#and theres so much more nuance to it thats its so. frustrating to see a statement like that

[zarnzarn]

i see all these comments talking about this after the new episode, but. i would like to state for the record that stolitz isn't. toxic.

first off, the concept of a toxic and a healthy relationship are such... vague terms. when you're online, drenched in language and tight moral boundaries, trying to put a nuanced story like helluva boss's into boxes is easy to attempt and impossible to do.

a toxic relationship is one where one or both parties is maliciously affecting the other. I'm talking fetid, nasty, rude interactions where there is more hurt than love. they're unhappy more often than not when they're with their partner, there's no respect or give from the other side.

stolitz is nothing like that.

Stolas actively cares about Blitz and actually has no fear or hesitation in ADMITTING IT OUT LOUD TO OZZIE. he has been calling, texting, commenting, laughing and finding ways to spend time with Blitz. he's throwing everything he has to the wind, finding the courage to move forward with the divorce, putting everything he has into trying to keep him. he's been alone in a palace since he was born, on medication, with such less people dear to him that he remembered the circus boy who spent a day with him DECADES ago- so when blitz comes into his life and brings back in laughter and color and sex, he's holding on with everything he's got.

and blitz does care!!! he cares a LOT, the whole series we see him falling in love with stolas through SHOW NOT TELL (his expressions, his choices, his fear, his lashing out) and utterly unable to process that stolas cares about him too when talking to fizz; almost a desperate kind of denial-

cause yknow. the first time he tried to confess something to someone he really liked, he accidentally killed half the people he knew and ruined the lives of the rest?

thats gonna leave just a teensy impact on the will to express your emotions in the future, methinks.

even before that, he clearly felt like on some level that he was unworthy and he's said twice that he despises himself for the accident even though it wasn't actually his fault. being self aware doesn't stop the emotions from emotioning.

he keeps insisting its only sex so urgently to anyone who doesn't ask because he can't even imagine it being anything else. he's both disappointed and relieved when he repeats that stolas sees him as a novelty, because what else can it be?

(there's a whole other spiel of how brave both Stolas and Blitz have to be to say it out loud even when asmodeus can't afford to, considering how publically and completely beaten down both were at the club.)

(there's also another whole spiel about how frustrating it has been for ME to see all these comments over time with such bad takes based on like,, 20 min worth of info of a show that takes months to release an ep. like godDAMN have some patience?? let the story UNFOLD MAYBE? IT WAS ALWAYS GOING TO HAVE AN EXPLANATION WHY WOULD YOU CRITICIZE THINGS THAT ARENT EVEN FINISHED ESPECIALLY AN INDIE ANIMATION- i digress)

mind you, this has NOTHING to do with abuse. an abusive relationship is one where one is actively harming the other with full awareness. Stella is an abuser and their marriage is abusive.

and stolitz isn't that; it isn't even unhealthy or toxic. it's a consensual, transactional fuckbuddy relationship that slid into something more for both of them.

but!!!!! one of the main reasons for the problems that everyone looks over is-

they're in a BDSM relationship.

I can't possibly delve into dynamics without making this a 10k research paper BUT even though we've gotten only hints and costumes and dialogue- they're very clearly and undeniably in a BDSM contract. Behind the scenes of this crazy show is a whole different story, of these two delving into the most hardcore kinks out there- knifeplay, painplay, bondage.

if you've gotten into the community, if you've read a couple dozen particularly good fics by authors who know what they're talking about, hell; even if your only experience is fifty shades or 365 or whatever- you gotta know that BDSM scenes are crazy fucking emotionally heavy. there's so much that has gone down between them during their full moons that helluva can't get into!!

but you know how in so many of these popular medias and fics, the dom in the relationship is also like,, the billionaire/mafia heir/prince, etc, the one with financial and physical power? this isnt that. it has been very clearly stated that stolas is subbing, blitz is domming.

now take a moment and think about how much that fucks up the dynamics.

in stolas' eyes, blitz is a confident, dangerous individual who's an old friend and cherished memory of his, who he's trusted wholly with his safety during sex and he's lucky to have; and he has been in an abusive arranged marriage for the past eighteen Years, he's probably not going to be pushing his luck with his dom that much in the first place. plus, blitz is never cowed by him during their conversations- think back to the first phone call right after he stole the book, completely unafraid.

and for blitz, it's someone trusting him again- but it's also a royal- a blue blood who's nearly untouchable and so much more powerful- who couldn't possibly like a piece of shit like him, apart from the sex he gets out of it. he only flirts once he gets some sort of cue from Stolas; he's desperately trying to view this as only a Goetia trying to get his rocks off, despite all the evidence to the contrary, because anything else is unfathomable to him, no matter how clearly Stolas shows it, because of the ptsd.

both of them thinks the other has the power. both of them aren't expecting the other to keep shut if something's bothering them.

and there's so much conflicting messages from the other too!

stolas calls him a plaything when trying to intimidate the humans; stolas cups his face gently and asks if he's alright

blitz asks him on a date and tells him to get better soon; blitz yells that it's only sex and doesn't reply to his messages

ya see?

bring it to fizzozzie for a second now; even though they do look all good on surface, you can still see fizz's trauma and doubt in all their interactions, they're still forced to keep the relationship secret. do you see his face when Ozzie says in hyperbole that he's never leaving the house again, or when someone accuses him of being a pampered house pet or when he got sexualized in the 7th ep? whatever happened in the interim between the accident with mammon, it fucked him UP. even though oz seems to be well aware of this when he tells him not to apologise and in their general interactions, fizz still visibly has trouble separating plaything/commodity from healthy relationship.

shout the fuck out to Ozzie btw, man knows whats UP. rooting for these two so much omg.

i forgot where I was going with this point, I'll edit it when i remember. but yeah! lovely fucking relationship, but damn what angst filled issues.

anyway, to sum up- stolitz is not a toxic relationship. the relationship is stuck sludging through misunderstandings and careless microaggressions and trauma responses, but it's not unhealthy or toxic because of the simple reason that most of the current hurt comes from... a misunderstanding. stolas didn't realise blitz would need reassurance about what they were and blitz didn't see stolas as someone who could get hurt.

unecessarily calling it toxic, even online, is more impactful than people think too. almost all spindlehorse ARE on all social medias; so MANY YouTube animators i know have found jobs there; they see your words, especially since a lot don't tag posts with "anti hb" correctly to keep them out of the main tag. there are Very few queer medias made BY queer people that haven't gone through heavy corporate revisions- helluva boss is practically a historical landmark in its success. it's very very very fucking easy to forget that not ten years ago some of the only queer videos on YouTube were butter lover (one kiss at the end post credits), dirty paws and welcome to hell (subtext).

the amount of "critical talk" helluva boss gets for what it is is very unprecedented. it's a beautiful show. can't wait for the next episode.

[comradekatara]

saw ur post on lok n the bender v nonbender oppression dynamics (or lack of ig) n if u dont mind me talking in ur inbox for a min but like. i think if lok wanted to explore the concept of oppressor/oppressed in a "post"-revolution world, i think it couldve been done if the shows main premise circulated around 'following politics as a principle v as a reactionary identity'. now this would require the writers being ppl who understand the nuances of oppression n history of oppressed ppl also sometimes taking up spaces as oppressors etc. but like. it couldve been interesting. oppressed ppl coming out of really fucked up oppressive regimes n how they reacted bc emotionally ur all over the place n u have a lot of emotions bc *ofc* u do. like the concept of southern water tribe benders "coming back" to the tribe n being so relieved there is any semblance left of the tribe, of their ppl, the culture that was actively eroded thru genocide but also maybe exploring anger bc like yeah thats their ppl, yeah they experienced so much oppression *obviously* but also as nonbenders they werent literally *locked and caged* n that can bring up complicated feelings (IF they really really wanted to go a nonbender v bender route. i dont necessarily think that shouldve ever been the route but like if the worldbuilding wanted it to be in that direction idk. it couldve explored legitamtely intersting dynamics that happen on a smaller --> larger level. but also that anger being directed to benders in the nwt for "not doijng enough" for them as their kin across the globe - an interesting positiona that was sorta touched on in s2 but like....not really. idk i just feel like..i wouldve really liked to see water tribe coming out of the war n at first feeling the relief of like 'its over' but then theres just...anger. like. a fuck ton of anger. n its obviously directed at fire nation but also the fire nation is ALLLL the way over *there* and currently the ppl who ended the war are trying Really Hard To Keep Peace and there is an Attempt at rebuilding the culture(s) but also...theres so much anger n i can see it also being redirected back at their ppl which i dont think is unrealistic..

or maybe exploring fire nation specifically. in a way to avoid/minimize accountability fire nation nonbenders couldve been like '100 year war is UR fault benders!11!! we were ~innocent~ n dragged along! to which the benders wouldve OBVIOUSLY reacted terribly too. but that is a convo i could realistically see happening in a fascist society that has been "defeated" n THAT is more interesting to me to see esp bc that would require a complete dismanteling of the monarchy but would obviously bring up other issues of 'we're losing our ~culture~' (an argument we literally see alllll the time w fascist countries) n thus a rise in conservatism in which fire nation ppl could stoke the tension in like. earth kingdom (since fire nation are still settlers in earth kingdoms) by pitting earth kingdom benders against nonbenders ('umm if our monarchy is getting taken down so is urs so whats UR culture earth ppl? umm why was the dai li (benders) basically puppeterring the king (nonbender)....r nonbenders weak....') n that sort of fascist rhetoric spreading thru the globe. even that sort of world building makes more sense to me then what they attempted in s1 where nonbenders n benders were just...hating....for no legit reason? idk.

and it could just be taken further w s4 - kuvira whos all 'earth kingdom has been suffering so we need to make sure that never happens again' which like ok...foundations are kinda there but then veers off bc her politc fails n ends up embodying fascists - which is arguably a great representation of liberalism aka what happens when u dont have principles as a politic but rather surface level understanding. like lok frustrates me bc there are lots of interesting political dynamics i feel couldve been explored just like...more. how liberalism normalizes the road back to fascism. how when the dominiant culture is fascism it can take root globally n that it takes like...a lot of work to dig to it n that requires being principles not just following somebody who seemingly represents an identity without meaning. for korra to actually go on a journey n couldve been an exploration of her radicalization being in line w her spirituality n positioning in both the physical world n also the universe. couldve been a show that really threw digs at obama. but also for that the show n the writers would need to understand what identity politics is as a politic n read the combahee river collective statement which like...ik they wouldnt do so..

yeah I mean you say a LOT here but the through line I am really getting from this is that lok needed to be grounded in genuine material analysis of the geopolitical conditions wrt how these various colonial dynamics and social discourses would have evolved in a postwar society, and instead of actually critiquing those social positions (namely liberalism) they instead perpetuate it because they are simply unserious and shallow. yeah.

[natsmagi]

proship anon again. I'm sorry if I got a bit heated. I'm very thankful that you are a kind enough human being to say that even despite being vehemently against those types of content, you still don't condone the harassment of people who create it. honestly I'm really glad to hear it.

I think myself and lot of other proshippers who do engage with these things in a completely online space tend to feel like we are constantly in danger because of the current social media client. I personally was "called out" as a pedophile when I was only 17, literally just because I said it wasn't okay to harass people who make dark/problematic content. so like. I'm sure you can sort of see where I'm coming from.

