#but this pretty much is my overall…. opinion on this discussion

[afklancelot]

the more i think bout it, the more i realize i didn't really like scp-6001. besides the bland references to previous scps, it just felt way too idealistic, especially with all the groups of interest coming together to one big organization, with one group specializing in one thing (paraphasing and remembering off the top of my head).

i think the reason why it didn't work for me is that the "twist" is that there really is not much wrong with the society, like it's not a crapsack world in disguise. and im actually glad that wasn't the case! but it would've been nice to see at least some problem within 6001 actually be explored in a section. maybe it could be overpopulation or occasional government incompetence, but it would've been nice to have a message that even 6001 isn't completely perfect, that it still has it's own problems but is handling them relatively well. from what i can remember the only problem that i saw was dragons, which could've also been nice to explore, but alas.

and if i remember correctly, the entrance to 6001 is in Japan. this seems intentional, and seeing as how 6001 is a near perfect place, the placement of the entrance to 6001 being in japan implies a correlation. but japan also has its own batch of problems, be it in its work culture, judicial system, or- as i said before- government incompetence from time to time. this isn't to say the author had to be aware of shit like that when writing, but the placement specifically being in japan just feels over-idealized, from the eyes of a tourist. and maybe that's the point, since the main protag is technically a tourist being guided by the cat scientist.

but hey, it was still better than scp-6000

[creatorofarcadia]

It's been a while since I watched Supernatural, so don't take my opinions as gospel or anything. But I think Dean is self-hating to the point of narcissism in some ways. Don't get me wrong, I empathise with Dean and understand why fans largely do too. But his self-loathing warps his perception and becomes the centre of EVERYTHING and at times that really has ripple effects on those around him - particularly Sam.

Take their childhood, Sam has a right to mourn the fact that he didn't get a normal childhood. He's allowed to be angry that he didn't get a home, a present father, a stable community, and consistent education. But whenever Sam attempts to express his complicated feelings about his childhood, Dean immediately interprets it as ' oh I was supposed to look out for you. Are you saying I failed? Are you confirming I'm worthless?' which grinds the conversation to a complete halt. Because of Dean's intense self-criticism, Sam can never really be 100% honest with him or ask for support with his own issues, especially regarding their childhood. As anything outside of 100% gratitude just becomes another stick for Dean to beat himself with, and the conversation is immediately derailed.

Not only does Deans self-hatred mean that Sam's expression of his own experiences are pretty consistently shut down. In some ways, I think Dean strips Sam of his autonomy - he's so self-loathing, he sees every decision Sam makes as being about/a reaction to him. A good example of this is Stanford. Rather than understanding Stanford for what it was, an attempt by Sam to carve out a better life from himself and escape hunting. Dean views it as betrayal or abandonment, some re-affirmation of his own belief that he's not worth caring about. Rather than understanding it's a rejection of hunting, he sees it as Sam rejecting him. To Dean, Sam isn't attempting to find a better life, he's punishing the family.

Overall, it's interesting that people largely and rightfully sympathise with Dean due to his self-hatred. However, I don't see as much discussion about how his self-hatred doesn't just hurt him, it hurts those he's close to, as it colours his interpretation of their every action. Dean's self-loathing is always the biggest thing in the room and that has consequences.

[longing-for-rain]

Katara and Mutuality in Relationships

There are lots of conflicting opinions about which characters Katara felt attraction towards, which characters she didn’t, and how long she felt that attraction. I see in most cases, people point to quick clips of her faintly blushing or kissing another character on the cheek as evidence, but I think these kind of takes miss the nuance of the purpose attraction serves in a story.

Most importantly, I see these characters treated as if they are actually people capable of making their own decisions. It’s important to remember that these are fictional characters. They don’t make their own choices; the writers make their choices for them for the purpose of telling a story. From that standpoint, it’s more valuable to examine how a character’s story and narrative themes tie into their relationships with other characters. Animators can shove in a kiss or a blush wherever they want, but it’s harder to demonstrate through storytelling how and why two characters might feel attraction towards one another, and how a relationship between them would develop both characters and contribute to the overarching themes of the story.

In other words, when discussing which characters Katara is “attracted” to, I’m discussing which relationships and actions within the narrative build on her established story and arc. Romance is always integrated into a story for a reason, and considering that reason is important.

Unfortunately, ATLA is very much a product of its time in this way. It’s easy to see what romance adds to the arcs of the male characters—but not so much with the female characters. All three canon relationships (kataang, sukka, and maiko) follow this trend to some degree. The primary purpose of the woman in this narrative is to act as a prize for the man for performing some good deed. Once they’re together, she ceases having her own motivations and becomes an extension of the male character she’s dating. This is pretty blatant with Suki—she barely had a personality in that later seasons; she is there to be Sokka’s girlfriend. Similarly, Katara becomes a completely different character—she’s even animated differently—when the narrative pushes her into romantic scenes with Aang. Her character is flattened.

So what is Katara’s arc, and how do the romantic interactions she has throughout the series contribute to this?

Well, that could be a whole other essay itself, but to put it simply, Katara’s arc is one of a young girl devastated by grief at a young age clinging to hope that she has the power to fight and change the world for the better. Which she does as she gains power and confidence throughout the series—culminating in her defeating Azula in the finale.

But the part I want to focus on here is how Katara connects with other characters. She connects with them over shared experiences of grief and loss.

