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captnjacksparrow · 3 years

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We’ve seen Naruto go into fits and rages over Sasuke. But I wanna live in a world where we see Sasuke completely go ape-shit because something happened to Naruto. What do you think that would look like? We’ve only ever really seen Sasuke calmly rage (except under the bridge) but do you think he’d go wild if Naruto died?

Aaahhh!!!! This Cruel Anon😮😮😮😮 I told you I'm horrible at headcanon. Why sending me such a brain-twisting but an exciting ask😭😭!!! Added to it, you didn’t provide me the info about the arc or the person who is going to kill Naruto , Anon, that makes this ask even more difficult. So, I’m just going to assume it in the context of Shippuden alone.

Anyways, Let me try.

Since we have never seen Naruto undergoing any near death experience before Sasuke's eyes and Sasuke usually never lets his emotions get ahead of his logical thinking, It's super hard to predict how he will react to Naruto's death. But it's not impossible. It’s just that I have to draw parallels from his other battles to get the vague idea of how he would react.

There are only 2 possibilities where Naruto can die before Sasuke.

Killed by someone else.

Killed by Sasuke himself.

Both of the situations are very improbable. Because Sasuke always hesitates at the last moment when it comes to killing Naruto like he did many times and with the way he protected Naruto so far, I don't think he would let someone lay a finger on him. And that’s why this is very difficult to predict.

KILLED BY SOMEONE ELSE

Before that, how did Sasuke feel about Naruto throughout the Shippuden series,?

Even though he acts out like he wanted to kill Naruto, For Sasuke, Naruto is the strongest bond which could be cut down only when he dies. It’s more powerful.

With that being said,

In SNS dynamics, Sasuke is the extremely protective one. To be honest, The word extreme is just an understatement!! Or may I say he is very obsessive about protecting Naruto?? Or should I say his protective instinct is very similar to Kushina and quicker than Minato?

Or should I say even if the entire world is about to get obliterated, Sasuke would just grab Naruto and run away?

Either way, it's just abnormal to extend this level of Protective tendency to a person who is not related by blood. Period. And that’s why the probability of this scenario happening is very less. However, there are some moments where Sasuke reacted in a peculiar way and from which we can infer the magnitude of his reaction.

Well, there are not many people he loves in this series except for Itachi and Naruto. Before looking at how he will react for the death, let’s see how he will react when someone trash talk the people he love.

This is when Sasuke is asking to Danzo, “Is it true that Uchiha Itachi eliminated my clan by the orders of the Elders?” Sasuke didn’t like Danzo uttering the name of Itachi, not one bit. Because, that bastard, Danzo, uttering his beloved brother’s name is almost like trash talking him.

There is a rage which is welling up inside Sasuke on seeing Danzo and it got only more intense as the battle deepens. A well justified reaction!!!

I don’t really have to talk about this, Do I?

I wouldn’t call it as rage. But Sasuke is just angry. When you keep chapter 698 in mind, Sasuke knew about Naruto a long time ago and he always liked his presence back then. When Sakura started to trash talk about Naruto, Sasuke just couldn’t keep up a straight face.

But the beauty of this scene is, he only knew Naruto from a Distance. They haven’t been acquainted yet. And still, Sasuke could pull up such an extreme reaction for Naruto.

That extremity for Naruto speaks volumes.

Here, Kabuto is trying to act as his Big Brother (knowing full well that his real brother is standing next to him) and claims that he will help him in destroying Konoha. Kabuto is indirectly comparing himself to Itachi and says that he understands Sasuke better than anyone.

Sasuke didn’t react anything for this remark surprisingly and he was carefully listening.

However, when it comes to Naruto,

I always find this funny but still, Sai was comparing himself with Naruto and saying, “I’ll be able to get along better with you compared to Naruto”. And, the thought of someone taking Naruto’s place just made Sasuke to put him in a Genjutsu.

Sasuke might have broke up with Naruto for the past 3 years. That doesn’t mean someone can take his place. And his reactions are more extreme than what he gives off for Itachi.

Lesson to learn : Don’t trash talk about Naruto in front of Sasuke unless you want to face some harsh reactions.

So, if just Badmouthing can draw such a severe emotion out of Sasuke, then if he heard that someone had killed Naruto, I could totally see Sasuke would take it very personal and get revenge for sure. The reason is that after the massacre, Sasuke always felt relieved whenever he saw Naruto. Which means he was the source of happiness and also the person who never made him feel alone. Or Should I say Naruto at some point has become ‘His Person’ in his world. If you take away that person, Sasuke could never be sane.

Added to that, he wouldn’t let anyone else to take revenge for Naruto’s sake either. I mean, there are many people who cares about Naruto, say, Kakashi, All Konoha 9 members, Gaara and many more. If any of these people tries to avenge for Naruto, Sasuke wouldn’t let them.

Or may I say Sasuke would even go to the extent of warning them, ‘Do not Interfere or else I’ll Kill you all too’???

Something like this. “My Revenge for Naruto is mine alone”. Sasuke would definitely say something along these lines.

Why do I say this?

Because Naruto and Sasuke are polar opposites in terms of their Emotions.

When Naruto asks his friends, “I can’t let any of you face Sasuke, I’m the only one who can fight him”.

If you think in the opposite way, Sasuke could definitely say something like this “I wont let any of you avenge for Naruto. I’m the only one who can do it”. Or he may say, “People like you who couldn’t even protect one of your Comrades have no right to take part in this revenge”

According to them, Sasuke left the village and hurt Naruto before. Probably they won’t like Sasuke acting all high and mighty for Naruto now. Even if they interfere, he would totally do this,

Like killing anyone who comes in his way without a second thought like he did under the bridge. Since he had no connection with them anyways, he won’t hesitate a bit.

Now, he removed whoever is interfering in his way. Now what happens when he reach the enemy?

I don’t think this part would be anything nice or rational .... like I wrote for Naruto’s post. If Sasuke was killed, Naruto would still keep his rationality in his mind and kill only the person who was responsible. And also he could differentiate between the way he would kill Danzo and Raikage.

However, it’s different in Sasuke’s case because of this panel.

Yes, Sasuke would slaughter the enemy and their precious people. And with Naruto not around to change his opinion about how to approach things in a constructive way, I don’t see Sasuke would just go and kill the only person responsible for his death.

Plus, when his Hatred on Itachi for about 8 years could be able to change into Love in a matter of hours, and that Love made him deranged to the point of not recognizing his comrades, Imagine the magnitude of Sasuke’s rage for Naruto whom he never Hated but always loved him in his own stubborn way.

And if you think I am slandering Sasuke by making him into a monster who would slaughter people, you are mistaken.

This was what Sasuke wanted to do after knowing the truth of Itachi. If not for Naruto who acted as a shield, under the Bridge and his time with Edo Tensei’ed Itachi who once again died stating himself as a proud Konoha shinobi, Sasuke would’ve gone through with his plan.

Even in Borutoverse, Sasuke’s ruthlessness still prevails. Meaning, he will not deal with people like how Naruto deals with tenderness.

If not for Naruto, Sasuke would have definitely obliterated this Shin Clones with his Amaterasu. And that’s why Sasuke is saying, “You’re too soft, as usual”.

And that’s why I concluded, Sasuke would do the same or even more than what he planned for Itachi’s revenge.

With that being said.

This could be his ‘I’m going to kill you, Bitch’ face all the time throughout the battle. LOL.

This is how he might start off his slaughter, by crushing someone with Susanoo with pure rage.

Although the real slaughter will more or less looks like either of this way,

An Uzumaki way

I could totally imagine Sasuke can crush many people with his Susanoo hands, like this. And Nagato was a warm boy who had a very good temper and yet his rage could cause this much destruction. What if it was Sasuke, I wonder!!!

An Uchiha way

Obito slaughtering Mist Village ninjas for making Rin into a Jinchurikki. This is another version of a slaughter which is my preferred one because Obito just transformed from Naruto to Kage Summit version of Sasuke in a matter of minutes & I also have another reason to prefer this which I will explain later. And since Sasuke always reacts extremely for Naruto, this version of pure rage is very possible.

So, if you ask me Would Sasuke go Ape Shit if Naruto dies?

Of course, Yes. At least after Itachi’s death, Sasuke was sane until he got caught up in the Kage summit conference and from there he fought endlessly to the point of not able to recognize friends from foes. However, Sasuke recognized Naruto and stopped his rampage.

If Naruto was gone too, then I don’t think there is anyone in the Narutoverse that can stop him from going deranged. He would overuse his eyes and body until he cannot move anymore.

But What will happen after getting his revenge????

As we all know, Madara and Obito also lost their fair share of precious people in their lives. They gave into Hatred, went to near death experience and lived persistently long enough to implement their Mugen Tsukuyomi Plan. They wanted to change this world. However, I believe this is where Sasuke differs from the rest of the two. I will explain about this later.

KILLED BY SASUKE

Another improbable situation and yet very interesting to explore.

I always wonder why Sasuke wants to kill Naruto but always protects him from other danger. And then, the Gold mine of SNS, the Land of the Waves always comes to pat my head and reminds me that Sasuke always valued Naruto’s life more than himself and that too unconditionally. When you value someone’s life more than yourself, you can never keep quiet when they are in danger. Your body automatically moves on its own to protect them. This kind of ridiculously extreme sense of protective instinct is mostly seen with Blood Relations.

If this instinct is shown towards a non-blood related person, then that person becomes ‘your person’ in your own world. And if this person needs to be cut down, you get this sense that ‘Only I should Kill that person rather than some piece of trash’. And when I realize this I just wondered how would Sasuke react after he killed Naruto.

This is one of the worst moments for Sasuke in his life after the massacre and his most emotional moment and in his mind lot of chaos is swirling inside, one of them being, having killed his own brother whom he once loved, got betrayed and when he realized his love again, he was no more.

And when it comes to Naruto, Sasuke would do the same, except that he never hated Naruto.

There were certain moments where Sasuke subtly showed his vulnerabilities when Naruto looked hurt.

There are multiple things we can infer from this picture. But to me I always see this scene as a display of Wanting to be close for one last time and conveying an Unbroken connection. Because these are the things Sasuke always wanted with Naruto.

Wanting to be close means, Sasuke always wanted to be walking next to Naruto but he never allowed himself to feel those things because he thought it was a weakness. Now, atleast for this one moment, Sasuke wanted to be honest with himself by listening to his heart and body, rather than his mind and he was feeling certain pain with a warmth.

Unbroken connection, here Rain falls on Sasuke, passes through his face and falls upon Naruto which creates a Connection even though he is keeping a certain distance. Sasuke may be crying here too. Anyways, Something from Sasuke is touching Naruto, which means that the bond hasn’t been broken yet or should I say Sasuke couldn’t?

And then this moment where Sasuke looks totally panicked.

Sasuke really wanted to kill him and he did his very best in the VoTE2 battle except for that moment where he turned off his Sharingan. However, on seeing Naruto’s arm got blown off, Sasuke didn’t even care about his own arm which went missing... His thoughts are about Naruto. So, Sasuke’s mind wanted to do something, he did it. But his heart couldn’t handle the consequences.

Considering all the above reactions, I think if Sasuke managed to kill Naruto, I think he would react more or less, like this.

This is the best possible reaction I can infer from Naruto series. This scene has everything like tears, warmth, sadness, wanting to be close with the dear one for the final time. And Sasuke would definitely react in a similar way. And that’s why Obito’s massacre was my preferred reaction.

Like I said earlier in the VoTE stare 1 section, Sasuke always wanted to be close with Naruto. Even if his mind says something, his heart and body always betrays him in these moments. Atleast after Naruto’s death, Sasuke wouldn’t mind embracing him with a hug with his warm tears flowing down endlessly.

Oh by the way,

If Sasuke, a grown man can hold Naruto in his lap..... There’s no doubt that if he manage to kill Naruto in the context of Shippuden, when no one is around, Sasuke could totally hug Naruto just like how Naruto hugged him in the Land of the Waves. And I can bet with my life that Sasuke would cry more for Naruto than Obito had cried for Rin.

So Far, I believe Sasuke would go for Revenge and eventually go insane if Naruto was killed by someone else. And if he kills Naruto by his own hands, Sasuke would cry immeasurably holding Naruto in his arms.

But, What happens after all this chaos? What will Sasuke do after Naruto’s death?

Remember I told you Sasuke was different from Obito and Madara.

It’s because of this. Unlike Madara and Obito who always wanted to do something for the Shinobi world from their childhood (though it ended up horribly), Sasuke never had such a grand dream for this world.

Sasuke has proved time and time again from part 1 to chapter 698 is that, he has self-destructive tendencies.

This was how Sasuke felt after killing Itachi and especially before knowing the truth. He made killing Itachi as his life goal and he achieved it. But he was not at all happy. He clearly looks like a person who doesn’t know what he was going to do!!!

Sasuke cannot be able to smile even after killing the person he hated the most. Because deep down he really loved Itachi. How could Sasuke remain calm if he kill the person he never hated and on top of it, he really loved him more than himself??

Am attaching this panel here to show that Naruto was the source of happiness for Sasuke when he was left all alone by himself. Deep down Sasuke always wanted a feeling of a family. And he got that whenever he saw Naruto or whenever he was around Naruto in his Genin Days. That’s why you could see Sasuke behaves like a normal child around Naruto, like making funny faces, calling name, teasing, smiling. I know extremist Sasuke fans won’t agree this because I am making Naruto as a Sunshine boy here. Am not. Naruto has his own shortcomings but that’s not the point of this post.

However, even though Sasuke considered it as weakness, that doesn’t stop him from making a strong bond with Naruto.

Why?

“A Person can’t defeat loneliness”.

Even Sasuke couldn’t. And that’s why he formed his strongest bond with Naruto even though his mind told him not to. And when the only person who made him happy when he was all alone was killed by someone, Sasuke would never stop his rampage. Because if not for Naruto, nobody could’ve stopped Sasuke under the Bridge.

And I could totally imagine Sasuke would put himself in Naruto’s suffering and say something like this, “If this hurts me this much, How much pain Naruto would have felt?”. This is a kind of self-destructive behaviour and that gives him even more rage.

He would go deranged and kill everyone in his path until he loses his eyesight & chakra and eventually let himself get killed.

And with the way, Sasuke panics every time when something happened or going to happened to Naruto, makes me think that if Sasuke managed to kill Naruto with his own hands after listening to his mind, his heart cannot be able to tolerate the consequences. As a result, Sasuke would weep immeasurably and put an end to himself.

And This dynamics has been strongly enforced by Kishimoto in Boruto Movie also.

Like in this scene, When shit goes out of hands, We have seen Gaara, Sakura, Ino were all seen helping villagers for their safety. Whereas Sasuke went straight to Naruto to help him out by standing next to him.

So, to conclude my headcanon,

In the context of Shippuden,

If someone killed Naruto,

Sasuke may have painfully broken up with Naruto at the end of VoTE1. But he never stopped considering Naruto as his closest friend.

So, No matter which arc it is or whoever the enemy is, Sasuke would set aside his own goals for Naruto and resort to take revenge personally. He would never allow anyone to take that away from him.

That revenge would always end up in a slaughter. There’s no way I could see Sasuke doing it in a rational way. And his rage would be more intense than what he showed for Itachi. Like instead of slowly progressing towards Darkness, Sasuke could go all out right off the bat.

The more he strides into this murderous dark path, the more he loses himself in terms of sanity, eyesight, energy and eventually he would die thinking about Naruto just like he did in the Land of the Waves arc.

However, if he kills Naruto with his own hands,

Sasuke could not deal with the consequence of Naruto’s loss and weep endlessly holding Naruto’s dead body in his arms.

As a result, he would put an end to himself and die next to Naruto.

In either of these cases, Unlike Madara and Obito, I cannot see Sasuke living long enough to move on and concoct plans to bring world peace and such.

Because,

There is no yin without yang and no yang without yin. If one goes down, the other follows. That’s how this pair was destined to be. And most importantly, Sasuke always wanted to be standing next to Naruto, no matter what, be it in life or death.

#sasunaru #narusasu #sasunarusasu #sns #ask #what if naruto died first?#naruto analysis #naruto #sasuke #how would sasuke react?

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generallypo · 4 years

Photo

in all sincerity, kim dokja makes me happy and he deserves to be so too :^(

incoherent yelling and sobbing under the cut. these fEELINGS will not be contained aaauuunnghhh.

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anyway i binge-read all 500+ chapters of ORV this week and i honest to god feel bad for this -- completely! fictional! aghhhh -- guy. in case you haven’t figured it out, the following is some spoilerly shit

i went in expecting a fun, brainless power trip fantasy for dudes with an isekai addiction. instead, it turns out ORV is actually a gigantic, self-deprecating prank on the entire genre itself. kdj plays more into the sad -- if high-functioning-- clown trope than the sexy, edgy, chuuni bastard type i was prepared to laugh at. there were -- gasp! -- female characters with personalities! parents (aka ADULTS who act like ADULTS) who actually survive and feature prominently! adorable children! a real sexy, edgy bastard! a power trio with amazing fashion! sexual tension and bickering! friendship! life and death bonding!

*breathes in deeply* fouND FAMILYYYYYYY.

like, yeah, the plot around the first few arcs seems a little aimless, but the buildup is worth. the world-building is pretty decent. there’s discernible effort put into the fight scenes, and i can appreciate that. but -- but! what i stayed for were the characters -- namely, the fantastic OT3 of KDJ, HSY, and YJH -- who come together despite their initial rivalries and end up saving each other’s asses, like, every other day. granted, the other characters don’t get as much focus, and they do fall into certain character tropes..

but a trope done well is nothing i would gripe about. every significant character in ORV has a coherent, and more importantly, respectful take on their respective trope. maybe it’s because sing-shong is actually a married couple, but all the interactions between even minor characters are a convincing blend of awkward rambling, suggestive humor, sharp remarks, and casual banter. in other words, this cast of mostly working adults (plus a teen and two kids) talks like working adults. the relationships built throughout the story are, frankly, some of most realistic of its genre. sing-shong has managed to craft a dynamic that undoubtedly brims with fluffy fondness all around, but also drips with sarcastic tension, with unspoken urgency, with a wariness that softens into sincerity over the course of many, many chapters. it’s the kind of progression that makes even stock characters read like more than just the 2-bit villain or comrade or love interest. here, we have relationships both straightforward and not, strained or otherwise, romantically-oriented as well as decidedly the opposite -- and then numerous others scattered along the spectrum with the freedom to shift either way.

it’s also an interesting point of note that our MC kdj actually does not end up with a stated romantic partner, much less a conventional heteroromantic harem. he gets teased about that fact from time to time, but it’s with less of the sleazy shonen locker room humor one would expect and more of the good-natured ribbing you’d find among friends or that one especially nosy auntie at the yearly family reunion. kdj is a grown ass man. in the background, i applaud his maturity, and he handles all the prodding like a champ.

so instead of finding and fulfilling his horny, he builds himself a wealth of loving family. yeah, there are beautiful men and women around him. yeah, they unequivocally adore him. but they’re also adults, and they have priorities, too -- which are not so much finding a way to bang kdj’s brains out and more so simply keeping the damn guy alive. this is truly not ‘oblivious mc with his thirsty, sex kitten harem’. it just so happens that a guy proves himself to be unflinchingly gentle and capable in an apocalyptic setting despite his broken self-esteem, and lots of people find that attractive, romantically and platonically.

it.. kinda makes sense? he’s a hard worker, thoughtful, and good with kids. kdj is the kind of guy you know would make a reliable partner, and anybody with eyes can plainly see and appreciate that.

and it’s not that our MC’s a total brick wall. in fact, it’s likely the opposite, and he’s just too darned repressed to admit it. from what has been implied, kdj does indeed recognize and accept love, or at least a primitive concept of it. i like to imagine that the kind of love that he ends up seeking out simply manifests itself more easily as acceptance and safety, as warmth and a home of people to return to every day. even better, the people who surround him know this, and they give him exactly that. it’s refreshing, and honestly, really sweet.