I guess the way I see it is that at the end of the day if an actual, literal pedophile can get their fill of that kind of thing in a way that is entirely fictional and in no way harms real life children, I would prefer that they have that as a substitute to the horrible alternative. I can't claim to understand how that sort of person's mind works but like. idk. I am aware of how insane this sounds I hope you understand what I'm trying to get at here.

anyway I don't want to get into it more, it's tiring for me to talk about, too. I'm really sorry I came at you like that, I'm just kind of like. frustrated that my friends and I who I know would never hurt anyone are getting lumped in with criminals and abusers. it sucks. I don't think there's one entirely right answer. I just wish the whole thing was handled with nuance, and very much to your credit, you do handle the situation with nuance, so thank you.

again, I apologize for bringing this upsetting topic back into your inbox again. I won't send any more messages about it. I hope you have a really nice day <3

oh its totally fine!! thank you for your kind words!!

and yes, i can understand where youre coming from. its a bit unfortunate that this whole debate is handled in such a black and white fashion when theres so many factors at play. like we've been over, people who actively engage on the side of "antis" tend to be teens. often times they know that something is wrong, and as theyre getting older they feel like they need to take more action /against/ what they think is wrong. i sincerely believe alot of it is out of good intent, and that they think theyre doing the right thing, but when youre 14 youre not very likely to have much grasp on the whole picture. you just see something bad and want to put a stop to it. the drive is admirable, but the execution can unfortunately become inhumane

i dont have a solution for any of this. i dont know what the best approach is. but thats why i at least wish to give people room to speak and to genuinely listen to whats on their mind (at least when it comes to fandom discourse and not like. unfiltered bigotry). i feel like genuinely talking things over and explaining ones side is the least we can do if we wish to remain civil and empathetic to one another, because at the end of the day my main principle is just not wanting people to get hurt. thats my core desire

we may disagree, but i hope you have a good day too! and stay safe out there!!

[agirlunderarock]

Hi, for the character opinion bingo, how about Brunnhilde?

OH HELL YEAH!!! LETS GOOOOOOOO

My dude I have not talked about this King in so long and with the release of the Thor Love and Thunder trailer I'm so excited to see her on screen again. I've missed her so much. I almost got a bingo on this card, because I really do like her in a team dynamic, but Brunnhilde is also one of the few characters that I can read for that absolutely does not need any of the other lead characters in the fic. I don't know if I've really talked about how much I love her arc here. I know I've done so in the past- but Brunnhilde and Thor's character arcs are nearly the same. We just didn't get to see her's play out on screen. I mean we sorta did. We know she was the leader of the Valkyries and helping to carry out Odin's conquest, at least thats the impressions I've always gotten from the flashback sequences. But then of course that all goes south and I can only assume she exiles herself until she stumbles into Sakaar, but it takes Thor desperately asking for her help to give her the push to start getting back to herself. She's still not the same person, she probably doesn't even give her real name to Thor, Bruce and Loki (Thats the only reason I can think of that no one adresses her by name after two movies and over 5 years passing since their first meeting), but she's making progress. She steps into this new version of herself, maybe more suspicious and jaded than before, but a leader and probably a compassionate and determined one at that. Dude I think about those five years she spent building New Asgard and watching Thor slip into that depressive state he found her in so much. Their relationship is so important to me and I know its not going to come up in the new movie, but I wish we could see some of that. How important their friendship has been for both of them recovering from their past traumas and overcoming new ones. I trust Taika to give us hints of it, but I still remember how many of the fans seemed to cut her out of the narrative completely when Thor Ragnarok came out. Brunnhilde is a character that I pay close attention to how people critique her, and write her in fanfiction. If the complaint is that she's introduced as the Strong or Angry Black woman stereotype, then absolutely go off, I feel that is a valid criticism, especially because the only way we see her addressed other than by Scrapper 142 is Angry Girl. However, I like to think that she herself has moved away from that, and Professor Hulk calling her that in Endgame speaks more to how out of touch with everyone he is (guy didn't bother to check in on Thor either so like???? but I also don't think the writers thought that through and I am absolutely giving them too much credit). This is quickly going to turn into me getting frustrated with the way friendship is shown with the Avengers so I'm going to move on to the fanfiction and how fans do her dirty. I am INCREDIBLY picky when it comes to Brunnhilde fanfic, and theres a handful that I constantly go back and read- (Go read Better Laté than Never on AO3 I promise you will not be disappointed) but a lot of the ones I find either end up making her seem preditory, or just straight up a bitch and its so exhausting and frustrating to come across. I trust very few people to write Brunnhilde with nuance and accuracy. She's such an interesting character with such an interesting story, and the parallels between her struggles and Thor after Infinity War are so nice and I can literally talk about her for ever. Theres a shot of her in the new trailer fighting the main antagonist and let me just say, I have never felt so much fear for a character than in that moment. I trust Taika, and I know I need to chill, but the last thing I want is for her to get so roughed up she's taken out of the plot and used as motivation for Thor and Jane, or worse killed for their development. I did not mean to ramble this much, I don't even know if any of this makes sense, but I feel like the MCU is just setting her to the side so often, and fans are even worse.

I'm sorry this was so long- but if anyone would like to hear me ramble and rave about other characters feel free to send me some characters for Character Bingo. MCU, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings/Hobbit and Avatar the Last Airbender and Game of Thrones is all fair game

[gayspock]

🤨? bsg

like i feel like im getting more + more frustrated... bc whilst i am measuring my own expectations, and furthermore i dont EXPECT a show to align fully with my own perspectives, tht can only go so far like... i feel like everything rn is just confused about exactly what the hell theyre trying to explore here + theyre just doin whatever the fuck

like it feels directionless but not intentionally so. which it COULD be given what theyve done but i just.. god idk man. i feel like theres just so many good CONCEPTS that are floated in this show and theres tensions but so few get fully developed and more and more of the time its getting all over the place. and so theres these epic points of convergence - wherein they have done the legwork, and they know wtf is up - where the show is REALLYYY freaking good as all the disparate parts come together.... but as it goes on and theyre getting more and more infrequent and im like ok... like

like again going back to what i said abt whastever the fuck. like again i think so much of it is the lack of respect the show has for the civvies + the cylons. it put a lot of work into the fleet itself and the subtlies within it but everyone else gets half arsed or patronised and its insane, and so when you wanna incorporate those essential elements back in everything is sloppyyyyyyy.

like absolutely NOTHING!!!!!1 NOTHING!!!! on the civilian side is unreasonable but the show is so desperate sometimes to prove that it is. its so funny. and you can absolutely do a nuanced take on it- and they have done really good examples before, or have gotten close to it. bc so true sometimes what the "majority" wants isnt always best, and is swayed very much by emotion - and thats GREAT you can do a lot of commentary there on the politics of that. like i think whilst it was imperfect, gaius' election arc is a good example bc yes he won by doing exactly that, and, i think the reason why i like that arc was bc it was the emphasis on gaius being manipulative rather than everyone being stupid and unreasonable (even though there was some of that i mean the "blame" was on him). BUT you still have to concede and you cant just..... rig a fucking election and take away ppls choice, force them to do whatever the fuck you want because yes. that is authoritarianism and like OTHER EPISODES like dirty hands show very well that these grand sweeping choices made by the president/military have such ill-effects on the everyday ppl that they dont even care about or see AND ITS LIKE YEAH THAT

BUT THEN ITS LIKE. RN. IS IT FUCKING AT ALL RIDICULOUS THAT PPL WOULD WANT TO OVERTHROW ROSLIN AND ADAMA? REALLY? like- its always ZAREK again bc hes depicted as some slimy extremist, and dont get me wrong i dont doubt sure he could have some ulterior motive, but he is a construct, he was written in that way, etc. so its just like.... SO TELLING that hes the villain when literally everything he WANTS is a) reasonable but also b) against the status quo established like... HE ISNT FUCKING WRONG. HE WASNT BEFORE, EITHER!!!! like roslin is not fit to be president from an objective pov. even if her visions are ultimately "correct" at this point in the show fucking... SEE HOW THAT LOOKS TO LITERALLY EVERYBODY ELSE IN THE HUMAN RACE. THEM STRONGARMING EVERYBODY INTO THEIR OWN DECISIONS, REPEATEDLY REFUSING TO LISTEN TO ANY OF "THE PEOPLE" TO DO WHAT THEY THINK IS RIGHT AND LEVERAGING THE MILITARY, ETC. TO GET THAT... LIKE HUH AND HEY ?

AND THATS THE THING THAT MAKES IT FRUSTRATING ALL THE MORE BC. this would be such a good fucking plot if they COMMITTED TO IT properly and just had more fucking teeth about it. quit fucking presenting zarek as some cartoonish slimeball; put more fucking criticism ONTO adama and roslin. stop saying "oh adama is so anti-authoritarian" and fucking put your pussy into showing that or showing his actual internal struggle with it. like for REAL for real- something that lasts more than 2 seconds. quit being so all over the place and FOCUS.

AND WHILE YOURE AT IT OH MY GOD IM SOMAD ABOUT EVERYTHING THEYVE DONE WITH THE CYLONS AT THIS POINT. LIKE IM NOT. because its as equally half arsed at this point and its just so... NOTHINGGGG .... you kept HALF ARSING the cylons before and i thought it was just mystery and intrigue but you girlies just clearly dont care enough and now ugh fuckiNG GOD its so flimsy bc ... its not my favourite route, but i am okay-ish if you did wanna try the fucking attempt at using them to be like ohoh arbitrary differences keeping us divided shtick and do the whole ah yes minority allergory thing from hereon if its done right but youve been so fucking LAZY with them and so im just feeling. my hackles every time you try some shit th- WHATEEVERRRR RANT OVERRRR IM TIRED TODAY WE ARENT DOING TI

[alcorian]

It's so frustrating because I hate Aaron for being a complete wreaking ball to the story. (And because he was a mysterious forest man with questionable morals back when Vylad was stuck in the nether so I was worried he was replacing him but that's more personal) But the more I think about it, the more Aaron as a character is,,,, I don't know. I'm still reluctant to call him good, but he makes me angry at Jess, not angry at him, and I'm realizing that now.

I mean, it's kind of trope-y but having that sort of an anti-hero with an arc centered around grief and recovery and revenge, and him sometimes having conflicting morals with some of the rest of the group could be really cool! (and also different from Vylad, with Vylad basically putting his moral compass into Garroth's hands, which is its own issue as he can actually have a more nuanced, complex, and compassiate view but I digress) And a really cool way to show that Aphmau as a character is not inherently perfect and sometimes there's not a solution that pleases everyone.

But no. Of course not. Once he trusts Aphmau they really never have any real fights I can recall, and his wife, son, and everyone he cared about are mentioned only in passing instead of being a longer arc. And of course there's the whole romance between them which ends up just scrapping all of the previous narrative build-up with Garroth/Laurance. Once again, not a bad thing for the character, necessary, (although arguably she could've handled it better, she isn't obligated to like or date anyone of course) but narratively, it just felt like so much of the momentum was dropped the second he came into frame.

Like how do I say that I think Aaron as a man is interesting and I think that his traits and backstory could make for a really good character, but I also lothe him as a symbol of Jess's incompetent writing?

gods vylad youre so right about all of this

1 - "wrecking ball to the story" is the PERFECT way to describe him. he didnt fit, and when he was forced in he destroyed a good chunk of the story to make room

2 - thats what's so frustrating about him! though he's a bit basic, he certainly could have had something. with a bit of good writing he could have been wrestled into a character that was at least up to par with the rest of the cast. but no; he wasn't there to be a good character. he was there to be jason's self-insert and to spite larmau and garmau fans.

3 - side note--i want to hear your thoughts about vylad putting his moral compass into garroth's hands, that sounds very interesting

4 - yeah! unless jess decided to write her endgame relationship as a polyamorous one (and lets be real, nobody ever does :/), somebody's feelings were gonna get hurt. and narratively, thats ok. that makes for a good story + thats exactly how it works in real life. to have aphmau choose one or neither or both, any of those would have made for a good story, but having aaron come in and wreck everything that was being set up? no. he prevented there from being any good payoff with larmau & garmau and instead we just got them sulking in the background.

