The specific scenarios of Miles parents meeting his friends is so funny to me bc after how they dragged Gwen's emo ass they'd be losing their shit over Hobie aka literal self proclaimed anarchist acab king who somehow radiates way more of a GET OUT aura to them than already mentioned gal does and then theyd have a whole ass man ??? with a literal child ????? lmao Peter wouldn't even have time for some rational explanation they'd just go for an instantaneous who ARE you and kick shove the door right in his face. Then they'd meet Pav. And they'd cry out of joy bc listen guys they'd fucking LOVE Pav ok like the kid SMILES and is KIND and EXTREMELY POLITE and gives overall THE BEST ENERGY EVER GIVEN and holy shit honey this kids the fucking actual sun oh my god wait is he single ?? I bet he isn't he is a DREAM hey son have you ever thought of idk yk dating him like listen ok forget about that white girl pls he is perfect ok listen to us for a moment Miles hear us out pleas
one of the things that's the most fucking frustrating for me about arguing with climate change deniers is the sheer fucking scope of how much it matters. sweating in my father's car, thinking about how it's the "hottest summer so far," every summer. and there's this deep, roiling rage that comes over me, every time.
the stakes are wrong, is the thing. that's part of what makes it not an actual debate: the other side isn't coming to the table with anything to fucking lose.
like okay. i am obviously pro gun control. but there is a basic human part of me that can understand and empathize with someone who says, "i'm worried that would lead to the law-abiding citizens being punished while criminals now essentially have a superpower." i don't agree, but i can tell the stakes for them are also very high.
but let's say the science is wrong and i'm wrong and the visible reality is wrong and every climate disaster refugee is wrong. let's say you're right, humans aren't causing it or it's not happening or whatever else. let's just say that, for fun.
so we spend hundreds of millions of dollars making the earth cleaner, and then it turns out we didn't need to do that. oops! we cleaned the earth. our children grow up with skies full of more butterflies and bees. lawns are taken over with rich local biodiversity. we don't cry over our electric bills anymore. and, if you're staunchly capitalist and i need to speak ROI with you - we've created so many jobs in developing sectors and we have exciting new investment opportunities.
i am reminded of kodak, and how they did not make "the switch" to digital photography; how within 20 years kodak was no longer a household brand. do we, as a nation, feel comfortable watching as the world makes "the switch" while we ride the laurels of oil? this boggles me. i have heard so much propaganda about how america cannot "fall behind" other countries, but in this crucial sector - the one that could actually influence our own monopolies - suddenly we turn the other cheek. but maybe you're right! maybe it will collapse like just another silicone valley dream. but isn't that the crux of capitalism? that some economies will peter out eventually?
but let's say you're right, and i'm wrong, and we stopped fracking for no good reason. that they re-seed quarries. that we tear down unused corporate-owned buildings or at least repurpose them for communities. that we make an effort, and that effort doesn't really help. what happens then? what are the stakes. what have we lost, and what have we gained?
sometimes we take our cars through a car wash and then later, it rains. "oh," we laugh to ourselves. we gripe about it over coffee with our coworkers. what a shame! but we are also aware: the car is cleaner. is that what you are worried about? that you'll make the effort but things will resolve naturally? that it will just be "a waste"?
and what i'm right. what if we're already seeing people lose their houses and their lives. what if it is happening everywhere, not just in coastal towns or equatorial countries you don't care about. what if i'm right and you're wrong but you're yelling and rich and powerful. so we ignore all of the bellwethers and all of the indicators and all of the sirens. what if we say - well, if it happens, it's fate.
nevermind. you wouldn't even wear a mask, anyway. i know what happens when you see disaster. you think the disaster will flinch if you just shout louder. that you can toss enough lives into the storm for the storm to recognize your sacrifice and balk. you argue because it feels good to stand up against "the liberals" even when the situation should not be political. you are busy crying for jesus with a bullhorn while i am trying to usher people into a shelter. you've already locked the doors, even on the church.
the stakes are skewed. you think this is some intellectual "debate" to win, some funny banter. you fuel up your huge unmuddied truck and say suck it to every citizen of that shitbird state california. serves them right for voting blue!
and the rest of us are terrified of the entire fucking environment collapsing.
