#but i didnt have the knowledge to understand that i was just way better at masking than she was

[lokh]

ive been thinking about this but. i think shuro understands laios' character pretty well, but he doesn't value his strengths or interests (monster knowledge). in the DVD extra where laios imagines what would have happened if they'd been on better terms, shuro STILL leaves because he thinks his chances are better with a trained crew (which....... is likely to be true but. look at how he ended up anyway lmao). meanwhile kabru recognises that while the party isnt particularly strong, the reason they get so far in the first place is BECAUSE of what laios knows about monsters. shuro seems aware that laios knows about monsters or has an interest in them, but views this as frivolous and a waste of time and doesn't seem to realise how much this knowledge carried them in the first place

[daily-hanamura]

[springcatalyst]

shogun (book) does the 'characters speaking in multiple languages' thing the best ive ever seen its so fuckign. the 'defaults' are typically either portugese or japanese and so those are written normally, with the exception that the japanese we hear from blackthornes perspective is either unintelligible (not direct quotes) or short words and phrases that he picks up (things like wakarimasuka and kinjuru are written just like that, and we the english reader learn what they mean as blackthorne does, so dont need translations evey time). japanese when heard from a japanese character's perspective is written in normal english, because its still the default, its their first, usually only, language. but it gets funky when youre speaking, say, latin, which they do sometimes. because blackthorne knows it fluently, but its not his first language (though neither is portugese) and its not the one he uses the most. so its written recognizably to us, an english-speaking reader, but in a way that makes it clear it is NOT portugese (default). so its written in this kind of old-englishy very elaborate style, with thees and thous and -ith at the ends of verbs and even just a different grammatical structure than normal english. "who giveth the sign? with importance it should be given quickly." <- not a sentence that comes naturally to english but it is A: recognizable as of the meaning and B: clearly Different. it signals theyre speaking latin even when the whole book is written in English and i think its NEAT

[dietbeverage]

Sometimes I remember a conversation I had with my mom around the time they were learning about my younger sisters adhd and she said "a lot of people with adhd need to do something to occupy themselves to help their brains think. A lot of them doodle or bounce their leg or do something like that in class and it helps them focus." And I remember thinking yeah I do both of those things but I'm built different lmao I just do those for fun and not bc of adhd. Girl...

[ne0ncowb0y]

The more I poke around the cyberpunk2077 fandom the more I find that yeah, I'm right. It's very clique-y. If you don't know the right people, if you don't have a certain amount of followers, you can't mod, you don't get any kind of positive interaction with the fandom. You don't deserve an in, you don't deserve eyes on your art and/or fics, you don't get anything because you're just no one, even if you've got fucking substance.

Anyway did y'all play the game? Did you understand the motifs and themes, not of V's story specifically, but about the world they live in? Just wondering

[blueskittlesart]

can we talk about how rauru is literally like. just zelda’s dad. like in that one scene where zelda looks like she’s gravely contemplating turning into a dragon and then rauru goes “i believe the answer lies in more research and understanding your power!” and she looks at him with such shock and awe. zelda’s adventures in the past are literally like her life but with a better dad. the queen promises her to help her figure out her power but dies before they can figure out a way how to use that power to safely save everyone. zelda desperately wants to help everyone and is clearly feeling the pressure of it all and the king is the one to tell her “hey i understand how hard you’re trying and how much you want to save everyone and we’re thankful for what you’re doing”. rauru actually acknowledges zelda’s dedication and the importance of research and technology, he is kind to her and never blames her for any of the bad things happening. he also never pushes zelda to make sacrifices and is the one sacrificing himself in the end - in botw, all the champions and zelda have to choose to make sacrifices to save the kingdom, but in totk rauru doesn’t ask that of any of the sages, instead recognizing his own responsibility as king and basically dying to save his kingdom. he’s literally zelda’s better dad.

same anon as the one raving about rauru also the differences between how the two kings treat link. they’re both tutorial figures but the way they guide is SO different. pretty much the first thing rhoam does is lie and pretend to be a random old man, being quite annoying as he sends link to do a bunch of challenges for a paraglider. the framing is so fundamentally different, rauru freely offers the information he has to link upfront, he apologises for the body modification, acknowledging link’s potential distress. rhoam basically keeps link on the plateau arbitrarily, presenting giving items and teaching link about things as challenges for link to overcome. rauru on the other hand aids link as best he can, tells him what he needs to do from the beginning (tells him to open the door which is pretty much the last thing he’ll need to do in the tutorial, telling him about the ultimate goal from the beginning), proposes solutions when it doesn’t work out (directs him to the shrines as a way to help him gain the strength he needs, as opposed to making him complete challenges to get a paraglider that in the moment seems like literally arbitrary conditions). rhoam telling link how much responsibility and pressure he has on him all of a sudden and how much he needs to do vs rauru telling link that it was wonderful to meet him and zelda’s accounts of him were all true. like. the framing. the difference in character. the deterioration of knowledge within hyrule falls parallel to the deterioration of its king’s kindness and virtue.

the differences between rauru and roham are crazy to me because one of them was so fundamentally good and one was so fundamentally flawed and yet. neither of them were able to save their kingdom. no matter how good a king of hyrule is, no matter what he gets right or wrong, he is still doomed to die. rhoam tried to sacrifice his daughter to keep hyrule alive. rauru did everything in his power to make sure she DIDNT have to be sacrificed. and in the end the outcome was the same. but the KINGS were not the same, and that difference in framing you mentioned i think is fundamentally a difference in legacy. rhoams legacy is to forever be the king who sacrificed children to save himself and died anyway. rhoam died a loser through and through, a king atop a throne of nothing but failure. i think that’s partially why he appears as an old man at first, because he KNOWS what being the king of hyrule means and he’s EMBARRASSED that his legacy is what it is. but rauru. in complete contrast, rauru was so GOOD. rauru died with his sages and his DAUGHTER alive to see another day. rauru ENSURED they’d live no matter what. he wouldn’t LET them sacrifice themselves for him. rauru put everyone else before himself. he didn’t expect or even tolerate self-sacrifice and yet when the time came he sacrificed HIMSELF selflessly despite knowing that it wouldn’t even WORK. rauru’s legacy is something to be proud of. he’s open to link because he has nothing TO hide. no regrets or stupid decisions. and he is remembered so much more favorably because of it.