5 - i hate the fact that hes still in love with his wife but its only mentioned to make him seem more tragic, and then he turns around and knocks up aph in the woods. thats no healthy relationship, luv. and that would be ok, except that its constantly portrayed as the pinnacle of healthy, and theres no exploring anything about the repercussions of aaron seeing aphmau as a replacement for her, or anything like that. it just. isnt satisfying writing in the slightest. (i dont watch mystreet, but i hear this is an issue with ms!aaron too.) (actually i heard somewhere that aarmau was based on jess and jason's actual marriage and that makes me slightly concerned. on several fronts)

6 - laur and garroth were dropped entirely after aaron came into the picture, not just romantically. this is probably what makes me the most angry, because garroth is my favorite and laurance is definitely up there. and garroth could have had such a wonderful arc in o'khasis in season three, but jess just had to relegate him to babysitting duty all season.

[boobchuy]

How will Anne friendship with Sprig and Polly chance? Will Anne still have strong friendship with Sprig. Or will it be different as Sprig is more mature and has less time to get up with wacky adventures as he a farm to run. With Polly will she be protecting sister.

heres entry #983264932 of sprite loses filter and goes insane

she and sprig still have the closest bond like in canon! though whereas sprig looked up to her like an older sister, anne looks up (down, lol) to him as an older bro. and while the hero stuff will probably still happen, ("you're my little ugly hero!" LMFAO) i wont be surprised if anne sees him as her own personal hero too. sprigs a good older bro >:) and he gives his lil siblings praises and compliments as much as he can (with the usual ribbing and teasing here and there) and anne just really likes hanging out w him in general. i imagine thered be a lot of moment where she displays habits from her previous friendships, and sprig will eventually untie those knots in his own way without outright telling her about them. he gets super protective of her, in a way thats more than just keeping her away from the monsters thatd gobble them up

polly and anne is a really good duo for me to overthink about in this au hehe. their relationship is really rocky at the start !!! kinda like in canon w anne and hp, but less in the sense of tradition vs new, and more of the i dont trust a monster being in this house and ill be watching you closely so youd better behave. normally anne would deal by not,,, really doing anything about it, bc what can you do? (cries in how she hadnt realized she'd experienced xenophobia back at home) but you can only live under the same roof w a person that hates u for so long, and, like in canon w her and the rest of wartwood, anne would get frustrated and get prompted to do dumb stuff to get on pollys good side. argument sparks, 'why do you hate me so much?' then something slips about the family losing their parents. yada yada drama (my heart is hurtingg thinking about this i hate evrythgin) and anne just... drops it. ig. it hurts her a bit to see that polly thinks she would harm them, but w what they went through she'd understand why. this is getting too long now so ill just say these two grow close to each other :') and polly would grow fond and pretty protective of her too.

now theres the case of these two betraying anne by hiding the music box. separated this in its own section bc this is just a whole 'nother can of worms to open, lmfao. i think theyd be a little more nuanced than burying it in their backyard, in what way im not sure but like... yeah. i think it just stings a lot for anne when she finds out they did what they did. it reopens old wounds of how polly didnt trust her. and when they tell her the full story, this time with the herons and how they were out of town, then it happens just like in canon. scenarios are pretty much the same as in the first temple :') this time sprigs too busy worrying over how to deal with it and beg for annes forgiveness to think clearly, and polly... kinda lets her temper get the best of her at times. couple these two w anne struggling w her own feelings about it all, then yeah. THEYRES SUCH A BIG MESS I LOVE THEM SO MUCH <333333

[enderspawn]

It's alright if u don't wanna answer this cuz this argument gets people really riled up but do you think c!Techno is a tyrant or nah?

Cuz many c!techno apologists argue that he isn't just cuz he's an anarchist but I've also read a lot of essays that go against it and it'd be really interesting to see ur opinion on this

i think he, in some contexts, can most definitely be called tyrannical, yes. a tyrant? no.

to avoid spamming ppl w discourse we've all def heard before (and bc this ended up MASSIVE (like 2.3k ish), but fairly in depth bc i didnt wanna speak out of bad faith and wanted to be EXPLICTLY clear-- oops), the rest will be under readmore

so heres the thing i want to preface: i used to really LOVE c!techno. i joined beginning of s2, right when exile started, and he was arguably my favorite character. since then though i've fallen out with him a LOT, to the point i almost... actively despite him at times (though mainly in a toxic kind of way which i can acknowledge is flawed).

in short, his actions started to speak louder than his words and i lost investment in his personal character struggles because of the actions he took (doomsday was my breaking point. i get feeling angry and betrayed, as well as seeking revenge against lmanberg, but his actions went too far for me to CARE and it hurt so many more characters as well.)

so when i speak, i come from a place of disliking him but also somewhat understanding the position c!techno apologists come from: i used to be one of them myself.

NOW, do i think he's a tyrant? no. for reference in my analysis, i try to look up the definition of terms to make sure they are utilized properly. while "tyranny" and "tyrannical" can have multiple uses, tyrant itself is a more specific term. to combine the top two definitions, a tyrant is referring to "an extremely oppressive, unjust, or cruel absolute ruler (who governs without restrictions, especially one who seized power illegally.)"

techno's position as an anarchist, imo, DOES indeed make him unable to be a tyrant. tyrants are rulers with very clear power over others from a structural way. anarchists are about the lack of structure or power over others and instead viewing the people around you as equals in power.

in forming the syndicate, they very explicitly worked to not designate a leader and instead make it so that no one would have any power over the others systemically. techno may have taken a integral role, yes, but it doesn't make him suddenly "the leader", its a role that wouldve had to be filled by someone (even if it was democratic to decide who to invite, they'd need someone to hand over the invite itself yknow? like no matter WHAT there needed to be A ROLE)

one could argue that he IS a leader in the shadow hierarchy of the syndicate (which, yes, is a real and professional term used in management courses despite sounding like it comes from a 4kids yugioh dub) in that everyone CONSIDERS and looks to him a leader without him having any actual structural basis behind it, but to argue that allows him to be a tyrant is in bad faith i believe. especially because to the people he would be "ruling", he ISNT oppressive, unjust, or cruel. they are his friends and support network and critical for a lot of his personal development (since feelings of betrayal and trust issues are critical to his character and why he acts the way he does). I wish we were able to SEE this develop more, but oh well.

but like i said: tyrant is fairly specific in definition. TYRANNY, and thus TYRANNICAL are not as limited. I've discussed their definitions here. originally, i made that post because i was angry at a take i had seen that claimed that, like you said, because techno was an anarchist and not part of any government or leadership position, he couldn't be tyrannical. to which i heartily disagree.

for something to be tyrannical, they simply must have an overarching/oppressive power over someone or something. it would not be inaccurate if i were to say that something is "under the tyranny" of a concept, because what it means is that something is under the power of another thing/concept. you can frankly call anything tyranny if it is widespread/overarching and you don't like it. mask mandates? tyranny, its forcing me to act in "rigorous condition". hell, theres even such things as tyranny of the majority in which people agree too much on one thing and it gives them unfair power or tyranny of the minority where people with minority opinions have too much power (thats a very grossly oversimplified definition of both, but it covers the base idea well enough for my point)

the point im making above isnt meant to be taken as "anything can be worked to be defined as tyranny thus it is a meaningless claim", it is that tyranny (and again, thus tyrannical) are very open and nonrestrictive terms.

to make it easier to define, alongside the definitions provided i want to add an explicit clause that is (imo) implied in the original definition: tyranny is... well, bad. that is to say if someone has power over a group but literally everyone is fine with it and agrees to it, its not tyranny. thats just a group of people getting along and one happens to have power over another. a leader does NOT equal a tyrant (as discussed above), so leadership should not be equated with tyranny.

thus as an example: wilbur acting as president (before the election) may have been "unelected" with power over his citizens, but no one was upset with that power. thus, he is not a tyrant and not acting tyrannically (as well as the fact his power was, arguably, NOT rigourous or absolute but thats another topic for another time). SCHLATT however IS a tyrant, as his power was absolute (he did not consult his cabinet) and forced people to comply instead of them complying willingly, thus he was acting tyrannically.

now to finally get to the damn point of this essay: where does c!techno lie? honest answer? it depends slightly on your perspective, but it depends a LOT on the future of the syndicate.

techno is incredibly clear in his goals: no governments, no corruption. in fighting with pogtopia, he is actively working to topple a tyranny-- he isn't tyrannical for doing that.

when he strikes out on nov 16th, it is because he opposes them forming a new government. when they oppose him and disagree, he launches an attack against them. is this tyranny? maybe, but probably not. he IS trying to impose his own physical strength and power (as well as his resources) over the others to stop them from doing what HE doesn't want them to do.

however its more nuanced than that:

1. hes lashing out emotionally as well as politically. he feels betrayed by those he trusted and he believed that they would destroy the government then go (i'm ignoring any debates on if he did or did not know that they planned another government, though it is a source of debate). but typically idk about you but i dont call tyranny for someone fighting with another person.

2. he also may be acting with good intent again, in HIS EYES. if tubbo was part of manburg, whos to say he wont be just as bad? he, in his pov, is likely trying to stop another tyrant before they rise.

3. and finally, and tbh the most damning from any perspective: he gives up. he quickly leaves then RETIRES without intent to try and attack again until he is later provoked. tyranny is defined by it not just being power, but power being USED. if he doesn't use his power to try and impose any will, then he's not tyrannical.

Doomsday I am also not going to touch very in depth on for much of the same reasons. My answer is again a "maybe", depending on the weight you personally place on each issue:

1. he's lashing out as revenge for the butcher army and as revenge against tommy for "betraying" him (though this one we explicitly know he was ignoring the fact tommy did not want to go through with it, however he still did trust and respect tommy regardless so his feelings are understandable anyway)

2. he sees new lmanberg as corrupt and tyrannical (which is undeniable: house arrest for noncompliance, exile without counsel, execution without trial, etc), and thus obligated to destroy it

but also, theres the implicit understanding he's doing this to send a message: do not form a government, or else. its a display of force that also works to warn others unless they want a similar fate. phil even explicitly states that he is doing so to send that message, so one could assume techno is doing the same alongside his personal reasoning listed above.

what i just described is the use of a oppressive and harsh (physical) power in order to gain compliance from people (that compliance being 'not making a government'). does that sound familiar? exactly. it follows the definition(s) of tyranny given previously. technoblade is acting in a way that is, by very definition, tyrannical.

so the debate shifts: is he valid in doing so because he is trying to PREVENT corruption and tyranny. like i said, new lmanberg was undeniably corrupt at points. i held nothing against techno for trying to topple manburg, so does that apply to new lmanberg as well? short answer: i dont know. it depends on your specific opinion of what is acceptable. its like the paradox of tolerance: to have a truly tolerant society, you have to be intolerant of intolerance. to have a truly non-tyrannical society, do you need to have a tyranny enforcing it?

personally (and bc im a lmanberg loyalist /hj) i say it is. regardless of the corruption of new lmanberg, they are also giving a threat to EVERYONE. even those who are innocent, they are presented with the exact same threat and rule set: if you make a government, you will be destroyed.

