#and she arguably has stockholm syndrome too

[dancingisdangerouss]

Am hyped as hell for what's coming next. I'm interested to see how their interactions change. Like, if he reverts immediately to Grabber persona fully and ignores any attempt at her trying to engage with him the way she did as his doctor? as Al?

I could see him doing that especially to obscure some of his previous more vulnerable moments they shared, but then how would he get to rub it in that /he's/ the one in charge /now/.

I'm sure he'll like to freak her out with the masks but will he be as cagey about showing his actual face like in the film? It wasn't necessarily elaborated on why he was.

But yeah can't wait to see if there's a disparity, especially compared the the captivity of your previous reader/grabber fic. The circumstances are dramatically different so I'm interested to see how or if they'll change. Especially considering a new location is on the horizons (presumably).

He reused the magician ruse, arguably at some risk. He's lucky the reader had a ditz moment and forgot. So maybe he's pretty attached to his old Schtick. The circumstances are actually more similar to the Black Acres sequel so maybe that gives us some hints? Or are you wanting to go in a different direction?

This work has been my comfort fic which is surprising since I'd never been interested in or even seen the film before your fics. lol. So thank you!

I'll be waiting with baited breath, and a dictionary (affectionate), until your update! <3

Oh wow, thank you so much for taking the time to send this to me!! I love responding to lengthy asks and seeing y’all’s thoughts 💚💚

Al is a mixed bag with a lot of layers. He’s going to act like he’s changed (and in some ways, he has), but he’ll be falling back into what he feels most comfortable with. The power dynamic has shifted, so that complicates things with how he interacts with Reader. He definitely rubs things in 😂 But he also doesn’t belittle her in the same way Dick-Burn or other people have. He makes it clear he sees her value as a clinician, but doesn’t respect any thoughts she has on his romantic attachment to her.

I personally headcanon that the masks help combat the voices of the ghosts, which get worse when he’s doing something he knows in his teeny-tiny conscious that he shouldn’t morally be doing. He’ll deny it, but it does help him separate himself from what he’s doing; he acts with Reader like he can “be himself” without the masks, but he’s played so many different versions of himself in his life that he’s kind of forgotten which one is the real him, and feels more comfortable hiding.

However, I think he has convinced himself that what he’s doing to Reader isn’t as bad, because he’s not killing her, and in his twisted way, he really loves her. So he has less guilt overall and less of a strong reaction to removing the mask, but does still feel more comfortable in it, since a small, subconscious part of him still knows what he’s doing is wrong.

I think the magician routine is the key piece in his modus operandi, and he’d be hard-pressed to deviate from that. And Reader is indeed a ditz 😂 But he also banked on her being tired and overworked (he knows her well enough to know that she pushes herself too hard), and therefore not paying much attention. I would also say that Al does look pretty damn different in his magician getup, and that I personally would never have recognized him as being Ethan Hawke (minus maybe the voice).

The direction leans more toward what Black Acres was doing, with the exception of the Stockholm syndrome aspect. It’s the same in that Al will be attempting to “play house” with Reader, but will deviate with some of the circumstances and the dynamic of their relationship.

Ahhhh I’m honored that my story is your comfort fic!! Speaking as someone who has their own comfort fics to turn to, that sincerely means a lot to me 💚

[morgana-ren]

nighty did nothing wrong he just wants to rebuild his family and also have at least four wives.

Nighty has never done anything wrong in his entire life and I will die on that hill. Sure, he's done some... deplorable shit. A lot of deplorable, unforgivable shit.

You just don't understand. It was necessary. Justified even.

I don't care how many people he has flayed living or gelded or how many towns he's burned down for amusement. I don't care if he is the literal devil. I do not care if he has spent a fat majority of his life being the waking nightmare of both Albion and Toril and even the underworld.

No, you don't understand. I love him. I love him. He's perfect.

I can't fix him-- and I don't want to-- and I can sure as fuck make him worse, and what else does a girl need, really?

[umbran6]

The Argument Against Caleo

Spoilers up to Blood of Olympus and beyond. Beware! (Or not, the book series has been out for a few years, get over it). I wrote this after seeing a user wondering why people didn’t like Caleo, or in some cases, hated it. Here, I want to explain the answer as much as possible while doling out my own points. 

One of the main grievances I have as a fan of Leo Valdez would be the ship Caleo, or Leo x Calypso. It’s a complicated ship, to say the least, with multiple issues that make me question why people like the ship. And I admit it, they initially had some chemistry, but there’s multiple issues that Uncle Rick produced through making such a relationship that makes it extremely open to criticism, criticism which I will explain through this post.

One of my main points against them is that the ship was created on a very limited time scale. Although we aren’t given an exact date to date of when Leo and Calypso met to when they fell in love, we can safely estimate it to be a week at best. Such a limited amount of time from going through the multiple stages of a relationship already stresses the limits of the suspension of disbelief.

A counterexample would be Percabeth, or Percy x Annabeth. Throughout the series, we aren’t introduced to them being romantically involved until the Titan’s Curse, which was two years after they met. Specifically, this is brought up by Aphrodite, the goddess of love herself. Admittedly, Percy and Annabeth were twelve years old when they first met, when romance was definitely out of the picture, especially with a quest to get the Master Bolt.

However, from there we get to see multiple examples of their character depth, ranging from their respective fatal flaws to their ambitions, hopes and dreams, and their friendship. We get to see the slow build up of their chemistry, which was a really good writing move on Uncle Rick’s part. These characters took their sweet time to get to where they wanted to go, and despite the false romantic lead of Rachel, they still got together.

On the other hand, we don’t see enough of this between Leo and Calypso — we only see one book where they interacted with each other in The House of Hades, and that was only for a handful of chapters. While they are definitely older so they can jump straight to romance (some may say too old, but I’ll get to that) its still a pretty huge gap to jump through without making it stick. This makes it hard to root for a ship when it is built on a rather faulty foundation from the ‘they just met’ to ‘they get together’, especially when they don’t have a lot of events to show their chemistry.

Which brings me to Ogygia, which has raised a few red flags for me when looking at it from a retrospective point of view. Now, we know what the main issue of the island is that the hero who landed on said island can’t leave until Calypso falls in love with them. And we’ve seen this with Percy during the Battle of the Labyrinth, where he lands in the island and Calypso falls in love with him while tending to his wounds from, you know, being erupted from freaking Mt. St. Helens. Needless to say, this falling in love with each other montage happened quickly to the point of suspicion, which sets up the complication that Calypso and Leo might have fallen in love due to magical intervention.

And hear me out, because although this  might be a pretty big pill to swallow, we have evidence for this through Percy. It only takes one chapter for Calypso and Percy to meet, and the next he’s willing to consider leaving Camp Half-Blood and Annabeth behind to live on the island when Hephaestus gives him the choice to leave Ogygia or stay. We don’t even get an explanation on why Percy considered giving it all up just so he can be with her. All we know is, girl meets boy, now they want to live on an isolated island forever. It’s especially absurd considering Percy’s hamartia (fatal flaw) is freaking loyalty to those he loves.  Needless to say, It’s a huge YIKES, especially when we apply it to Leo and Calypso. 

It also raises the possibility that the romantic relationship between them is doomed to failure. And if you guys want to fight me on this, let’s look at Jason and Piper, a couple whose relationship started with a similar foundation. Piper had romantic memories implanted into her brain by Hera through the use of the Mist, while Jason was reduced to a Tabula Rasa (a blank slate for those who lack culture) by said goddess. They broke up before the Trials of Apollo because it was clear that when the dust settled, Piper had been aware that their romance was a lie and that their intentions to stay together was a mix of delusion and pressure from freaking Aphrodite. Leo and Calypso get together under what is arguably a very similar set of conditions if Ogygia’s magic had any influence on their relationship, and that this magic could wear off if given enough time. 

Third, and here’s a pretty big one for me, would be Calypso’s character, mainly because there are a lot of unfortunate implications attached to it. In The Blood of Olympus, she was turned into the divine equivalent of Princess Peach, with Leo being her Mario (except he saves her with a badass metal dragon). Its extremely unnecessary to make a character, especially as one such as Calypso, get  turned into the typical reward of a B-Class action movie. It’s insulting and puts her up as a trophy, a narrative that is definitely not ok by any means necessary.

In another direction, Calypso is also really, really worrying when things don’t go get her way. First, let’s look at The Odyssey, the first myth she pops up. Calypso had imprisoned Odysseus for ten years on her island until Hermes said to let him go, and although it gives them plenty of time to fall in love, it also raises the implications of stockholm syndrome. Then we’ve got the fact that Calypso cursed Annabeth out of spite, implicitly saying that she wished the daughter of Athena would suffer the same isolation that she did, which came to reality when Percy and Annabeth met the Arai in Tartarus. And Annabeth wasn’t even aware that she was still in Ogygia, much less intentionally intervened in the matter. When Percy left Ogygia, rather than be angry at Percy, Calypso cursed Annabeth out of all people to suffer the same loneliness and misery she went through. That’s some Hera at her worst levels of spite. 

Through such evidence we can see that Calypso is extremely wrathful towards those who break her heart even though they don’t want to. It certainly implies that Calypso isn’t in a good state of mind, and could easily repeat said actions if provoked. We could almost compare it to Medea and the original Jason, but at least in that case, Medea has every right to be pissed off at Jason and take her revenge. Calypso’s curse and how she handles things certainly implies a level of immaturity that would end in disaster if they broke up.

One issue that, I’ll admit is more from my personal point of view is that the ship took a lot of Leo’s character and threw it in the garbage in Blood of Olympus. Though we see him do a lot of stuff behind the scenes, the fact that its all for the goal of reaching Calypso just reduced him to someone who is more focused on love than, you know, fighting the evil goddess that was responsible for killing his mom and getting sweet sweet revenge. While the revenge plot can be cliched sometimes, it can be played well, while romance and the typical ‘always save the girl’ trope is just overdone. If Leo had been allowed to, you know, be more focused on other things rather than Calypso, we could have seen a lot more variety in his character.

For example as one of the possible character arcs he could’ve gone through, Leo has always been alone among the couples, often being isolated. Heck, Nemesis herself stated that he would always be the seventh wheel, and that he would never find a place among his brethren. Though some fellow tumblr users have taken this in multiple ways, either saying that he should learn to be happy by himself or that he is socially isolated in the Argo II because of these romantic relationships (I prefer a mix of both). Uncle Rick just giving him a girlfriend seems like taking the easy way out of solving such an issue and abandoning what could’ve been a rather interesting character arc. The relationship isn’t a bad thing if we remove some of the unfortunate implications, but it is a bad way to end what is a complex and realistic problem for a character and in some cases maybe possible in real life.

One more minor but still yikes worthy point is that there’s a huge age gap between them. We’re not talking about the ‘Hazel is 15 and Frank is 17 and in one year that’ll be a problem because then Hazel will be jailbait’ age gap. And even then, we can argue that Hazel is older since she is chronologically ninety-one years old. No, Calypso is older by millennia in terms of mindset and body due to the perks of being a goddess, while Leo is sixteen.

God-to-Mortal relationships are already complicated, even with emotionally and socially well-functioning adults. The fact that Leo is underage, inexperienced with romance (despite his flirting, Calypso was his first kiss), and has been through a freaking ton of trauma in his youth, does not make this okay. At best, they’re both mutually interested in each other but may have different expectations when it comes to a relationship. At worst, Calypso is taking advantage of a boy just so she can get out of Ogygia and possibly dumping him later on like the wrapping of a candy bar. Even though Calypso lost her immortality during The Trials of Apollo, that doesn’t even compensate for the immense age gap alongside Leo’s guilt at the possibility that he might’ve been responsible for her losing said immortality.

