#but maybe it was a little act of rebeliousness?

[burningvelvet]

Quickly and poorly reviewing and ranking adaptations of Jane Eyre (1996, 1997, 2006, 2011) by their pros and cons:

1996 pros:

Best fire scene, easily. It actually gave me that excited feeling that good cinema gives a person. Much of the cinematic art was enjoyable altogether, including the costumes.

This film probably has ond of the best Bertha's in my opinion. She's truly sympathetic, beautiful, and fierce. probably tied for my favorite Bertha actress with 2006. She and Poole are given little time in the story, however.

Most adaptations shit on St. John. Here, that isn't the case. What little time he has is spent in making him much more appealing than I've ever seen him, both physically and characteristically. I like this, because many forget that Jane did love him in her way, and he is supposed to be attractive and nice despite his zealotism.

1996 has the best Adèle, which is amazing for me as a big Adèle fan. There is more focus on her and her relationships with Jane/Rochester. I particularly love the scene where J draws R and Adèle tries to play cupid a little, and when Adèle is offended when the ladies insult Jane.

Best Lowood plot by far. This is the first time I've been able to stand the Young Jane scenes, and little time was devoted to her early life with the Reeds, just enough to let us know she was abused. I like this choice. The young actresses playing Jane and Helen were the best and most rebelious I've seen yet. Their hair cutting scene brought tears to my eyes, which rarely ever happens for me.

Good Blanche plotline. I absolutely love the cinematography/aesthetic & set design.

1996 cons:

the actors are individually endearing in some ways (the scene of Jane and the mirror is particularly touching, as is their reunion). However, The biggest downside to this adaptation is that the chemistry between Jane and Rochester was lacking in my opinion. this is particularly notable in their meeting scene and first proposal scene.

William Hurt is a fantastic actor, and he's likeable, but he's not my favorite Rochester ever. He's alright. On a rewatch I could see myself warming to him more.

I love Charlotte Gainsbourg more for her music than her acting. Granted, she was young here like Jane is supposed to be, so I do not blame her. Visually, aside from her height, I can absolutely see her as Jane. As the film went on I warmed to her acting style; Jane Eyre is a hard role to perform due to her inwardness. I don't think she was horrible, but Anna Paquin (of later True Blood fame) as Young Jane Eyre somewhat outshined Gainsbourg.

I was disappointed in Adèle being sent away to school before the disaster and her not coming back in the end (why couldn't they have had her running with Pilot in the landscape shot!!!).

1997 pros:

Maybe the most accurate Jane and Rochester. I wasn't expecting to like him at all but he blew me away. excellent chemistry between the actors. The dancing scene was very captivating, as was the scene with him jumping from the walkway, their outdoor talks, him chasing her down the stairs — really, I was impressed, because I thought I'd hate this film. Like in the novel and in 96, both actors are a bit conventionally unattractive (well, compared to 11 and to some extent 06) - and like them, the characters grow on you.

BEST ST. JOHN (although 2006 has the best Rivers sisters) - St. John is described as being nice though serious, and looking like a statue of a Greek God with all the coldness AND beauty - and this movie is the only one who relatively understood that assignment (96 came close emphasizing his niceness). Most adaptations adapt his coldness but not his conventional Eurocentric good looks, which not only symbolize his colonizer attribute but also his appeal to Jane and the others. It's also important to have a conventionally handsome actor play St. John just as it's important to have a conventionally less attractive Jane Eyre because one theme of the novel is the critique of Victorian physiognomy & beauty; Jane/Rochester being unconventionally attractive is a contrast to Bertha, St. John, Blanche, Georgiana being attractive, so I think this element is not inconsequential. The difficult part is that beauty is highly subjective, so relying on conventional standards is key, as is the reminder that Victorian standards were a bit different from our own.

good Lowood plotline, good Gateshead plotline, fantastic Adèle with lots of adorableness & miraculous though OOC bonding between her and Rochester, fantastic costuming (though I don't know about accuracy), good Blanche plotline overall. Probably my favorite Bertha plotline for being sufficiently creepy.

1997 cons:

this isn't really a con for me but many people may dislike 97 Rochester for being passionate to the point of coming off crazy, and physical domineering as when he grabs Jane when she tries to leave — however, this does kind of fit for canonical Rochester & I don't mind it since he's supposed to be that way, but this is still arguably a con nevertheless. he does come off as too forward but i get they were trying to capture the whole overpassionate thing. it does come off as a little more toxic than other depictions perhaps!

I have very few complaints overall. I don't think the chemistry is as appealing as 2006, but it is accurate. I wish there was more Adèle, but you can't have everything.

The posters are bad and make the actors look worse than they are which subsequently turns people away. I think 1996 was marketed a bit better but that 2006 also suffers from bad poster syndrome which had an effect on me also. Presentation is important; marketing and advertising are also important in cinema. The aesthetic isn't as good as 1996 although I don't think the visuals are bad overall.

Jane is a little dissociative seeming, which can be off-putting for myself and other viewers I assume, but to be fair she is described as being like a weird little elf creature in the book, and the actress plays this very well, actually looking quite ill when Rochester asks if she is.

2006 pros:

Best chemistry between Jane/Rochester by far and for this reason will always be my favorite because it actually made me fall in love with Rochester in the end though I didn't like his portrayal at all at first (that's power! — and my love for this Rochester should arguably be a con for the sake of my sanity and pride). best Rochester imo and a fantastic Jane. I love love love the way they did the Rochester storytime flashbacks and fleshed out his character as a result.

Best and most enjoyable Blanche Ingram plotline by far (although no one likes the lack of Rochester-in-drag, the party scenes & insertion of the twin flame theory was delightful).

some of the best dialogue, fantastic Adèle plotline, good Bertha plotline, best Pilot, best Rosamond, good costuming, good sets/locations (the fairytale ambience of Jane walking outside before meeting Rochester! Rochester's weird study!), I like the extra focus placed on themes such as nature/genetics/science, religion, travel, sexuality, etc.

2006 cons:

I dislike the way they did the Lowood and Gateshead plots, and although the Rivers sisters were good, I resent their St. John plotline for the most part. I disliked the lack of mystery surrounding Bertha; I think they made it way too obvious & not creepy enough, especially in showing her perspective from the window and giving her lines (one line, calling Jane a whore in Spanish) which no other adaptation does. I was sorely bored before and after Thornfield and only really revived when she got back to Ferndean (although Jane's flashbacks and some of the St. John plotline [the references to love, reminding us of her inner thoughts of Rochester] kept me alive). I suppose there were prices to pay for the excellence of the Jane and Rochester moments. - in comparison these seem like small prices, but still!

2011 pros:

deciding to go with a non-linear structure was a fantastic choice though I was skeptical of it at first, good St. John plotline for the most part & which they put emphasis on, really fantastic Jane with a lot of good fierce moments & lines, maybe the best Gateshead plotline including Mrs. Reed & the Red Room scene (although the lack of red was disappointing, and the lack of explanation for the chimney monster is conflicting – was it all in her head?), good young Jane, one of the best Richard Masons, star-studded cast, good dialogue, maybe the best costuming, Aesthetic™️

2011 cons:

least favorite adele (not insulting the child actress, this is the fault of the writers/directors)

— this is where i call security to protect me from an onslaught of jane eyre 2011 fans here on tumblr. alright, maybe i should watch it again — but i was expecting a lot more. particularly from michael fassbender as mr. rochester. probably my least favorite rochester by far & the least sympathetic. this rochester captures the dark and dangerous part of him but imo not so much the higher feelings that define him. the lack of humour & lack of unrepressed passion/drama/rage is noticeable - rochester isn't supposed to be quiet; as toby stephens (2006) said in an interview, rochester never shuts up in the book, he's really too eccentric to even be adapted accurately; he has to be toned down to be realistic, but here he's muted too far. - i felt like mia was carrying all of their scenes on her back & that the chemistry really rested on her primarily.

