#but he shouldn't have to be morally pure/justified to do that. he just needs to be in-character

[whitestopper]

I think a problem with Isaac is that he not only doesn't do anything meaningful in his first season, but he's not given a clear trajectory for the next season by the end of it. Sahar may not do anything meaningful in her first season but we know that we have her and Imogen's friendship to deal with in the future. That rugby trio do nothing in S1 but the point in S2 is that their inaction was wrong and they have to do better (they don't actually do much better, but it's a point). Hell, Tori may not do anything plot-altering but at least she has a heartfelt moment with Charlie which allows us more insight on his mental state (specifically that he doesn't eat when he gets distressed). Meanwhile, there's nothing in S1 that really indicates what Isaac's turmoils in S2 will be, since he's not bothered by the coupling-up taking place in his friendship group nor his general place as a platonic nth-wheel.

[bright-hope-spot-19]

All right, so I was thinking about the sand sibs, as one does, and one thought crossed my mind. Now, we know that of all the kids from Naruto's generation (so, the Konoha rookies + the sand sibs). Gaara is the one with the highest body count (of people he's killed). This all led me to think about the kids (excluding the adults), which ones I feel like, would have the bigger body counts, and most kills after Gaara. This is pure speculation, but I felt like ranking them, from whom I feel, has the most kills to who has the least.

1- Obviously Gaara. Needs no explanation. We all know how unhinged he was in the chunin exams. His is probably in the quadruple digits, if not more. I even feel like his bc could even match Kakashi's, and Kashi has also been trained to kill since he was like, 5 or 6 years old.

2- Sai. Surprising, I know. Now, I didn't know whether to include him or not, cause he was introduced in Shippuden after all. But I like Sai, so here he is. The reason he takes the 2nd spot right after Gaara is cause he was part of Root Anbu, I belive it was the section that was under Danzo's command, and they did most of the village's dirty work. I imagine Sai would've also been trained to kill from a very young age, where most of the other kids were still at the academy, in what would be the last of their innocent years. That's why he's here. He's been trained to be an obedient killing machine by the state, from a very early age, and does so without flinching or hesitation.

3- Kankuro and Temari. Now, it shouldn't be weird that Gaara's siblings are this high. After all, there is the joke that "Gaara did have the excuse of having a demon whispering bloody murder in his head for years, to justify the way he turned out. Kankuro and Temari are unhinged just because they think it's funny." Now, seriously, it just makes sense that having grown up with Gaara, they'd also be bloodthirsty and unhinged. The scene of Temari happily waving goodbye to Gaara's victims in the forest of death comes to mind. Both of them were also shown to have very low empathy at the beginning, and don't hesitate when it comes to threatening or harming others. They even seem to take joy in it. If I had to declare a tiebreaker, tho, I'd say Kanks is slightly higher, if only cause Temari did end up becoming an ambassador very early on in Shippuden, which would mean she'd be going to less missions, and kill less people as a result. To be the village's liason to the rest of the world, she does need to keep a very 'neat' reputation after all. Other villages aren't going to trust Suna or form alliances with them if their ambassador is a sadistic killer. Kank, on the other hand, has no role that forces him to keep his reputation neat and proper, so he feels free to go feral, killing as many people as he sees fit, for Gaara's and the village's safety. I'd say both of them have a body count in the double digits, at the minimum. Like, Temari's would be 50+ while Kanks would be in the 60s.

4- Tenten. Now, hear me out. Tenten isn't the kind of character you'd imagine would be so high on a list like this. Most people would imagine that, from Team Gai, Neji would be the highest ranked one. I think it makes sense, in retrospect. Neji and Lee do seem like the kind of soldiers who'd have some kind of 'moral code' against killing people on missions. Lee, as we know, would never, even if the bad guys in question deserved it, and Neji would only ever kill in self-defense if there's no other option. Tenten seems like the kind of fighter who wouldn't adhere to these same morals and wouldn't really care if she ended up killing a few people on missions, whether it be by accident or not. She's a weapons mistress, after all. She's trained herself to do as much lethal damage as possible with her weapons. If she hits a guy and he dies, I'd imagine her reaction would be akin to a shrug of the shoulders, followed by a "Well, this is life, we are ninja after all", with Lee and Neji watching surprised in abject horror in the background. Anyways, it'd be funny if she also ended up forming a rivalry with Temari over this, with them being the two girls with most kills. Just two girlies, discussing their most recent kills.

5- Sasuke. I wasn't really sure where exactly to rank him. On the one hand, he was a rogue ninja, painted as a 'bad guy' for most of the series, but on the other; the only people I think he's ever really killed, were: Danzo, Itachi, and Orochimaru. And I think Orochimaru was brought back by Kabuto. I don't remember how, but he did. Ultimately, we all know that deep down, Sasuke isn't a bad person and would never kill without reason, especially innocent people, cause he knows what that feels like. But also, I think that he might've amassed a high enough body count in the time he was under Orochimaru's tutelage, of people who'd either cross him or Orochimaru. I think ultimately, intent and will are what matters, and Sasuke is fully capable of killing in cold blood if someone gets in the way of his goals. That doesn't make him a truly bad person, per say, just shows the effect his childhood trauma had on him.

6- Sakura. This is another one people would expect to be near the bottom of the list. With Sakura, I view her as a very special case. Most of the time, she doesn't kill on purpose or with the intent to kill. She's just so strong and hits so hard that she kills people without meaning to. Also, Sakura can also be unhinged and feral, and if she gets really angry in a battle, I can imagine she'd hit with the intent to kill or break a few bones. I imagine if team 7 are on a mission, and they come across someone who disrespect any of her loved ones: Sasuke, Tsunade, Naruto, Kakashi, etc, she will want to punch that person in the face, not caring if it puts them in the hospital or the grave. Also, she's a doctor. So, she's gotta know like the most creative ways to kill a person without leaving a single trace, which is terrifying to think about.

7- Shino and Kiba. Yeah, another tie. All I gotta say about them is that they do give off those vibes. After all, team 8, I imagine, would be very widely known amongst the other genin teams as the 'the team of freaks' and for very good reason. They are weirdos, and they're proud of it. Part of it is how much they enjoy every time they're given a mission to eliminate or kill someone. As a mostly tracker team, they don't usually get any real 'dangerous' missions where they have to get their hands dirty. Whenever they do, though, I can imagine Kiba would be pumping his fists in the air and hollering, and Shino would just shrug his shoulders in that detached way that is so very characteristic of him. The reason I didn't lump Hinata in with them is cause, sadly, I imagine her being way more gentle and less excited about the prospect of killing. Kiba has that animal instinct deep in him that gets him excited at the mere thought of tasting blood, and Shino simply doesn't care. He does what he has to in order to accomplish the mission. That's why they're in here.

8- Neji. Here's our resident Hyuga prince. Relatively low on the list, I'm aware of that. I think that the fact he tried to kill Hinata in the chunin exams has twisted people's perception of him. The way I see him, he's not one who enjoys killing or resorting to it. His circumstances in the chunin exams were different; he had his own unresolved trauma then, to deal with, which is what pushed him to get his anger out on her: the main representative of the Hyuga clan's highest branch. He was angry and confused then. Under normal circumstances, Neji is actually pretty nice to be around, I imagine. He can be a little cold and callous but never does it with malice. He just says what he's thinking. As I've said in the Tenten section, he'd only ever kill as a last resort to defend himself and his loved ones. Even then, he'd still treat his victims with respect, especially if they were strong opponents, and had good enough reasons to do what they did. I imagine he'd have a very philosophical view on life and death that'd make him view death as a 'natural part of life, something inevitable'. And that 'no matter how high and mighty one is in life, in death, the grim reaper sees no difference between the mighty and the weak." You know the kind of things he'd say.