Take Haru, for instance.

Haru: After the attack, they rounded up my father and every other earthbender, and took them away. We haven't seen them since.

Katara: So that's why you hide your earthbending.

Haru: Yeah. Problem is…the only way I can feel close to my father now is when I practice my bending. He taught me everything I know.

Katara: See this necklace? My mother gave it to me.

Haru: It’s beautiful.

Katara: I lost my mother in a Fire Nation raid. This necklace is all I have left of her.

Haru: It’s not enough, is it?

Katara: No.

This isn’t just a throwaway moment; it’s an important character moment that leads up to growth and the progression of Katara’s overall story, both in this individual episode and in the whole series.

Katara finds her power in the connections she’s able to make with other characters. It’s a powerful driving force for her that makes her a strong character even before her bending abilities develop. Imprisoned was such an important episode to establish who Katara is and what her power is, and adds so much to her arc.

But there is one line in particular from the above exchange that also stands out: Haru says “it’s not enough, is it?” and Katara agrees. Even this early in the series, we’re establishing the fact that despite her drive and hopeful outlook, Katara feels deeply hurt, she feels a deep sense of loss that she opens up about to other characters in moments like these. But unlike Haru…Katara can’t go rescue her mother. Her mother is dead, and we see her grapple with that grief throughout the series.

Another character she reaches out to like this is Jet.

Jet: Longshot over there? His town got burned down by the Fire Nation. And we found The Duke trying to steal our food. I don't think he ever really had a home.

Katara: What about you?

Jet: The Fire Nation killed my parents. I was only eight years old. That day changed me forever.

Katara: Sokka and I lost our mother to the Fire Nation.

Jet: I’m so sorry, Katara.

Another important note about Jet is that there are explicit romantic feelings from Katara in this episode. Again, Katara empathizes with another character through a shared sense of loss. Sadly, in this case, Jet manipulated her feelings and tricked her into helping in his plot to flood the village…but those feelings were undeniably there.

That was the tragedy in this episode, but it also gives the audience so much information about Katara as a character: what motivates her, and what she wants. Katara is established as a character who wants someone who will connect with her and empathize with her over her loss—her greatest sense of trauma. She wants to help others but also receive support in return. The reason why she was smitten with Jet, beyond just initial attraction, is because he gave her a sense of that before Katara realized his true motivations.

A lot of people make the claim that Aang is good for Katara because he also feels a sense of great loss and trauma. And while on paper that’s true…does he really demonstrate that? I just gave two examples of characters Katara connected with this way, and both responded with deep empathy to what she said. Very early on in the show—the third episode—Katara attempts to connect with Aang the same way. How does he respond?

Katara: Aang, before we get to the temple, I want to talk to you about the airbenders.

Aang: What about 'em?

Katara: Well, I just want you to be prepared for what you might see. The Fire Nation is ruthless. They killed my mother, and they could have done the same to your people.

Aang: Just because no one has seen an airbender, doesn't mean the Fire Nation killed them all. They probably escaped!

Just compare this exchange to Haru and Jet. No effort to empathize, not even a “sorry for your loss” or anything. It’s a stark contrast, and the reason for that is because this narrative entirely centers Aang. Katara’s narrative always seems to be secondary to his when they’re together—which is exactly my point when I say this relationship has a fundamental lack of mutuality. It’s built that way from the beginning of the series. It does not add to Katara’s arc nor establish what about this dynamic would attract her.

And, look, before someone jumps down my throat about this…I’m not saying Aang is a horrible person for this response. I think it’s a sign that he’s immature and has a fundamentally different approach to problems than Katara. Katara is a character who has been forced to take on responsibilities beyond her years due to being a child of a war-torn world. Aang’s approach to problems is avoidance while Katara never had that luxury. It doesn’t mesh well.

This is all in Book 1. I honestly could have gotten on board with Kataang if the series meaningfully addressed these issues…but it didn’t. In fact, they actually got worse in some ways.

Back to Katara’s mother. We’ve established that this is a core part of Katara’s character and like in the scene with Haru, she indicates that this is an unresolved issue that pains her. But then, in Book 3, Katara actually does get a chance to confront this pain.

This would have been a powerful moment. Surely the character who is meant to be her partner, her equal, would have been there for her. Surely he would have understood and supported her, fulfilling her narrative and adding to her story.

But Aang didn’t do that. I won’t go into details because there are a million analyses out there on The Southern Raiders, but Aang’s response to Katara was the opposite of understanding. He got angry with her, insinuated that she was a monster for wanting revenge, and tried to dictate her behavior according to his own moral values. And importantly, from a narrative standpoint, he did not go with Katara. One of the most important events in her arc, and Aang didn’t support her—he actually tried stopping her. He didn’t contribute to her growth and development.

Also noteworthy:

Katara: But I didn’t forgive him. I’ll never forgive him.

Even at the end of the episode, Aang clearly doesn’t understand at all what Katara is feeling. This line demonstrates it perfectly. He thinks she forgave him when that wasn’t the case at all…but of course, he didn’t even accompany her, so he didn’t see what actually took place. His worldview is fundamentally different from hers, and he’s consistently too rigid in his morality and immature to center Katara’s feelings.

Throughout Katara’s whole arc, her most significant character moments, Aang’s character just doesn’t come through the way Katara’s constantly does for him. Their narrative lacks mutuality. When Katara and Aang are together, she becomes an accessory to him. The ending scene is a perfect demonstration of this.