Cinematography-wise, there are some gems in the stills (famous hand holding gif), but I dislike the overall muted palette of the film; many will think this suits the tone and in some ways I agree, however, I will always prefer color and dislike the epidemic of desaturation we've seen so often in 21st century cinema. For this reason, 96, 97, 06 all triumph against 2011 aesthetically for me personally, although I still recognize some of the artistry of 2011, it is not my preference.

My overall ranking: 2006 (primarily for Jane/Rochester), 1997 (excellent overall), 1996 (good but flawed), 2011 (I tried but overall did not enjoy it).

[runn1ngn0se]

I posted 5,814 times in 2022

That's 5,600 more posts than 2021!

137 posts created (2%)

5,677 posts reblogged (98%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@khaotik-singularity

@talonpaw

@berrystumpytail

@girltigerclaw

@00389a

I tagged 1,807 of my posts in 2022

#runningnose - 285 posts

#shadowsight - 205 posts

#bluestar - 162 posts

#requested by me - 146 posts

#sol - 58 posts

#mudlizard family - 51 posts

#warrior cats - 38 posts

#ohno - 33 posts

#deathloop - 27 posts

#nightstar - 25 posts

Longest Tag: 138 characters

#i still can't believe than in the left pic i had to color her a grey lighter cause i accidentaly used her actual dark grey for the lineart

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

I really hope that Nightheart x Sunbeam is a trashfire of a relationship and for that to be the point.

We as a society forgot that the point of Romeo and Juilet was that the two of them were rebelious, emotionally charged teenagers who got infatuated with eachother once, but then when their families steped in and started telling them no, in defiance they pushed further and further into eachother into it eventually killed them both. The tragedy wasn't that they never got to love eachother, it was because they never got to explore their relationship in an honest manner that wasn't them acting spiteful to everybody else.

The point of Nightheart and Sunbeam is that their entire relationship is based off them using eachother to act in defiance of or to escape their clanmates (Squirrelflight, Bramblestar, and Sparkpelt in Nightheart's case, and Lightleap, Blazefire, and Berryheart in Sunbeam's case), and that the two a very clearly both emotionally unstable [Ya sure Nighthearts show that plenty of times, but Sunbeam was just seething at Lightleap in the most petty manner durring her little bothers funeral]

My hope for Shadow and onward is that they have a honeymoon period at first where they're all lovey-dovey, but then relationship slowly but surely begins to slip apart as their more unstable elements clash, but the two will refuse to seperate because it would mean making Squirrelflight and Berryheart smug, so it just continues to rot until it finally explodes in dramatic fashion.

The fact the the will-they-won't-they aspect of the story is already over 2 books in (which is the usual way to keep a romance plot like this going, see BristleRoot), and they couldn't possibly fill 2/3rds of 4 books with "Berryheart doesn't like Nightheart", they need something more for their story and I think this would be great for material.

I know this fandom would hate a story like that, but I've always been capivated by the toxic trashfires of relationships like RaggedYellow, and I'm excited to see us get that as a plot in a main series arc.

I really do hope this is their intention, cause if they do play it off as actually genuine and correct, then this arc is gonna be another kind of trashfire.

I understand people's hesitation to believe that the Erins could pull of a storyline like this without it slipping and falling on its face given their track record, but I'm willing to wait it out and see if they can stick the landing. Shadow is going to be a really important book in solidifying how i feel about this arc going forward

Also people who say Frostpaw's chapters are the only good ones only care about "the plot" and I think those people are boring

76 notes - Posted November 3, 2022

#4

Something people aren’t talking enough about with the ASC covers:

The Warriors logo color matches the eye color of the front-most character

102 notes - Posted May 5, 2022

#3

Felt like drawing something this morning, then I saw @lockandkeyhyena 's Cinders design for the 100th time and figured that looked like something I could bang out real quick, maybe even experiment with lineless art again.

105 notes - Posted November 29, 2022

#2

ok so apparently somebody has found a copy of a reprinted Skyclan's Destiny with a new cover THAT WAS NEVER ANNOUNCED!?!?!

284 notes - Posted May 16, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

I said this in the tags of a reblog and i just want to put this out there proper

Its wild that Runningnose was conceived entirely as a joke character. His single point of existence for Into the Wild was so that, when Firepaw found Yellowfang in ThunderClan territory, they could be like "but wait, if you're not ShadowClan's medicine cat anymore, that who... OHNO" *smash cut like a Family Guy cutaway joke to the single most unqualified-to-be-a-doctor person imaginable and play laugh track* Thats his entire place in the story.

Then they realized when they started writing the later books that the dumb joke character was still ShadowClan's medicine cat and was therefore too important to just ignore / write out, so they had to take him seriously as a charcater, and as more and more horrible stuff happened in ShadowClan the more and more emotional weight they put on the doctor who couldn't cure his runny nose.

Eventually we get to Yellowfang's Secret and its revealed that he had a neglegent mother and was the foster brother of the tyrant that ruined his life, and when we get to his naming ceremony Yellowfang has to say with a straight face "Your name will be a reminder that medicine cats can't cure everything" and they have to just straight into Yellowfang's dream cause how could you possibly write his reaction to that as anything other than him realizing his entire life is a joke.

And now we are at the point where people are reading stuff like Exile from ShadowClan where theres just a character whos a doctor with an uncurable runny nose named Runningnose and everybody had to treat him like any other serious character and can't even bat an eye at how foolish that is while the reader is left to wonder how we ended up in this timeline.

This is all just another reason why hes my favorite charcater

1,280 notes - Posted October 7, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[ninjasmart]

Hi, could you do a celebrity reading? The one I have in mind is Tom Cruise. The questions could be 1. How does he actually feel/think about Scientology, 2. his love life 3. Is Suri his daughter? The last one might be a bit too private, but the first two maybe. Thanks

I have done a few readings on him. Apart from some anger outbursts he is a genuinely interesting person to read on.

He does not have passion for it but he definitely enjous the servitude he receives. Everything he wants - he gets it and he gets it exactly how he wants it. His heart is somewhere else, though. Something about finances being messed up and a knight of wands - a young man or a woman. They are seeking each other energetically. I think I know what this is about.

Hahaha. What love life? Let me explain. After Nicole Kidman a casting for a new wife was done for him from within scientology. They figured that if something goes wrong like with the marriage to Nicole, at least the children will not be b*ing about never seeing their mother again.

Well, he had his rebelious act where he married a woman who stalked and targeted him and inserted herself into his life. Big Megsy vibes.

She had also learned the lessons of the marriage failore with the 1st wife and went for the jugular. If I am not mistaken she is still poisoning their daughter against him while he provides for them financially... Dream come true for many **** women - get the ring + give birth to a baby = be financially provided for for decades.

Despite the negative cards for his love life - Empress rx, King of pentacles rx, 10 of wands rx, 3 of cups rx, and a highly critical and snooping in his personal life woman - queen of swords, I believe that there is someone: 3 of wands and he wants to keep it to himself: 4 pentacles rx.

3. She is. She is not his only child, did you know that? He is hoping to build a relationship with her but she's judgmental and angry at the moment. There is a fragile balance between them but it is there. I believe that she's badly influenced by "other famous offsprings" and is planning to emancipate herself legally from him as a statement of independence. On the inside she really badly wants to speak with him, and have a daddy. She's very harsh but I personally blame her mother for this. Yes, she had to kond of abduct her from her father in order to escape the scientology grip. However, unlike her she's an adult and the definition of an uncaring father is a father who does not give a sh*t to and about his child. TC does provide even though she did him dirty.