Oh, and about Leo... I’m a fan of him, but I can admit that he is in a bad spot both mentally and emotionally throughout the series. He’s lost his mom due to a mix of his own powers and Gaea’s trickery, and never had the chance to fully process that event and come to terms with it. The foster home system alongside his own trauma has forced him to hide his emotions through a façade of happiness and jokes when it’s quite clear to me he needs a therapist, stat. He's also run away from several foster homes, implying this means he was and still is being affected by the event. His mask is still on during The Blood of Olympus considering he hid a lot of things from Piper and Jason.

Speaking about them, not helping this matter is the fact that he’s rather isolated in terms of friendships since Jason and Piper, his supposed best friends are more interested in locking lip rather than, you know, actually hanging out with each other.  He doesn’t have good friendships with the rest of the Seven, and the closest ones he does have is with Hazel and Frank. And even then they start off in the wrong spot since Frank is very insecure about possibly losing Hazel to him during Mark of Athena while Hazel in the meantime, is also dealing with the fact that he is the descendant of her possible boyfriend Sammy Valdez. 

This could indirectly have made him desperate for affection since he has nobody else to confide in during the rest of the series, which is a bad mental state to be in when one lands on Ogygia, the island that we’ve seen could possibly force two people to fall in love with each other. A romantic relationship is not something that he needs or something that will help him in the future. He needs more than that, and having him in one that could end in disaster is the last thing he needs. 

And that does not make him a bad person, much less a bad character. While some who are similarly emotionally and socially isolated may turn to violence or creepy behavior on those they want affection from, Leo does not do that to the other characters. It just means that he as a character needs more time to recover and develop before we go giving him romantic relationships, much less one with Calypso.

That’s not to say that they don’t have some things in common. Both are starved for love and affection, with Calypso being constantly rejected by heroes while Leo was rejected by foster homes and his own family. It’s a trait that they have in common, but it shouldn’t be the only thing that they have in common, especially since it is laced with a trauma that is clear they haven’t had help processing. They need to develop more as characters and as friends before they should be paired together.

So… yeah. The Caleo relationship is, in my eyes, doomed to failure, or at least heavily flawed after taking the above points into account. Uncle Rick, as if seemingly aware of these criticisms, has put the relationship in a rocky place by The Tower of Nero, giving them the possibility of overcoming the above criticisms and their own flaws, or giving fanfic writers an out and pairing Leo with another character or have him single, but happy. Either way, in my opinion Caleo is a bad ship when it comes to how it was created, alongside the flaws and unfortunate implications it has.

While I can see some of the chemistry the ship has, you can’t just use a couple of moments where they get along as evidence that they belong together, especially with the above reasons. That’s like using a band-aid to cover a bullet hole without removing the bullet, stopping the bleeding, and preventing infection. If both characters and their relationship had been given more time to develop, I would understand how they would get together. 

[yanderenightmare]

could we get the bnha yanderes with a darling that’s actually really fond of their dark side and revels in the attention

yandere ! BNHA headcannons

TIP-JAR

goodiebag WARNINGS: anxiety, arson, drugs, guilt, delusions, kidnapping, Stockholm syndrome, mind control, DUBCON, yandere-themes

BAKUGO KATSUKI - KACHAN

He had planned to be sweet, similar to his scent of caramel as opposed to what destruction he was capable of. He had planned to be patient, to tolerate whatever screams and cries his darling might have reacted with, but what he was met with wasn’t horror, but… something strangely akin to what he would call gratitude or even excitement or even lovesickness. He thinks she surprised herself more than she surprised him with how easy she folded, but once he got over the shock and not to mention the suspicion her compliant nature beckoned from him, he was only motivated to go harder, to be rougher, to be as intense as he had wished but had held back. She likes the attention, despite it being overwhelming and scary and brutal at times, she still likes it, maybe even because of it. Once he got over the fear of her acceptance crushing under the full weight of his obsession, he became cocky about it. She’s his little freak and he has the confidence and the reassurance to tease her for it now, thoroughly amused with how her eyes cross paths and her brows knit together, drooling and mewling with his hand wrapped around her throat, squeezing her neck with her tight little pussy clenching around his shaft as he drives into her. He exploits it, finding such great amusement and entertainment in hearing her pray for him to go harder and faster, even as she begins to cry, limbs shaking as she continues to beg for him, eyes like opium, wide and void with pooling darkness.

DABI - TODOROKI TOUYA

Dabi had expectations. Expecting his little darling to not fully be at peace with his self-proclaimed ownership of her, he had decided to not pay her objections any mind. He decided that the hard way was the best way from the very start. But… his darling didn’t meet him with the type of reluctance he had expected. Sure, she was crying, but when he reached out his hand she didn’t bite like the sort of animal he’d expected, but rather, reached out ever so timidly and eyes so wide and glossy and sparkly and in search for some comfort. He couldn’t be harsh when she was being so sweet, he couldn’t be anything but appreciative when she curled up on his lap like such a soft little thing, hands gripping onto his shirt, sobs that seemed too tame for him to scold her, besides… it felt… nice. It felt nice to be the source of comfort as opposed to the factor of discomfort. It felt like absolution. He used to think he’d find clinginess annoying, but his little darling is clingy in all the right ways. Latching onto him when she’s crying, after a bad dream, all throughout the night, even when he’s the source to her pain, when he makes her jump up and down on his cock, her arms wrapped around his neck, fingers intertwining in his raven locks, legs around his torso, running to hug and welcome him home, kissing him, telling him how she missed him, how much she loves him, how much she needs him.

SHIGARAKI TOMURA

He’s so confused. He kidnapped her. Kidnapped her. Took her, abducted her, stole her, forced her away from a life with little regard to her feelings on the whole ordeal, subjugated her to a tiny room with more flying specs of dust than light allowed to shine through the windows. It’s not even like he’s a handsome kidnapper either. Is she insane? Why is she looking at him like that? Why isn’t she afraid, why isn’t she swatting his hands away when he reaches to touch her? Why is she touching him? How can she touch his wrinkles, his scars, his cracking breaking skin? How can she touch his hands, his scarred deadly bloodied hands? And what is that look on her face? If he didn’t know any better he’d call it fascination, curiosity perhaps… adoration? No. No, no, no, no way. No way she’s simply just… accepting… enjoying… just as simple as that. To be honest, he’s feeling slightly freaked out, alarmed, concerned. This isn’t natural. This isn’t healthy. She should at least cry, if only just a little bit. But no. No, her fingers playing curiously with his hair when he’s playing videogames. At least she doesn’t talk to him like they’re chummy old pals, then he’d really feel the thin hairs at the back of his neck rise. But, when he touches her milky skin with his sandpaper-fingertips she doesn’t squirm, and when he pushes those same fingers knuckle deep inside her she doesn’t tell him to stop. He finds himself quickly enjoying testing the boundaries of his little darling, boundaries he’s yet to have found proof of.

SHINSO HITOSHI

He was expecting for there to be some debate surrounding his ownership of her, he was preparing to teach his little pet a thing or two about who was boss early on, but… she seemed to slip right into her role so naturally. Instead of him teasing her, she’s teasing him, mocking him, making him feel as though he has no control even as he stares into those wide milky orbs who no longer have the ability of mobility, yet still has the power to inch her lips into that eerie playful catlike grin, as though she’s excited, as though spiked with untamed thrill. She’ll talk to him as though there’s no danger, as though he won’t have her mind in his clutches by the end of it, almost as if she’s counting on it, waiting for it, coaxing him with words of her own. They’ll play like cat and mouse, one always either tempting or chasing the other. She’ll even laugh, eyes bright and vivid and spiked and twirling as she lets him catch her time and time again, in a way that makes him believe he’s the one that’s been captured. He’s surprised, to say the least, surprised because his little darling is in fact a little devil, a little baby-faced angel-eyed demon, who enjoys how the darkness feels against her skin, who loves how his inky-fingers feel when tampering with her mind, and has darkness of her own to drown him with too.

TAKAMI KEIGO - HAWKS

He was preparing for a wild beast, but was happy to find his little darling settling in as though she understood that in the comfort of his house is where she belonged. Calling it a kidnapping became weird and sounded foreign when referring to their arrangement, especially when he came home to his darling in her apron, cooking, cleaning or sleeping so soundly on his couch you’d think she’d done so her whole life. She doesn’t flinch when he touches her, she rather leans in to greet the touch, her eyes heavy-lidded and joined with his gaze. And when he comes home, some days all broken and bruised and bloodied and smoke-ridden, his feathers ragged and plucked, she’ll fuss. Fuss and pamper and coo and take such good care of him, softly and sweetly patching him up, messaging wings, give his torn lip a kiss, stroke a careful hand through his locks. She’ll be so perfect, like an angel, a living breathing real-life angel. Or a guardian, something he’s always wanting. Someone to make him feel safe and loved and protected, despite him being the hero and his darling being the victim to his villainy.

MIDORIYA IZUKU - DEKU

Here he was thinking she couldn’t possibly be any more of an adorable little darling than what she already was. He’s not used to being wrong about his calculations, he’s not used to liking finding faults in his calculations, but he has to admit he was pleasantly surprised with how his darling accepted his feelings easier than what he had expected. He had assumed it to be a lengthy and gradual and careful process, he was prepared to take his time, be patient, be supportive, but… his darling portrayed little of what anxiety symptoms he had imagined: panic-attacks, quaking, crying, screaming. She seemed more honored than anything. Amazed to have caught the eye of the Midoriya Izuku, the number 1. Hero of not just Japan, but arguably the whole world. She felt proud, bashful to be getting the attention, but thriving in it despite herself believing it was misplaced. Wanting to return Izuku’s worship, cherish, awe with appreciation of her own at every given turn. She would still yelp when he picked her up to carry her about, but who wouldn’t when his arms are the sizes of pillars. Though, the sound of surprise would always be followed by the sound of laughter, school-girl giggles that felt like the fluttering of butterflies against his chest. Also, when she slept on top of him. With one of his hands placed on the dome of her ass and the other holding a book up for him to read, the small feel of her drumming pitter patter heartbeats against his ribcage, so cute and comfortable and safe.

CHISAKI KAI - OVERHAUL 

He was expecting a fight, he was expecting annoying migraine-evoking screams, he was expecting thrashing, causing waves to fall onto the bathroom tiles when she was in the bathtub. He was expecting the worst, because that’s what good business men do: expect the worst, prepare for the worst, and find refuge in the fact that it was far from what hell they had imagined. But… it’s rare to be met with the exact opposition of what you had predicted, which was what had happened. There was no war, there was no fight, there was no riot, there wasn’t even the hint of resistance. There were still small tremors of fear though, yet far less than what he had foreseen. The type of fear you find when bringing home a new pet, more careful hesitant curiosity than actual fear, as though trying to find comfort in your surroundings, as though trying to settle in. He looks like a dangerous man, yet… her eyes aren’t terror-wide but big with anticipation, with a strange form of thrill. And though her actions remained feather-light she was still the first one to reach out, she was still the one to ask to witness the demolition and recreation of his quirk, she was still the one that chose to tie the knot to his tie in the morning. Though he was the one to have found and taken her, she was the pioneer.

TODOROKI SHOTO

Not much can change what Shoto has planned for his darling’s future. Whether she enjoys it or hates it, it will be accepted. What he plans to do with her, what soft-tinted or red-violent passions he plans on bestowing upon her, the fact that she likes it from the start hardly matters when through time she was going to learn to enjoy it anyway. He was always going to lick up her skin with his flames or make her skin whisper upon the threat of being frozen, until she’s a sweat-slicked feverish mess in his lap, and he was always going to take good soft care of her afterwards. But, he must admit, he’s surprised to find that the aftercare is such a sweet pleasure, seemingly rivaling what blissed-out state he can reach when playing with his little darling. He knew he would enjoy it, but… he could never have imagined the motherly touch his darling gifts him with, what tender smiles and heavenly laughs and the way she tangles herself with him, limbs an unruly yet comfortable knot. What more, when she asks to see his quirks, wants him to make frost-flowers on the windows or in the shower on the glass-walls, when she holds his hands as he creates little lanterns of dancing tendrils and wisps, ones she can tickle with her fingertips as they twirl in his palm. The way her eyes light up with that childlike-wonder he never seemed to possess when he was young, makes him feel a different type of warm far from burning.

