#and how right i am

[silly-bees]

i know we shit on miguel for beating up miles and how it was unnecessary and stuff, and that's totally true. he should not be beating the hell out of children. he definitely should spend time in spider-jail for that. but can we talk about how terrified this man must be?

the loss of his daughter is fresh- possibly within less than a year fresh, and it was all his fault (at least that is what is interpreted by him). an entire UNIVERSE got destroyed because of his actions and now some punk kid who he was been trying to hard to keep out of this operation suddenly appears and starts making the same mistakes miguel did.

miguel sees this kid preaching that he can fix it all and miguel 𝘬𝘯𝘰𝘸𝘴. he can remember thinking those same things. he can remember the naivety of being someone new to multi-dimensional travel; but understanding doesn't change the risks, and this kid threatens everything miguel has seeked to fix.

miles is thinking like miguel did and that terrifies him. it terrifies him that what happened to his world would happen to everyone else's and it would inevitably be 𝘮𝘪𝘨𝘶𝘦𝘭'𝘴 fault. not miles', not anyone else, miguel's (in his mind, anyway).

so, yes. yes he shouldn't have chased miles, but fear does things to the brain. fear leads to desperation and desperation leads to miles' determination and that leads to more fear and it continues in this vicious cycle of pain, danger and pure, guilty terror.

i'm not excusing his actions, but i understand them. i understand them and it hurts so bad in a good way.

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Expertise can't help you here.

[lazylittledragon]

can't believe we're all adults being forced into the club penguin level of censorship in 2024

[redstonedust]

i appreciate the attempts a lot of game devs are making with gender neutral character creation, and i appreciate that it's actually a very difficult task to implement that depending on the game's base code. but it's so funny to me when you hear an uproar because some game has "entirely removed the gender option from character creation!!!!!" so you go to check it out and its just like

[hinamie]

10 years later

[androdragynous]

as my own direct immediate list of game grievances i hate that stardew valley expects you to side against a wheelchair user who is upset that he was moved without his consent. i hate that the mass effect trilogy gives you visible scarring as a direct result of choosing mean dialogue and heals it if you're nice. i hate that the vampire the masquerade ttrpg has a monstrous player class that can appear as horrible vampiric monsters or as visibly disabled people and both of these appearances are mechanically the same. i hate that dark souls games have a difficulty level implemented in a way that cannot be adjusted for disability. i hate that i can play as a mermaid or a werewolf or a horse in the sims games but can't use a wheelchair. i hate that the ace attorney games have so much flashing and not all of the games can disable it. i hate that disability is constantly something that happens to teach a lesson, i hate that disability is something that happens as a punishment, i hate that disability is either compensated perfectly with no drawbacks or something that is endlessly sought to be cured. i hate that no character customization will ever include the mobility aids i use, that the player avatars that represent me will never look like me. i am so goddamn annoyed and so goddamn tired.

[transassdemon]

[My art, don't steal, tag if reposting]

[ato-dato]

I wish gay people were real :(

[jingyismom]

undead boy with "UNMARRIED" on his gravestone makes sure to put "BELOVED WIFE" on his girl's gravestone even though he knows she won't be in the ground for long

[technically-human]

It's not complicated, it's just weird

[stromblessed]

Mizu, femininity, and fallen sparrows

In my last post about Mizu and Akemi, I feel like I came across as overly critical of Mizu given that Mizu is a woman who - in her own words - has to live as a man in order to go down the path of revenge.

If she is ever discovered to be female by the wrong person, she will not only be unable to complete her quest, but there's a good chance that she'll be arrested or killed.

So it makes complete sense for Mizu to distance herself as much as possible from any behavior that she feels like would make someone question her sex.

I felt so indignant toward Mizu on my first couple watchthroughs for this moment. Why couldn't Mizu bribe the woman and her child's way into the city too? If Mizu is presenting as a man, couldn't she claim to be the woman's escort?

However, this moment makes things pretty clear. Mizu knows all too well the plight of women in her society. She knows it so well that she cannot risk ever finding herself back in their position again. She helps in what little way she can - without drawing attention to herself.