Now, to address the elephant in the room.

Which character does actually add to Katara’s narrative and support her growth as a character?

Correct! I just talked about how important The Southern Raiders is to Katara’s character and story, how it’s a chance for her to finally address the grief she’s been carrying since Book 1. And who stood by her side throughout this pivotal moment? Right—Zuko did.

You can talk all you want about how he’s a “colonizer” while Aang’s people suffered genocide, but you’re forgetting that “show, don’t tell” is one of the most basic aspects of storytelling. The fact is, despite how it looks on paper, Zuko was the one there for Katara at her critical moments. Zuko empathized with Katara more than Aang ever did—as demonstrated in this episode. Zuko never once brought up his own cultural values. Zuko never once told Katara what to do. Zuko’s position was that Katara should be the one to decide, and that he would support any choice she made. He supported her decision to spare Yon Rha, but he would have also supported her if she decided to kill him. I actually found this episode to be a satisfying reversal to what is typically seen in TV—for once, the female character is centered while her male counterpart takes the backseat and becomes a supporting role to her narrative.

Even before this, Zuko is shown to empathize with Katara.

Zuko: I’m sorry. That’s something we have in common.

I think what gets me about this scene is the fact that he’s still Katara’s enemy, and she was just yelling about how she hates him and his people. But despite that, Zuko still empathizes with Katara. She is fundamentally human to him, and he expresses that to her in a way that allows them to connect. Zuko stands to gain nothing from this. It’s true that Azula entered the picture and twisted things around—but in this moment, Zuko’s compassion is genuine. His instinct was to respond to her grief with empathy, just like she consistently does for other characters.

And finally, how else does Zuko add to Katara’s arc?

I don’t think there is any more perfect of an example than the finale itself—the culmination of the arcs and development of all characters.

Zuko and Katara fight together. In a heartbeat, Zuko asks Katara to fight by his side against Azula, because he trusts her strength. She’s his equal—both in his mind, and in a narrative sense.

Then, this:

Both of their roles are so critical in this fight. They both save each other. The scene has such raw emotion to it. These characters were together at the conclusion of their respective arcs for a reason.

This is the perfect conclusion to Katara’s arc. She just played a critical role in ending the war that has caused her trauma her whole life. She just demonstrated her mastery of waterbending (another thing she’s dreamed of throughout the series) by defeating the world’s most powerful firebender during Sozin’s Comet. Even though she had help as all characters do, these are victories that belong to her and demonstrate the growth and power of her character. And to top it all off? She was able to save Zuko’s life. She didn’t have to endure the pain of feeling helpless to do anything while someone else died for her; this time, she had an active role, she changed her fate, and she prevailed. Zuko plays an important role in Katara’s story without dominating it. They perfectly represent mutuality. They add to each other’s stories. Their narratives become stronger when they’re together, without one diminishing or sidelining the other.

So, from that standpoint, that’s why I always see the attraction between Zuko and Katara and why I see it lacking between Aang and Katara. Zuko and Katara’s story doesn’t need some cheap little throwaway moments to shine. It’s integral to both characters’ stories. We are shown not told of the way these characters feel about each other. Given everything we know about Katara, her goals, her values, her past loves…absolutely everything points to Zuko being the true subject of her feelings.

Because let’s be honest. The ending I just described is so much more powerful and so much more Katara than seeing her being relegated back to a doe-eyed love interest for Aang to kiss. It hardly even made sense—Katara played no role at all at the culmination of Aang’s arc. She was relegated back to a love interest, rather than the powerful figure we saw fight alongside Zuko.

[viennakarma]

hi! oh my gosh i loved wreck my plans, fernando is just chef’s kiss because that man was sooo patient he deserved that happy ending

even if you don’t add anymore parts to that story, i just wanted to ask how you think it would be between reader and nando in the future. and if luna gets a new sibling ☺️

Hi there! Thank you so much, hun.

So, a few head canons about the life after, in wreck my plans:

- You went back to social media after a while, and the followers were surprisingly receptive to you. There, you shared small snippets of your life (nothing too personal), pics of you, of Luna, your pets and even pics of Fernando (but they didn't show his face or anything recognizable).

- You found out you were pregnant again a little bit before your 3 year anniversary with Fernando, so you decided to tell him about the baby with a cute little present (a box with a custom AM baby onesie, baby socks with the number 14 and the positive pregnancy test). You moved in together around that time (Luna also started picking up spanish because of the familiarity of living with Fernando).

- Luna took the news very well, you and Fernando were scared she wasn't going to like it, but she was very excited about a little sibling. And because of Luna, it didn't take long for her to tell her dad about it. Which resulted in a frantic call you got from your Lewis late at night asking if it was true, he went ballistic once you confirmed and before he could do anything, you hung up on him.

- Only two weeks later, a paparazzi posted pictures he took of you, Luna and Fernando walking around in his hometown. It sent the world into a frenzy. You calmed down an angry Fernando telling him it was a coincidence, but deep down you knew it wasn't. Luckily, your pregnancy wasn't showing at that time, so no one noticed.

- You sent Lewis a big rant via text, and all the screenshots of the texts the woman who he cheated on you with sent you when you were pregnant with Luna. Then you blocked him before he could reply. There was a big wave of hatred towards you when the news came out, not only on social media, but also in general media outlets.