TIP-JAR

[strangerthings-stans]

Thoughts Throughout My First Watch Through of Stranger Things Season Four:

WARNING: Spoilers and non-sense ahead. As I typed without thought. No think, just awe.

*All these statements were written directly after watching said episode. These are basically live reactions*

Chapter One:

In general, I'm terrified. So, right off the bat. I think Eddie is 010. He has a watch blocking his tattoo. He seemed to almost know what was going to happen to Chrissy and 010 seemed to know things in advance. And you're probably thinking I'm crazy because 010 is dead, but what if he faked his death? If 009 was able to survive, maybe he could too? Anyways. Even if it's left field. Eddie Munson Stan club.

*I needed a two hour break between episodes as I was alone at a cottage in the middle of no where. Absolutely terrified. I know they said this season was going to be scary. But jeez*

Chapter Two:

this episode brought to light how desensitized El is to inflicting pain. Now that the pain she inflicted is not a power, but her own free will, it shows that perhaps there is still a monster in her. Vecna probably shows your biggest fear/regret ... That would explain Freds vision. I'm wondering is Victor Creel is Vecna. It could also be 010 because he is getting vengeance on Eleven. I really don't have much to say about this episode at this present moment.

Chapter Three:

"peters projects"...Is Peter 010 or an experiment? The dinner table scenes are arguably the best scenes for comedic timing in stranger things, prove me wrong. My theory on 010 being Eddie still stands. He seemed unphased by Steve bringing up a friend with powers... But mind you, he could be numb to everything because of trauma. If Sam knows so much about elevens power (given though he is a scientist), then perhaps he has had an inside source?

*You can tell the writers really used the extra time during the hiatus wisely*

Chapter Four:

Absolute chills. As someone who has lost everyone in the last year, I can't help but feel a comfort in this episode. The special effects and practical effects in this episode were above and beyond. It really portrayed what nightmares feels like, fake elements but mostly real. This episode makes me feel bad for moments I felt as though Max's character was slightly lack luster (please please don't hate me because I already hate myself). She is nothing less than amazing. And her bond with Lucas is so pure, they geniuenly want the best for eachother... I wish we would've found out what was in the letter to him- but I'm glad he didn't because that would've been bad. Hopper being reunited with Jif was just so pure, I can't wait to see him reunite with Joyce (at least I hope that happens). Can you imagine him just not letting her say anything and just swooping her in for a kiss? My heart would not be able to handle that. On the note of Russia, I don't think Murray had the coffee... He may have been smart and he is conscience enough to figure out a plan.

Chapter Five:

I don't know how I feel about Brenner being back, and by that I mean, I don't know whether or not I can trust him. I'm so excited to see his character back, but it feels like this is Stockholm syndrome. I felt so bad for hopper this episode, I just felt for him. When he brought back up Sarah, I just cried. As per Eddie, I think the jocks meeting up with him was for the best... So they could maybe put two and two together to see Eddie didn't cause Chrissy's death. I'm really interested to see how the house will play into defeating Vecna (well this is under the impression he will be defeated). Suzie, please come and save the day.

Chapter 6:

I am starting to believe Joyce and Murray could single handedly take over the world. They both balance the chaos in eachother and I just love their dynamic. Speaking of dynamic, Suzie's house just seems like the most chaotic place in the world and part of me wishes that I lived there- I'm sure Argyle thinks the same. I loved his commentary of Eden's name relating it to her religious culture- he was really trying to score the brownie points. I'm also really worried that vecna took Eddie underwater... Last we saw him he was swimming..

Chapter Seven:

I absolutely love a good interrogation scene. And then the insanely smart use of light brights. I hope to save Nancy sings to her. Chefs kiss. Then the Russians. My god. The writers really had me on my toes. It had such high stakes with such high rewards. 1000 to 1. Wow. Just wow. The Reunion between Joyce and Hop- heart melting. To see Hop have his guard up to dropping it because he loves this women so much that he is just taking one minute to embrace her. Oh and then finally El leading to Vecna? I figured Vecna had something to do with the Creel's and I figured a new character this season would be an experiment. This was expected yet not? I should've saw it coming when the kruels little son didn't have the black eyes. I'm wondering if perhaps Terry was artificially inseminated with 001 ... Specimen... And perhaps that's how Brenner knows Eleven is their only hope. That is if Brenner is to be trusted, which that I'm not certain on. To think this isn't the finale.

My theories for the finale episodes of season 4 will be out once I compose myself.

[holden-norgorov]

I gotta say it. For all the issues there are in the show, my biggest disappointment is with the absence of Per Haskell, and Inej's freedom being directly dependent on Kaz. This altered the entire foundation of the Kanej dynamic that was present in the books and, as far as I can tell, there's no way it's not going to end up portraying either Kaz or Inej as incredibly OOC at some point. Another huge let-down is also Kaz's main drive and motivator being his love for Inej rather than personal revenge (which is something Freddy himself also confirmed in an interview, other than being contextually evident during the whole season). These two elements combined will lead to unescapable narrative or logical contradictions in the long term.

I was really hoping, until the last minute, that the show would come up with a clever justification as to why Per Haskell was kept out of the picture, without ending up sacrificing the core of Kaz and Inej's relationship. But it doesn't. And Kaz being directly responsible for granting Inej's freedom is a new, giant ethical dilemma that was never present in the books, and whose absence there gave moral context and permission to a lot of what happened in their shared backgrounds.

Inej's freedom being independent from Kaz was PIVOTAL in the books. The nuance and beauty of their relationship vastly came from the fact that Kaz had no actual means for estinguishing Inej's debt, and that her work for the Dregs was not something he could absolve her from performing in any way. At least, not until the giant, life-changing offer of 30 million kruge they got at the beginning of SoC, which was kind of the whole point. Until then, the narrative had made abundantly clear that Inej's agency was entirely dependent on Per Haskell holding her contract, and that despite having played a pivotal role in liberating her from the Menagerie, Kaz really couldn't do anything to absolve her from the criminal life she had decided to dive into in exchange of escaping Tante Heleen's whip. This is what absolved Kaz from any moral judgment, on the part of the reader, when it came to forging the myth of the Wraith and teaching Inej how to fight, kill, pick locks and steal. By having no leverage on her freedom, turning her into a weapon meant helping her staying alive and providing her with a better chance at solving her debts. It was not something he could spare her, only something he could help her master.

But in the show, with Kaz becoming the one and only obstacle standing between Inej and her freedom, the ethical dimension of their dynamic entirely shifted, loosing breadth, depth and complexity. They couldn't afford to make this shift and still keep Dirtyhands' main decision/action motivator being his own revenge against Pekka Rollins without turning Kanej into an abusive relationship. This is why Kaz was softened and why his own motivator became his love for Inej. They just couldn't portray Inej being in love with the one person who was directly holding her back from her freedom and whose character was also mainly fueled by personal revenge, completely utilitarian and without conscience, and perfectly willing to strip agency from his investments as soon as they proved to be useful to his cause, without for the relationship to become morally corrupt and abusive (and kind of Stockholm Syndrome-y). Pre-SoC Kaz not being burdened by the responsibility of Inej's agency and freedom in the books absolved him from moral condemnations on our part when it came to viewing Inej as a mere investment, or naively wishing for her to be tied to him and become Kings and Queens together, because he could not liberate her in any way. Inej was the only one responsible for paying her own debt, and none of the things she had to do to achieve that end were ever optional. This gave Kaz plenty of ethical turf to navigate that enriched their dynamic a lot without stripping Inej of her own agency (whose beholder was Per Haskell), and without having to compromise his own vengeful objectives.

So, what are we left with here? We are left with Kaz inevitably having as a character-defining motivator his love for Inej in order to avoid the glamorization of abuse (which is what this version of Kanej would be otherwise), which is not something workable for the integrity of the characters in the long run.

One of the things I loved the most about Kanej in the books was that the narrative established that they would do anything for each other, without for them to even need to (or arguably, be able to) talk out loud about it. That their bond was almost entirely fueled by introspection and internal monologues, and most importantly, that what they felt for each other never defined them as individuals. Inej's main decision drive was never her love for Kaz, but her own freedom and the newborn purpose of hunting slavers (which is, in its own way, a form of revenge for what was done to her). Kaz's main decision drive was never his love for Inej, but his own vendetta against Pekka Rollins that could silence Jordie's voice inside him and strip him of that feeling of shame that had been slowly eating him whole for years (which is, in its own way, a form of revenge for what was done to him). And they help each other out in achieving those ends by the end of CK (Kaz by bying her a ship, Inej by threatening Pekka's life), but their individual backgrounds still bear too much trauma to lead either of them to be comfortable enough in defining themselves according to what they feel for each other. Still, at the same time, it's established by the end of the duology that both of them are willing to try again, and that gives a hopeful note to their ending.

In the show, instead, Kaz ends up doing everything having Inej's freedom as a main motivator, because it's entirely dependent on him, and the romantic tension between the two would be toxic if this was not the case. But pre-SoC Kaz, Dirtyhands in the making, would spend 0.2 seconds in indulging Inej's complaints, would find himself another spider, kidnap Alina with no remorse or second thought and cash in the million kruge prize to build up his name and reputation, with the downfall of Pekka Rollins in mind.

In S01E02, when Inej is about to kill Arken to be freed from the Menagerie, she turns to Kaz and asks "so you choose him over my freedom?" and he replies "you assume it's one or the other". But this narrative doesn't add up. If Kaz is truly in need of Inej's skills but at the same time is motivated by his feelings for her and is willing to bet the entire Crow Club on her liberation from Tante Heleen, while Inej's main desire is to be reunited with her own family, find her brother (whose addition was completely pointless) and gain her old life back... how can the show make Inej stay with the Crows to, you know, carry out the plot of SoC and CK, in any convincing way? Why would we believe that she would give up her independence and newly-gained freedom to remain a criminal out of personal will?

As far as I can tell, the ending of season 1 left us with two alternatives. Either Kaz keeps his promise to her, gives her her own freedom back, and Inej decides to keep working for him instead of looking out for her family, or Kaz betrays her trust and keeps her under his own authority as the ultimate beholder of her contract, thereby making her own involvement in the Ice Court heist mandatory.

And I'm sorry, but both of these alternatives are deeply OOC and absurd for both characters, whose relationship has been taken into an entirely new direction thanks to the absence of Per Haskell and its narrative implications.

I just can't see how the writers can find their way out of this conundrum without utterly cheapening or entirely deforming the core of what Kanej is in the books.

[tundrainafrica]

i know i sent the same ask to other blogs but it bothers me that people claim levihan is an abusive ship. this is because levi used to knock out hange to bathe them. which is def not ok, don’t get me wrong.

but they also gloss over the ass beating he gave eren and the fact that he threatened to break both of erwins legs in order for him to not go to shiganshina. it’s like they are insinuating that levi is abusive. and while he is too rough, he definitely did not do any of these things to cause harm at all.

he wants to take care of them. he saved eren, he knew erwin was in no position to fight. hange is often too busy or deep in their research. forgetting to eat sleep and bathe isn’t healthy for them. or probably refusing to do any of those things because that’s time they could be spending in their lab. so levi does some cleaning up. i’m in no way justifying the way in which he does things, but i’m pretty sure levi cares for hange enough to keep them clean.

if he found hange repulsive he would not spend so much time with them even. and levi was forced to be violent in his youth from living in the slums. he lived in filth so he probably has some sort of ptsd from that. he wants to keep the environment clean and healthy. i’m sure with time he will learn to be more gentle. we have seen him become softer in the manga.

but it makes me angry that they throw around the word abusive so easily when levi is one of the kindest people in the snk universe.

Hello Anon!

Sorry for only getting to this now. 

Here’s one thing I noticed about the people who actually go all the way as to point all these flaws of Levihan --- they point it out because they’re shipping Levi with someone else or they’re shipping Hange with someone else.

