#because while they're undeniably evil and what they do is wrong

[y-rhywbeth2]

One can easily see why Durge would simply embrace their ordained role as a villain; there is literally nothing else they can be. If they resist then Bhaal just locks them up in their own mind and does it anyway, and even if they could, their soul is damned regardless.

Embrace the sin and start killing and have fun doing it, because it won't make a single bit of difference whether you do it willingly or otherwise! You will be condemned by people and the universe for what you are anyway!

Choices and names are for people; the Dark Urge is a weapon and they will do what weapons do.

[canmom]

Comics mini-Comints: Dungeon Meshi

reread dungeon meshi through to the end. still such a great manga. here are immediate thoughts - if I end up having time and energy I hope I can write something that goes deeper!

ironically i was only a few chapters from the end when I stopped keeping up, but I was struggling to remember all the characters and context, so reading it through in one go was definitely an ideal way to achieve maximum impact there.

ryoko kui does a very elegant job of handling a transition from 'silly antics' to 'big dramatic fantasy' while still keeping the central thematic throughline - eating and being eaten, belonging to an ecosystem, the significance of sacrificing others to achieve your own desires. a lot of setups pay off in a way that feels meticulously planned - and of course the crux of the final showdown revolves around characters attempting to eat each other, of course the big payoff is a huge feast that symbolically unites all the conflicting factions. it is maybe a bit too neat and happy for my taste, but it's undeniably tightly executed - it never loses sight of what it's about. especially compared to something like Frieren, it's an incredibly coherent serialisation, up there with e.g. Fullmetal Alchemist.

kui's art style deserves all kinds of praise - it feels effortlessly simple, but it clearly communicates all sorts of different shapes and body types and it's really fun to see her play around with remixing the different visual elements when she switches the races around. in general Laius's autistic monster loving ways clearly reflect kui's own deeply felt appreciation for all the ways people and animals live (accentuated further by all the extra sketches the scanlators tuck in). in a way you could kinda call it like Parts Unknown the fantasy manga.

the stakes of the final conflict are interesting - there is much to be said about the framing of 'desire' and its fulfilment, of this occult idea of 'the infinite'. lots you could put in relation to other manga, and also buddhism. (in particular I really want to develop a comparison to Made In Abyss, there are so many parallels, it just might be too spicy for tumblr lmao).

one thing I really like about it is how much its fantasy dungeon-exploring setting owes to D&D and other TTRPGs, rather than videogames. monster ecology has been a fascination of that game since the early days of Dragon magazine, and Kui sharply zeroes in on some of the intrinsic conflicts baked in to that fantasy milieu, notably the lifespan thing, while smartly avoiding the traps of 'evil races'. there's some really fun nods to the weirder monster manual entries. and in a story with so many characters and factions, it does a genuinely incredible job of furnishing everyone with understandable, reasonable motivations, conflicts drawn from their context just like the monsters are explained by their ecology.

and one thing that I particularly appreciate is like... how much it is able to simultaneously understand and sympathise with a character and also show us how and why they'd rub others the wrong way. it's impossible not to like our main group, they're all such charming dorks and the manga leads you along with all the crazy rpg party shit they do, but at the same time you definitely find yourself thinking 'guy's got a point' in the kabru chapters lmao. I'm projecting hard bc i don't really know a thing about ryōko kui but laius def feels like the sort of depiction of having an autism that you can only do if you've lived it.

but yeah, it's a fuzzy ending where it all turns out well. but what's the deeper thrust of it all? there's a funny moment where marcille is like 'maybe in the end our journey is about learning to accept death' and the grouchy old gnome guy completely laughs this off as naive, because death doesn't mean anything. and indeed their big plan pays off, and falin does indeed come back just fine. but still, through all of this it asks you to bite the bullet that being a living creature means eating to survive, at the cost of other creatures, with the other side being that one day you too will be eaten. in contrast to this honest way of being is the beguiling fantasy of infinity, where all your desires are immediately fulfilled - this is shown as a dangerous path of corruption that produces madness and manipulability. having limits and rubbing up against the wishes of others, or 'doing things you don't want to do' as izutsumi's arc puts it, becomes necessary for having some kind of definition as a subject. the thing that makes the demon concrete as an entity is a desire, or appetite, that can't immediately be fulfilled.

of course we can connect this to the idea of narrative conflict. a standard advice for putting together a plot is to ask what each character wants and why they can't get it. wanting something implies movement. and indeed over the course of this story, we see that while having too many desires fulfilled too readily leads to incoherence and callousness, equally a character who is left catatonic as their desires have been eaten by the demon must be reawakened to activity by finding a new desire.

it's kinda Buddhist innit. neither the opulence of the palace nor asceticism. desires are what tie you to the world. but mixed with ecology: what a creature does to find the energy to live is what defines its lifestyle, its form.

this is probably where I'd start talking about entropy gradients and shit if i wasn't typing this on a phone at 1:30am lmao.

but yeah - it's a powerful move to go from 'D&D monster recipe show sendup' to 'living with the inherently violent nature of being an organism fated to live in a finite sum game' and yet Dungeon Meshi makes it feel natural and convincing, while remaining tremendously charming and funny throughout. ryōko kui is definitely some kind of genius, and I can't wait to see what her next act is gonna be. it's all definitely making me appreciate the act of eating a lot more.

next story on my plate is probably The Flower That Bloomed Nowhere, which sounds like it will present a very gnarly thematic contrast.

[celaenaeiln]

Absolutely agree with your post. My friend once told me something like “it’s interesting to see how there are a lot of narratives within dick grayson’s stories that can be read as metaphors of rejection of someone’s autonomy—which is many times it happens towards/explored in female characters, e.g the robin mantle being ‘ripped away’ from him without his consent, his should have been ‘fate’ as talon, a tool for CoO” and when you add it with his canonical SA and the many times he gets objectified, another thing that media throughout the times write happened to/explored in female characters, it further cements the point of him occupying the (traditional) female character role.

OG post in reference

Thank you!!! Those are all excellent points to bring up!

You guys did a fantastic job of identifying core examples of where Dick is written for the female role. Every time I read him, I'm amazed time and time again how beautifully DC has written him. He's undeniably written as a man but he's unique in the way his characteristics overwhelmingly reflect typical female personality traits and his entire life story is written as if he were a woman. The relationships he has with people, he always subtly ends up in the female role.

Take the scene of him being objectified -

JLA/Titans Issue #3

This is exactly what it's like to be catcalled.

It's humiliating, uncomfortable, and scary. It needs to be addressed.

But here's where I oppose fandom's view on this. Fandom basically blames DC for scenarios like this where Dick is being harassed by other characters for his beauty or suggesting that Dick somehow encourages this behavior, but I think we should restructure our outlook.

Dick being objectified should be considered as one of his trauma's like his SA is. Like the way Jason death affected him, Stephanie's death affected her, or the way Tim's depression did him, Dick's constant sexual objectification should be analyzed as part of canon problem because it's relates to once again to how women feel in these exact situations. Note the way he is uncomfortable - the writers know what they're doing. They know it's wrong and if they're bringing up his reluctance time and time again, then this should be explored not as a fault of DC but as a problem he's forced to face.

DC uses Dick as a soundboard to broadcast the issues women face in a way that wouldn't be as problematic as if they did with other major female characters. Because doing such things to female characters is a little too political for a comic book and a corporate company so they take liberties through Dick instead. Some of the times they've written him seem intentional and other times it seems unintentional, but even with the way the later is written, it's because they're following Dick's standard characterization which was written to be the balance between men and women.

Another major, MAJOR point you bring up is autonomy.

Autonomy is the essence of his character.

Quick definition: autonomy is the right to self-govern. This means you're in control of your own actions, beliefs, and HERE IT IS - Freedom to do what you wish to.

From the moment Dick and Bruce started fighting, the problem with their relationship boiled down to one thing and one thing only. Freedom.

Given my other Bruce and Dick posts, I've mentioned how Bruce felt an increasing need for control over Dick while Dick felt increasingly furious at his freedom being taken away.

Even Azrael when he lost it for a moment. Batman!Dick

Batman (1940) Issue #709

Another point: For Bruce, all his enemies want him to break. They want him to turn evil but for Dick's, his enemies always want to him to follow them.

Yet the fact that Dick faces all this and continually fights this - he's girlbossing so hard.

That's why I like Dick so much. He breaks the gender roles. Because breaking gender roles isn't just painting your nails pink and saying you respect women. No. It means playing the traditional role of men and women both.

A man's typical role is strength, power, and competitiveness.

A woman's typical role is vulnerability, empathy, and intutition.

