#and moderate criticism

[sparring-spirals]

bell's hells at any given enemy: friendship? :)

bell's hells, after battle has already kicked off, casting Command, Fast Friends, using telepathy, trying to immobilize them, etc: >:( Friend. Ship.

[villainihavedonethymotheronao3]

Not sure how to explain my enduring weakness for Liliana’s shitty mom antics. It’s just. In a modern AU she’d be 53 year old separated-but-not-divorced semi-employed conspiracy theorist living a cabin off the grid chopping her own fire wood and corresponding exclusively by messenger pigeon. She’s got a an anti-religion religion that involves communing with the moon. She might be on the No-Fly List and she’s definitely banned from multiple local churches. She has a bittersweet relationship with her adult daughter who moved out and got on good medication where she couldn’t. There’s a twenty year old arrear against her for child support but she and her ex still have pictures of each other in their wallets. I know this woman. If she showed up to a family reunion and introduced herself as one of my aunts I would not question it.

[andreal831]

Elijah antis make it so hard to talk about him.

Sometimes I just want to say "This a**hole."

And not get a hundred responses saying: "Thank you! Elijah is the worst, most evil character to ever exist in the world."

[pippinscribs]

Cross Campaign Conspiring

[identityflawed]

as much as i love blaming palpatine for everything regarding anakin’s fall (because i think palpatine would love to take the credit for it) it’s not entirely true.

anakin had problems from before the jedi took him in, and the jedi weren’t exactly prepared to take care of a kid like him. ppl say he would’ve been able to get along with the jedi had palpatine not intervened… i think this opinion is pretty true IF qui-gon lived. bc the council resisted to having anakin brought in anyways (i think anakin picked up on this ngl), but qui-gon vouched for him n all that

i think, had palpatine not been a factor, they never would’ve found anakin anyways. he was never even on their radar until padme and co. had to escape naboo’s blockade that palpatine orchestrated. ani might’ve popped up again when he’s a pro podracer, but ironically enough, i don’t know if they ever would’ve found him if not for sith intervention.

how strange that the downfall of the dark side was discovered by the dark side itself.

[elliesgaymachete]

Best part of the SDCC critical role panel was Robbie forgetting to introduce Sam and everyone giving him shit for it even though Sam wasn’t listed on his panel notes

[genericpuff]

Guess it's time for me to give the people what they asked for- (FP spoilers ahead)

Hey y'all, thanks for waiting while I got my ducks in a row to put this lil' essay together. Life's been doing a lot of 180's and I haven't had as many spoons to allocate to LO crit and all that good shit. And honestly, half the struggle of putting these essays together is finding screenshots to back up my claims, the episodes are so cluttered with nonsensically-woven events that it often has me scrolling through multiple episodes wondering if I'm crazy and if the panels I remember even exist.

BUT I just got back from work, Halloween's right around the corner, and I'm feeling like talking about one of the witchiest LO characters of all.

Yep, we're talking Daphne.

(note: there are FastPass spoilers in this essay!)

Now I know - some of y'all in the UnpopularLO and LO crit communities really like Daphne because of her willingness to hold Thanatos accountable. But if you'll give me a few paragraphs, ima tell you why she's just as if not more problematic than some of the go-to problematic characters in LO (AND ima blow your mind with something I don't think y'all have even realized but once you see it, you can't unsee it).

Daphne, like many characters in LO, started off relatively strong. Though her inclusion was a little random, I liked it as a way to show Persephone's past friends from the Mortal Realm (and also it just went to show how obsessed Apollo was with Persephone prior to the whole overthrowing-Zeus retcon).

But that's about where my compliments end because as her inclusion in the plot went on, I came to realize that Daphne is 1.) yet another character in the plot whose only purpose is to be a victim, 2.) unable to practice what she preaches and forces onto other characters, and 3.) yet another character who's used as a Therapy Speak stand-in for Rachel to try and project herself onto.

Let's get the obvious aside - yes, she's basically just another Persephone clone. And by extension that does, in a really messed up way, make her another Rachel clone, but instead of serving the DDLG function of satisfying Rachel's weird but obvious hyperfixation on being a sugar baby (i.e. Persephone) she instead serves the function of being a holier than thou "I'm gonna recite self-help advice that doesn't actually apply to your situation" person, in the same vein as people who use Twitter as their handbook for catch-all moral behavior. Y'know the word... virtue signalling.