(as a side note, i really, really do appreciate the cosmic bi energy radiating off of kdj, who canonically earns the title of being loved by all and is all but in name married to yjh and hsy. he also respects women and small children and honestly anyone who isn’t total scum to him or his family. i respect that.)

but the happy stuff aside, you know it it just ain’t ORV without the generous screaming dollop of angst. admittedly, there’s self-sacrifice, injury, lonesome wandering, more sacrifice, some epic fighting, reunion and confrontation. all of it is a lot to digest, sure, but never does it feel entirely hopeless, or truly, truly heart-clenching. ORV, up until the final act, is a mostly light read. you relax in your chair, thinking that nothing beyond this point can disturb you.

yeah fucking right.

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and then the beginning of the end arrives. when the squad finally break through to their ‘ending’, the scene that kind of breaks me is the reveal of the Most Ancient Dream. it ties so much thematically into the little tidbits that we get of kdj’s past, and it though it feels like almost a joke that the source of the goddamn apocalypse is a kid with bruises smeared across his skinny ass body -- it’s such a pathetic picture that it’s kinda poetic, actually. you’re left mystified but somewhat convinced, like a math problem explained halfway through. this.. child.. is a villain somehow, isn’t he?

and then 999th turn uriel speaks up, and she. just. hugs him.

[[You are this universe’s most powerless existence, aren’t you.]]

that. that gets me. kdj’s reaction immediately upon this revelation? absolute murder. seeing him essentially self-destruct upon realizing that all these people he’s surrounded himself with -- some who continuously proclaim their loyalty and affection for him throughout their journey, some who suffered eons of war and loss and trauma because of his existence -- not only forgive his younger self but smother him with unconditional acceptance and love is stifling, is too vulnerable and exposed and he simply can’t cope -- it’s so telling of his true mentality, of his crippling insecurity and crumpled sense of self-worth. kim dokja is a liar, through and through, so much that he fails, or perhaps refuses, to comprehend the veracity of others’ kindness and love towards himself.

by some miracle, the events at the end of the world somehow resolve.. or so it seems. there is a departing train, a liberated team of ex-gods, and a child rousing from his slumber. in the aftermath, i am left shaking. somehow, despite the ending having been (happily?) reached, there’s still another chapter ahead. what is this witchcraft?

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and then ah, yes -- the epilogue arc. i teetered on the edge of being critical for a little bit there -- is that display of deus ex machina, of sad, self-sacrificing nobility a bit too egregious to be acceptable? is this some wild last let-me-yank-this-outta-my-ass plot twist to drag out the chapter count? i sincerely thought that the arc before it would have been the finale. i was wrong. thank god.

anyways, as an answer to the above: no, and no. i stake my firm claim on the belief that the epilogue arc was meticulously planned out well in advance of its release, confusing and time-warpy as it is. i liked it. tremendously. even if it entirely invalidates all of kdj’s supposed development (”haha lol yeah sure i won’t sacrifice myself or anything anymore guys don’t worry about me” -- KDJ, at some point because he’s a lying rat bastard). actually, our beloved MC disappears for a large chunk of this arc, and i think it’s great. in his absence, the other characters not only go absolutely fucking nuts, but they have to figure out this new problem on their own, even if the lure of peaceful complacency in the newly saved Korea might convince them otherwise.

and then the whole time paradox thing comes around. yjh goes to space, hsy saves the only life she can, and kdj grows up. the crew waits, holding onto their hope even if it bleeds them dry. sing-shong does a damn good job of illustrating their fraying calm, their lurking madness, the unseen but pervasive depression that seeps in from kdj’s absence. the kids lose their father, lhs and jhw lose their reliable leader figure, ysa loses a best friend and confidant, lsk -- as distant as she pretends to be from her son -- loses her only child. and then there’s hsy and yjh , who are essentially bereft of the other half of their existences. their pain is palpable, is grounded in the hopeless, gnawing frustration of an utterly meaningless victory. emotionally, ORV hits all the right -- if agonizing -- beats.

however, a story can’t sustain itself just through its pathos. i’m happy to say that ORV doesn’t drop the ball after the first milestone, and after all the hurt, the characters do leap straight back into action. even better, the plot holes actually do get patches, and the poetic cycle of writer, protagonist, and reader comes full circle by making use of all those supposedly throwaway characters from the myriad world lines.

at the end of the road, there is a distinct sense of unity, of a delicate but undeniable cohesion to the world lines and their origins. sing-shong lets us guess a little here at the finish, but there’s just enough information to feel hopeful. maybe there never had been a definite start -- or finish -- to the story of kdj company, and... that’s okay. everybody ends up where they were meant to be, where they fought and struggled to reach. it’s.. almost like a happily ever after, if we’re allowed to dream of that.

------

now, i realize, this was all an orchestrated maneuver.

i’ll take it.

to me, all of this work sounds like someone put some serious thought into this behemoth of a plot. it cements the entire original premise of the story. it suggests -- but never explicitly confirms! -- the possibility that breaking free of the cycle is possible through the exact same system that sustains it. it’s terribly interesting -- and inspirational! with all the dramatic revelations and life-threatening scenarios and the cast’s resigned acceptance of them that essentially make up ORV’s entire mood, there’s still that last hint of rebellious and righteous anger that lights up the whole damn nebula. it’s like the kdj company blasting away at the heavens just to yell into the nether: we’re not looking for the happy end, but the free one. stay alive.

it’s subtle, and yet it’s such an emotional gut punch. i came away with the most ruinous, frustrating, bittersweet sense of longing in ages. i pined. for these fictional darlings. god, i am weak.

so. yeah. ORV is pretty good. flawed, but ambitious and impressively thought out. i’m stoked that the webtoon is making pretty good progress, even if it’ll take an eternity and a half to meet that monstrous chapter count. i’m still gonna follow it. hell yeah.

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(by the way the idea that secretive plotter and co are literally gonna take care of and raise baby kdj and spoil him and be the best friggin family a kid could ever want does things to me. protect him. he’s suffered too much. let at least one worldline’s version of him know happiness. and actually, aLL OF THEM DESERVE DOMESTIC BLISS TOGETHER IN A BIG OL MANSION WITH SUN AND FRESH AIR AND TENDER FAMILY MOMENTS UGH)

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and there you have it, folks. you made it to the end. in the far, far distance, i’m cheering you on and crying my eyes out in gratitude. thanks for tuning in!

#omniscient reader #orv #omniscient reader's viewpoint #kim dokja #fanart #kdj happiness rights!#protect him!#let! him! have his big house! with everyone! he loves!#please!#long ass emotional screeching #look i can't do him justice with drawing but hell can i yell out my love for him :'^DD

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eldritch-elrics · 3 years

Text

svsss: binghe callout party + the system’s punishment

so much happened in these chapters oh my god. i can’t believe i’m on chap 74 of 81

tldr: sqq needs to stop procrastinating on his sexuality crisis, also yay for cqms protecting its own but oh no for binghe discovering the truth about his parents, also COOL system penalty. oh and fake internet drama my beloved

zzl my poor, poor boy. i hate that he killed gongyi xiao but :((( he’s trying so hard to be nice to sqq!!! sqq’s making it so hard for him!

it’s also really interesting how fixated on repaying debts/revenges he is. i know it’s demon culture being different from human culture but i am going hmm… neurodivergence momence….

tlj, completely unprompted, once again: huh, so sqq likes threesomes does he? very interesting…

sqq saying he trusts binghe <3

seems like sqq believes binghe will change. i also believe in him! though seeing what lbh’s been like, we’ll see how fast that change happens lol.

sqq also says later that most of the tension between him and lbh has been a misunderstanding, which… yeah that’s fair enough. but sqq is very much at fault for a lot of that misunderstanding! because he is (or used to be, at least) shit at communication! at least he’s been taking responsibility

always astounded by how much effort liu qingge goes through to rescue sqq, whether that’s just his body or his actual person. sqq is really just drowning in men who want to do things for him

sqh confessing everything and babbling at lqg <3 and oh my god he fought mobei-jun?

binghe: only two rooms thanks :3 i don’t have money for more :3

liu qingge: i’ll fucking kill you

i really do want to see the scene of lbh and lqg trying to share a room. i was hoping maybe they would do some enemies-to-friends bro bonding but it seems like it’s too early for that… grudges like that can’t be fixed in one night...

we’re almost at chapter 70 and sqq still thinks he’s straight.

funny that the system says it needs to save resources? that feels like a bad excuse. there’s never been a problem like that before… and doesn’t it make sense for the system to just have infinite resources? i’m very interested in this statement. maybe it’s just bluffing to make itself seem less powerful than it is / delay sqq’s gratification

the fact that it’s not giving him any new coolness points is probably a good thing, since he spends all of them a couple chapters later. maybe sqq will gain back all those he lost in a rush at the end of the month

SQQ IS SO EMOTIONAL ABOUT GETTING HIS FAN BACK I LOVE HIM

binghe serving him breakfast waaaa

as far as i recall, binghe’s the only one who’s been able to make the system give sqq prompts with multiple-choice answers. protagonist power! one more piece of evidence for the idea that lbh’s subconscious is what influences the system most

lqg kicking doors down is so normal that sqq doesn’t react

poor zzl for the dozenth time: gets used as a seat cushion :(

this entire next part is just Hurting Binghe Hours

this scene felt super mdzs. it’s like… stirring up a giant crowd against someone, with the intention of ruining their reputation? reminiscent of jinlan city too of course but that theme of reputation is so central to mdzs that it made me think. also the whole thing about lbh being a bastard/otherwise outside the cultivation world norm... hmm.....

“tianlang-jun is not my father. i don’t need a father.”

fucks me up…

lqg and yqy: *knocks ten angry cultivators away from sqq* oops my hand slipped

lbh ran away… bingqiu separated once more :(

ohhhhh my god the system penalty. i had totally forgot about the whole “sending him back to his original world” thing but i’m so glad it got brought up again. all the peak lords must be worried sick haha... hopefully he’ll wake up in his bed in qing jing peak or something later and it’ll all be ok

meeting og!lbh… god i got chills. that part was so good

i can’t help but notice he lost his right arm and left leg….. just like edward elric……

that’s such a good system punishment tbh like.. it’s not sending him back to HIS original world, but it’s sort of like sending him to sqq’s original world, for just a few minutes…

yay meng mo saved him!

not surprised at how bad shen jiu’s situation was. i will have to read more about it later!!

i’m so close to the end holy shit. i expect we’ll get some more bingqiu development soon but it’s so funny that sqq hasn’t even realized he’s not straight, let alone that he likes lbh! i guess this novel is really their getting-together story more than anything (we’ve got the extras for established relationship stuff) but i feel like there’s still so much left to resolve!

speaking of extras… there’s an extra chapter plopped right in the middle here? thanks mxtx lol

ok my take is: reading fake internet drama is so FUCKING funny

i do not know anything about chinese webnovel internet culture but this scene still rings so true to me… people on web forums just be like that huh

airplane is so excited about all the arguing sjkdhsjd

the fact that peerless cucumber is labeled an expert.

peerless cucumber up in here with his fantastic takes like “the monsters are so much more interesting than the endless wives” and “the only good bit is binghe’s arc”

the person who comments “cucumber bro wrote so many words just to hate on it, must be true love”

the person who comments “hey guys wanna read my bingqiu slash”

the handful of comments that are like “the romance between binghe and the women is terrible but the relationships he has with the male characters are emotional and moving” just go to solidify my “airplane is gay and knows jack shit about women” theory

again, araki jojo vibes

what a way to die, airplane

and he was thinking of sqq too! just like sqq was thinking about him when he died :) it’s fate!

#svsss #svsss spoilers #finn reads scum villain #my post

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girltigerclaw · 3 years

Note

27 and 1 ?

Thanks for the ask! Nice name, btw

27. Least shippable character?

-I'd have to say Crowfeather. Not even in a salty way, I just genuinely think he'd function better without a relationship. Which I think is okay!

-Ships with him can be cute. Like Crow x Squirrel. But to me personally, it feels almost out of character when he has a relationship that doesn't later blow up in his face....

-Crowfeather doesn't let go of his past, he holds grudges and he lets that hold him back from something new.

-When he starts a relationship, it feels like a coping mechanism of: "I lost someone and now need someone new to fill that hole" instead of working through those feelings first, and it ultimately ends up hurting himself and the cats around him.

-This is what I find interesting about him, really. Characters who are completely good and everything goes perfectly right are boring. He wasn't a good dad, but he brings an interesting personality and perspective.

1. What OTPS in your fandom do you just not get?

Tigerheart x Dovewing

-This has to be one of my saltiest opinions, but I literally just cannot imagine ever liking Tigerheart. Especially not enough to ship him with anyone. And of course, not my beloved Dovewing😔💔

-He is straight up just an exact COPY of Brambleclaw:

-Both are Tiger clones

-Both had the "I'm not Tigeystar!1!!1🥺🥺" problem

-Both had "WAHhH!! Women is Indepndent and dOesnT wiKe me!!!😭😭🥺💔" arc

-Both became leader/deputy at the end of their arcs despite, arguably, not deserving the positions at all.

-I'll say it!! I'll say it!! I don't care that he's a good dad in the new arc!! I dont!! Knowing warrior cats, he's probably been regressed into a default background character and is a lifeless puppet who shows up and says things for the plot and disappears again. I've seen it happen many, many times.

-You can't fool ME erins!! He is a stinky little bastard man!! A nasty little clown!! I remember!!

#wake up and immediately rant abouts cats #hit that like button subscribe and send more asks so i can poison your dash with bad opinions🥺🥺#tigerheart my be-HATED #long post #ask #erins asks #asks

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cheshiresense · 5 years

Note

Ok so Im going to take this chance and go wild: GiottoxMukuro + Bad Vongola AU

UM. So, I sort of just sat on this last one cuz what even lmao. I checked AO3 and omg this ship exists??? but there’s like just two fics under it. But alright, here’s my stab at this very random pairing, it doesn’t even quite get all the way to a pairing, but I gave them both page time and at least you gave me something new to try XD Sorry it’s so late.

ALSO YAY I FINISHED ALL TEN

1. Ok so! First thing’s first - how do I stick these two into the same time period? Either full AU or time travel/reincarnation fuckery. Let’s go with reincarnation. Sort of. Where Neo Primo is literally Neo Primo ;)

Tsuna is dead. They’re in the future arc, he’s being forced to take the boss trial, and Hibari suffocates him just a little too long. So Tsuna dies at the feet of his ancestors, and Giotto is forced to witness the death of a fourteen-year-old boy who had never asked for any of this bloodshed but had also never backed down from it, never folded, even under the pressure of so many Vongola bosses. And Giotto is angry. He has spent centuries watching his beloved Vongola become mired in blood and sin, built on an empire of corpses and suffering. He is so sick of it, of not being able to do anything about it, but his latest descendant is dead, and his body is empty of a soul, and in that moment, more than anything else, all Giotto wants is a chance to act, to be something other than helpless, to fix even just a little of what his bloodline has broken.

Will and Flames and desperation are powerful things when combined.

Next thing Giotto knows, he’s opening his eyes to a cold-looking training room, the remains of a cage that killed a fourteen-year-old boy splintering around him, and it barely takes a thought for his Flames to surge up and out and slam the Cloud - Hibari Kyouya - into the far wall with a viciousness Giotto had spent the majority of his first life keeping under wraps. For a split second, he almost kills the Cloud for his gall. A Guardian who could murder his own Sky - however well-intentioned or unknowingly - is no Guardian at all, but then, out of all of the Tenth Generation, as far as Giotto can tell, not a single one of them had had a real bond with Tsuna. The one who’d come closest had been the Mist, but after ten years and the weight of Vongola’s sins on his shoulders, even that connection had dissolved.

If Giotto is honest, the person Tsuna had become ten years later under the crushing pressure of that Sun Arcobaleno and the Vongola had been near unrecognizable compared to the boy Giotto had so admired. But that man is dead, at least for now, dragged under by too many enemies and too many bad decisions, and all that’s left is this younger version, dragged to the future against his will and forced to fight a war of someone else’s making.

Not even that anymore obviously, and all that’s left is Giotto, a bloody legacy to his name and too many regrets to pay for. All he can do is live out Tsuna’s life now and hopefully undo some of the damage Vongola has wrought. Tsuna wouldn’t want him killing this Cloud though, and so Giotto lets him go in the end. Hibari gets to his feet, something bloodthirsty and thrilled gleaming in his eyes, completely ignorant of the fact that he’d killed his Sky, and all Giotto can think as he recalls the way Tsuna had always had to bribe this man for him to even consider helping is how Alaude must be rolling in his grave.

“I’m done,” He says instead, slicing a cool look around the room, and then he walks out, back to his room. Nobody stops him, but Giotto wouldn’t have stopped him either, with the shadow of his Flames licking across the concrete floor.

2. Giotto does his duty. Ten years in the future is far too late to really change anything significant, so the faster he takes care of business here, the sooner they can all go home. In the meantime, it amuses him - in a funny world-burning sort of way - how none of Tsuna’s friends seems to realize anything is wrong, that the boy they profess their loyalty to is gone, and his body has been usurped by an interloper. Giotto considers himself a decent enough actor, but for a bunch of Flame-actives with Vongola rings on their fingers and Guardian titles to their names, they’re a rather oblivious lot.

(All of Tsuna’s past and present and future sits in his memories now though, and Giotto can’t say he’s terribly surprised. The person these children wanted to follow was never actually the boy Tsuna had been, not entirely. They pay attention to the parts of him that they like, and ignore the rest like they don’t exist. It infuriates Giotto, because Tsuna deserved better, but Tsuna is dead, and even if Giotto has every intention of at the very least demoting them from their Guardian positions once they’re finished here, he cannot truly harm these children Tsuna had called friends.)

So he does his duty, fights the battles people want him to fight, and smiles blandly back in the face of Reborn’s suspicious glances. That hitman at least can sense something is off, if only because his student no longer cringes or screams, but no one save the Vongola bosses knows the details of what happens in the Vongola Trial, and it’s easy enough to balance Reborn’s misgivings with that.

It’s fun though, messing with the pseudo-baby. The last time Reborn tried to shoot him awake in the morning, Giotto had set the entire room on fire and ended up singeing off Reborn’s sideburns. The resulting training session had been grueling, but it had been worth finally getting back at the man first responsible for more or less browbeating Tsuna into obedience.