9- Naruto. It's very funny for the titular character to be this low, I know. By all means and purposes, Naruto should be near the top, maybe even in 2nd place, right after Gaara, because of all the deaths Kurama has actually caused. Now, I don't think that's fair. Gaara is at number 1 because the circumstances he lived in, with no one to offer love or safety, giving himself up to the influence of his tailed beast, was the only option, if he wanted to stay alive. Naruto, on the other hand, is shown to be a lot better at controlling his tailed beast and not falling under its influence. Also, the fact he had Iruka in his life, who's pretty much the reason he didn't turn out like Gaara. Naruto would only ever kill, in the very rare circumstances, he's so, so angry he literally unleashes Kurama's power willingly. Which I imagine would only be if Sasuke's life is at stake. Now, he cares bout the rest of team 7 too, but I can only imagine him unleashing Kurama with killing intent if it's to defend Sasuke or his honor. Other than that, he's pretty much the kind of sunshine who feels terrible every time he hurts someone. He's not one to resort to violence. When he does, though, he can be terrifying.

10- Ino-Shika-Cho. Yeah, all three of them are here, lumped together. They're a team who work together, after all. If one of them has killed someone, then it's because the other two helped as well. As all things go, if I had to say who'd have the highest bc, it would be Shikamaru. I mean, the scene of him killing Hidan in such a rad and emotionless way paints a very different picture of him. Also, spending time with Temari and her brothers might've also played a role in 'toughening him up' and just made him more willing and accepting of the idea of killing his opponents without much complaining, if need be. Ino, in general, doesn't like getting dirty, but she also won't complain if they're on a mission, Shikamaru comes up with a plan, and for the plan to work, they need to get rid of someone. She'd be like, "aight. Tell me what to do, let's get rid of them fuckers real quick." Chouji tho, would be the one to feel the most remorse, and need the most convincing if they need to kill someone. He'd still feel terrible right after and insist that "guys, we've actually killed that person." I also imagine killing someone on a mission might be the only thing strong enough to make him lose his appetite. Shikamaru and Ino would be surprised the first time it happened, when they had to kill someone together as a team, and they go for BBQ and they're eating normally, while Chouji isn't even touching his food, still thinking about their actions. We still love him anyway.

11- Hinata. Near the bottom, as expected. Now, I know there's people who enjoy the characterization of her as a feral, unhinged, little freak, just like her teammates, but I don't think it really fits her. She never even really wanted to become a ninja, the killing life ain't for her. Whenever they have to kill someone on a mission, Kiba would be vibrating from excitement, Shino would accept it as a normal part of his job, while Hinata would be even more silent and nervous than normal. I think having grown in the Hyuga clan, where it's the norm for the main branch to torture and even sacrifice the members of the secondary branch, she'd develop an aversion to all forms of harming people. She's seen enough of it already. She doesn't want to go through it and be the one doing it, too. She normally asks Kiba and Shino to do the actual killing part of the mission while she just stands as guard for them, scouting the area with her Byakugan, so they won't be caught in the act. Shino and Kiba are okay with it. They understand her feelings and always try to keep her as far as possible from anything, even remotely involving killing, usually giving her other roles where she'd feel safer. Needless to say, she's happy to have left the shinobi life behind after becoming a mom. I'm not shaming her for it. Good for her that she found what makes her happy.

12- Rock-Lee. Of course, he's dead last. Now, people might argue that he should've been higher because in his epic chunin exam fight against Gaara, after he opened the gates, and started absolutely kicking Gaara's ass, it really did seem like he was hitting to kill. I don't think that's the case. Lee is as averse to killing as a ninja can get and cries every time they have to do it. He's always begging Neji, and especially Tenten, to control themselves in battle cause "it's not necessary to kill." To the point Gai had to take him once in private, and give him a talk, that no, actually, as a ninja sometimes it's okay to kill for your safety and that of your comrades. Lee would be horrified once Gai sensei tells him that he has, in fact, also had to kill people in the past. It takes him a long time to accept that fact and still tries to avoid that outcome as much as possible. Literally, it takes his entire team begging him, cause "if you don't kill the enemy, they'll kill you!" For him to go along with it. That's how I imagine him anyways.

Pheww, and that would be all. A very long list, but I hope my opinion doesn't offend anyone if you think any of the characters should've been lower or higher.

[emblemxeno]

Man I hate the fire emblem fanbase so much it is hurting my enjoyment of the games. They can nitpick every little thing about Engage's and Fate's story, but watch out if you point out that Edelgard blaming the church for her experimentstion and not, y'know, her uncle who she KNOWS is an Arganthan, or how it doesn't make sense that the disappearance of 9 royals was swept snugly under the rug in the empire, or how Jeralt was suspsicious of Rheas doing to Byleth what she did to HIM, and suddenly you're a "hater" and "you have bad taste" and " lack media literacy".

3houses has the same storytelling issues Fates and Engage have, but bc the game has big tiddy lesbians and "I can fix them" traumatized characters = best JRPG since FF7. Fuck right off bruh. I'm so tired.

It does lend a lot of chances to be hypocritical in the fandom yes.

For as much as people can hate about Engage's time travel and magic stuff, or anything regarding Valla in Fates, at least those are purely fantastical. Does it erase the problems? No. But "magic world has magic things that don't need to always be explained in great detail" is-or at least should be-a sufficient explanation.

3H's issues, meanwhile, are almost always logical, informative, and communicative. Edelgard's war is predicated on logic jumps built upon exaggerated issues, an inflated ego, a savior complex, and half truths, and she herself is a canonical liar and manipulator. 3H's worldbuilding is based upon taking NPCs, books, and character biases as fact, despite there being known cover ups in Fodlan's history; to the point where it's not even fully known whether the other Hresvelg siblings actually exist. Jeralt is supposed to be 100% trustworthy as your dad, but being vigilant means you'll probably realize he's kind of shit and did a poor job properly teaching Byleth growing up.

Fates might have the Valla curse and a magic truth throne, but those things have a simple A -> B explanation and impact on that game's plot. It's easy to criticize because it's easy to understand.

3H on the other hand, you have to constantly twist yourself into a pretzel in order justify every angle and every motivation for every character in the game, mostly in service of not overly shitting on Edelgard's character, which usually results in kowtowing to her fans by shitting on Rhea, Dimitri, the church and Faerghus or, in my eyes, giving up and claiming "no one's completely in the right and that's why the story's good in the first place!"

From my perspective, if this happens, where someone can't form a rock solid opinion on even just how they personally feel/think about the writing, then either they need more time to themselves instead of online discourse or (where I lean) the writing they're discussing simply isn't that good enough to warrant engaging with its bad faith fans.

Side tangent that doesn't really fit but I wanted to say it anyway: Other FE games' moral dilemmas worked as well as they did because they were ornamental; a spice to the main emotional and thematic thrust of what their stories were trying to convey. Even the more complex examples like the Tellius and Jugdral games, weren't trying to sell their stories based on "look how complex and morally gray everything is", they were natural elements of war stories that supplemented the more major storytelling beats (Tellius' discrimination aesop, religious and political dogma, class warfare, and Jugdral's geopolitical inheritance feuds and territorial disputes, blood quantums, and passing the torch to the next generation).

3H's main drive... is the moral grayness. War horrors, comparisons between peace time and conflict, and constant conversation over "what the other side's justification is" while trying to "fix Fodlan." And the sloppy, fractured, and overly bleak attempts at nuance exemplified in the story is precisely why moral grayness shouldn't be the main factor. But people ate it up because... well, the prose wasn't too shabby I guess.