But Dick? Dick is one of the strongest fighters in all of DC, he's considered the best leader, and he's so brilliant he always wins his fights. But at the same time, he cries when he's heartbroken. He cares for children that aren't his own and citizens he doesn't know. He anticipates the emotions of his family and friends and loves them for who they are.

That's also a core difference between Bruce's treatment of the batfamily vs Dick's. Where Bruce rages at their disobedience and differences, Dick accepts them and encourages them. Another why Bruce is viewed as the father role of the family while Dick is viewed in the mother context. Evidence of this is pretty clear in Red Robin Issues #23 - 26 with the way Dick treats Tim vs the way Bruce treats him.

DC made Dick pretty on purpose and they wrote him like a woman on purpose while building him up as a man.

I'll iterate agin, he was built to fight male toxic masculinity and we should be looking at him through those lens. He's a complex, deep character that was meant to break gender roles by embodying both male and female characteristics and that's beauty of him.

[tanihanya]

[Full-Series Heavy Spoilers, The Stormlight Archive] One of the reasons I love the Stormlight Archive so much is the difference in perspectives-- there are so many pov shifts, and all of them don't just give insight to the world, but every single character. It helps me to remember how complicated everyone is. Even when not from that character's pov, the series is so sure to make sure to show that everyone's goals and ideals and personalities play into their decisions-- that though those decisions are wrong, they make sense. They don't make the character undeniably evil but evil characters still exist because of their actions I love to think about how, with the evil characters, we understand their motivations, while they're still undeniably evil for what they've done, and often their justifications are faux and gross anyway. I mean, take Sadeas and Amaram-- despite their justifications, power is the undeniable objective. There's the more crude justifications-- such as how Amaram wants power so badly due to fear of the end and nostalgia for the Knights Radiant--- While Sadeas has twisted intentions from the beginning-- But we understand those intentions, without making the character at all morally grey, and that's what's so important. It's like "Every Villain is the hero of their own story" but not completely, as it's undeniable that some of them know of their villainy-- Holyshit I don't even know if I have the space to attend to Taravangian's relation to all this--- He knows what he's doing is wrong, and that he's undeniably an evil person, but believes that it's worth it, as it's his responsibility to be condemned in return for keeping his domain intact, safe, and stable (which is part of his justifications for the end of RoW too) And then there's Moash, I find that he's the most universally hated for what he did to be soo interesting. Despite Sadeas, Amaram, and Taravangian all doing things that arguably costed far greater in both lives and our protagonists' cause, Moash has such a resounding hatred because his actions were worse. Let's be honest, Elhokar could have been killed by another Singer if Moash wasn't there,, But we hate him because he betrayed Kaladin, and killed Teft--- a double betrayal. Betrayal of a character is one of the worst crimes because it feels the most biting, the most twisted to us-- it hurts, to see our characters hurt so much because of it. So much that we excuse murder where we don't excuse, even predictable, betrayal The only other times that we see this awful betrayal is when Sadeas and Amaram betray Dalinar at their seperate points-- and even those were sort of predicted by the reader before hand, and were from characters we hadn't grown to love. Sure, Sadeas' betrayal affected Dalinar-- but it was anger rather than loss. This shows how the complexities of each character work so well in telling the series' story-- Characters can do so much worse than others (Dalinar as Usurper, Adolin committing cold-blooded murder, Shallan on an average tuesday) but are justified due to our love for them-- Because our views have been made to align with theirs. Holyshit I wanted to talk about so much more than this, but I'm rambling so much. jflgkjgflkfgd I didn't manage to even prove anything but this is getting too longg

[thegoodgayshit]

The magic mirror is the best item ever added to bg3, and you can't tell me I'm wrong.

Not only that, but playing a durge character while romancing Shadowheart just got so much better. And sooo much angstier.

SPOILERS for Dark Urge/Shadowheart Romance under the cut:

I just did a full 180 on the opposites-attract trope from Act I to Act III, and it's all cuz of that damn mirror. And I am living for it.

So I started the game with my Prince Charming-looking, do-gooder tiefling Paladin, Elaina. Her goal? To help save as many innocents as she can. Despite, you know, that odd memory loss and those weird urges for horrific violence (hmm wonder what that's about?)

And then there's her opposite, Shadowheart... who seems unconcerned with do-gooding because of her memory loss and devotion to a vile and very undeniably evil goddess.

Then around the same time in Act II they start to change. Because now they're both going through it and realizing that do gooding is important... but a lot harder than they originally thought. They both start to lean a little too hard into the darkness. After the Butler speaks to Elaina for the third time, her horns get tipped red. The makeup gets darker, and the blond hair slowly gets streaked dark.

And Shadowheart changes too. She gets fixated on her journey to become a Dark Justiciar. She takes no shit and listens to nobody when they tell her it mighttt be a bad idea. The relationship growing between the two of them slows to almost a halt.

Then there's the tipping point. They both get so close to breaking. Shadowheart doesn't kill Nightsong. Elaina doesn't kill Isobel, so instead she almost kills Shadowheart. It's an all-time low for both of them. It's then that we see the roles change.

Durge slowly starts to lose herself to the realization of what they are. Their makeup and jewelry get edgier, and they cover their Paladin tattoo for a beholder. Their blond hair fades entirely to dark brown with streaks of grey from the stress. One of their topaz eyes turns blood red.

And Shadowheart is doing the opposite. She's freeing herself from Shar and rediscovering her lost faith in Selune. She lightens her hair, and smiles more. She gives durge encouragement to beat their blood curse because she really has become optimistic enough that she believes Elaina can. It's exactly what that blond haired Prince Charming Durge would have done for her in Act I.

Because god damn it, they both have worked too hard to lose one another to darkness again. They just got out of that boat. Shadowheart knows better than anybody she needed that Paladin to free herself from Shar. So she's going to be there to help free Elaina from Bhaal. Cinematic poetry.

And to think, all of these awesome cinematic parallels for a romance came together because Larian put the magic mirror in the game. God, I love BG3.

[cdroloisms]

dr3's attempted serious of c!dream duo rankings based on lore importance (note: probably wrong, definitely argue)

c!Dream and c!Tommy: This is kinda undeniable. Like, in terms of their story, in terms of the Dream SMP, they are absolutely the heart and soul of the server. The c!Dream and c!Tommy show was such a thing that it has been like intentionally referenced and parodied within the story itself a million times. The story literally hinged on the idea of their opposing each other, c!Tommy-as-hero and c!Dream-as-villain, to the point where their whole you know finale and the closure for both characters involved realizing that they actually wanted the same thing and intentionally stepping out of the roles given them. Nothing really compares, sorry c!Discduo for the poll (but the heart wants what it wants XD)

c!Dream and c!Wilbur: I cannot believe they ended up ranking so low like I'm actually appalled. SLASH JAY but like . guys. Guys Please. c!Dream and c!Tommy's whole schtick forms the beating heart of this server because the story c!Wilbur wrote about them was its backbone. Like it's incredibly difficult to actually overstate how much c!Wilbur actually influences how c!Dream ends up--the paranoid spiral he ends up on is a direct influence of the increasing isolation he lived up until November 16th--this is why c!Quackity is so confident when he states c!Dream has no one left during dethronement and this is why c!Wilbur knows that c!Dream has no one in inconsolable differences. c!Dream doesn't exist in a vacuum and the whole, L'manburg narrative tyrant-villain-monster idea that originates from Wilbur ends up culminating in the identity that c!Dream ends up assuming to accomplish what he wants like hoooly shit he quotes "unfinished symphony" in Doomsday and he expects c!Wilbur to save him from the prison to the point of calling on him as his savior before basically Anyone and he lists c!Wilbur's name with c!Sam and c!Quackity post-prison like. Shit's fucked. Anyway.

c!Dream and c!Sam: Look I warned you guys I was going to be a little selfish. A Tad. Though, you know, it's kinda hard to compare in terms of like, you know, the fact that they literally spent a fuckin year together with almost no one else--sure there were visitors, sure Quackity happened, but like so much about them is very much isolated to. Them. (Also the ccs very clearly got a little carried away w/ these two and this reflects onto their like, Everything XD). With c!Sam and c!Dream it's less about well, straightforward comparisons and more about the Multitudes--c!Sam as the Plan, and c!Sam as part of the time and part of the server that c!Dream idealizes, and c!Sam as the cage for the monster the punishment for the evil the one that holds the villain away. And obviously while c!Dream doesn't um redefine his whole identity to base it on c!Sam the way that c!Sam does with c!Dream, the power of the trauma bond established over a year of Nothing Else does makes c!Dream noticeably more comfortable, almost, with c!Sam compared to like quite literally everyone else post-prison. Which is. Y'know.