- Only a couple of days later, Lewis was questioned about your (now public) relationship with one of his rivals. Surprisingly, he said you were a single woman and he just wanted you to be happy. He also held himself accountable and came clean about the cheating that caused your relationship to end.

- Fernando wanted to retire immediately after finding out you were pregnant, but you convinced him to think better and at least finish the current season in Formula One. When the season ended, you were around five months pregnant.

- You went to the last race of that season with Fernando, a pretty dress that clung to your body as you proudly showed the baby bump and a jacket with a big 14 on the back. That was his last race before retirement and there was a small symbolic ceremony to celebrate his career.

- Fernando and Luna got a great relationship, and she even asked him to take her karting in his track frquently. She enjoyed time with him, and Fernando always respected his role as a step father. Eventually, after her brother, Vicenzo, was born, she started calling Fernando "Papá Nano" because her brother called him "Papá". (There was a long conversation with Lewis about his opinion on the matter, and after some discussion, he said Luna could call Fernando that as long as Lewis kept being the only Dad/Daddy)

- You and Lewis manage to get a good, respectable relationship for the sake of Luna. You never found out if he was the one who leaked your relationship with Fernando (and you never cared to ask).

- You and Fernando got married in a little intimate wedding ceremony on the beach, just the closest family and friends. Vicenzo was 2 and Luna was 7 when the wedding happened. You got pregnant again by accident after the honeymoon.

IDK I JUST THINK ABOUT AN OVERALL HAPPY ENDING BECAUSE READER DESERVES IT.

[whiskersz]

Hello, 👻 anon here! Saw that you're accepting three requests for Adam and well, he's one of my favorites so here I am!

I actually requested this on another blog a while ago, but I'm curious about your take on it. So, would you be willing to write platonic headcannons or ficlet (up to you) for Adam with a gender neutral teenage angel reader? Like the reader died as a teenager and somehow and for some reason Adam took them under his wing. And after a while, the reader starts to see Adam as a father figure and one time the reader accidentally calls Adam 'Dad' but they are very embarrassed about it.

Hope this makes sense, but if it's too specific for you, feel free to decline!

Hope you're doing well!

👻

Hey Ghost! This is such a sweet request, especially for Adam, since he doesn’t exactly have a heart of gold. Reader must have done something really special for him to take them under his wing.

Anyways, here is my interpretation; I ended up basically making up a short story lol, got really into it...hopefully you enjoy!!

Platonic Father Figure Adam x Reader

It took you a while to get used to residing in Heaven, that’s for sure; despite getting the warmest of welcomes from both Saint Peter and the other Angels who would later become your friends, you still found it hard to settle in.

That is until you met Adam.

Adam is very well known both for being the very first man ever created and also the first human soul to ever enter Heaven, and for his notable personality. He’s egotistical, cruel and an overall depraved soul, making you wonder what it really took for a deceased human to end up in Heaven. But let’s not dwell on that too much.

You and Adam met through the concerts of his band; not that he’s the most famous guitar player in Heaven, his band is rather small actually, but you actually have to thank that for getting you multiple meetings with him and the rest of the group. You kind of see them as a family at this point, Adam included.

 You actually end up helping them sometimes, with either the lyrics of their songs or the sonority of their music in general. Everyone appreciates you a lot, although every time you express a negative opinion on how Adam’s bit sounds he’s not afraid of basically telling you off. He secretly values your opinion a lot though, and in his free time, when he’s not busy practicing with the rest of the band or taking care of Extermination matters, he revises on his own on whatever piece sounded off to you.

Either way, Adam ends up becoming pretty protective of you; he even warns his right hand woman, Lute, to never treat you in the wrong way, and from that moment on she gains a lot of respect for you as well.

You three are rarely seen walking around without each other actually, unless you’re out and about with your other friends your age, in which case he warns you that they better treat you right or you’re never seeing them again, to which you retort with saying that this is very unlikely since you’ve known them for a while and this is Heaven after all, if they’re here they must’ve earned it somehow. He simply replies that in the rare case that they do something distasteful to you he’s completely willing to send them where they belong – in Hell.

Adam manages to tone it down with the rude nicknames when it comes to you; he will still call you ‘bitch’ or anything of the like, or he might call you a little asshole from time to time if you do something that mildly annoys him, but he will never go too overboard as he doesn’t really wish to make you uncomfortable – the thoughts in his head though might sound something like: “Ah, shit. I basically became a father figure, call them something weird and they’re gone Adam, gone.”

The one time you manage to make Adam, the First Man, emotional, is the night before the Extermination.

With Charlie’s father, Lucifer himself, somehow getting her to visit Heaven and discuss with Sera and Emily themselves, you’re worried that he might be planning to make an appearance and hurt Adam.

Adam dismisses your theories, even dares to call them stupid, and in a fit of emotion you blurt out a “But I don’t want to lose you just for being careless, dad!”.

You quickly realize what you just said and both your hands travel to your mouth, a shocked expression on both you and Adam’s faces.

He mumbles a ‘shit’ before pulling you into a hug with his wing.

“Promise I’ll watch my back, kid.”

[snapscube]

So do you have a spoiler free review of the Spider-Man 2 game, for people like me who haven’t bought/seen the game yet? (I lack money so I have to wait for Christmas lol)

I can give you my top-down thoughts yeah!