Pettiness aside, Giotto does put effort into training. Tsuna’s body is in decent shape, but it could be even better, so Giotto does his best to make it so. The weapons of the future are something of a marvel too, and he smiles indulgently at the full-grown wing-adorned flame-pelted Leone di Cieli that gracefully leaps out to greet him, but in the privacy of his rooms, he lets his Flames swirl free and summons the phoenix that had been his constant companion in his first life, the soul of his Flames, his will made sentient.

“Natsu,” He names the lion, after Tsuna, and welcomes Persephone home as she does a sweep of his bedroom before landing light and delicate on his shoulder, the way she’d always done in battle.

The looks on everyone’s faces when they see her with him is enough to make Giotto smile for the next week.

3. It becomes clear soon enough that they’re going to need all hands on deck for the final confrontation against Millefiore, but even before that, Giotto begins asking some pointed questions that Tsuna had thought but hadn’t quite been brave enough to ask.

“When are we getting my Mist out of Vendicare?” He enquires one night over dinner, and smiles pleasantly as everyone freezes. “We require all the aid we can get, yes? And Mukuro has always been strong.”

“Jyuudaime!” Hayato is the first to burst out, chair skidding back with how emphatically he stands up. “We don’t need that bastard!” Giotto looks at him, not a twitch in his expression, impenetrable as ice even as he keeps his features soft, and Hayato falters. “Or- Or even if we do, he can just possess Dokuro! He can’t be trusted if we let him out!”

Giotto stirs more sugar into his coffee - rich and sweet, gave G a minor aneurysm every time he saw it - just the way he likes it. “So we make him serve, and offer nothing in return?”

Giotto waits out the confused spluttering around him. Reborn is drilling holes into the side of his head but he pays the baby no mind.

“He has been imprisoned for ten years,” Giotto continues in mild tones. “And has remained loyal all this time, si?” He glances briefly at Chrome, the younger one, who stares back, meek and mute. She is loyal to Mukuro above all others, and it would’ve been so very easy for him to influence her into betraying Vongola - betraying Tsuna - anytime.

That he hadn’t, in all this time, is… something. It’s something. The lingering threads of a frayed potential bond. The stubborn refusal to give up something he’d once perhaps considered his. A promise once given - keep my people safe and you will have my allegiance - and never broken, not by Mukuro.

People have often remarked on how similar the First and Tenth Generations are. Personally, Giotto has never seen two sets of people so different.

“I wish to free him,” He says at last, over the voices of those trying to convince him otherwise. “Loyalty deserves loyalty returned. Whatever else he used to be, he has bled in my service for ten years. Surely that is enough to justify his release?”

It is not a question, and everyone knows it. Reborn is all but glaring now. He doesn’t like this new Tsuna who does not cower even in the face of his bullets.

Giotto is spiteful enough to enjoy every moment of it.

It is Takeshi who relents first. “Okay,” He says, all easy agreement and assessing eyes, and maybe this one at least is not so far removed from Ugetsu’s blood after all. “But how are we gonna do that? Vendicare’s hard to break into, right?”

Hayato - the only mafia-raised of the lot - looks positively horrified. “It’s not hard, Baseball Freak, it’s impossible!”

“But Mukuro already broke out twice, didn’t he?”

“Yes,” Giotto interjects, smiling at Takeshi, who preens a little under the attention and is in some ways possibly the most insane of them all. Giotto does have a fondness for those who consider laws as guidelines at best. “So, I suppose we need a Mist.” He takes a gulp of his coffee. “The Varia has a new one these days, don’t they?”

Three conferences, five one-sided shouting matches, and a hefty sum of money transferred over to the Varia accounts later, Giotto has secured Xanxus’ partly baffled, mostly irritated agreement for Fran’s services. Fran turns out to be a rather… precocious young man, but he has Mist Flames and skills that almost rival Mukuro’s, and Giotto is relatively content to leave the breakout to him.

His confidence is not misplaced. Days and half a dozen more battles later, with Byakuran grandstanding across from him, Giotto’s entire ill-fitted, misfit Family is gathered, and the First Generation appears at Giotto’s silent command to unseal the Vongola rings.

(All of them know what he is, the soul peering out from behind Tsuna’s eyes. But in this one moment, not even Daemon gives him away, and Giotto is free to finally unleash his carefully controlled wrath on the Family that had decimated his.)

Millefiore doesn’t stand a chance.

4. “You are not Sawada Tsunayoshi,” Mukuro - the older one - says in deceptively light tones as he joins Giotto on the balcony. It’s late, the night before they would all finally return to the past, and the two of them are probably the only ones still awake.

“No,” Giotto confirms, because there’s no hiding it from this man. “I’m afraid Sawada Tsunayoshi perished in Kyouya’s Box Weapon when he and Reborn attempted to force a Vongola Trial.”

Mukuro, staring out at the sprawling woods before them, does not visibly react, does not even move. For a moment, it doesn’t even seem like he’s breathing, and that’s what gives him away.

Giotto does not say he is sorry. He is, for this, and for too many other things to list, but whatever connection had formed between Tsuna and his Mist had been lost a long time ago, and sorry only sounds trite in the face of such a travesty. The only reason Mukuro had never drifted away, Giotto suspects, was because the Mist had refused to let go. Mukuro himself would never admit it, perhaps never even acknowledge it to himself, but if there was one thing Giotto had always envied Tsuna for, it was his ability to earn a Mist’s devotion so completely.

(And so it had hurt all the more to watch the years go by as Tsuna allowed Vongola to convince him to leave Mukuro in Vendicare. Hurt most of all to realize, one day, that Tsuna no longer cared so long as Mukuro continued reporting in and doing as he was told.)

“What will you do with my younger self?” Mukuro eventually asks, carefully void of every emotion save for the thinnest veneer of detached interest.

“Free him,” Giotto replies promptly, seeing no need for word games here. Reborn had tried to interrogate him about his Vongola Trial, and Giotto had given him every answer but a straight one. It had been highly entertaining. “If he wishes, he will have a place in my Famiglia. If he does not, then I will ensure he is able to start a new life elsewhere with his people, without Vongola dogging their every step.” He pauses, absently considering his hands, more solid than they’ve been in four hundred years. “Even Tsunayoshi’s fear of Reborn was not enough to stop him from asking repeatedly after you. This is the least I can do for your younger self when Tsunayoshi worried about him so often.”

Mukuro scoffs, a hollow puff of air that fades to nothing. “Had he a few more years in him, you would’ve had nothing to concern yourself with.”

Giotto inclines his head in acknowledgement but says nothing more. There is probably no one who knew Tsuna - who fought him and lost to him and understood him - more than Mukuro. The Mist doesn’t need Giotto expounding on the rise and fall of one of the brightest and most short-lived Skies the world would ever see.

“You will not tell the others about me?” Giotto asks instead, more curious than any kind of anxious about it.

Mukuro tips a mocking facsimile of a smile in his direction, looking him straight-on for the first time since his arrival. “What business is it of mine, if Vongola wishes to destroy itself?”

Giotto half-smiles, half-grimaces. He supposes this is hardly a surprise either; it was never Vongola that Mukuro swore unspoken fealty to.

So instead, he reaches out, gently catching one of Mukuro’s hands in his own and knowing he can only because Mukuro allows it. Mismatched eyes watch him like a hawk, a derisive curl on his lips that freezes when Giotto presses the flickering heat of a piece of Sky Flame into his palm.

Then he steps back, once, twice, enough room to sketch an esoteric bow, too formal for this age but recognizable enough here and now if Mukuro’s sharp intake of breath is anything to go by.

Gratitude. Apology. And a dissolution of debt and duty between Guardian and Sky.

If Mukuro so wishes, even after Giotto is gone, the shard of Sky will ensure a clean break from Vongola, and not even Sawada Tsunayoshi will be able to track his former Guardian down. It is all Giotto can offer him.

He straightens, glancing at the piece of Sky now settled into the shimmering form of a phoenix feather. A new life, if Mukuro wants it.

He meets the Mist’s gaze. Mukuro is the first to look away, fingers curling around the feather, eyes on the horizon, and he doesn’t speak again.

Giotto nods, takes his leave, and he does not see the Mist again, not this version at least. Once time straightens itself out, the adult Tsuna of this universe will return, and while Millefiore is no longer a threat, Vongola - and its Decimo - will still be the same stagnant bloodstained mess.

There is nothing Giotto can do about that, but at the back of his mind, he wonders if it wouldn’t have been better after all to have let Millefiore wipe Vongola out.

5. Later, much later, after a jailbreak and Daemon and a broken curse, Giotto and his Guardians - still no bonds, but he can’t seem to find a good time to get rid of them, so maybe instead of that, he can educate them to be better - sit down for a Family dinner at the most upscale banquet hall Namimori has to offer, with the Ninth and his men, the CEDEF and even Varia. They’re in public so everyone has their law-abiding citizen face on, but (a redo of) the Inheritance Ceremony is imminent, and Timoteo smiles, sly and pleased that all the pieces have finally fallen into place. He waves Giotto into the seat on his immediate right and doesn’t even question how very little Giotto resembles Tsuna these days, ascribing the changes to Reborn’s training and recent battles and growing up, and looking no further than that.

The food is good, Italian but cooked by the best chefs on Vongola payroll. Giotto stares Kyouya into grudging silence over the fare, and then he focuses on chatting amicably with Timoteo, weaving smooth flattery into casual but attentive conversation the way he’d learned to do a lifetime ago.

Giotto watched Timoteo grow up. There is no skeleton in his closet that Giotto did not witness him stashing away. But he is old and past his prime and he will soon learn that his successor is not as easy to control as he’d hoped, as he thinks, so Giotto can smile back now and give him his momentary triumph, smile and sip his wine and not let his eyes linger on every bite of food Timoteo takes.

During a lull in the conversation, he turns and catches Mukuro’s eye. His Mist is seated beside his female counterpart, all the way at the end of the line, farthest from his Sky to any outsider’s eye. But Mukuro smirks back from behind his cloth napkin, and as the Nono’s dessert is carried in, the faint twist of Mist Flames - unnoticed by all except two - darts into the panna cotta.

Timoteo eats his fill, compliments the chef, beams at Giotto’s gently filial fussing again like the kindly grandfather he excels at pretending to be, and nobody thinks to question how masterfully Giotto draws all attention to himself and his rowdier Guardians, never letting the generally jovial mood falter, his Sky Flames a subtle pulsing encouragement beneath it all to distract them from the knife at their backs.

The whole affair is a success. At the very least, nobody threw any food, no fights broke out, and no one lost their tempers. It almost feels like a miracle.

They part ways in groups, and to their credit, Hayato and Kyouya only try to kill each other after the elder Vongola party is gone. It doesn’t take long for Ryouhei to join in, and at a glance from Mukuro, Chrome scoops Lambo up and picks up her pace to catch up to a laughing Takeshi.

Mukuro falls into step beside Giotto. Giotto had asked, after the Arcobaleno business was finally over, if Mukuro would stay. Mukuro had asked what Giotto would offer if he did.

“A place in my Family, for you and yours,” Giotto had sworn. “And a hand in toppling the Vongola Empire once and for all.”

Mukuro had smiled, ten years’ worth of another world’s memories behind it, and six lives’ worth of suffering driving his answer.

“Tsunayoshi would never have chosen this method,” Mukuro says now, voice pitched low but as idly as if he were commenting on the weather.

Giotto smiles, grim and long past the point of any return.

Tsuna was his favourite. He reminded Giotto of the man he used to be, when Vongola was still a goal wrapped in optimism and determination, before they’d become embroiled in the mafia and Giotto had spent the next four hundred years after his death watching his life’s work build itself a throne of corpses.

Tsuna was his favourite, but he was also an ideal Giotto won’t ever be again, and cannot be if he truly wants to see this iteration of Vongola dead in his second lifetime. Tsuna would’ve been eaten alive by Vongola - Giotto had seen an entire future’s worth of proof of that.

“I am not Tsunayoshi,” Giotto says, and it is another regret he will have to carry, but their world is neither kind nor fair, and Tsuna as he was would never have survived it.

Mukuro studies him, a thoughtful tilt to his head, and something like fascination glitters in his eyes. “No, you are not,” He agrees. “But that isn’t necessarily a bad thing.”

Giotto glances at him, then ahead, at children who had almost killed and been almost killed mere days ago, now roughhousing amongst themselves. “The world could do with more Tsunayoshis.”

“The world needs more of you,” Mukuro retorts just as swiftly, a sardonic sort of amusement in his smirk. “In that other future, Tsunayoshi proved beyond a doubt that everything he promised, he couldn’t keep, didn’t he? And yet here you are, Vongola Primo, poisoning your enemies over dinner, and just yesterday you had me hide you while you met with Gesso and Simon and Giglio Nero in private. You certainly don’t waste any time.” His smirk widens. “If Vongola isn’t careful, you’ll turn half of Europe against the older generation before they realize it.”

Giotto hums and doesn’t deny any of it. “You would be willing to aid me though?”

Mukuro arches an eyebrow, and his right eye flickers briefly with Mist Flames. “Have I not been doing so already?”

Giotto nods. “Yes, and I am grateful. But lending a hand now is not the same as devoting at least the next ten years of your life to a goal most would consider impossible. And I am not Tsunayoshi.”

Mukuro’s steps slow, then stop entirely. Giotto blinks and halts as well, half-turning.

“Does that matter so much to you?” Mukuro asks, peering at him with surprisingly genuine puzzlement. “Do you think it matters so much to me? That you are not Tsunayoshi?”

Giotto half-shrugs, and Mukuro shakes his head. “Tsunayoshi had a heart that I will never fully understand,” He says, blunt in a way he almost never is. “He was naive and foolish, hopeful and soft, and it made him as weak as it made him strong. I could trust him to never turn on Chrome or Ken or Chikusa, even if they or I tested his tolerance, but by that same logic, I could never have trusted him to stand firm against Vongola’s ideals, no matter what he proclaimed. And I was right, wasn’t I? In the end, Vongola destroyed him, and he became one of them.”

He pauses, his gaze sliding away, hands coming together to twist one of the rings on his fingers. Then he looks back at Giotto, and his next smirk is equal parts challenge and approval. “You though. You have witnessed the results of letting your previous Mist Guardian walk free, and spent years watching your descendants commit atrocities in the name of strengthening your organization. If I were to promise you my loyalty, and then betray you sometime down the road, you would slit my throat yourself. But at the same time, at least I know - you are both ruthless enough and determined enough to see your objectives through to the end, with a conviction that’s centuries in the making. The current Vongola would have to kill you to stop you.” His right eye flares indigo again. “So I suppose that is where I come in.”

Up ahead, the others turn a corner, still bickering. Giotto thinks Takeshi has probably noticed that he and Mukuro have fallen behind, and of course Chrome knows, but neither of them stops to wait either.

Mukuro steps back, once, twice, and Giotto’s eyes widen as the Mist lifts a hand to brush over the earring he hasn’t stopped wearing since he got it. And then… well.

The Mukuro from the future must’ve known how because this Mukuro doesn’t even look awkward as he drops to one knee and bows his head, just a dip, slow enough to look deliberate, proud enough to meet Giotto’s gaze again afterwards.

“You asked for ten years, Neo Primo,” Mukuro announces. “So, very well, I will pledge you ten years of my life, for you to use as you see fit, so long as you keep your word. We can revisit this in a decade, but for the next ten years, I will make you untouchable to your enemies and sow discord amongst them in your name.” He smiles and it’s a mad and bloodthirsty thing, the same furious hateful beast he’d aimed at Daemon Spade when he’d sought to rip Chrome from Mukuro’s side. “And should the worst come to pass and I go the way of my predecessor, may my life be forfeit at your hands.”

He reaches up, catches Giotto’s hand in his own, and his red eye glows as orange and indigo burst into existence between their fingers, a blaze of light under the night sky as they twine together, fierce and unyielding and true.

They both gasp from the surge of power that rushes through them as the Guardian bond snaps into place, the first one Giotto will ever have in this body, the first one in over four hundred years, a core of Flame that promises a home, something Daemon had never been able to give him, and Giotto doesn’t even think before he’s yanking Mukuro to his feet and reeling him close.

Tsuna had been short for his age so Giotto isn’t quite eye-level with his new Mist, but it hardly matters when he curls a near-bruising grip along Mukuro’s jaw and sees the same hunger and possessiveness he feels reflected in the illusionist’s eyes.

“A Guardian bond is not something I take lightly,” Giotto murmurs, and he knows even without a mirror that his own Flames are burning in his eyes. “You are mine now, and I do not share. In ten years, you will pledge another ten, and another ten after that, and any who dare to try and take you from me, I would run rivers red with their lifeblood.”

(These oaths are old, old and binding and near-forgotten, bastardized ten ways to Sunday but still echoing of power, and even in Giotto’s time, only G and Ugetsu had sworn them. That his new reign would begin with one, when as far as Giotto knows, none have spoken them in centuries - perhaps it speaks of the dawn of a new age.)

Mukuro inhales shakily, not at all prepared for the sheer depth and intensity of a true Flame bond. But the grip he has on Giotto’s wrist is just as tight as Giotto’s, and it only takes him another breath to regain his bearings.

“As you Will it, Giotto,” Mukuro murmurs, and it crackles over Giotto’s skin. No one has spoken his name since his resurrection.

The bond settles between them, calm now but no less potent. Giotto lets go, tickling a tongue of Sun-tinted Sky Flame along Mukuro’s skin to soothe the sting left behind. Mukuro only huffs a breath of laughter, gaze still unwavering on Giotto’s face.

“Well then,” The Mist - Giotto’s Mist - smiles, quieter, more serene, like a glass-spun secret cloaked in shadow, but exultantly bright all the same. “Long live the new King. May your reign be long and prosperous.”

#khr #headcanon meme: answered #giotto #rokudo mukuro #G69 #vongola famiglia #headcanon #there we go g69 wow i didn't think i could do it #lmfao they're both prob way ooc #but that's how it came out

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wonderfulworldofmichaelford · 4 years

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Michael in the Mainstream: Artemis Fowl

Since the early 2000s, Artemis Fowl has been languishing in development hell, and it really is a mystery as to why. The series has everything you could possibly want for a blockbuster young adult franchise: it’s a charming blend of science and fantasy with rich worldbuilding and mythology, it has enjoyable and even complex characters who go through great character arcs over the course of the series, it has an enjoyable major antagonist, an insufferable smug villain protagonist who goes through a stellar redemption arc over the course of the series, and tons of crazy heists that combine scheming and fairy magic. There was no reason this couldn’t have existed as a competitor to the Harry Potter series, but alas, it was not to be. The young adult fantasy franchise languished for decades in development hell, until finally Disney pulled it out and put Kenneth Branagh at the helm. Finally, we were going to get the Artemis Fowl adaptation we deserved!

Except we didn’t.

Artemis Fowl is legitimately one of the worst adaptations of any work of fiction ever. It has been held up alongside The Last Airbender and The Lightning Thief as part of the Unholy Trinity of terrible adaptations, and I’m not even going to try and pretend that this “Honor” isn’t well and truly earned. This film is an utterly abominable bastardization of the beloved franchise, to the point where this feels like an entirely different story that had familiar names slapped on it at the last second. If you want to know what horrific extents this film has butchered the story and characters, read onward, but there’s no way I’m going to pretend this film isn’t awful right off the bat.