“Grandmother is visiting,” Damian suddenly said with no warning and with his usual not-quite demanding tone.
“Who?” Tim wasn’t the only one to startle, seeing as Bruce had practically froze, a downturn to his lips in a silent show of confusion.
Damian scowled. “Are you deaf Drake? Grandmother is coming to Gotham to, quote, make sure I am being properly cared for.” None of them had known that Ras was with anyone actually. At least Tim was pretty sure that would have been in the files.
“Oh?” Dick didn’t quite crouch to Damian’s height but it was a near thing. “She-” “He,” Damian corrected, interrupting him. They all exchanged a glance before Dick continued.
“Is he coming to the Manor or…”
Damian scoffed again, a tiny bit of a flush against his face. “No, Grandmother will most likely be staying with Akhi-”
You know what's hilarious, if Ludinus was indeed a young man being traumatized by the end of the Calamity. Deirta Thelyss is almost certainly older than he is.
This is not relevant but I think Essek should bring this up, just to be a bitch about it.
While I’m a big fan of the “Von Karma being a piece of shit mentor and father figure to Edgeworth” concept and there is definitely some truth to those statements, I also wanna address the fact that it is canon that Von Karma was a good mentor to Edgeworth and growing up in that household wasn’t as horrific as it may seem at first glance. Frankly if it was, Edgeworth wouldn’t have been manipulated like he was.
Now just taking that into consideration, that makes the moment Edgeworth finds out what actually happened to his dad so much more heartbreaking. When mini Miles lost his dad, that was his world taken from him. He didn’t have any other relatives to go to and no direction in life. Then in steps a man who he knew his father respected to some degree, offering him a home and guidance, teaching mini Miles everything he knows and inspiring him. The ruthless God of prosecutors himself helping Edgeworth build himself up again.
Then he finds out that the one man who stepped in, the one he was willing to follow, was the very same man who caused his suffering in the first place. Not only that, but he’s spent so long following his teachings, that he himself has essentially become just another version of the man who caused his suffering. And to add fuel to the fire, that father figure clearly knew of Edgeworth’s survivors guilt and PTSD and used it against him and went as far as to frame him for murder.
It is honestly a wonder to me how Edgeworth didn’t completely break down right then and there in the courtroom. Von Karmas betrayal of Edgeworth is definitely talked about a lot in the fandom but the added context of what isn’t shown in the game or anime just makes it all the more heartbreaking
Edit: doing an edit on this post cuz I feel like I didn’t communicate what I wanted the best I could. My bad, y’all. This isn’t me saying that there wasn’t abuse at play. There was. Manfred was very obviously emotionally neglectful of Edgeworth and Franziska and instilled a perfectionist complex in both of them. That much is clear by the way Edgeworth speaks with him in a strictly business like manner. But I think it’s important to acknowledge that while Manfred was a shitty father figure, he still showed Edgeworth some form of kindness over the years. (I also believe that it has been confirmed that he was a good mentor to Miles but if I’m wrong about that let me know). We see that in the anime in particular where it’s shown he favoured Miles over Franziska. And also that’s how abuse works. The abuser will show kindness to their victim because otherwise they can’t manipulate the victim as easily. Manfred isn’t a good person but I think it’s important to look at his relationship with Edgeworth with a bit of nuance. Miles knew Manfred wouldn’t show him mercy in the court room because he knows how important his win record is. That doesn’t take away from the fact that he showed Edgeworth some form of kindness over the years. In my opinion, it just makes the whole situation more tragic
So those graphic novel pages huh? Seems I posted my cover post at just the right time because literally minutes after I was informed the preview pages came out and uh. This is Buddy and Norman!