Gameplay-wise, it's a night and day improvement over the first game in basically every regard. I've heard some mixed opinions on the new gadget/abilities system, and I had my own hang-ups here and there, but once I got a feel for it and started actively looking for ways to cleverly use them and upgrade them it really clicked. The flow of combat is amazing. The swinging mechanics are a MONUMENTAL improvement over Spider-Man Remastered and Miles Morales. Those games had fantastic swinging, don't get me wrong, but they always had the issue of having a pretty intense speed cap and a disappointingly small amount of maneuvers to play with and master. This game introduces not only the web wings, which add a whole extra dimension of traversal to play with, but also still manages to improve the swinging itself more than I ever expected. Tight cornering, loop-de-loops, slingshots, and more are ALL introduced and work amazingly. And on top of it all, the speed cap for traversal is a 3X INCREASE when fully upgraded. And you feel it IMMEDIATELY, because even the baseline speed is so much faster from the jump. The game just plays beautifully in every regard, easily worth the price of entry for that alone.

Story-wise, I've mentioned I have some hangups about the pacing that I'm still working out. I just started a second story playthrough so I'm giving it time before I form any "final" thoughts, but my gut experience was that the first Act comes out the gate firing on all cylinders. The characters feel so alive, the world is breathtaking, and there's a ton of intrigue. But then once you hit Act 2 and 3 things speed up in a way that can feel a bit unnatural. One thing that helps this though is making sure to pace out your playthrough with side missions. It doesn't fix the pacing entirely, but there are so many side missions in this game that honestly feel just as integral and worth doing as the main story. I would say definitely try to do as much as you can to pace out Act 2 a little more with side content, cause much like Miles Morales this feels like the kind of game that lives and dies by its side stories. The secondary cast is incredible, and there's a ton of easter eggs and emotional beats that are integral to the overall picture of this game but just aren't in the main stuff. But the beats that hit in the main story hit REALLY HARD. The game definitely has the common sequel problem of shooting for a lot more and as a result kinda ends up a lot messier. The first game is still more of a quintessentially good Spider-Man tale than this one. But that is NOT to disparage this one at all. It is WORTH experiencing, for sure, I just think maybe it could have used some more polish. But there are a ton of moving parts, so I can totally see how they ended up with what they did.

I have a lot of other thoughts but those are sorta the big two pillars I can easily discuss without encroaching on spoiler territory and without writing basically a whole article.

[avelera]

So I've been watching Three Body Problem with my partner and we just got to Episode 5. It has (spoilers) a pretty gruesome scene in it from the book, very bloody. I literally didn't watch it, just listened and watched my partner's (shocked) face throughout it.

This got me thinking. Not so much about Three Body Problem, because I haven't finished it yet nor read the books so I haven't really formed any sort of opinion on the show or the overall story, but more on Benioff and Weiss.

While looking away from That Scene I was curious if it was even in the book, so I was looking that up instead of watching. It was, but sure enough, Benioff and Weiss had embellished it.

I'll discuss it in more detail beneath the cut to avoid spoilers but suffice to say this is my take away:

For Benioff and Weiss, it's always been about cruelty. The chance to show cruelty above and beyond the source material, using the source material only as a spring board to delve into horrific imagery, is literally what attracts them to the stories they choose to depict.

And I felt like I'm taking crazy pills when I pointed this out all through the Game of Thrones era, not so much no one was figuring it out but because it felt like no one in the mainstream media was talking about it. They'd get asked these deep artistic questions about a certain scene (like the quote below which has spoilers) and it would be asked completely seriously and they'd give this answer like, "Oh we didn't want to show all that gore but we had no choice."

And I'm just sitting their flabbergasted like... what the fuck are you talking about, just admit that's what you wanted to depict?? That's what gave you a boner to tell this particular story??

Let me be clear, an artist choosing to depict gore and cruelty isn't a problem. I'm not a horror fan but it's not like I think horror shouldn't exist, or gore, or horrifying scenes that shock us to our marrow. That's very much a thing art can and should do!

I just feel like I'm fucking crazy because Benioff and Weiss and the people interviewing them never seem to get that this is their story kink. They always put this like... veneer of genteel shock and respectability over their questions about the cruel and gorey scenes they depict, like it just happened that way, when it's really really clear this is the stuff they like showing the most.

Benioff and Weiss's Game of Thrones was literally more gorey, graphic, and dehumanizing in places than the actual book. Where they departed from the books was, more often than not, to make things more abjectly cruel, dehumanizing, and shocking towards the characters. That's what they like doing as creators.

So this scene in Three Body Problem...

(SPOILERS)

... Where the ship gets slashed to ribbons and little children are literally shredded apparently isn't even depicted in the book.

"“We wanted to show it, we didn’t want to evade it,” Benioff said at a roundtable earlier this month. “I think when you actually see something on a screen, it is going to be more horrific than in the book. You’re reading these descriptions, but you’re not seeing blood, you’re not seeing a bunch of kids running away, you’re not seeing children’s backpacks getting split in half.” (source)

Didn't want to evade it? The book literally doesn't show children getting shredded and you went out of your way to show us numerous scenes introducing these children just so you can lovingly show them and their world get shredded to ribbons while completely aware and confronting the full horror of their fates like...

Again, I am not trying to moralize here. There is a space for horror, there is a space for exploring horrible things happening to innocents.