[acoldghostlypresence]

An exhaustingly long list of California Slim and Alcatraz headcanons

General:

In the Epithet universe everyone speaks one global language, but in RSR they introduced the concept of old world languages to justify Cragior's accent. This isn't cannon but I'm adopting it purely so that Slim can swear a people in old world Italian.

I've also decided the boys are from Island country because of course they are, its themed around the mafia for fucks sake. Specifically they're from an island called Chaparral since California doesn't exist in the Epithet universe.

•Most criminals will reconsider robbing you if you claim to have an epithet so the fact that Cal and Al specialise in cleaning up inscribed makes them very sought-after. They have a very consistent cash flow but still live like Daniel Dancer, childhood financial insecurity will do that too you.

Alcatraz:

Al is like 2 degrees of separation away from a living statue and acts like it. He's almost incapable of being bored, he'd be perfectly fine standing dead still on display for years at a time (though he'd probably still prefer to be doing something other than that), and though he can't sleep, at night when there's nothing for him to be doing he will go dormant in this manner to conserve energy.

On a related note he doesn't emote much naturally, but he intentionally exaggerates his reactions when around people because he doesn't want to seem intimidating. A 6 foot something suit of armour with no facial features is hard to read after all.

Since he never actually sleeps or looses consciousness when Slim's asleep and Al's left in the hotel alone Slim leaves the comedy channel on for him. Its the only channel that will be reliably showing the same thing all night and not suddenly leave Al unable to change the channel when a scary movie comes on. As a side effect its the cause of Al's interest in stand up comedy.

Isn't technically made of any metal, he's pure magic pretending to be a suit of armour. If you pointed an industrial magnet at him it wouldn't affect him at all until he turned around and noticed it was there, similarly Ramsey's powers only work on him if Ramsey announces what he's trying to do so that Al know how to play along. He also forgets he's supposed to rust for months at a time only to step in a puddle and be stiff and struggling to move a hour later.

To be clear this isn't something he can control, it's pure epithet instinct to fit into people's perception of him. This is also why he's randomly Scottish.

Part of the reason he's so willing to go along with Slim's bullshit is because of how he lost Bev. He's not about to let down another sibling even if that means compromising his morals.

Even though Alcatraz the sentient moral compass didn't exist until after Bev died, Alcatraz the magic suit of armour very much did. Bev would ask Slim to summon him just so she could play dolls with him, he'd always be the knight that had gotten into trouble on his noble quest and she'd be the princess who'd have to go out to save him. Al remembers every single one of the adventures even the ones Slim wasn't present for.

When Slim was available for these play dates he'd be the dragon Al need saving from.

California Slim

As much a Slim never wants to admit to ever having relied on his epithet, he was still using it for the first 17 years of his life and that experience still does colour his image of himself.

Most notably Al has healing abilities which means at some point Slim had healing abilities, healing abilities that allowed him to shrug off injuries that would have sent other kids to the hospital. That combined with his naturally high pain tolerance means he regularly neglects to seek medical attention when he should because he thinks he shouldn't need it.

Hospitals are where you go when you are weak and vulnerable! And Slim's never vulnerable and especially not weak, in fact he's strong as hell! He can take anything! He can handle himself just fine! He knows first aid!

The list of medical issues he's currently ignoring includes:

Chronic nose bleeds. Al came out his nostril and permanently fucked it up a bit, plus his high blood pressure means even sneezing can set him off on a bad day.

High blood pressure. Canonically he straight up doesn't believe the doctor who told him this, quote: "If my blood really was pressurised theoretically I could just slit my wrist and use it to squirt blood at people." He should probably be taking medication for that, or at least cutting back on smoking.

Fatigue. The stamina cost for his abilities and Al's come out of the same stamina pool and being the one with a physical body Slim's the one who feels that harder. He's constantly tired and running on coffee and spite. The switch from "night shifts" to the strictly regimented prison lifestyle is not helping.

He's lost all hearing in his mauled ear. He's been successfully ignoring this the longest but it's becoming increasingly evident he needs hearing aids. He needs the captions on for everything and regularly struggles to keep up with conversations, he's only been going out at night for ages now just to avoid big, overwhelming crowds that make it impossible for him to tell where a sound is coming from. Any attempts to bring this up to him are quickly shut down, it's sunk costs at this point.

He's always either completely apathetic to everything and won't move from his hotel for days or extremely switched on and ready to fight anything and everything that moves. The only consistency between these two moods in his putting off eating to a nebulous later that never comes.

One day in the future a treasure hunter will dig up California Slim's buried mafia treasure and they will find a metal box filled completely with old baseball cards and cool novelty knives he's never used.

There's a betting pool in the prison based around guessing Slim's real name, the punchline is that California is his real name. He's actually been introducing himself as California, Slim (as in "Hi I'm California, most people call me Slim") and everyone just misheard him. Slim is unaware of the confusion.

His full name is California Holmby Hills, Holmby Hills being the neighbourhood right next to Beverly Hills to keep with the theme.

When Bev was alive Slim would be the one to do her hair, he'd do her bow up every morning before breakfast. As a adult Slim only wears a tie specifically to have something to put a knot in while he waits for the coffee to boil.

[dalesramblingsblog]

OK conversely to my rant about The Disease, I have to confess that I... do actually quite like Cogenitor. Like, I understand why people have such a visceral reaction to it, I really do. The dialogue around gender is, well, it's a very 2003 understanding of gender; Archer's condemnation of Trip's actions is very tough to stomach, and it's easy to read the episode as a straightforward agreement with that condemnation.

But I think a *lot* of the discourse surrounding this episode really fails to take into account that the issues of moral relativism and unilateral intervention here have a very specific resonance for the world of April 2003. In a world where right-wingers were constantly bringing up the plight of women and girls in countries like Afghanistan and Iraq purely to justify an opportunistic imperialist invasion, Trip's actions were very pointed.

And, like, for all that people really like to say that Trip was made out to be the villain of the piece, I... really don't think he was? He's shown to have slipped up, yes, but I think the episode is actually remarkably clear in showing every step of his thought process, and how the values traditionally associated with Star Trek led him to the conclusions he made. The fact that so many viewers empathised with him enough to feel outraged at Archer's closing speech *IS VERY MUCH THE EPISODE'S POINT*.

The point is not "You are wrong, viewer, for feeling the same way as Trip, and while we're at it you shouldn't protest the treatment of women by the Taliban btw." It's something a lot more nuanced, and frankly for an episode produced just a month after the Iraq War began - even though Trip's actions are obv far less severe - it's actually a rather bold indictment of American foreign policy and the tendency to assume that the global south is just full of backwards villains who need a rugged square-jawed good old boy from the South to liberate them.

(For the best illustration of how warped the discourse around this episode is, look no further than the person who claimed that Cogenitor exemplified Enterprise's inheritance of the post-9/11 political climate. Which really doesn't jive with the whole "It's a polemic against meddling in other cultures because 'muh moral relativism'" narrative, unless you're seriously under the impression that the dominant response to 9/11 was "Actually, we shouldn't invade the Middle East because morals are relative." And frankly if that really is what you think well then that's fucking precious. Like, babe, do you even *know* who Donald Rumsfeld was?)

[tenaciousdecapitator]

Entrapta, like Catra, has all the foundations for a corruption arc. Pre-existing deviance, a solid motivation for revenge, climbing up the enemy ranks until she is the head boss's left hand, and then gaining powet over Hordak himself. Like many villain scientists she assists and joins with the good guys from time to time.