Sure, I mentioned it before, I have lots of friends and family who watch AOT and don’t ship Levihan but none of them have ever mentioned the ‘abusiveness’ of the ship. Like literally I get everything from ‘Hange is ugly’ to ‘their height difference is just blah.’ 

(And antis, if you just don’t like Levihan’s relationship and you feel like it’s attacking your ship, instead of screaming ‘homophobic’ or ‘abuse enablers,’ just say ‘Hange is ugly’ or ‘their height difference is ugly’ and just go. Stop turning every attack on our ship to a social issue? Cause like literally there are way more problematic ships out there like wah people actually ship Sam and Dean Winchester together.)

But to bring virtue signaling into the equation? Antis must have some hidden agenda (aka another ship) and which non Levihan Levi ships are the most vocal? I’ll leave you to go to twitter and to do the research yourself. .

Anyway...

From what I know, an argument of a lot of the antis who actually bitch about the abusiveness of Levihan bring up the ‘Levi knocks out Hange to bathe her’ thing. 

Honestly for me, sure knocking someone out to bathe them in real life is one thing. And in real life, I personally cannot see any situation where the absolutely right thing to do is to hurt someone physically (except maybe self defense) but I recognize that people hurt others in anger, people break stuff in anger and does that automatically make those people bad? No.

Every single one of us has been an asshole once, whether physically, emotionally or verbally or in any other sense. Every single one of us has done something others would have considered inexcusable and because of that, close minded virtue signalling will never fly for me, regardless of what background the person who is doing ti comes from.

Because the most authentic and purposeful type of preaching doesn’t come from a place of ‘You’re wrong’ it comes from a place of ‘tell me why you did that so we can discuss this together.’ If the person isn’t listening to you or your side then they’re not preaching right. The world is too complex for any side to be completely in the right.

And I digress. 

But I’m sure as an audience, we have suspended disbelief multiple times while watching TV shows already, most of us have actually seen someone slap their boyfriend or have seen someone punch someone out of anger but instead of screaming ‘AH ABUSE’ most of us would actually go ‘OOOOOOOOHHHH’ and if we think the guy or the girl deserved it, sometimes we wouldn’t even call it abuse.  

And that’s how naturally inclined people are to making double standards.

And if these same people who are calling Levihan an abusive ship are shipping Levi with other people….

You’re right to point out that Levi did give Eren a worse beating and Levi actually threatened to break Erwin’s legs before they left for Shiganshina and that does not count as abuse?

Or if those same people who are calling Levihan an abusive ship are the same people who would cheer just watching anyone get hurt....

So that means that the antis are so conveniently taking whatever they can, virtue signalling their way into invalidating our ship. Which doesn’t hold if they can’t really practice what they preach or keep it consistent in all grounds. 

Besides Levi and Hange are both battle hardened soldiers. They’re both incredibly healthy human beings. And I’m sure they actually don’t think too much about getting bruised up here and there knowing were Levi grew up and knowing they go into expeditions and they experience much worse things there. 

And on top of that, I’m sure the knocks her out to bathe her thing was played for lolz. 

And if Hange hated it, if she herself had considered it abuse for Levi to do it, I’m sure Hange would have acted on it long ago. Arguably, Hange is Levi’s superior after all. And if the antis are gonna scream ‘It’s stockholm syndrome. Hange just accepts it and it’s unhealthy’ 

Really? If anyone was a sub in their relationship, I’d put it at Levi tbh.  

The point is I don’t think any argument to the ‘abusiveness’ of Levihan actually holds if the shippers are so easily going to dismiss Levi threatening to break Erwin’s legs or Levi beating up Eren. At the same time, I don’t think it holds either if these same people who are criticizing abuse in this type of setting are cheering for violence and abuse in any other type of setting.

People bring up social issues and accuse people of being assholes all the time and if they’re not going out of their way to research what other sides exist to a problem, I’m convinced that more than half the time they’re conveniently pointing things out to fuel some other hidden agenda inside them. 

This is common practice in ship wars. People find anything bad to say about any ship. And I just hate seeing people bring up shit like social issues into the shipping war. 

“If you don’t ship them you’re homophobic.” “If you don’t ship them, you’re transphobic.” “If you ship them, you’re an enabler.” 

Because when has shipping preferences ever determined whether someone is a good person or not? People ship for different reasons? Not everyone ships with a ‘THIS IS MY DREAM RELATIONSHIP’ scenario in mind. Like people ship because they like enemies to lovers dynamics. People ship because they like contemplating the complexities of relationships. Peoples ship and they celebrate their problematic ships because they want to explore the complexities of the issues that govern such material. 

People forget that in the end, what we ship is really just preferences. And I do not think it reflects much on how the person is. People can have the most problematic kinks and still be the kindest people. 

Because in the end it’s awareness of one’s surroundings, it’s empathy, discipline, good control of emotions, openness and the ability to discern whatever information comes our way which makes us good people. And in the end, it’s our own efforts everyday to be a better and kinder person which makes us good people, not the opinion of some stranger on the internet who decided that we were bad just because we ship a ship they don’t like. 

Anyway, I think I went overboard with this answer anon but I hope this makes you realize things about antis.

[marvelthalia]

Fan Theory that Kublai Khan was in love with Marco Polo (Netflix)

Okay so I will admit I’m not well read enough to understand what coquetry means without looking it up. For those who like me, don’t know it means flirtatious behaviour. The reason I bring this up is because I was going through the Khan’s speech when he goes off on Marco about saving his father whilst Jingim’s kids are being born and every line of it just makes it seem more and more like he loved Marco or though Marco was in love with him. I know people always put Marco in as the Khan’s ‘son’ or ship him Jingim (which I also do) but just look at this speech and tell me he’s not head over heels in love with this Europe. N.B. This is only about the Netflix TV show, obviously not about real life.

The world gets bigger, so you open your arms wider. Is that not the Ghengis way?You let in the outsiders, with their sad eyes and wounded hearts, the orphaned son, the abandoned boy, you let them in your home, learn from them? Yes, but raise them and love them? Offer them all the magic the whole world has to offer? They fuck you. Oaths? Meaningless. Love in their eyes, worthless. Heart they promise you, will never be. Oh, they’ll stare, plead. Love mixed with awe mixed with coquetry mixed with an insatiable festering need. Need of a home, need of a father, need of a fucking place in the world. Give them all of this and more and what do they do, they scurry back to their dubious relations despite their meager characters that lack entirely of heart.

Like are you kidding me? The “orphaned son” must be his adopted son Ahmad but the “abandoned boy”? That’s defo Marco.  “Raise them” is Ahmad (even though Polo is like 19 when he reaches Cambulac) but the “love them” is referring to both of them because he loves them both one as a son and one as something more perhaps?

“Offer them all the magic the whole world has to offer” What do you, a king, do for your lover if not show them all the wonders of the world. When he showed him Xanadu in S2 tell me that wasn’t some showing off to a crush like look at my magic city, look at me climb this mountain and watch me stare down a wolf, come on a nice romantic secluded hike with me.

“Love in their eyes” “Heart they promise you, will never be” I don’t even have to explain this one, like come on guys. Kublai clearly thought Marco loved him, like LOVED him, and he’s heartbroken and pissed off now that he thinks that not true.

And that brings us to where we started “Love mixed with awe mixed with coquetry mixed with an insatiable fucking need” Kublai probably liked the power imbalance, this young boy completely out of his depth with no friends, completely at his mercy and the mercy of his every whim. A pretty boy with flowery words who spends half his time playing chess with the Khan in his private quarters and whispering sweet nothings about his empire.

But here’s the clincher of my little reading-too-much-into-subtext theory. Marco actually DID love him. I was convinced after I finished the show that Marco had Stockholm Syndrome and there was an explanation/theory on AO3 which outlined all of the good reasons for this, the fact that he can never bring himself to leave the Khan even when he does horrible things, even when he kills little boys who just want a hug and when he sentences Marco to death or beats a man to death in front of him he still remains loyal to the Khan even when multiple people ask him to run away with them or tell him to leave and give him a means of escape he won’t do it and I thought that was textbook Stockholm and it definitely still is but there’s more to it. Marco is in love with Kublai Khan and that’s why he’s so invested in the Mongol Empire, why he constantly risks his own life to save him and why he will never leave.

Also note that this isn’t a healthy relationship I’m proposing between the two, Kublai has waaaaaaay to much power over him, he’s way older (his sons are the same age if not older than him) and Marco really is just too much in need of a home and a place in the world. I don’t even think the Khan is purposely taking advantage of him in a weird way, he’s just the most powerful guy in the area, of course he’s going to be used to having utter control over other people lives but with Marco he’s almost like a fun Latin novelty who he gets to induct into this new way of thinking where the Khan is his be all and end all and Marco is utterly devoted to him by the end. For a guy on a power trip I can only assume that would be fun and we saw with Mei Lin how easy it was for a royal concubine to worm their way into his good books and arguably into his heart (if not his bed). The only other person who I think gets that same level of devotion is Kokachin the fake blue princess who we have explicitly seen he loves and even she gets left on read when the Khan’s needs (and his father’s) take precedent.

Kublai loves Marco and that’s why Jingim hates him so much in S1 (amongst other reason like the fact that he never keeps his mouth shut), heck he might have even also been in love with Marco and jealous that his father would likley get first dibs. 

My last and most compelling piece of evidence is simply put, how could anyone look at Marco Polo and not fall in love with him?

fin

[artemis-maia]

Why I think Hamuko‘s Persona should have been Psyche

I have always thought that it was a waste to also give Hamuko Orpheus since Psyche would have arguably been a better match for her in every regard. In fact there are some story aspects that match Psyche‘s story a lot. I will mention these story parts over the course of the article.

I also think that giving Psyche to Metis was wrong since nothing in her storyline fits Psyche in the slightest. 

First of Psyche is a human princess which is emphasized over and over. 

In Aigis‘ case her being a robot makes sense since Athena was born fully armored from Zeus’ head and she is the goddess of strategic warfare (which means that it is her job to finds a way to cause the most damage/deaths unlike Ares who just represents normally clashing armies).

Even Labrys makes sense as non human since Ariadne is not 100% human since her father Minos is a son of Zeus and her mother Pasiphaë is a daughter of Helios. Also the name Labrys refers to the labrys axt from Minoan culture from Crete (labrys and labyrinth are also said to be related words).

Metis’ name is fine since it is the name of Athena‘s mother. But her storyline is actually like a retelling of Athena‘s friend Pallas not of Psyche.

Both Athena and Pallas are warriors raised as sisters, Athena accidentally kills Pallas in a sparring match and out of mourning names herself Pallas Athena. This fits Aigis‘ guilt feelings and her taking over the protagonist‘s place in the Answer.

Giving Metis Pallas as a Persona would fit Aigis‘ Athena theme totally (the name Aigis/Aegis named after Athena’s shield, Palladion the wooden statue of Athena, Athena as a Persona herself) and also explains why Metis looks like another warrior robot since Pallas fought like Athena.

Now why I think that Hamuko should have gotten Psyche:

Hamuko‘s entire premise is the butterfly effect thus Psyche‘s butterfly depiction and her connection to the soul would fit a lot.

Psyche is a human princess who secretly feels very lonely since people just worship her as a new Venus however there is no one who actually tries to approach her or marry her.

This reminds me of Hamuko‘s Stepford smile. A lot of Ryoji’s fortune link actually shows you that a lot of her previous behavior was a facade.

Anyway when Venus gets angry that Psyche is worshipped she sends Eros/Cupid to torture Psyche. However he accidentally falls in love with Psyche and defies his mother to make Psyche his. Psyche‘s father after an oracle says that Psyche gets married to a monster let Psyche become the wife of said monster (actually Eros/Cupid).

Psyche thus ends up in a relationship with Cupid similar to Beauty and the Beast. He interacts with her and her only at night.