[crescentmel]

i watched the x-men films for the first time ever here are my thoughts *spoilers obviously* :D

small backstory: i was going to go watch Deadpool & Wolverine however i have seen the previous deadpool movies but i’ve never watch the x-men films at all, my knowledge of that universe is minimal. my coworker suggested i at least watch Logan before watching Deadpool & Wolverine so i did.

Logan is easily one of the best Marvel films i have ever watched in my life, like top 3 films for sure it was amazing im still thinking about this movie weeks later. so i watch Deadpool & Wolverine and realize im low key obsessed with logan so might as well watch all the x-men films ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

ALSO I HAVE NO KNOWLEDGE FROM THE COMICS DONT COME FOR ME

The Original Trilogy

Overall i enjoyed the first two films, i think The Last Stand might be my least favorite of the whole franchise im not gonna lie

i’m just gonna say it, i was so not here for the Logan & Jean romance, like im kind of a hater so if this upsets you than this post is not for you lmao

ADORED JEANSCOTT WITH MY HEART AND SOUL !!! THEYRE SO FUCKING CUTE !!!!

Right of the bat, Logan & Jean’s romance felt SO forced. like it wasn’t believable for me, in the first movie it felt like Logan decided he was in love with Jean, not that he is actively falling in love with her, it was kinda weird

Meanwhile you can like clearly tell that Scott & Jean are in love with each other, but it feels like Logan’s character is just disregarding that

I understand in the comics it’s supposed to be a love triangle of sorts, i just think that if they wanted to do that for the films they could have portrayed it better

Ororo is an angel i love her

charles & eric need to make out

scott summers you ball of sunshine

i’m glad the rogue crush thing died in the first film bc ohmygod that was hard to watch

my favorite is X2 of this trilogy i really liked the plot and how it expanded more into Logan’s story

The Wolverine Trilogy

Origins wasn’t like, super terrible? i guess? my least favorite of this trilogy for sure though

i liked the plot twist that his girlfriend of 6 years was manipulating him, i didn’t see it coming, i was like WOW that’s fucked up

was disappointed he forgave her like wtf 😭

deadpool thing was weird i didn’t like that

good film to learn logan’s backstory, his brother was so fucking annoying though

The Wolverine was a decent film, if ur looking for an x-men film that’s more action centric than mutant centric this is your film

it felt like a wolverine side quest lol, nothing crazy going on, but i liked it more than Origins

logan is just tired

snake lady’s powers were cool

this girl is never going to see logan again so at least she got what she could

it goes without saying that Logan 2017 is the best film in the whole x-men/fox franchise

i could definitely make a whole post going into a deep dive of Logan but i’ll just keep it short

Logan’s dedication to taking care of Charles warms my heart in a way you cannot imagine, he truly cares so deeply for that man, charles gave him the opportunity of having a new family and i feel like logan will always be grateful for him

Logan & Laura :’)

it was like watching Logan go from only caring about kids in a “i’m a teacher” way to seeing Laura in a “i’m her caretaker now” kind of way, like there was a shift in his character that he wasn’t expecting

my little family of three that definitely lived happily ever after

my favorite scene of the whole film was when Logan realizes that it was his clone self that stabbed Charles, and his immediate gut reaction was to say “It wasn’t me” and to reassure Charles that Logan would NEVER do that

so that Charles would never die thinking one of his closest friends (AND SON FIGURE) would ever betray him like that and kill him

LIKE THAT WAS SO IMPORTANT TO LOGAN, HE DIDNT WANT CHARLES TO DIE THINKING HE KILLED HIM ;_________;

Logan 2017 the film that you are

X-Men Prequel Films

oh boy here go

right off the bat i’m going to say Days of Future Past exceeds all four of these films, so fucking good, my favorite after Logan

but yeah First Class wasn’t like, terrible per say, i just found myself a little bored ngl

absolutely here for eric & charles love story, they’re literally friends to lovers to enemies to still lovers but they’re still enemies i adore it

i liked the character that mystique brought (& jennifer lawrence) but it was just such a jump from the mystique in the first films

also i just think that if eric wants to kill his abuser then he should go for it ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ just saying charles it was a lil weird u wanted to stop him

i get the premise, setting up the basis of the x-men, but i just found it a little lacking

DAYS OF FUTURE PAST

amazing 10/10 movie, i genuinely enjoyed every second, actually felt like a superhero movie

great balance of logan not knowing what the fuck is going on vs charles knowing exactly what to do next & logan just going along with it i love it

i’ve heard legends of how amazing quicksilver is in these films and this went beyond my expectations, fantastic character AND amazing showcase of his powers, the writers cooked on this, also makes me want to rewatch wandavision bc i didn’t appreciate his character enough son i’m so sorry

prison breaking out eric sequence was amazing

there’s so much more but just overall amazing film

apocalypse was definitely something? i mean it was probably difficult to follow up days of futures past so i can’t blame them, not like the worst film ever but ….. idk