What makes Entrapta different is that, through all of this, she ISNT a mastermind, morally grey ends justifies the means scientist. She is in fact a complete cinnamon roll who's hurt by what happened but doesn't hold a grudge at all and has joined the villains because they gave her sense of belonging, and a place to foster her love of science. So you have the top dog villain at the start of season 3 when shes finally got power over Hordak, and she's using it to tell him to love himself, to show him that our flaws are what make us beautiful and they shouldn't be masked, especially if we need help. And in season 5 she's not the sneaky ex villain getting a questionable redemption, she's literally leading the front lines in terms of converting people to the Rebellion, pulling one clone of a million clones out from under Prime and immediately being able to connect with him, being the one to tell Prime to his face he will never understand love, wrecking his brainwashing network, her connection with Hordak leading to Prime's death.

It's... so OPPOSITE to Shadow Weaver, who joined the rebellion about the same time Entrapta overtook Catra in the horde and then disappeared. Weaver has the standard "redemption" arc but doesn't learn a damn thing in her life, has no humility, and is constantly fucking with people's heads underneath her silver tongued words, all stuff Entrapta literally cannot do.

So you have this very compassionate pure of heart character influencing the iron cold leader of the villains, and this incredibly manipulative abusive character influencing the leaders of the heroes.

I think it's interested how shera plays so hard with tropes.

Yes! Exactly! One of my favorite parts about Entrapta’s character is that, in seemingly direct contrast to Shadow Weaver who looks, talks, and acts like a fairy tale Disney villain evil witch 24/7, with even her attempted ‘redemption martyr moment’ just piling more mental scars onto her surrogate daughters,  everything that we’re presented with in the first few minutes System Failure gives us the idea that Entrapta is this typical (albeit sweet-toothed) Mad Scientist soon-to-be-if-not-already-villain. She lives in a classically evil scary castle on a mountain, it’s full of traps, secret passageways, and (conveniently timed) robot zombies, and there’s mutants in the sewers apparently?!? Especially since some fans know her old incarnation was a shallow villain, once she finally crawls out of a vent like a goddamn Xenomorph with welding mask eyes glowing with menace the audience thinks they have her character figured out, and then she subverts these expectations by greeting our heroes with a genuine, cheery, hospitable welcome that still acknowledges the immediate danger they’re facing and her direct involvement in it. And ever since then, all she’s wanted to do is help people and do science (and hopefully make friends with people by doing those two things). Even when she learns She Ra’s most direct and effective weakness, even when she’s given the chance to use that weakness *again* after she thinks the BFS and Princess Alliance left her for dead, she still doesn’t take the opportunity to go full "They laughed at my experiments, but now I’ll show them all! Brand New Day! Muahahahaha!” etc etc. Shadow Weaver WISHES she could’ve climbed the evil corporate ladder as fast as Entrapta did, and ironically she accomplished it by doing the exact opposite approach to SW: Being 100% genuine and honest about her opinions, knowledge, and feelings. And Hordak establishes time and time again that he hates dishonesty in his ranks (mostly because he’s not great at subterfuge and trickery himself) and gains valuable knowledge and self-worth from Entrapta’s genuine honesty. I may be forgetting something, but I’m pretty sure the one and only time Entrapta intentionally, consciously lies about something is that bit in System Failure where she find the lab and says “We’re here! Uh, I mean, of course we’re here, we were never lost.” Of course, just because she never even considers taking steps towards actual, conscious Villainy and Vengeance doesn’t mean we can’t think up AUs where she does go down that path a bit.  One concept that I’ve yet to make into a proper fic is an alternate ending to Season 5 in which she has a more active role in usurping Prime, fully disconnecting him from the other Clones before Hordak does the Darth Vader/Emperor reference, then taking over the Velvet Glove’s army of clones, droids, and drones in order to collect data on the flora, fauna, and magic of Etheria before expanding her DC Brainiac style "data collection” to the rest of the newly entered galaxy. 

anyway thanks for prompting and then coming to my Ted Talk

[merakiui]

omg yan!heizou is now consuming my thoughts 😭💞 he's so !!! and the way he'd have all the resources pretty much at his fingertips for whatever he has planned for darling, from kidnap to just keeping tabs on them and everything beyond and in-between ,,

do you think he'd have an internal moral struggle? like "i'm supposed to be with the law, i shouldn't be thinking/doing this; etc."?

i can also see him logic-ing his way through any actions he may take "what can i really do about this obsession? what if it gets worse and i act drastically? see this is why i should just act now and be rational about it," and spiraling downhill like that.

ahh he's just super cool! i adore yan detectives sm <33

What’s ironic about yan!Heizou is that he’s probably seen cases of obsession before and he knows how terrible they can potentially turn out for both the suspect and the victim(s). He of all people should know how the human mind can get when obsession plays a role in twisting someone’s morals until they’re using all sorts of crooked logic to justify their actions. He can probably sniff out the beginnings of his admiration for you. And he’ll realize rather quickly when what he thought was a simple, textbook crush soon becomes something more and he becomes entirely dependent and devoted to you. Always wanting to see you, always wanting to be near you, always wanting to make sure you’re safe and well.

Heizou knows an obsession as strong as this one will never lead to anything good, and he worries that if it continues like this—with him following you from afar, claiming he’s only doing his routine patrols (for once) or peering through your windows late at night, hoping to catch a glimpse of you because he’s following some nonexistent evidence trail—it’ll spell trouble for him. He’s lying to himself. Heizou—a detective, the law’s most reliable ally. Or so everyone believes.

He’s seen his fair share of corruption amongst those who claim to be aligned with the law. He’s not corrupt. He knows he isn’t because he’s dedicated to hunting down criminals and making them pay for their crimes. It’s all part of his job! Maybe there’s some wiggle room when it comes to you… Heizou might struggle to come to terms with his obsession and he may even try to rid himself of it, but if he’s already past the point of no return then it’s simply impossible to shed the layers of obsession. So he’ll submit to an act. It’s easy to play the part of the carefree, friendly, and intelligent detective. No one would suspect him because why would he ever do something like that? There are no visible signs that he may harbor an earth-shattering obsession. Everything is kept behind closed doors.

He wants to look at it from a logical, rational perspective. But such a perspective is too lawful. He knows he should let you live your life. He knows he should stop stalking you, utilizing his position as a Tenryou detective to see you during his supposed patrol hours. But he really doesn’t want to quit, not after he’s seen how cruel the world can be. Heizou is addicted to you. You’re just too pure-hearted and he only wants what’s best for you. That’s what his stellar intuition tells him! You need him. Perhaps you don’t realize it yet, but you will soon. And Heizou needs you, too. Just not in the ways you think.

Heizou once read that a person is most dangerous when they’re fearless, for this lack of fear allows them to do the most perilous of things. He’s not fearless and he has everything to lose, but when he looks at you he realizes it might be worth it to put everything on the line and act. He’d a detective, so he’s seen all variations of crime—both perfect and imperfect. He knows how to get inside a criminal’s head, but he’s not quite sure if he can crack this current case.

Just how can he when the criminal is himself and his mind is the most complex enigma of all?