So, I looked them up too. He has held out for her for years. But I think that by this time even he realised that the sacrifise is not worth it. The little game they played is not working out any more. So - he's coming out, slowly slowly from the hybernation. And she- she'll need to soon dace the reality of her situation and look at her broken heart and work on healing it.

[darkasagrowl]

Understanding Wesker’s motivations

I’m not claiming to be an expert on character analysis, but I sure as heck am tired of seeing every RE head canon I come across making this guy seem like he does what he does just for laughs, or because he is “just evil”, or emotionally unattached. Like seriously?

Here I list 3 major points about his character. Some are speculation but most of it is based on information that we have been given throughout the games.

Let me know what you think:

1. Emotionally detached - I can't believe people pull this one up on him constantly. We have more than enough evidence that this couldn't be farther from the truth. First of all, we have Birkin as one proof that he can develop and maintain deep and meaningful connections with other people. We can also go back to re6 and argue that maybe he also had a relationship with Jake's mom, but we don't have enough evidence of that (that I'm aware). Ultimately, we can refer to how he lets his anger control him in re5, if nothing else. He might be incredibly intelligent, but he isn't as rational as he likes to make people believe. 

2. Concerned for Alex? - in re5 there is a list of which of the Wesker children are alive, but in rev2 we see a picture of both Alex and Albert together. He seems to be wearing the same clothes from re4, which could mean the picture dates from around the same time. If this is true, maybe this is around the same time that Alex started her own experiments at that island and they lost touch. Wesker could be using that list and info about the children to try and track her down and find out what she's up to, and maybe he himself gave her the uroboros sample she ended up working on.

3. Superiority complex - I argue that he has in fact the opposite. Wesker has an inferiority complex and it is only enhanced further the more he interacts with Chris. I think Wesker is a bit jealous of him, and also, hates that Chris got such an accurate read of him. So this one's a little long:

Wesker has lived his whole life thinking all he had ever accomplished was on him. He believed he was smarter and generally better at everything than everyone else. This boosted his ego from a very young age. He finally discovers that everything he has ever done, everything he had ever thought or discovered or whomever he'd manipulated to get what and to where he wanted could actually not be due to his free will, but because he was being controlled by Spencer and Umbrella and even his existence was, as he put it, "manufactured". He was manufactured to act that way; to think that way - he was manufactured to be this next step in human evolution that he had always thought he was. But he was actually a thing, not an actual person; no better that those experiments he had trifled with his entire life. This realization, I believe, broke him. Just think about it, what would you do if you found out suddenly that your every action or thought might never have been your own; that they might have been imposed on you? Well I certainly know what I would try to do: prove to myself and to whoever is still watching that I can, in fact, make my own decisions; act according to my own free will.

And that's what he did. The whole "God" thing, I think, was him trying to make his actions big, and by big, I mean meaningful. I mean, can you imagine being someone that has been involved in how the world is being shaped, in how different societies are developing solely because of your own advancements and meddling in either science or political relations around the globe (due to selling and enforcing the use of chemical warfare and terrorism)? Can you imagine, after all that, something that would really have an impact in your life and prove to you and everyone around you that you are your own person; that what you are doing, you are doing it of your own accord and, again, free will? I mean, it HAS to be something BIG.

Que Redfield. Like I said before, Chris had Wesker all figured out immediately at the end of re1 (tyrant scene). It's obvious how his laugh affects Wesker. But I believe Wesker is visibly confused by this, and not angered per se. See, I think this is the point in which he has one of his first realizations as "himself" and not as an Umbrella/Spencer project. I think he did think the same thing as Chris: what he was doing, and the way he was acting at that moment, WAS pitiful. But the thing is, although he knew that, he couldn’t understand why. I mean, that was what he had been working on for a long time, and he was finally about to see it in action, but it still felt lacking; and what happened next proves it to him (being stabbed by it meant that thing he was so proud of, so enamored by, wasn't perfect -but he was - so it made no sense to see himself in such a thing; such a “failure” as Chris puts it, or did it?). This started his hatred for Redfield. Before this, we can argue that maybe, during their time together at STARS, their interactions made Wesker see how different his life could have been. Seeing how carefree Chris was in his younger years made him realize how repressed he must have felt when he was his age (and maybe at that time as well), but there isn't much information about this time, except the novels, but I'm not sure about how canon they are, so let's leave this part at that.

Even in re5, when Chris asked if he always takes his ideas from comic book villains, he got it right. I know this one sounds far-fetched, but bear with me here. What if he did? What if the only thing he could think about was to a simpler time in his life, when Umbrella didn't feed him their intentions 24/7? I believe that, when he was a child, his life must have been relatively normal, to a certain extent so he must have had hobbies; things kids like to do growing up. And what is something kids enjoy? Reading comics. I know, this doesn't make much sense, that I'm making this part up or whatever, but we don't know about this part in his life. Maybe, when he found out about his origin and felt the need to reject it, his mind shot back to a simpler time; to when he felt safe and as normal as everyone else. It makes sense to me. But you can disregard this part if you want.

Back to Chris, in re5 we can see more closely how Wesker is jealous of Chris. He's had numerous chances in the past to either let him die or directly kill him, although he always opted for the option of "toying" with him. In re5 this is no different. He could have easily killed Chris (and Sheva) in the first fight they have, but opts to "play" for 7 minutes. The second fight he could have finished the job, but he wanted to make it last and was defeated, which led to him being temporarily weakened and presumably dying at the volcano.

The way he says his name, the way he yells for him; it's always Chris, even though others have thwarted his plans and machinations, Wesker always seems to have Chris in his mind; it doesn't matter who else is around, Chris is always there - it's always him, even when it isn't. It feels as though Wesker wants to prove to either Chris or himself (or maybe both) that he is better than Chris, but always ends up failing.

And ultimately, I think it's because Chris has the life Wesker always wanted to have. This hatred developed from earlier in their lives, to seeing how he has a family that cares enough about him to risk their own lives for him (Claire in both re2 and code Veronica), close friends and a seemingly easy ability to befriend people (something that his cold and controlled demeanor prevents him from, achieving little more than a relationship of authority towards most people *and also, can we talk about his sunglasses? He's been wearing them since before his eyes mutated. Was this on purpose to create even more distance from people and make developing any form of connection impossible?*) and finally, a purpose. Yes, a purpose. He's always had something up his sleeve during his time at Umbrella and after, but their accomplishment was never enough; it never satisfied him. And after speaking with Spencer about his origin, it finally made sense. Those were never his goals. They were the designs of other people whom, at the end of it all, failed; which could also be something that affects him, knowing that, to top it all off, he failed - his existence is summed up to be just a failed experiment.

 Idk man, if that were me, I'd also be poppin' off.

[ezxthan]

Hey!! I was wondering why you don’t like MC in Motonari’s route? I thought she was kind of dumb with the way she was acting sometimes.

s a m e

Before I start: English is not my native language so sorry if this post will be a whole mess called "what the hell she's talking about".

In my opinion, some suitors could switch their Mcs. Sometimes Mai's personality doesn't affect my overall impression, but sometimes *cough*keijimotonari*cough*.

Poor thing, she really tried in her mini rebelious era which quickly changed into mOOotonari ur so bad🥺how dare uuu uwu baka. The whole beggining of his route is just forking stupid😭 You know, I don't have main reason why I dislike Mai here, she's just no compatible enough with Motonari.