Oh dear... I'll put the full graphic novel pages down below but I have so much to say on how awful this is it'll need several posts. However, right now I want to mostly talk about representation and briefly touch on why it's so damn important + inform others about the current shit Mike and Meatly are saying about the books n such.
Now note: All the things I'm saying below are based on my personal experience, maybe some people don't care about seeing the representation of their identities in the media they consume. Maybe some will think I'm merely being dramatic and I might be but I'm not lying when I say I personally believe being represented and seen in the media you consume can be one of the most wonderful feelings in the world.
Look I'm not here to argue with people who think that Norman in particular was never meant to be a person of color, I would argue he is very coded but the points I'm making here are not about how Norman particularly had to be black. The point I want to make is the lack of diversity in our cast in general and how Norman's design has heavily dwindled it considering most people [including myself] rightfully assumed he was at least one of three black characters in our cast. Not according to this though and looking at the the rest of the pages our chances of seeing any kind of decent diverse character designs dwindle more.
So firstly... Buddy a character who has been said to experience discrimination for being Jewish, lacks any kind of ethnic features at all. That's... Cool but yeah I think this shows a rather grim future for the character designs as a whole.
Also, Norman... As I mentioned he was largely assumed to be black due to his southern dialect, his voice, and other factors. But nope, he's a generic white guy. With... Gross looking hair tbh...
Sadly this is not the first time the topic of poor representation has come up concerning Bendy either.
[note how he disregarded the other mentioned minorities and specifically cites LGBTQ+ characters]
This sucks as a response but sadly considering Mike's recent behavior it seems to fall in line with the Bendy team's general lack of care towards representing anyone who isn't straight and white.
So how did Mike respond to all of this? Well...
TDLR - "Who cares if the Graphic Novel we're selling to our fans for full price sucks, we now no longer consider the books canon."
This is horrible, I know Mike and Meatly are only really in this for the money, the fact BATIM is in the state that it is proved that, but they really couldn't have been less obvious about it?
So basically when it benefited them, AKA when it meant people would have to buy the books to understand important lore like Boris' identity... [the character you spend all of chapter 4 trying to rescue] They were considered canon... At least the author sure thought so.
Hell even in the tweet Meatly made here he doesn't say the books aren't canon, he just says they're not needed to understand Bendy's world. Now Mike is using that as a shield instead of doing the right thing and saying "You're right, the poc in our fanbase deserve better we'll have it fixed right away!" Like most reasonable people would considering how his studio has literally been accused of bigotry, poor rep, and general lack of diversity before. Why risk making more people avoid this franchise?
Also just... Imagine how insulting it would be to be an author who helps flesh out so much of this world and gives its characters depth like NONE of the games have managed to do, filling in plot holes, creating a timeline for events, etc... Then because they couldn't bother to change the graphic novel for ur story to be better they instead throw out all ur writing and declare it non-canon.
If I were her to put it bluntly I'd feel insulted and horrible. Why make her do all the work of making sure her works align with the timeline and game's canon if they're not part of it?
I can't speak for her obviously but Meatly and Mike know of her account, so speaking out against this could very much risk her being fired or at least not allowed to work on Bendy anymore... So I would take all her tweets on this situation with a grain of salt. She very much is not in a position where she could be honest if she was against this.
So with all that history now, the question I'm sure many are wondering is... Why does this even matter? Who cares how diverse the characters are when it doesn't affect the story?
Well for one thing, if you think like that consider having more empathy for your fellow human beings but also it does affect the story. One of DCTL's themes is about the bigotry of the period it is set in.
Now the Bendy team has managed to make the discussion of this book centering around their bigotry which is ironic in a way I almost find funny... Though this entire thing is just a bit too hurtful and upsetting to find any humor in, at least for me...
But another thing is representation can bring people such joy when it's done with care. It really shouldn't be understated how far it can go to make people feel more comfortable in their own sense of self to have a franchise choose to represent them and their experiences. I know this from personal experience.