[lemonhemlock]

What do you think about some of Asoiaf antagonists like Euron , Littlefinger , Varys , bloodraven Tywin , Roose?

some controversial opinions!

i like a lot of these antagonists actually! euron is one of my faves, absolutely unhinged and genuinely scary? one of the few undeniably evil characters george included in the books, like, i don't think euron has one redeeming quality to his name. but he's sort of mesmerizing? his actions make me sick but also leave me wanting more?? also he can be really funny and full of shit, which makes characters more enjoyable for me. love euron!!! hope lord leyton whoops his arse!!!! (fervently praying to the seven) euron is The One villain i couldn't possibly woobify even if i tried, so props to him he truly is *the one by shakira starts playing*

littlefinger & varys i can't really stand. i appreciate them for comic relief (always down for a good joke) but their meddling in westerosi affairs i find very exhausting & pugnacious. like, i realise everyone is out here for themselves, so, in that sense, them being self-serving shouldn't bother me the way it does, but i can't with these two. littlefinger is a naked opportunist and, while i can admire that trait in other characters, his sleaziness and lack of charisma put me off, so into the trash bin he goes.

varys i have an even bigger problem with. generally-speaking sanctimoniousness and moral righteousness are triggers for me and i can't really stand characters that are Like That. i legit fight with people who exhibit those traits in real life, like, i am an aries so i do not back down lol you'll die with me around your neck. there has to be something else in that character to balance out these things that annoy me, i guess, but varys didn't manage to make the cut, bc that is the entirety of his personality, i'm afraid. this may ruffle some feathers but i think that his scheme with young griff, real or not, is essentially morally bankrupt, in that he's out there role-playing the head of a research institute sending out his agents into the world to carry out this political experiment that may or may not work, but will have a huge body count regardless. it's very callously cynical to me, but he expects to be congratulated on how ideologically pure and morally unsullied he is - i think that's what drives me up the wall.

i know that people really want young griff to be real but varys' grand master plan is to destabilize a country, intentionally plunge it into a civil war that'll get a lot of people killed, in order to facilitate what would be another war of conquest undertaken under aegon vi's banners. instead of trying to actively improve the lives of the common people, since he's on the small council. he's still focusing on power plays and on plots with this brainwashed belief that he's doing it for the good of the people. but is he? he doesn't even know young griff. what if he turns out to be some bad apple; how is varys to know? idk i just cannot get behind it. and i don't think the author will eventually condone this message or plot as righteous either bc i don't see how aegon's reign will last. i think varys is the type of person dead-set in their belief that their actions are for The Greater Good in a the-ends-justify-the-means kind of way, but, ultimately what he truly cares more about is being Right TM - i.e. having his hypothesis proven to be true. clinical, cold researcher/mad scientist vibes.

for roose bolton i couldn't possibly mount a defense even if i were so inclined, but i do enjoy him as a character. i think he's very funny? lmao this sounds very obnoxious after i just tore varys a new arsehole but roose is unquestionably a villain, so there's no need to pretend like he's contributing to the good of society or anything. whereas with varys there is that element to him, perhaps why i find him annoying and roose i do not. roose has some great one-liners - he was funny in the show and he's funny on the page. absolutely awful but enjoyable for what he is.

for tywin i will not be writing any significant meta until i wrap up my last phd chapter and do a proper re-read bc i do not have energy to get into that disk horse right now. i know people hate him but yes he is one of my faves. with tywin i find that he generates three types of commentaries - either people hate his guts and see everything he does in a villainous lens or he attracts the sort of dudebro fan who idolizes the ground he walks on in a v silly way. the third way is the few people who might want to attempt to see him as more three-dimensional, but, because they don't want to get attacked, they preface their commentaries with disclaimers and apologies and messages that they absolutely do not condone his actions, so much so that the observations kind of get lost along the way. i'm neither. i want enlightened centrist meta on tywin lannister. i'm a chill tywin enjoyer, an aficionado of Machiavelli deconstructions. i'd lighten up the mood a little with my quirky takes. but anyway i don't really have time for that kind of fight and tywin himself would tell me to stop procrastinating and get my work done so i'll have to listen to Daddy i guess!!!

EDIT: oohhh i forgot about bloodraven. i'm gonna be contrarian about this one bc i really don't like it when george shoves his fave characters down my throat. i can FEEL that he really wants me to like bloodraven and the blackwoods, just like he wants me to like daemon the rogue prince. and it's annoying sorry old man. i don't think bloodraven is supposed to be written as 100% evil (george wouldn't do that to one of his faves) so his human life is supposed to be guided by some moral principles - i believe that he believed he was servicing the realm with his anti-blackfyre stance and surveillance regime and i believe that even the author intends that to be true to some extent. however, i can't say the same thing about his time as a magical tree. that's just some creepy AF shit. his luring of bran, i see that as magical corruption. bran is mostly a victim in all of this, but he is kind of tainted for me as a character now, bc i don't see how anyone could be 'redeemed' after dabbling in dark magicks like that, willingly or unwillingly. it would feel like a betrayal to how magic has been approached in the books so far - like a force you have to pay a high price for if you want to access it & not necessarily a bringer of peace and harmony either. that being said!!! if we ever got a blackfyre timeline show & bloodraven was played by this dark, sylphidine, mysterious, brooding albino twink......................i am not immune!

[sofipitch]

something that confuses me about louis/i dont have a concrete conclusion on is the fact that he is so proud of his abstinence as a vampire and moralises it constantly but when he was human he was literally the most hedonistic mf. why do you think that is?

Okay this one took me a bit to get too bc the way Louis frames it in IWTV is so insane I would look at this passage and think "Am I stupid this makes no sense" but it actually doesn't:

My thirst rose in me like fever, and I followed him. My desire to die was constant, like a pure thought in the mind, devoid of emotion. Yet I needed to feed. I’ve indicated to you I would not then kill people. I moved along the rooftop in search of rats.”

“But why…you’ve said Lestat shouldn’t have made you start with people. Did you mean…do you mean for you it was an aesthetic choice, not a moral one?”

“Had you asked me then, I would have told you it was aesthetic, that I wished to understand death in stages. That the death of an animal yielded such pleasure and experience to me that I had only begun to understand it, and wished to save the experience of human death for my mature understanding. But it was moral. Because all aesthetic decisions are moral, really.”

“I don’t understand,” said the boy. “I thought aesthetic decisions could be completely immoral. What about the cliché of the artist who leaves his wife and children so he can paint? Or Nero playing the harp while Rome burned?”

“Both were moral decisions. Both served a higher good, in the mind of the artist. The conflict lies between the morals of the artist and the morals of society, not between aesthetics and morality. But often this isn’t understood; and here comes the waste, the tragedy. An artist, stealing paints from a store, for example, imagines himself to have made an inevitable but immoral decision, and then he sees himself as fallen from grace; what follows is despair and petty irresponsibility, as if morality were a great glass world which can be utterly shattered by one act. But this was not my great concern then. I did not know these things then. I believed I killed animals for aesthetic reasons only, and I hedged against the great moral question of whether or not by my very nature I was damned.

Louis abstains from killing people in the beginning because he thinks he derives such pleasure from it that it is something he shouldn't indulge in often. For him killing humans and drinking their blood is the bottle of champagne only opened on a special occasion, the perfume you only wear on fancy occasions, etc etc. The idea of luxury, to Louis, means that it is something you shouldn't have often, and thus he abstains from killing humans. He thinks he should eat rats and work his way up the scala naturae so that he tastes the difference between a rat and cat, or a cat and horse, and finally a horse and human.

Part of why he hates Lestat is bc he sees Lestat as naturally wasteful, he doesn't savor the finer things in life, bc Lestat is ravenous after so many years without. Lestat died starving. Lestat did not have the luxury of hoping for a better tomorrow at a lot of points in his life, because of his past Lestat lives perpetually in the now bc that is all he can guarantee. So Lestat does things like kill "important" people, or order champagne in their hotel room just to look at and never drink.

However, Louis eventually gives in to drinking from and killing humans. So to justify this he makes up a new moral code to fit his own deeds. He says anything that creates pleasure/beauty is good. This is blatantly not true when you consider to him pleasure is killing people. The example he gives, an artist stealing supplies, is so low stakes he must know he is warping the situation in his favor. Even right now, what immediately comes to mind is diamonds. Yes a large mined diamond is gorgeous, but when you know people and especially children mine them in slave like conditions, how can a small beauty ever be worth the cost of suffering?