Seeing Pharos/Ryoji as the stand-in for Cupid would actually be pretty fitting in my opinion since Ryoji not only is not human, in the Fortune s-link you sympathize with him despite him being an antagonist (Maki was a grey character, Jun had a redemption arc however Ryoji despite having no evilness in his heart is unfortunately on the wrong side the entire time).

Eros/Cupid and Thanatos actually do have a lot in common. Both are often depicted with wings sometimes their statues look so similar that they are called Eros-Thanatos since it can‘t be said who it depicts. 

Also both Eros/Cupid and Thanatos also are sometimes depicted as children (Pharos can be the stand-in).

In early depictions Eros‘ mother wasn‘t Aphrodite/Venus or even Penia (goddess of poverty), it was Nyx who laid an egg. Sometimes Eros is also said to have emerged shortly after Chaos similar to how Ryoji virtually appears from nothingness.

Also Ryoji‘s brief stint in his s-link can be seen as similar to Eros‘ brief adventure in company of a human.

Eros-Thanatos would also emphasize the teaching of Freud about the Eros and Thanatos urges. I always got a really Freudian and Jungian atmosphere from Ryoji‘s s-link since it is full of tropes and very fairy tale like.

In Thanatos‘ profile his connection to butterflies (soul symbol) which he sometimes holds in his hand is also mentioned. Cupid is also often depicted holding butterflies.

Anyway when the relationship reaches the climax there is this interesting option:

To kill the ‚monster‘.

Psyche is urged by her sisters to get rid of the ‚monster‘ Eros/Cupid.

Hamuko has the option to kill Ryoji when the December 31 decision approaches.

Both decide against it and the antagonist already means too much for them.

Both Cupid/Eros and Ryoji leave right this confrontation.

Psyche then has to fulfill several tasks one of them is to go to Tartarus. Thus Hamuko if she would have had Psyche would have even had a Persona that has a Katabasis/goes to the Underworld story.

The most interesting part though is this:

Psyche after opening the jar she received from Proserpina/Persephone falls into a death like slumber. After this Zeus allows her and Cupid to be united after she drinks ambrosia and is no mere mortal anymore she is now a deity.

This description of death sounds even way more matching to the ending death scene than how Orpheus dies in myth. Orpheus is sometimes depicted as returning as a prophet like figure (Orphic mysteries) however his final death description is not softly falling asleep, it’s violent since Dionysus worshippers tear him apart.

They did ponder which gender the P3 protagonist should have early on or whether they should add an option like in if... which is why they later returned to a FEMC in P3P.

Maybe they did play with the thought of giving Psyche to a FEMC early on and later just gave Psyche to Metis since they didn’t really give any thoughts about what else they could give her.

I would have liked Orpheus for MC, Psyche for FEMC since both Orpheus and Psyche have a Katabasis and that Metis gets the actually fitting Pallas.

Cupid and Psyche is also sometimes dubbed ,forbidden love‘ which matches Ryoji‘s s-link being star-crossed (RomeoxJuliet, TristanxIsolde, PyramusxThisbe, HeroxLeander style). Also the divine date trope and Did you just romance Cthulhu trope Ryoji’s s-link has would match a lot as well.

Another interesting aspect is that I sometimes see discussions regarding the extent of how much Ryoji manipulates Hamuko into a relationship:

Cupid and Psyche is often examined regarding Stockholm Syndrom and also Greco-Roman rape myth stories.

While I see Ryoji unlike Eros/Cupid as innocent since he has amnesia there is a power difference between him and Hamuko due to being different specimen.

It was actually interesting to see how such a power difference story would actually play out in a s-link.

If you wanna see a CupidxPsyche or Beauty and the Beast like movie that does depict a similar power dynamic I can recommend the Russian movie Dragon Love is a scary tale. I watched it on amazon prime and didn‘t expect much at first but it ended up being a good depiction of the trope.

As I have mentioned I like how trope like and fairy tale like Ryoji‘s character turned out.

I even sometimes see Ryoji as a bit of an Aladdin-like character (his Ryoji disguise basically being kinda like Prince Ali from Ababwa).

Even some of the lines in his link remind me of the Aladdin movies XD.

[entomjinx]

Here's 1554 words on Why Gray/Juvia is toxic for both parties + receipts and a small personal anecdote about why I'll never shut up about this: 

Google doc Or click keep reading:

Firstly, Juvia gets very little growth as a character, to the point that even by the end of the series, she is still entirely obsessed with Gray and it's basically her only character trait(in canon). Everything she does is in someway related to Gray. Had she gotten real character development, I think I really would have loved her, but instead she was made to be nothing but someone who has an obsession with Gray. (Which clearly stemmed from hero-worship, and had it only lasted a short time with her coming to her senses and apologizing for it, then it might have been a good subplot!)

Secondly, even if she had gotten better, that would not erase the fact that she is a stalker and never even apologized. Even if she had apologized, Gray isn’t obligated to forgive her. Gray rejected her multiple times in canon(see bottom), and she continued to come on to him. If their roles were reversed, and it was Gray doing this to Juvia, everyone would be disgusted by the ship. There's a double standard around it. During the one year time skip when she forced him to live with her for 6 months while he was emotionally compromised, there was emotional manipulation similar to what is found in  Stockholm Syndrome patients. In several fields of psychology, it's been tested(and confirmed) that in 99% of cases where a person dates their stalker, it is because of their manipulation during moments of high emotion(typically negative, chapter 416) often caused by the stalker themself but sometimes by outside elements(like with Gray(chapter 416), and yet again, is similar to Stockholm Syndrome). They only thing that happened between them is that she emotionally manipulated Gray into being complacent. 

Thirdly, SHE WAS A STALKER. Period. There is NO justifying that for any reason. She made him uncomfortable in canon. He openly said he was uncomfortable IN CANON. She followed him around to places he thought he was safe, and made those places unsafe, and it affected his mental state in a visible way. 

Fourthly, Gray is someone who cares deeply about his nakama, which makes him ignore a lot of his own problems if that means helping them, which is why he tried to let her down easily at first. He still protected her, because even though she made him uncomfortable, she's still a member of Fairy Tail. 

Fifthly, she has several delusions about Gray, as are shown in canon, which are vastly different to how Gray actually is. Which means she's likely in love with her own idea of him, and not Gray himself (Again, this stems from the hero-worship and obsession). So while the delusions are played up for comedy and don't accurately depict Gray, they do accurately depict Juvia's VIEW of Gray. 

Sixthly, she freaks out anytime he so much as speaks to another girl, which is a red-flag. That's not the kind of relationship anyone wants to be in, because it's over controlling and there's no real trust. It also speaks volumes about her codependency issues, which shows that being with Gray(an extremely independent individual) is also bad for her! The ship is toxic both ways. 

Receipts

(and please note I only used a few for each because I could have pulled out more.)

Point 1 (little character growth):

-chapter 48: Juvia's debut chapter. She's depressed after what has clearly been years of abuse and is later reinforced in the few flashbacks we get of her (people leaving because of the rain and other reasons.) 

-chapter 116: this is during the battle of Fairy Tail arc, and while Juvia has a little bit of character growth here, she goes right back to being overly jealous of everyone and trying to control who Gray interacts with as soon as the arc is over. Character development isn't development if it doesn't stick.

-Chapter 424: Juvia is in the exact same headspace as before, making herself sick over someone who rejected her multiple times. She could have gone to others for help! Lucy had a lead on Gray, so refusing that help and keeping to herself only shows that she was obsessed with the idea of doing things herself. This is a toxic mindset and would big a massive red flag in a real relationship, as it shows a desperate need for control over the other person. 

-ft100 chapter 1: she still gets into the same headspace when Gray leaves. This is further proof that the relationship isn't just toxic for Gray, but for Juvia as well. (Extreme codependency is terrible)

Point 2 (emotional manipulation): 

-Chapter 340: Juvia tells Gray that he's rude for being upset. She tells him that he should be smiling! She's blatantly ignoring his feelings and trying to control him. 

-chapter 416: Gray is obviously distraught over what happened, and Juvia tries to make her guilt more important than his grief. She says "Juvia doesn't have the right to love you anymore," which is an obvious guilt trip. She's attempting to get him to respond positively instead of getting the negative responses she usually gets from him by using his grief weakened mindset against him. And that's not even mentioning that she stalked him to his parents grave all the way in Isvan. He clearly didn't invite her. Gray's too private of a character for that, and he obviously expected to be alone, considering his surprise when she shows herself. ("juvia! You followed me here?")

Point 3 (stalking, general abuse)

-see 416 above (how else would she have known he'd have gone back to an entirely different country when he obviously didn't tell anyone, let alone her.)

-episode 50: Juvia attempts to drug Gray with a love potion. This would make him love her regardless of his own feelings, basically making him a slave to her whims. 

-chapter 67: she's clearly shown stalking him before joining Fairy Tail, and she never apologized or grew enough as a character that we can definitely say she wouldn't do so again. 

-episode 129: Juvia stalked Gray when he went on a job with Erza.

-chapter 432: Gray's "why are you here?" Is a clear indication that she shouldn’t be there, and that she most likely followed him.

-there's also multiple sexual harassment issues, such as when Juvia asks Gray to punish/spank(depends on translation) her on Tenrou(chapter 249: "I don't have those kinds of hobbies!" Gray says, and then she responds with "I do") and when she admitted to sleeping with him without his knowledge during the Avatar arc(chapter 424: see Gray's rejections for the quote)

Point 4 (Gray is a softie and tried to let her down easy before being blunt):

-literally the entirety of Fairy Tail.

-Lullaby arc: he protects Lucy and Happy from some of the Eisenwald guild members, and openly worries about Erza pushing herself to hard to finish the mission.

-Galuna arc: he protects Lucy, Natsu, and Happy from Lyon, and he attempted iced shell TWICE to protect them from Lyon's plan.

-Phantom Lord arc: Gray is so adamant about protecting Lucy from Phantom that it's literally what starts Juvia's obsession with Lucy as her "love-rival."

-Tower of Heaven Arc: he's incredibly anxious about getting Erza when she's captured, and arguably the most urgent to get her back to protect her

Do I need to keep going or do you get the picture here?

Point 5(delusions):

-Do I even need to track all these down? There’s one ever dozen chapters or so, so we’ve all seen them.

Point 6(abuse and mistreatment of other characters): 

-Lucy: chapters 77, 79, 86, 103, ect (there's so many more, all for the sake of getting rid of her "Love-Rival")

-Chapter 202: Juvia's is rude to Lisanna even when she's being kind and offering to be Juvia's partner, because she thinks Lisanna might "take" Gray. Gray isn't an object and shouldn't be treated like one, and that shouldn't be Juvia's priority here anyways. She can't see past her obsession to be nice to anyone else.

-chapter 208: Juvia puts Gray's safety over everyone else's and intended to lie to everyone so that she could go find Gray on her own to be his savior. 

Some of Gray's rejections: 

-chapter 271: This is one of the gentler rejections. Juvia brings a sleepy bag for her and Gray, and Gray says "No way am I getting in that." 

-chapter 322: Gray asked her to let go of his hand and she refused.

-chapter 338: "Gray-Sama! I love you!" Was met with Gray's "I don't."

-chapter 424: "slept together.... well tried to. He kicked me out." Quoted Directly from Juvia. 

One last thing: As someone who has been stalked TWICE, I can attest for how it fucks up your mental state. While it was still nowhere near as extreme as some of the lengths Juvia went to, it STILL has lingering effects on me. I still have difficulty even talking about it at times, because of how much it's fucked me up and given me paranoia. I literally live out in the middle of fucking no where and the though of my window now being covered terrifies me. What Juvia does is not okay, and I refuse to shut up about how toxic they are.

[howtowhumpyourhiccup]

Winter Whumperland Day 2 - Alone

Summary: Written for Winter Whumperland Day 2. Set in a modern AU, sequel to Day 1 'Appearances'. At night after the party, Hiccup lies awake, unable to sleep. He's not alone in bed, but still alone with his thoughts.