But they always talk about these very deliberate depictions of abject cruelty as if it's just *shrugs* "What can ya do? It had to be done!" NO IT DIDN'T. IT'S LITERALLY NOT IN THE BOOK IN THAT WAY. JUST OWN IT. OWN YOUR ARTISTIC VISION. OWN THE FACT YOU GLORY IN MAKING SLASHER LEVELS OF GORE AND TORTURE AND DEHUMANIZATION. STOP BEING SO FUCKING GENTEEL ABOUT IT. JUST FUCKING... LEAN IN TO WHAT YOU ARE INSTEAD OF ACTING LIKE IT WASN'T THE CHANCE TO SHOW CRUELTY THAT ATTRACTED YOU TO THE STORY IN THE FIRST PLACE.

And just as a lateral, US politics note, it felt like this under Trump too. I'm not saying artists depicting cruelty in an artistic work is anything like a politician with real power reveling in flexes of power channeled towards deliberate acts of fascistic cruelty.

But in both cases I felt like I was taking crazy pills because the media would just... speculate about the root desire behind such actions? Like "What could possibly be motivating these guys? Gosh, we don't know, to say what's actually happening here would be far too gauche so we'll just pretend it was an unpleasant byproduct of their TRUE goals, whatever those may be, no matter how implausible they may be."

Like: it's cruelty! The point is cruelty! Some people are just sadists! Some people get off on hurting others or in having the power to hurt others OR (and this is by far the only acceptable version of this and by the way it's completely acceptable to do this in FICTION) in creating artistic works that depict terrible cruelty and sadism.

... So anyway, I definitely went into Three Body Problem going, "Huh, I wonder why Benioff and Weiss chose THIS supremely difficult story to adapt as one of their next big projects?" And then I saw the boat getting shredded and the children they added to the loving depictions of gore and was like, "... Ah, yes. That's why."

(Edit: Just to be clear for those thinking of watching the show, it's not a gore-fest. It was easy to see this scene coming and to look away for it. There's some other moments of violence but those are also pretty easy to anticipate and look away from. This isn't a slasher horror show and it's had a lot of good points (so far). This particular scene just made me go, "Ah, there's the Benioff and Weiss I remember.")

[potatocitytechnology]

Sweet Like Pumpkin Pie - S.JN

Kinktober Day 2

Face sitting: also known as queening or kinging, is a sexual practice with one partner sitting over the other's face.

INTRO: One fall day, you decide it's time to let go of your worries. Turns out you're a natural freak in the sheets and Johnny loves it.

GENRES: Smut

PAIRING: reader (afab) x boyfriend!johnny suh

WARNINGS: profanity/swearing, face sitting (F), face riding (F), a little body worship, more dominant Johnny but mostly no power dynamic, marking, hair pulling/scalp scratching - overall explicit content - PLEASE, DO NOT ENGAGE WITH THIS POST/BLOG IF YOU'RE UNDERAGE. MINORS WILL BE BLOCKED.

WORD COUNT: 1.86k (remember, size doesn't matter)

AUTHORS NOTE: Okay. I'm already a day behind but we got this team. Also, I've noticed that my posts aren't coming up under the tags for some reason? If anyone is coming from one of the tags lmk cause it would be cool to see who is. Otherwise I'm trying my best to fix it. Anyways, enjoy October 2nd! (＞﹏＜)

*unedited*

It wasn’t something you never discussed, yet it still took you by surprise when Johnny suggested we actually try it this time. “I want you to sit on my face.” He states, no hesitation in his voice because he clearly knows no shame. It is Johnny after-all. 

You stutter over your words, trying not to choke on the words as they get stuck in your throat. “Um, are you sure?” You ask. It’s not that you don’t want to sit on Johnny’s gorgeous face, it’s just that you haven’t done it before, the activity foreign. 

A chill runs up your spine as your eyes cast past Johnny’s shoulder, watching out the window. Green leaves on your cherry tree turning orange with the call of fall. You’re almost envious of how pretty it turns with each season, but fall being the most beautiful concept on it in your opinion. 

Your eyes meet his again, determined mindset in tow as he gives you begging eyes. Johnny never wants to push you, that’s why you’re so glad he’s your boyfriend, but you need to give too. Besides, this will be fun and with Johnny you will be safe. 

You nod, “Okay.”. He smiles, giving you a peck on the lips. “It’s gonna be so much fun, baby. You have no idea how long I wanted to do this with you.” His excitement sends a thrill of excitement through your body, the feeling stopping at your lower stomach. God, he makes you wet without even touching you. 

You tread behind him as he leads you to your shared bedroom. You must admit out of the two of you, Johnny is most definitely the more adventurous lover. He always wants to try new things, but you always say ‘maybe’ or ‘next time’, though it never happens next time. To be honest, this is probably the only thing off ‘vanilla’ sex that you’ve ever done. It's more than a little sad.

His hand reaches for yours, squeezing you lightly in reassurance as he shuts the bedroom door behind you. His hand then leaves yours in favour of joining the other as they wrap themselves around your waist, the rest of his body leaning into your back. “I got you.” He mumbles through your hair. “Waited so long, gonna make it worth it.” His voice darkens as each word leaves his lips, a shiver running up your spine. 

“I trust you.” You gulp, voice sounding small. “I know, baby.” He hums, his hold on your body firm and safe, just how you like it. He gently runs his hands down your stomach until his fingertips grip at the fabric of your sweater, tugging it up. You grin, taking the hint and lifting your arms as he discards both your sweater and thermal. He kisses your neck, goosebumps following his fingertips.