There is literally nothing in this film that works. Nothing at all. Starting from the opening scene, the establishing shots, you can tell things are wrong – there are news people around Fowl Manor? Mulch is being interrogated? What is going on? The film from the word go is simply making one thing absolutely and abundantly clear: this is not the Artemis Fowl you know. The film goes out of its way to do the opposite of the franchise, merely using names and vague concepts in an attempt to sucker fans into watching it. Butler’s first name, an emotional reveal from the third book, is common knowledge; Opal Koboi, a cunning and threatening major villain who was the antagonist for almost every novel starting with the second, is here reduced to basically a personification of the voice on the phone from Scream; Root, once a short-tempered man who was hard on Holly as a method of tough love to push her to be the very best LEP had to offer to prove women belonged on the force, is here a woman who, while just as angry as ever, robs Holly of a major part of her arc and reduces her to plucky female sidekick. And even outside of that, as its own thing, the movie is just utterly incomprehensible. The story is rushed and confusing, with lots of exposition and action but with no context or cohesion. Things happen and things go from scene to scene, but none of it makes any sort of sense. A character will switch allegiances within a few minutes, characters will somehow find a way to survive deadly attacks offscreen… the worst offender is a character death they try to push off as emotional, despite there being no reason to care for this character, and when all hope seems lost, a deus ex machina saves the day! My wife, who is unfamiliar with the series, and I, a huge fan, both struggled to figure out what was going on at any given point; the movie is really that bad at communicating what is happening, which is even more baffling because the film is a pathetic hour and a half in length, a distressingly short amount of time to establish a new science-fantasy franchise of this scale.

The characters are almost all terrible. Artemis is the standout with how awful he is; no longer the cunning criminal masterminds of the book, Artemis here is more of a somewhat smug little brat who is overly emotional and, worst of all, NICE. He’s so nice in fact that by the end of the film he has managed to speedrun his character development and arcs with Mulch and Holly, who consider him their close friend and ally. Butler is pretty bad here as well, mostly because he is given almost nothing to do and is seemingly only there because he was in the book. In fact, his crowning moment – when he took on the troll – is instead given to Artemis and even Holly, with Butler ending up severely injured. It’s a bit nasty that they changed Butler to be black and then had his (white) master steal his greatest moment; it’s giving me flashbacks to Kazaam. Opal is hit pretty bad as well; being made the big bad of this loose adaptation of the first book’s plot – which is amusingly one of the few books she had absolutely no role in – wouldn’t be so rough if she was more of a presence and not just some vague, hooded figure who threatens Artemis over the phone and generally does nothing to warrant being an adaptation of the baddest bitch in the series. She’s rather ineffectual and they even try and give her a sort of sympathetic motivation, one where she resents humans for pushing her kind underground. It really is a disgusting waste of a character who could easily rival heavy hitters like Voldemort in the awesome and theatrically evil department.

Holly is almost okay, but her entire arc and a big chunk of her narrative purpose is robbed by making Commander Root a woman. Root, played by Judi Dench, is honestly one of the better characters since Dench has Root dropping lines like “Top o’ the morning to ya” with gravelly deadpan seriousness which makes the character unintentionally hilarious, but the cheap laughs don’t really make up for butchering the story of one of fiction’s finest ladies. As a side note, they have made Holly 100% white despite her skin being described as nut brown rather frequently in the book, and the now white Holly together with Artemis steal away Butler’s biggest moment. And that’s not even getting into how they neutered Juliet, who has also been race lifted but was turned into a child who barely appeared in the film. I’m not usually one to toss about racism accusations, but there’s a lot of red flags here that Branagh’s usual colorblind casting just doesn’t excuse.

The most consistently enjoyable performance is Josh Gad’s as Mulch. From the moment he was cast, I knew he’d do a good job and capture the spirit of the character, and he does! ...sort of. The decision to have Mulch be a giant dwarf and narrate the story in a crappy Batman impression while also violating literally the most important law of fairy culture (don’t tell the humans anything about us) by spilling the beans to M16 is unbearably stupid, and a lot of his jokes are just relentlessly unfunny. But I think that Gad does leak a bit of that Mulch charm at a few points, and it’s apparent he at least somewhat gets his character, which is not something that can be said for anyone else in this film. Sadly, much like his standout performance as Lefou in the live action Beauty and the Beast, he can’t possibly save the trainwreck of a film he’s in.

I guess I’m not entirely surprised by this film. I mean, a lot of quality young adult literature from the past two decades has been horrifically mangled in the wake of Harry Potter – Inkheart, The Golden Compass, The Lightning Thief, Ender’s Game, and Eragon – so this movie really isn’t an anomaly. But it is the culmination of a horrible trend. This is the zenith of horrible young adult adaptations, or perhaps I should say the nadir of adaptations as a whole? For all the flak I could give those other adaptations, on some fundamental level they still understood something about the source material. Ender’s Game still understood it could not erase the ending where children are revealed to be being conscripted to perform the ethnic cleansing of an alien race. Eragon couldn’t completely ruin Saphira, try as it might. The Lightning Thief… well, I mean, I guess the Medusa scene was mostly faithful. But Artemis Fowl? Artemis Fowl goes out of its way to be the opposite of its literary counterpart that there is no way to justify even saying it is based on the book by Eoin Colfer; it would be like having a movie about kids hanging out at the mall and doing mundane stuff, except they’re all named Jesus and Peter and Paul and then saying it’s based on the Bible. Just using names doesn’t mean anything, you actually have to use the themes and characterizations too, and this movie does none of that.

This movie is most comparable to The Emoji Movie. Neither of these works really deserve to be called a “Film” since they are basically whatever it is they’re trying so desperately to be stripped down to the bare essentials. The Emoji Movie is the most basic, by-the-numbers animated adventure film with a “be yourself” message you could ever hope to see, with a story so absolutely basic that just watching the trailer will allow you to predict the every motion of the plot. Artemis Fowl on the other hand is the most cliche-ridden fantasy epic franchise-starter you could imagine, and that’s if you’re able to penetrate the ridiculously dense and cluttered story and are able to make sense of what’s going on. I can think of absolutely no one this film could ever appeal to. There’s not a single redeeming thing about it. The movie is flashy, trashy junk that should never have been released, and Disney honestly did the right thing by releasing this on their streaming service because it would be outright disgusting to charge movie ticket prices for this tripe. The fact Disney has more faith in the eternally-delayed New Mutants theatrically speaks volumes about the quality of this film.

I can’t in good conscious say that this is the worst film of all time. F4ntastic is probably a much worse butchering of characters than this film; Disaster Movie is much more horrendously offensive and unfunny than this; hell, Chicken Little is probably a worse Disney movie because as awful as everyone in this film is, at least they aren’t Buck Cluck! But I don’t think there’s a single movie I hate more than this one. Lucy can finally move over and sleep easy knowing that the fact it’s not based on a pre-existing work has finally saved it from the #1 spot on my worst list; Artemis Fowl is now the reigning champ. Kenneth Branagh should be ashamed of himself for making and releasing this (and doubly ashamed for having the gall to unironically compare his slaughtering of Artemis Fowl’s character to Michael Corleone), Disney should be shamed for putting more money into this film than they did into BLM charities, and I hope that Eoin Colfer finds whatever he was paid worth it to see his greatest creation butchered and disrespected like this.

#Michael in the Mainstream #Review #movie review #Artemis Fowl #Kenneth Branagh #Eoin Colfer #fantasy film #fantasy #science-fantasy #Josh Gad #Judi Dench #Disney #Disney+#disney movie

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awed-frog · 5 years

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I’ve seen a couple of explanations about why GoT changed so much and why the finale disappointed so many people, and I think they’re good ones. It’s true, for instance, that while GRR Martin worked forwards, building convincing characters and then letting them do whatever (which is going to be a problem for him, btw), the showrunners worked backwards (and did it very badly). But something that’s bothered me a lot and haven’t seen anyone mention so far is the narrative dissonance of The Iron Throne.

Basically, what this finale attempted was circular storytelling, which can be a beautiful thing when done right; what it ended up doing, however, was making it clear to us that in the end, you can’t escape your upbringing; who you were 100% determines who you’ll be.

(That’s hugely different from well-made circular storytelling.)

That’s why the characters who escape (narratively) unscathed are people like Sansa, who grew up adored in a loving household and becomes a version of what she’s been taught to be her entire childhood: the lady of the mansion.

Meanwhile, Jon never fully got over his ‘bastard’ upbringing: military success, camaraderie, the love of two remarkable women and the respect of entire armies – none of that could fundamentally change who Jon was on the inside: the bastard, the brushed aside orphan always on the margins of things. Arguably, that’s why he kept taking so many risks, and that’s why he always felt it was on him to fix whatever was fixable: because his life didn’t, in the end, truly matter to anyone. As a bastard, he had no true family, no name and no inheritance; and as a member of the Night Watch, of course, he had no future, in the sense that he could take no wife and father no children. Thus, Jon rejoining the Watch (what Watch, by the way? unclear) and disappearing beyond the Wall places him back where he was at the beginning: among the unseen, the unwanted and the unknown.

The same goes for Daenerys, who, despite atrocious sufferings and an iron-will determination, saw her entire character arc collapse back into the person she was apparently destined to be: the daughter of a madman, the fire and blood princess, the destroyer, the abused child who claws back and hurts everyone else because ‘they don’t love me, so they might as well fear me’. Because that’s what you learn from a life of abuse, isnt’ it? That it’s either love or fear that will keep you safe. And all along, GoT teased an end to that destructive cycle so many people are trapped into IRL – through her kindness, empathy, profound sense of self-worth (problematic in some ways, but also a miracle in itself for someone who was raised to be sacrificial cattle) and her courage, it seemed that Daenerys would learn that you can trust yourself to love others and be loved in return, even if you’re not sure what the feeling is; that you can choose to do the right thing even if it’s risky; that you can survive without turning into your abusers. But - lol, jk. All of that was undone, as it was undone for so many other characters: Sandor, who died in that fire he feared so much to kill a brother that should have meant nothing to him; Jaime, who was so close to letting himself become a better person; Bran, whose profoundly spiritual path was apparently preparation for the very mundane game of politics; Missandei, who died in chains; and Westeros itself, which is returned to its Baratheon state (a king who’s got no real right to the throne, a council that represents almost nobody, lords chosen for their loyalty to powerful friends, and all those brothels in King’s Landing which will soon reopen - and quickly be filled, no doubt, with poor, vulnerable women who’ve got no other choice).

Now, I mentioned narrative dissonance because – in themselves – the collapse of a character’s arc exactly back to the beginning and a complete inability to escape destiny are not bad writing.

What they are, though, is the very definition of tragedy.

(Laius is told his son will kill him – casts the baby aside, and still dies. Priam dreams his youngest son will doom Troy – casts the baby aside, and the city still burns. In the TV version, Arthur chooses to spare Mordred out of kindness - Mordred still kills him.)

Entire societies are or were shaped by the idea that you can’t, in the end, defeat fate and defy your heritage. It may be a gloomy worldview, but it’s a fascinating one, especially on a stage. We’ve all cried for Romeo and Juliet; we’ve all cried for Achilles. Sometimes, people fail; sometimes there’s no way out, and that’s the terrible beauty and fascination of the story.

The thing is, though: GoT is not a tragedy. It’s got a very clear happy ending: the two main villains of the season (the Night King and Cersei) get their comeuppance, and that is a direct message to the back of our brains - a very loud siren - signaling that all is now well. The quietly hopeful music and the cheerful group portrait of a bunch of rational and beloved characters working on further fixing the kingdom cement that subconscious feeling.

But this is where the narrative dissonance comes in. Characters like Daenerys, Jon and Jaime were a central part of the main cast: we rooted for them to make it, to survive, to succeed. In order to deny them a happy ending while not turning the entire thing into a tragedy, the show needed to change their status mid-story, and this is what it did. Jaime chooses to die for his horrible sister; Jon kills the woman he loves in the most treacherous, underhanded way possible; and Daenerys, of course (and most visibly, because women) becomes this unredeemable butcher of children.

So here is the distortion, and here is the dissonance. It’s cheap, and it’s worse than cheap: it’s badly made.

(There is not even shock value here - we’ve all seen this coming for a while now.)

No, this is just a story that can’t decide what it is, and unfortunately knowing what story you’re writing is the main rule for producing (good) fiction. GoT ends well, but it ends well by turning half its main characters into villains and thus implying they deserved what they got. This is why - on top of everything else, like the more and more overt racism - many of us are so frustrated and let down by the ending of a story they loved for years and years and years. Seriously, what a waste. Let’s hope someone up high learns from this, and decides to spend some of that lavish CGI funding they’re so generous with on a decent screenwriter instead.

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razberryyum · 5 years

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With the past arc coming to an end this week, resulting in most of our collective hearts being ripped out of our chests, I wanted to take this opportunity to pay tribute to our two dear big sisters of The Untamed/MDZS, Jiang Yanli and Wen Qing.

(novel and ep 32 spoilers below the cut)

Jiang Yanli (Shijie)

I took an immediate liking to Shijie the first moment we met her on the show since with her sweet smile and gentle eyes, she was so obviously a loving person and a caring big sister to her two unruly little brothers, there was almost no way I wouldn’t like her. She felt like the gentle type who would not harm a fly, and as we got to know her even more, I only loved her more. I’ve already talked about her kick-ass moment on Phoenix Mountain which perfectly encapsulated her greatness as a person, so I will look at other aspects of her life instead. Considering the fact that she grew up with parents who loved her in a well-respected cultivation sect, she really could have easily been a spoiled princess type of character since I doubt she was ever left wanting. And then, when her father brought home Wei Wuxian, she also could have easily either ignored the kid or worse yet treat him like crap, especially with the rumors about Wei Wuxian being her dad’s bastard son, which I’m sure she would have gotten a whiff of. Even if she had mistreated WWX, she probably would have gotten the full backing of her mom in doing so. But instead, because she is really just the most generous soul on earth, she instantly accepted him as part of the family and loved him as she did her own brother, even making sure that Jiang Cheng would accept him and treat him right as well. In fact, it is abundantly clear that Shijie had to act as more of a mother to WWX since Madame Yu most definitely had no intention of filling that role. Her attitude actually reminded me of Catelyn Stark and Jon Snow in Game of Thrones: like Catelyn Stark, she simply couldn’t forgive her husband’s infidelity and therefore could never like the child her husband brought back since she saw the boy as a daily reminder of his unfaithfulness. As much as I love Madame Yu, because she is awesome and fierce AF, it could NOT have been easy growing up in her household when one’s mere existence and presence triggered her ire. So really, thank God for Shijie, for being there and providing WWX with the motherly love and warmth that he probably sorely needed since Jiang Fengmian probably couldn’t always be around to take care of him.

As a result, I totally understand why WWX would have such bitter feelings towards someone like Jin Zixuan, since I felt the same way for a long time. Actually it wasn’t until JZX’s last moments did I finally like him as a person. Despite the fact that the live action has given us more time with him to redeem his character and make him more likable, I still held out all the way until the bitter end because, honestly, how can I ever forgive someone who had made Shijie cry like this:

But since he was also the one to make her smile and enjoy the happiest moments of her life, I could also never really hate JZX either. Mostly I’m just Shijie got to be with the man she obviously was in love with and I really appreciated the fact that the live action made him earn her forgiveness a little more. Even though she had to sneak out to let WWX see her in her beautiful bridal gown, I do believe that she had JZX’s blessing to do so because he knew how important WWX was to her, and how sad she probably already felt that he wasn’t allowed to attend her wedding. I wish the siblings’ reunion in Yiling was the last moment they could have shared together, instead of the gut-wrenching one in Nightless City.

When JZX was killed, my heart hurt so much because I instantly thought of how much his death would hurt Shijie, especially when she learned of it and more importantly, who killed him...they didn’t even have to show us her reaction since my imagination had already conjured up the worse scenario possible. I am certain WWX was thinking the same exact thoughts and conjuring up the same image, hence the pain on his face was so understandable and completely heart-wrenching.

Yet, despite being told her beloved A-Xian was the one who killed her beloved husband, that moment when she saw him at her home, she didn’t even hesitate to call out to him, using the same affectionate nickname she has always used. There was not an ounce of hatred or anger or blame on her face, only something akin to joy that she could see her brother again. Knowing he was in trouble as a result of visiting her, she then actually rushed right into the midst of battle to reunite with him again. I mean, just think about that for a second. Here she was, still in mourning for her husband, the love of her life, holding her only one month old child, but upon realizing her little brother was nearby, she dropped everything to rush after him, to see him, probably because she just could not believe he would ever do anything to hurt her like that. All the nasty things people have been saying about WWX, including how he commanded Wen Ning to murder her husband, she probably couldn’t believe because that was simply not the Xian Xian she knew and loved. In the past, every time Jiang Cheng would talk smack about WWX misbehaving or up to no good, she would always come to his defense. And even though in this particular case she had full reason to not defend him for once, she still believed in the good of WWX to go after him. Her love and faith in her A-Xian was so strong that when great danger was to befall him and she saw the sword strike heading for him, she completely forgot that she was a mother now with a child that still needed her, and just took that fatal hit for him because she just loved her brother so damn much that the only thing she was probably thinking about was A-Xian's in danger, must protect!. One might say she acted purely on instinct, without really thinking about the negative consequences of taking such a hit would have on her, but I believe that even if Shijie had one more minute to think about the situation, she would still make the same decision. Because that’s the type of selfless person she was: the caring big sister she was, the loving mother figure to WWX she will always be, the amazing mother she would have been to Jin Ling.

Even though Jin Ling grew up to be the spoiled princess instead, at least his basic nature is still good, and I’d like to think that that is what he got from his mom (while the spoiled part from his flowery peacock of a dad, lol) since God knows grumpy uncle JC and “doting” uncle Jin Guangyao probably weren’t much help in nurturing that sweet side of him, and not to mention we know he’s mostly friendless because of his disposition. Regardless of the sincerity behind JGY’s gestures when it came to his nephew, I am still utterly grateful that he gave him Fairy the floofiest doggo in the entire universe so that at least Jin Ling didn’t feel so alone when his peers mostly ignored him (even if it was kinda his own doing). I hope that wherever Shijie is, she can smile and be happy that her son grew up healthy and well and somewhat loved, and now, having finally reunited with the uncle he never knew but whom she probably would have always wanted him to meet, he could become an even better person who would make her even more proud.

Wen Qing

I owe Wen Qing a big apology. Before I started watching The Untamed, I had read rumors that they were going to change the love story between WWX and Lan Wangji to a love story between WWX and most likely Wen Qing, and therefore, I started the show with a lot of misgivings about her character. Personally, I hate when perfectly good love stories are altered due to no other reason than bigotry, so even though the character of Wen Qing is really the innocent bystander caught in the line of fire in this case (it’s not her fault if the writers had changed her character in that way), every time she shared a scene with WWX in those beginning episodes, I would actually grimace a little because I thought I knew where things were heading. Suffice it to say, I’m glad things worked out in favor of WangXian and I’m sorry I had any negative feelings towards her at all, because after WWX, she really is the most tragic character in The Untamed/MDZS.