If Motonari's MC would be more mature and decisive, their relationship could be so much better and spicier. Motonari is a really great character, so that wasted potential hurts me a little bit. He's kinda similar to ikepri Silvio and I absolutely ADORE his MC. Hey, doggo, can I borrow your girl for a while? I'm asking for a friend.

Maybe it's mostly a matter of translation, I really don't know. Maybe she wouldn't bother me with other suitor. But in this case, the plot is just less convincing for me.

Anyway, my fav ikesen MC is the Mitsunari's one, she's just perfect 😭 And for Motonari, hmmm, maybe someone like Hideyoshi's MC would be better?

No wonder why Kicho wants destroy the world so bad, well, good luck with that dude.

Of course, it's only my opinion, If anyone disagrees it's totally okay! Feel free to share your thoughts♥️

[ask-agent-rapzutin-vodello]

Norma &Lizzie even though both of ypu guys shared some details about your life before coming to the motherlobe. Would you two care to go more into depth about life back home ?

[NORMA] You see, Liz, what happens when we put off answering questions? People start asking the same questions.

[LIZZIE] You do realize that this could just be the same Anon? But okay, let’s do this, Sis.

[NORMA] Me and LIzzie were born in a rather wealthy family. Not “20 room mansion, 2 swimming pools, ect...” rich, but still wealthy enough Dad has some pull where we lived. Father is the CEO of Big Accounting Firm. Family business. 4th Generation Son to inherit the position. But with that comes that Father has been raised with certain ...opinions.

[LIZZIE] Wich is a nice way to say that Dad got fed a unhealthy dose of Bias, biogotry and stereotyping from the moment he could recognize faces. He’d have certain opinions about Adam, for instance.

[NORMA] Yeah, that’s basically it. Big wealth, big expectations. Like the first born of the family being a boy. Neither he or Grandfather were really pleased with having Twin Girls. Still, Grandfather has stated numour times during the remainder of his time that we still could have our ...uses. Mother would get so angry whenever he started spouting his nonsense. 

[LIZZIE] (puts on a gravely voice) “Women are only good for marying families of influence and bearing our heirs.” Yeah, the old fart wasn’t really subtle. Still, I have to give it to our Old Man that he never really agreed with Gran’dad’s opinion. After all, our Mother is the daugher of Dominican Republic Migrants and he married her despite the absolute [BEEP] Gran’dad gave her. Nanna was always nice to her and tried to reel Gran’dad in a bit. Maybe ‘cause she and Mom were very similar. Tough. Saying it like it is. A bit rebelious. I felt inspired. I started to ‘rebel’ from an early age. Seems like I’m the one who looks like Mom and Nanna the most.

[NORMA] You saying I primarily take after Father? That I’m like him?

[LIZZIE] Wow, Norma, NOT what I meant. I didn’t mean t’-

[NORMA] Just pulling your leg, Lizzie. It’s true that, out of the two of us, I spent the first few years of my life trying to please Father and Grandfather, gain their appreciation, being what they expected me to be. 

[LIZZIE] Yeah, You really acted like a real 5th generation-

[NORMA] Don’t say that name. We started using Mom’s Maiden Name for a reason.

[LIZZIE] Yeah, our Symbolic act of denouncing our Paternal Family Half. Anyway, like we said, It weren’t all shit and gloom our lives, especially after Gran’dad (and his influence) died. Dad started to become a little bit more ...sociable in his acting around us. We started having fun with him. Still, he didn’t like it at all when we came out of the closet last year. If it weren’t for Hollis being there to pick us up ...

[NORMA] Anyway, to make a long story short. We got chosen by Agent Forsythe herself for the Advanced Intern Program. Father isn’t one who would decline a request from an Government Official, so we were allowed to go.

[LIZZIE] Best thing that ever happened to us. We got to meet Raz and the others. We got to be ourselves here. We bloomed. Even Norma eventually stopped denying she liked girls ‘that way’. That was one intense ‘7 minutes of heaven’ with Gisu.

[NORMA] S-shut up, Liz.

[hugthepanda12]

Bobo rant

Ok, @narvana27 this one’s for you coz I’ve mustered up some motivation to finally write some analyses just like you or @medeaminte​

This one will cover our beautiful Brazillian boy Raimundo Pedrosa. Some spoilers are inevitable to mention, but the main focus is on the episode titled ‘The Return of Master Monk Guan’.

1.1 short synopsis of the episode:

Master Fung, seeing how the forces of evil grew in power, decides to send monks to another temple for their training. It turns out the new master that is destined to teach them is Master Monk Guan. 

As for his methods, they are surprisingly cruel. Our heroes are not allowed to take breaks or even ASK QUESTIONS! Guan becomes that horrible general in military school who likes when cadets are blindly following his orders and train to the point they collapse due to severe exhaustion. 

Rai, of course, sees that the way Guan treats his students is unfair and stands up for the rest. Which ends up bad for him. Guan punishes him with additional training and what is worse humiliates him through giving him insulting nicknames! Later on, the audience learns that this disrespectful behaviour of Master Guan was intentional. What is more, Raimundo knows about it as well. It was a part of the agreement between them, reached off screen without the knowledge of the other monks. The main goal of such a strategy was to lure Hannibal Roy Bean out of his hiding, let him believe Rai is ready to turn to the Heylin side (again) and snatch the Treasure of the Blind Swordsman from his little evil vines. 

As the episode reaches its end, this plan as well ends in success. Bean is mad as hell and promises Raimundo that he’ll pay for it. Yeah, yeah happy ending. Cool. Rai gets one of the Spears of Guan as a gift for a succesfull colaboration with Master Monk Guan bla blah 

BUT!

Even if it was all the play on Guan and Rai’s part throughout the whole episode, in my opionion Guan was too harsh anyway. I get it. He had to be plausible, but man... Rai literally cried when he banished him from the temple!  

And this is an issue I wanted to talk about. 

1.2. Let’s look at all ‘nicknames’ Guan came up with for Raimundo. 

1. Young prince 2. bobo

3. someone dark, ruthless, shady, rebelious

I WANT TO PROVE RAI. IS. NOT. ANY OF THESE. 

1.2.1.The insult ‘young prince’ (or princess) is often used when a young person is too lazy to finish chores or he/she is not willing to do them at all. Maybe it was Raimundo in s01, although he had never said ‘no’ to master Fung. He just wanted to go easy way, like swiping the dirt under the sofa instead of getting rid of it in a proper way. But mind you, it is season 3 and this boy has changed a lot. Sometimes you don’t have to work hard to get your task done. All it takes is an adequate situation assessment and good organisation of your work.

 It looks as if Guan just doesn’t get it. Just like how vital breaks are in order to rise productivity. 

Rai made a right decision to stop training and lay on the grass. He knows what’s good for him and he stands by this intention to REST. Life is not ALWAYS about saving the world. He’s just a kid. Just like Omi, Kimiko or Clay. He’s defending his boundaries, but it appears no one’s respecting that choice. 

1.2.2. What about Bobo? Up to this day I thought that Guan wanted to underline that Rai acts like a clown, so he gave him a clown name. However, I came across this site. And guess. Bobo in Portuguese means ‘silly.’

And my question is: Did Guan know? Hmm!? Did you know about it, Guan? If yes, I’m very disappointed in you. ‘Silly little clown boy’ - this is what Rai is? No, it’s not like he was the only one brave enough to fight Mala Mala Jong... or EVEN OMI when he turned heylin!

It’s not like he has feelings or something... He’s the fun guy! Always chill! Not allowed to cry! His purpose is to entertain the rest, righ?