Rating: Mature

Characters: Hiccup, Viggo

Pairing: Vigcup, past-Hiccstrid

Words: 1 321

Fandom: How to Train Your Dragon

Prompt: “Sleep Deprivation”

Whumpee: Hiccup

Author’s Notes: Since these all take place in the same story, but are loosely tied together, it means that I have the full story to work with as I post these one-shots. I somewhat re-wrote this one and the previous one to fit and flow better and even added another scene to Day 3 because of an event happening on a later day that was already planned but hadn't been written yet.

What I'm trying to say is, this has been an interesting project to work on.Also, is the rating of "mature" right? And I've seen the Winter Whumperland blog itself tag the first Day as "dubcon", does that count for whole relationships that only one half of the couple wants as well?

Constructive criticism is appreciated!

Enjoy!

@amonthofwhump

Ao3

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The clock ticking softly on the wall is infuriating, but it's about the only companion he has right now. That and the moonlight timidly lighting the room with what little the moon can reflect.

Eyes on the ceiling, he's never seen a room look so blue before, so used to the orange light of streetlamps coming in instead.

Or maybe he is used to it, he's been here long enough, after all.

He hates how that thought makes him feel. He's so used to everything now, nothing really fazes him anymore, nothing is new.

He wants to be at home.

Hiccup sighs deeply, a familiar feeling of a deep yearning in his heart that seems so far out of reach now. Every day it dwindles just a little more, every day it goes farther and farther away. Like a pleasant dream one has at night only to wake up and barely remember it.

Someone follows his example, breathing just as deeply, but more contentedly than he does.

He's not alone in bed as Viggo is with him. As if they're a real couple, they share the bed and sometimes it's almost like the elder of the two actually believes that they are. And Hiccup, he feels like pretending that they are makes things easier for him.

He pretended less than an hour ago.

Both bare underneath the covers, Viggo's head is lying on his naked chest, Hiccup can feel his prickly beard on his skin. His expression is quite neutral and Hiccup would've liked it if his sleep was at least a little bit troubled. He doesn't deserve a full night of rest.

The ironic thing is, Viggo is sleeping well because of Hiccup's presence. Something he'd told the young man, who almost felt flattered until that rational part of him, no matter how small after everything, reminded him not to be fooled.

Viggo is a manipulative man, the last thing he needs is to develop Stockholm syndrome after everything.

It's not fair that he gets to sleep while Hiccup can't. He's too uncomfortable to.

There's a layer of sweat coating him and the feeling of it drying on his skin is abhorrent, especially given the circumstances. And so is the culmination of wetness between his legs and on his stomach. They had sex before Viggo so graciously fell asleep on his chest and Hiccup desperately wants to take a shower.

But alas, he can't. That involves getting up and 'his darling' won't appreciate being moved. Maybe he'll get the chance somewhere during the night. If not, he'll be forced to wait until morning. So he has hours of uncomfortably lying in their mess to look forward to.

And he'll be expected to change the sheets later. When you keep someone hostage for your pleasure, you expect them to do the housework, too, apparently.

The Grimborns used to have a housekeeper, but she was "fired" for discovering Hiccup and not wanting to keep him quiet.

She was so kind, Hiccup hopes it was quick at least.

Gods, he hates himself right now. Not that it's a new feeling. He feels responsible for what happened to that poor woman and so he hates himself. And for getting caught in the first place, for drawing attention everywhere he goes, for everything he's had to do just to get through the day.

He's been performing his role as some kind of obedient... He doesn't want to think about it. Like a dog, he's expected to bark, roll over, play dead whenever his master commands him to and he's done it all. He's done it all. Because he's already figured that fighting Viggo and Ryker physically just doesn't work. And then there are those invisible fences to keep him trapped, like he's some pretty bird in a golden cage and Viggo is the master who makes him perform just for him until the day he dies.

It's sad and he hates it, but sex is a handy tool. The youngest Grimborn is a smart man who likes a smart partner, he's reminded Hiccup several times of this fact. But he, too, can be persuaded with the pleasures of the flesh, especially if the person offering is Hiccup.

Tonight, Hiccup pretended they are a couple and offered his body to lessen his anger when Viggo came searching for him after the party and found the bedroom door to be locked. Just as he predicted earlier, locking the door on top of everything else he'd done was the final straw for that night. And it didn't help that the party had left Viggo drained and even more easily agitated.

Hiccup doesn't want to think about how trading himself for his own safety makes him feel like. He doesn't want to be alone with his thoughts either and yet here he is.

Astrid was his girlfriend and they've only done it twice. They were a young couple that thought they had plenty of time, so they didn't rush. That is far, far less than what he's done with his current... "lover".

They were both inexperienced, simply exploring, finding things out together, garnering experience together. He doubts that has changed much for Astrid, but his experience has skyrocketed since their separation. Another thing he hates. So much he's had to learn that he wants to unlearn.

Before pretending that they are in love, he's tried to pretend this was Astrid he was with, but that never lasted long. A 19-year-old young woman and a 30 to 40 something-year-old man aren't the same things, after all.

And then there is another little thing that he's heard the brothers talk about, eavesdropping in on a conversation he was never meant to hear and probably would've been punished severely for. But that is for when Viggo's broken him enough to when they can be sure Hiccup won't run away given the chance.

It'll be the final insult, the last chain that is meant to keep him here, the end goal so to speak. When that guest made his joke earlier, he probably didn't guess the meaning behind Viggo's look correctly, but Hiccup knows what that smile was about.

But he's not going to let it come to that, he can't. Even if he's never found, he has to get out of this situation somehow.

Or maybe he's too optimistic for his own good and his kidnapping will end like so many other cases before him have. Namely, with him in a shallow grave somewhere far away from home. Nothing but skeletal remains and forever remembered as the tragic golden child who went missing when he had so much promise.

Once again, not him, just like that reflection wasn't him.

Hiccup wishes he could sleep. He's so, so tired and he wants his thought process to finally stop bringing him places he doesn't want it to go. He can't even use this time to think of a way out, his mind too preoccupied with hurting itself. He closes his heavy eyes, but they won't stay closed.

How dare Viggo sleep so peacefully when he's the one harboring a missing person that he stole and exploits in every way he wants to.

Glaring down at him, Hiccup curses him for leaving him alone with his thoughts like this.

The nights are arguably the worst in this aspect. Days are bad, but at least there's stuff he can keep himself busy with. House stuff usually, since he's not allowed to do anything else, and they somehow always manage to keep his list of chores full. It's almost like he's a child in a strict household.

But now there's nothing stopping him from thinking, from feeling, from missing. And what he feels is discomfort, fear, heartache, and loneliness.

A well, he'll just have to bear with it. Despite Viggo's methods and his way to beat him down and tire him out, Hiccup does have a plan.

[fontofmercy-archived2]

Rethinking The Unkiss: Sansa Stark and Trauma

“The Unkiss” refers to the (confirmed as intentional) inconsistency in Sansa’s recollection of her interaction with Sandor at The Battle of Blackwater. Many fans interpret that this inconsistency is a sign that Sansa is romantically interested in Sandor, but I would like to offer a different perspective. The perspective of Sansa not as a self-insert for adult women who are attracted to Sandor, but as the traumatized child she is in canon.

I’m not going to explain in depth that Sandor is verbally, physically, and sexually abusive to Sansa because that is just blatantly in the text; it’s not a debate or a theory, it’s a canonical fact that Sandor is Sansa’s abuser. Just because he had a few good moments and is arguably a little better than other abusers doesn’t change that. There is a great meta that does explain that though if you want a refresher: https://stardyng.tumblr.com/post/181474608232/a-song-of-birds-and-burns-anti-sansan-meta by @stardyng

1.) First things first, let’s just take a look at the actual scene:

“The blood masked the worst of his scars, but his eyes were white and wide and terrifying. The burnt corner of his mouth twitched and twitched again. Sansa could smell him; a stink of sweat and sour wine and stale vomit, and over it all the reek of blood, blood, blood.

"I could keep you safe," he rasped. "They're all afraid of me. No one would hurt you again, or I'd kill them." He yanked her closer, and for a moment she thought he meant to kiss her. He was too strong to fight. She closed her eyes, wanting it to be over, but nothing happened. "Still can't bear to look, can you?" she heard him say. He gave her arm a hard wrench, pulling her around and shoving her down onto the bed. "I'll have that song. Florian and Jonquil, you said." His dagger was out, poised at her throat. "Sing, little bird. Sing for your little life."

Her throat was dry and tight with fear, and every song she had ever known had fled from her mind. Please don't kill me, she wanted to scream, please don't. She could feel him twisting the point, pushing it into her throat, and she almost closed her eyes again, but then she remembered. It was not the song of Florian and Jonquil, but it was a song. Her voice sounded small and thin and tremulous in her ears.” - A Clash of Kings, Sansa VII

Does that sound like a girl who wants to be kissed? No. That is a child who is genuinely afraid for her life. She thought he might kiss her (planting the seed for the false memory) and she wanted it to be over. It is clear here that Sansa is disgusted by and terrified of Sandor, not attracted to him.

2.) Sansa does not have adult desires

Sansa Stark is not an adult woman fantasizing about kissing someone she likes. Firstly, she is not an adult. Even if child sex was the accepted social norm in ASoIaF (it’s not, it’s a rarity and frowned upon) that still wouldn’t change the fact that children’s sexual development is based on their brain development not social norm. Children who live in locations where child sex is the norm are not adults, they aren’t magically ready for sex just because adults think it’s normal to rape them. The reader cannot analyze Sansa’s sexuality as if it is developed, it is not. Her sexuality is premature and being warped by prolonged abuse.

Secondly, Sansa is not fantasizing about kissing Sandor, she’s not actively choosing to indulge the thought because it’s pleasant; she truly believes that the kiss happened because her brain altered the memory without her conscious knowledge. Sansa’s memory of The Battle of Blackwater is a trauma memory and cannot be treated as a normal memory. For a child to be restrained and held at knife point by an adult who is threatening to kill her and verbally belittling her, for a child to truly believe she may be murdered, is a trauma. There is no child in the world who is “mature” or “understanding” or anything enough to not be traumatized by that.

Let’s look at when Sansa thinks about The Unkiss, because it’s not when she is daydreaming for fun and certainly not for arousal:

“If I close my eyes I can pretend (Sweetrobin) is the Knight of Flowers. Ser Loras had given Sansa Stark a red rose once, but he had never kissed her . . . and no Tyrell would ever kiss Alayne Stone. Pretty as she was, she had been born on the wrong side of the blanket.

As the boy's lips touched her own she found herself thinking of another kiss. She could still remember how it felt, when his cruel mouth pressed down on her own. He had come to Sansa in the darkness as green fire filled the sky. He took a song and a kiss, and left me nothing but a bloody cloak.” - A Feast for Crows, Alayne II

Here, Sansa is being nonconsensually kissed by Sweetrobin and tries to think about Loras (who she was attracted to). If Sansa’s memory changes were a result of her desires, she would have remembered Loras kissing her but she can’t because none of her memories with Loras were traumatic and therefore she remembers them correctly. It is trauma that causes Sansa’s memories to be warped, they are not warped by Sansa’s desires.

Now, let’s go back to right before the above quote so I can further explain why Sansa’s Unkiss memory coming up here is not her using it as escapism:

“Before she could summon the servants, however, Sweetrobin threw his skinny arms around her and kissed her. It was a little boy's kiss, and clumsy. Everything Robert Arryn did was clumsy...” - A Feast for Crows, Alayne II

Anything that reminds a PTSD survivor of their trauma can be a trigger, and what Sweetrobin does here is almost step-for-step what Sandor did at The Battle of Blackwater:

“Then something stirred behind her, and a hand reached out of the dark and grabbed her wrist.