Now if you've been following me for a while, you know I'm a big fan of Transformers. I no longer engage with it much due to baggage from the fandom's awful treatment of me, but before I left I remember being able to witness the release of Transformers: Earthspark first few episodes.
These introduced the Maltos the family who meets the Transformers and serve as our protagonists and guess what?
It's a family of Filipinos!
Now look I'm not Filipino, but I am half Mexican and I have a lot of love for that part of me. So seeing the representation of any Spanish culture in this franchise I loved made me so happy! I remember just watching the first episode I was happily telling my partner how fun it was to see people like me and my family in a world I love!!
But it didn't end with the Maltos in fact... There was another character who spoke to me, their name was Nightshade. Their pronouns are They/Them and they spoke about it on the show! Not just mentioning it and moving on but actually sitting down to speak about their experiences...
This clip in particular really turned them into an absolute favorite among fans and well... I'll let you see it for yourself.
This scene... Fills me with a joy I cannot describe. It is the creators of a franchise I love telling me they see people like me and find the stories of people like me important enough to include in this series. There really is nothing like being able to say there are Non-Binary characters in a franchise I have so much love for. I was far from the only one too.
This is amazing, this is wonderful, this clip and character were moving to so so many people and...
This is a joy the Bendy creators have no interest in giving their audience. They don't care how you feel as a queer and/or black person, which... Hurts...
I... Discovered I was trans while in the Bendy community... It was where I learned the word Non-Binary and started using it for myself. To me Bendy will always have that connection... But the devs themselves seem to hate the idea of being forced to actually represent that in their games... And I still haven't really gotten over that pain or betrayal if I'm being honest.
So...
With Norman now being portrayed as white here, we are down to two black characters. Thomas [who Meatly has claimed is white in the past] based on a vague conversation with Sammy in DCTL they could easily ignore... And Jacob.... A book exclusive character which according to Mike means he is non-canon.
If we don't count Thomas' vague talk with Sammy about disrespect as confirmation he's black [which the devs don't seem to think so] then we have one black character in all of Bendy... And he recently got retconned into non-existence. Great.
Look... The Bendy fanbase has always been full of wonderfully diverse designs for the staff and even more diverse people creating them. Bendy's fandom was built with the work of queer people from all kinds of places.
If the Bendy team continues to show how little they care for anyone who isn't straight or white... I wonder who they are counting on to buy this book or in general financially support their franchise?
I know right now, I am furious, I am hurt and I most certainly don't feel like buying a book that's currently just a massive fuck you to the fans and I hope I've expressed why I feel this way in an easy-to-understand way here...
Either way, I will not be forgetting this anytime soon and I hope the fanbase does the same. Maybe just maybe, if there's enough backlash to this series of horrible decisions they'll learn better.
Right now, it's kinda of our only hope for a better future, and if you know any poc who are into Bendy right now... Maybe consider making sure they're feeling okay.
I know from experience how much this sort of thing hurts, to have the creators of a world you love straight up tell you they don't intend to fix the fact no one in their stories represents your identity or life...
What I'm trying to say is...
This is a really low point for Bendy and its fans... Even more for the poc who have to witness such ignorant and careless attitudes from Mike and Meatly towards their feelings.
Please don't forget them when you discuss these tweets or this situation. That's exactly what Mike and Meatly want right now.
For them to be unrepresented and therefore... Unheard.
Do you ever think about Minoris reaction to being freed from the possession because I do a lot. Like. Imagine you were used as a puppet to torment this incredibly kind and patient boy, who didn't do anything to you except be too odd and off-putting. Imagine you said so many horrible things to him and made school unbearable. Imagine you tormented him until he finally snapped and then he saves your life. After you made his life a living hell, he just...saves you anyway. And he looks at you with big, disappointed eyes and asks you if you actually treat people like that. If you would actually make someone's life a living hell or if that was just Mogami rewriting your personality to suit his needs. And you could lie. You want to lie. But you don't. You are like that. You have done it, multiple times, too many times. You've berated and harassed people who've done nothing but been too weird, too annoying, just existed wrong around you. And you have no excuse. They didn't do anything wrong. He didn't do anything wrong. And what are you supposed to say? "You didn't deserve it" what does that even do? What would make what you did hurt less? What would make up for all the horrible things you told him? What can you possibly say to make up for it? Would you even have said sorry if he HADNT saved you? Do you even know?