NO. Rai is not only a capable warrior but also a very dedicated friend, who can sacrifice ANYTHING in order to save the rest. Let’s ennumerate how many people he saved throughout the series. People who live near the vulcano in Brazil, that Lady who turned out to be the Bird of Paradise.... OMI. The rest of his team a couple of times... 

And what is more, every encounter TAUGHT HIM SOMETHING or had left some scars. He was possessed by Wuya, got beat up, and constantly he is accused of having EVIL TENDENCIES. What? Because ONE TIME he betrayed them? And that betrayal was justified because he felt hella ineadequate? 

But yeah, Guan. Go on. He is just silly to get all the punches for the team. It’s not like he isn’t bothered when the forces of evil are victorious.

Not at all. 

1.2.3. Ok, I agree Rai is rebelious, but as I mentioned earlier - HE HAS REASONS to be that way. He feels something is wrong - he exclaims why this is wrong and tries to FIX IT with the help or without it. The thing is, in s1-2 prefers facing problems alone due to that inadequacy he’s often reminded of by his peers. It’s sad to see that monks never realised Raimundo feels that way. Luckily, in season 3 Rai grew as a character. He displays more and more leader characteristics. He comes up with better strategy and is ore connected to his friends. As a result their cooperation during fights is on a higher level, just like in the last showdown in that alternate timeline. 

DARK, RUTHLESS, SHADY. - those are lies and I won’t comment on that

He can be ruthless only if someone hurts his family and friends. They’re gonna pay for that. Respect Rai for that. 

2. My opinion on  ‘ The Return of Master Monk Guan’

2.1. Guan’s behaviour - this post is about it. Just wanted to add he is very inconsistent as a character and writers probably had no idea how to write him so they just randomly threw him to some plot points in order to give episodes smooth flow between scenes. 

But yeah in that particular ep Guan is a jerk. First kidnapping Dojo, then overworking children only to kick out the most responsible one outta his temple with numerous sculptures of him, Dashi and replicas of his fav spear.

2.2 Monks’ behaviour - wanted to help, turned out bad. Omi as always was questioning Rai’s value and laughed at him bc of his new nicknames. Very mature of the chosen one, really. 

2.3 My review

This episode was good because:

1. It's rai-centered

2. He put to use that clever brain of his and gave master Guan the idea how to retrieve the most powerful wu from Bean

3. He can KICK ASS, only refuses to use that against his friends. 4. good preparation for cheeseball to reconsider he's NOT ALWAYS THE BEST and should be aware of Raimundo's skills

2.4. Summary

Raimundo Pedrosa has one of the best character developments in animation history but most importantly he is the complete opposite of those things the other characters tell him he is. He learns from his mistakes and utilises the knowledge for his benefit to protect what he believes is right. He’s very compassionate young man, who can do great things and he WILL with guidance of his temple family.

But most importantly, he well deserved the position of the Xiaolin Leader. His name is not Bobo. Only Raimundo Pedrosa. Good friend, leader, warrior, the future hope for making the world a better place. 

[askandsmile]

I know Hiram wasn't invited to Veronica's wedding with Chad but do you think even with all Hiram has done towards Archie he'd be invited to a Varchie wedding? Could you see him finally accepting Archie as the man in Veronica's life?

i hope we learn a little more about this, tbh. i think is not even that he wasn’t invited, veronica didn’t even inform him that she was getting married lol i think maybe marrying chad was a bit of a rebelious act for her in some way, like, “i do what i want now and no one can say anything about it”.

i don’t know what are hiram’s shady deals with chad just yet, but they have been talking behind ronnie’s back, so we’ll learn if hiram was aware of anything chad was doing behind veronica’s back and if he’s been trying to “help” or fuck her over.

as for archie, yes, i think archie and hiram will always have a rivalry but they also can have some respect built between them. and i think that, ultimately, and deep down, hiram knows that archie is the right man for his daughter, which is why he hates archie so much lol.

[arcade-conspiracy]

Hey! Can I get a matchup for Danganronpa & Death Note plz ? I'm a straight girl that takes interest in a lot of things, I like to learn but not in a very academic manner and want to be a polyglott – for the moment I am fluent english and french, next is japanese and arabic cause why not ? I like sports, especially basket-b, videos/cards games, anything that is a game maybe lol ? music, writting, drawing, food, caramel and chips are so additive T-T ugh spicy food psychology and memes ofc.

My personality type is entp, i am independent, polyvalent/moody, honest, sassy, playful but even if at first glance I look intimidant despite being somewhat charismatic to people and dumb I am surprisingly smart and funny ! Top students here hehe and official clown of my school, my family and the town, next is the country.

I am quite prideful and fear being weak and boredrom. I am chaotic good, competitive, ambitious and scarily serious when I want to reach my goals lol also protective of my few friends and the shy/reclused one Beside that I can be interested by anything really, like nowadays who care about flower language ? Me. and even if it doesn't suit the image people have of me : my style is streetwear, i am 5'8. Doesn't that last one sounded pretty arrogant lol ? I am pretty rebelious, intuitive and creative. Low key tsundere ugh but I can be flirty ! Just not comfortable with feelings and physical touch but I don't mind someone more at ease.

Ideal date would be at beach, arcades or just something like walking in town or a beautiful and isolated spot. Even a study date is fine ! I think that my ideal partner shouldn't restrain myself to express my opinion and that in a way I should find something fascinating from them.

I match you with,,,

Mello!

Oh boy does he have fun with you

Not in a bad way or anything, he just thinks its fun to tease you

Though, he can be quite the tsundere himself, so don’t worry about not having opportunities to get him back for it

Because you definitely will have the chance to tease him back

He will not hesitate to insist that hes taller, despite you two being the same height

Its not even important, but he insists. He acts like it gives him more power or something.

He’s grown acustom to to having video games around, due to Matt, so dont be afraid to force him to play with you

Actually, please do, he acts like he doesn’t like them but he does

Be prepared, he can be hella competitive with it once hes in it, though

If you win, gets all pouty,, please make fun of him for it 

He believes the languages you know, and want to learn, is a really useful skill

It’s not that your other interests aren’t useful or interesting to him, because they are, but this one in particular intrigues him

And also because he only believes “useful” things are worth the time, and it’s an actually useful thing to know, but yknow

Hes not big on physical affection, himself, hes better with words of affirmation

Giving and recieving!

Though hes in fact terrible at trying to praise anyone, since it’s just not his normal way of going about anything, especially you cuz you’re you

He puts you higher than anyone else, of course he’s gonna get awkward around you. He’s trying his best tho!

Tl;Dr, Yall are too smart for each other. Just a lil bit.

Hajime Hinata!

Boy howdy, he’s enamored with you

Just absolutely fascinated with all the things you’re good at

He especially loves all the games you’re into, and your writing, though

Your writing is calming to read, since he knows it comes from you, it helps him get to know you better without having to talk to you

And obviously games are something you can do together, whether they be video games or board games, it’s enjoyable to him

He’s not too quick to speak about his feelings, himself, so if that’s an area you’re uncomfortable with, don’t even worry!

There are other ways to express and discuss how you feel without directly speaking about it, and you two have found basically every one, so it tends to be fine

He wants nothing more than for you to be yourself, so he’d never try and hold you back

Even if you’re interested in seventeen things at once and wanna tell him about all of them, he still just thinks it’s the most interesting thing in the world

You being you is what makes him care, so of course he’s going to want you to be completely yourself no matter what

Your humor doesn’t really get to him at first, he’s always too nervous around you to even realize you’re joking

But after a while, once he gets used to it, he thinks the jokes you come up with and the way you make everyone laugh is so special

He’s just too serious sometimes, and tends to overthink so much that humor goes right over his head

Speaking of seriousness, he tries to be serious like,, 99% of the time, so if you get overly serious when you’re stuck on something you wanna get done, he’s all for matching that energy

As long as it’s benefiting you, and it’s something he can handle, he’ll probably go for it

Tl;Dr, He’s a little whipped. That’s all.

