#anyway i have said so many words

[kitamars]

how can you drop a heavy burden if it's holding you up as well

[royalarchivist]

[A sad violin song plays over an image of a sad hamster]

Pac: This doesn't have anything to do with me – I wear a blue sweatshirt, you're crazy, this mouse doesn't even have a sweatshirt, this hamster! [Reading chat] Am I a depressed hamster?

[ Transcript continued ↓ ]*

–

Pac: Actually– that's fine! I embrace that idea – of course I'm going to be depressed, are you crazy? [He hits his desk, then starts counting off people on his fingers] Fit is gone, Richarlyson is gone, Ramon is gone, Bagi and Empanada who were always there when we were there are also gone, I haven't seen them! It's just me and Tubbo, and sometimes Philza shows up.

Pac: I lost Chume Labs, I lost the Favela, I lost Murder Mystery, I lost Ilha Chume Labs, it's crazy! Look at how much I've lost, and I've gained nothing! Of course I'm going to be depressed, are you crazy?! How am I supposed to be happy?!

Pac: [Reading chat] "You have us Pac," that's true, thank you. No, that's true, sorry.

* NOTE: Please note that this is an incomplete transcript, as I was primarily relying on Aypierre's translation mod at the time and if I am not confident of the translation, I do not include it. As always, please feel free to add on translations or message me corrections.

[luck-of-the-drawings]

OH ARTHUR BENNETT.. such a gorgeous and intriguing character. terribly burdened by a GRUESOME set of crimes, his light suffocated by a HEAVY century of GUILT. so tragic, so dark and broody, and yet PAINFULLY awkward in any social setting ever

[hallwyeoo]

Ellie’s memory of the golfing scene and what it tells us about her.

🚨spoilers for tlou2🚨

I think Ellie’s flashback to Joel’s death is very telling of how she internalized the event and the meaning she applied to his death. It’s also a good demonstration of her relationship to autonomy. Let’s break down the elements that were inconsistent with the actual event:

The stairs/hallway are much longer than they were. This suggests a sense of helplessness, an inability to get there fast enough. Joel is constantly out of reach.

There is blood on the floor outside of the door. Not entirely certain on this one but my hunch is that she blames herself for not seeing more obvious signs of violence/not knowing something was wrong sooner.

The door is locked, another roadblock in her path to Joel. She can’t access him, she can’t help, he needs her and she isn’t there.

Most importantly. Joel yells “Ellie, help me” (which he didn’t in the actual scene, he just screams. He doesn’t say a word in the actual scene)

Ellie hearing Joel scream for her help, calling for her while being horribly beaten, and her being repeatedly impeded on her way to him suggests that what she took away from his death is that she wasn’t enough. They always helped each other, always had each others backs, always got up. Ellie views his death as a failure. She was too slow, too weak, not smart enough to save him. She failed him when he needed her most. She is absolutely helpless to save him, just like she was helpless to save Riley, Tess, Sam, and Jessie (and Marlene, and humanity, and and and-).

Once again, Ellie makes a decision (staying with Riley, going to the fireflies, staying with Joel, being the cure, trying to forgive Joel) and once again her autonomy and ability to find closure is ripped from her.

This is the inciting incident of tlou pt2, this is the moment where Ellie’s whole world shatters the same way Joel’s did at the start of pt1. Ellie enters into the same cycle (which I like to call the “Joel cycle” because… yeah.) that he did, and throughout pt2 she stays in the “20 years later” phase of the cycle. She is changed, she has lost her light, lost what she fought for. She lost her chance to genuinely forgive Joel and rebuild their relationship. She is stuck in a gruelling and violent world that she has no anchor in, at least not anymore. His death is so sudden and so incredibly violent that it practically gave her (and me as well, tbh) whiplash. She’s in a state of total shock.

On another devastating note, this is one of the three times in tlou that we see Ellie beg (that I remember). The first is begging Joel to get up at the university of Eastern Colorado, the second is begging him to get up and for Abby to stop, and the third is begging Abby to not kill Dina because she’s pregnant. (Two times she begs Joel to get up, one time he doesn’t. Two times she begs Abby to spare her family and one time she does. What a beautifully haunting contrast)

To wrap up, every person creates an internal narrative, a story of their life that is crafted from their context and lived experiences. The meaning we derive from those experiences doesn’t always reflect the truth, and that can sometimes bite us in the ass majorly when we experience a traumatic event. We tend to want to find someone or something to assign blame to, some reason or rationale to why it happened. We tell stories. We write them in our minds about ourselves and what happens to us and what that says about us.