Here's the thing, even though she didn’t turn out to be the love interest that would come between WWX and LWJ, I DO firmly believe that Wen Qing was in love with WWX, based on the way the actress played her and some of the moments we’ve seen (her reaction to having her wrist held by WWX, the way she asks about him when Jiang Chang rescues her from the Wen dungeon, the way she looks at WWX sometimes). Some might say she’s just being a big sister to him, which I would wholeheartedly agree with in terms of her novel counterpart, but on the show, that wasn’t my read of her character at all. However, I actually find it utterly reasonable that she would be in love with WWX because...hell, who wouldn’t be in that situation? Putting aside the fact that he’s her age, charming, smart, handsome, funny, kind-hearted, and talented, he’s also the savior of her treasured little brother and her clan. I would actually find it more shocking if she wasn’t in love with him. I know Wen Qing in the novel was not written that way at all, but she also didn’t appear much either despite having a pretty significant impact on certain key plot elements. Here’s the thing though, I actually think her feelings for WWX is what makes her character even more sympathetic because it’s a love unfulfilled, could never be fulfilled, not just because of her shortened lifespan, but also because during their time at the Burial Mound, it was made abundantly clear that WWX’s heart was elsewhere the entire time. Her disappointment at seeing the invitation from LWJ to his sister’s baby shower perfectly captured her understanding of that fact.

She believes WWX is staying with them only out of a sense of obligation, and one can imagine how guilt-ridden she felt since she believes her family is what has been keeping him from the people he actually loves. Even though her time at the Burial Mound is probably the happiest she‘s ever been in her short life, especially after Wen Ning woke up, she was still not afforded complete happiness because of her own sense of guilt in addition to her ever-present fear that their simple, happy days would eventually come to an end at the hands of the unforgiving world surrounding them.

Just thinking about Wen Qing’s life in general is enough to make my heart ache on her behalf. It could not have been easy growing up as basically a hostage of the Wen Sect, constantly living in fear of what Wen Ruohan would do to her little brother or her family if she didn’t do as she was told. Thank God she was blessed with the gift of being a talented physician and therefore useful to WRH, but it is also because of her talent that she acquired the unsavory reputation of being a ruthless, vicious medicine woman of the Wen sect, according to WWX when they first spoke to each other in the back hills of the Cloud Recesses. Nie Minghue’s words about her not being guiltless because she never once tried stopping WRH from doing his horrible deeds actually got to me since there is some truth to them: I mean, isn’t someone who is a part of the Nazis guilty by association, regardless of why they had to join in the first place? When she wasn’t worried about what the Wens would do to Wen Qing, Wen Qing was probably plagued with guilt since she undoubtedly witnessed the horrible things the Wens did and yet could do nothing to stop them. As someone who saved lives as a profession, seeing the Wens carelessly take lives could not have been easy on her conscience. But there was little she could have done since she had her own people to protect. It had to have been a stifling existence. And then, when the Wens were defeated, instead of being granted the freedom she probably wished for her whole life, the good guys turned around and basically imprisoned/tortured her people and even killed her beloved A-Ning whom she had lived her life for all this time. Her life went from bad to worse in a blink of an eye.

But then thanks to WWX, her little bro was miraculously brought back to life and even more miraculously retained all the sweet qualities that made him lovable so that she could at least enjoy one short year with him. Unfortunately, the semi-joyous days came to an abrupt end in the worst way possible. I can only imagine how heartbroken she was when she made the decision with Wen Ning to surrender themselves to the Jins, but I also believe that in knowing what fate would befall her brother as a result, there was no way she would be able to live with herself after that, so that’s why she chose to go to her death with him.

And honestly, her death is what haunts me and will continue to haunt me, because if memory serves, we were never really given details of how she died in the novel, nor did we get much in the show. We know she was just reduced to dust, so she was never even afforded a proper burial, but that still pales in comparison to the notion of what torture probably awaited her in the hands of that particular Jin father and son duo. There is no way Wen Qing’s death could have been pleasant. The only consolation I have is that at least she died quickly, relatively speaking, at least compared to poor Wen Ning, whom they kept around for a much, much longer period of time to experiment on. Seriously, just thinking about it now is making me sick to my stomach. For someone who probably never hurt anyone in her life, Wen Qing didn’t deserve that kind of ending. I’m glad she got to meet Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian and through them, experience friendship and maybe love like any normal girl would, but it was still too small and quick an interlude in her otherwise difficult life. Personally I wish they developed her relationship with JC a little more since I actually thought the two of them had a lot of chemistry, but I doubt that would have afforded her a happy ending either since, as she pointed out, JC wouldn’t have been able to let go of his responsibilities and status as sect leader to save her and her family as WWX was willing to do. It would have still been a doomed romance in a sadly doomed life.

Before I end this tribute, I wanted to also applaud the two actresses who so wonderfully brought our two beautiful big sisters to life: Xuan Lu as Shijie and Meng Zi Yi as Wen Qing. Their performances greatly contributed to the affection I feel for these two characters and I am so glad they were chosen to embody them.

So to our dear Shijie and Wen Qing, the two fine, brave ladies of The Untamed/MDZS, I salute you, and I hope that wherever you are, you are finally at peace and happy.

#The Untamed #陈情令 #CQL #Mo Dao Zu Shi #MDZS #Jiang Yanli #Shijie #Wen Qing #novel spoilers #episode 32 spoilers #Jin Ling #Wen Ning #Wei Wuxian #Jin Zixuan #Jiang Cheng #Madame Yu

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notapaladin · 4 years

Text

so let’s be sinners to be saints

oh boy i uh. well. completely forgot to post this here??? whoops?

Legend says that the first scorpion was once a priest who broke his vow of chastity.* Of course, that's not something Acatl has to worry about now, right?...Right? Surely he can have one night with his lover without waking up in a body not his own.

Unfortunately, the gods have a very mean sense of humor.

* this is an actual myth! I did not make this up! it was apparently first written down in "Treatise on the Heathen Superstitions That Today Live Among the Indians Native to this New Spain, 1629" by Hernando Ruiz de Alarcón and i cannot find an ebook copy ANYWHERE, but google books was here for me in my hour of need. i found out about it in a twitter thread & went "itsfreerealestate.jpg"

there’s unwilling (temporary) animal transformation in this! there is also sex, not at the same time. you can also read it on ao3.

On something like a high ridge, a beautiful young man was resting and taking in the view. He was dressed as a prince in a headdress of golden flowers and a butterfly nose ornament; when he moved, the air around him shimmered with light. At his elbow was a golden bowl of popcorn, from which he took the occasional handful. An ancient coyote reclined by his feet, either sleeping or dead. He prodded it lightly with a gold-sandaled foot; irritated, it kicked a back leg at him. Sleeping, then.

He turned his gaze back to the expanse below him. “Xochiquetzal is still furious, you know. She hates being slighted.”

The coyote whined a question.

The young man smirked, his carefree gaze turning cruel. “Why, she tried to seduce Mictlantecuhtli’s High Priest! And lost, of course. The man’s a stone; did he not shed blood in our service, I would question whether he had any. Foolish woman, to think she could tempt him to break his vows.”

The coyote rose and shook itself, narrowing its rheumy eyes to squint out at the world below them. After a moment, it let out a little whuff of amusement.

“...Really.” He turned a speculative glance down at a small house in Tenochtitlan, its high rank marked only by a second story. “You think so?”

It nodded, tail thumping on the ground and raising puffs of glittering dust.

“Hmm. It would explain a lot—and oh, how it would make Xochiquetzal wroth to learn who claims him on their mat.” For a long moment he studied the house below—and then he started to smile, terrible as a gloating jaguar. “I think I’ll take that wager. Fine, Old Coyote—do what you will to him, and we’ll see whether his lover comes to me or to my beloved consort.”

The coyote sprang up on its hind feet to execute a shaky pirouette, cackling with laughter, before dropping back down to all fours and speeding away.

& &

In Acatl’s house, there was only moonlight. Teomitl had wanted to light a torch or two—he’d breathed I want to see you, Acatl, and Acatl had nearly given in—but the last thing either of them needed was anything that would draw attention to the house and what they were doing inside. Acatl had started to regret that decision almost immediately, but getting up to start a fire would mean stopping what they were doing, which was plainly not an option in any sane world. They’d shed their cloaks and sandals as soon as they’d gotten in the door, and Teomitl was fumbling with his loincloth one-handed while the other ran restlessly over Acatl’s chest.

Acatl was not helping. Teomitl was straddling him, which meant his thighs were right there and entirely too tempting to ignore. He slid his palms over lean muscle purely to feel him shiver; what the silvery light hid, his touch revealed. He liked that. Almost accidentally, Acatl let his thumbnail graze the curve of a hipbone. “Mmm, you are lovely.”

“And you are a bastard,” Teomitl huffed as he finally tossed his loincloth behind him—by the soft fwumph, it landed on his discarded cloak—and pressed Acatl back down onto the mat, taking a searing kiss that had him arcing breathlessly before his lover finally pulled away to breathe, “Good thing I love you anyway.”

No matter how many times he heard that, he still had to close his eyes as the enormity of Teomitl’s affections hit him again. After all they’d done, all they’d been through, Teomitl loved him. Duality, I don’t deserve this. All he could do in response was pull him closer, feeling the hot press of Teomitl’s cock against his still-regrettably-clothed hip. He’d been half-hard himself since the first hungry kiss they’d shared that evening, and feeling Teomitl’s own arousal was a delicious reminder of all the other things they could be doing with their night. “Do you?”

“You doubt me?” Teomitl propped himself up on his elbows, head tilted suspiciously; Acatl swore he could hear his frown.

Feeling bold, he gave Teomitl’s ass a lingering squeeze. “I’m still dressed.”

And then Teomitl’s hands were in his hair, pulling his head back, and teeth nipped sharply at his exposed throat. He made an incoherent noise, toes curling at the mix of pleasure and pain that sparked over sensitive skin. More of that, he wanted to say, but speech required entirely too much coordination; even when Teomitl’s hands slid back down his body, unceasing in their new quest to get his loincloth out of the way, he could only tremble and pant roughly as Teomitl sucked bruises along his neck that he absolutely wasn’t going to be able to hide. Discreet. We’re supposed be being— But then he was exposed, the air cool on his hard flesh, and before he could think about it he ground his hips against Teomitl’s thigh with a whine.

Teomitl lifted his mouth from his collarbone, voice rough. “What do you want me to do?”

What do I…? There was only one answer, something he’d thought about before they’d even kissed and with increasing frequency since then. He took a slow breath and tried to marshal his thoughts, calming the little flutter of embarrassment below his ribcage; no matter how much he’d dreamed about it, actually saying it still made his face burn. “...Make love to me.”

Teomitl stilled, one calloused palm resting lightly at his hip. It was hard to tell in the shadows, but Acatl suspected he was blushing. It made him want to kiss him senseless. “Acatl,” he murmured, “Are you sure…?”

Acatl couldn’t help but smile, scratching lightly down his spine in a way he knew would make his lover shiver. “I’ve never known you to hesitate before.”

And Teomitl did shiver, but then he was drawing away and resettling himself to kneel between Acatl’s spread legs, still so close that their cocks slid against each others in an agony of not enough friction. He sucked in a hard breath and almost missed Teomitl’s soft reply. “Your vows are important to you.”

For a too-long heartbeat, all he could do was breathe. He’d vowed to be chaste all his life, but he’d made that vow when he was young and stupid and hadn’t met Teomitl yet, hadn’t known that lust could rise in him like a flame at the touch of a hand or a sweet, teasing grin. He’d spent enough nights pondering the depth of his own desires to be sure of them now, no matter what happened. Half-forgotten myths and cautionary tales were not going to stop him. If Lord Death himself stormed up from Mictlan and turned him to dust on the spot, he’d figure out some way to make it work as a shade. He pushed himself up on one elbow and met Teomitl’s eyes, reaching out to cup his jaw. “If the gods punish me, at least let me have this first. Please?”

Teomitl closed his eyes; when he opened them again, there was an excitingly wicked light in them. “You don’t need to beg.” He paused, grinning. “But you can, if you’d like.”

“I’m not going to—“ But then a hand was being wrapped around his cock, and he broke off with a gasp. “Oh.” It was very different from his own, stronger and broader, and as Teomitl stroked him to full hardness he found himself instinctively rocking into it.

“Gods,” Teomitl whispered, “I really wish you could see yourself now, Acatl. You’re beautiful.”

Flatterer, he wanted to say. What came out instead was a growl of “Now who’s the bastard?” Teomitl’s hand was relentless, thumb working over the head of his cock in a way that was absolutely maddening, just on the edge of too much and not enough. If it was intended to rile him up, it was working.

Teomitl chuckled, caressing his hip. His voice turned almost sly as he looked him over, gaze taking on a possessive air. “I thought you were the patient one. Are you so eager to be taken already, Acatl-tzin?”

Acatl swallowed. Once Teomitl had learned that he rather liked being addressed like that during their intimacies—to be fair, it had come as something of a surprise to Acatl, too—he’d shown unerring instincts regarding when to deploy it for maximum effect. It would have made him flush on its own; with Teomitl’s voice a heated purr and his hand on his cock, it felt like it was lighting his skin on fire. His voice sounded rough even to his own ears. “Teomitl. You have no idea how long I’ve waited for this.” Since we stood on the temple steps together, since I saw you in the setting sun gilded like an emperor and knew that I loved you...

He was gratified to see Teomitl’s eyes widen slightly before he sent his gaze darting around the room. “We need...oil. Grease. Something. It will hurt otherwise and I don’t ever want to hurt you—“

“In the chest—one moment—ah, let go, I need to reach—” There was just no dignified way to scrabble one-handed through the nearest open chest and pull out the jar that had been hiding in there for two weeks, but it was worth it for the way Teomitl audibly drew in a breath when it was in his own hands. He found himself regretting the veto on torches again.

He expected to be breached. He didn’t expect Teomitl’s hand sliding up his inner thigh in a warm, slick caress, pulling out a shaky moan. Instinct told him to press his knees together, but he forced himself to relax. Teomitl’s other hand had found his own, interlacing their fingers tightly. “Have you done this before?”

He breathed out slowly. “To—to myself. A few times. Never with someone else.” There weren’t any vows prohibiting that, and if he’d spent most of those times imagining it was Teomitl instead of his own hand it certainly wasn’t Lord Death’s business.

Fingers slid over his balls and then behind them, smearing oil as they went; when Teomitl breathed, “Gods, you had better let me watch next time,” a shameful whimper of pure arousal escaped before he could even think to muffle it. It wasn’t something he’d considered before, but the idea of putting on a show for Teomitl—Teomitl, who was even now tracing his hole slowly with a single finger and sending little tremors up his spine—was apparently very exciting to whichever part of his mind decided such things.

“I—“ That finger slid in, and his grip on Teomitl’s hand reflexively tightened. Whatever he was going to say evaporated from his mind. “Gods.” It was entirely different from doing it to himself; for a moment it just felt strange, but then he breathed out and relaxed and that was better, he could work with that. Teomitl worked him slowly, when he brushed the spot that sent sparks through his veins, Acatl arched encouragingly. “Nnh—there…”

Teomitl leaned over him, grabbing a fistful of loose hair and bracing himself on the mat; Acatl mourned the loss of the hand in his, but it was worth it for the way Teomitl started to open him up in earnest, the stretch of an additional finger alongside the first making his legs tremble. His lover’s voice was a breathless sort of rasp. “This...won’t be enough. Don’t want to break you.”

He sucked in air. Break me. He imagined Teomitl’s cock in him, splitting him open, filling him, wrecking him. He bucked his hips hard, trying to get those fingers in him deeper. It was starting to ache, but it still wouldn’t be enough. “Teomitl—please—“

More oil drizzled down, enough that when Teomitl moved his fingers Acatl could actually hear how slick his own flesh sounded. While he shuddered, rocking into his hand, Teomitl whispered, “How’s that?”

It took him a moment to remember how words worked. “Nnh...more?”

A third finger slid in, and he gasped and clenched around it. Now it was starting to burn, the stretch an entirely different sort of pain than he was accustomed to—but then Teomitl did something with his fingers, or maybe his wrist, and he saw stars. Breath hissed out of him in an explosive “Fuck,” but before Teomitl could think to stop he hastened to add, “Keep going.” If you stop, he thought, I might actually die.

Teomitl kept going. Acatl swore he could feel himself being reshaped around those fingers, each slide past that one spot building the sparks along his nerves into an inferno. He knew he was the furthest thing from quiet—each thrust was pulling increasingly eager whimpers from his throat—and yet he couldn’t seem to stop. “Please—Teomitl, just fuck me!”

“Nnh.”

Teomitl pulled his fingers out. Acatl keened, but before he could do more than register the emptiness of his own body Teomitl was lining himself up and finally sliding in. All he could think for a long moment was oh gods; Teomitl had stretched him but it was nothing compared to the stone-hard heat of his cock opening him up more than he’d ever thought possible. He’d never been stuffed so full in his life and for a dizzying moment he wasn’t sure it would fit; he clawed at Teomitl’s shoulder, feeling him shudder, feeling that cock actually pulse inside him, and registered that he finally knew why disgraced ex-maidens spoke of being ruined. This really was going to wreck him.

His lover held himself perfectly still, panting into his ear. “Acatl.”

In his name, Acatl heard a wealth of questions—are you alright, can I move. Shakily, he nodded and shifted his hips, a careful roll that turned the pressure of Teomitl’s cock from overwhelming to intoxicating. Teomitl blew out a breath and started to thrust shallowly in response, which felt fine but wasn’t enough. Acatl barely recognized his own voice when he gritted out, “Deeper.”

“Fuck.” Teomitl shifted his weight, drawing back; Acatl didn’t even have time to be confused before he was surging forward again, grabbing Acatl’s hip to hoist one leg up to rest on his shoulder and oh, that opened him up wider and gave Teomitl room to fuck him properly. He’d asked for it deeper; Teomitl seemed to read his mind and gave it to him faster and harder as well, each thrust reducing Acatl’s mind to jelly. All he could do was rake his nails down Teomitl’s back and hang on, barely hearing the crackling of the reed mat under them over his own punched-out gasps. Teomitl was more talkative or at least more capable of stringing sounds together; his voice was a near-savage snarl against Acatl’s shoulder. “Fuck, you’re—Acatl, I love you, you are perfect—“

It was the sort of base flattery he’d normally at least try to refute, but such was utterly beyond him now; his lover’s cock had driven out any thoughts that weren’t more and harder and Teomitl. Even his usual hesitation was gone; while his mind was empty, his hips had no problem bucking frantically to urge Teomitl on. When Teomitl’s teeth scraped over his skin during a particularly rough thrust, he dug his fingers into his spine with a strangled cry.

Teomitl was trembling; he’d wrapped a fistful of Acatl’s hair around the hand holding himself up, and now he tugged hard enough to hurt a little when Acatl dared lift his head to steal a messy kiss. “I’m not going to—“ His voice cracked halfway through, and Acatl knew he was close.