So yeah Louis is aware he is a hypocrite, he had to come up with his own new morality to justify his actions. He's the millionaire justifying jetting everywhere with "there's no ethical consumption under capitalism"

I think both the movie and TV show have individual scenes that let you glimpse this but I would have loved to hear him say this convo with Daniel out loud bc it's so insane and it would have been fun to as a fandom tear him to shreds for it

[crusherthedoctor]

Infinite, Eggman, Shadow, Sonic, Tails, Amy, Knuckles, Silver

(I apologize for dumping so many characters in here, I just really want to hear your opinions on them!)

Let's see if I can think of a divisive opinion for each of them...

Infinite: I think he succeeds as a deconstruction of Mephiles-type villains, whether that was the intention with him or not. (I think it genuinely is, unlike what Flynn likes to say about Scourge being a "parody".) They could have admittedly done more with him, and you could argue that the focus on him took away much needed time for Eggman and his conquest, but despite all that, I still like the guy, and it's probably a secret act of mercy that he's apparently not allowed to feature in IDW.

Eggman: Obvious one incoming: I prefer Eggman to actually be a villain, and a competent villain at that. This should not be a controversial statement, but here we are.

Also, while Jimbotnik is still widely beloved, I'm aware that more fans have been getting vocal about their issues with this portrayal for his differences to Game Eggman... not me though. I still wholeheartedly love this portrayal, because I believe he's similar where it counts, and the differences that do exist work to said portrayal's benefit, even if they wouldn't work as well for Game Eggman. Compare that to something like SatAM Robotnik, where I just cannot see Eggman at all.

Shadow: I'm not convinced that the Vegeta!Shadow mandate actually exists, since he wasn't all that Vegeta-esque in Forces or even TSR. With all the discussions that have resulted from it, I don't think I've ever seen any proper confirmation that didn't come from the mouth of either Flynn himself, or someone else who coincidentally has a bone to pick with SEGA.

Also, I feel that even before ShtH came along and shoehorned Black Doom Ten Packs a Day Man into it, Shadow's backstory already veered a tad too close to inappropriate territory, namely with the way certain elements were executed. Maria getting capped by the military and Gerald being executed by them is a tad too specific for a franchise like this, compared to if Maria died to her illness, and Gerald blamed G.U.N. for cutting off the funding to his efforts to create a cure.

Sonic: Certain problems that people have with Pontaff!Sonic - namely making jokes when he should be getting serious - have existed long before Colours came along. It's one thing to argue that it became more frequent by that point, but to say it never happened at all in the previous games is pure nostalgic bias. Even Unleashed was guilty of this on more than one occasion.

I also feel that people have been exaggerating how morally grey Sonic actually is. Yes, he's willing to make tough decisions regardless of how he may be judged for them, like in Black Knight. But he's still unambiguously heroic, always striving to do the right thing even when it's not the easy one, and a legitimately nice guy all the same. Occasionally making hard decisions does not automatically make him an anti-hero.

Tails: Fans that say he shouldn't be able to do as much as the big guns (Sonic, Shadow, etc) because he's "just a kid" have been influenced too much by the DBZ era of Sonic. Like it or not, Tails is the Luigi of the franchise, and he deserves to be treated as such. He's proven that he can accomplish just as great achievements as the rest, with or without a super form.

Amy: I acknowledge the importance of Amy's crush on Sonic, but I also find it to be the least interesting aspect of her. I'm much more endeared by her interactions with other characters, her endless optimism, her much-forgotten skill with tarot cards, etc.

Knuckles: I don't think the plot needs to revolve around Angel Island or the Master Emerald to justify Knuckles' appearance, but I DO think you have to be more thoughtful about whether his appearance makes sense beyond "there's a bad guy, go stop them", compared to characters with more freedom like Sonic and Eggman. Otherwise you end up with an '06 situation where he's got nothing to do, and his most triumphant moment is going the wrong direction.

Silver: For the love of god, stop handcuffing Blaze to him. Pretty please?

As well as that, one reason why I've never been all that enthusiastic about Silver is because his entire schtick creates a massive roadblock with no easy solution. This franchise is no stranger to characters with similar hiccups (Knuckles and Angel Island, Blaze and her dimension), but it's taken up to eleven with Silver due to the time travel factor. Do you have him time travel to justify his presence every single time, in order to stop yet another threat that's destroyed his future, thereby making him look like the biggest failure ever? Or do you have him cut out the middle man and stick around in the present, and risk fans complaining about losing what made him unique?

There's a lot of clutter with Silver that I can't be bothered with, and on top of everything else... meh.

[mega-ringsandthings-world]

What infuriates me about authors attempting to write war stories and the fandoms is you have the victims of these awful governments either trying to make peace with them or seeing others do it and it always fails! Either they get hurt or people lose to them do so authors/fandom please tell me what other alternatives/options they have. It just feel like one big giant victim blaming gane of how this or that character was so “angry or vengeful”. It’s like they expect these characters to just be pure blood god and surrender themselves to die hence vilifying these characters instead of providing answers to what else can they do?

The nature of war is that people will get hurt and lose to the oppressive governments in the fight against them, that at least is accurate. There is no way of fighting a safe war. The problem is that these authors bring up the idea that change is needed, but they flake out on allowing the characters to be fully justified in their fight, and they always have to introduce some aspect or argument of morality instead of just saying, "change was needed. These people fought the bitter fight and did what was necessary to change things for the better." I see too many of those catch 22s in real life, "Oh, what is being done to these people is wrong, but they shouldn't have reacted that way/did that thing, because that makes them no better than the people who are hurting them!" Which is literally what happened with Gale and Katniss, lmao. That is not to say that life is all black and white and grey situations/people don't exist, but it' all too easy for people to fall into the negative rhetoric that surrounds every marginalized person/group's fight for the better. Gale's position in the war is "morally better" by the fact that he is fighting against a system that enslaved him and others like him. What was he supposed to do? Not fight back? Hold in his anger? Sit there and accept his position dutifully so he does not run the risk of harming anyone at all? People like to claim he killed innocents, but there is a degree of separation between the innocents of the districts and the innocents of the Capitol. The people in the districts were enslaved, subjugated, abused starved and killed, while everyone in the Capitol benefited directly from the torment the people in the Districts endured, and regarded them as sub-human. They were complacent. People dying on both sides of the war is horrible, yes. But how many more children would die in slavery and squalor if the revolution hadn't happened? So yes, what else could they do? But again, this is something these authors refuse to address. And they refuse to fully condone the need for change, usually by vilifying the freedom fighters.

[itsclydebitches]

RWBY explains why reactionary, traumatized teenagers who have never been held accountable for their actions shouldn't carry grand fantasy narratives. RWBYJNR have no moral code, no loyalty, no ability to work with outsiders, and now by all rights they should have screwed two cities. The Ace Ops and IW are doing a great job as reasonable adults. It's just when the show says 'these are the heroes' (or the FNDM actually bc RWBYJNR don't have a win yet in 8 seasons) that there's an inconsistency.