Sansa opened her mouth to scream, but another hand clamped down over her face, smothering her.” - A Clash of Kings, Sansa VII

Sansa is suddenly grabbed and prevented from calling out...then kissed without consent? It is not uncommon for trauma survivors to imagine the abuse that’s happening to them happening in a “better” way or even just in a different way so it feels more under their control. That’s what Sansa is doing, Sweetrobin triggered her and she thought of a romantic version of BoB. Another example:

"Oh, yes. He died on top of me. In me, if truth be told. You do know what goes on in a marriage bed, I hope?"

She thought of Tyrion, and of the Hound and how he'd kissed her, and gave a nod.” - A Feast for Crows, Alayne II

Here Sansa is feeling uncomfortable and trying to feel like she has more experience than she does. Notice that she doesn’t think of Littlefinger or Sweetrobin here even though they’ve both already kissed her, and she glosses over Tyrion’s groping: because those were sexual traumas that really happened, it’s easier to imagine The Hound. A kiss that was “cruel” and unwanted like the rest in her life, but one that is at least under her control because she subconsciously knows it’s not real.

3.) Why The Unkiss?

So, I’ve established that Sansa’s change in memory is a result of trauma and not her desires, and that she doesn’t remember The Unkiss in positive context, but why would she remember the trauma as a kiss at all?

If The Unkiss were real, it would have been Sansa’s first real kiss. It would have been a kiss before Littlefinger’s molestation began. Sansa inventing The Unkiss was not because she wanted Sandor to kiss her, nowhere in the scene is that the case, but because when Sandor is safety far away from her the memory is a convenient way for Sansa’s brain to kill two birds with one stone; to establish autonomy over her sexuality and to repress the trauma of that memory.

I’m no expert in the human brain, but I am a psychology student and I do know a lot about trauma and I know that the human brain loves convenient compartmentalization, especially when someone (like Sansa) is in a situation where she’s captive and unable to escape danger. From a psychological standpoint, Sandor’s assault is the ideal opportunity for Sansa’s autonomous first kiss to have occurred because no one else was there during that interaction, Sandor is far away, and she told no one about it. That event is a secret place in Sansa’s mind, a perfect place to hide a little piece of autonomy from other abusers such as Littlefinger.

If The Unkiss were real, it also would have happened in place of the most traumatic part of the memory when Sandor puts the knife to her throat and she thinks she’s going to die. Look back at the scene and you’ll see Sansa thinks Sandor is going to kiss her right before he puts the knife to her throat.

I could not find one single line where Sansa thinks about Sandor putting the knife to her throat, where she thinks about her mind going blank with terror and internally begging for her life. Instead, Sansa remembers the kiss and the cloak and the times Sandor protected her because that’s easier. Sansa clings to the parts of that night that are easy to romanticize, that are not actually linked to her feelings of terror and violation.

4.) Other SanSan “evidence”

Beyond The Unkiss, other “evidence” of SanSan all boils down to Stockholm Syndrome. Sansa has been a captive most of her storyline and no one around her is truly on her side. Anyone, especially a child, who is trapped in a dangerous environment with no one on their side is going to cling to anyone who can offer any relative safety even if that means compartmentalizing the abuse they’ve inflicted.

Sansa does this with every single one of her abusers. To say that there’s something romantic and genuine about her Stockholm Syndrome symptoms towards one abuser but not all the others is just pure bias.

Sansa thinks of Littlefinger as being half-Petyr who is her friend and half-Littlefinger who does deeply troubling things. She despises and fears his sociopathic behavior, but she still has to think of him as her protector because if he’s not then she has no one.

Sansa looks on Tyrion’s moments of protecting her and ignores the fact that he forced her to marry him and groped her. Tyrion isn’t as bad as the other Lannisters and she doesn’t have a choice but to be around them so she ignores all he’s done that harmed her.

Sansa thinks about the times that Sandor protected her and his Knight’s cloak and ignores the fact that he made her fear for her life and was constantly abusive towards her. If Sandor can’t protect her, none of the other Knights will and so she minimizes the terror he’s caused.

Sandor is no different. It is not romantic longing for Sansa to “wish The Hound were here” because she doesn’t want to be beat. That’s just survival.

I don’t know how to end this but please stop reducing my girl’s arc to “saving” some abusive man from himself. Sansa Stark is a main character, Sandor isn’t, and her arc is so so much more than becoming a consolation prize to a man who literally abused her as a child ok bye.

[derangedhyena-zoids]

some blather on misaligned and related bs;

hnngghHHHH backstory 2020 continued.

-gonna go with ‘specula was a little sleep deprived for a while while she determined that hiltz was not, in fact, going to End Ryss’ -hiltz would be terrifying on a good day. combined with the fact he’s basically gone insane but is held together by angry eyebrows, willpower and spite alone? uh. -Ryss’s group and anyone who drew from Specula’s colony was basically known for mindfuck, which they employed liberally to deal with the genocidal horrors bearing down on them. Hiltz’s group didn’t like that, obviously. It’d actually been very difficult to find, nevermind get at Ryss’s group. -you’d think that such a display of efficacy and power would convince Hiltz’s group that Ryss’s is worth keeping around and being allies with, maybe. but no: given that the central concept involved is deception, that offends their sensibilities too much. -....because that group, for as violent and awful as it was to others, strongly values an internal forthright state. CAN’T BE VICIOUS INSIDE AND OUT, it’d fall apart. I feel like they had a lot of hyper-ritualized behaviors to channel their aggression into, formal and strict ways to address issues. weird meditative decorum. the idea absolutely wasn’t just to be a bunch of fuckin wild animals, the idea was to laser-focus those base instincts into something they had full control over and could wield as weapons/personal improvement. -as I mentioned previously this cultural miss is where most of the unclear expectations between Hiltz and Ryss sourced from and that rift’s only real option was to widen. -Hiltz early-on established that No, You May Not Read His Mind which is why Ryss and Specula later get so blindsided by his “betrayal.” (I’m going to argue that it really is a “who shot first” thing given the whole race traitor angle, but. I digress.) Otherwise it’s just permanently stupid that the show’s PSYCHIC CHARACTER behaved the way she did. But with this set of restrictions in-mind, and that it literally took Hiltz trying to kill her to jar her out of her FUCKING STOCKHOLM SYNDROME... the above makes her behavior in the remainder of the show make far more sense, imo. she’s not JUST dealing with “being betrayed” and all the shit going on, she’s dealing with the last umpteen years of her life being upended and effectively moot - dealing with having to see the horrific results of something she helped set up - and that’s all on top of her past Zoidian experience(s) and the whole thing with Nichalo. she’s had a fucking TIME. -Hiltz demands Specula and Ryss be thankful for their situation, which to the latter is (initially) only marginally improved. But Hiltz is comparing her situation to his early situation, so of course he feels like a fucking saint. -did Ryss love Hiltz? technically, yes. But again: literal stockholm syndrome. Did Hiltz love Ryss? Arguably a spoiler and It’s Complicated but yes, he did,  -Hiltz kinda has ptsd from how badly he was treated by humans but let’s be real nobody cares dude. you have literally no sympathy points to spend. -Ambient didn’t wake up when Hiltz woke up in a panic.... oof. 😬

- ”do something” = DUDE, ANYONE WITH EYES CAN SEE THERE’S SOMETHING SERIOUSLY WRONG THERE, HE’S YOUR MAN, HOLY SHIT HELP HIM 😬 -you know how when something is wrong you just sort of. want to ignore it. and maybe it will just... go away. (you know. like Zeke did also. Organoids clearly have this issue. 😬)  -it did not go away, it got worse.

-way worse

one of the large remaining backstory-comics to do besides kill your heroes is the one where One is first found. (which needs a title. it’s current Pantheon but idk. it tl;drs to: )

*direct eye-contact with Prozen* psst, hey kid, I heard you like death saurers

[karazetian]

What’s happening is that Disney is not doing its job.

I ended up doing an essay lol. I obviously appreciate someone reading it but given that is really lengthy, I don’t expect anyone to do so. I’m also not Asian so, there’s that. And my English leaves a lot to be desired (I corrected the orthography but I’m prone to grammar errors). 

I do recommend checking out the sources I linked, especially 1 (youtube video made by a Chinese person), 2 and 3 (the descriptions are below).

I talk about what Disney is doing is not out of naive idleness. Idleness yes, but naivety no. 

I keep thinking, where the hell did this movie go wrong? Because yes, this is not the first time nor the last time Disney is going to deliver a less than mediocre live-action remake, but, despite all of their track record, I still had hope for this one. 

Because, while the other movies are classics, they had certain aspects that didn’t age perfectly, which it is understandable. Beauty and the Beast, although arguably the best Disney animated movie, had these “Stockholm Syndrome” connotations* (bear with me) and we also had to consider how much of Beast’s personality could stay in the remake (since he could have been read really wrong if he lashed out on Belle too much, not only because of his appearance but for the power dynamics of him being the one in calling the shots of Belle’s wellbeing, hope that made sense). 

Cinderella could have made some* audiences criticize her for her apparent submissiveness, Aladdin is a whole can of worms in the subject of orientalism (which they kept in the remake, anyway), etc., etc.

*This is not the post to discuss whether or not Belle suffered Stockholm Syndrome during her movie, nor to discuss whether or not Cinderella was actually submissive in the original. Many people have already done that, my point in bringing that up is, Disney used that as an excuse to change scenes and plot in the remakes. 

But Mulan, aside from minor problems that come from an American company writing an eastern story (and the values and trends present when the movie was made), had a very strong plot that still holds up to this day (I say that like the movie was made in the 30s lol). 

Not only it is a “feminist” movie but also, the story is very well written and made, in my opinion. There was not a lot that you needed to change. The main character had already a well-rounded personality (unlike, for example, my girl Aurora), the story was already very rich, etc. The removal of Mushu (and the whole dragon symbolism), although sad, it’s understandable how it was necessary.

However, is not just the removal of important and nostalgic characters like Mushu or grandma Fa, but the removal of the soul of the movie.

Mulan 2020 is a soulless movie. 

This is not unique to this remake, as this is not even unique to remakes, imo. But it is one of the most painful ones, because this movie meant a lot to a lot of women (and people) and the beauty of it all was that you didn’t need to be Chinese, or a woman, to appreciate it (that’s a good thing in the sense that is good when you can relate to a story, even if you don’t share some of the traits with the main character. Not that it’s good despite being the story of a Chinese woman, is that clear? Sorry if it’s not).

And it’s also painful because it could have been so easy to... not do that. Other people have already talk about this (and in a much briefer, better way) but yes, what made Mulan so great in the original was that she was your average girl, even worse because she lived in a very conservative society yet she managed to become a badass while, not only discovering who she was in the process, but also staying true to that. That was the reason she was great. She had flaws, she couldn’t adapt, she was the underdog but she, through her unwillingness to give up, her tenacity, wits and compassion, overcame that, eventually becoming a hero. 

It was not because of her qì. Again, I’m not going to do a deep dive in that because others have already talked about how they made her a Chosen One. What I want to discuss is how sad it is that they went for that route and my confusion as to why they did it. 

And I think it was more than laziness. It’s definitely a lack of motivation but, when you dwelve on it, I don’t think that laziness goes hand in hand with carelessness. But first, with the laziness, a google search would have made them see what progressive crowds now deem as feminist values. Both eastern and western crowds. 

Because yeah, sure, I doubt the Chinese government is well versed in intersectional feminism. Yet, there are movies both the Chinese government and its people have liked and appreciated. Weren’t they the ones that, upon watching Kung Fu Panda said something like “how did we not come up with that?” 

I saw this video made my Chinese youtuber Accented Cinema (links below: 1, I highly recommend watching it) and he even mentioned his school taking his class to watch the original movie in theaters. So, yeah, believe it or not, you can make a feminist movie set in a third world country (I also come from a third world country, sorry if this sounds like I’m being mean to Chinese people). 