I think where Daphne first started to fall apart for me was her first serious interaction with Thanatos, and this is one that gets called out a lot. Daphne is talking about her issues trying to get Apollo's validation, and Thanatos is mentioning how upset he is over Persephone getting special treatment from Hades, when we get THIS little schpeel:

I'm sorry to break it to y'all, but she is NOT being insightful here. She's basically telling Thanatos what Rachel wants to say to her audience - "stop caring so much that Hades is a creepy old man taking advantage of a 19 year old girl in a corporate setting where there's obvious special treatment at play - you're supposed to ship them dammit!"

Neither do we, Thanatos, neither do we.

But think about it. Thanatos is an employee of Hades, one we've found out through both previous and future interactions is often berated and mistreated by Hades (retconned to be Daddy Issues, okay Rachel...) whose job is literally affected by internships, the same way it is in most corporate settings. Internships are incredibly competitive positions, ESPECIALLY in massive mega-corporate settings like the one run by the King of the Dead. There were undoubtedly more people way more qualified for the job. Especially considering little miss Persephone doesn't even know how to operate a computer.

No, you're not required to already 'know' everything during an internship, but there's a reason most internships are only open to students with some kind of transcript showing they're familiar with the work that's being expected of them. Persephone has NONE of that here, AFAIK she's in school for biochem, she has no experience managing shades or even turning on a bloody computer, and here she is, hired to work a job that she has no connection to or interest in besides Hera telling her to (which idk why Hera's even able to do that considering it's not her domain) and the money. Which she shouldn't even be receiving but does because of Hades favoring her for being cute.

I've seen a myriad of Daphne-like defenses of this, stating "well Thanatos is the God of the Dead, his job isn't necessarily affected by Persephone so he shouldn't give a shit."

Except he literally sits next to her.

If you've ever worked in a corporate setting or any kind of industry that utilizes internship programs, you very likely also know what it's like to get an intern who's clearly been hired due to favoritism or nepotism or some other bullshit reason that has nothing to do with the job itself. Intern or not, the skill level of other employees can and will affect your own job. If Persephone fucks up, that could mean problems for Thanatos, Minthe, and other employees under Hades' care. And Thanatos/Minthe/etc. should NOT have to be responsible for carrying her weight or teaching her how to do a job that she should have been qualified for when she got picked.

And, by the way, we can give further credit to Thanatos being bothered by this because we know that Thanatos has been working for Hades for centuries and he's witnesses Hades hire not one, not two, but three employees simply due to being cute or because of some made-up superfluous reason that Hades came up with on the spot. That we know of. Needless to say, HADES HAS A HISTORY OF HIRING PEOPLE ON THE SPOT WITH ZERO REAL QUALIFICATIONS.

(there are some obvious parallels between Persephone and Minthe but we're not gonna get into that in this essay)

Needless to say, if you had a boss who treated you like a doormat despite ABSOLUTELY NEEDING YOU TO MAKE MONEY AT ALL (remember that Thanatos is LITERALLY the god of the dead and Hades is the equivalent of the dead's accountant, Thanatos is not someone who is considered subservient to Hades, if anyone is working for anyone, it's the other way around) and had a history of hiring and firing women for no reason other than wanting to bone them? You'd be pretty pissed too.

And yet here comes Daphne with the oh-so-insightful "wHy dO yOu cArE" schpeel straight from the Twitter Handbook of Life Advice as if Thanatos doesn't stand to have his own job or life compromised by Hades' shitty behavior. Thanatos is fully in the right for raising an eyebrow at his boss - and later established, his father figure - constantly hiring unqualified hot young women to help manage the Underworld.

So that alone had me kind of rolling my eyes at Daphne. She's trying to take some kind of moral high ground without taking a moment in the SLIGHTEST to understand where he's coming from or the context of his situation, even though it's literally what he does for her.

But that's just the tip of the iceberg. We ain't done, folks.

Shortly after this, Daphne shows a clear interest in Thanatos but makes it clear she doesn't wanna date him to "fix" him, she wants him to "get his shit together."

This on its own was fine, I'm all for having more female characters who don't date the first guy who gives them empathy.

But then almost IMMEDIATELY afterwards, basically by the time we see her next, she's dating him anyways and goes ahead and says this shit:

Daphne, which is it exactly? Do you have self-respect, or are you seriously gonna try and 'fix' him when you literally just said to him that you weren't gonna be responsible for that? Pick a lane, for the love of god.

Now, once was bad enough, but she literally does it again in Episode 217. When Hades shows up to speak to Thanatos (in an attempt to find Hypnos) and Thanatos obviously IMMEDIATELY writes him off (as he should!) and Daphne just ?? stomps on Thanatos' boundaries entirely? ??