(which, small divergence here, is part of why debating c!techno is so frustrating. so many times you end up hitting a "well it depends on your political views" situation and there ISNT a correct answer there. im here to analyze characters for fun, not debate political theory)

so: the syndicate then. this is where this debate really "took off" and i think its due to one very specific miscommunication about its goals and plans. the syndicate, upon formation, declares itself to stand against corruption and tyranny. when they are found, the syndicate would work to destroy it. so heres the golden question: what do THEY define as corruption and tyranny? if you were to go off c!techno's previous statements, seemingly "any government" is a valid answer. however, he also states he's fine with people just being in groups together hanging together.

what then DEFINES A GOVERNMENT for them? what lines do they have to sort out what does "deserve to be destroyed" and what does "deserve to exist freely"

this is a hypothetical i like to post when it comes to syndicate discourse:

i have a group of people. lets say 5 or so for example. they all live together and build together. any decisions made that would impact the entire group they make together and they must have a unanimous agreement in order to proceed, but otherwise they are free to be their own people and do their own thing. when you ask them, they tell you they are their own nation and they have a very clearly defined government: they are a direct democracy. does the syndicate have an obligation to attack?

there is absolutely no hierarchy present. there is no corruption present. but, they ARE indeed a government. is that then inherently negative? my answer is fuck no (see the whole "difference between a tyrant and a leader" thing above).

but THATS where the issue of this discourse LIES. in some people's eyes, the answer to that is YES. techno's made it clear "no government" is his personal view, but does that spread to the syndicate as a whole? do they act preemptively in case it DOES become corrupt? is it inherently corrupt because its a government, regardless of how it is ruled? the fact of the matter is because of how little we've seen the syndicate work as a SYNDICATE, we don't know that answer. so we're left to debate and speculate HOW they would act.

if the syndicate were to let that government exist, then they are not tyrannical. they are showing that they are working to stop tyranny and corruption, just like in pogtopia again.

if the syndicate were to destroy/attack that government, then they are tyrannical. simple as that. they are enforcing a rule of their own creation without any nuance or flexibility under the threat of absolute destruction.

miscommunication in debates comes, in my opinion, in the above. of course theres more points of nuance. for example:

would the syndicate allow a government like i had described with early lmanberg, where there is an established hierarchy but everyone in the country consents to said leadership? on one hand, there is no tyranny or corruption present which is what they are trying to work against. on the other hand, theres more a possibility of it occuring. perhaps they'd find a middle road between the two binary options of "leave or destroy" i am presenting, such as checking in occasionally to ensure no corruption occurs.

but if they were to destroy it without, for lack of a better word, "giving it a chance" they would be, in my opinion, tyrannical. they would be going aginst their words of opposing corruption and instead abusing their power to gain compliance.

your/others opinions may differ, again it depends on if you see it as worth it to possibly stop future tyranny or if a hierarchy is INHERENTLY a negative thing.

part of the reason so many blog gave up this debate, beyond not getting very clear answers for the syndicate, is because of the nuance present. there. is. no. right. answer. every single person will view it differently, because there is no universally agreed upon truth of right or wrong here. BUT, i hope this helps shed some light on the discussion and my thoughts on it

[eviclair]

I don’t know if I’ve ever heard of your actual thoughts(tm) on khr, so what’s your constructive review on the series as a whole? Like some positives and negatives w/ the writing, characters, etc. If u don’t feel like answering, feel free to ignore this LOL.

 tl;dr because this is 800 words of nonsense. i think you should know i would not know a constructive review if it bit me in the ass.

my guy i have not done a full read of khr in maybe two years and i know that does not sound like a long time but i have the long-term memory of a fruit fly. please bear with me. luckily for both of us i liveblogged the last time i read so i at least have my own sparknotes jdflaksjddaf

first off! khr is a satire manga!!! i cannot stress this enough, i can and will fight you to the death about this!!! “oh but it gets serious later” it grows a PLOT, thats not the same thing. khr is stupid as hell and that is both on purpose and my favorite thing about it.

i fucking love shonen man!!! its all about FIGHTING and LOVING YOUR FRIENDS and HAVING EMOTIONS and. bro im a water sign. my mars is in gemini, there is nothing i can do about this, god made me and said “get that bitch some found family and also some incredible violence” and we all just have to live with that. 

khr is so much all of those things that i did not realize they were being made fun of until very long after the fact so my current opinions are very much not the ones i started with jaldkhjdfhd but man. once i clued in i both loved it so much more and became 100% incapable of interacting with fandom in any meaningful way L M A O

i just. the main conceit is that theyve weaponized the deus ex machina eleventh-hour shonen power up. the “my dead family came back to life to kill me” trope is used three separate times. the big bad student body president is a delinquent. theres an entire subset of above magic god powers thatre just

the tyl bazooka was just ripping on the Timeskip Arc until the Timeskip Arc actually happened?? like fuuta’s special thing is that he can communicate with the Meta Planet to divine Character Rankings, i dont know what to tell you!!! the truth is out there!!! 

like DO YOU EVEN REMEMBER that time tsuna experienced a villain’s flashback sequence FOR HIM because i fucking do, i think about it every day,

so in the sense of “please critique the writing”, i cant do that because im pretty sure 98% of all the tropey bullshit is by design. do i wish people like the kokuyo gang got more characterization outside of being ride-or-die villain sidekicks?? of course i do but thats my own damn fault for seeing cool side characters and losing all higher brain function. on the other hand, hibari being the person he is and having absolutely no backstory or motivation beyond “get out of my school” is really fucking funny and keeps me warm at night, so. win some, lose some.

(the 2% of the writing that isnt tropey bullshit that i CAN critique is whatever is happening with kyoko. Bad Female Cast is definitely a shonen trope but its a shitty one and i want it to die. within maybe four minutes of kyoko being introduced she tries to body a man and then thats just never spoken about again?? wheres that energy queen?!!! let kyoko say fuck!!!!)

((this applies to haru too in the sense that all she really does is make moon eyes at tsuna but the way in which she does so is honestly so fucking funny and unhinged that it comes back around to being great. like yeah yep yes ma’am thats 100% bonafide Girl Who Throws Skittles In A Puddle And Calls It Potion right there please may i have another))

If khr took itself even 4% more seriously it could be really deep and compelling and i think that frustrates a lot of people, but i think i like it better this way?? half the fun for me is reading in between the lines!! the subtext, however unintentional it may be!!

examples: yamamoto is one of my favorites just because theres SO FUCKING MUCH to unpack about him!! canon gives us a lot of information about him just by virtue of the fact that he’s a Main Character, but paradoxically he himself is never really the focus. he just Does Shit and you have to figure out why on your own and i LOVE DOING THAT.

i dont love mukuro because he’s a fleshed out and nuanced villain, i love him because he says shit like “i went to hell six times” and never expounds upon that or “i can definitely trust the information i got from this magic monocle called Demon Spade’s Super Evil Murder Eye or whatever the fuck” and then expresses surprise when daemon spade is an asshole. he goes and willfully fucks up the only job anyones ever given him (impersonate 80 year old leonardo lippi) because he Just Has to shapeshift into a young hot dude and hand deliver byakuran, the boss of the Flower Family, the Family that names all its members after Flowers, a bouquet that means “i am in disguise ;) cant catch me bitch ;)”

like WHAT THE FUCK!!

i dont know man. i just like puzzles and khr is a gift that keeps giving.

(sidenote that should’ve maybe just been the subject of the post but re:i cant shut the fuck up about anything ever, i love tsuna so much. so much. his personality!! his relationships!!! his growth!!! his growth!!!!! his growth!!!!!!! khr has its claws in me because i see tsuna do something cool or brave or even deeply stupid actually and my whole heart goes AAAAAAAAA bc thats him!!! thats my son!!!!! my baby boy whom ive raised since birth!!!!!! suit me up and call me a reborn kinnie, fuck!!!!!!!!!)

[merrilldidnothingwrong]

Yeah playing dai was really frustrating despite all the cool new lore because you just. Can't denounce the chantry in any way OR the templars and you cant even support the mages as much as u could in da2. I enjoyed how there were lots of continued threads from the previous games but 😐 and not to mention even when hawke supported anders they still kind of demonish him which is...weird. probably the best part of the game was getting to see the cultures which were previously introduced finally like orlais and then all the new elf/magic lore. but I really couldnt stand how it stuffed you into one box. im sure this has been discussed for ages and im just cautiously hopeful that da4 will have nuance wrt solas and the new crisis but.......i dont have much faith in the writers

yeah i was SO happy to play a dalish again, but then its like.... if you dont play your cards right you can get your clan wiped out.... nobody says a word...  and theyre so.... proper?? (every inquisitor has the same personality??) such a huge step backwards from the warden. you cant be proud to be dalish, (or Quanri, or a Dwarf) like you get disapproval from everyone??!! 

theres a templar banner outside the quarters, there’s reminders of the people who colonizes your people everywhere, even the damn war table (the tree was torn down after the war between humans and elves and you gotta use it every time you gather to talk to your people about the missions). and like 2 of the advisors are cool but then you got cullen whose like talking about a “dalish queen” or some shit and fetishes your people... and is racist against all other races in thedas. but then again most humans are. (blackwall, my main main, gets his prejudices pointed out and hes like oh shit you right)

and yeah bioware / the game REALLY hate elven mages, which is probably why they created solas in the first place. i mean in da2 we had merrill, who was an angel, OH but blood mage, ohh so EVIL. and she wanted to preserve her people, wanted to save her people, DOUBLE EVIL. make her autistic coded? TRIPLE EVIL. even though they (humans) are obsessed with their own gods, their history, their past, but oh thats okay, but because its elves, its fictional, its “crazy”, its make believe. it doesn’t exist. and they MUST shut it down, kill it, wipe it out (genocide) and thats what they must do again. (which is why theres a part of me that hopes some of solas’ plans works. i want the elves to have their culture, i dont want them to continue to suffer. i don’t want them to die, i dont want thedas to die, but clearly, genocide of a culture is not the answer. This shit has been going on a thousand years, ENOUGH. the chantry, the templars, the circles, should NOT exist)

its just really horrible what the non human inquisitors go through during inquisition. always surrounded by humans, having to listen to human bullshit. even though they have companions that are of their own race, its like theyre disconnected from it too, and they don’t talk about the struggle of it. Varric is like, nah, im cool. i grew up this way. but hes cool with the chantry? even after everything hes been with in Kirkwall???? 

just imagining what could have been different if they put more nuance into it like they did with origins....... sigh. what i would have given tell the chantry to stfu and gtfo

sorry i didnt mean to type a novel lol nothing about inquisition makes any sense what so ever

[archer3-13]

Thoughts on Other Students in 3H

in no particular order

Hubert: evil snake boi, i kinda like you. i just wish there was more actual meat to ya then what there is. still, he does his role effectively and unlike edelgard plays into the whole evil empire thing with more gusto so i ironically find him more palatable because atleast the game isnt trying to pretend he isnt shady as fuck.

Dedue: oddly charming despite his straight laced attitude, he gets some interesting nuance in how well he highly respects (cough loves cough) dimitri and likes individual people from the blue lions, he doesnt have any particular fondness for faerghus as a whole which is definitely understandable given his history. hes essentially using the camus/murdoch aspect of undying loyalty and even borrows elements of the female camuses line of romantic interest in their liege however heavily implied it might be and applying that to a male playable character. Plus he just has some fun and interesting interactions with other characters in general.

Lorenz: I have difficulty saying whether i like him. on the one hand, he ended up being more multidimensional then i thought he was going to be with his internal conflict between keeping up appearances for the sake social status and societal order and his desire to pursue his own personal interests and ideals against the needs of his father and thus societal conventions. on the other hand, the game never really runs with this as much as it should and hes still treated as a bit of a joke character so... c+ to b? 

Ingrid: the token heterosexual of the blue lions whos still kinda gay anyways, her whole struggle with being a knight over a housewife seems a bit odd on the surface considering theres plenty of female knights and no one throws much of a fuss in universe, until you learn that it isnt so much that society expects her to do it as matter of course and more so that shes struggling with whether to pursue personal duty to her family or personal desires and ideals kinda like lorenz. in that respect she hits the mark a bit better then he does.

Raphael: kinda insubstantial but i liked him anyways, his sheer exuberance can be kinda refreshing in the games darker moments and hes got a few angles of his own such as his refusal to consider his parents deaths as part of a larger conspiracy so as to not hurt his friendship with ignatz nor ruin his own life and his sisters. plus hes just generally a nice guy. like a big huggable bear. just a shame that being a nice kinda dumb huggable bear is all thats really done with him.