[riverpheonixs]

The women in River Phoenix's life After all this years being a fan of River and many other people, I was able to observe a certain behaviour that always bothered me but I never addressed properly: the way people treat and judge the women whose had a relationship with a famous man they admire. This happens way before the internet, we can see this behaviour with Yoko Ono. The woman is an incredible conceptual and performatic artist way before she met John Lennon but for what is she most famous? For ending The Beatles. Which, of course, it's not true. It doesn't need much research to see that Paul, John, George and Ringo weren't having a good relationship and were diverging in interests and in what direction they should carry on their songs, sound and careers. The band was already doomed to end soon with or without Yoko, Paul already said himself. Plus, I think racism has a lot to do with the way people still ridicularize Yoko, I don't think she would be attacked and called witch that much even today if she was a pretty and blonde white woman. Another famous situation of blaming and judging the women for the wrong things that happened to the men: Courtney Love. Courtney, a very good rock musician, was already attacked moral and verbally by Nirvana fans when Kurt Cobain was still alive, he even talked about how fans should be nice to her in a concert. And, of course, after his suicide people started to blame Courtney. They keep attacking her and trying to discredit her in any possible way, either if it's in her personal or professional life. The fact that Courtney is not an model of perfect woman and has a very rebelious and agressive attitude (kind of like Kurt) doesn’t help either, women are always judged when they don’t have a good and proper ladylike behaviour, it’s like men are allowed to be rebelious rockstars but not women. It doesn't need much effort to see it, there's ALWAYS gonna be someone attacking her after more than 20 years. We can also see a terrible and sexist behaviour when young fans attack the new girlfriends of some teen idol either for saying she is too ugly for them or not good or talented (if she's also an artist) enough. I realized after this cases and many more that the women will always be blamed by the general public and with River’s public wouldn't be different: We have his first girlfriend, Martha Plimpton Martha and River dated from 1985 to 1989 and kept being friends until River's death. Both of them said they started a relationship because they had a lot in common, but what I most heard about Martha is how she is not pretty enough to date River. Which is a shallow thing to say specially being fan of River and knowing how he despised all this. I also heard how maybe it wasn't "true love" since she left him and didn't save him, and that she maybe dated him for his sucess. And honestly... 1) She started dating him before Stand By Me was even out, he wasn't sucessful back then. 2) It's not hard to imagine yourself in Martha's situation at all. Imagine being a teenager, being with someone you love whose alcohol and drug problems have increased, you kept insisting he should stop with all that for almost 4 years but he doesn't listen. What would you do? She has her own life to take care and she has the right to move on, like Martha said he needed to want to change for himself. And I honestly would do the same if this happened to me. After Martha we have Sue Solgot We don't know much about her since she's not in the entertaiment business. We only know some little things that are said in River's interviews at that time and biographies. We know she went to college in the city where River lived, we know she had a girlband in that college and she met River in a local concert, River first said he wasn't River Phoenix like he always used to but then he said the truth to her and asked her for a date. Shortly after, they started living together. What bothers me the most in Sue's case is how people say she was only with him because of his fame and how they talk about the fact that River helped her by paying her college education like is a bad thing. I mean, we don't even know much about her, she doesn't even accompained River in any of his movie premieres or in Hollywood (it really seems like River didn't want this part of his life involved with the business), how we can assume this without considering other reasons? Remember we don't know much about her. Plus, I don't know about you but if I dated and lived with someone and this person was having trouble at paying their college education and I had the money I would help. There's also the fact that River told Peter Bogdanovich, the director of The Thing Called Love, that they broke up because River cheated Sue, she found out and cheated him. But River himself told Peter he understood her actions, that this was the way she found to protect herself. It's honestly ridiculous to blame only Sue for the break up since both of them made their mistakes for things to end this way and River admited it. Sue also said River was having more problems with drugs, that he was changing a lot and didn't want anyone nagging him about it. After Sue we have Samantha Mathis Samatha may be the one most judged and blamed and we all know why. People always say she dated him for his fame, they keep judging her for not doing enough to save him the night he died or even pointing out that she "acted suspicious" for not knowing what to do and just start to cry and bang her head in the wall the moment River started to collapse. They also judge her for supposedly date someone else in the next year after River's death. She met River in 1992 on the set of The Thing Called Love, Samantha was dating someone else and Peter Bogdanovich said how interested River was in Samantha and how he was flirting with her on set anytime he had the chance. River already had two long relationships ended because he didn't want to change and look for a way to end his problems with drugs. Again, it's just a way to put yourself in her place and it's not hard: Imagine being a young woman in a place where drugs are common between young people, you meet a cool guy who happens to have some problems with drugs and start to date him. You know him only for a short period of time. I wouldn't feel I have the right to demand him to stop, he is an adult and he should know what he's doing. Of course, that might be worrisome but what you can truly do if he doesn't want to change for himself and doesn't want to be nagged about it? There's also the fact that people judge the way she reacted to River collapsing. And who are we to judge that? We weren't there, people in shock react differently to a such difficult situation. You truly need more empathy in such a delicate matter. You need to remember she was only 23 back then and I don't think she ever experienced and faced death in such a brutal way before. And, of course, the other thing about Samantha is how they judge her for dating someone else "that fast." Well, let's remember she wasn't a 50 years-old widow married for 32 years. She knew River for an year only, they spend their time together and unfortunately things didn't end well for River, but it wasn't her fault and she needed to move on with her life. With all three of them I see the pression of how they should love River in a very unrealistic and romantized way, the way I don't believe love actually exists, let's be logicals. Maybe if some of them died right after him like Sid and Nancy or Romeo and Juliet people wouldn't be judging them that much. On the contrary, they would be romantizing their lives, love and story together. I've seen those things being said over and over again throughout the years and the worse thing is that they are said not only by young fans but by people way older than me, it makes me see that this concerns the whole society and is very problematic. Remember, River was not a perfect and innocent boy totally influenced by everyone like the press always wanted to paint him and how he always hated people assumed he was. It's okay to recognize that he had flaws and that he wasn’t a perfect boyfriend in his relationships with those women and still admire him. Maybe the idolization towards some artists linked to sexism and misogyny has gone too far to the point that people forget these men are humans, they make mistakes by themselves, they have their on minds and the women or the people around them are not the only ones to blame when something terribly wrong happens. It might be painful to some of you, but the truth is that the world doesn't revolve around River or any other famous man. Women, just like men, are humans and have the right to take care of  their own lives and do what's best for them.

[notsosecretwriting]

It had been too long.

Sid hadn’t really wanted to be around anyone after retirement. It was hard to walk away. Under those circumstances. But after he did, there will small consolations. The escape from the spotlight he’d been under basically all his life was freeing. He doesn’t have to be Sidney Crosby anymore, at least for a little while. 

Sid started to test what that meant. Little rebelious acts that his inner voice couldn’t tell him weren’t allowed anymore. Unplugging, not training, taking up new hobbies, eating what he wants when he wants. Every day one step further to exploring who is Sid? 

Naturally, he missed his teammates and when it didn’t hurt to think of what he’d lost quite so intensely, he decided it was time to call. Deciding to do something and doing the thing are not always a friendly pair. What could he say? After months of radio silence, how would they react? And every day gone by was that much harder.