Next he gets down on his knees, surprising you as you clutch his shoulders. “Johnny what’re you-” He silences you, a ‘shushh’ leaving his lips as he pulls your sweatpants down. Lifting your ankles, he throws them behind him, your bare legs catching his attention. Smiling, he begins kissing the flesh of your thighs. “You’re so beautiful, baby.” he mumbles against you. 

“Stop teasing.” you whine, annoyed that he’s not touching you where you need him. “I’m not teasing, just showing you how much I love everything about you.” His eyes lock onto yours as you look down on him. “I want you to always be comfortable coming to me if you want to try new things.” Returning to his assault on your thighs, you moan. His affirmations and sweet kisses driving you mad. 

He nips and bites at your sensitive skin, marks following the path of his mouth, but you don’t mind. All the more of him to feel tomorrow. His attention spans from your knees to above your belly button. Butterflies erupting in your stomach everytime he gets closer to your aching pussy. 

When he finally peels away your dripping panties, you’re practically panting. Your head feels lighter as all blood seemingly rushes to your core, the heat he’s kindled making you hot to the touch. He licks across your pelvic bone, the sensation making you breathe faster. His tongue swipes just a half inch from your clit and your body shakes. 

He grins, eyes mischievously peering up at you, “you’re so sensitive, baby.” he chuckles and you roll your eyes half-heartedly. “I wonder why.” is your completely sarcastic response. You want to say, how the fuck can you not be after the torcher he’s putting you through? It’s a wonder you’re still standing while he taunts you with the promise of a mind blowing orgasm. 

Your hands grip his hair as he pokes his tongue at your clit, finally giving you something. You don’t even try to hold back the moan that escapes your lips, ecstasy filling you for a short moment before he stops again. 

This time you groan in frustration, your nails accidentally scratching the surface of his scalp a little harder than you intended it to. A sharp hiss that draws into a hidden moan passes his lips, making you laugh internally. His slitted eyes glare up at you as a smile tugs at your lips. “Oops.” you add to the silence, the insincerity clearer than you meant for it to be. 

“Alright, let’s do it then.” he announces and you nod your head, wanting nothing more at this point than to sit on his face. “You sure you’re ready though?” He questions, a pointed and soft look that shows he genuinely wants to know if you’re ready. “Johnny, I’m practically leaking like a dam. Please, I want to do this.” He nods, sucking in a breath. “Okay, baby.” 

He stands up from his knees before grabbing your hand and bringing you to the side of the bed. He smiles at you, proceeding to pull his shirt over his head. You’ll never get used to the sight of Johnny’s body, he really is gorgeous inside and out.  

Going ahead, he climbs onto the bed, lying down in the centre and pointing at you. “Come’ere.” You obey, crawling to him and sitting back on parted knees, hands between your open thighs. Johnny can’t help the groan that leaves him as he strokes up your marked thighs, mouth salivating. 

“Now you just gotta put your knees beside my head, baby.” He says, leaning back to rest his neck on the mattress. You follow his instructions, moving to place your knees on either side of his head so that you’re facing down his body. He places a hand on your thigh, stopping you. “Not that way, baby. Turn around, I want to see you.” 

You gulp, a weak ‘okay’ your response. Turning around so you’re facing the headboard of the bed, you see his eyes peer up at you through his long lashes. You hover above him, your nerves now distracting you from how turned on you were, Johnny notices. 

Quick to distract you from your thoughts, he licks a path up your inner thigh, collecting the juices that drip from you. You’re too high for him to reach, still hovering above his face. He grabs your hips, swiftly pulling you down onto his already parted lips. You are then left with no room in your mind to stress as it quickly fills with pleasure. 

His tongue moves with skill around your clit, the feeling so foreign yet familiar. Of course Johnny’s eaten you out, just now like this. It’s so new it feels taboo to you, which only turns you on more as his warm tongue darts into your hole.

Johnny looks up and watches you as your lips part in moan after beautiful moan. Each time the sound sending blood pumping to his hard cock. His lips work to form an ‘o’ around your sensitive clit before he sucks on it. It sends your mind into a frenzy, your hips beginning to grind against his face. 

He groans into you when your hands reach for tufts of his dark hair, lacing through each strand and tugging as you desperately find a way to keep yourself grounded. Each frenzied moan that leaves your mouth becomes more and more careless, the fucks to give leaving your thoughts. 

His strong arms wrap securely around your hips, pulling you further into his mouth to the point you're almost worried. Johnny, however, has been waiting to do this with you for a long time, the need to have your cum covering his face overwhelms his need to breathe at this moment. 

“Wanna ride your face.” you gasp between moans and Johnny groans beneath you, your words both turning him on and making him so proud that you're telling him what you want.

You feel him nod into you, loosening his hold on your hips and flattening his tongue. Your heart quickens its beat, but you push the anxiety to the back of your mind. You hesitantly start rocking your hips back and forth, the feeling making your eyes roll back and an unholy sound releasing from your chest. 

You get no time to be embarrassed about it, and you don’t want to be. This feeling is a pure drug, he’s your ecstacy and you’re addicted. His nose bumps your clit and your fist your fingers in his hair, moving both your hips and his face against you. 