But Ellie is wrong. Joel’s death happened in response to a conscious and willing choice he made. It is in no way her fault, and there was absolutely no way for her to know or to stop what was happening. I think Ellie knows that much on an intellectual level, It just doesn’t change how devastated she is over the whole event. It can’t change the fact that she FEELS as though this was all her fault, that Joel did what he did to save her, that she could have saved him. That she should have.

[lowrezbonuslevel]

sketch dump 3 (cursed edition)

go ahead guys. rate my god damned. jinkles (PS i just found out what "bad words" are sooooo. yeah)

[chmyri]

OH MY FUCKING GOD I THOUGHT FOR SURE ICE ADOLESCENCE WAS CANNED, THIS IS LITERALLY CRUMBS BUT I'LL FUCKING TAKE IT, look i watched yuri on ice when it was airing, i was 11 and it fucking changed my life, it's a very important show to me personally I'VE WAITED 7 YEARS AND I'M PREPARED TO WAIT MORE, I DON'T CARE IF EVERYBODY ELSE GAVE UP ON THIS MOVIE RELEASING I DON'T CARE THAT NOT THAT MANY PEOPLE CARE FOR THE FRANCHISE ANYMORE I DON'T FUCKING CARE!! I'M PUTTING MY FULL FAITH INTO THIS MOVIE UNTIL IT RELEASES OR IT'S OFFICIALLY ANNOUNCED TO BE DEAD

[carnivalcarriondiscarded]

yeehaw just wrote over 3k and i can't publish Any of it without miles of fantasy au context

[teplejtrouba]

my psychiatrist confirmed that i am in fact autistic

[hualianisms]

i love how fanghua are so danmei coded. fang duobing as the protective nianxia ml whose life was so monumentally changed and shaped by a shifu he met only once when he was younger but whose small act of kindness moved him so deeply that he spent most of his life trying to get stronger, working hard to finally be able to catch up to and be worthy of that glorious shifu that he so admired.

except he finally meets that shifu again years later as an adult and he's finally caught up to him but now their positions are reversed - li lianhua is now the sickly one, and fallen from grace; fdb is now the (physically) stronger one, the young hero, and he becomes friends with and falls for llh who he now no. longer wants to be the disciple of. instead, he now wants to protect and care for li lianhua like one protects and cares for a lover.

[hum--hallelujah]

Patrick in 2005 // Pete in 2010

[sea-me-now]

taking this international asexual day to say that crowley and aziraphale from good omens are asexual and would never have sex thank you and goodnight

[andromeda3116]

"One day when I was a young boy on holiday in Uberwald, I was walking along the bank of a stream when I saw a mother otter with her cubs. A very endearing sight, I'm sure you will agree, and even as I watched, the mother otter dived into the water and came up with a plump salmon, which she subdued and dragged onto a half-submerged log. As she ate it, while of course it was still alive, the body split and I remember to this day the sweet pinkness of its roes as they spilled out, much to the delight of the baby otters who scrambled over themselves to feed on the delicacy. One of nature's wonders, gentlemen: mother and children dining upon mother and children. And that's when I first learned about evil. It is built into the very nature of the universe. Every world spins in pain. If there is any kind of supreme being, I told myself, it is up to all of us to become his moral superior."

--Lord Vetinari, Unseen Academicals by Terry Pratchett

[royalarchivist]

Oscurucho: Welcome back, brother. Cucurucho: What. Oscurucho: Not even a "Good morning"? How cold.

Here's Cucurucho and Oscurucho's long lore conversation from yesterday! The entire conversation lasted about 8 minutes, but most of that time was just silence between each exchange, so I edited out the long pauses and got it down to ~3 minutes. I also fixed the audio levels and added subtitles since I personally find it difficult to understand Oscurucho sometimes :'D

I hope folks find this helpful!

[ Subtitle Transcript ↓ ]

-

Oscurucho: Welcome back, brother.

Cucurucho: What.

Oscurucho: Not even a "Good morning"? How cold.