Through some incredible act of coordination, he managed to reach a hand between them and wrap it around his own cock, thinking at the very least they could come together, but then Teomitl’s hand was there too and he was snapping his hips in quick, ferocious thrusts and it was all too much. Acatl’s release hit him in a wave that turned his world to a single spasming point of white-hot pleasure; he was dimly aware that he was raking his nails down Teomitl’s back hard enough to draw blood, but with his jaw clamped shut around a scream it was the only outlet left. And then Teomitl was coming too, teeth in Acatl’s shoulder a sting he didn’t even feel next to the pulsing of that hot, hard cock spilling into him.

Acatl couldn’t think. His mind was entirely, blissfully blank. Even when Teomitl softened and pulled out, drawing an entirely reflexive shudder at the overstimulation, he could only blink up at the hidden darkness of the ceiling. Other sensations filtered in slowly; there was Teomitl carefully unbending that one leg, there was Teomitl running his fingers through his hair. He was sweaty and sticky and sore, eyelids suddenly heavy. “Hmm...”

Teomitl rolled off him; Acatl felt him settle on his side and press a kiss to his mouth. Acatl returned it as best he could, feeling drained. When Teomitl spoke, his voice was hushed. “Mmm. Acatl, that was…”

He found his voice. It was easier with Teomitl touching him, one hand resting on his chest like a promise. “Wonderful?”

His lover chuckled, bumping their noses together. He could hear the smile in his voice. “Mm-hmm. How do you feel?” Without waiting for an answer, he grabbed a cloth from somewhere and started cleaning them both up, touch impossibly gentle.

Acatl considered the question. His spine felt like liquid, and he still wasn’t entirely sure he could move his legs yet. He knew without a doubt that he’d be sore tomorrow, with marks on his throat and hips and shoulders, but it would be a pleasant and well-earned ache. I thought I’d feel different. Changed, somehow. Instead I’m just...a man. A man who’s taken his lover to bed. Or...been taken, I suppose. “Tired. Happy, but...tired.”

“So am I.” Indeed, Teomitl’s face was twisting in the manner of someone forcibly suppressing a yawn as he spoke. “Acatl, I...I don’t want to go back to the Duality House tonight. Can I…?”

Discretion was paramount. Mihmatini was on their side, but if Tizoc or any of his men found out, Acatl knew he wouldn’t hesitate to have them both killed. If Acatl was a wise man, he would be throwing Teomitl out already. But he imagined Teomitl in the dawn light, hair sticking up every which way and eyes hazy with sleep as he breathed his name, and what came out of his mouth instead was “Please.” Stay tonight. Stay forever.

Teomitl sighed, nestling against him, and it sent a sudden pang through his heart; before he could stop himself, he found himself asking, “Will you be here when I wake?”

Teomitl snorted, breath stirring his hair. “As if I would ever leave you.”

Thus warmed from within, he drifted off to sleep.

Something was wrong.

Something was very, very wrong.

His skin felt too tight and too cold, and though he knew it was still dark out, the room was bright as day and sparkling around the edges. It took a moment for his vision to focus properly; when it did, he realized that the black thing blocking most of his view was an enormous scorpion’s claw. His limbs twitched. So did the claw. So did the long arc of a venom-tipped tail above him.

He thought he probably should be screaming, if only inside his own head. He thought he probably would be screaming, if he hadn’t had knowledge of the gods’ favorite punishments all but beaten into him at the calmecac. And I told Teomitl it’s never actually happened. A sudden icy spike of fear flashed through him; while he tried to force himself to remain calm, his legs had entirely different ideas and carried him off the mat and into a corner he only recognized by the presence of two walls and much more dust than he’d remembered. Corners were safe. He would think better here.

Breathing felt downright bizarre, but it still helped just as much as it always did. Focus. I need to focus. He could still feel, past the panic, the stretched emptiness of Mictlan running through his veins; Teomitl, asleep on his half of the mat, was much larger in proportion to what he supposed was his decreased size but still shone the same jade-green-and-gold through his priest senses. The gods had not abandoned him, then, and so this was unlikely to have been their will. Mandibles clattered together in what he supposed was the scorpion equivalent of a man biting his lip. It was possible that it had been some sort of sorcerer with a grudge, but he really couldn’t think of any that had escaped his justice recently. Quenami might hate him that much, but he was sure the man lacked the means for such a spell. Not to mention the sense of humor. Whoever did this...knew, somehow, what I was up to tonight. I’m sure of it.

Teomitl was stirring. Acatl froze as his lover rolled over onto his stomach and blindly reached across the mat, making a disgruntled little snuffling noise when his hand encountered only empty air. “Mmf.” One eye cracked open; seeing that he was alone, he sat up and scratched roughly at his scalp. It ruffled up his hair even more than sleep had, and the corner of Acatl’s heart not currently locked in terror melted at the sight.

“Acatl? Where are—“ Teomitl’s gaze fell on him, face twisting. “By the gods,” he muttered, before calling out, “Acatl, there’s a scorpion the size of a damned dog in here; where do you keep your knives again?”

It would have been wonderful, Acatl reflected, if whatever transformation had come upon him had left him the ability to speak. Since no configuration of mandibles and pedipalps seemed to be producing sound, he settled for scuttling closer and waving one claw in what he hoped desperately was a motion unusual enough to stay Teomitl’s hand. He’d seen Teomitl throw knives before, and he was very good at it.

Teomitl went still, one hand on the carved-bone chest that held Acatl’s knives. His eyes widened in something like fear as Acatl approached, only to be drained and refilled by bleak horror. Slowly, without taking his eyes off him, he crumpled to his knees. “...A scorpion...with...your day sign on its back...” For a horrible moment, Acatl thought he was about to burst into tears. When he managed to speak again, his voice was a barely audible whisper. “Acatl?”

At least whatever caused this had the decency to label me for safekeeping. He clicked his pincers together; evidently it was understandable as an affirmation, because Teomitl’s hand went to his mouth and he looked like he might be sick.

Teomitl was silent for a long while, staring fixedly at the floor in front of him. Though he was clearly trying to maintain some form of dignity, Acatl realized that the faint rattling he heard came from his earrings as he trembled, and not even hugging himself tightly enough to turn his knuckles white was helping. All at once, the fear he felt for himself was replaced by rage—rage that such a thing had dared happen, that it had upset Teomitl during what should have been such a wonderful night, that now Acatl couldn’t even hold him through it. Before he could rush forward—to do what, he wasn’t sure—Teomitl’s gaze fell on him again. He was starting to look angry, which at least was better than misery. “I don’t—I don’t understand. How did this happen? We—you were fine earlier, weren’t you?”

Ah. He supposed Teomitl’s education hadn’t covered that story. It took some doing to figure out where he was heading—his house looked very different a few inches away from the floor—but then he managed to scrabble across the room to the wicker chest that held his codices. His new lack of thumbs briefly stymied him, but Teomitl was right behind him to open the lid, leaving Acatl to fidget with his fangs while he searched. It took long enough that he idly began to experiment, lifting first one pair of legs and then the next. He tried flexing his tail, finding that it took the merest thought to have it touching the ground in front of him. Well, he thought, at least I’m not a spider.

And then Teomitl’s legs folded under him. The earth under Acatl’s clawed feet shook as he hit the floor, staring blankly at the codex he now held. Acatl didn’t need to look to know what was on it—the priest Yappan, transformed into the first scorpion for laying with Xochiquetzal and thus breaking his vows.

He looked bleak. “This is my doing, isn’t it? The gods’ punishment on you for what we did—Acatl, I’m so sorry.”

Acatl had a sudden, profound urge to sting him. He settled for scuttling forward and pinching his knee hard, tail waving furiously above him. Don’t you dare apologize. Not for this.

Teomitl flinched, but rallied with a savage glare. “But I—“

Acatl pinched him again. This time he winced, rubbing the welt left behind, and had the grace to look sheepish. “Alright, you don’t like me saying that. But what else could it be? I’m sure if there was a sorcerer who could do this, we would have heard of a good deal more mysterious disappearances by now. Tizoc would make a wonderful scorpion.” His gaze drifted over the discarded codices in the chest, brow furrowed in thought. “...Is your connection to the underworld still…”

He clattered his claws together, hoping Teomitl wouldn’t ask him to prove it. He wasn’t sure what it would do in this new body. I’m still here. He wanted to say I love you, wanted to tell him This isn’t your fault. All he could manage was a clicking of his mandibles.

Teomitl frowned, catching his lower lip between his teeth. His obsidian lip plug, a small thing with a jaguar’s face Mihmatini had gotten him for his last birthday, gleamed in the moonlight. “...Hm. We certainly won’t find answers here.” Then he was getting to his feet again and gathering his clothing, muttering to himself as he dressed. “Not waking Ichtaca...definitely not going to the Duality House, Mihm would flay us both once she stopped laughing...she absolutely would laugh, Acatl, trust me.”

Acatl didn’t think so—he thought it far more likely she’d skip any sort of amusement and go straight to fury—but he didn’t bother trying to express that. Instead he focused his priest-senses past the blaze of Teomitl’s magic and the low-level underworld hum that had seeped into every crevice of his home, trying to pick up on any foreign influences. Nothing...nothing...there! Flowing out the entrance curtain was the faintest hint of rose-red.

And then he realized Teomitl was about to leave without him. Baring his fangs, he raced after him; Teomitl stopped midstride, blinking, as he snapped his claws at his ankles. “You can’t think I’d accept this! We have to find a way to change you back into a man. God or sorcerer, whoever did this to you has to pay.”

Obviously! But you can’t think you’re doing this alone, Teomitl! He wished fervently he was capable of making some sort of noise beyond clicking—even a snort would be acceptable—but settled for hopping onto Teomitl’s foot and raising his claws like a toddler demanding to be picked up. It was humiliating, but it was the only way he could think of to make himself understood.

Teomitl frowned at him. “I don’t think you could keep up, but I suppose you could...climb up on my shoulder? And I’ll put another cloak on over you to—to hide you. You are a large scorpion, you know.”

He’d realized that. Teomitl knelt down, offering his hand after a noticeable moment of hesitation; when Acatl set his claws on his arm, he was struck by the warmth of his skin. Teomitl always ran hot, but it had never been quite as comforting as it was in that moment. He allowed himself an instant to bask, claws waving slowly, before clambering up to his lover’s shoulder. It took some very undignified scratching to settle his weight comfortably—scorpions were not meant to drape over anything—but once he had, he immediately felt much better about his change in elevation. It made him feel more human, seeing the world from a proper angle.

Teomitl set a hand on his carapace, and that helped too. He felt his lover’s shoulders shift as he took a slow breath. “Alright, then. Where to first? Maybe...maybe we should confess our sins—ow!”

Acatl released Teomitl’s ear from his claw, waving his tail in what he hoped was a suitably annoyed manner.

“But—“

He hopped off Teomitl’s shoulder and stabbed his tail in the dirt repeatedly, not letting up until it formed a recognizable dot for the number one. The only confession we get in our lives, and you want to waste it on something like that?

Teomitl stared at him. “You really don’t think this is because of—Acatl, forgive me for stating the obvious but you’re a giant scorpion. Wouldn’t Tlazolteotl be able to...to fix that? So long as we—ah, never did it again? Which of course wouldn’t be ideal, but...”

He was starting to really wish he’d been transformed into something with facial expressions.

“...Alright. We’re not going to Tlazolteotl, then. But—if not her, then who…?” Teomitl trailed off, puffing out his cheeks thoughtfully. “What we do together—it isn’t Xochiquetzal’s domain.”

Indeed it wasn’t, and in any case he had no desire to stand in Xochiquetzal’s presence on two feet, never mind six. But rose-red, parrot-red, could belong to only a few deities, and if not her then they would have to go to her consort. He thought he knew vaguely where the temple of Xochipilli was from his doorstep; if his hunch was right, the thread of magic would lead them the rest of the way.

He scrambled back onto his new perch on his lover’s shoulder and jabbed his tail in the direction of the door. Teomitl pulled a second cloak on over them both, and they set off.

Neither of them noticed the dark blotch of something parrot-shaped taking off into the night ahead of them.

They followed the magic to a temple of Xochipilli just on the edge of the Sacred Precinct, rich enough for its priests to still be awake at what Acatl suspected was either very late at night or very early in the morning, but not quite rich enough for Teomitl’s hurried stride to attract too much attention. In daylight, it would probably be beautiful with its frescoes of flowers and birds; at night, it just made Acatl nervous. Xochipilli was the god of youth, games, and those whose tastes on the mat did not run towards the begetting of children; Acatl had begun to think seriously of making a quiet sacrifice or two in His direction, but some lingering embarrassment had stayed his hand every time. He cursed himself for a coward and a fool, hunkering down next to his lover’s neck and feeling his pulse like it was his own. He wished they’d had enough time to formulate something like a plan. Parrots. We should have brought parrots and—whichever flowers Xochipilli favors, gold and quetzal feathers and precious jade. His skin was starting to itch, and he didn’t know if that was a sign of the transformation wearing off or something far worse. The magic in the air was tinting everything the color of blood, and what priests were in the courtyard were showing the whites of their eyes like dogs.

Teomitl had barely crossed the threshold when a priest in Xochipilli’s flower-bedecked cloak and headdress of parrot feathers approached them. Acatl tried to make himself as inconspicuous as possible, noting how ragged the man looked. He wasn’t old—a few years younger than Acatl himself, if he had to guess—but strain had sunken into his furrowed brow and fresh blood dripped from his earlobes. When Teomitl drew himself up, the man met his eyes with a twist to his expression that said his night couldn’t get any worse. “Zolin, Fire Priest of Xochipilli, at your service. What brings the Master of the House of Darts to our humble temple at this hour?”

They hadn’t expected to be recognized immediately; judging by the way Teomitl shifted, he hadn’t spent their trek through the Sacred Precinct thinking of an explanation. Acatl prayed that, just this once, he would discover the ability to lie. “Ah.”

“Well?” Zolin cast an impatient glance behind him to the top of the temple, where the central chamber had been lit with torches even at this late hour. “I don’t mean to pressure you, my lord, but we are somewhat...busy at the moment. If you’re looking for the god’s favor in winning a ball game—or for relationship advice, our god is not a god of judgement and I assure you we have seen everything—please come back at dawn.”

Teomitl swallowed. “It’s not that. It’s…” He trailed off, staring at his feet for a moment in which Acatl felt his temperature rise before he finally met Zolin’s eyes. “My lover is under what we believe is a curse, and I—we came here hoping the Flower Prince would—“

That got Zolin’s attention. His gaze sharpened, focusing on the huddled lump of Acatl under Teomitl’s cloak. “Most men would go to a sorcerer for that. A nobleman like you should go to the priests for the Dead. What sort of curse do you mean? If it’s the one with the boils, there’s a poultice for that.”

Oh, Duality preserve us. He’s going for the truth.

After so long laying between Teomitl’s furnace heat and a well-made cotton cloak, the night air was almost a shock when he was exposed. Zolin, to his great credit, only looked mildly revolted. “...Well. And here I thought that was something they made up to keep us all chaste in calmecac. It certainly explains what we’ve had to deal with here.”

“Oh?” Teomitl sounded as though he was half dreading the answer, but Acatl knew he had to be picking up on the anxious excitement in the air as well.

Zolin took in a long breath and let it out in a sigh. “You are in luck, my lords. Tonight we have the very great honor of paying host to the Flower Prince in person, for He has deigned to appear in the flesh of our high priest. He has been in high good humor for the past several hours, and may be inclined to offer a boon.”

Teomitl didn’t flinch. Acatl could feel the rock-solid stiffness of his muscles and knew just how much he wasn’t flinching; if he’d been in his proper shape, his own spine would be rigid with nerves. Throwing yourselves on the mercy of an unfamiliar priesthood was one thing; walking into a god’s realm with preparation and sacrifice was another. But to have the god unexpectedly appear in the flesh—and Xochipilli was known to be capricious—was enough to turn even the strongest man’s bones to water. The single meeting he’d had with the Flower Prince’s high priest gave him no reassurance now. He rubbed the side of his claw against Teomitl’s neck, the only sort of comfort he could give.

Zolin led them up the temple steps. As before, the other priests of Xochipilli scurried out of the way as they passed, but now Acatl knew why. The closer they got to the central chamber, the warmer the air got and the fiercer their blood pounded; by the time they neared the top, Teomitl was staggering like a drunkard and panting as he fought to control his limbs. Acatl nearly fell off his shoulder twice, legs spasming; the effects of Xochipilli’s presence were lessened in this body, but his mind had no such restraints. When they reached the top, he let himself drop off and scuttled along by Teomitl’s side.

Xochipilli waited for them inside, lounging on a bloodstained altar like a throne. The high priest whose body he was borrowing was a middle-aged man of average height, but Acatl could barely see him through the haze of his god’s power. There was gold on His hands and feet, and feathers had been shaped into brilliant bands for His upper arms. More feathers hemmed His cloak and parrot-shaped headdress; His face, beaming at the world from within the headdress’s beak, had been brightly painted with butterflies. The incense was thick enough to obscure the finer details of His form, and Acatl was glad he was so low to the ground. He knew it had to be drugged, and prayed that Teomitl could handle it.

The god was eating popcorn. As Teomitl entered and knelt, averting his gaze, He put the bowl down and laughed. It was a rich, thrilling sound, and Teomitl almost whimpered as He spoke. “I would have privacy. Leave us, all of you.” The priests attending Him did not precisely run, but Acatl had to wedge himself against Teomitl’s calf to avoid being stepped on.

And then they were alone—though Acatl was sure there was at least one priest eavesdropping on the steps outside—and Xochipilli was grinning at them with teeth like a jaguar’s. “Well now, and who might you be?”

Teomitl swallowed hard, and one hand drifted over Acatl’s back. “...Teomitl, my lord.”

Xochipilli cocked His head like a bird. “Aren’t you the Master of the House of Darts?” At Teomitl’s nod, He let out a bark of laughter. “Oh, you’re Jade Skirt’s boy! She’ll be terribly pleased, I’m sure. Whatever brings you here, pretty little thing? And with such an...interesting pet?” Now His face bore an unmistakable leer.

He could rummage through our minds at any time, but he already knows. He knows and he wants to hear Teomitl say it. Irritation cut through the warm haze in Acatl’s mind, only for it to flood back in at the next breath. There was no point in bringing such a petty emotion as mortal anger before a god, after all.

Unfortunately, he couldn’t remind Teomitl of that. “He’s not a pet,” his lover snarled. “He is Acatl-tzin, High Priest of Mictlantecuhtli.” Though even he wasn’t bold or suicidal enough to look Xochipilli in the face, he was nevertheless glaring viciously somewhere around the god’s knees. Acatl fought the urge to bury his face in his claws.

“He’s—“ Xochipilli flung His head back with a whoop, slapping His knee. It upset the bowl of popcorn, sending puffy kernels tumbling across the floor while He cackled. It went on for so long that He started to wheeze, clutching His stomach in pain as He visibly fought for air. “Oh...oh, I needed that. Does he have blood? Was he warm in your arms? Or did he just lay there like one of his corpses? Don’t be shy, don’t be shy! Tell Me everything.” He leaned forward eagerly, hands on His knees like a spectator at a ball game.