c!Dteam (emphasis on c!Dnf): Admittedly, I'm not the biggest c!dnfer around by a long shot, so I don't really have as much to say here--but you know, considering c!Dteam very literally symbolize what c!Dream desires like. They're an extremely important part of who he is, what he wants, and why he does what he does. There's a reason why dethronement (and the cutting ties with c!Sapnap and c!George) is such a defining moment in terms of showing when he's fully burned bridges with the rest of the server, when he totally stands alone, etc. Obviously c!George is the originator of the "big happy family" line and well his mutual interests line up with c!Dream's quite a bit more than c!Sapnap's do, but as far as c!Dream is concerned both relationships are very much important to him and symbolic of happier times (and he's quite convinced that well. Both of them kinda want him dead, for reasonable reasons. So.)

c!Techno and c!Dream: This is where numbers get finicky, admittedly. As much as I love c!Rivals, and I love them a lot, I struggle a bit to put them on a definitive ranking. Because...well, on one hand, c!Techno is absolutely very high on c!Dream's priority list like as a character. I have said before and I'll say again that some of the most like outstanding displays of loyalty on the server come from c!Dream coming in c!Techno's defense at GREAT risk of personal harm--this guy literally stares down and denies both of his fucking torturers for c!Techno, like holy shit. c!Dream really fucking likes the guy like. So damn much. At the same time though, we're talking more...narrative importance versus importance to the character from a character's perspective--which is part of why c!Dteam is as high as they are, imo--while they're extremely important in terms of c!Dream's motivations and how he defines the whole "happy family" ideal around the idea of them living peacefully as a family, as far as actually looking at character interactions...especially post-dethronement they mostly just. Exist as figures that c!Dream yearns for but is also really fucking scared of. There's not as much consistent character interaction and frankly when we're talking about a character that's actively suppressing what he actually wants, they're not exactly high on his mental priority list either. All this being said, c!Techno definitely gets points by being one of the main vehicles by which we see c!Dream's like, humanity--being one of the few characters not to treat him as just a monster to be defeated and having similar ideals and therefore being an obvious comparison to make. Which is obviously important when we're talking about c!Dream, who was keeping himself rather in the dark.

c!Dream and c!Punz: Another real struggle to rank--I'd understand putting them up higher, but what really holds me back is well. c!Dream and c!Punz is the same as c!Dream and the Plan. And don't get me wrong, the Plan is extremely important to c!Dream as a character and like defines a lot of his actions especially post-revive book onwards, but what complicates this is like...well c!Punz as a character in terms of c!Dream? Like, he's just. He's just the Plan. That is his purpose, that's who he is supposed to be, and of course the Plan is important and of course c!Punz's like motivations here end up playing a big part in the tangled mess of what c!Dream ends up doing when we're talking what he starts ranting about in the third finale stream, but like. Well it's really not about c!Punz, innit, it's about what they're working together towards. c!Punz is secondary to the plan in a way that you really can't say the same for when you're talking about, say, c!Wilbur + the L'manburg narrative, or c!Sam and the prison. I can see an argument for them being higher just because like, if we're talking major c!Dream arcs, it's reasonable to have c!Dream and c!Tommy as being like a presence as the "main characters" in Wilbur's story starting the revolutionary war and ending at the genuine finale with c!Dream's main character development being split between the previously-named season finales--c!Wilbur being the main influence leading up to November 16th as c!Dream takes on the villain mantle, The Plan (and therefore c!Punz) driving him until Staged Finale, and the c!Sam and the Prison being the main force until the prison break...but well. There's just not enough of c!Punz and c!Dream actually acting together as a duo in terms of give and take in this dynamic to really make me put them higher--what's really important about c!Punz and c!Dream is just. The Plan and the Plan alone. Anyway, I'm decently flexible about this, but eeeeeeeh.

[greentrickster]

I've seen a number of people on my Beloathed and Darling thread go on tangents in the tags where the Villainess and Prince's parents are both bad actually because it turns out the whole system is corrupt/cultish/evil and the kids, by breaking free of it, are actually the good guys. And, I'm gonna be real... I always hide those reblogs. Because 1) I don't want to see them built on (and it's my thread, so I'm allowed) and, more importantly, 2) ...it completely misses the point of the concept.

Yes, the main purpose of Darling and Beloathed is 'aesthetic' and 'cute fun couple,' but, at a slightly deeper look, it's also a story about two people with extremely conflicting world views and moral codes deciding to not only be together, but figuring out how to be together in such a way that neither of them has to truly compromise their beliefs in order to do so. It's about two people, one who is undeniably a good person and the other who is unapologetically evil, deciding to make it work without anything like a redemption arc or the discovery that actually both sides are wrong and they need to find a new, third way to exist. Because if the system itself is evil, then it kind of undermines all the work they've put in to find the pre-existing places of overlap and figure out what parts of their lifestyles they're willing to compromise on to make their partner comfortable without making themselves unhappy.

And that, to me, is a far more interesting concept overall, because it's something we're much more likely to encounter in real life. None of us are ever going to tear down an entire government's worth of systems with the help of love and a couple spunky friends; it's fun to read about, it has its place in literature, but it's not gonna happen. In contrast, there's a very good chance that one day we'll meet a person whom we really like, really enjoy spending time with, but whose views on religion/politics/sports/character ships/whatever are completely at odds with our own, with neither of us willing to change our opinions, no matter how much we like that person in other regards.

And that's when we'll have to decide whether we're just going to stop hanging out, or whether, like the Prince and Villainess, we can find a way to make it work while respecting both ourselves and each other. Sometimes reality isn't about redemption, systemic change, or harsh, gritty truths. Sometimes it's about having the breathtaking courage to acknowledge that a person will never be like you, but being able to love them anyway.

[safetypinpals]

How Fionna and Cake explores PB and Marcy's characters while only having them in a 15 sec cameo

As much as I would have loved to see more of PB and Marcy in Fionna and Cake, I feel like it still does a really good job at exploring their individual characters as well as their relationship through how they're reflected in their alternate universes.

I really loved the star, and I think it does these fascinating character studies of pb and marcy and does it while they're one-off side characters in this episode. Its efficient, but still really impactful, and its all done through these alternate versions. I think it's something that can really only be done due to the extensive worldbuilding from AT, and the complex storytelling Fionna and Cake takes on through these alternate universes.

Part 1: Marceline and Bonnibel's characters:

In AT and Distant Lands Obsidian we've seen Bonnie and Marcy's flaws. Bonnie can be cold, paranoid, controlling, stubborn, prideful, obsessive and Machiavellian. We've seen her willing to hurt people for what she views as the greater good. She's a fairly utilitarian person. I think we see her darker side beginning in season 4, and its explored in season 5 and 6. Some examples off the top of my head include a) imprisoning flame princess as a baby b) her surveillance over like, everybody c) Throwing everybody in tree trunks' wedding in prison. These reasons are why a lot of people really dislike her, and see her as an authoritarian dictator, and I don't think they're totally wrong to feel that way. However, we see her grow in season 6, she realizes that some of the stuff she's doing is messed up, and she makes a clear effort to do better. in season 7 when she's usurped, she finished her redemption arc. Finn, Flame Princess, and Marceline, the people in her life play an important role in helping her become a better person. (S6 EP 22 "The cooler", S6 EP23 "The Pajama War", S7 E2 "Varmints"). One of the major things that also really softens her character is her clear love for her people. There's an undeniable motherliness to how she cares for her people and her kingdom that there's something really sweet about. Even though she doesn't always show it well, she does have a lot of love. Love for her people, love for her brother (S7E1 "Bonnie and Neddie"), love for Marceline, and love for her friends (Finn and Jake). She built her whole kingdom because she wanted to have people to be with!

Marcy is also a bit morally gray. Especially in the beginning of the series, she is shown to be unconcerned with people's feelings or the impact of her actions on others. in general, she's apathetic towards the feelings of other people, and primarily sees them as a source of entertainment. She manipulates and plays elaborate mind tricks on people for her own amusement. The song from her debut episode puts it best when she says "I'm a thousand years old and I just lost track of my moral code". She's not an evil person, but over time and through all the things she's lived through, she struggles to empathize with people. She's "burnt out on dealing with mortals".

when we first meet her in S1E2 "Evicted". She literally kicks Finn and Jake out of their house (that s technically hers) even though by the end of the episode it's clear she has other options and is really only doing it to fuck with them. She even tries to kill Jake (which only doesnt work bc Jake uses his powers, but how would she know that?). By her second appearance in S1E22 "Henchmen" it becomes clear that she isn't actually evil, she mostly likes playing mind games. Nonetheless, still fairly messed up. We also see her callousnes In S2E1 "It Came From The Nightosphere" When Hunter Aberdeer terrorizes Ooo, and goes about the land stealing souls and murdering people, Marceline is wholly unconcerned with the people her dad is murdering, and really only worried about getting her bass back (/focused on her own daddy issues). As the series goes along, and as she spends time with finn and jake she mellows out a bit, and gets better. She works through a lot of her issues during the Stakes mini-series (S8 E6-13). We also see her past, and a bit of how her childhood, often lacking consistent, healthy parental figures to model from, and how some of her issues came to be. In fact, I think a large part of why she’s so messed up to people at the beginning of the series is because since Simon’s the ice king, and all the humans are gone, she hasnt had a positive influence on her for a long while.  By the end of Stakes, we see a more grown up, empathetic Marcy. We see this new insight in the finale (S10 E13 "Come Along With Me") when she talks to PB, trying to get her to not go to war. Marcy really just needs people to ground her. Because her life has been so unstable, and so many people in her life have been lost, or have left her (her mom, her dad, simon, Bonnie), she takes to lashing out at people to scare them away in order to avoid rejection. All this is really made clear in Distant Lands: Obsidian.