So, why did you not do your homework, Disney? Again, I understand they couldn’t have made the most leftist movie, not only because it’s Disney, but because they wanted to appeal to both governments, however, you could have made the remake be satisfying enough for that audience and the rest of the world. But they didn’t even satisfy the Chinese audience, with a lot of them saying how the movie reinforces ideologies the Chinese themselves have already moved on from (the “devotion to family” inscription in the sword has received a lot of criticisms: 2).

This means that they failed to do even the only thing they seemed to compromise on. You could have had still appealed to the government. That is to say, I don’t expect Disney to be the wokest of them all and go full anarchist on their movies because that’s not even what Disney wants anyway.

They could have still done some things that wouldn’t have anything to do with western or eastern values. For example, they could have given Mulan’s sister a personality. Giving your character one is not a western/Americanized value, it’s part of what means to make a well written story.

Without that, her character seems completely pointless. Seriously, I keep thinking what was the point of her character, besides being a disappointing replacement of the grandma. I’d like to think that she was the movie’s way to represent how more conservative values are still valid, if the woman chooses so. Her wanting to get married and have a traditional family doesn’t diminish her value as a person. They could have made a scene with the two sisters still being able to bond with each other, even if they had very different views of the world.

But since we never find out about her motivations or desires, it is left unknown whether this is what she chose for herself or if she is just another victim of her circumstances. And I ask myself why, since it could have been so easily to do that. You could have replaced the scene where kid Mulan is combing her sister’s hair (which, for what I can remember, only serves to further stablish the sister’s fear of spiders… which they make clear in other two scenes) if the movie’s duration was a problem.

Being left with no logical answers, I can only conclude that it was out of laziness. But it doesn’t end there, does it? Because I think “ok, so they were lazy, then they could have done what every lazy student does when they don’t have any motivation left and copy-pasted the original. Didn’t they do that with the Lion King already?”

And I get that it didn’t work with that one, but that’s because you shouldn’t somber up a movie that has anthropomorphic animals, that also heavily relied on being an animated movie. Mulan doesn’t rely on that; Mulan was inspired by a legend. Live-action Mulan had already been made with good results, so what couldn’t they have just copy pasted their own original? If they didn’t have the energy to give it a proper, well-made twist (i.e., Maleficent), the least they could have done is respect its predecessor.

But they took away all the things that made Mulan great in the first place, to made her what every writer will tell you not to do. Making her being born with extraordinary skills, which then results in her not having to work for her merits, is something even I, a nobody, knows not to do. I’m not even going to address how taking agency away from her sends the wrong message to the little girls that are going to see this sad excuse of a movie.

What I’m trying to say, it may not be comparable to a lazy student copying the homework of one of the most accomplished students, but it is as if they based their work on that, just butchering all the parts that made the accomplished student’s work good. And, unlike with the lazy student whose reasons might be justifiable, Disney had no excuse to do so, because it is their job.

It is their job to deliver a well written story or, if that’s too demanding, to at least make a movie with a happy-go feeling (is that grammatically correct?) that sends a well-meaning message. Instead, the message this movie (I would say, purposefully) delivers is that you can only accomplish great things if you’re born special.

Us, regular folks, especially regular women, especially regular women born in less than ideal circumstances, are doomed. And that’s what’s sad.

 Links to sources used:

1.    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZccG-wtt5FA&ab_channel=AccentedCinema

2.    https://twitter.com/tony_zy/status/1302743527240142849

Why “boycott” Mulan 2020 (not only because of what the lead actress said):

3.    https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/09/07/why-disneys-new-mulan-is-scandal/

4.    https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/global-opinions/whats-happening-in-xinjiang-is-genocide/2020/07/06/cde3f9da-bfaa-11ea-9fdd-b7ac6b051dc8_story.html

5.    What the actress did say: https://time.com/5653973/mulan-boycott-liu-yifei/

[safefromsin]

ok but on the flip side for rp canon stuff - let’s talk about how jacob ( @only-we ) saw something more in sara than her arguably “weak” outer appearance would lead someone to believe. perhaps he, like joseph and faith in IEG, saw someone who could be manipulated and molded into something of his own making (which, yes, does happen), but he also saw a survivor. 

sara has always been very careful not to appear broken. at a young age, she was forced to mature and become her own parent. after her father passed when she was three, her mother developed a substance abuse problem and was committed to rehab, forcing sara into the foster system. she was in and out of foster homes for several years until her mother was deemed a fit parent again. even after they were reunited, sara’s mother was emotionally distant and could not be the mother sara needed. again, sara was forced to look after herself. this eventually led to sara moving out of her mother’s place at a young age (seventeen) and living with a boyfriend. despite all of this, sara made a promise to herself that she would not let her shitty childhood dictate who she became as a person. it wasn’t easy, obviously, but she did her best to remain positive and life affirming, looking out to see the good in others, while still being cautious about the truth, and always looking to both sides of a situation. 

i’m not sure if many of you know this, but sara and jacob met after sara saved him. and in that thread, she saved him not only once but twice. the second time by shooting and killing her first person to save the herald’s life. this was when jacob decided to take sara back to the mountains and she eventually stayed there. 

ok now onto the deeper parts of their relationship. 

let me start by saying there is so many unhealthy tactics at play in this relationship. both of the muns acknowledge that their relationship is not normal, nor is it a model of a healthy relationship. there are themes of manipulation and hints of stockholm syndrome. however, sara retains much of herself along the way as well. despite all jacob has done, she treats him as she would treat anyone else... with kindness and understanding. this is not something jacob is used to and i believe (don’t quote me on this, ask vers if you want more info) that is part of what draws jacob in as well. she’s different. she doesn’t look at him in fear. and she is not afraid to grow closer to him. from sara’s side, jacob gives her the tools to survive. as i mentioned previously, she has always been strong-willed and this is only heightened when she lives in the mountains. often she is in life-or-death situations and sara refuses to die. she refuses to give up. part of her (the manipulated side) is doing it for jacob’s affirmation (much like how the trials are constructed to make the victim feel), but her will to survive and carry on is a part of her and always has been. again, jacob saw this in her because something similar runs in him too. 

regardless, sara grew. she grew into a woman she never thought she’d become. this newfound strength even gave her the courage to stand up to john ( @gcdsaved ) who had been the source of her trauma in hope county. she finally had the grit to face her enemies. and she was given the tools to become a survivor, one fit for the collapse. 

and guess what? it happened. 

in my main rp canon, jacob never died and his bunker becomes one used during the collapse. sara is there with jacob and this is when their dynamic shifts. prior to the bombs dropping, sara had an arguably submissive relationship to jacob, despite how she grew as a person. it was very clear he had her under his thumb, though there was likely more of a respect between them. in the quiet moments when they were together with no one else around, sara was kind and comforting to him. this dynamic continued into the bunkers, but with sara’s growing confidence she began to express herself more, slowly becoming her own person again. and while a sexual tension existed between them prior to the bombs, it wasn’t until the bunker they became more physically involved. at first, the sex was to let off steam, to have a time where they could forget about the metal walls they were trapped in and release stress. as time went on, it became more intimate and caring (again, away from all other eyes). 

slowly but surely, with the shift in their relationship along with the confidence sara possessed, she became more of jacob’s equal. she was given tasks and management positions within the bunker, becoming more independent and showing just how capable she was to help keep the project alive. and, as many of you know, sara’s and jacob’s relationship eventually created their son, isaac, in that bunker. that’s a whole other post and i won’t get into that with this essay, but my point is sara is not simply some submissive servant to jacob. she still has a mind of her own. she still wants to believe people can be good and there’s hope past the cruelty in this world. and her will to survive never once faltered. 

[nawaazishein]

Broken but beautiful (2018)

“Broken but beautiful” (ALTBalaji) is the story of Veer, a guy who lost his wife to a car accident four years ago, and Sameera, who cannot accept the fact that her relationship of five years ended. A year ago. Their tracks are connected through Kartik, Veer’s cousin and Sameera’s ex-boyfriend. The show revolves around how both refuse to let go of their past, how it effects their present, and how they manage to break out of that with the help of one another. [Spoilers from here on] It’s one of the oldest stories in the book, boy meets girl, they help each other get over toxic periods in their life, possibly fall in love, life is beautiful, done. There’s nothing mind-blowingly new about this concept, but that’s fine, the trailer didn’t promise anything else. I was hoping for a couple of hours of shallow entertainment and nothing more, however I was still disappointed. Let’s start with the main characters. Veer blames himself for his wife’s death in a car accident because he didn’t make sure she put on a seatbelt (ok??) and has been living a very self-destructive and secluded life ever since. He copes by sleeping with anything with a heartbeat and talking to his dead wife. You’d think he should see a shrink but he really still is the sanest of them all. Sameera’s the one to really takes the cake. When Kartik and Veer first call her “psycho stalker ex” I thought that was a tad bit exaggerated but boy, it was not. She is so obsessed with Kartik and their relationship that she behaves like a brainless dummy for 10 out of 11 episodes. Girl, please google “Stockholm Syndrome” when you find the time. She sits in a cab in front of his house and just stares at it for hours, drops everything at the blink of an eye when he calls only to get stood up or looked in an almari, basically makes a fool of herself at every chance given. These two meet because Veer moved into Kartik and Sameera’s old apartment without her knowing and she walks in on him working on another notch on the bedpost while she’s actually looking for Kartik. Kartik is undoubtedly a dick ‘cause he sold the house and got right of all her shit without telling her – including the dog, which a couple of episodes later turns out to have hidden in Veer’s bathroom and he didn’t notice?? Veer is done with Sameera’s shit right from the start, as are her friends and I cannot blame any of them, wants her missing signature for the purchase of the house and be done. That’s where things, or rather the timeline gets weird. The scenes are not shown in chronological order but rather jump from their first meeting to a fake relationship to make Kartik jealous to “I think I love Veer” confession in front of the whole family back to the fake relationship, which is super confusing. It took me a couple of episodes to understand that they were going back and forth in the first place, and up until episode 9 or 10 to figure out the actual progression of their storyline within the universe. It makes absolutely no sense for them to tell this story that away, and if it’s just a creative choice, theek hai, but then it’s very badly done. The first nine episodes are spent with this back and forth while Sameera continues to be an annoying psycho, stalking her ex, and Veer wants her to leave him alone. Special shoutout to him when he loses it after having to save her from being locked in Kartik’s almari and when he yells at her, wanting to know if this is some weird bimbo fetish she’s into or just a mental issue. I was cheering for him a bit there, ngl. In episode ten, all of a sudden, both realize that they’re attracted to one another. Actually Sameera goes so far as to call it love on the spot and instantly goes from projecting the need for affection from Kartik onto Veer. She even says so herself and for a second I have hopes she wasn’t asleep jab akkal baanth rahi thi.

The show ends with Veer defaming any kind of positive feeling towards Sam in front of his friends, her hearing that, the inevitable heartbreak, both of them milkar delivering his friend’s baby, that event changing their outlook on everything for whatever reason, Veer realizing he does have the hots for her, Sam forgiving Veer and realizing she’s a strong independent woman that needs no man. If you’re like “Wtf, where did this all come from all of a sudden?” that makes two of us. What the first nine episode might arguably lack in progress and speed – they don’t imo but when you only have 11 episodes to work with… - the last two episodes try to make up for and fail. The only thing making it a tiny bit worth watching, and the reason for me suffering through it, was Massey. He was great as usual. His acting has got a certain rawness to it, which makes his characters so much more real and believable by proxy, and he was the perfect fit for Veer. He was, as expected tbh, the saving grace of this whole entire show. Can’t say too much about Harleen because this is the first thing I’ve seen her in and I really hope the director made her put on the blank, somewhat spaced out expression she walked around with 95% of the time rather than it being her style of acting. To sum it up: The whole thing was just plain… bad. Awful. The concept was not developed enough, the writing made it worse and the actors couldn’t “outact” that. Whoever’s responsible for this probably thought exactly what I did minutes before handing in a half-assed uni-assignment, “Ah, fuck it, I can’t be bothered anymore.” and that’s exactly what comes across on screen.