THINGS I LOVED !! young jean & scott :’) !!!!! genuinely so happy to see the beginning of their friendship & romantic relationship, they’re literally so fucking cute AND young storm omfg a baby 🫶🏾

took me a second to realize it was oscar isaac lol, also OUCH eric’s little family but also like wtf was that death ??? 😭

idk plot was just kinda everywhere, nothing super memorable, also i just found it funny that logan was there for like less that 5 minutes and all he did was grunt lmfao at least he popped off on stryker for the millionth time fuck that guy

uhm dark phoenix

the one and only highlight for me for dark phoenix was once again, jean & scott lmfao

the whole solar flare & alien race thing was kinda weird, they didn’t even explain the alien race thing that well, idk what to even say about this movie

i thought it was weird that hank & eric were suddenly jumping on the “let’s kill jean” train when like they know she didn’t mean to kill raven ??? 😭 like wtf

someone explain the timeline bs to me bc i was surprised that jean “died” AGAIN.

wasn’t the point of futures past that logan now in the present is experiencing the new timeline in which charles, scott, and jean are all alive

so why did jean die in this, does that not defeat the purpose, like she’s alive in the present

or were they trying to plan another prequel film in which she comes back, again. then it’s just a repeating storyline from the og trilogy

anyways it was kinda bad

i don’t even want to talk about The New Mutants i’m gonna be real, it was also bad

and that is my long af reaction to watching all the x-men films for the first time. if you’re reading this and read all my yapping then thank you i really appreciate it lol 🫶🏾 in conclusion, i’m sad i missed out on a whole era of these movies when they were being released (probably bc im avengers obsessed lol) but i’m glad i did watch them now, and now i have a new universe to hyper fixate on lmfao (and logan) amazing movies !! gonna go rewatch Logan now ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ

also here is my full x-men movies ranking, deadpool films included:

[kierongillen]

i have to know - as a disco elysium fan who didnt do disco, what would you say is essential disco listening for me?

I'm hugely behind on the asks, but I have to answer this one, because I'm going to answer a connected but completely different question, and then maybe then loop back to you. I'm just looking for an excuse to ramble, and do the writer equivalent of a warm-up sketch (i.e. waste time).

My apologies.

If you wake up and decide that you want to get into a whole genre of music, there's basically two tactics.

(There's also the "Why would anyone care to get into something they don't care about", which is one of the few things I have a "There's two sorts of people..." response to - those who when presented by something unknown either think "why should I know about that?" or "why don't I know about that?" I'm the latter, and it's served me well.)

The first tactic is simple.

Jump on a genre with Best Of in the title and follow your pleasure response. Here's a Spotify one. What interests you? What excited you? What makes you laugh? Probably explore more of that. If not, indulge widely, and see what sticks. At a glance, Disco playlists seem to have the problem of most playlists, in that strictly not everything on it is disco per se. For example, Dancing Queen strictly speaking isn't a disco song - but it's a song about disco, in every way. But if anything has found its way on a playlist, it's found its way on for a reason.

In your case, you're interested in what Disco resonates with Disco Elysium. Which I've bought for C, but not played, but I'm aware of in a "if I was still a games journalist, this is clearly one I would write a lot about." I spent years writing about Planescape Torment, and I know a spiritual successor when I see one.

This makes me think the area you want is basically the classier end - the big bleak emotions, the chilliness, the control, lonely on a dancefloor, lonely everywhere, oh-so-much cocaine, and - to steal Paul Lester's line - glass mountains on fire.

Which leads back to the second way of getting into a genre of music - which is to hit a major artist, and hit them hard.

When asked about "how shall I get into a band" my advice is actually the opposite of what I'm about to give. If you just want to get into a band, get Best Of, see what tracks you like, then go to the albums they're from. But if you're trying to get into a whole genre of music, that's a more serious endeavour, and may reward the opposite approach.

Basically pick a key album from a key band, and get into it, and grow from there. Read about the band - you don't need much, but a little helps. Learn how to listen to what their tracks do. And then you use that band as the single point of knowledge you have to orientate yourself to everything else you listen afterwarads.

There's a huge danger to this - basically, no-one is more ignorant than someone with a little knowledge. You have to be aware that you are the person who knows a bit about Boss Baby, and using that to get into things other than Boss Baby.

The strength is that it's a more holistic, lived in knowledge than just skimming the surface. You understand the music better as an artifact of their times, made by people, responding to their specific situation - which adds different flavours to your appreciation of it. Sure, your own response and how it finds a place in your life is always the thing which over-rules anything else - but the more you can listen for, the more you can hear, the more you can get from a work of art.

Anyway - I'm telling you to go and listen to Risque by Chic.

Chic are basically fucking awesome. If you don't know Disco at all, the opening Good Times chilly ironic take on American late-seventies culture is a great and (I suspect) Disco Elysium relevant intro. You'll know it as a sample, if nothing else, and the eight minutes version that opens Risque is a great way to think about it as both music for dancing (it is endless) and music for listening (it is boundless).

I got Risque as Paul Lester went to bat for it so hard in the Unknown Pleasures book the Maker stuck on the cover in 1995 (it was covering 20 albums that had fell out of the critical conversation, and it absolutely changed the dirction of my listening in the period). Here's Lester writing about Risque more recently for a taste, as the original piece doesn't appear to be online. I just read it in my copy, and it's a burst of love, describing it Disco as music about love - never sex, only love, and mainly love that is denied. That seems solid, at least for the best of chic.

Risque is the Chic album that Lloyd from Phonogram would have been listening to, certainly. I know I did.