AND THEN SHE HAS THE NERVE

TO TWITTER SPEAK AT HADES

TELLING HIM TO LISTEN AND VALUE THANATOS' FEELINGS

AS IF SHE'S NOT COMPLETELY DISMISSING THANATOS' FEELINGS JUST TO TAKE SOME SUPERFLUOUS MORAL HIGHGROUND-

Man, seriously, fuck Daphne. If Persephone is Rachel's messed up way of having some kink fantasy self-insert, then Daphne is Rachel's equally messed up way of having her moral high ground talk-at-the-audience self-insert.

But hoo boy, that brings us to Persephone, Hades, and the inversion of their relationship juxtaposed against Daphne and Thanatos. This is that "once you see it" thing y'all have been waiting for.

And that begins once you ask yourself, who do Daphne and Thanatos remind you of?

Oh. Right.

Pink nymph-like character from the Mortal Realm with flowing hair who acts like they're better than everyone else and constantly gets away with shitty behavior? Check.

Blue/grey cthonic god with dominion over the dead, mommy/daddy issues, and banging Minthe? Check.

Obvious gap in how the two people in the relationship are presented, treated, and behave in LO's class system compared to everyone around them? Check.

Borderline toxic relationship dynamic in which one plays the Daddy Dom role and another plays the Little Girl role? Oh yeah, check.

But in Daphne and Thanatos' case, it's inverted.

Persephone is presented as a naive, in-over-her-head character who gets into a relationship with someone who speaks on her behalf and makes a lot of decisions for her.

And here we have Thanatos, a naive, in-over-his-head character who gets into a relationship with someone who speaks on his behalf and makes decisions for him- oop.

Daphne and Thanatos may as well just be Rachel's excuse to keep drawing Persephone x Hades fluff without it being Persephone x Hades fluff.

Same petty, tone deaf virtue-signaling dialogue. Same pink x blue aesthetic. Same roles in the comic's established class system. Same character arc that's reduced to being nothing more than a #metoo victim of assault from a man (the same man no less) all just to push their love interests' character arc and make them look better by comparison. Same creepy, toxic DDLG undertones projected from a creator who's proven to be into these power-imbalanced controlling relationship dynamics.

Daphne isn't 'empowering'. She's not 'mature.' She's yet another Rachel projection - Persephone but not Persephone - to talk at the audience with generic Therapy Speak while refusing to uphold the very virtues she's signaling. It's not a good thing that her greatest contribution to the plot was being another victim of Apollo.

The proof is all there. If you've still got a hint of doubt, look no further than the newest FastPass preview for Episode 219.

That's all I'm gonna say on that.

[spop-romanticizes-abuse]

i remember seeing an interview with nate where he was talking about the creative process. and he said that whenever he needed a scene to be more comedic, he would just ask bow's VA to add in a voice crack while recording his lines. which shows us how much effort they put into writing good comedy (or heck, good anything) for the show.

[seraheart]

They should be tasked with making a new Detective Conan movie but this time there's isn't allowed to be any of the following:

- bombs and explosions

- more than one (1) skateboard scene and it should mostly function like an actual motorized skateboard

- impossible sniper skills

- inane not-really shipping bait that goes nowhere

- action finales so over-the-top out of touch with the tone of the rest of the franchise that they don't feel like they actually happened in the same story

- Bourbon

- Bourbon's 54352 tragic backstories

You know. Stop with the low-hanging fruit and go back to at least kinda trying to write something good instead?

[veliseraptor]

the fun thing about that wip meme has been remembering that there are a lot of wips i have that i really like, actually. the downside has been now going "how do i choose what to work on though" about it

[sparring-spirals]

Bell's hells continually meeting people and going "yeah they wanted to unleash something to EAT ALL THE GODS" and generally getting a slightly unenthused ".... and?" in response. encouraging.

[revvethasmythh]

I do really enjoy the continuing intimacy between Caleb and Veth at this stage in their lives. Despite how far apart they live (Nicodranas vs Rexxentrum) they appear to see each other decently often, often enough that Veth doesn't think much of it when he shows up outside her house (and that he, uh, knows to look for the scoutmaster scarf out her window). It's unclear if Caleb spends very much time in Nicodranas with her family, though I kind of doubt it considering he doesn't seem to see Yeza much at all, but Veth takes Luc up to Rexxentrum to have Caleb tutor him in magic and (even though it was a throwaway line, I know) maybe spends enough time there herself to keep some spare clothes at his place. For a pair who arguably always had the closest/most intimate relationship in the campaign, it's really enjoyable to see that continue to be a through line.