Acatl prayed that Teomitl would keep his temper. The Duality must have heard him; though Teomitl’s fists were clenched and his face flushed with fury as well as shame, his voice remained admirably steady. “We...were intimate, yes, for the first time—“

Xochipilli cut him off with a delighted cackle, clapping his hands. “You deflowered Lord Death’s High Priest! What a conquest, little warrior! Oh, oh, the Hummingbird will be so proud of you when I tell Him. Was it any good?”

“It was perfect,” Teomitl bit out. “But then I woke—and he was like this. We have come to throw ourselves on Your mercy, My Lord, and beg that you might know a way to restore him to—to his proper shape. Please.”

“...Hmmm.” The silence stretched on just long enough to be uncomfortable, and then Xochipilli shifted on His altar with a clatter of jewelry. “Restoring him is well within my power, but...ah, you ask a great favor, Teomitl.” His tongue caressed the sounds of his name in a way that made a sick, hot surge of jealousy curl low in Acatl’s gut. “What will you give me? Hymns? Sacrifice? Yourself? Will you sheathe the walls of My temples in gold? Why should I bother with men who do not worship Me?”

Teomitl closed his eyes. For a long moment, he was silent; when he spoke, his voice was as firm as any Revered Speaker’s proclamation. “You shall have my worship, my lord, and my faith. I will give you the blood of parrots, the hearts of eagles, and I will lay gold at your feet because—because I love him, my lord, more than I thought I ever could love anyone. He is the best man in the Empire, the star that guides my way in the night, and if I have been remiss in my gratitude towards You it’s only because sometimes I...I still cannot believe he loves me back.”

He flashed Acatl a brief, wry smile, but Acatl barely noticed. He knew Teomitl loved him—the man was hardly shy about showing it, tugging him aside in the street or draping over him in courtyards to whisper things so soft and gentle that they made him melt—but it was one thing to know he was loved and another for it to be proclaimed fearlessly to the Flower Prince Himself. If scorpions could blush, he knew he’d be crimson. The best man in the Empire? Me? And he cannot believe—Duality, when I am a man again I’m going to show him just how I feel.

Xochipilli sat back on His seat, clearly making a show of considering the matter. “...Oh. You are in love. Fine, then, you may have him back.” He waved a hand.

Acatl’s world was consumed by darkness and pain. It spread through his veins and over his skin like fire, separating him from all awareness of his own limbs with the same unerring precision of a sacrificial knife. He thought he was probably screaming inside his own head, but he couldn’t hear anything over the rush of his own blood and Teomitl’s panicked cry. Just when he thought he really wasn’t going to survive this—that this would be how he would die, on the floor of Xochipilli’s temple—it stopped.

For the span of a heartbeat, he couldn’t feel anything.

Awareness filtered in slowly.

“Acatl? Acatl! Say something—Acatl, please—“

He was alive, and the stone floor was freezing on his soft skin. He had an entirely normal compliment of human limbs; every inch of skin tingled with returned bloodflow, but he flexed carefully and felt the response of fingers and toes with relief. Breath filled his lungs with the scent of incense and stirred the hair that had fallen in his face. When he blinked—he could blink! He was never going to take having eyelids for granted again!—his vision started to clear, and he registered that Teomitl was hovering over him with a hand outstretched as though he was afraid to touch him.

He was also naked, but that somehow didn’t seem as important. “Mrgh.”

“Oh—“ When he tried to sit up, Teomitl sprang into action. His hands on Acatl’s arms were a relief, and then he wrapped the spare cloak around him and Acatl collapsed, boneless with the exhausted memory of agony, into his arms. Teomitl held him tightly enough to hurt, burying his face in his hair. Finally—with a faint tremor in his voice—he asked, “How are you feeling?”

He nodded before realizing that Teomitl would probably want words. It took two tries before he could produce any; his tongue felt foreign in his mouth, and the incense was starting to make his head swim. Finally he managed a rough “I’ve been better.” But I’m here. Alive. A man again, with a man’s proper form, and Teomitl’s arms around me. Nothing else matters.

Xochipilli tapped His fingers on the altar, sounding deeply smug. “See? Safe and sound.”

He sucked in a breath, coughed as the smoke stung his throat, and croaked out, “Thank you, my lord. I...do you know what caused my...transformation? I would avoid it happening again.”

The Flower Prince smirked, an expression that reminded Acatl unpleasantly of Quenami at his most self-satisfied. “You need not fear that. It was a wager with the Old Coyote, which I’m pleased to report you two have won for Me. Treat him well, Ahuizotl, and remember the old gods as well as the Hummingbird when you are Revered Speaker. Oh—and try to avoid Xochiquetzal. She might take this personally.”

Acatl couldn’t breathe. A bet? I spent two hours transformed into a godsdamned scorpion for a bet?! He’d faced down Tlaloc in His own realm, but he’d never before felt a seething desire to punch a god in the face. Only the knowledge that it would be both disrespectful and a means of certain suicide kept his fists from clenching, though the grip he had on his own cloak trembled. “...I see.”

“I—I will, my lord.” Teomitl kept his head bowed, but Acatl knew by the twisting of his mouth that he’d come to the same conclusion.

Xochipilli released His high priest like a child dropping a worn-out toy. Acatl watched as the godhood faded, the haze around the man dissipating to reveal graying hair and bloodshot, red-rimmed eyes in a face that had probably been handsome enough twenty years ago. He pulled off his headdress, shook out his blood-matted hair, and fixed them both with a tired smile. “You two both deserved a better night than what you got. I will have someone bring you a loincloth, Acatl-tzin, and some maize cakes. I’m sure you’re hungry.”

As the man spoke, Acatl realized he was hungry—and had the oddest craving for roasted grasshoppers, which he was not going to mention. “Thank you.” He still couldn’t remember the other priest’s name, but it was entirely too late to ask.

He certainly couldn’t fault the temple for its efficiency. It was the work of minutes for one of the definitely-eavesdropping priests outside to fetch him a loincloth, and the high priest himself brought them chocolate along with the maize cakes.

He also brought an apology, which Teomitl waved off. “It was hardly your fault, Nemalhuilli-tzin.”

That’s right. It was Huehuecoyotl’s and Xochipilli’s fault. Because apparently it amused them. Acatl concentrated on his chocolate, which had more vanilla than he liked but was delicious nonetheless, and tried very hard not to think about the gods using such a personal part of his life for their own enjoyment. It was embarrassing enough when he remembered Mihmatini knew about it, and now it was a topic of divine gossip. At least it wouldn’t reach Tizoc’s ears if the priesthood of Xochipilli had their way; he’d already seen a small but fervent whisper circle in the temple courtyard break up at Nemalhuilli’s glare. Their consensus seemed to be that Teomitl was a very lucky man, which was just absurd.

He and Teomitl wound up sitting on the temple steps, moonlight turning the world silver and making his lover’s hair gleam. Teomitl picked at his maize cake, and Acatl wondered what he was thinking. For his part, he only hoped he would be able to make it home before collapsing.

Finally Teomitl broke the silence between them. “What now?”

“...Now?” He didn’t need to think about it. He’d had plans and desires at sunset that were still burning, unfulfilled, in his mind. He could still feel Teomitl’s hands on him. But he remembered Teomitl’s horror at his transformation, his fear that it might not be reversed, and it stopped his voice in his throat for a moment. No. For the rest of the night, let me just hold him. “I think...we should go back to my house. Don’t you?”

Teomitl bit his lip, dropping his gaze to his sandals. “Acatl...Acatl-tzin, I…”

The maize cake he’d devoured felt like a stone in his stomach. “You don’t want to.”

“I do!” Teomitl’s face was still turned away, hands clasped unhappily together in his lap. “But—the gods have taken notice of what we have, Acatl, and I understand if you don’t want to...repeat the experience, given how it ended. I surely wouldn’t blame you.”

What. For a moment, all he could do was stare incredulously at his lover as the words filtered through his brain. “Teomitl. I intend to repeat the experience, as you put it, as many times as you’ll have me. Did you not hear the Flower Prince himself grant us His blessing?”

Teomitl’s head snapped up like a dog on the alert, eyes wide. Even in the moonlight, it was clear he was turning crimson. “Oh. Is that—you’re sure, then?”

He reached out and covered Teomitl’s hand with his own, stroking it until his tense grip relaxed. When Teomitl favored him with a sweet smile and gave his fingers a squeeze, he found himself smiling back. If I’m the stars for you, then you are the sun in my sky. “As sure as I’ve ever been of anything in my life. Take me home. When dawn breaks, I want to greet it in your arms.”

Teomitl took him home.

& &

The house in Tenochtitlan was not expecting visitors, but the young man who ambled up to its entrance-curtain, whistling a jaunty tune in the dawn mist, didn’t care about such things. He had much more important things to do. The richly dressed slave on duty, normally quick to bar unwelcome visitors, took one look at him and made himself scarce.

Bells chimed on the curtain and on his ankles as the young man entered, beaming at the older woman eating a leisurely meal of grilled frog and peppers on her dais. Unaffected by her icy glare, he sketched a mockingly elaborate bow. “Xochiquetzal, my darling!”

She’d been as beautiful as he was, once, but that had been a very, very long time ago. Now she swallowed, narrowed her red-rimmed eyes, and told him, “Leave.”

His grin took on a vicious edge. If she’d been a mortal, it would have stricken fear into her heart. “Ah, but I think you’ll love to hear this. You recall the High Priest of Mictlantecuhtli?”

She could hardly forget him. Not many men turned her down, and even fewer went on to thwart her carefully-laid plans. Still, she couldn’t imagine how he’d attracted her consort’s attention. “...That cold fish? What has he done?”

The young man’s grin grew even wider. “The Master of the House of Darts. Or perhaps Jade Skirt’s boy has done him; they were regrettably close-mouthed on the details.”

He strolled out just as the screaming started, a thrown plate whizzing harmlessly past his head.

#obsidian and blood #teomitl #teocatl #acatl #not work safe #paladin writes stuff

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julibf · 5 years

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WHY THE END OF GAME OF THRONES IS NOT WORKING FOR ME....

I told in some of my past metas, that I wrote after the show was done, why the ending was so unsatisfying and I am going to try to explain why here in some point. Its not because it was sad and heartbreaking, or some of our theories never really turned out to be true.

I am afraid to say, Its George RRM who is letting me down, not Benioff and Weiss. So lets start with the points that are making my head spin.

BRAN THE BROKEN KING

If accept Bran Stark as the final King of this story, I have to pretend I didnt read the past books A CLASH IF KINGS and a FEAST FOR CROWS, where we had very good contenders fighting for the Throne (Rob Stark, Renly Baratheon, Stannis Baratheon, Joffrey Baratheon, etc) Yes, some of those men were not so good from a moral point of view, but they brought strength, militar support, militar and political alliances, legitimate claims to the Throne...

I could go on and on and on. There is absolutely no reason for why would Yara Greyjoy would bend the knee to Brandon Stark and accept him as her leader and ruler; or the Prince of Dorne, or the Lords from the Westerlands. This choice is absolutely absurd and if you read the books you would know that picking a boy king, with no claim to the Throne or no powerful armies makes any sense at all. Whe we add the fact Bran had hardly any experience ruling or leading people during the 7 years of this story, this pic gets even more and more bizarre.Not to mention, I really dislike the idea that humans are incapable to control their own emotions, and because of that we must pick a God like creature with no emotions.

I understand George wanted a surprising ending and he wanted to go against the expectations, but this choice is an utopia. I cant get behind this choice. I am sorry.

TYRION HAND OF THE KING

Again, do I have to pretend I didnt read the books and actually know that being a Kingslayer is a very terrible sin to carry on Westeros??? Tyrion is not a beloved figure in this story, even before he killed his own father, Tywin Lannister.

Tyrion decision to kill his father, not only started the downfall of House Lannister, it also made the entire region of the Westerlands political weaker and more vulnerable to future attacks.He must be a very despised figure in the entire realm. Yet, he will be the second person in charge of Westeros??

At this point I am at loss of words. I have no idea what George is planning with this.

JON KILLING DAENERYS AS A LOVER IS A TERRIBLE IDEA.

Awful, terrible, horrible idea. Any way you slice, this was a terrible idea to end such amazing novel. Its corny, outdated and down right dangerous, considering we live in a world where females are at risk of being murdered by their male partners all the time.

This is such underwhelming decision, in a sea of underwhelming decisions that I am starting to think George was simply trying to make us all hate this ending.

We could have the realm raising in Rebelion against the Queen of Ashes; we could have second Dance of Dragons; We could have Arya using her underused superpowers as a Faceless men to kill Daenerys. No, we will have Jon Snow, still making excuses for Daenerys terrible behavior, begging her to start acting better???? telling her she will always be his queen while putting a dagger into her heart!!!

Again, this ending is coming from George himself. I cant really blame the D’s for this mess.

JON SNOW AND DAENERYS TARGARYEN ROMANCE WAS ANOTHER TERRIBLE IDEA.

Awful, terrible, horrible idea. Any way you slice, this was a terrible idea to end such amazing novel. If you dont believe Political Jon theory, then Jon Snow is just a completely fool, who fell in love with a tyrant, closed his eyes to all her terrible behavior and in the end was forced to kill the love of his life to save humanity. He is a idiot. and it breaks my heart that this is how Jon Snow will be remembered by audiences. Some people keep on telling me. “Oh, by, I dont think this is how George will write him, I think its going to be much better” But I have to say, I dont think it will.

I do believe Jon was playing Dany in the beginning of their romance and was manipulating her in order to use her dragons and armies to save the North, but I also believe that once he finds out she is his family too, he became a little torned between his Targ and Stark family. He is a family man in the end of the day and he must feel some sort of guilty for his actions towards D@ny.

I think that George will keep Political Jon hidden between the lines, just like the show did. He may write much better and be more obvious, but I dont think it will ever be revealed explicit to the audience. And this is what kills his character. If he doesnt reveal to the audience that Jon was playing Daenerys, than it seems Jon Snow never really learned anything from his past 10 years and it sucks!!

No matter how you slice it, if George will keep Jon’s actions hidden and make the audience believe he is madly in love with this entitled monster and will keep on defending her until the very end and this is the character assassination of Jon Snow.

If, he is madly in love with Dany and has to be told several times that he must kill her to save the world from her tyranny, he is an IDIOT who never learned a damn thing in his life. If he DOESNT love Dany, but out of duty still is loyal to her, and has to be told several times to kill her in order to save the world, he is an IDIOT who never fucking learns anything. I dont get what George is doing here. He is destroying the character he spend so much time bulding as a hero, but that's exactly what he wants to do it. Maybe there are NO HEROS. (what a shit message).

I wished Jon and Dany had been just allies and later became enemies. This would be a much better ending for both characters.

CHARACTERS ARCS THAT SEEMS POINTLESS BY THE END OF THE STORY....

Jaime can not put Cersei behind him and comes back to die with her in the end;

Jon Snow can never, ever, ever learn with his mistakes and is still struggling after so much pain and misery in his life, over duty and honour.

Jon Snow years and years learning to be a leader and ruler is absolutely pointless and he is sent back to the Wall, where he started???

Sansa, who dreamed about love and family all 5 novels, ends this story completely alone;

Arya, who desperate wanted to go back home since season 1, leaves once again, this time for good??? leaving her younger brother alone in the South (where Stark men dont do well), her sister alone in Winterfell and Jon all alone at the Wall. WHAT THE FUCK?????

Daenerys can never overcome her family tragedy of Fire and Blood, and becomes the monster her father was;

In fact, it seems that its impossible for humans to evolve and become better people than their parents, a God like creature must rule us all, otherwise we are lost. (I can not repeated enough times, what terrible message this ending is, and its no even true!!!!, we live in a world of no magic, and we were able to produce rules who brought us peace, progress and humanity.)

THE COMPLETE LACK OF JOY, LOVE AND HOPE....

What really got me by surprise in the end, it was how sterile and hopeless this entire story felt. George once said that he writes so much violence, deaths and rapes in his novels because it is part of real medieval life and would be a lie to avoid those themes in his books, but you know whats also real part of medieval life?? Marriages? Marriage alliances, happy normal ones, who produce children, heirs, LIFE, FUTURE!!!

Oh we had weddings on ASOIAF, but most of them ended in slaughter, death, rape, misery. I dont think we had one happy birth inthis entire story? Gilly had a child from her father rapist and Edmure was able to produce a child too, but his bride Roselin was actualy in tears when they had sex (because she was aware of the Red Wedding plans)

What a miserable tale this was. Our heros never really get to experience real joy. They never get to fullfill their childhood dreams. But they do get to be raped and abused, so, maybe thats ALL IT REALLY happened in the medieal times. Oh wait, its not tue, The War of the Roses ended with the marriage of Henry Tutor and Elizabeth of York. They had a very happy marriage and produced several children.

In our story, we dont get to have laughter, joy, happiness or hope for a future. We do get several pages of Theon being tortured and dismembered in the books; or Sansa being physically and mentally abused; or Jon being consumed by loneliness and grief. But I guess, thats all it happened in the medieval times, so..........

Funny thing is, you see, before the story started, marriages and children were a common occurence in Westeros. Ned and Cat had several children; Cersei and Robbert had 3; Lysa was able to produce a child too; The Tyrells keep on making babies, even God damn Lyanna Stark, who only spent a few months married to Rheagar, was able to had a child. What miracle, its almost like those events were normal facts in those days.

In our story, no House can produce children, even bastards!!! Jon, Theon and Tyrion had quite lots of sex during this story, yet no children was ever produced. Maybe all men in Westeros became sterile, once ASOIAF started it.

AS YOU SEE....

By the end of the day, I am disappointed in George, not really the TV show, which is even more sadder. I think he wrote a very beautiful story, but his ending is taking away all my joy for those characters and this novel. I know he wanted avoid the expected and subvert the expectations, but he is shooting his own story in their foot. And its braking my heart.

What terrible way to end such fascinating tale...

“[Bran] will be a good ruler bc he’s inhuman - which is a very depressing message. GoT was always about the struggle between human good & human evil w/in each person. Bran being king suggests that the solution to human evil isn’t human good, it’s being not human.”

ALT SHIFT X described in great words, how I felt about this ending, and you could sense his disappointment in the final message of this story too. It's was an extremely nihlistic ending. Westeros hasn't changed in facts it's worse politically.

A SONG OF ICE ANF FIRE VS LORD OF THE RINGS....

Now, lets compare this to LORD OF THE RINGS ending, who also got a bittersweet ending. Remember, George RRM is always comparing those stories and believes he is having a conversation to Tolkien.

Honest to God, in comparison LOTR looks like a Disney movie. It has a beautiful coronation ceremony, humanity came together to save the world from evil, and THEY TRIUMPHED!!!! There is JOY, LOVE, HOPE. Aragorn is King of the Reunited Kingdom, the people love and admire him (can we say the same about King Bran?) .

He marries his childhood love, Arwen and produce an heir. This brings hope and a sense of future for the reader. This story is uplifting, its inspiring, its quite frankly, a good story.