It had been too long, but it was time. The first choice was obvious. Geno responded more eagerly than Sid had anticipated, and he was headed up the next day. Sid’s not sure why he expected anything different, but it was a warm, surprising feeling. However, Sid suddently felt self-conscious. He took stock of his body, and there were places... softer than before would be the kind way to put it. With less than a day, there wasn’t much he could do about that now. Maybe Geno wouldn’t chirp him too hard. Maybe.

[translationandbetrayals]

Shiki eugenics, traditionalism and the theory of genocide v2

It goes without saying that there will be spoilers for Shiki (1998 Book, 2007 manga adaptation and the 2010 anime) 

  It is not a grand statement to say societies are defined by traditions, that which dictates how we live and understand our positions in our close communities; be it the exploited, oppressed, controled or the perpetrators of such negative social phenomenon of the “civilized” world. Despite this,  we can call the many categories of citizenship a social construct, it is important to pinpoint recorded behaviours that base their justification on the “true nature” of all things: traditionalism (or at least conservative traditionalism). I believe that it is this concept that is the actual main drive of the conflict in the story of Story of Shiki, I say this not to dismiss the very real violence between the humans and “vampires” (Shiki) but to in fact enhance our understanding of what is really at stake; how we come to accept perspectives of the natural. I must advise that when I talk about the story of Shiki I will mainly be referencing the animated series. 

  Shiki’s story takes place in small rural isolated Japanese village called Sotoba, it has a long traditional history of wood craftsmanship that most of the 1300 people living there still uphold, everyone knows everyone else and it is kinda hard to have a family scandal without being noticed. This peaceful and uneventful place (at least superficially) is the initial status quo that this series begins with and that most of the villages subscribe to, they are prone to superstitious beliefs and hesitant before change, which is evident when everyone is unhappy with the “strange european like castle which is out of place in Sotoba” that suddenly appears out of nowhere…Well, almost everyone.

  Megumi is, sadly for all of us, a teenager…one of the bad ones. I will admit that I am a bit biased with my taste in people but I can sympathize with Megumi’s rejection of the other villagers is not totally unwarranted; Sotoba status quo indirectly oppresses Megumi’s sense of identity, an example of this is when the villagers laugh at her “weird” sense of fashion which does result in her social isolation (be it self imposed). For people living in rural villages and towns, “cities” function more as a ideological concept than a urbanistic definition for they represent a place where diversity is plentiful in contrast of their current location. Let’s be clear that diversity in this context really means opportunities of interest for the subject, in Megumi’s case these opportunities are fashion, celebrities, and aesthetics of the “elegant woman”.  This ideological framework of cities is also applied by one of the main characters, Natsuo, who dislikes living Sotoba because “there is nothing to do here” but in his case it is also because he is trying to resist his parents political ideas being pushed onto him. At least in the case of these two characters, the “rebelious phase” of teenages is not motivated politics or ideology but instead is the result of the frustration they feel due to the lack of power they have over their lives; they seek freedom (from their social surroundings). 

  When reviewing this mundane repression of the self, one may be hesitant to pin down traditionalism as guilty of oppression or even harmful. One could criticize the teenagers of being selfish, individualistic while the villagers live in a peaceful and happy community (which is disrupted by the arrival of the supernatural). So let’s talk about gender and witchcraft for a little bit: The assigned role of women (as housewife and reproductive engine of the workforce) is one construct by the rise of bourgeoisie and establishment of capitalist societies, it is maintained by the forms and rules of traditionalism; you may understand this as a type of sexism, be this systematic or cases micro sexism. Despite the degree of human suffering from this tool of oppression, the fact of the mater is that this form of repression is mundane compared to the tools used to establish the traditions of the capitalist housewife, the witch hunts. European societies always had patriarchal elements in them, but there were women with strong social capital in the form of the wise women; rebellious wise women by the way. The objective of the witch hunt and the capitalist housewife model, despite one being extreme and borderline genocidal and the other normalized and traditionalized, share the same objective: the oppression of women’s agency in their labor; and operate under the same justification: the (just) resistance towards the subversion of the natural. To explain clearly the relation of this very real case of oppression with the teenage angst of Megumi and Natsuno, despite the repression of the self (and their agency) is mundane, it can be agued (with the understand of history) that such forms of minor social pressure is the result of a criminal chronology of oppression of those considered “deviants” of the status quo, maybe result of a event that could be considered a war crime. 

  In most monster stories (at least in a traditional sense), the most critical moment of the story is the reveal or exposing of the monster; the horrifying truth that the typical town folks discover that their is a monster in their mist; the commonality is under threat! In Shiki’s case, the reveal of the monster is not only a case of commonality under threat but of the rational thinkers way of understanding nature is in danger of completely collapsing. 

  Toshio Ozaki is our main rational thinker in the story (he is a literal authority of science; a doctor). When Toshio receives his first live victim of the Shiki at his hospital, he at first comes to a rational diagnosis, a light case of anemia. But when his patient suddenly dies, he is not only shocked that his rational conclusion is incorrect (that it is simply a light case of anemia and that it is impossible for it to be lethal) but at his supposed incompetence as a doctor; the consistency of his rationality is linked to his identity of being a doctor. Despite the insistence of science enthusiasts to separate their methodology from the political (this being imposible) and traditionalism, the scientific method has been incorporated into traditionalism as part of its arsenal to succeed in its objective: the oppression of the social deviant and adversary. What was once used to confront conservative and religious beliefs and prejudice is now (and even before 1920) used to defend conservative and naturalist beliefs and prejudices. A similar comparison can be made of the function of Toshio Ozaki in his community; what was once a justifier and defender of healing and care uses the same knowledge to justify and defend what is basically a whole race/tangent-species of humans (the shiki). As the professional doctor Toshio receives more and more evidence of the existence of the Shiki, in fact he gets so much evidence that it is simply idiotic to reject such a reality. But despite the overwhelming evidence of their existence, Toshio needs the ritual of the scientific method to confirm 100% the reality of the Shiki; which means experimenting or to be more accurate experimenting on his vampiric wife. He justifies this (honestly) very uncomfortable act and the genocide of the Shiki with the conclusion that they are “no longer human” and that they are “unnatural”.  The “rational mind set” and “scientific mind” takes a much more a social role in Shiki than that of the empiricist thought: when Toshio tries to suggest the existence of Shiki to his “rational thinker” friends (the fact that they almost always meet in a cafe, a place where the “intellectuals have their drinks”, solidifies this characterization of them) they immediately shut down his ideas with the justification that they are “rational thinkers”; the suggestion of the supernatural, a element that subverts the natural, is not only impossible but demonstrates a degeneration of intelligence in such a mindset, a closed minded way of seeing the natural. 

  For the Shiki themselves, they are the subversion of nature. At least this is what Toshio establishes and a categorization that the villagers accept, the Shiki also adopt this assigned roled as a matter of fact; They see themselves as slaves to their nature.  Sunako and Seishin draw parallels from their conversations as creatures being assigned their “natural” role, Seishun had to adopt his “natural family” role as the village monk and Sunako had to accept her natural role as a blood thirsty Shiki driven only by first. Yet when it comes to the ending of any kind of life, be it human or shiki,  there is a consistent dismissal of the value of death; for the Shiki death is meaningless, for the Humans the killing of Shiki is not a ethical issue because the Shiki are not human. 

  The use of eugenic rhetoric is always a narrative contradiction; one of personal superiority and threat of personal extinction. When it comes to the Shiki and humans, yes- the shike are faster, stronger and will live forever…but they are not right, they are not natural; and therefore they are worse than normal humans and they will end normal humans: their extermination is rational. 