[pillowprincessshaxx]

Sitting here, thinking about the fact that, in game, Cole gets more vitriol for his actions against mages than Cullen.

This thought is then often followed by the self-reminder Cole takes more responsibility for his actions against mages than Cullen

[bioshocked-astroghost]

I want to say something about the whole Claudia calling them Uncle Lestat and Daddy Louis thing

I saw someone be like “oh it makes me sad that Claudia calls Louis her dad but refers to Lestat as her uncle” and while I get why that makes you sad, Lestat does not deserve the title of Dad for Claudia. He’s her maker and married to Louis (technically) but that’s about as far as it goes. Louis is the one who wanted to save her, who loves her unconditionally, who spends quality time with her, who is emotionally available with her, who is GENTLE with her, etc. Lestat does not love her, he barely tolerates her as is. He’s unnecessarily cruel (see: the scene in which he forces her to watch Charlie burn.) and standoffish with her. He is closed to her and only interacts with her because it makes Louis happy.

As well, my friend actually thinks Lestat is jealous of her relationship with Louis, and I think she’s right. No matter what Claudia does, Louis does not hate her. He might be upset but he still adores her. He ADMITTED to Daniel that he loved her unconditionally. Lestat has Louis’ love, but it has conditions. He’s already left him once. Lestat, despite him saying that he loves Louis so much, sabotages their relationship at every turn just to get mad at Louis. He sees how happy Claudia makes Louis and out of jealousy and anger makes her upset and is cold and cruel about the Charlie incident.

Lestat may be her maker but he is not her father.

[eurydicees]

i get the appeal of being a hater for sure but personally i was built to be a lover and to love things and to see the beauty and worth in everything i choose to see beauty and worth in sometimes for no other reason than that i want to see beauty and worth in them. like i don’t want to hate things for fun! why are we all so mean to each other! you do you but personally im gonna choose to unapologetically love the things i love

[fairandfatalasfair]

i want to know about Fenders_AngstCrack plsplspls

:D :D :D

This fic started as just a dumping ground for all of my sad-fucked-up-self-destructive-Anders feelings (hence the title) and then I showed it to @lesetoilesfous and her cheerleading turned it into like... an actual fic with an outline, which is now probably about 1/2 written? but currently slow progress.

It's a post-DA2 fic with the premise that Sebastian captured Anders shortly after the end of DA2, and proceeded to hold him prisoner indefinitely while carrying out some fairly nasty psychologically-targeted vengeance. And then a year or two later Fenris agrees to do Sebastian a favour and check out the rumours coming out of Haven, and Sebastian offers to send a (much-altered) Anders along as backup. Which leads to Fenris trailing a very messed up Anders across half of Thedas while trying to 1. figure out what happened to him, 2. fix it, & 3. not spontaneously combust from how much of his own history this is bringing up.

It's a lot of me poking at the idea of trauma and how it's painful and heartbreaking and sad but also annoying and inconvenient and socially awkward and inclined to make you have stupid blow-up fights because you were talking about different things. And also me indulging in Fenris as a cynical knight in shining armour, riding to the rescue half against his will, even as he tries to convince himself that he's probably misreading those red flags, and everything is probably fine actually (it's not. he knows it's not.) And also Anders being a stubborn determined bastard who has recovered from spending a year in solitary confinement once and will do it again, he just. needs a minute.

(snippet under cut)

"Anders hesitated, shifting some of the sticks to expose a bed of coals.

“I don't know that I'm the best person to ask,” he said. “You're talking to someone who ran away from the circle for the first time when he was thirteen.” He poked at the coals, shifted the food a little closer to the heat. “But no,” he admitted, “for the most part they're not. They're not pleasant. I have no doubt that those children have seen friends killed by templars, or branded, or raped, or driven to suicide. But those are outliers, the ones who get unlucky, or are prone to making trouble, like me. For most mages it's...easier. Still miserable, but better than freezing to death on the streets.”

He settled back on the dirt, watching the shimmering coals. Fenris turned the words over in his mind, considering.

Three years ago, he might have told the mage to count his blessings; that there were many who froze to death in the streets and had no other options. And it was true that there were many in Thedas for whom shelter, however unsafe, and food, however conditional, would seem a luxury.

But even as he said the words, he would not have meant them. They were the words of the magisters who had argued that slavery was a public good, because without it the streets would be crowded with beggars. A barb thrown out to get a rise out of the mage, because that was what they did. Because the rhythm of jab and counter between them was familiar and comfortable and because the hunger in Anders’ eyes when Fenris argued with him made him feel like his good opinion was worth fighting for."