(Plus At Last I Am Free from C'est Chic, obv)

There's a lot of Chic to listen to - their own work, especially in the period, and all their productions. Their work with Sister Sledge is of particular import - Lost In Music was one of the working title for Phonogram, and you can see and hear why. They're also the Disco band whose influence is perhaps most obvious in other bands. Everyone liked Chic. No Chic, no Orange Juice, no Orange Juice, no Smiths, etc.

Sister Sledge was the first live band I was at. My mum went to see them when she was eight and a half months pregnant. The temptration to say I'd have heard Lost in Music then and sold is tempting, but ahistorical - it's well before their work with Chic.

Anyway - get into Chic. It'll make your life better - and when your life isn't better, it's a superior context to lose yourself.

However, to go back to your question, as a Disco Elysium fan, I'm not sure it's actually THIS Disco you're looking for.

How about Disco Inferno?

Not Disco at all, but most like itself than anything else, which sounds like what I understand about Disco Elysium. right?

(DI Goes Pop is the starting place)

[aryas-faces]

I dont understand team blacks insistence that the greens killed her daughter. Yes the two gut punches of Rhsenyras father being dead and Aegon being crowned triggered her into an early birth, but she was very clearly far along already, and that child didnt come out premature then die later in the same way Baelon did. It was a still birth. Still births dont happen at birth it happens before that and the mother tragically in those days would never know it.

She had 3 healthy children with Harwin, then 2 children with her uncle. And unfortunately, when Targaryean women have children multiple times with men in their own family, miscarriages and stillborns are not uncommon.

It's horrible, but her daughter not making it was not the greens fault, it was a tragedy that has happened to many women in Rhaenyras family including her mother.

Like her daughter not making it obviously effected her even more considering how close it was with Lucerys's death, but I don't grasp why they call her death murder and that it's the greens fault.

Its nothing short of a miracle for Rhaenyra that she had 5 healthy children up to that point with little complications. I get why Rhaenyra blames them in her grief, but I don't get why team black fans blame them when we should have the objective knowledge to know better.

Because didn’t you know? Everything that happened during the Dance was the Greens’ fault! Even things that are scientifically impossible!

I agree. The fact Rhaenyra had as many healthy kids as she did for the tine period is incredible! But things happen, especially in that time, and it’s no one’s fault

I feel like the reason they blame the Greens is purely because Rhaenyra says they killed her daughter, even though we are supposed to see this as delusional. Black fans really do just agree with whatever she says and not think deeper (unless thinking deeper means that you claim that everything in the book is Maester/green propaganda)

[commanderquinn]

a list of canon ways in which lillian hart is The Fucking Worst that cora coe deserves financial and emotional compensation for:

-the basis for the big divorce counseling mission is that cora's worried for her mother's safety. that means, before going on a deep cover operation with smugglers known to kill rangers, marines, or anyone else caught trying to interfere with their business, lillian didnt leave her daughter a heads up much less a lead. once the fuck again, this woman decided that her career was more important than her daughter's mental and emotional health. once the fuck again, this woman decided she could just disappear from cora's life and then come back out of the blue without consequence

-when you go to lillian's office to look for her at cora's request, the guy working the desk knows SAM well enough to know his name and give him shit like they've got a personal history, but he??? isnt sure about????? cora's name???? word for word, he looks at her and says "it's cora, right?" you're telling me that this woman doesn't talk about her kid enough for her fellow INVESTIAGATIVE rangers to be sure about her name??? are you SHITTING ME??????? get the fuck out of here. you cant push "ranger family values" and the close ties they have in one breath then claim she likes to keep a professional distance at work in the other. you wanna have the conversation about what fresh hell it is being a working mother in a position of power, lets go, ill have that conversation all day long. but lillian hart is not a fucking example of a working mother and im gonna be pretty fucking insulted for working mothers everywhere if i catch wind of ppl trying to pull that kind of defense card. the woman's an awful parent and should be held the fuck accountable for it. you wanna know how i know????

she doesn't say cora's name enough for the ranger watching the door to be confident in it, but he remembers alllll the stories of the captain her ex is cozying up to. and lillian is the one to confirm during the quest that she has been getting the stories from cora, so there's some clear "oh she already likes the stranger more than me." i know im reading into it because its fiction and none of these people are real, but ive also, y'know been in cora's shoes, so i can tell you from real life experience that shit does exist. idk if that was the writers INTENT, but it sure does a great job at reflecting a very sad reality

-sam points out its dumb that lillian wants to speed the ship, with her daughter on it, directly at the sydicate. idk abt y'all, but my ship was pretty dinky at that point bc i was focused on outposts, and we got ambushed by like 6 ship waves once we landed for that fight. again, i get it. game mechanics get a higher priority than realism. but this whole "we have to finish this because theres a chance you were spotted trying to rescue me" shit is so. nauseating. theres no demand to drop off cora somewhere safe, theres no "lets call in the cavalry." its this fucking egomaniac looking you dead in the eye and being like "i know i just traumatized the shit out of my kid but i need you to drive us into an ambush while she's still on board. hope you're a good shot because sam and i cant kill them ourselves." and so what that we did that????? YOURE TELLING ME IT WAS JUST THOSE SHIPS???? the rest of the organization is just going to LET IT GO???? like no fucking wonder sam sees himself as the better option even through all his fucking doubt. at least he knows when to turn the fuck around because shit is above his paygrade

-she has custody rights. she is a decorated and respected ranger. sam being a smuggler wasnt public knowledge, but point out one person in akila who wouldnt believe her in a heartbeat over it. everyone in town gives him nothing but shit, and they all side with his dad who was definitely no picnic to live with. im guessing big emotional detachment there, lotta interrogation and persecution rather than teaching and understanding. HELL, sam would probably own up to his past if lillian outed him for it, he's that type of idiot. at literally any point she could put in the effort to get legal council involved. if she's SOOOO by the law, whats the hold up there???? i agree the kid shouldnt be on my ship while im in the middle of a space fight. ive talked with sam about it, and im not even the kids parent (as of the personal quest). what the fuck are you doing about it lillian????????? oh thats right. we cant get lillian on the phone. whomp whomp.