Part 2: Vampire universe PB and Marcy

In Fionna and Cake E7 we see the versions of them without the things that made them better people. We see how their circumstances created their most toxic selves; for Marcy, that's not having Simon, and for PB it's being put in survival mode, and not having the love of her family.

Princess Bubblegum, instead of being a Princess, is the leader of a resistance against vampires in an apocalyptic world. She's very ruthless, cold, and militaristic. She's dead set on taking down the vampires no matter the cost. as she says "I'm gonna slay him (the Vampire King) or die trying". She only stops to pick up Simon, Fionna and Cake, because she figured that Cake's "murder skills" would be useful in taking down the vamps. In the scene where she refuses to stop to help strangers on the road calling for help really illustrates her mindset. In this, her and Fionna have the following exchange: F: "Quick! Pull over!" B: "No distractions" F: "But you stopped for us." B: "I stopped for your mutant cat. Big picture." When Martin dies, and Fionna apologizes since it was kinda her fault, Bonnie says this “You should be! It’s your fault I’m down one man, and more importantly, one tank. We see her do to the extreme what she's done in the past when she's trying to keep everything together: push all her feelings down, distance herself emotionally from others, and stick to her utilitarian ways. This isn't to say she's all bad. her end goals are nobel. She's trying to save humanity. 

Bubblegum also shows a lot of aggression and ruthfulness. 

She also seems to be very obsessed with Marcy in a very sworn enemies (gay) way. Liek she hates her but she’s also totally obsessed with her and stuck in this powerbattle with her. Marcy makes her crazy mad when she calls her a loser. This is VERY personal to her 

Marcy, without Simon or Finn and Jake’s influence- toss in the VK as a father figure, has totally lost touch with her humanity. Her carelessness towards the lives of others is dialed up to a 10 with her literally murdering henchmen for saying something she didn't like. She’s still playful, but in a much more twisted, evil, crazy way. Her favorite plaything being bonnibel. She seems equally obsessed with Bonnie, and even admires her a little bit. She gets mad when her henchmen talk bad about her and question her as to why she hasn’t killed her yet. She doesn’t seem to actually want to kill her that much because she likes her too much: VK scolds her for “toying her prey”, and tells her to “finish it off”.

Bonnie in kind , as much as she seems to hate Marceline, also seems to secretly like her too, at least in my opinion. Bonnie knows a lot about Marceline; she knows her first name.  Her adamant refusal of “I would never” is loaded with so much history.  When Marceline offers her “You know you could join me” Bonnie seems to briefly consider it, if only for a moment before saying “What’s the point? The population’s crashed and you're running out of food.” There’s something very romantic in that final declaration of “if you poof me, you’ll die too” “together then”. Their dying moments fighting in each other's arms to the death mirrored by Gary and Marshall-lee kissing.

[trouslinabone]

what do you think about undertale ships?

WARNING: THIS IS A LONG LIST OF VARIOUS SHIPS OF BOTH UNDERTALE AND DELTARUNE. SOME SHIPS ARE IMMORAL. (With pictures :D)

Depends on the ship.

When I first was learning about Undertale, I looked up a lot of Undertale Comic Dubs (I knew more about AUs than the actual game for a while), so I was prone to a lot of ship material, notably Frans, Sanscest, and Fontcest. As I matured, I lost interest in most ships, but there are some I think about from time to time.

-

I was into Frans for a minute, as there was so many cute comic dubs of it, but stopped caring about it as I eventually starting disliking Sans. I was still a kid at this point. Like 13 or so. While I like Sans as a character now, I still don't go after it as it's immoral and typically feels like a power complex.

(Made by WaiqiuVale)

-

I was into Charus for a while, and still am to a degree, but the moral ambiguity of it makes me not really look into it much anymore either. (Is Chara still a kid even if Chara has been dead for ages? Probably. Is Papyrus a kid as well due to his childish manners? Probably not.)

I mainly liked it due to this specific scenario where Papyrus successfully convinced Chara to abort genocide and thought them to be a better person. You can tell I liked this when "Chara is evil" was still the fanon consensus.

(Made by TallestDwarfGremlin)

-

I hate Papyton. No real reason, I just think it's a toxic ship and Papyrus deserves better. I also dislike Mettaton as a character. He's funny, but in comparison to everyone else, kinda flat. He's the most 2 dimensional character.

He's a star, he likes being a star and wants to be a bigger star but wasn't always a star. There's minor interesting things, but eh... As I believe Papyrus has an insane amount of depth, I'd want him to be with someone with a lot of depth as well.

(Made by GalacticJoelle)

-

Asriel x Chara (Chariel?) feels like step incest. It can be cute, but it's a tough pill to swallow.

(Made by Renrick)

-

Speaking of incest, Fontcest is a ship I dislike. I understand the appeal - Papyrus and Sans have really good chemistry, care for eachother, and are funny together... But that's because they're family.

Something that comes to mind about Fontcest tho, there's this one high-quality animation that is genuinely insanely good and emotional that's fontcest. AM I SUPPOSED TO DISLIKE IT OR LIKE IT???

(Made by xXMimykoXx)

-

Sanscest exists. It's incest on steroids for the most part. Everything wrong with incest on a practical level is doubled with Sanscest, and I have gotten into heated debates about this. Am I serious about it? Not really, but it's something fun to think about.

(Made by The-Cyan-Wolf)

-

Soriel is canon to me. In my AU, Deltarune: Insanity Calls, it's canon. It just makes too much sense. And Toriel appears about 40 (even if she's actually 900+ years or whatever), and Sans appears about in his mid 30s. It's a bit of a gap, but nothing to bad for me. I think it's cute.

Especially the Deltarune version of the ship.

(Made by daisiloou)

-

Papyrus x Frisk (Papyrisk?) is arguably canon. I always bring it up in arguments when people are against Frans. I've already discussed how I don't care for Frans, but it's another one of those things I'm not really serious about, but just find it interesting to talk about.

(Made by Mozer)

-

On the topic of Papyrus x Frisk, Alphys x Frisk is also arguably canon. Same thing as above, but I dislike it more than Papyrisk as there's no Papyrus, and I enjoy Alphdyne.

(Made by Gaster)

-

Speaking of Alphdyne, it ain't an OTP for me, but it's the only undeniably canon ship in Undertale and it's cute.

(Made by Caligmaera)

-

I hate Temmie x The Annoying Dog as it's immoral to ship real people and both of those are self inserts.

(Made by Arinna1)

-

[Character Here] x Self Insert/OC is something that I've done often since I'm an avid roleplayer. Notably I've done long term Sans x Self Insert and various Papyri x OC roleplays before. They're okay. Nothing to write home about.

(Made by @braindeadskeletons)

-

As a bonus, some random Deltarune ships:

Kris X Susie X Noelle (A Poly ship... Kruselle?) is my personal OTP for Deltarune. Susie x Noelle is cute, Kris x Susie is cute, Noelle x Kris is cute, the best way to get around this? They date eachother. I used to have bad trauma over polyamorous relationships due to my own bad experiences with them, so this is actually good progress for me :3

(Made by @pillowbug99) -

Spamvil is basically canon, and I like it as it's canon in the same AU of mine I mentioned before - Insanity Calls - but I like it more in terms of Jevil having a massive, obvious crush on Spamton and Spamton hating Jevil's guts. That dynamic of Spamvil is more interesting to me than Spamvil itself.

(Made by Mipexch)

-

Spamton x Alphys (A real ship, I swear. Also Spamhys?) is a cute ship. Not a lot of content about it, but it fits Alphys' personality I feel like (her dating an AI) and it feels like a good match. I'm a sucker for [Nervous Character] x [Smooth Talker], even if Spamton ain't as smooth as he used to be.