Ignatz: his painting stuff and personal insecurities about wanting to do it over being a knight which his parents want him to do, more of that duty over desires and ideals thing again, is well enough and his probably misplaced guilt over raphaels misfortunes is definitely a highlight of him but he never really grabs as a character for some reason. probably because theres a lot of other characters in the game that hit those same marks and do it better then him.

Sylvain: has a lot of aspects that never really feel like they get proper follow up, his big thing is less womanizer and more so that he covers up his own mistrust and personal feeling by pretending to be a shameless flirt and philanderer. basically, maybe the emotional pain will go away if i flirt with girls and act the fool. but again there never really feels like theres any proper follow up for all this, others comment on it and then its more often then not dropped in story. hes fun enough but never really realized if that makes sense.

Caspar: shonen protagonist is kinda an apt word to describe him honestly, and that idealism of his clashes with the more grey on grey morality of the world hes within which is never a particularly bad direction to take the shonen bois in if done well like hunter x hunter. And he is done well, or at least satisfactorily to the point that hes another one i ended up liking more then i thought i would. his problem is more so that his interactions with most other characters in the main cast which feel duller then they should on most occasions.

Dorothea: probably gonna get a bit of shit for this, but i have no interest in her. her insecurities about her future and getting a good husband is well and interesting but manuela does that better honestly and outside of that dorotheas a bit... not shallow but hazy and insubstantial if you will. she obviously has appeal to people but like ignatz she failed to grab me in part because others did what she did and better within the game itself.

Ashe: soft boi chose to be soft instead of hard, one of the characters i found liking and one i expected to kinda like to begin with. in game he gets accused of being childish and naive a lot but i dont see it personally, hes not naive but more so tries to look for the best in people and in life like lonato did all those years ago for him. that said, the speed with which lonato dies damages his identity as a character a bit by happening before we really get a chance to feel for his relation to lonato, its not to big a bug bear as it doesnt hurt his character all that much but it does feel a bit frustrating.

Felix: teenage angst personified, his main gripes seem to be a distaste of warrior culture and its glorification of bloodshed and sacrifice but instead of approaching it with sadness or pacifism, he lashes out against what he feels is the unfairness of the world. hes not exactly wrong in his feelings and as a character it makes sense and works for his abrasive attitude, and its an interesting twist to the navarre type to have their isolation come not from stoicism nor sheer blood lust or a combo of the two but rather from a rage against the machine of society mindset.

Ferdinand: he got more interesting as i got farther along, and i personally feel he works the best as a character when going against edelgard since thats where more of his personal drama comes from. hes eager to succeed and prove himself worthy of his title over time and holds a chivalrous mindset very similar to others in the cast but his growth is less about learning how to hold onto those ideals in the face of reality for the sake of personal fulfillment but more so about learning to define himself by himself and not by societies needs. ultimately he comes to value chivalry not because its what people tell him to value but because he truly values it and i enjoy that. but its also why i feel he works better on other routes then edelgards since there hes still valuing himself not for himself but for the expectations society or edelgard in this case is placing him under, one tyrant for another in a sense. i admit i dont remember much about him on edelgards route though because i just like him more on the others.

Leonie: poorly timed support aside, she has an odd charm to her that a lot of modern fire emblem characters just dont have anymore. but knuckling past jeralt senpai shes an interesting blend of stingy and work effort that goes to inform itself and her relations to others. and like a lot of the golden deer she has a lackadaisical attitude of ‘i might not know what the fuck is happening, but i do know someone needs an ass whooping!’ and it works especially well in her case since her character is very attuned towards focusing more on her personal matters then the grand scheme of things because she has rent due in a few months. if she was in a more traditional fe set up she would definitely be a beowolf archtype that you need to pay to recruit. in fact im surprised thats not an option on other routes to begin with for her.

Hilda: honestly suprised me by not being a pure serra type. she has aspects of that on the surface with the selfish almost vain attitude towards life and others bur well serra is more about puffing herself up to hide insecurity and contribute towards a desperate desire for grand social status, Hilda downplays herself and her abilities due to living in her brothers shadow if unintentionally and seeing the stress it can bring. they’re both lazy and vain, on the surface anyways, always getting others to do their work for them but well serra seeks more social status to escape it hilda seeks less social status to escape it. plus it was kinda funny to see hilda act as claudes unofficial number 2 you could still recruit.

Lindhart: Sleepy boi needs a nap and thats kinda it really. exaggeration maybe but unlike a lot of characters in the game and the series as a whole he really doesnt have a reason to be there as a character. as a unit certainly but not a character, in terms of motivation anyways. He hates blood, fighting and violence, hed rather sleep or pursue personal interests then work or politics, hes insightful and intelligent but the important players in the plot have other advisers and hes not interested in stepping up in that regard anyways. his only real reason for being there is academic interest and even then a pin has to be put in that when war breaks out. hes not a bad character overall though, his sleepiness and insight make for an interesting double act along with his blunt mannerisms, i just have trouble pinning down motivations for him.

Mercedes: big team mom energy, which i suppose goes along with the whole being older then everyone thing. a bit dopey and airheaded at first glance shes one of the more receptive characters to how others are feeling and well she does try to nurture shes not above scolding if she feels it would help someone more then praise and reassurance. of course shes also very detached to events of the world mostly just there to help the people around her from the bottom rather then the top which is not an insult and more one of the things i find fascinating about her. it all makes for a very interesting character and one of my personal favorites of the cast.

Annette: overworker, issues with her dad, magic bubbly, and hits things with axes. a nice recipe of a character but it never feels as if the game can get it all to blend properly. more so to the point is that most of these elements work independently of each other and not to inform each other despite the games insistence. theres a lot of dramatic potential involving her father as well and though the game makes the best use of those aspects its not to the benefit of the rest of her character. it doesnt hurt her either though and she has some appealing dialogue with other characters.

Marianne: I had trouble getting to like her, perhaps more so then any other character among the other students. not because i hated her but because shes, well, very boring. alot of the characters in the game are into the self deprecation thing already and well her personality aspects of acting quite and submissive to fall into the background from a lack of self confidence it also feels like the game came up with two different explanations for it and couldnt settle on whether it was because of her adoptive fathers pressure or her families history and instead of weaving both together decided to use them interchangeably. Sometimes shes a wallflower because of her father and a lack of confidence to state her mind and self loathing over that lack of confidence, other times its because of her lineage and self loathing over her cursed history. never really at the same time.

Bernadetta: another odd favorite for me. recent support changes aside, the basic gist of her history remains the same in that her father was a tyrant in regards to her future which caused her to grow up with no confidence and a crippling fear of society, so shes already off to a good start as a character by basically doing mariannes schtik but better. well its hard for me to definitely say she ever grows past that as a character, thats fine in my opinion because her development is less stop being a recluse because society demands you dont and more so about making actual friends and learning that not all people are garbage fires just most of them. in most of her supports anyways. she just feels the most rewarding to interact with alright, and she was the one i always felt the most upset to mess up a speak thing with. Let us hug and stay inside watching cartoons together.

Petra: i went in wanting to like her and really liking her at first, but shes hit a middle of the road for me now. her speech gimmick wasn't particularly egregious and gets even less noticeable after the timeskip, but her actual character is a very straight forward ‘national pride demands independence’ package and doesnt really escape past that boundary all that much. its very understandable motivation, id even go so far as to say that shes the one with the best reasons to betray the empire of the black eagles characters, so like ferdinand i feel she works better outside of the black eagles in term of her own character identity and motivation/development as she finally stands up for her peoples right to exist on their own in an fe6 echidna kinda fashion. outside of that though shes... foreign to the other characters. thats kinda it.

Lysithia: as a unit she hits like a truck, as a character shes functional but hardly revolutionary for the series. i mean i did like her since i have a fondness for her archtype of weird magic prodigy poor social skills, but more so that she doesn't hit any particularly new notes in that regard. Shes a lot of lute, with some delthea childishness in her, some of sanakis sharper political wit and dark history, and a bit of miriels scientist on top. that said its all blended very nicely and she has some nice scenes for herself that got me to feel and care for her, some kinda adorable moments, and a history well woven into the games background and more so then most of the other deer and a lot of the other characters from across the houses in general. for a minor character anyways.

you may now all stone me to death.

[e8luhs]

Hey! So, since you run an actually successful fanventure, do you have any tips on writing one? Mine, Scratchwise, is still in the baby stages, and I want to make it the best it can be.

heres the post ive written about character development!

since most of my previous posts on actual plot writing have been nonexistent and very vague, HERE under the cut are a couple of things that i can say ive learned over the course of time and hopefully it will help you somehow. enjoy

obviously the first question that should be asked is this: what story do you want to tell? figure out themes that are important to you. study your favorite novels and analyze the themes you recognize, why you recognize them, and why they may or may not have an emotional impact on you. do you want to tell a story about recovery? about struggle? WHATEVER have you? ask why you want to tell it, and how youre going to tell it.

sidenote 1.1: sometimes you wont know what youre going for for a while, and thats okay. to be honest i totally had no idea what the main theme of cataclysmalbound until later into the game. sometimes this shit just pulls itself together and thats fine too, but i recommend thinking about themes early on because it helps immensely with foreshadowing and character development.

please god do your research if youre going to be writing about heavier topics. honestly this is a pretty obvious point but i still feel it needs to be specified. i cant even really begin to describe how not just annoying but downright frustrating it is seeing stories where people milk their characters trauma or really just have the audacity to write about experiences that they have no authority to speak about. if youre going to be writing about abuse and trauma, please take on these topics with care, and keep in mind that they must be covered with a sense of understanding, nuance, and with education; these are actual experiences that actual people have to go through.

sidenote 2.1: here and here are some jumping-off-point sources for advice with writing traumatized characters. again these are like SUPER JUMPING OFF POINT sources take it all with a grain of salt and sense of skepticism, theres also plenty of writing blogs on tumblr and whatnot which have typically talked about similar. just USE RESOURCES. you get the gist.

revise revise revise. listen to me right now, youre not going to go with the first version of your story. in fact you SHOULDNT go with the first version of your story, EVER, because your story WILL become better alongside you and your own writing style. give yourself time to let your story sink in, and adjust accordingly when you find hiccups.

sidenote 3.1: im tellin you that cataclysmalbound originally? was nothing like it is now and its because ive been working on it since 2016. i have obviously changed not only as a person but a writer since that point in time. i originally tried starting up the comic one month after the creation of the characters. guess how that went? TERRIBLY! because i had NO idea who the characters were, half of them were irrelevant, the plot was rushed and all in all it was a bad time. just like, let yourself SIT on it no matter how enthusiastic you are. i get it... i know... but seriously

be flexible. in my experience its good to have a plot but its even more important to go with what feels natural to your characters. im personally a very character driven person so it MIGHT just be me, but honestly if your plot is TOO structured it can be almost suffocating to the characters because it gives them no space for development, conversation, emotions, it leaves NO space for tension. dont guide your characters, FOLLOW them because it will ultimately be 20x more impactful in the end due to it being driven by your characters feelings/motivations/actions rather than just like... whatever.

pacing is important. if you have too much going on too quickly, it will lead to an ultimately unfulfilling and lifeless story. let things build up over time. this might not come naturally and thats okay as well! ive had to re-write and re-pace my story like 3 or 4 or HOWEVER many times because ive realized later on just how rushed it sounded. again: youre going to evolve and flexibility is important so that you CAN evolve.

keep track of your plot. duh, obviously. write it down, keep it in a google doc, keep it on a google sheet, whatever is best for you

sidenote 6.1: write down all of your new ideas too. “oh ill remember this later its too cool to forge--” NO. you WILL FORGET. WRITE IT DOWN. KEEP NOTES ON YOUR PHONE. KEEP A NOTEPAD ON YOU. you will thank yourself later.

talk to other people about your characters. overcome the anxiety! its worth it! not only will it help you with bouncing new ideas for plot points off of other people, but it will also give you an idea of how these events and characters will be interpreted. taking from not only your OWN skillset but OTHERS is really great and good and no matter how “solo” of a job youre pulling, writing and literature ultimately is about teamwork because of the fact that it can be interpreted and tweaked upon in unique ways by everyone.

when in doubt write it out. i have run into pitfalls where i have an idea of what i want to happen, but i dont know HOW to make it happen. what causes it, what are the characters intentions, how does it build up, etc. sometimes the best thing you can do at these points is just WRITE like, from whichever characters perspective is necessary and go ham on it. write out the aftermath, or write DURING the plot point, or write how relationships might be affected by it. genuinely it has been helpful to me for brainstorming, since it puts me into my characters places and helps me ask “what would logically happen based on how everyone acts”. sometimes its really as simple as getting it out of your head and onto the page.

sidenote 8.1: on the topic of characters, as ive stated in the “character development” half of this, if you dont care about or dont have a place for your character in the plot, ditch em. really. throw em out if they dont have an actual impact. if you DO care but still dont have a place, its up to you to make one.

sidenote 8.2: also sometimes you might have a character which you might really favor and want to give them a lot of like DRAMA but if you want to have equal emphasis on all of your characters, you need to figure out how to redistribute the spotlight.

finally all i can say is that the rest is up to you. to get all up and fucking poetic in here, the sparks of inspiration will naturally come from your own life and experiences and feelings. utilize that and also the ways that you as an individual garner ideas... because thats what makes your story unique ^_^ go fucking hogwild. apeshit, if you will

[luau-lmao]

MAKEN SHAO [JP]

Review Written by LUAU_lmao

so maken shao is an updated port of the dreamcast original, updated to ps2 graphical capability with some changes.

the original came to america whilst this version did not despite this being seen a more definitive version.