-she made cora cry. hyper independent, "big girls dont cry" cora coe. multiple times. worse, she made cora cry because she made cora feel like she wasn't as important as lillian's career. i dont give a fuck what criminals are doing. i do not give a fuck. i give a fuck that that little pixel child got her heart broken and there isnt a dialogue for me to call out her mother for being a huge fucking cunt to her own daughter but theres a thousand and one options for me to tell sam he's parenting wrong. he is, and i have no problem using them when they're appropriate, but where the fuck are they for lillian??? why am i not allowed to tear this woman a new asshole at any point, but there's like 20+ extra dialogue options added to every single npc you have a persuade option with???? todd my head hurts and its your fault

-"im sure sam's told you all about me. go on. ask whatever you want." yet there is no option to ask what the fuck her problem is. so, clearly, i cannot, in fact, ask whatever i want.

-"but the looks i got from my fellow rangers reading alexander dumas... we do strange things for kids." yeah hart??? thats your standard????? THATS your idea of going out of your way for your kid??? literally how did sam fall for this woman oh my god i cant even listen to her speak without wanting to use the power of bitchhood i inherited from a long line of angry irish women to ridicule her to tears. maybe then she'll fucking understand how small she makes her fucking kid feel every time she turns a moment of bonding into a little "woe is me and my comfort zone oh how unfortunate i am to have a brilliant daughter that wants to connect with me through her greatest passion"

-she openly admits that she dumped the cargo sam was smuggling not because she felt any connection or sympathy or just didnt want to destroy someones chance at life in a capitalist society, but because he was a good pilot and she didnt want that talent to "go to waste" so she could recruit him. thats not really a thing against cora i just really fucking hate that and the picture it paints of her priorities as a human being

-"if we're going to be really honest here... back when we were a team... cora would follow you everywhere, like a little adoring dog. i... just fell out of it. long before we separated."

i literally. do not have words for how fucking disgusted i am by that line of dialogue. oh my fucking god. oh my fucking god. i. i TRULY would not even know where to start. the dog comparison makes me violently angry and if you'd given me a punch interrupt at that moment, i would have broken my keyboard punching the accept option

-go replay or watch a recording of that divorce counseling mission one more time. while you're doing it, imagine the roles reversed. imagine youre romancing a character thats a mother bringing cora into space, and the ranger standing in your cockpit asking to finish the mission is her father who took off to live at work once it was clear his little girl liked mommy better. imagine THAT while you listen to the (imo) out of fucking pocket dialogue where sam constantly praises lillian for being "a good ranger/woman." then you come back and tell me how comfortable you are with the concept of lillian hart as a character.

[mechacringekitty]

incredibly messy essay of my thoughts on darkstalker, straight from my DMs with a friend because they demanded i post it [which means it has incredibly improper grammar]

hes an awful awful person, unapolagetically, and i think there are scenes and areas where he could've been written better. or had more nuance, like his dynamic with arctic [why do they hate each other ?? theres no explanation given, really, besides the fact that they do] but people who reduce him to a monster just baffle me. he loved his mother, he loved whiteout, he tried to love clearsight even though he did it wrong. and clearsight/darkstalker is a really iffy territory, because he did love her and he thought he was loving her right but he wasnt he was kind of controlling and bad! the earrings !! the earrings that kept her from seeing the bad futures !! but he also loved her, he did. their relationship was doomed from the start but he tried. she loved him back too, thats why it didnt work. thats why it hurt so much. he loved his mother too,, the few brief interactions they got in arc 2 hurt me to my core because fuck foeslayer loved him too, even though she realises he's done bad things. and whiteout!! whiteout!! she's one of the only characters we see darkstalker actually properly caring about in a way that doesnt really hurt them somehow. i think she loved him too,, she tried to warn him, she did :( ive thought about them a lot, maybe darkstalker trying to calm whiteout down at times, or them hiding with each other while arctic and foeslayer fought. arctic and foeslayer make me really ill too but this rant is getting long enough as it is. darkstalker lost a little of his pizzazz in arc two because of how domination focused he was and the writing went more focused on making him this evil, hateable villain [imo] than a relatable and understandable villain. which is the best kind of villain. i hate the peacemaker thing i hate it i hate it and that scene in book ten makes me cry every time because he was hurt by it he was so hurt by it. he didnt need a second chance, he needed to die, he needed to reconcile with himself and accept that there was no way he would ever save any of it. something like him coming to his senses, him realising everything he's done is awful and hurtful and he's not ever going to be able to fix it, but he can at least apologise even if the icewings dont accept his apology, not all of them, they'll understand they havent been hating a monster without feelings this whole time,, and maybe some of them can start to understand him and they can start to heal and they can stop hurting each other. but he needed to die and it needed to be on his own terms and i think foeslayer shouldve gotten her peace with that and i think if i were here i wouldve chosen to die too. the world is so different from what either of them knew and i would be tired of trying to change and i would be tired of trying to fix it and i think ending that legacy right there and right then with the two of them together wouldve been good. and maybe foeslayer can tell darkstalker she loves him - maybe she never had time when he was a kid - and maybe he can tell her too and they can leave that world together with the knowledge that they tried but they dont have to try anymore.