Its impossible not feel good about this story and the ending is one of the reasons this story has touched so many people, from all over the world and has remained a classic. Because, the tale of humanity coming together to defeat the evil is a theme that its always occurring in our life times. This is something that Tolkien experienced personally, having to fight in the WWII.

The nazis were defeated because several countries, put aside their differences and fought for the good of humanity and yes, it is possible. And after WWII we actually managed to achieve a lot of humans rights for several people who were considered less in the early century.

In GOT there was no joy or celebration, no weddings to form new alliances; to make peace; no births to bring new heirs, to bring a hope for the future. In fact, most wedding in the show were always associated with death and pain. Death and pain, yes, there was a lot of death and pain in ASOAIF. Thats all it has to offer the reader and viewer? Death, pain and misery??

I understand that George wanted to do the different and not give what the reader really wanted. But I have to be honest to you, in my opinion, this was a unfulfilling, uninspiring, unpleasant story. I said a few times, i have no desire to re read those long books. This story brought me no joy. And I understand that, stories are not obliged to bring us joy, but, they are supposed to make sense. And, I just dont think the ending made a lot of sense for those who read the books. Hey, maybe that was our mistake. Hee

What sad story :/

#jonsa #sansa stark #jon and sansa #season 8 #game of thrones

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the-desolated-quill · 5 years

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Doctor Strange - Marvel Cinematic Universe blog (as requested by 1000+ followers)

(SPOILER WARNING: The following is an in-depth critical analysis. If you haven’t seen this movie yet, you may want to before reading this review)

Before I start, I just want to say thank you again to all one thousand of my followers (still can’t believe it. That number just doesn’t seem real. LOL). And, as promised, here’s my review of Doctor Strange. I chose to review this movie to mark getting one thousand followers because people have been wanting me to do this review for a long time now (nearly three years in fact) and also because it was this movie, or rather my harsh criticism of this movie, that arguably cemented my reputation on this site. So here we go. Hope you feel it was worth the wait. Enjoy :)

2016. A year of ups and downs to be sure. While it will forever be infamous for the Brexit referendum result, Trump’s victory in the presidential elections and many much beloved celebrity icons dropping dead like fruit flies, it was also the year where two of my all time favourite comic book characters would finally make the jump to the big screen. The first was Deadpool. The second was Doctor Strange. Two characters I thought would never get movie adaptations on account of them both being somewhat niche products. Deadpool was a violent, anarchic parody of antiheroes like Wolverine and the Punisher, while Doctor Strange was a psychedelic fantasy story focused on existentialism and Zen philosophy as well as having its themes and influences deep rooted in various Asian cultures and mythologies. Not exactly mainstream. And yet, against all the odds, both movies found great success at the box office. The difference being Deadpool managed to stay true to the tone and themes of the source material, whereas Doctor Strange... oh dear.

Now my long term followers will be very much aware of my stance on this movie. At the time I refused to watch it due to the casting of Tilda Swinton as the Ancient One, viewing it as not only racist erasure, but also demonstrating a severe lack of understanding on the filmmaker’s part. East Asia isn’t just used as window dressing. It’s vitally important to the story as a whole, so discarding it would be incredibly moronic as well as deeply offensive. Now I’m not going to go into all the reasons why the whitewashing of the Ancient One is racist and why all the excuses Marvel gave at the time was bullshit as I’ve already explained these reasons ad nauseum various times before. If you’re curious, read Doctor Yellowface And The Bullshit Machine, where I explain it all in excruciating detail. Here I’m just going to say that this movie is racist. That’s not my opinion. It’s demonstrably, objectively, scientifically, factually and literally true. If you think otherwise, you’re an idiot. Period. Full stop. End of discussion. Do not pass Go. Do not collect £200. With this in mind, when I sat down to watch this for the first time, I expected to be angered and outraged by it throughout. But I wasn’t. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a bad movie and a bad adaptation of Doctor Strange, but honestly the most remarkable thing about this movie is how unremarkable it is. Which is a problem in more ways than one, but now we’re getting ahead of ourselves.

Lets start with the things I liked. Don’t worry. This won’t take long. There really isn’t that much to like about this film frankly. Even the bits I like have massive caveats to them.

My first shiny gold star has to go to Benedict Wong as Wong. Now as much as I love the comics, I’ll be the first to admit it has massive problems when it comes to how it presents Asian characters. So I’m pleased to report that Wong is the only aspect of the film that’s actually better than the source material. Whereas comic book Wong was Doctor Strange’s manservant, movie Wong plays more of a mentor role in Strange’s story. He’s the librarian of Kamar-Taj, guarding the sacred tomes, and is actually at a higher rank than Strange, which I love. It’s a good shift that refreshes the dynamic between them, and Benedict Wong’s deadpan delivery is exceptional. I just wish we could have spent more time with Wong and Strange. Maybe see Wong actually teach him something.

The second praiseworthy element of the film is the visual effects. This film was nominated for an Academy Award and... yeah, can’t argue with that. The CGI is fairly good for the most part. My favourite part of the whole film was when the Ancient One shows Strange the multiverse for the first time. The visual effects team clearly had a lot of fun coming up with weird and wonderful worlds that we only get a short tantalising glimpse of. (the dimension of hands gave me the shivers). This sequence came the closest to realising Steve Ditko’s vision in my opinion. Beyond that all we see for the rest of the movie is the poxy mirror dimension, which admittedly is cool at first, but quickly becomes dull and repetitive each time its trotted out. There’s even an entire fight sequence between Strange, Mordo and Kaecilius in a distorted version of New York, which would have been impressive if Christopher Nolan hadn’t done it first in Inception. And the less said about the technicolor monstrosity that was the Dark Dimension, the better.

Finally there’s Benedict Cumberbatch as Strange himself. I know some people were disappointed that Marvel didn’t racebend the character and I would have preferred that to, but if we must have a white guy in the role, I’m glad it’s Cumberbatch. He does a decent job in the role and there are moments where Strange almost leaps from the page and onto the screen.

Almost.

Because that’s the problem. Cumberbatch does the best he can, but he’s ultimately let down by the script. This film has a lot of issues, but by far the biggest is the title character. He may be called Doctor Strange, but he’s really Doctor Strange in name only. I was a massive fan of the comics growing up and I’m telling you this guy isn’t Doctor Strange. At least not the Doctor Strange I remember. And the weird thing is this seems almost by design. In order to show him to a mainstream audience, Marvel seem to have felt the need to completely sanitise the character, removing everything about him that made him unique and interesting in order to fit the expectations of the lowest common denominator.

Let me explain.

People often compare Strange unfavourably to Iron Man, and I can understand why to a certain extent. Both represent the epitome of white privilege and materialist obsession and their origin stories focus very heavily on criticising and deconstructing these inherently selfish and unlikable characters. Iron Man is about forcing a capitalist industrialist to take responsibility for the consequences of his actions, whereas Doctor Strange is about forcing an egocentric man to care about the wider world outside of his own bubble of privilege. Both may sound similar, but there’s a key difference between the two. Iron Man’s origin revolves around responsibility whereas Doctor Strange’s origin revolves around relativity. This needs to be understood if you’re going to attempt to adapt Strange and director Scott Derrickson doesn’t seem to understand that at all.

The fatal mistake Derrickson makes with this movie is that he’s trying to make Strange like Iron Man without fully understanding what made the first Iron Man movie good and what sets Strange apart. He’s clearly hit upon the arrogant, egocentric thing, but the problem is people exhibit arrogance and egocentricity in different ways. The comics understood this. Iron Man’s arrogance takes the form of this charismatic, devil may care kind of attitude, whereas Strange’s arrogance was more along the lines of an Ebenezer Scrooge type figure. Someone who’s cold and uncaring. Someone like...

Yeah! Someone like Dr Gregory House from the TV series House M.D.

See, if Iron Man is like Elon Musk, Doctor Strange is like House. Both are arrogant, but in different ways. So to see movie Strange acting all smug and making quips and one liners just didn’t feel right. Which is not to say Strange can’t be funny. The comics had their humorous moments, but it’s not the same kind of humour as Iron Man. Strange should be more cutting. More snarky. He needs to have more of a bite to him. Instead we get the poor man’s version of Robert Downey Jr.

But wait, because it’s actually worse than that. It’s not just Strange’s personality that’s different. Our perception of him is different too. The first Iron Man movie was extremely clear in how we should view Tony Stark. The gambling, the drinking, his lack of responsibility and the way he takes his friends and co-workers for granted. We’re clearly not supposed to like him. That’s why his character arc works. We’re seeing this selfish individual realise how selfish he is and try to make amends. Strange should be similar. He’s a callous arsehole who won’t lift a finger to help someone if the case isn’t interesting enough, seeing it as beneath him. So when the car accident occurs, him getting nerve damage in his hands feels less like a tragedy and more like karma. The universe punishing Strange for his selfish behaviour and forcing him to change. In the movie however, he doesn’t seem like that at all. In fact kind of the opposite. He doesn’t object to helping his ex girlfriend get a bullet out of a patient’s head and he seems to get on well with most of his colleagues, including his ex. Sure he’s a bit of a dick, but he still seems nice enough. The only time we see his Scroogeness come out is after the accident, at which point it’s hard to hate him even after he berates his ex because he’s a decent guy who’s understandably frustrated, which absolutely should not be the case. Strange is a bastard who cares for no one but himself. We’re not supposed to like him. But Marvel and Disney are so preoccupied about getting bums on seats that they’ve actually managed to strip away all the elements that make Strange Strange.

And then there’s the origin story itself, which the film gets completely wrong. Sure the basic elements are still there. Strange, in a last ditch effort to save his hands, travels East to see the Ancient One (except the Ancient One is now in Nepal instead of Tibet because of the Chinese market, but apparently they still can’t cast an Asian person as the Ancient One even though the film no longer has anything to do with Tibet and therefore there should be no issue. Marvel are racist dicks. Case closed), but beyond that everything is changed. In the comics, the Ancient One refuses to heal Strange’s hands because he’s a selfish arsehole who deserves no pity or help from anyone, but then when Baron Mordo tries to assassinate the Ancient One, Strange does the first selfless thing he’s ever done in his miserable life and tries to warn the Ancient One despite having his mouth magically sealed shut by Mordo. Then it’s later revealed that his mouth wasn’t sealed shut at all, and that the Ancient One knew all along Mordo was planning to assassinate him and was merely testing Strange, at which point he invites the good doctor to practice magic in order to stop Mordo in the future. In the movie however, Strange gets kicked out by the Ancient One only to then promptly get let back in after banging on their front door for several hours and gets taught all these spells despite showing no sign of selflessness or willingness to change whatsoever. Oh yeah, and Strange and Mordo are now total besties.

Do you see what I mean about this being a bad adaptation? There’s no longer any conflict. No character arcs. No one learns anything. Everything is just hunky dory and Strange is just magically a good person now. This is truly shit writing.

Everything about this movie seems to have been designed to be as bland and uncomplicated as possible. All the Asian influences and philosophies have been surgically removed to make way for a generic, knock-off Hogwarts for Dummies. The interesting plots and themes have been replaced with a by-the-numbers save the world plot. Even the lore has been simplified to an almost insulting degree. Take the Eye of Agamotto for instance. A powerful magical artefact created by and named after the most powerful sorcerer that ever lived.... reduced to a fucking Infinity Stone.

Oh and the Cloak of Levitation now has a mind and personality of its own because why the fuck not? Who wants to watch something intelligent or philosophical? Lets just make a shitty cross between Harry Potter and Mr. Bean.

And then... there’s the white saviour stuff.

Now I confess I haven’t read the comics for quite some time, so correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m pretty sure Strange didn’t have a photographic memory. Yet in the movie, that’s the convenient explanation we’re given for why Strange is somehow able to learn complex spells in a matter of days. Spells that are apparently meant to take years to learn, like astral projection and time manipulation. Now the comics had this problem too, what with proclaiming that Strange is not only the Sorcerer Supreme, but the most powerful Sorcerer Supreme that’s ever lived, as though his white skin were like the star power-up from Super Mario Bros, but the movie seems to go out of its way to double down on this bollocks. Oh sure, we see him struggle to create magic portals every now and then, but it doesn’t hide the fact that he’s somehow able to create mirror worlds and time loops despite having little to no training whatsoever. He’s like Rey from Star Wars. He can just pull any random super power out of his arse when the script requires him too.

So having completely botched Strange’s characterisation and journey, how are the rest of the supporting cast? Well like I said, I like this new Wong, even though he’s criminally underused. As for the other characters, it’s a pretty forgettable bunch.

Lets start with the elephant in the room. Tilda Swinton. Having heard all the excuses under the sun as to why Marvel and Disney simply had to cast a bald white woman wearing a bathrobe in an Asian role, I was expecting something pretty spectacular from Swinton, especially after all the praise critics gave her. Instead we get... well... a pretty dull character actually. In fact I’d go as far to say that this is the blandest and most uninspired performance I think I’ve ever seen Swinton give. There’s just nothing there. Now admittedly the Ancient One wasn’t all that complex or well developed in the comics neither, being little more than a racial caricature, but I thought the whole reason they whitewashed the character was to make him/her ‘enigmatic and ethereal.’ Instead we just get the same generic mentor figure we’ve seen dozens of times before. All the stuff about her tapping into the powers of Dormammu to increase her lifespan could have made her more interesting, but the film never fully capitalises on this revelation before she kicks the bucket.

Baron Mordo is pretty much just dead weight, with the great Chiwetel Ejiofor utterly wasted in the role. He’s essentially reduced to being yet another black sidekick for the white lead. Again, the comic book version isn’t all that great neither, but the movie replaces this camp pantomime villain with absolutely bugger all. We don’t get to see any real conflict between him and Strange until the very end and even then it doesn’t really make sense. Mordo is a stickler for rules and so gets pissy with Strange when he breaks the rules in order to save the world, to which I can only ask... what else could he have done? I didn’t see you come up with any bright ideas Mordo, you fucking moron.

Rachel McAdams... exists.

Seriously, why is she in this movie? Why does Doctor Strange need a love interest? Why not just wait and introduce Clea? I could get behind using an ex girlfriend to display how selfish and narcissistic Strange is (a bit cliche I admit, but this is an MCU film we’re talking about. I’m not exactly expecting Citizen Kane here), but as I said before, the two seem to get on quite well. And other than stitching up a stab wound, Christine Palmer pretty much does nothing throughout the majority of the film. So what is she even doing there?

Also it appears the film’s racism doesn’t just extend to Asian people because it turns out Christine Palmer is actually Night Nurse in the comics. The same mantle Claire Temple has, who appears in Marvel’s Netflix shows. Not only does this come off as quite alarmingly racist, it’s also just plain weird. For all their boasts about wanting to create a shared universe, Marvel seems to spend every opportunity it can find to keep the Netflix stuff at arms’ length, to the point where you question why they’re even in the same continuity in the first place. If Strange must have some human connection, why couldn’t it have been Claire Temple? For one thing, Claire’s character is much more interesting than Christine’s (and Rosario Dawson is a much better actor than McAdams. Sorry, but it’s true), and it would be a great opportunity to bridge the gap between the movies and Netflix shows without having to bog the narrative down with exposition. But as I’ve said numerous times in the past, Marvel are more interested in creating a BIG shared universe than a coherent one.

Finally there’s the villains. Nearly always the worst aspect of any MCU film and Strange is no different. We have Kaecilius, played by Hannibal’s Mads Mikkelsen whose performance is more wooden than Pinocchio, and Dormammu, played by Benedict Cumberbatch who seems to be competing with Andy Serkis as to who can play the most CGI/motion capture characters. Both, unsurprisingly, are shite. Kaecilius wants to save the world from death by allowing Dormammu to destroy it.

I don’t get it either.

So you’re probably wondering who was Kaecilius in the comics. I mean I’ve explained everything else, haven’t I? And honestly, I haven’t the faintest idea. Turns out he was a henchman of Baron Mordo who I completely forgot about because he barely ever shows up in the comics. So... they turned Baron Mordo into the black sidekick so that the villain could be played by a white guy. Oh. And guess what race Kaecilius is in the comics.

YYYYYep. He’s Asian. I guess all the Asian actors were sick that day, so they had to cast a white guy.

Oh and you’ll never guess what his backstory is. You’re right! He has none! Other than references to some tragedy, we know absolutely fuck all about him. Critics actually liked this movie?!?!

Oh and don’t get me started on the humour.

Kaecilius: “Mr...?”

Strange: “Doctor.”

Kaecilius: “Mr. Doctor?”

Strange: “No, it’s Strange.”

Kaecilius: “I guess so. Who am I to judge?”

Dear God, someone was paid to write that.

Then there’s the Big Bad Dormammu from the Dark Dimension. (Yes, the same Dark Dimension from Agent Carter and nope, that’s never referenced. In fact this doesn’t even look like the same Dark Dimension as the one from Agent Carter. Although, to be fair, I’d want to forget Season 2 happened as well considering how fucking terrible it was, but come on guys!). In the comics Dormammu is a mystical entity that has a quote ‘unnatural obsession with our material universe’. Could be interesting to explore. Oh but I forget, this is an MCU film. They don’t want interesting. They want safe. So instead we get a purple, floating CGI head and the generic destroyer of worlds archetype. (In fact Dormammu weirdly has more in common with Galactus than the actual Dormammu. Sometimes I wonder if anyone at Marvel Studios have ever even so much as glanced at one of their own comics before).

In conclusion, is this the worst film I’ve ever seen? Admittedly no. It’s not that bad. If you switch your brain off, I can imagine someone having a good time with this film. But you see that’s the problem. You shouldn’t have to switch your brain off to enjoy Doctor Strange. If anything the opposite is true. The comics, despite their faults, were intelligent, surreal and thought provoking, asking questions about our universe and our place within it. Steve Ditko (and only Steve Ditko. The late Stan Lee may have put pen to paper, but it was ultimately Ditko’s ideas and vision, which makes the gratuitous Stan Lee cameo in this film particularly galling to me) created something truly captivating in Doctor Strange. Despite the racial caricatures and white saviour tropes, I still love these comics because of how it explores the world and our relation to that world. How we are just small cogs in a massive and intricate machine. It’s truly groundbreaking and would influence many other comics to come. The Doctor Strange movie doesn’t even begin to do that. It won’t influence anyone. It won’t make anyone think or question their role in the cosmos. In fact, three years later, despite being a huge box office success, it’s largely been forgotten. And that’s a crying shame because Strange deserves so much more.

Doctor Strange may not be the worst comic book movie ever made, but it’s a terrible adaptation of the source material. Anything that made it unique or interesting was carefully removed with surgical precision under the guise of making it more progressive, when in reality they just wanted to make it profitable. But profitable doesn’t mean good, and Doctor Strange doesn’t even come close to being a good movie. I would love to have seen what a director like David Lynch or Ang Lee would have done with this psychedelic material. This movie could and should have been the most intelligent and surreal comic book movie that’s ever been made. A perfect opportunity to allow a visionary filmmaker to go wild and express themselves artistically. Instead it’s just another MCU movie. It’s such a shame.

And people wonder why I’m worried about Deadpool joining the MCU.

#doctor strange #marvel cinematic universe #review #spoilers

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