And then he just tells you to change. You both know sorry isn't enough. Sorry will never be enough. There is nothing you can do to take it back. You just have to be better. And you have no idea where to start. You have no idea what being a good person even means. And you have to live with knowing somewhere out there there's a complete stranger who will always remember how you treated him, and who decided you deserved to live anyways. And you have no idea why.
see the thing that gets me about the nekoma v. nohebi match is that when naoi is helping yaku on the side of the court, he tells him, "shibayama may look weak, but he's strong" to try and reassure him and yaku just goes, "i know. it's not him i'm worried about" in response
and whenever i read that i'm just like "!!!" because yaku never doubted shibayama! yaku ALWAYS believed in him, even when shibayama didn't believe in himself! yaku trusted that he would carry! what the fuck was naoi even on! why would he say that in the first place! yaku is presumably the one who spent the most time with shibayama, training him and helping him and teaching him to grow! to connect! to become part of the team! that's YAKU'S number one pupil! how could yaku not have any faith in him? how could yaku think, even for a second, that shibayama wouldn't pull through?
also, his admission that it was lev he was worried about? which, yeah, i'm pretty sure all of us already knew — if anyone was going to be a weak link, it would be the cocky overconfident first-year brat who talked hot shit without anything to show for it. (and i'm saying this as someone who loves lev a lot, mind you.)
but what worried yaku the most was that lev didn't understand 'connection'. and while yaku could more than make up for it with his own skill, it's crazy to think that lev didn't understand it while yaku, of all people, was on the court. lev didn't understand until shibayama stepped in! and that's the crazier part: yaku couldn't connect with lev, but shibayama did. yaku and lev worked fine, yeah, but that wasn't what lev needed to understand. and that's okay! sometimes all it takes is the right person with the right words, and everything falls into place. and i think that's an absolutely brilliant and incredibly lovely lesson on how connection is also about finding the different ways to make puzzle pieces fit instead of sanding down their edges, because everyone is different and that should be something we are all understanding of!!!!
going insane thinking about skk breakup dazai leaving the port mafia again because. he really just up and left without saying anything. not a word, not a goodbye, not a “chuuya would you like to come with me.” and he never said anything after. didn’t try to get in contact at all. no texts, no calls, no letters, no cryptic messages decipherable only to the both of them.
imagine being partners with someone. imagine forging a bond so strong that it’s been likened to a diamond sharpening another diamond. imagine spending three years with someone, forging a relationship, learning about each other and what makes them click and how to work together and how exist together.
imagine they throw it all in your face. they leave and not only do they leave, but they do so in a manner which shows that they never even considered you. they left as if your lives aren’t connected, they left as if it was the easiest thing in the world.
imagine everyone else finding out before you.
what was the past three years for then. what was them telling you that you gave them a reason to live for then. has it expired? has it run out? was it not enough? did they find something better?
and the lack of respect of it all. you never would have stopped them from leaving if they just explained why they had to. you would have been angry, you would have been pissed off because it’s the same story over and over again, you hurt everything you touch, you hurt everything you get close to, you’re never enough of a reason for someone to stay; but you would have understood. eventually. but they didn’t do that.
they wrote you so neatly out of their life that you wonder if you were ever a part of it in the first place.
congratulations to Mme. Pascale Leclerc, who has surely just experienced both the funniest and most unhinged weekend a mother could ever have. Dear fucking christ, I hope your middlest son brought you a bottle of champagne for yourself, ma'am.