(Made by anon artists on 4Chan)

-

Spamton x Papyrus (Another real ship, I swear... Spamrus?) is funny. I toy with the idea a lot. It probably wouldn't work, but it's by far an insanely funny crack list. I only know this ship is a thing due to a ex-friend of mine who really liked it.

(Made by Eugenia_yesme)

So yeah, those are my thoughts on Undertale (and some Deltarune) ships!

Before anyone mentions it, yes I know I didn't give Suselle its own tier, but my opinion kinda falls under the Kruselle ship.

I barely scratched the surface. Some honorable ships are Kris x Berdly, Noelle x Berdly, Alphys x Asgore, Gaster x Asgore, Gaster x Grillby, Grillby X Sans, Burgerpants x Nice Cream Guy - you get the point.

Maybe if this gets any interest what-so-ever, I'll do a part 2 where I go over more ships and give my two cents about them.

Let me know if I miscredited any artists or if you know who did the Alphys x Spamton art.

[mermaidsirennikita]

ARC Review: The Hurricane Wars by Thea Guanzon

4/5. Releases 10/3/2023.

Vibes: enemies to lovers who actually do battle, secret princess-ness, masks (hot), and fantasy meets sci-fi

When Prince Alaric, son of the Night Emperor, discovers that orphan rebel Talasyn wields magic to counter his own, he knows there's more to her than what meets the eye. Combined, their abilities reach untold degrees of strength. The question is--now that they know this, what are they going to do about it?

Thea Guanzon has taken her original source material, infused it with a Filipino influence, and created a really interesting enemies to lovers romance that is heavy on politics and plotting. It was a step towards world-heaviness for me, but it never lost my attention and set up a compelling love story.

Quick Takes:

--Yes, this is a classic "dark prince/light girl" story, which I know some people are going to rag on, but it does that setup very well. And it's a classic for a reason, you know? Alaric and Talasyn are legitimately enemies, which is kind of hard to find in EtL right now. You begin this novel with them in the heat of battle, and I don't think they're going to overcome their issues easily, however much they may be attracted to each other. It feels like an actual challenge.

I'll add that, to me, Alaric's motivations for standing where he does make much more sense than those of many characters we could compare him to. Frankly, for me, as soon as you make someone the "Prince of the Apparently Evil Empire", you've already done a lot of the work there. We may want to see these corruption arcs, but the reality is that if you were raised on the "good side" (is the good side really good--a question in this novel, for sure) you have to like... either be dumb or naive enough to get seduced into the dark, or legitimately agree with the dark side's points on some level. Alaric doesn't really have a lot of choice here--there is family and responsibility and also simply culture to consider. I found all of that interesting, and I will say that he is undeniably the more compelling of our two leads, but like. That's not a shocker, all things considered.

Also, Alaric has like, never held the hand of a woman, and him getting very literally distracted by Sexy Girl was highly entertaining and pleasing to me and my brand.

--I really liked his mask. I have nothing to say about this except "mask is hot", mask made a big impression on me, I was a fan, 10/10 mask usage.

--You do start right in the midst of the action, but in terms of the romance it's a slow burn. Like, a slower burn than what I usually read; a "this will take a few books to cover" slow burn. However, I didn't feel frustrated by that, because it seemed natural. They could not simply jump into their desires and feelings here. The situation was too complicated, and they would have looked a bit silly if they had acted any earlier than they did.

--I've seen other reviews that call this too romance-heavy, calling out the world-building and magic system... Whereas I as a romance reader am like "this could have used a bit more romance". I would definitely call this a romance--but like I said, there's gotta be some stretch over (I believe) three books. She has to take her time. In the end, and I kind of feel like... I don't know, Thea, you don't need to explain the world much more for me. I'm good, I get it, I don't need the minutiae of magic. So while I'm not saying that fantasy-first readers are wrong in that sense, I do tend to wonder if this book is meant for fantasy-first readers. To me, it's reading as more romance-first, but I DO want to see the romance kick up a notch in the next book, and I'm reading this with the assumption that it will.

For the sake of comparison--as someone who enjoyed Fourth Wing, I would call this heavier on the worldbuilding than Fourth Wing, but still somewhat comparable in a tonal sense. The Big War Plot and the Magic and Shit is secondary to the Feelings. As they should be, in my opinion. Again, I really think that in the next installment, it should be HEAVIER on the feelings. I do worry somewhat that romance-first readers might have an equal but opposite complaint to the fantasy-first readers.

--In that sense, I do think this book is a little denser than it needed to be, and we could've used a little bit of quickening in the general pace. Like, I was engaged, I was interested, I was about it, I just think it could have mored a little faster. That said, I am someone who in general prefers a brisk pace, and I know that this is not necessarily the norm for fantasy-heavy books.

The Sex:

As I said, this is a slow burn. It's not closed door by any means (what happens is explicit and clear) but we're taking incremental steps towards a full................ commitment.

Interesting and romantic and adventurous, The Hurricane Wars is a step outside of the norm if you're not used to fantasy or fantasy romance, but I found it pretty easy to understand and fun to read. Would recommend!

Thanks to Harper Voyager and Netgalley for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

[caffeineandsociety]

Trans men are in an interesting place with the dynamics of sexism, and I hate how much infighting it causes for trying to create a singular hard and fast rule about whether Society sees becoming a man as an "upgrade" more than it sees being trans as a "downgrade" because there IS no singular rule about it.

Gender conformity is a big part of it. If you're Just Some Guy(TM), if you style yourself very masc and pass well, then of course in most external aspects - with people you pass with - you're going to start getting treated, well, like a man, with...most of the benefits that typically entails. The external ones, at least. In fact, sometimes even if someone finds out you're trans, that first impression will be enough to keep them taking you more seriously, or at least, once they find out, they may treat you less seriously than a cis man but more seriously than a cis woman.

But if you're GNC? Like me? That...has NOT been my experience. Far from it, in fact. I often find people take me much less seriously than they did when I was presenting as a cis woman. They'll compliment my technicolor hair or my nails, but unless they're also visibly queer, they'll look to someone else for an opinion on what might be wrong with their computer, or car, or whatever else - even if they KNOW I've been in tech and mechanics all my life - and I often spend MORE time waiting to be seen in the ER or urgent care, not less.

Speaking of wait times in the ER, here's something interesting: I have more luck getting people to take my disabilities seriously if I have someone presumed to be a cis woman to advocate for me, than if I have someone presumed to be a cis man doing the same job, unless that man is my actual biological father. Why? Well, my working hypothesis is that people see me with a man roughly my own age and just write us both off as a couple of melodramatic attention-seeking faggots; when they see me with a woman they start going-

-to figure out what her deal is and why she'd be hanging out with me and settle on thinking of her as a Mama Bear-type? It's something I'd have to do much more study on to be sure about!

There's also how it intersects with race - I have ethnically ambiguous facial features that read as much less white on a man than on a woman, and my skin tone is very sun sensitive, going from ghostly pale in the winter (which often gets me read as half white-half East Asian) to fairly dark tan in the summer if I go out a lot (which often gets me read as Mexican). You know the whole dual stereotype of trans men as pathetic baby transtrender babygirls looking for attention vs. evil roid raging groomers? Yeah, for SOME reason, I get looked at as the former more often in the winter and the latter more often in the summer.

Body type also plays into this. It's undeniable that men have a much larger window of body types than women that we can have before we're considered ugly, but...my weight fluctuates such that I go between midsized and Certifiably Fat depending on a lot of disability-related factors, almost like the myths about how weight works for most people. I get treated better as a man while my weight is at its healthy lowest than I did as a woman, but at its highest? ...people don't like GNC men when they're not skinny white guys. I speak from experience. Before I transitioned, I was treated as a Fat Woman no matter what - bullied, condescended to, every health problem blamed on my weight, the whole works. After, my lowest healthy weight often won't be considered fat at all, but if shit happens and I put on my Sickness Weight, I'm not a Fat Man in the way a lot of sitcom leads are allowed to be, I'm not even a Fat Man in the sense of that one fedora guy we unfairly ascribed predatory behavior to, I am seen as a Fat Man in a horrible transmisogynistic caricature kind of way. And we wonder why GNC transmascs have such a high rate of eating disorders, or blame it on ~female conditioning~?

What I'm saying is, once again, intersectionality! It's a whole industrial size barrel of worms! And we need more formal studies of gender dynamics that take transness and presentation into account! And stop trying to make singular hard and fast rules about How Trans Men Are Seen!