I feel like ive spent enough time with this game to get a fair review in. now note that I havent finished it, but I feel ive gotten to a point where the game is consistent enough that I generally know where I stand and that is that Maken shao is:

A deeply flawed game but still pretty decent fun,

Ive only played a lick, but it felt like forever, a lot of the time what would happen was that the difficulty would mainly come from the game funneling you down pretty narrow pathways which did get pretty annoying after awhile, but among that, a lot of interesting level design and neat little mechanics and nuance took place throughout the game, pretty much done on a stage by stage basis. You had things like light switches and drawbridge switchs and…

Yeah, a lot of it is switch based, you had astonishingly stiff platforming which really isnt all that big a deal since the levels were pretty bite-sized, which honestly alleviated a lot of backtracking and frustration.

The gameplay was pretty repetitive too, sometimes you lock-on strafe, sometimes you circle strafe, the majority of difficulty like I just said, came from narrow pathways and weird platforming. But It had a pretty arcade-y feel to it, atleast thats what I got.

I enjoyed it for what it was, sometimes you had to mind triggering certain enemies when you were dealing with other enemies, sometimes you had new enemies with specific attacks that would only appear for certain levels, sometimes you had to manage dodging projectiles while dealing with other enemies.

And you had special enemies that would pop up every few levels  and get switched out along with the standard foot soldier and cannon soldier thats present in every level.

You can counter certain projectiles just like you would the t rex skeleton in devil may cry.

But the camera in the ps2 port is weird, atlus weirdly changed it to be 3rd person. Probably because of motion sickness concerns, but they kept the tank controls from the original ports first person view so it just ends up being a weird amalgamation of looking like a modern ps2 game, but not playing like a modern ps2 game.

The really only 1 out of 2 ways the game manages to keep fresh aside from the varied enemies with all of this is that you can mind swap into different characters that you find along the way, its a thing with the story. And you get skills and you evolve as time goes on and you defeat more enemies and earn more xp. The uje.

But yeah thats it, its pretty much a hack n slash pre-devil may cry through & through. And I sorta like it, a lot of the time what you’d see after stuff like devil may cry and god of war came out, pretty much everything wanted to be like that, and theres really nothing wrong with that, but i’ve never seen a hack n slash like this really hone in on the specifics at the bare minimum and create some neat stuff for it.

The lock on system really saved this game, it isn’t radial to just your front side, you can lock on from any direction, Its very much based on what enemies are closest to you. It indicates where they are through arrows to the side that are pretty big and noticeable. And its super nice, I cant tell you how many times I appreciated the fact it was the size it was. through the time I played this game.

the dreamcast original is not like this, so do not expect it to go your way like that.

You can block with r2 and r1 and some characters block better than others,

the characters you can switch to are pretty varied.

If anything, now that it comes to the mind, it feels like a tech demo to the later devil summoner titles a little bit, since they took more of an approach like this. But I dunno, we’re reviewing maken shao right now.

The level design was actually pretty okay for the most part, despite my previous complaints, and its pretty varied too.

You have a wide array of environments, like the gloomy back streets of hong kong, an abandoned mine in lyon, france coming from an abandoned subway line. You go to lisbon where you go through a city sidewalk overpass and you make your way through a meat packing factory. You ford through london with rampant transhumanist neo nazism…

yeah, seriously. they had the balls to do this.

and various other places…

if theres ever one complaint I have, and its a pretty subjective one, is that the levels shading can be a little too dark at points, but its pretty much a non complaint, its really not a big deal, ive dealt with astronomically worse.

Artistically speaking, its all pretty much a rough draft of what you’d think to find  in the Shin Megami Tensei games succeeding this game, save of shin Megami Tensei Nine, which was pretty much reminiscent of a mid 90s ova since it was jp xbox exclusive which is still not translated nor ported, side note atlus if there ever is a game, that would be it. Back to it, its really not much, it doesn't have as much cel shading like smt nocturne does, so it has aged a lot more considerably. But that said it still looks fine for the time period

It did come from the dreamcast after all, that stuff aged pretty damn well for a gen 5 console, probably early gen 6, I dunno.

sega was weird with console releases.

Sound design is pretty clear, the sound track has a lot of neat or cool tracks to it, id say give it a listen. I especially like the first levels music, the title screen and the london level music is also good. Its a very vibrating ost, not reverb-y if that makes any sense.  

and the volume of the music isnt too loud or overcomplicated, so you can hear the the enemies winding up to attack,

And youre gonna know when you hit something or get hit, the sound effect is very prominent, it will be a constant throughout your playthrough IF you decide to get it however you may, im not judging.

The mixing is pretty good. Especially for a game from this era, a lot of games in this time period had a big problem with general audio mixing and making the ost a lot louder than the actual game.

So yeah,

- gameplays repetitive but enjoyable

-switching characters, varied movesets

- enemies are varied and unique with a basic standard throughtout the game

-overall good level design

-good music and sound design

I played about 7 hours worth with lots of deaths because im an idiot,

so im giving this game a nothing, because numerical rating for media is pretty dumb.

[renmaru]

you know. sometimes i love something a lot so i need to scream about the things that piss me off about it. i don’t think this is a particularly negative post but it’s just like sheer frustration and if you dont get some satisfaction from articulating your frustration into tumbler dot coms longposts and destroying the capital of this website because you are not a gemini sun then like fair i guess feel free to disregard this. tonbokiris kiwame is cool go look at that.

now to the lukewarm tea ive been simmering for five years. the one thing i always think about all the time is that tkrb is a popular game despite itself. the piss poor gameplay with only the barest of bare QoL in the five years its been up, the seeming complete lack of direction and the frankly nonexistent worldbuilding is held up purely because of its attention to detail and reverence to the original culture and history of the swords combined with some very good character design and subtle but nuanced character writing that can be openly interpreted. just enough flavour to imply something larger but chickening out on actually making anything y’know. concrete. basically allowing the fans to draw their own conclusions. but even then a game like that would not survive cause there have been countless, hundreds of games with high quality and fervent attention to detail and respect for the source material that just died completely because they have such little to actually offer in terms of engagement. i think the main thing that bugs me about tkrb is that it has one of THE most creative, dedicated and strong fanbases of this genre of game who go out of their way to engage with any and all of the content and the devs seem kind of oblivious to this.

in comparison to modern gacha style games, touken ranbu releases barely any new content and frequently recycles content but somehow it’s still relatively popular with approx. 1mil active players daily but the maddening thing is that tkrb can reach much MUCH further. the fans are there, the curiosity is there, it’s just the game content is not fucking there. it does not put the effort into commissioning seasonal art, pushing new events with actual plotline/story content, creating promotional materials, tie-ins etc. but somehow its still in the top 5 comiket circles for nearly five fuckin years straight. here are your badley compiled receipts: c89(w2015), c90(s2016), c91(w2016), c92(s2017), c93(w2017), c94(s2018), c95(w2018), c96(s2019)

 it can launch itself from laughably low in the appstore ratings, hovering in the middle of the 200′s to TOP 30s in the appstore at the flick of a switch. what is this magic button that fucking quadruples revenue and skyrockets your app into the top 50 grossing apps? 3/4 of your characters getting static CGs that you cannot use at all anywhere in the game but will do a powerpoint transition and appear for 5 seconds at login. oh and like a few free mats i guess. and i kid you not it fuckin worked.

wanna know why that worked? it’s cause otherwise characters, especially fan favourites just don’t get anything at all. it’s like most characters outside of the very popular ones rarely get new art, new recollections, new anything outside of their kiwame upgrade which is more often than not years down the line and only recently, four years in, they decided to add alternate costumes but even then there’s a catch which has me feeling some kind of way.

and yes, i fully understand that tkrb is a multi-media franchise, i get that it’s got its fingers in so many pies like the stageplay, musicals, various manga anthologies, the animes, hell its even got live action but man, would it hurt to give some love in game? i’m not asking them to go full fgo route and commission the industry creme de la creme to make 6 full CE illustrations, lots of promo art and tonnes of new merch every single month. but the fact is for such a big franchise, reusing the same sprite art on nearly every piece of official merch, going so far as to add NEW costume art which is just the heads of the old default sprites edited onto new bodies? it screams cost cutting, it screams lazy, the path of minimum effort. it’s almost like the game itself and the original materials are an absolute afterthought at this point with only the most dedicated hanging on to it. i guarantee that the majority of people still playing tkrb are the committed day1 players and the actual rekijou cause it’s just painfully offputting to new fans, with other fans even going out of their way to specify the game is not integral to enjoying the series which sucks, but it’s true.

its a real damn shame to think that something you are so invested in is not particularly invested in itself. sometimes, just sometimes i wish they dev team for tkrb was more hands-on, more adventurous, more willing to listen to players, invest in the game and genuinely try and make the game the best it can be. i’m not asking for balls to the wall summer events, beautiful animated CMs from the likes of the industries best animators, i’m not asking for pages of supplemental lore compiled into books, character backstory novels or whatever i’m just asking for the lore and the characters that we love to sometimes occasionally be remembered in the actual game outside of like ... the two years between their kiwame and the vague possibility of a recollection. i want to feel like this game puts as much effort into itself as the fans do towards it.

it’s a painful truth but there’s one shining light which is that the fandom for tkrb is genuinely one of the most committed and transformative ones ive ever seen. i have never been involved with a fandom that varies so widely and puts in so much effort for these characters and this world. tkrb exists solely as a popular franchise due to the sheer legwork of the fans carrying it on their backs collaboratively. ultimately, tkrb is very very lore-light, there’s so much thats missing and the characters in-game rarely rarely interact with each other. the characters are contained solely in however many voice lines they get at implementation, their kiwame letters, and their updates kiwame lines and the only interaction they get with other swords is recollections or depending on the sword, the odd custom sparring lines.

but despite that there has been so much fan effort to explore everything in so many different varied ways, and amazingly there are certain tropes, relationships, lore etc. that have started off fanon and become canon. the fan community, especially the fanartists, doujins, writers, animators etc. being given a small indulgence by the anime is one of my favourite things about tkrbs relationship with its fanbase. that’s not to say that the fans dont give back in kind a hundred fold.

there’s so much i love about tkrb fans going out of their way to go SEE historical swords in japan, single-handedly reforging swords using crowdfunding and revitalising lots of small-town tourism having real world impact. shit makes me unbelievably happy. the stage plays and musicals are always met with warm reception and are always well attended and even though its hard to access, there are lots of western fans who have dived into a whole new MEDIUM that most of us arent really familiar with but out of their love for tkrb theyve done that. they have hosted the musical as far out as india and france, making tkrb a truly worldwide franchise and there theyve met full seats! as far out as india! then theres the fantranslators, who always have the drive the commitment and energy for the thankless work, the wiki always always is well maintained and they have new content up so fast, and there are so many people willing to help you out. even when crunchyr*ll got hanamaru s2 (i think) a week late and we were left without subs for the premier episode for a whole ass week, fantranslators who had never subbed before stepped up to translate a whole episode for FREE, encoding, subbing and timing it all despite never having done so just so others could understand the episode faster than cr*nchy themselves could. even, as well, it’s made so many history nerds out of a whole bunch of people, it’s created an appreciation for nihontou and japanese history that would otherwise probably never be in their orbit because of how inaccessible it is, especially in english. even on a personal note, i started learning japanese primarily so i could understand tkrb and the history behind it better and to read jp fanart/interact with fanartists.

 no matter what, i am forever warmed by how much i love tkrb and its fanbase and im glad that tkrb is still going strong, even despite itself sometimes and i hope that moving on tkrb tries new things, and becomes better for everyone.