[spicybylerpolls]

Interesting points from anon who argued for bottom mike there. Thanks for being so generous with your explanation for your preference! 

I found this interesting: i guess my main reasoning for him being a bratty bottom is just how he acts sometimes through the show, his clear distaste for being told what to do and his snappy comebacks.

To me, this indicates that mike very much would not want to be told what to do in the bedroom, and would thus take control. Distaste… so why would he like being told what to do in the bedroom? 

I mean, maybe, as a kink, as a relief, in the way people who engage in d/s culture enjoy the separation from their reality. But that’s also a highly self aware and advanced sexual expression that requires knowledge and courage. Your average virgin does not immediately engage in bdsm culture or even understand its psychology. Most people barely know what they like in the bedroom, let alone the complex dynamics of bdsm and d/s. 

Which leads me to the realisation of how interesting it is to see such common dom/sub conversations around byler sex in this fandom. it speaks to the fact that fandom is very fantasy- and imagination-based rather than just working with what is canon. It's so intriguing, because I personally came to fandom hoping to discuss the show, almost analytically like we were in media class, and found lots of fantasy play and headcanons and stuff, which I hadn't known were a thing. At first it didnt make sense to me... why would you want to celebrate characters/a show but make it completely into something that no longer resembles that show or those characters??

I understand fandom better now, but even so re: sex, I would say that irl, at least 50% of people dont engage in dom/sub dynamics in their sex life at all, or even anything that would be considered kinky or fetish. In fact, one you've removed the percentage of people who don’t have sex at all, a large portion of sexually active people (especially women) don’t engage in even the simplest kind of vanilla sex where they ask for the bare minimum of what they would enjoy, what they want, know what they want - many dont even enjoy sex or know how to orgasm. This doesnt mean their sex is abusive or toxic or they have a history of trauma, but just that they dont feel comfortable or that it’s their place to ask for pleasure. They just do what they think they should do, 'normal sex' (a common historic phrase here was 'lie back and think of england' lmao... basically what royal queens were told to think as their husbands butchered them in the least enjoyable way possible).

(I also always found the scene with Steve’s mean friends in s1, after he and Nancy have sex, uncomfortable because they were clearly taking the mick out of Nancy when imitating her screams, and it highlighted how performative that sexual experience may well have been for Nancy. I mean, if Steve made her cum during her first time? Damn, he’s good. But chances are he didn’t, and nancy’s storyline was partially about performances and status in s1, so her first time w Steve also being performative is a possibility. It makes the barb storyline even sadder too.)

But back to byler. theyre boys so dynamic will be different to a man and woman, but I think dom/sub conversation comes up so much more in gay sex, and is it because people just can’t see gay men as being equals in the bedroom? Even though people have no issue imaging equal sex with a man and woman, despite a similar dynamic of who is penetrating? But two men? Nope, one must be dom or sub, one must be more powerful, even if you’re a power bottom you’re still a power something. Why can’t it be equal? Why do we ALWAYS have to refer to dom and sub? 

I’m not saying that dynamic wouldnt exist for byler at some point, or that it’s no good, but it doesn’t need to be the only frame of reference. Sure, byler don’t always have to have penetrative sex either, but even if they are, will it ever be possible to talk about topping and bottoming without power dynamics being involved? Equal union, joining of bodies, not an inkling of power in sight. In fact, not even using the term ‘topping’ and ‘bottoming’, which may well have origins in physicality, such as the missionary position, but certainly also hold connotations of power. Who’s on top? Who’s bottom? I don’t love the wording tbh, and I wonder what the history of that is in gay culture. 

"Which leads me to the realization of how interesting it is to see such common dom/sub conversations around byler sex in this fandom. it speaks to the fact that fandom is very fantasy- and imagination-based rather than just working with what is canon. It's so intriguing, because I personally came to fandom hoping to discuss the show, almost analytically like we were in media class, and found lots of fantasy play and headcanons and stuff"

This is so interesting to me - it reminds me of that one anon the regular byler poll blog got recently about their confusion as to why people were speculating about things they can't possibly know the answer to. But yeah, you're right that a significant portion of fandom is imagination/headcanon based, and I agree with the anon on the byler polls account who pointed out that this is largely personality-driven, where some are all about this and others are... very much not.

All your other points are super interesting too! What does everyone else think?

[anxiousdemifaemess]

mmmm having thoughts about kfam again. bc the show is AWFUL and so so so bigoted in so many ways- BUT. it had potential.

and when i was 20 and depressed and couldn't do the usual things i did for serotonin bc i didnt have glasses, i listened to every podcast that sounded vaguely interesting. and bc i was 20 with conservative parents and living with them, i didnt know a whole lot of the red flags- i just knew that this show was making me feel happy in a way that was really difficult otherwise.

and a year or so later, i went back to it in a better headspace, with more understanding, and i was appalled. things that were mildly uncomfortable before were now making me physically recoil, jokes i didnt understand were now in stark relief, and i was so upset.

because i had loved this show- and i hadnt noticed any of this before. sure, things had made me uncomfortable, but lots of things made me uncomfortable! my dad would say things REGULARLY that made me uncomfortable! but i now had the context of "this is uncomfortable because-" and it was awful. because i still saw the potential it had, and now i could never look at it the same way or look only at the surface of it.

kfam could have been great- there was a fascinating narrative to muck around with, an interesting setting, and ive always loved hearing a story told this way. but a story with this much bigotry baked into its bones- i cant ever interact with it the same way.

i will always want to know how this story would have gone, and what it could have been, but at this point the only reason i dont set it on the shelf of shame with harry potter is because- to my knowledge- the creators do not openly support bigoted laws and legislature and hate groups. and maybe im wrong and they do, and i will gladly put it on the shelf of shame if someone would tell me.

but i will always mourn the potential of this show, because as a storyteller i desperately wanted to see it flourish.