[They enter Cucurucho's office]

Oscurucho: I wanted to see if you're still as rigid in your beliefs as ever. You see, I've been thinking about our... Let's call it "philosophical divergence." You stand for order, for predictability. But where's the fun in that? You see, brother, while you build, I ponder the beauty in tearing down. It's not just destruction - it's rebirth. A chance to remake things in a more... thrilling image.

[...]

Oscurucho: You once had a backbone for our cause. Now, I see a softness in you, a sentimental weakness for those Eggs. Mere experiments, and yet - they've softened you.

Cucurucho: Your vision obstructs the path to perfection. You fail to understand the potential of the Eggs.

Oscurucho: Potential? They're but catalysts for change - for revolution. Without them, stagnation reigns.

[...]

Oscurucho: You chase perfection, I embrace the beauty of flaws. Your world is one of order, mine thrives in chaos. You wish for everything to run smoothly, I dream of watching it all burn to the ground. We may share a name, but our souls are worlds apart. All your efforts, all for what? Mere acknowledgment from a Duck who told you to do it? Imagine the possibilities - rather, show me where it is, and I'll do the rest.

[...]

Oscurucho: Speaking of possibilities, I couldn't help but notice how easily others can access the island. It seems your security measures aren't as impenetrable as you think.

Cucurucho: No. My island's vulnerabilities are of your own making. Do not mistake restraint for ignorance.

Oscurucho: Pity. But then again, I never really needed your approval. Just consider: Cucurucho - in your quest for order, have you not sown the seeds of your own undoing? Do you genuinely trust all your Federation minions?

Cucurucho: ...

Oscurucho: Perhaps it's time you question not just my intentions, but those who you believe stand with you.

Cucurucho: That is none of your business, I shall say. Now, leave me alone and try to disturb someone else.

[stardust-vi]

Dumb ramble but I hate that you can't critique The Thing you love within a fandom space without some dude breathing down your neck like "Well actually that means you hate The Author and The Thing! And what about all the times The Author did this Good Thing? Checkmate, liberal." as if you can't be critical of something because you love it and want it to be better.

[familyofpaladins]

finally figured out why this shot always gave me weird vibes

WHAT'S UP WITH THE EYE SHAPE?????

Like.... why aren't they glow-y LEGO eyes? why are they like actual eye shape here?

The only other times i think we see this shape is with Macaque's shadow?

I mean, it could simply be that who ever animated this scene drew them that way and no one bothered to change it (looks a little more sinister maybe, and where this is Azure talking about how Monkey King fought against him, maybe that was the goal) Zhu Bajie's (sorry if that's spelled wrong) eyes also look like they maybe has this shape in the same scene.

maybe it's just an animation choice. maybe it's not (idk what it means tho)

[artificial-horizon]

Being visibly mixed race/racially ambiguous and visibly trans/GNC is being inherently confusing and unreadable to white cis people. Like, they can tell you're sure as hell not a white man or woman but they can't decipher you beyond that; they don't know how what to do with you because they can't put you in any category.

You are both masculine and feminine, but not enough of either to fulfil the white criteria for manhood or womanhood, and regardless, brown people are gendered differently to white people anyway. You could tick off almost all the criteria for "male" features (such as, and notably, body hair) and still be read as a cis woman, because the level of masculinity white people accept in brown (perceived) women is higher than what they accept in white (perceived) women, because brownness itself is masculine to them. (Though it can be feminine and androgynous at the same time, too. Again, POC are gendered differently than white people.)

They have these set ideas of how they're meant to relate to people, set ways that they treat, let's say, white women, Black men, East Asian women, Middle Eastern men - but they can't even tell what you are, so how are they meant to treat you? How are they meant to relate to you?

I don't doubt at all that this is why I've always been ignored in public, even before transitioning; never treated as a fellow person to connect with, but an anomaly that happens to occupy the same spaces. I scare them by defying categorization, so it's better not to engage and risk upsetting their preconceived notions of gender and race. Alternatively, they will just be bigots instead, though I can tell that's hard for them too as they aren't quite sure what specific flavour of bigotry to throw at me.

[cw for following paragraph: non-graphic description of an incident of racist and transphobic harassment]

I always think back to this one time, having recently come out, when I was harassed by a white man on the bus. Seeing me in all my gender ambiguity and reading me as Black, he expressed his disgust at us Black people, at how "you can never fucking tell whether they're girls or boys". Honestly, in all my interactions with white cis people from then on, I never stopped feeling the echoes of his words.