[possibilistfanfiction]

hey jude!!! just read ur last anon abt being nb and wondered if u could talk abt ur own gender experience?

well basically i didnt grow up in a very open household, like rly Zero discussion of gender, so i know i Experienced gender entirely but i played almost exclusively with the boys in my class until probably grade 6 or 7, & at puberty, even tho i was a better athlete than most boys in my class still, i started hanging out with girls more, at recess, etc. i was always into androgyny, even if i had no idea (& i didn’t) what that was—i liked some femme things, absolutely, but i wanted nothing to do w skirts or pretty shoes. i wanted to be in adidas running sneakers 24/7 if i could help it, & i wore a uniform to school w the option of a skirt/pants, & im p sure i always wore pants. at the time this, to me, seemed more functional, & it was, but it was also, as i can understand now, something that made me feel Less like a girl, although not at all like a boy.

when i was older, 12, 13, 14, my parents wanted me to dress nicer, & i was v much into like american eagle shit, although by mid hs i was into some vintage stuff. one rly big odd style influence for me was mia wasikowksa in this weird movie called restless bc it was this v soft femme androgyny & i think for me this kind of gender expression became very important to see & understand. it wasn’t that she didn’t look like a girl, or that she wasn’t a girl, but she also sometimes looked like a boy, or wore boys clothes, but she wasn’t butch. idk this movie sent me for a loop honestly lol. 

& obviously my understanding of gender expression didn’t correlate (& doesn’t correlate!) w so many gender identities, & “passing” is extremely harmful as a notion, etc. but when i was younger my understanding of gender & sexuality was very limited & began to expand when i saw very femme but still andro ppl, even tho i couldn’t articulate it at the time. 

when i was a teenager i knew i didnt want to rly have a single thing to do w any boy, which made me sure i was a lesbian bc thats the only narrative i’d rly known abt queerness, or queer women, or even queer ppl who presented as femme. there werent any out lesbians at my school (no fucking way), & the only out queer kid at all was a white gay guy a year older than me, who was popular in the way white gay boys can be popular in high school. but i read voraciously, was fascinated by the crossdressing in shakespeare (paris in the merchant of venice was a particular fixation of mine?) & anyway. i knew i was queer, i knew i liked girls, & i knew i was outrageously uncomfortable w my body, particularly my breasts. for a long time i thought this was because i was ashamed of my sexuality, when i came to sort of understand that, but ofc now i know abt dysmorphia & dysphoria, so yknow. knowledge.

when i went to college i came out big time, & it became very important to me to both be queer & look sort of queer but not queer enough to be Queer—i wanted ppl to be like ‘maybe into girls, but maybe straight.’ as im sure many of us know, this was a lot of internalized shame abt a lot of things, so that sucks. however, i cut my hair which was like the first comfortable thing i had done for my appearance in a v long time, & also smth which my parents hated & i did anyway. i wore a Lot of rly femme stuff bc they hated it tho? so this was all v confusing for me bc my parents are v homophobic, & here i was in college starting to read queer theory & gender theory & falling in love w like. the most beautiful, brilliant girl, & also spiraling into a mixed episode after i got diagnosed w bipolar I, which sort of put everything else on the backburner for a year. 

eventually tho i sorted that out (as much as u can sort smth like that out) & i started to rly pay attention to androgyny. i went to europe & i think theres a whole bunch of nuances to fashion that exist there that certainly arent here, & i spent a winter in warsaw so there were aspects to fashion & expression there that were entirely abt functionality, which i was v attracted to. in college, as well, & especially after college, gender became smth i was v much invested in bc i was (& absolutely am) a feminist, so my place in the canon & zeitgeist was one as a queer female writer. it was so so central to who i was, & what i was writing abt. every single thing i wrote in college was in some way a balm, some sort of piece abt myself, learning abt trauma & the body. sorting through a lot of hurt. i could write a theory piece abt elizabeth bishop & reading it back now i know it was also abt me, that kinda stuff.

when i went to toronto i rly rly started being invested in looking critically at gender & my experience of it bc being read as a woman was smth that was grating on me, even tho i had identified as woman for so long, & had no desire at all to transition. i know 100% i am not a trans man, so that was confusing for a long time because i sort of knew there was a space between but it was very hard to conceptualize. eventually i sort of came to understand gender is a color wheel where cis boys are blue & cis women are pink & then theres literally a ton of other colors out there, so yknow. lots of different experiences of gender. some days i feel much more strongly like i identify w women (in mostly political situations, it matters to me to be read as “female” sometimes bc rights for ppl w vaginas AND trans women are FUCKED UP in so many places). some days i hate the idea of identifying as a woman. i also never want to identify as a man. so when i was in toronto i rly started to know a LOT of queer ppl w so many different expressions of gender. & we were all young & lovely & open & fucked up & we would get fucked up but we would also go read together in the park & wander around alleys in the snow & like. there’s a Muchness to toronto that i experienced that helped me, personally, understand these intersections between my own sexuality & gender & expression as much more than just a gay woman who isn’t butch & isn’t femme. i was rly lucky to become part of a community that identified as Queer, & so i became v much understanding of these different aspects of my own identity that fell outside of binary—my sexuality, my gender. Queerness is a vital & profound thing to me & i was rly able (& so fortunate) to have a close friend group of mostly queer ppl & then a few of the actual literally most incredible allies i’ve ever known & will ever know. 

so then from there i just rly kinda thought abt things & like i got a binder & stuff in TO but rly started to evaluate my dysmorphia & dysphoria (i had struggled really badly w an eating disorder in/post college) & was able to sort out that so much of it had to do w feeling uncomfortable in the way my body was read in the world. & that will always happen bc i LOVE makeup & i have a “feminine” voice & sometimes i love skirts & i shave my legs bc i like how it feels sometimes & i dont ever want to go on T—none of these things make anyone ANY gender, but ofc theyre coded as “female.” but i’m learning to just yknow educate where i can & take a lot of solace in the community of ppl i have fostered who support & understand my Being. i’ve also allowed myself to be invested in aesthetics & fashion & how much a role that plays bc like. yah fuck Yah i look cool shit bc my friends love it & absolutely i wanna wear the same vans maia mitchell has & i want a melodrama hoodie & i LOVE local toronto designers & their angsty patches abt sad songs & whiskey but i love fashion born out of histories that is connected to smth i can understand, like queer punk movements, or smth my friends & i share, like blundstones (which are gender neutral, which is cool). i’m fascinated in how ppl express their Selves, & we are so unfortunately Finite in our bodies in the sense that that’s rly how the world, in our day to day interactions, processes who & what we are. so i invest in the care of mine by trying to listen to it, trying to make it comfortable—& clothing is a huge thing that can do that. also its fun so anyone who thinks loving (ethical, cool) fashion is vain can eat my ass

anyway lmao now i have a p decent sense, atm at least, of what makes my body its most comfortable (even if that is v far from Comfortable at times). i love my tattoos, & i basically never rly want long hair again i’m p sure, & i love makeup, & if i could wear vans or blundstones every day for the entirety of my life at this point that would be incredible. those are easy things, & i try to allow my body, in its cultural place, to have access to them as much as possible, which is so important to me in a sense of having access to a physical space that matches my mental space of gender identity. politically sometimes i feel v v much a “woman” in terms of my lived experience, & i allow that of myself as well. sometimes when i write it’s important to me that my poetry be read as a queer person but also someone who is culturally coded as a woman, bc those are still always central concerns of my work—the trauma, the power there. but day to day i’m mostly happy spending my time obsessing over other things, like what to call this new genre of music halsey & lorde are making, or why my dog stevie is a Fanatic when it comes to ice cubes. ive come to enough terms w my gender, & my sexuality—& the expression thereof—that unless someone is talking abt gender, or someone asks me a question, it’s not smth that is constantly on my mind, which is. Nice. its so nice lol. 

also i would like to point out that i know my experience being non binary is rly rly white & western in so many ways & i get that. my cultural experience of non binary gender is also v much this like. ive felt frustrated before but never in my life have i felt scared to be non-binary while i was like out & abt in the world, bc i still pass as a cis white woman literally everywhere all the time (which has its pros & cons but like, still, a lot of privilege). so i do try to keep all of that in mind as well when i try to center myself & all that jazz

& who tf knows where all of that will take me. i feel like, bc ive learned to listen to my body & my brain so much better than i did when i was younger—even when they might hate themselves—i am so much better at filling up a space in the world that occupies smth healthy. which is not smth i take lightly, & i’m also so open to changes, as long as they feel good & beneficial & true. which is sort of new for me. who knows man ur mid twenties are a wild ride 

[unproduciblesmackdown]

s2g that moss has even been foreshadowing that lars was gonna get briefly killed like…not that specific but since we’re shown that the moss is lars and the flowers have a bit of gem in them…………

ppl are always weird about stuff everywhere smh but like…theres been obviously weird things like being way more ok with ancient beings ready to destroy all life on the planet than lars being too ill-tempered or doing something selfish like…i see that…. like lars doesnt need to be redeemed for anything jeez. every episode where he does something crap its on a minor scale vs like endangering lives or something and he gets k.o’d for it and then makes some sincere form of apology like? theres your redemption…i guess maybe people expect him to become acceptable overnight maybe but thats how people work and then every episode is like The Lesson of the Week instead of a closer look at a character and another step in their development as people figuring themselves out

like literally every character has issues smh! in like this and everything also but like….honestly lars has been a super self conscious and anxious teen from the start and really unhappy and like sometimes he does dumbass shit but who hasnt. if you think youve never hurt people you havent been paying close enough attention

anyways one of the things i really dont like? despite general overall stuff like teenaged lars momentarily losing his patience and realizing he’s in the wrong and immediately trying to make amends = him being judged more harshly than like….every millenia-old actually murderous actual antagonist introduced…. is that overall? its like really really clear really early on that he’s always struggling with a lot of mental health issues, and a common theme is irl people who really do have disorders pointing this out. like, that point can be made for every character in su and lars isnt The Mentally Ill One who alone represents the whole of the universal mental illness experience because obviously that doesnt exist and its a very unique and personal experience, and people dont have to directly relate to lars or any other character with such problems to verify their own. but lars and the cool kids is like super upfront about anxiety and he obv has really low confidence and low self worth and i’ll fight anytime about island adventure hinting strongly at depression—in addition to having him state outright that he feels lonely and isolated all the time. and like, he hates the job he works all the time, he’s not good in school, he and sadie feel an early connection but they obviously had to do a lot of work on that and step on each other’s emotional fingers along the way to finally get to where they are now—which i’m guessing is dating but without acknowledging so or at least not to others, he isn’t very close to his parents currently, he starts the series with 1.5 friends maximum and cant even approach the cool kids besides being desperate to be friends with them