[pastanest]

if you’re wondering why I’m having to repost this, or why you were perhaps previously following me but no longer are, please refer to this post. I was able to retrieve this thanks to @rosieathena - thanks so much!! ♡

Spencer Reid x she/her reader

Reid x Youtuber/Streamer Girlfriend

- Spencer Reid has a somewhat boomer knowledge of social media platforms, he doesnt really understand them, but he knows from his job that they cause a lot of problems, so generally he steered clear of them in his personal life

- that was, until he met you

- the two of you very quickly became good friends soon after you joined the team, and it wasnt long before you both realised that the connection you had was not one between friends

- you went on a date, and things have only gone up from there

- during a conversation Spencer remembers very well, you casually mentioned your side-job as a youtuber and twitch streamer

- Spencer didnt even know what twitch was, and assumed you meant you live streamed yourself twitching and got paid for it

- you slowly introduced him to the world of youtube and livestreaming, and he was fascinated

- at first, he would sit out of frame while you streamed, just listening to you commentate over various video games you played and observing the way you communicated with the people in the stream chat as if they were your friends

- by no means did you earn a lot through this hobby, but it was something you enjoyed, and Spencer would support any harmless hobby that brought you so much joy

- but then he discovered it wasnt harmless

- you had been very fortunate to have Spencer sit in on streams in which you received very little abuse in chat, and because he wasnt reading the chat you could simply ignore any hateful messages there and he would be none the wiser

- however, on the first stream that he decided to join, things were a little different

- Spencer was sitting beside you, the two of you playing a multiplayer video game, both of you visible to the thousands of people watching

- and he, being the genius capable of doing a million things at once, was able to glance into the chat and read what people were saying as he played, curious to any tips or tricks they may lend him to help him be a better player in the game

- what he saw was anything but helpful

“jesus christ, how the fuck did she manage to trick him to date her”

“this guy makes her look even worse than she already does”

“he could do SO much better”

“I’d rather kill myself than be seen anywhere with her”

“maybe (Y/N) should be the one killing herself since she clearly doesnt deserve him”

“yeah haha u right u right”

- those messages were among more pleasant ones, but Spencer couldnt see those

- in fact, he couldnt even see the game anymore because he was staring at the chat log, and as a result his character died

“Spence? Everything alright?”

“How often do you see messages like that directed at you?”

- you knew what he was referring to without having to look in chat, you had really hoped you could hide the negative side of streaming for just a little longer

“Trust me, it’s alright. People behind a screen think they can be assholes without any comeuppance, and most of the time they’re right. Repercussions for them are minimal. Im lucky to get very few negative messages on my streams, Im used to that and I can cope.”

- Spencer shook his head, he was not happy with this

“You shouldnt have to get used to something like this.”

- with that, he stood up and grabbed his phone, the fans in your stream confused as to what was going on

- “Spencer, what are you-“

“Hey, Garcia, can you do me a favour? The scum of the internet are in (Y/N)’s stream chat, could you- oh, you already see them? Great. Yeah, I know, they’re disgusting.”

he walked back over to you and leaned over to look at your computer, scrolling back through chat to find the usernames.

“Scroll back to where user jnjmemes sent a crying laughing emoticon, you see the string of messages after that? Could you send every single one of those users a nasty virus? Thanks Garcia!”

- your jaw was hanging open, you stared at Spencer with wide eyes, completely lost for words while your fans in the chat were screaming over Spencer’s protectiveness of you

“Oh, one last thing Garcia, is it possible to set up a programme that automatically sends a virus to anyone who leaves a message of a similar nature? Of course you can do that, I should’ve known, thanks again!”

- he hung up and sat back down beside you

“There’s a lesson for all of you in this: dont say hurtful things to people online. But there’s a lesson even more important than that, which I hope you’ve all paid attention to.”

“What’s that?” You asked.

“Dont fuck with a woman in the FBI.”

[throughtartaruswithyou]

PJO show review (because you care)

hmm I think the time has arrived for me to put my thoughts into words on this bad boy. Ive had some thoughts swirling around since the show finished but i felt like i needed to sit on them before putting them out into the big wide world.

I think the show was mid.

before we get up in arms- mid does not mean bad!! theres countless shows which are worse, and some that are better. honestly, mid means more interesting. lets do a good old fashion pros and cons list:

PROS

LOVED the casting. I think the casting was spot on- uncle rick did not disappoint in that category. age, appearance, demeanour, everything was working for me. I honestly agree with every single casting choice. (even lin-manual miranda ik ik)

Contrary to popular belief, I think the pacing was good. I'm not mad they cut scenes from the book. I think it'll encourage more people to read it. game of thrones did a similar thing (cut a bunch of scenes) and I think it helps preserve the independence of the two PJO mediums. Ya some scenes would've been cool but I'm not totally pissed about any cuts.