Mizu is not a hero and she is not one to make of herself a martyr - she will not set herself on fire to keep others warm. There's room to argue that Mizu shouldn't prioritize her quest over people's lives, but given the collateral damage Mizu can live with in almost every episode of season 1, Mizu is simply not operating under that kind of morality at this point. ("You don't know what I've done to reach you," Mizu tells Fowler.)

And while I still feel like Mizu has an obvious and established blind spot when it comes to Akemi because of their differences in station, such that Mizu's judgment of Akemi and actions in episode 5 are the result of prejudice rather than the result of Mizu's caution, I also want to establish that Mizu is just as caged as Akemi is, despite her technically having more freedom while living as a man.

Mizu can hide her mixed race identity some of the time, and she can hide her sex almost all of the time, but being able to operate outside of her society's strict rules for women does not mean she cannot see their plight.

It does not mean she doesn't hurt for them.

Back to Mizu and collateral damage, remember that sparrow?

While Mizu is breaking into Boss Hamata's manse, she gets startled by a bird and kills it on reflex. She then cradles it in her hands - much more tenderly than we've seen Mizu treat almost anything up to this point in the season:

She then puts it in its nest, with its unhatched eggs. Almost like she's trying to make the death look natural. Or like an accident.

You see where I'm going with this.

When Mizu kills Kinuyo, Mizu lingers in the moment, holding the body tenderly:

And btw a lot of stuff about this show hit me hard, but this remains the biggest gut punch of them all for me, Mizu holding that poor girl's body close, GOD

When Mizu arranges the "scene of the crime," Kinuyo's body is delicate, birdlike. And Mizu is so shaken afterward that she gets sloppy. She's horrified at this kill to the point that she can't bring herself to take another innocent life - the boy who rats her out.

MIZU'S ONE MOMENT OF SOFTNESS AND MERCY, COMING ON THE HEELS OF HER NEEDING TO KILL A GIRL TO SPARE HER THE WORST FATE THAT THIS RIGID SOCIETY HAS TO OFFER WOMEN, AND TO SPARE A BROTHEL FULL OF INNOCENT WOMEN WHO ARE THE CASTOFFS OF SOCIETY, NEARLY RESULTS IN ALL OF THEIR DEATHS

No wonder Mizu is as stoic and cold as she is.

And no wonder Mizu has no patience for Akemi whatsoever right before the terrible reveal and the fight breaks out:

Speaking of Akemi - guess who else is compared to a bird!

The plumage is more colorful, a bit flashier. But a bird is a bird.

And, uh

Yeah.

I like to think that Mizu killing the sparrow is not only foreshadowing for what she must do to Kinuyo, but is also a representation of the choice she makes on Akemi's behalf. She decides to cage the bird because she believes the bird is "better off." Better off caged than... dead.

But because Mizu doesn't know Akemi or her situation, she of course doesn't realize that the bird is fated to die if it is caged and sent back home.

Mizu is clearly not happy, or pleased, or satisfied by allowing Akemi to be dragged back to her father:

But softness and mercy haven't gotten Mizu anywhere good, recently.

There is so much tragedy layered into Mizu's character, and it includes the things she has to witness and the choices she makes - or believes she has to make - involving women, when she herself can skirt around a lot of what her society throws at women. Although, I do believe that it comes at the cost of a part of Mizu's soul.

After all, I'm gonna be haunted for the rest of this show by Mizu's very first prayer in episode 1:

"LET" her die. Because as Ringo points out, she doesn't "know how" to die.

Kind of like another bird in this show:

[egophiliac]

tsum events really are just the best, huh

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Hey now, Let her cook!

[mizandria]

people make fun of the "oh you only hate her because she's a WOMAN" crazy feminist mentality but yeah actually you guys do only hate her because she's a woman a lot of times. for every hated female tv character there's ten male tv characters who are a million times worse and still given at least the "intriguing morally grey character" treatment if not straight up praise. for every hated female celebrity in real life there's one hundred famous men who have done worse and don't get half the hate she does. for every hated female politician, for every hated female historical figure, for the women you know in real life and on and on.

[hinamie]

spiraling

[thebluelittlewitch2-thesequel]

May i offer Egyptian miku in these trying times