The strange thing is that the writers must have some sense that they’re writing a group ill-equipped to deal with the realities of this war because they keep having others call them ignorant kids, demanding that they make a choice, be held accountable, Ruby’s favorite phrase right now is “I don’t know”... but it never leads anywhere. The show pulls back on every acknowledgement before any change can occur: Ruby is comforted for her ignorance, charges are dropped, May changes her tune, Ren no longer has a problem with their behavior, etc. Then on the flip side, we have characters who are doing their best given the situation, which means that in order to ensure they’re appropriately evil in comparison, they do things like oh, say, shooting innocents for absolutely no reason. We can’t forget that Ironwood presumably killed the councilman and must believe he’s killed Oscar, which is by no means doing a great job, yet we simultaneously recognize that these actions don’t fit with the rest of his characterization. We keep seeing A, being told B, watching the show acknowledge that it is actually A, before still insisting it’s B. So we’re watching this show call Ruby out in one episode, then reassuring her she’s blameless the next; having Ironwood making realistic and justified decisions one moment, then randomly killing someone. It’s like the writers know they haven’t crafted the characters they wanted  — a morally pure simple soul and a corrupt dictator  — and they understand that they need to acknowledge that, yet they’re entirely unwilling to commit to these characterizations in the long term, either to run with them, or to develop them into what they wanted them to be in the first place. It’s like watching someone try to make a cake. You said you were going for cake, you called this product a cake, but the reality is you forgot the leavening agents, frosting, and messed up the ingredient amounts. That’s a brownie! And the person goes, “Oh yeah, I guess it is a brownie...” only to turn around the next day and try to sell it to you as a cake again. No, you acknowledging that you messed up doesn’t suddenly turn this into something new. Either work with the fact that you made brownies or start a new season batch and try to actually make a cake this time. 

...idk where I’m going with this, except to say it’s weird to watch a show that acknowledges its problems without making any attempt to fix them. And also I’m apparently hungry lol 

[k-s-morgan]

(1/5)Hi again!) Hm, I don't think that Merope could have influenced Tom that much? If we take for granted that his lack of impulse control and not-so-great-ability to fully comprehend the consequences of his own actions aren't the result of his upbringing and are the result of pre-born circumstances. (Otherwise, sure) She herself didn't really think about consequences too much, if I think about it. Could she really present a logical argument why you shouldn't hurt people? One he would listen to?

(2/5)In fact, I don't think she had that integrity in the first place, hence the whole Riddle affair... (I suppose, one could work with thought patterns to prevent needless cruelty, APD-therapy-ish, but it would be hard, just on an intellectual level - because Tom is clever enough to catch obvious bullshit.)Speaking of "asexuality being used just to justify the lack of same-sex physical intimacy", people might often forget that aro ace couples can and frequently are physically or/and emotionally 

(3/5) affectionate with each other. Like, we do not just stare at each other lovingly and talk about purely platonic things. We cuddle, sleep together, explore our sexualities (kinks, rated fics, etc; a lot of aces actually are more willing to discuss sex than an average non asexual person, at least where I am), talk about relationships.. I am afraid that people just don't understand that asexuality isn't an absence of sexuality. It is a sexual orientation. Er,well, that was definitely rambling.

(4/6) I hope you don't mind. Sorry? P.S. What's your stance on "manipulative Dumbledore"? I recently 've been told an opinion that Harry wasn't "his responsibility", that he was just a Headmaster (+ a bunch of other things) and he doesn't have an obligation to be invested in the lives of his student on such a personal level so he would deal with their individual personal problems.P.P.S. Have you read The Train to Nowhere? I checked and you haven't mentioned it in any of your fic rec lists.

(5/5) It has quite an oblivious Voldemort in it - he completely doesn't read the signals as sexual, even though they'd be pretty obvious to an average observer. I absolutely loved it, partially because I nurse I headcanon of him being ace in there, even though it's 100% not gonna happen.( Well, for what we need slow burn if not for the opportunity to headcanon characters as a-spec and relationships as qpr for as long as possible (at least, a lot of aces told me it's the case with them.)) -- Alen

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

Hey, Alen! Thank you for as always interesting message))

1) With Merope, I can see several ways of development. From how we see her in canon, she doesn’t seem likely to provide Tom with a healthy environment, but some people transform drastically when they give birth to a child, so maybe this could have happened to her? She could have regretted her actions and tried to raise Tom to the best of her abilities. She could seek help from magical and Muggle communities both. Or maybe she’d raise a monster still - it’s interesting to speculate about it. But I think Tom would love his mother anyway if she stayed by his side.

2) Very true about asexuals and the attitude of many of them toward sex. In fact, the guy I lost virginity to told me later that he suspected I might be ace because the topic of sex and sex itself never fazed me and I treated it like a curious puzzle :D And yes, people who know little of asexuality try to use it as an excuse while also failing to understand what it means completely. So many of them think asexual = celibate.

3)  Dumbledore is very manipulative, but he’s not a villain either. He had to make some of the toughest decisions in his life, and his gray morality is the reason why I like him. All in all, he treated Harry terribly because he did raise him like a pig for slaughter, but it was for ‘greater good’ - and greater good is greater in terms of its scale. Dumbledore tried to rid Harry of the Horcrux, like with the Basilisk’s fang, but when it failed, he knew Harry would have to die to defeat Voldemort once and for all and save all other people. Granted, I think the whole existence of  Voldemort is partly Dumbledore’s fault because he treated Tom unfairly and cruelly from the start. The fact that he hid his parentage from him, even though Tom was likely mocked and bullied for it for the first year or two, definitely contributed to Tom’s overall bitterness. 

As for Harry not being his responsibility... of course he was -  Dumbledore made it so from the moment he chose to leave him in an abusive household to raise a potential hero with no feeling of self-worth. Harry was always special.  Dumbledore wasn’t just a Headmaster, he was a key player in the fight against Voldemort, and while I believe he loved Harry, he was prepared to sacrifice him to win this fight, which warranted a more personal contact and influence. 

4) I did read The Train to Nowhere and I absolutely loved it! I think I spent the entire night reading it. The reason why I don’t mention it in my lists is that the pacing there is very slow, and by the chapter I read last, we clearly weren’t even half-way close to the ending. I’m a bit cautious about labelling something as my favorite work when I have no idea of where the story might still go and how the central relationship will develop. I think I’m going to catch up on all the chapters I missed, though))

[raptorific]

Okay, let's talk about this... entirely new topic. Rorschach is an incredibly interesting character but I also don't think we need to pretend that he's, like, misunderstood or that his heart is in the right place but his methods are bad. Rorschach is a violent far-right reactionary. His heart is decidedly in the wrong place. He is openly racist, misogynistic, and homophobic. He's not even consistent in his morality— he objects to Veidt bombing New York to avert a nuclear war, but justifies Harry Truman using the Atomic Bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki to end the second World War. He kills rapists but excuses the Comedian's rapes as a "lapse in judgement." He's disgusted by Lawbreakers but refuses to unmask or retire when HIS actions are ruled Illegal. He looks down on the Brainwashed Masses while getting his news exclusively from a white supremacist propaganda rag. He has the gall to claim he'll never compromise even though he spends the whole book compromising every single one of his supposed values and rationalizing his hypocrisy.

To the original point of this post, Rorschach is an incredibly compelling and fascinating character. I don't think it would be right to claim such a character shouldn't exist just because he's a violent misogynist and white supremacist— in fact, I think it's important that we DO have works of fiction that explore how monsters like that tick— but that hardly means his actions are in any way motivated by "ridding the world of anything less than purely good" or the result of his abuse as a child. Taking even one step in the direction he was trying to go would've been "going too far."

Whenever I see people discoursing online about how all fiction must model good behavior and explicitly state that any bad behavior depicted is wrong, lest someone in the audience mistake it for “glorifying,” all I can think of is that line from Arrested Development where Buster, in his mid-30s, objects to something by saying “that’s not the way mother is raising me”

[perriwinklesblog]

i saw your pre-exile analysis and i just wanted to say a few things? i hope that's okay.

you said "tommy gave into dream's taunting" and that that was his fault, but dream was provoking tommy to make him upset and so yeah tommy got upset. that's dream's fault for purposely trying to be an ass. i don't blame him for getting angry because dream was deliberately trying to make him angry.

also tommy didn't need punishment for the house because griefing and stealing aren't actions anyone on else on the server has been punished for. sapnap actually went and blew up george's house after tommy was exiled. dream blew up tommy's vacation home on the way to exile. dream and puffy went around blowing up chunks of bbh's property, eret's castle, and other people's buildings and placing signs to make people believe it was tommy. people regularly grief tommys house with things like netherrack, red white and blue penises, and by removing the entire floor. none of them were punished for this. people just rebuilt and moved on.

the house was just an excuse for dream to get tommy to exile. george fixed it in five minutes. also george doesn't even log on the server. by that logic did ranboo need punishment as well? the negotiations pre-exile were public humiliation because that's what dream wanted. tommy shouldn't have had to stand for it. griefing george's house was a morally wrong thing to do, but as seen above, people on the server do things like that all the time because they have different status quos than us. it was fully blown out of proportion.