[spmcomic]

Bleck for the ask thing

First impression:

something about this guy instantly endeared him to me. i think it was the goofy introduction and the absurdity of him orchestrating a wedding between two beloved characters (with quirky offbeat music and everything) to summon an artifact of doom.

like normally there's a vague "the forces of darkness" in stories for the heroes to fight, evil for the sake of evil, but this guy kinda threw everything into the evil schtick and the game pleasantly surprised me by looking at the implications of destroying the world. like "if you destroy the world what's left to rule??" and this guy deadass goes "no no i'm not ruling the world i really am just destroying it"

Impression now:

this man has something deeply deeply wrong with him and probably always has, and i love to study him under a microscope at all hours

Favorite moment:

right at the beginning when he's goofing with mimi. she shapeshifts into him and o'chunks' instant reaction is to scold her out of respect for the count, but the count just brushes him off and says she's almost as dapper as the real thing. he's not egotistical or prideful in that way, he likes spending time with his minions on a personal level... he likes horsing around with his friends, even if he doesn't realize they are his friends. it really set him apart from antagonists like bowser or a disney villain.

Idea for a story:

i'm writing one! i want to see how he went from blumiere to count bleck. the whole way. full throttle.

Unpopular opinion:

hmm... i have a lot of opinions on how to interpret his behavior, but i wouldn't call any of them "unpopular opinions," just the way i chose to fit everything together. like i won't excuse any of his actions or say they're not evil. they totally are. maybe an unpopular one is- he's not an evil person, even though his actions are undeniably evil? he could, and should, do better, and that's why he's allowed to leave when he decides he's going to do better.

Favorite relationship:

i love his relationship with mimi. the way she takes his presence as a constant in her life and almost treats him like her favorite toy or "source of Affection And Things" while he has a much more warm acceptance of her as a person. the way she's willing to throw away the rest of the world just because she wants him around- that little "but... i don't want you to go?" when there's no possible way he could come with the gang at the end. i get the feeling he knows how she sees him on the surface level and he chooses to love that, and he might not realize how much she loves him under that surface level (mostly because he doesn't think anyone CAN genuinely love him, and also because even mimi doesn't know that).

Favorite headcanon:

that boy has horns!!!!!!!!

[ifyouknowmenahyoudontt]

guys, it wasn't really sirius' job to free kreacher? it would be on walburga and orion, the heads of their household- he owned literally nothing from the noble house of black at the time. his only possessions from any family members were what he got from his uncle alphard black! kreacher was not his servant specifically, it wouldn't have been on him OR regulus.

also, this is kind of just? arguing semantics? yes there were other evils in the wizarding world, that's undeniable! but the order was kind of in the middle of a war against an active threat, the death eaters, who were killing and torturing other people left and right.

this kinda goes back to the "they didn't help remus against discrimination for being a werewolf :/" argument from a week or so ago, to which i will say, go look up the picture of the order of the phoenix- the ORIGINAL one, with james and lily and sirius in it. that's a very small amount of people to try and dismantle entire systems of discrimination that existed for hundreds of years prior.

(mostly) everyone knows racism is bad! have we fixed it? uhh, no, unfortunately not. oh, what about sexism? awww man, no... homophobia, maybe? nahhh.... why? because these have existed for A LONG TIME. even if views are progressing and people are understanding such discrimination is wrong, it's not just going to go away.

and unfortunately, the same goes for house elves, which were kinda just common practice for wealthy wizards. and then with hermione's efforts with SPEW, people kinda got the idea that it's not the greatest- i think! haven't read the books in a while. but even then, if her message didn't really get across, that's more true to life. house elves have been A THING in the wizarding world for centuries, why would they listen to this random MUGGLEBORN girl saying it's wrong? if it was wrong, they wouldn't be allowed, silly goose!

none of this negates the fact that sirius left because he was the black sheep of his household. his parents aligned with voldemort's ideals, his brother was a death eater (notice how his parents weren't death eaters themselves), and it's not illogical that kreacher would adopt the ideologies and terminologies of his masters; it's not sirius' JOB to keep himself in that situation to try and convince kreacher nor regulus, "hey friend, maybe we SHOULDN'T advocate for killing off entire races of people just because we think they're below us! why? oh, because that's just sooo not nice..."

no child of an unsafe, unhealthy, abusive, or (insert other negative adjective) is obligated to stay in that situation to try and change any of the people who mistreat them. sirius black was a teenager, a minor, a child- no older than most of the new marauders fan base (11-17). it is not the job of the kid to try and make any significant changes to improve their family, it's the job of the parents to do better and create a better, safer, more loving household for their children. walburga and orion didn't do that, which is what contributed to regulus being a voldemort fanatic and kreacher repeating all their hateful rhetoric, which is what led sirius to leave. it's not his job to fix his family or save anyone but himself, as the mistreated child. something something, this is just very convoluted victim blaming from everyone who blames sirius for something.

(and again, it's not his job to "save" regulus, or to make him leave too. regulus (1961) was only a year or so younger than sirius (late 1959), very much capable of thinking for himself by time sirius left. very much capable of thinking for himself when he became a death eater. he would probably be offended at the notion that he didn't choose to follow voldemort, because he DID. he was a product of his environment, but had very many windows of opportunity to change his views and leave like sirius did. he didn't make that choice, own up to it. i'm sorry, but he just wasn't an abused baby boy forced to get the dark mark, and it's not sirius' fault he is the way he is.)

!!!!

[devotedmimic]

You know, Jimmy? While I can't say that you have never been responsible for helping out the town you also created or influenced the vast majority of major threats in the first place. The Yolkians only came to Retroville because of your signal. The same goes for Meldar Prime. The Nanobots, Shirley, and Evil Jimmy were all your creations. You caused the ice age. You created the sentient pants. You made the sick patch, you turned your teacher into a fifty-foot monstrosity, and you injured Santa Claus, almost ruining Christmas. The vast majority of this town's problems are caused, at least indirectly, by you. And you know what? In all honesty, that would be fine. You are very intelligent and you almost always do fix it, and in the end it's extremely unlikely that you won't end up benefiting the world a lot more than you will damage it. My children and my children's children are probably going to live in a world free of war and disease, and I'll have you to thank for that.

But fuck, dude. You can't keep using your intelligence as a way to escape your humanity. I didn't ask you to say salt because I thought a customer would seriously care or because I was insecure, I did it because it made you look weird and I was trying to get you to adopt behaviors and use language that makes you come across like a normal fucking person. Everyone knows what sodium chloride is, but calling it that outside the context of a chemistry class makes you seem like someone who defines themselves solely by their intelligence, which is undeniably who you are. I know you think that there's nothing wrong with being that person, dude, but there is. Taking your IQ and deciding that it elevates you above the rest of the planet is an awful decision that will lead to a life filled with misery and alienation. It will color every interaction you ever have and make it impossible to have real friends or relationships. I'm not saying that you won't have any. But they won't hold any meaning to you, and they certainly won't bring you any happiness. Sure, you'll probably manage a pity-fuck or two your sophomore year of college after giving some drunk sorority girl a jetpack ride, but it'll bring you nothing but emptiness. Maybe you'll eventually abandon women altogether and decide that "your true love is science", secretly seething inside whenever you see a guy like Nick or Bolbi getting married to someone he really cares about, who cares about him. You'll say I'm exaggerating, but dude, look at how you treat the people in your life now. Carl and Sheen, quirks aside, really do see you as a friend, and they'd go through some serious shit if it meant helping you out of a scrape. Can you say that you see them the same way, as anything other than the only two kids your age willing to put up with your ridiculous ego? What have you ever done for them? Inventing doesn't count, dude. Even when you build something for someone else, you're really doing that for YOU.

Every llama-bot or Ultra Lord simulator is only created with the expectation of further praise. They're not friends to you. They're worshippers. And your parents? Lord, the way you treat them. You think I've got folks that care about me the way your mom and dad do, working in a shithole like this? I wish. Everyday your dad watches you scarf down the dinner your mom slaved to make for you and prays that you might think about spending some fucking time with him instead of disappearing into your lab to do god knows what. They watch you toy with dimensional-warping science that they can't wrap their minds around on a daily basis and you laugh at them for worrying about you. Have you ever played catch with your dad, Jimmy? Ever asked him how his day at work was? You don't have a clue what l'd do for a dad like yours in my life, dude. What about your mom? Why not invent something that'll make her life easier instead of gallivanting around the Bermuda Triangle to play with fucking seaweed? We both know the reason. She would thank you for it, she'd be happy to imagine a version of you that thought for an instant about the needs of another person, but she wouldn't call you the greatest thing in the universe for it like your friends do. And in Neutron's world, whoever doesn't do that might as well not exist.