like clearly he’s unhappy and for a while sadie and steven are probably the people closest to him even tho he is a lot more annoyed by steven at the start of things when steven is more little-kiddish than he is now…..but lars still acts mostly like himself around them But at the start him and sadie have too many complications and uncertainties to be really comfortable and again steven doesnt really come across as very mature, with lars pointing it out just now how stevens changed in that way, and it being difficult anyways for lars to confide in anybody

so like lars is and has always been super super defined and restricted by his fear of everybody he encounters, specifically being afraid of being hurt by them / fear of being disliked. i like to say that i think the way he prevents himself / his image is meant to be a way of controlling the reactions he expects people to have: i.e. making people dislike him is less scary/painful than being judged badly while hoping for the opposite. but i also never like saying that anyone who consciously cultivates their Look is faker than someone who doesnt put any thought into it, or is lying to themselves or others or whatever, i just would bet thats a part of it. but moreso than that, the fact that he’s irritable and ill-tempered all the time fits really well as a result of being so unhappy and afraid and trying to deal with it solo. it’s not about him not caring about people, when on an unrelated note but related-to-the-universal-human-experience he does something thoughtless or mean or just generally crosses a line, he notices immediately when someone feels hurt, and he’s shown to immediately feel bad, arguably to a fault and going too far with how guilty he feels. but anyways clearly even though he has the capacity to hurt people’s feelings, he’s very sensitive to that, he cares deeply when it happens, and he doesn’t want to hurt people. like apologizing with any genuine depth to it right off is an incredibly difficult task even for grownass adults, and lars is already really good at it. its wild that people think of him as super cruel and selfish when it’s clear that he’s very emotionally vulnerable and doesn’t have the capacity to callously disregard other people’s hurt feelings

anyways a point i’m taking a really long time to come around to is that lars is a really good example of someone who’s young and unhappy and isolated and really struggling with a lot of things and afraid of everything and the fact is that usually when youre looking for characters who are struggling with this kind of shit you get one-dimensional, maybe even one-episode characters like the person who shows up for the very special episode where everyone has a serious talk and learns a serious lesson and the Depression Character never shows up again, having gone off to be depressed somewhere else since we already know about depressed people. or depression and anxiety is something that can be solved literally overnight if you just confront the root cause, like eliminating the life problem that made x depressed or giving y a makeover or throwing them a surprise party to show them they have friends or something. or you learn that joe the bully is actually just physically violent because he is insecure, whoa man. or the Sad Kid is a running joke and a periphery character and their parents are getting divorced etc etc etc etc

the point is that lars is a main character and even when he learns things about himself that put him in a better place than when the episode began, his issues still don’t vanish (and i wouldnt be surprised if people use that as evidence that his character doesnt “grow”). and dealing with / revealing some of his issues arent a special episode, its just an episode, and its about him. he’s developed over and over and he’s shown to be a complicated person. he’s shown to enjoy things and have interests and a life. he’s a regular character as much as anyone else is, he isnt set aside in a special category

but the thing is that maybe people expect Mentally Ill™ characters to be more of the hamfisted media clichés with zero nuance and about as much accuracy to them? because there’s always the sweet-and-soft kind of person who’s surely dealing with mental illness acceptably because they make up for it by being pure and noble and something approximately like a newborn lamb. like depression is being maybe a bit cagey and avoidant and crying a lot and writing poetry (which will later be revealed as their secret talent!!) and sighing and generally just waiting for someone to approach them, very gently because they are shy and nervous like a fawn, and that savior will cure them with love and also with showing them how beautiful life is!!! and then they will start wearing more colorful clothes and they will be happy and the depression is over now, because someone just had to show their delicate, beautifully wounded soul the light

trauma? you can tell someone has Trauma because they act very stoic and strong 1000% of the time no exceptions but it is just a façade. they will never talk about The Thing. they will finally talk about the thing because someone pries about it with pure intentions and it is a big dramafest and theyve never talked about this before and everyone cries and its super serious and heavy and the person is a bit softer after that because they could finally let it out that one time. thanks, another savior. having disorders is just having turned away from the light

the point is that irl obviously things are very different and its rare to see people with such issues being treated the same as any other character and being able to grow in a realistic way and being able to have flaws the way that everyone else does, not having to be a pure defenseless dewy-eyed baby kitten who someone strong and Normal needs to rescue and put on the right path away from these problems forever. being pissed off and frustrated and confused but trying a lot of different ways to figure things out anyways is a lot more common, the way lars reacts to and deals with his vulnerability is a lot more realistic than just being a fairy-tale in-distress type figure. his character feels a million times more like he was developed by people who understand what its like to be experiencing what he does and developed for people who can relate to him, rather than being made by and for people who cant directly relate and who tend to make content thats wholly inaccurate and treats that kind of thing like an Other issue for Others that you only need to learn bullet points about because if its going to be a part of your life it’ll be a fleeting, one-time thing, not your everyday reality

i mean, its unsurprising that lars is actually pretty comfortable with steven now, given how long theyve known each other, but also how relentless steven is in being supportive of lars and treating him like a friend. its not surprising that it took lars this long to accept that, or that it was in part forced along by being stuck in a “we might die” scenario with steven. and its important to point out that this wasn’t just lars changing that made their relationship better, but steven growing as a person as well. if you put both if them in that situation during the start of the series, they could probably get along better than usual still, but you cant say that this is the first sign of lars developing any more than you can say this is stevens first development. lars has been struggling with himself just as steven has, although not in a fate-of-the-world way till now. lars couldnt be so conscious of his own fear and frustrated with it, and steven wouldnt have the maturity to do stuff like freakin sacrifice himself for earth by separating himself from the other crystal gems, much less lend lars the emotional support needed to give lars enough confidence to protect the off-colors

lars has been developing the whole time and even if people look at individual episodes and think lars learns nothing during them, i cant see how anyone could deny that this isn’t a turning point for lars as much as its the culmination of a gradual path he’s already been on. not to mention that “turning point” has implications like “redemption arc,” as if lars was inherently bad or worthless at the start of the series. he wasn’t; none of the characters were, but each character and all of their relationships were least developed of course. we see details and different sides of the donuts right away, and they both care enough about steven to treat him more as a little brother than a customer and to humor him sometimes. theyve always been important, and the fact that lars has always been a main character in the set of protagonists and that steven has always been a friend means that he cannot be converted by a “redemption” arc. he’s already there smh he’s always been there. seriously name one episode where he’s done something shitty and didnt do anything to make up for it. the only thing unresolved rn is he couldnt fight topaz for sadie, and he said himself he felt guilty over it, and it was already at that point the boldest thing he’d done and like, its not that unreasonable for a wisp of a teen to be terrified by a giant gem warrior that he had zero chance of doing anything to anyways. it wasnt glistening heroics but if thats gonna condemn lars like throw me in the pit too i guess. then he went and died for twelve individuals and left himself defenseless in hostile unfamiliar territory so that steven can go back to earth so thats something. but before all this alien drama like, again…..he’s always directly apologizing for shit and he’s just making everyday kinds of fuckups. he beats himself up about stuff. and gets beat up. and really like doesnt ever require an apology when he’s the one to get hurt, which isnt a requirement by any means and which is probably part of him thinking too badly of himself

the point? that maybe i still havent made besides saying i was gonna make it like half a dozen times?? is that lars is a really real portrayal of a person dealing with things in a real way. and its not the “pain is transcendent” thing where if someone is Suffering from mental illness it makes them wiser and kinder and holier than us regular people. its not where all you need to help someone with mental illness is one incidence of reaching out and telling them you love them and look at the stars and isnt it lovely. its not where disorders themselves are an arc and at the end, people’s personalities will be indistinguishable from that of those who never experienced what they did. its where dealing with this shit is normal and human and everyday and its not beautiful and its not gonna make other people “inspired” or get to feel good about themselves as your savior. its about pushing people away or having them avoid you anyways because they can hurt you in ways they can’t understand as being hurtful and shits confusing and sometimes kids will lash out and i bet lars was a lot more Difficult closer to stevens age than he is now. its about characteristics that seem ugly or repulsive or otherwise don’t directly cry out for help. its about shit staying with you even while you’re trying to figure out how to work through it. its about the unpleasantness of it all but also the real humanity behind it, not just using it as some device. lars’s problems are about lars and belong to him

and yeah of course he hurts people, but literally all the characters do; it has nothing to do with having disorders or not. everyone hurts each other even though they love each other, sometimes with the best intentions or 0% knowingly because they just have to figure out more things about themselves and each other. everything is about people making mistakes. lars is no worse in that matter than any of the other characters, he just happens to have a less appealing/inviting personality, god forbid less relatable. in the recent episodes he didnt have his usual defensive abrasiveness, even his frustration with steven in “stuck together” wasn’t that significant, and wasnt even much directed at steven. after that he was just scared, without it being masked by anger. he could be brave for the other gems because he knew he wanted to be brave and he knew how it felt for them to be so afraid and he was finally told that it was an okay thing that he still felt terrified. he could be completely himself with steven because of all the ways steven has gotten to know lars and refused to stop valuing him and how steven has grown to be someone who could protect others on his own in serious situations—which in this case included supporting lars emotionally as well as protecting him physically. if lars was dropped in that situation with the kid who just learned to summon his shield and was having an ice cream crisis five minutes ago, he couldnt trust or rely on him or count on him for encouraging advice. the way lars is in the wanted arc being so different from earlier episodes is as much about stevens development as lars’s really

like the real lars is and always has been deeply sensitive to peoples feelings (to the point he feels extremely vulnerable to them e.g. afraid of being hurt by being regarded negatively) and he’s always cared about the people he feels close to and he’s always been capable of moments of bravery for the sake of others and he likes wrestling and he’s good at cooking and he’s a dumbass sometimes and he watches scary movies and plays video games and sucks at school and is grumpy and is passionate and is scared and is a huge nerd with nerd parents and he never got over feeling hurt by the explorer club incident and he doesnt like fries and he and his coworker like each other and relate to each other and he sees steven as his annoying little brother and he doesnt know what he wants and also he’s a bi icon, it must be exhausting

lars has always been good and complex and i might be willing to forgive my slight disappointment in people realizing he’s good only now if and only if they go back and acknowledge that he’s been good this whole time. like obviously he doesn’t have to be your Fave or even “liked” to just be not hated or to be recognized as a complex, solid character. lars is so, so developed, probably more than any other human. he’s always been important, even before his importance had direct cosmic significance. he’s always shown signs of being thoughtful and caring and soft, and the fact that he’s hurt people he cares about and who care about him isnt evidence that he’s bad, not only because of the fact that literally all the Good characters hurt each other, but because irl hurting people you love isnt even necessarily evidence of a failure, its just an inevitability, and what happens following the event is whats a lot more telling than the fact any negative emotions were ever a part of a good relationship

anyways what’s definitely true is that lars didnt need to die. it wasnt a necessary atonement for anything lars has ever done. he didnt and doesnt need to be redeemed. he just was willing to risk his life for gems in a situation he could immediately relate to, and that risk happened to win out momentarily. besides, what lars was overcoming in that situation was his own fear, it wasnt anything that caused the stuff in the past that people seem to think so badly of him for. he was also protecting steven, sure, but steven was pretty much fine by the end of it coz of his shield. but he also hadnt ever really Not protected steven or anything so he didnt really need to make up for that or whatever

also one more thing ive always meant to bring up is that lars doesnt think much of himself and is prone to being too hard on himself but i know there are probably plenty of people who believe him when he says he needs to “deserve” being alive again. nah!!!! lars always deserved it