Okay so this is really long and in by no means meant to come across mean or angry or bitchy. Sometimes when I’m trying to be clear my sentences become short but please know I’m just trying to explain my point a bit better.

I didn’t mean it to sound so victim blaming that part.

It was more trying to explain how Dream knew Tommy wasn’t great at staying calm when put in that scenario. Like for me, I’d have been able to ignore it but for Tommy he couldn’t, at least in pre-exile he definitely struggled with being able to respond to aggravating situations with a calm head. But that’s something people learn with time as they mature. His response was normal and it was Dream who aggravated the situation first. My point on that aspect was just to show how if Tommy had learned how to approach those situations with a calmer response then Dreams taunting wouldn’t have worked and therefore the situation that happened afterwards wouldn’t have played out.

I’m not very good at explaining things sometimes and since it wasn’t the main purpose of my post I didn’t think too much into the wording so that is my fault there.

My main thing was there were a lot of posts saying Tommy deserved exile and that he had been in the wrong and that the exile therefore was a just punishment.

Exile wasn’t a just punishment. It was an extreme presented by Dream and manipulated by Dream as the only option. The majority audience at the time believed this too not just the creators. It was clever of Dream the way he presented it but in hindsight we all now know it was a bad. Lol.

Thievery is a contested subject within the fandom and server. There have been times where we believe it wrong and yelled at our streamers and the streamers themselves have seen consequences on the server for thieving but more often than not it goes unnoticed. And I believe, not saying it’s fact, that this is due to it being viewed much like the canon lives system. If it’s important to the plot then it matters.

Tommy robbing George was a statement about his anger for George not participating in the battle and not him trying to find resources and therefore impacted the plot. The arson was an unfortunate accident.

Yes Dream used this situation to escalate things and exaggerate but my point was without Dream, Tommy still hurt someone from his actions and therefore should be held accountable.

But that accountability shouldn’t have been what we saw in the story. It shouldn’t have been what played out. And that’s mainly what I was trying to get across.

I focused on the Tommy incident purely because that’s what was being discussed but if the griefing or thieving impacts the plot then it should be held accountable, that goes for everyone. That’s my stance on it. I wasn’t trying to say one rule for Tommy and one rule for everyone else.

Like when Bad stole the shulker the other night from Foolish, albeit for a moment, we all held our breaths because we knew that would impact something. Luckily Bad gave it back.

Tommy going to rob George was a moment like that which is why I think on that occasion it was justifiable to wish for accountability.

Did I agree with the way in which they held Tommy accountable? No. It went way too far.

Ranboo should have been held accountable too when it was realised he also played a part. I do believe that. Again shouldnt have been exile. I don’t think exile was the solution.

We’ve seen wars happen over houses being grieved. Like this first war started over such a thing so depending on whether it’s important to the person depends on how it’s handled.

Even now when people have ruined a build in some way, they’ve retaliated or asked them to fix it or apologise. Like they do that now. And that’s holding someone accountable.

Accountability doesn’t just have to be punishment.

With that said, the idea of giving Tommy a time out for twenty minutes would have probably been a good way to make him think about how he handled his anger towards George. Not a full blown exile.

Because Pre-exile Tommy often didn’t think about the other side of situations or the what the consequences of his action might be. This wasn’t all the time but he did often just think in the moment and worry later about the rest. Like he didn’t think of how a Vice President robbing the king of your neighbouring country might impact others. Punishing him in more of a sit and think why we are annoyed with you Tommy rather than Get the fuck out of the country, would have been a more reasonable solution.

My post was just trying to say, yes Tommy made a mistake and did something wrong but exile wasn’t the answer as a response to the posts popping up again about that one specific situation due to the fact that Michael was watching lore recaps. I was just talking about that one plot relevant incident and that situation.

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Yes! Excellent point! It definitely matters that their people are likeable. Otherwise, the stakes might be personal for the Snake, but why should we care?

On the other hand, Snake characters don't have to be likeable if that's not their purpose in the story! Snake loyalty makes a *great* villain motivation. It shouldn't be *all* your villains' motivation (you can't have an evil House, that's rude) but it is a good way of making a villain who thinks their actions are justified.

The hardest part about writing villains, imo, is that they're either going to be Cartoon Brand Pure Evil (great in some works), or their actions make some level of moral sense to them, or they're insane (lazy and ableist when written poorly, also overused, not my favorite). But this is a situation where we don't have to like the bad guys; their motive just needs to make sense, and they can definitely be interesting in other ways.

Though. I love it when they still are likeable. Excuse me while I ramble about the more established of my two novel projects.

Half of my pair of bad guys is a Badger who's dehumanizing those she sees as oppressors. She's kind and charismatic, she has a huge cult following, and most of all she has a Snake who's devoted to her. Not without reason; they grew up together somewhere shitty and have been protecting each other all this time. This is a pair with very few qualms about what methods they'll use to "help" the people she decides are in need and "actually people."

The thing is, she's likeable. That's why she's dangerous. And even though the heroes (and most of the Badger's cult) are terrified of the Snake villain, *she* thinks he's a good person who's doing what's necessary. Sure, people find him intimidating, but they just don't know him like she does! If only they'd see that he's as much of a hero as she is.

Meanwhile (hopefully) the reader's getting really confused because they're not sure they want to like these characters. If I can get someone to want to write a fix-it fic where these two both come out ok, turn good and get married and live together somewhere safe with a puppy... but that feels weird, because they're both murderers? Yeah.

Hell, I want the heroes to have moments of "okay, but I see how they got there. Are we sure we should be doing this?" And while the Bird hero is off debating that as he charms and distracts the Badger villain, the Snake heroine is off braining the Snake villain with a bat and kicking him when he's down. She's too much of a proper lady to describe it as such, but she's here to rescue Important hostages and she doesn't have time to dick around. And the story paints both of their reactions as reasonable and necessary.

Are Snake Primaries that charming in media or is it just me ? Every time there’s a Snake Primary in a story I’m like « You . You’re my favorite . » Which is weird , considering that I’m a Bird Primary and not a Snake .

They certainly have charismatic qualities! Snakes make for fun main characters.

From a narrative perspective, Snake stakes are obvious from day one and very up close and personal. They're prioritizing a person, not an intangible ideal, and often that's easier to relate to than someone who values, say, justice over some giant evil force. Internal primaries have a lot of obvious fire to them, but the ideals that Lion primary characters are given tend to be huge, and if the story isn't handled carefully, hard to care about.

They also get some neat tropes! They have a certain unfuckwithability, because if you hurt them or Their People badly enough, it's hard to tell where they'll draw the line in what they're willing to do for revenge (or just to stop you from doing it again). Sometimes they just don't give a shit, and they'll wander around following people they like. A number of them have that whole "I'm grouchy for everyone else but soft for This Person" thing. Ooh, and burned Snakes learning to let themselves care about people again? Gimme that angst/wholesomeness recovery combo.

I don't necessarily favor them over other characters who are also well-written, though. I think you might have a type ;)

Thanks for your ask, anon! ^^