The story of Shiki’s climax is that of the genocide of the “Shiki people” invoking a ancient tradition that is used not only as a coverup but as a social instruction for everyone to follow despite being a extraordinary situation; that being the extermination of the Shiki. After invoking this ancient tradition, the bloody act is normalized and traditionalized: the men hunt the Shiki down and the women make sure they are dead, clean up and of course make the bloody sandwiches.  It brings up questions of where these villagers received such training to make a rapid response towards the “subversion of the natural state” came from, but we forget our history that such traditions are incubated by events of great violence and hate as were the witch hunts. It is easy to dehumanize the Shiki because there is a long tradition of defining what is natural and what is not; life and death. It is easy to kill what is not human because there is a long tradition of the rationalization of moral killing; we kill animals and plants so we can live. Traditions maintain the objectives of destructive events like witch hunts through what I classify as mundane repression or oppression you can see this in the forms of hate speech and systemic discrimination; despite their lack of “flashiness of the disaster” they can result in very harmful results to groups of people. The real threat of Traditionalism is not its micro aggression, but its ability to invoke grand events that can result in mass deaths. 

  What makes Shiki such a good monster story is not the monsters or the reveal of the monster, but how people faces the existential threat of something “unnatural” disrupting the “natural” order of things, a commonality defined by centuries of tradition…tradition that is waiting, like a sleeping knight, to fight against the “darkness” once again. 

  Videos related to this subject: 

  Vid 1 ::: Vid 2 ::: Vid 3 ::: Vid 4

A wierd…wierd video about someone talking about themselves being a trad…that being a traditionalist… view at your own discretion (It’s kinda of what you would expect). 

  The “trad” Vid

  Bonus: 

  Mystery vid 

  —

  Pedro Pons

[elysianisms]

♔

Send me a ♔ for me to describe a favorite rp character of mine.

I just want to start saying I love all of my characters and there’s moments where all of them live under the same spotlight and have my heart whenever they want it. But okay, currently favorite character is this lil kiddo I’ve had for so long, she was literally one of my first characters in the rpc here in tumblr. I brought her to this rpg I was already in to fill a wanted connection and she grew on me, I had her in that group for two years and then I never played her again until now. I never thought I’d find a place where she’d fit again, especially due to her story but I’m playing her a bit older now and it’s giving me so many possibilities to keep developing her personality, story and just making new conections that build her as a person with every interaction and plot.

She was 18 years old when I started playing her, I used Taissa Farmiga as her fc, and she was this girl who had been forced to grow up all too son and become her own parental figure, however weak that concept was. She had all this issues asides from her traumatic brought up, she was still on her teenage years acting and moving in the adult world, with a lot of losses in the process of building her sense of sel and without really compensating them with a proper psychological development in terms of maturity and becoming a person strong enough to handle the challenges one faces throughout their life.

She moved in with her cousin and got a job, because that’s what people do and she barely even cared about it all. She’d become rebelious and confrontative with any kind of authority or things that were socially acceptable because she never had any proof that society could actually be good, or that the shared stereotypes of good parents, teenagers, adultship were actually real. She’d only ever known disappointment when it came to what should be expected and she’d learnt to this point that it was her against the world and that she should get the things she needed to get by however she could. 

Living in NYC she finally started to settle down and have an attempt at building actual bonds with people, allowing herself to care and be somewhat nicer to the people that she got along with. Wihout letting herself be at complete ease, Bonnie actually felt that things could for once not be that bad. Either way she never once complained about the life she got for she had somehow outcome her own experiences with being born in a family that didn’t want her and simply neglected her, parents that didn’t love each other and as a product of their toxic relationship she was beaten up daily, an environment in which no kid should ever grow up between guns and drugs and crime. She felt like she had handled the worst and was just fine on her own, but still being left by the people she had begin to care about clouded her with disappointment and abandonment issues that she soon transformed into a sentiment of being her the one constantly disappointing other and believing it was her own idea to be on her own, not needing people. Here’s where I played her last, her story then kept developing even if I didn’t play her.

Being left behind by her cousin meant she was homeless and barely even making the cut to stay alive, and somehow she was unaffected by all of this. Bonnie had built up a strength of mind where she simply blocked emotion and took things as rationally as she could, scattering for practical solutions however inmoral or fucked up. Sleeping on the sidewalk, exchanging sex for photography lessons or simply for a room, she got used to being this reckless and careless, just having an idea of what she wanted and trying to get that. Falling into a relationship with a man she did not love wasn’t really a problem to her but it was more a solution, she only needed to be around and play the part and she got what she wanted which was to do her job and learn more. Soon enough she was trapped in an abusive relationship she had not asked for but which seemed natural at this point given her upbring, to the point she didn’t even question it. She’d fight back and try to defend herself because she had all this anger bottled up but then again not being able to grasp the thought that maybe just maybe, what was out there could be better than her current situation.

It took a lot for her to actually make the choice and finally leave, she didn’t have plans or anyone to really go to, it was her and whatever she was experiencing at the moment, she took situations as they came and would take a punch if that was what’s coming her way. So the possibility of doing her job somehow without the abusive boyfriend or any actual connection to a particular person that could potentially harm her emotionally if not physical, it sounded like a good enough deal.

And here’s when I play her again, five years later and she’s 23 and her faceclaim is Caitlin Stasey, and she’s changed. She’s put up so many barriers and simply wants to go through life without having to actually get to know people because deep down she knows how vulnerable she can be and how much it can fuck her up. Caring, having any type of emotions, letting people close enough to hurt you… she doesn’t want to live through that again, she can’t afford another loss that would mess her up psychologically, her sense of self, the faulty identity she’s built up for herself, the shaky ground in which she’s settled to try and keep growing. In all honesty she’s surprised she’s made it this far and she doesn’t wanna risk it. 

She knows she’s all sorts of screwed and that what she needs is so many things that she’s just been pushing to the back of her mind and building walls around it to keep it far from actually disturbing her in her way through life. Bonnie strongly believes that she can only hurt people that care for her, because the people she’s ever cared for have hurt her. She feels like she’s a major disappointment in society’s eyes and everyone seems to be living a pleasant or somewhat nice life caught in betweent the sterotypes and that thought as correct or possible, while she’s simply an outcast… someone who really shouldn’t exist in the elements that make society what it is.

Finally she’s just stuck at this place in which she wants to run so desperately, afraid that if she stays at one place for too long she’ll end up doing exactly what she doesn’t want, which is to form relationships and make friends and actually interact with people in a deeper and more relevant level. She wants to run but she also wants to stay so badly, to give it a try at being normal, at maybe being happy like everyone else seems to be. And she’s already getting to that point where she cares about a couple of people, likes them, could see even bigger things with them and she’s so conflicted because she doesn’t want it, she can’t picture herself keeping it together and actually make it work. So she’s simply testing waters, ready to leave, curious to take the leap.

I love Bonnie because even though her backstory is a bit peculiar in comparison to some of my other characters with more familiar or realistic backgrounds, she’s the most human of them all or at least I feel like it. She’s doing this thing of feeling and repressing feelings, trying to do things the right way but constantly messing up and just blaming it upon herself, not questioning things that everyone should be questioning, choosing the seemingly easier path, struggling to be a person who knows who she is, what she’s doing… she’s fucked up and everyone is, in their own particular way, and she’s trying very hard and shows a tough armour to defend herself from society, feelings, her own… and some other times she’s this vulnerable little kid who never had someone to comfort her when she had nightmares and I love her, I feel like I’ve really invested in her and dedicate my time every day to try and understand what she’s feeling and going through, stuff like that.

So that is my Bonnie Patterson to y’all!