Ignore me if you want. Keep going the way you're going, and I'll see you in thirty years, lugging around sixteen Nobel prizes in your pockets as if they could substitute for a lifetime's worth of human love and interaction. You've always mocked Calamitus for his inability to finish what he started, but the man had a wife and a daughter that tolerated him enough to want to stay in his life through everything, and at the rate you're going I'd be amazed if you could manage the same with Goddard. The rest of Retroville, Jimmy, they'll never be able to do what you do. They'll never be able to invent rockets or solve cold fusion or add three numbers together. But they will find genuine friendship and love, and they will call it salt, and despite everything you accomplish you'll only be remembered as nothing more than the man who wouldn't. Who couldn't, perhaps. Get out, dude. You're fired. Big McThankies from McSpanky's.

ah yes the jimmy neutron salt vent copypaste from 4chin

[thankskenpenders]

Scourge the Speed Demon: A summary

Because this has all been crazy, here's a timeline of this whole situation with Penders licensing out Scourge. This has been a huge mess and the fandom has turned it into a big game of telephone, so for posterity I just wanna have one complete post about what happened.

Pre-announcement

August 18th, 2021: Penders announces that he intends to license out his Acorn Kingdom-based Archie Sonic characters. (Licensing them, not selling them. People keep saying he's selling them. He's not.) Specifically named are supporting characters like Prince Elias, Geoffrey St. John, and Queen Alicia, but most notably, Evil Sonic AKA Anti-Sonic AKA Scourge is on the list. This offer is aimed at fans and third parties, but also Sega and IDW, as Ken believes that them licensing his characters would be mutually beneficial. Fans mostly continue to be bewildered and outraged by the fact that Ken owns a character who originated as Sonic but with a leather jacket and sunglasses, although some who still like the guy instead optimistically respond with "Yay, the Archie characters are coming back!" (They're not.)

(I'm not going to get into the nitty gritty of the copyright situation because I Am Not A Lawyer and we'd be here all day, but yes, Penders does own Scourge. He just can't say he's Sonic the Hedgehog anymore. No, it isn't fair, but he does. Archie losing the contracts made everything more complicated. This was all settled in court years ago.)

August 23rd: During a BumbleKast Q&A, Ian Flynn is asked about the licensing offer and the prospect of Sega striking a deal with Ken to use those characters in the IDW comics. Listen to the linked podcast clip if you want Ian's full explanation, but a partial summary:

Ian states up front very clearly that he's just a freelancer and that he doesn't represent Sega or IDW. But in his opinion, they probably wouldn't think it was worth the trouble to license old supporting characters from a third party, especially when Sega currently doesn't want the comics to reference SatAM at all. Characters like Elias and Alicia would need to be radically altered to separate them from Sally, and at that point they might as well just make new characters. Keep that last comment in mind, as it'll become relevant very soon... (Ian does, however, add that he loves writing Elias, and reminds listeners that getting to work on the original Archie Sonic universe was a dream come true for him. He just doesn't think Sega would go for it.)

But, again, Ian says that this is just his personal guess, and that if a deal was made he would happily admit he was wrong

Later that night: Outraged by an inaccurate secondhand account of Ian's podcast answer, Ken releases an outline of his proposed licensing deal in an attempt to explain why Ian's reasoning is, in his words, "absolute bullshit." He argues that he "really is easy to deal with," and that Ian simply doesn't want to work with non-game characters, which is absolutely not what he said at all. When confronted about what Ian actually said, Ken tells people to Google it because he "doesn't spend his time searching this stuff out."

Said licensing deal is widely derided by Sonic fans, mostly because of the relatively steep asking price of $10,000 up front against royalties for a two year license, but also in part because he pads out the list of characters on the table with uber-obscure extras like Lt. Smiley and Dynamac-3000. Fans generally do not agree with Ken's assertion that "IDW and Sega would only benefit from the inclusion of his material."

August 26th: Following the initial solicits of IDW's Sonic: Imposter Syndrome miniseries from August 20th, we get the proper unveiling of Surge the Tenrec, a new evil green and black doppelganger of Sonic who's immediately compared to Scourge by fans for obvious reasons. While the influence is undeniable, writer Ian Flynn had wanted to include Surge and her companion Kit the Fennec in the IDW series since day one to form a villainous glitch character trio with Dr. Starline, with Surge being a tribute to the ever-popular "Ashura" glitch. Surge and Kit are immediately greeted with a massive wave of hype and fanart

August 30th: Nobody seems to bite with the $10k bulk licensing deal, but Ken says that several parties are interested in licensing individual characters or groups of characters from him for a lower amount

[Edit 11/21: This post originally contained a section detailing a rumor about an alleged Scourge licensing deal that I had been privately contacted about in October, and how said deal later supposedly fell apart. This information has since been proven to be an elaborate lie. The Scourge comic that we're about to talk about is the only one ever licensed by Penders. I apologize sincerely for adding to the confusion here. [Edit 11/26: If you want more info on the fake deal, here's a separate post.]]

Post-announcement

November 15th: "Scourge the Speed Demon" is announced

RUSH! Comics in association with @KenPenders is proud to announce production on a 4-issue mini-series, Scourge The Speed Demon! 🔥The Official Revival Of The King🔥 #ScourgeComic #Scourge Follow Scourge & his Hellfire Gang as they conquer The Wasteland.

Yes. He has a cigar now. I wonder whether or not he's still supposed to be 17 here

The Patreon-funded Scourge the Speed Demon (which, yes, was going to be a commercial product, not a free fancomic) is immediately hit with a massive wave of criticism via hundreds of replies and quote tweets. Fans are upset that Penders is not only licensing out the evil AU version of Sonic, but his Scourge persona in particular, which Ken had no involvement with. The makeover and name change were conceived by editor Mike Pellerito and artist Patrick Spaziante, and he was developed into a fan favorite character in stories by Ian Flynn and Tracy Yardley. (Contrary to popular belief, no, Ian is not solely responsible for Scourge's creation.) Plus, fans continue to blame Penders for Scourge's removal from the comics, although this is an oversimplification of what happened there. Ken did want Archie to license the characters back from him - they just didn't. But fans still blame him regardless. And, of course, many question the entire premise of giving Scourge his own series that has nothing to do with Sonic

Fans also look into the creative team behind Scourge the Speed Demon (which does not include Penders, who was merely giving them the license), and a number of red flags come up. For one, folks find out about a skeevy sexual harassment scene in Rush!, the team's previous comic for which their company is named, where the hero strips a pair of female villains nude in public because he thinks they're hot. More concerningly, it's discovered that the lead artist on the project is following a number of extreme right wing accounts like Breitbart, PragerU, Steven Crowder, the Trumps, and more, and she had liked some pretty heinous posts from them. (In particular, an Islamophobic tweet from alt right conspiracy theorist Paul Joseph Watson is singled out, but there are some general MAGA tweets as well.) "The artist is a white supremacist" quickly becomes pretty much the only thing people are talking about regarding the comic aside from "fuck Penders." When Ken is asked about it, he says this:

November 16th: The Scourge the Speed Demon team releases the following statement in an attempt to clarify several points of controversy:

This statement does not help

November 17th: In the middle of all this, IDW's Sonic: Imposter Syndrome #1 comes out. The fandom continues to love Surge and Kit. A common refrain among fans is that nobody needs to license Scourge from Ken now that Surge exists. I wish the only Sonic thing I had to talk about this week was how cool Surge and Kit are

November 17th - 18th: At some point, people notice that the replies listing who was working on the comic under the announcement tweet have been deleted. Some assume that this is an attempt to hide their affiliation with the controversial artist, but I would guess it was due to how much hate the project was getting in general

The lead artist would also eventually unfollow the far right accounts that had gotten her called out. Maybe she really had changed and had just forgotten to unfollow those accounts since she's so inactive on Twitter. Maybe not. (A later comment from the writer described the exclusively far right political accounts the artist was following as "mainstream political commentators," and he also added "I'm Aussie I don't know nor give a fuck about American politics." This does not inspire confidence.) The artist has yet to say anything about any of this, and she probably never will because of what happened next

November 19th: After three days of radio silence, the Scourge the Speed Demon Twitter vanishes, the Patreon (which had accrued $29 in pledges) is taken down, and all mentions of the series are scrubbed from the Rush! Comics website. The writer releases this statement explaining that the project has been canceled a mere four days after its announcement due to the backlash:

I'll state clearly that I absolutely do not support targeted harassment (which is one reason why I'm not naming or linking members of the creative team on this post), especially as an artist who's been on the receiving end of it myself, and I tried very hard to set aside my opinions on Penders and just wish the Scourge team the best from the start. But it's unclear how much of this "abuse" was genuine harassment, and how much was people criticizing the core concept of a non-Sonic Scourge comic, the sexual harassment scene in Rush!, and the political views of the lead artist. It should also not be surprising to anyone that a new Sonic-adjacent project with Ken's name attached was received poorly by Sonic fans. Even if he was never going to have any creative input, I genuinely do not know what they thought would happen when they uttered the phrase "in association with Ken Penders" in the year of our lord 2021

But let's look at it another way: maybe the team dodged a bullet! The getting yelled at by the entire Sonic fandom part, not so much, but the project being canceled means they can't possibly get in trouble with Sega for copyright infringement. I have no idea what would've happened (again - not a lawyer), but while Ken does own Scourge, he's explicitly forbidden from making his new stuff look too much like Sonic to avoid brand confusion, which is why The Lara-Su Chronicles looks like that. But that Scourge design still looks A LOT like Sonic. The updates just make him look like Movie Sonic. Who knows how Sega would have responded had this thing actually made it to market

At the time of posting this over a full day after the cancelation, Penders has yet to make any sort of comment. He's just continued his Sisyphean task of arguing with people on Twitter about how he can claim ownership of Scourge

It's unclear what will happen next, but as Penders has apparently been in contact with multiple potential licensees, I wouldn't be surprised if we saw another announcement involving a Penders-owned Archie Sonic character before long. You know, provided the interested parties haven't been scared off after all this. I just pray that there's no news for at least a couple weeks so I can have a fucking break

[the-ghost-king]

So I'm not going to start like an Anti-Chiron tag because I don't find that enjoyable personally, but every so often people ask why I dislike him so here's essentially a "masterpost" of my thoughts on that situation for when anyone asks, just so I have it to explain some...

