because you have a reputation for mind games - which marc, like valentino, has acquired over the years. ideally, your on-track plus off-track presence gets to the point where you don't really need to do anything and can let your opponents engage in shadowboxing while you can spend your time in more useful ways. think of that excellent clip from motogp unlimited where poor joan mir complains about marc's towing, freaks out when he realises the press has said he's complained about marc's towing, and then goes to explain to marc how he hadn't actually complained about marc's towing. and marc, with the air of a man who has been high on painkillers for the past week and hasn't given joan much thought beyond contemplating how well he'd pair with potatoes, graciously accepts this explanation - which joan is painfully, obviously relieved by. marc wasn't playing any 'mind games' in this clip, he was just standing there. but sometimes that's all you've got to do! call it a good return on prior investment. (partly this is also just a result of the status the sheer extent of marc and valentino's successes provides them and, relatedly, their power and influence within the sport.) here, from one of oxley's books:

Once you've established a reputation for trickery, you can confuse people without doing anything. At this year's [2009] German GP Casey Stoner accused Rossi of attempting to confuse his rivals by scrubbing the white sidewall paint from his front slick; the paint denoting Bridgestone's softer compound tyres. In fact Bridgestone had run out of white paint (no, really), but the reality didn't matter because Stoner was sat on the grid, convinced Rossi was playing tricks when he should've been getting himself in the zone, focusing on his race.

that's the ideal, right: you don't even have to do the dirty work yourself because it's the reputation doing the work for you. marc inspires a similar effect on riders, where he just gets them to the point where they're spending way too much time hyper-analysing whatever he's doing at any given moment. which means that he doesn't actually need to be trying to fuck with anyone for the effect to still be the same. free and easy, what's not to love

so, that's it, more or less. all the on-track stuff, from 'how to build up an intimidating presence 101', to just being extremely annoying in non-race sessions, to trying to mess with your teammate, to more generally how you go about handling disputes with other riders. managing your motivation, their motivation, everyone's motivation. of course marc's not quite scaled the heights (yet) of cursing another rider to never win another race again - which, hey, nobody's perfect, but I think he's built together a fairly decent resume for himself! there's plenty more stuff you could get into here, c.f. 'everything that's been going on with ducati internal politics this year'... but this post is more than long enough, and you can follow all that stuff while it's actually happening. a few more related topics I've deigned outside of the scope of this post include how he generally manages perceptions of himself and his performance potential in ways that aren't targeted at any specific rival, for instance how he talks about his injury and has a tendency to change his tune depending on what's convenient at any given time, or how in the past he managed perceptions of the competitiveness of his honda package. likewise, I also haven't discussed the actual success rate of these tactics: let's not forget that trying to fuck with your rivals doesn't... always produce the effects you want it to. (sometimes just in kind of dumb ways, like I get messing with the rookie sensation but please try not to crash when catching a tow, marc. "marc clearly tried to get into fabio's head and I think he hit his head himself quite big." "so, I think it's karma. fabio's on pole and I hope marc is uninjured of course. but he tried to get in his head because he knows fabio is fast." not ideal!) but, hey, the most important thing is he's trying hard and having fun. or something

because that's the thing, right. when you are attempting to exert psychological pressure on your opponents, when you're trying to weaken your rivals, inevitably this also has an effect on you. there are athletes who prefer to completely ignore their opponents and act as if they are essentially competing on their lonesome. neither valentino nor marc fall into this category. as a result, how you behave towards your rivals inevitably also becomes at least in part about motivating yourself. you are attempting to focus your mind in some way - whether it is to see your rival as an enemy or to simply distance yourself from them or otherwise. you may even be minded to treat your rival particularly warmly, knowing they are less likely to give you grief if you have ensured the interpersonal relationship has remained amicable... maybe even looking for a slight psychological edge if they are not sufficiently motivated to beat you. maybe that too is about managing your reputation and drawing a line under past unfriendlier rivalries, to distinguish your most beloathed rival from all the others. you may need to find a way to keep the fire within going, to reinvigorate yourself even in periods of relative competitive tranquillity by giving yourself something to be angry at, a reason to fight and to win out of spite... finding reasons to care, again and again and again. celebrating with exuberance not just because you are genuinely filled with joy but also because you need to be filled with joy - so that you can find it within yourself to keep fighting. there's never just one brain involved in the arena of psychological warfare. to succeed in sports the first person you have to play mind games on, after all, is yourse- *gets taken out by sniper rifle*

[bonefall]

oo snowkit becomes snowcarve?

He does!

In StarClan, you can use the names and appearance that you could have had, if you died young. It's very rare that you get permakits or permapprentices. I lifted from the COTC story about Smallstar and his siblings.

(Though, in BB those kits actually survive and it's MAPLESHADE’S kits who lead to the law on protecting children, Darkstar's Commandment, the Queen’s Rights. Smallstar is the leader of WindClan and xey're super chill. Xey own a lovely shawl.)

So Snowkit chooses to appear as Snowcarve, an Honor Title he would have earned for the creation of a full written Clan cat language, expanded from the simple glyphs. I'm not sure if he's a popular patron, but I do know that Bramble and Tawny invoke him sometimes.

Unfortunately though he's more invoked for general guidance by the two of them, not for possibilities like I think he'd like. He watches over them though, like a guardian angel. A lot of cats secretly have those.

I'm not sure who he follows around more often though. I think he LIKES following Tawny more because she's a better listener to his omens. But he feels like Bramble NEEDS him more, y'know?

Also notably, Snowcarve was technically their uncle, but the relationship is best described as "1st cousin." Rabnir in Clanmew, a familial role about somewhat distant but parallel growth, seen also with Brightpaw and Swiftpaw.

[galacticlamps]

Jamie + Zoe textposts, not because they even vaguely relate to anything going on in canon, just because they have a very memeable dynamic & their screenshots pair well with the humor on this website

[semiotomatics]

i have a ~dream question~