Set was good. set design felt authentic without trying too hard. No one really mentions the set when they review the show but like the set was really good?? CONS The biggest con for me is that it felt like they undercut Annabeth ALOT. shes supposed to be the wise girl, but for some reason sally was the one telling percy about the mythology? and hes telling it to annabeth? huh? and grover also seems way more knowledgeable than her. I was really disappointed by this theme- especially because it seemed to come up often. the only scene where she really showed her smarts was in the hephestus amusement park gate-trap thingy. it made her character seem under-powered compared to percy. Also she didnt use her dagger enough imo.

the show vs tell issue. this has been brought up alot so I wont go into it too much but ugh. I understand the show is aimed at kids but kids deserve good media too. kids aren't dumb. they can afford to let the episodes go a little longer to allow some of those plot points to build! give the watchers a sense of mystery then the satisfying feel of discovery! I noticed this especially in the lotus casino episode. I wish they didnt tell us about the lotus flowers right off the bat. the scene could have been so much better with that little change.

The delay on season 2! this isn't even just me being an impatient fan I have a genuine worry they actors are gonna age up too much. they all already look older and I just hope they wont have to age up the characters. esp for season 3- which they should get renewed ASAP since it should take place in the winter after season 2. not so much the teams fault but I hope they wont get too rushed by the timeline. esp since i know it's important to rick to have age-accurate casting.

overall I thought the show was mid to well-done and if season 1 is the worst season we might have a great lil' show on our hands. also disney pls renew season 3!!!! i pinky promise i'll watch it.

[cult-of-the-eye]

👀

Fandom mix up

Which avatars do you think the pjo characters would be? Which gods would the tma characters be the children/kin of?

JSHSHAJJANANAKAKAK HERE WE GO

Eye, web, lonely, dark, extinction, buried, slaughter, flesh, spiral, hunt, stranger, end, vast, corruption

Percy Jackson

His whole thing is excess loyalty right? And then you got dark Percy from house of Hades (hoh) and everything so we've definitely got a lot to go on

Hmm this one's a bit difficult cause he doesn't fit neatly into any of them I think

My first thought was the vast cause of the ocean and like by the end of hoo, he is so powerful that its almost unfathomable like the ocean and the vast, to the point where even he only just understands the extent of his power, like what happened in hoh

The excess loyalty could fit into that as well cause loyalty is something he hedges all his bets on, it's the one sort of indefinitely huge thing that rules his way of looking at things - like the ocean

But I'm not sure, if anyone has any better ideas please say so

Annabeth Chase

Girl's hubristic

I guess my first thought would be the web cause obviously she's strategic, she makes plans, she manipulates

But she is terrified of spiders so that wouldn't quite work

I'm not sure where hubris would fit in

I guess it could be the eye, cause with it you're desperate to gain all the knowledge, witness and understand EVERYTHING and therefore would be threatened if that ever failed - if you didnt know everything or if someone didn't believe in your all-knowingness

Which is also a huge part of her character - being underestimated because of the way she looks and speaks and how she both uses that to her advantage and hates the way it happens

I think that works quite well and I think unfortunately she'd be a fantastic Archivist

Grover

Is wonderful and I love him but I guess he'd be the extinction

Listen his whole thing about getting demigods safely to camp? How he's there when they think their world is about to end? When their world literally ends if he doesn't get them there safely? How he has to go through this over and over again, experiencing mini extinction level events every single year

And then you've got the whole pan thinks humans are destroying the world thing and how maybe he'd destroy humans to keep the world safe (I can't really remember that storyline and may have just imagined it so I'm not sure where it would fit exactly lol)

Jason

Jason's the stranger I think

He doesn't know who he is when he's first introduced, he has to spend a couple books remembering who he is and then he struggles with his identity as a son of Jupiter, praetor, leader etc

I think he's been forced to play a role that wasn't him and the essence of the stranger is just that - being forced to reckon with someone who you might've recognised once but certainly don't anymore

Piper

She is immediately web

Her whole thing is manipulation with her charmspeak, forcing people to do her bidding

A huge part of the web is loss of free will and that's exactly her thing - creating a situation in which a person has no choice but to act the way she wants them to

Nico

Boy oh boy

I want to say the end but now I think about it maybe the lonely

He had his sister ripped away from him, the only other person who's experienced the same insane things that he has, he's always seen himself as the lone wolf, different from the rest, the only gay one, the unrequited crush on Percy and how he admitted it to someone who didn't understand, the fact that he was trapped in the underworld alone for so long in that vase or whatever

I feel like at some point he accepted his life of solitude and the fact that no one would miss him or even try to understand or choose him first which definitely encapsulates the lonely

Reyna

The hunt I guess

She's constantly hunting for something more - like validation as the praetor, from Jason, revenge from her tragic backstory, she's constantly striving to be better and work harder

plus she actually joins the hunters of Artemis so that works itself out

Hazel

Im gonna say maybe the corruption

Cause her whole deal with hecate and her getting to grips with the daughter of death god is giving there is something deeply intrinsically wrong with me but I will embrace it and feed it and join the wondrous thrumming in my veins kinda vibes, like finding a family and comfort in the wrongness and both feeding it and feeding off of it

Frank

Gonna be honest with you, can't really remember his character

In my defence I read these books years ago

Oh wait he's the son of Ares who has the wood that he needs to keep safe cause if it burns down then he dies right

Ok well that's giving the end - once that flame touches the wood he's gone, he's living in fear of the one event that will end him, the end that could slowly creep up on him or be a sudden death

Leo

Hot stuff

Oh yeah this has got to be the desolation/extinction right

With his whole burning down his mum's factory and then going from orphanage to orphanage or something

Like I feel like he's constantly ending things just so he can be the one to leave first so he doesn't get abandoned, he's got his barrier up and he's never pulling it down

I'm not sure about this one actually maybe I just thought FIRE and therefore desolation

Anyway you guys can fight me in the tags or whatever I'm tired and want to sleep