This isn't nearly a full list, and there's many more "incidents" that make me less than fond of Chiron, I don't hate the old man but he leaves a bad taste in my mouth and I'm not a fan of that. He's a very twisted character.

- The Lightning Thief

This quote is literally just after Percy's mom "dies", they're all sitting on the porch of the Big House right after he's finally woken up after days of sleeping, and that's the line Chiron pulls out on him.

That's straight up emotional manipulation which was entirely unnecessary in the context of what Chiron was trying to explain. There wasn't a single reason for that, in the slightest.

Immediately following that, and Percy, who canonically has anger issues, does his best to remain calm, he is immediately threatened by Dionysus, and Chiron doesn't even tell Dionysus off for doing that; Chiron just let's it happen. It's Grover who has to speak up to tell Dionysus off...

The only reason Chiron comes out looking like a old guy in this scene is because Dionysus was so much worse in his behavior, at one point intimidating Percy with his power over madness.

- The Titan's Curse

This is the aftermath of when Nico ran away upon confirmation of Bianca's death. When Percy is telling Chiron about the situation, Chiron wishes Nico had been eaten alive rather than recruited into an army.

He'd rather a child be dead than fight against him, and he openly tells this to other children he's in charge of. If Percy went missing would he have said "I hope he was eaten <3" as well?

I don't blame Perry for not delivering the truth here, it was done in an effort to protect Nico; which wasn't something Annabeth had planned on doing... I don't blame Annabeth for that though either, she's been beneath Chiron so long that she probably doesn't realize the shady stuff he does, and to her "going to tell" probably was the "right" move because she was a child...

But the fact that Chiron believes Nico truly would be better off eaten than alive :/

- Tower of Nero

This quote from Tower of Nero shows that Chiron lied to a bunch of young children (most of them were young because the older campers are largely dead because of the war or too old for camp now). It wasn't just a little white lie that adults sometimes tell kids either; they were walking into battle and he told them it was a field trip.

Did he even begin to explain the danger he was putting these kids in? Did the children understand their situation? And how dangerous it was?

Kayla has been blindsided over the years into thinking that telling children they're going on a field trip instead of fighting a battle is something to make a joke of and not be questioned... (Again, I don't blame her she's only like 12 in the book, but still)

Apollo also agrees, which isn't on Chiron but it's a whole mother reason why I can't stand Rick's interpretation of Apollo...

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This isn't me being like "oh Chiron is the worst most evil character ever" I just think that he has numerous flaws which are largely ignored in favor of the "perfect wise teacher" narrative when in fact Chiron and Dumbledore share a lot of.. Offputting qualities.

I do think that some of the situation is simply a result of Chiron having his hands tied behind his back by the gods some. And he even goes so far as to confirm this in a scene of TLT

However many of the scenes in which he exhibits behaviors like that in my first three screenshots are not related to anything the gods require and are, in fact, of Chiron's own free will.

Some things I would blame Zeus and the council for, such as how he withholds information from Percy to an excessive amount for long periods of time even when Percy straight up asks about things. I could easily see that being Zeus trying to prevent Percy from claiming the prophecy as his own, and I could see reasoning that maybe Chiron had sworn over the River Styx or something similar.

But those things don't apply to Chiron making such an unnecessary comment about Percy's mother so close to her "death". It doesn't explain why he would say he hoped Nico had been eaten out loud, and it doesn't cover the fact that he led children into a battlefield without telling them that's what was happening.

I think the context of Chiron's choices and comments would be different if the campers were older. If they were in their late teens or early twenties for the most part, I wouldn't really have much to say about how Chiron handled the situation.

But this man is in charge of children and extremely young teenagers, Percy is only 12 in TLT, maybe if he would have been 16 or 17 then I could give Chiron a pass, but he wasn't. Within the context of the comment he made in the Titan's Curse, Percy is only 14 and Nico is 10 at the beginning of the book... You don't wish a 10 year old had been eaten alive by a monster no matter how bad you think the alternative is, and if you do wish that you don't say it out loud to a group of other children. In the battle from Tower of Nero we get a quick look at the battlefield, and although Ben's age, and the age of another girl fighting alongside him are never confirmed they are implied to be fairly young, and we know Kayla is only 12 at the time too; yet Chiron told them it was a field trip instead of a battle, limiting the time they would have to mentally prepare themselves for what was coming.

On top of that, the nods the reader gets to the fact that Chiron can't act out against the gods depletes over the course of the series. After TLT the amount of times the situation involves the gods interfering with what Chiron is allowed to say lessens, and by the time the Heroes of Olympus series comes around, these limitations on his speech is almost entirely gone. Yet as seen in Tower of Nero he still does morally questionable things in regards to how he treats the campers.

Like I said, I recognize that in many scenes Chiron's hands are tied behind his back because of the gods.. But there are undeniably things he does of his own free will that are, in the nicest manner, very :/

This also isn't a full list of comparisons just a few notable scenes. I don't think Chiron is equally as bad as Dumbledore, but I think it undeniable that Chiron has some significant flaws built into his character design.

A good character has flaws, and there's nothing wrong with having a character that doesn't always conduct themselves properly or have good intentions- it's actually good writing, and I can appreciate that, but for some reason I find myself personally rubbed the wrong way by Chiron. This doesn't make Chiron badly written, or poorly designed, in fact I would say Rick's Chiron is very well designed in lots of ways, but I just don't like how it's never acknowledged by anyone in the series.

Like I said, I'm not starting an anti-Chiron situation, I just think little events like those mentioned, the way he's built a child army, and how he doesn't even try to plead with the gods over raising the ages on campers being allowed to battle is a little sus. But it more so bothers me that there's no attention payed to this problem anywhere in the books, not even by a side character or Luke, nowhere.

I don't actually care that much and this isn't that important to me, but sometimes people ask why I don't like Chiron and this is basically just my explanation to hand off to them... It's not even so much that I dislike Chiron entirely, he's well written and has his "good" moments, I just don't like the way other characters interact with him and his actions.

It's more a personal beef with him rather than an aspect of poor writing or him "being bad"... PJO in general (and HoO/ToA to a much lesser extent) shows that there's not such an inherent good vs bad in the world, and that sometimes people are victims of circumstances in some situations, or they're horribly misguided in their actions, but the series does a good job of showing those people as human still, and I applaud that.

I don't really know how to tie this up in its entirety, but there's nothing wrong with having a morally grey character who does questionable things and in many aspects it is good writing. I think Chiron is a result of Rick not thinking through the implications what he's doing in lots of situations, and I can see a fairly consistent drop in Chiron's characterization from PJO-ToA which is consistent with most other aspects of Rick's work.

I also want to clarify that if you like Chiron and disagree with me, that's absolutely 110% okay, I just personally dislike Chiron and that's on me. Like my problem with many of Rick's other immortal characters, I think he missed important aspects of them in some manner and slightly (or entirely in some cases) mischaracterized them in comparison to their original myths.. Some of these characters he came around on and fixed their character in many aspects to their more "correct" characterization (like Hera), while others (like Chiron and Apollo) he never quite figured them out. Which is a running complaint I have with Rick so I'm just adding this to his tab.

But yeah, I don't hate Chiron I just dislike him and those are different things, and I don't think it's a bad thing to have a morally questionable character, Chiron just personally rubs me the wrong way and I just wanted to explain that more fully because I've been asked about it multiple times.

Also I apologize for not adding a [read more] to this, it's a complaint of mine often when scrolling through the tags but I'm on mobile currently and don't have immediate access to a computer so~