Johnny can’t believe it. His timid girlfriend becoming so animalistically wild and using his face like a toy. It’s the turn on he never knew he wanted, but god does it feel good. His fingers dig into the soft flesh of your hips, working with you to rock them against his tongue. 

Your breaths quicken, the heavenly feeling of your orgasm building up making the movement of your hips stutter and and falter. You’re lucky Johnny’s strong enough to keep you shifting over him. He watches your face carefully, looking for the expression he’s longing to see. 

He picks up when your body loosens up, mouth parting and eyes going blank as you sit on the edge of euphoria. He quickly stops your movement, arms cementing you in place as he attaches his lips around your clit again and sucks. Fucking hard. 

It pushes you into your orgasm as your eyebrows furrow and your mouth forms a perfect ‘o’. Your entire body shakes as spluttered and broken moans leave your lips along with short, gasped breaths. 

Johnny watches you in amazement, pure admiration on his face as he watches you unfold on top of him. He couldn’t be prouder of you. 

You go limp, gently lifting yourself from him but not after he cleans you up. You tumble down beside him as he wraps you in his arms. Safe with him. Always safe. 

“You did so well, baby.” He mumbles into your ear, a smile gracing your lips as you hum a ‘yeah?’. 

He hums back. “And you taste like heaven.” 

You groan, really not wanting to hear about how your taste as a blush rises to your cheeks. 

“Sweet like pumpkin pie.” 

You scowl, slapping his bare shoulder as he laughs at you. Secretly you look pleased. 

[red-pill-to-swallow]

How to be attractive to men and my goals

Hey babes,

like I said – I want to incorporate RPT (Red Pill Theories) into my daily life immediately.

A few things that every women within the community seemed to be content with were:

1. You are never finished with glowing or leveling up. Never stop learning. Never stop trying to better yourself.

2. Pretty privilege is real.

I agree that pretty privilege is very real. I mean, I get affected by pretty people like everybody else, even if I don’t do it on purpose. It’s just something that is ingrained in our brains and I need to learn how to take this to my advantage.

I think I have a decent starting base, because I’m a skinny white woman in her twenties with long blonde hair. I am not really tall – even short men are at least 5-7cms taller than me – but I’m also not extremely short.

I have a petite frame but my body-shape is something between an hourglass and a peach. My face is average – I don’t really have striking features or am a natural beauty model – but my features also aren’t hideous. It’s really just something you can look at without thinking too much.

On a scale, I would rate myself a 5,5-6/10 on an average day and I guess that’s great!

But how can I make myself look better on a daily basis? I really took hours to research how I could make myself more attractive to wealthy and high value men.

Obviously, no man is like the other and every man prefers something different. One man might like tattoos and piercings while another man with the same social status thinks they are hideous. I don’t want to completely change who I am and I don’t want to spend thousands of dollars for it.

However, I really like this whole clean girl and old money aesthetic that is going viral on Tiktok right now – and I think those two aesthetics could fit me and my personality really well.

Most wealthy men seem to like this traits in women:

1. great skin without obvious pimples or enlarged pores

2. long and healthy hair in a natural color

3. straight white teeth

4. clean nails on both hands and feet

5. hairless legs, armpits and at least trimmed pubic hair

6. wearing clean and wrinkle free clothes without any holes

7. wearing a nice smell that is fitting to your overall appearance

I think those are the basics and they can be achieved by almost anyone. If you can’t afford braces make sure that your teeth are always perfectly brushed and that you’re keeping up with your dental hygiene in general.

In fact – if you have problems affording certain beauty procedures, research how to get as close as possible to them with DIYs.

For years, I always wanted to be the mysterious woman in the room. The woman with a dark aura, the woman that doesn’t speak much and remains most of her life a secret.

Well, I am not this woman even if I’m trying very hard. It would be an act that I would put on and I am sure that everyone in the room would notice.

I am naturally very bubbly and I love having conversations with people in general. I would also say that I have a broad knowledge on different topics and that I’m able to talk to almost everyone.

I am also very welcoming and I enjoy making people laugh and have fun in my presence. I tend to have strong opinions and I’m not afraid to take on a discussion.

With everything that I know about myself now, I made some points that I need to tackle in order to level up:

1. stop oversharing. Being bubbly is great but not everyone needs to know everything about my business. Sometimes it’s just better to be silent and to listen.

2. start with exercise again. I am happy with my weight but I am extremely weak and I have almost zero muscle mass. My breath is getting heavy if I have to take the stairs and my legs start to hurt after roughly 15 minutes of walking. I plan on going for a walk every day and doing pilates 3x a week.

3. start doing my hair and makeup again. My hair is long and blonde – so it is an eyecatcher. It’s also very healthy but I usually just throw it up in a bun or in a clawclip, so no one is really seeing it. I have multiple styling tools at home and I need to start using them. The same applies to makeup. I have so much great stuff that looks really beautiful and natural but I am just too lazy to use it. I plan on taking 20 minutes every day to do my makeup and to suck it up – because I usually always do a double cleanse at night, so it’s not really a struggle to take it off in the evening. It’s just inconvenient in the morning.

4. taking better care of my skin and of my dental health. I have high quality skincare and I love doing my skincare but sometimes I’m just too lazy. Let me just say that it doesn’t happen often – but still too much for my liking. Also my dental health – I need to make a dentist appointment asap. I think the last time I went was around 3 years ago!

5. buying better fitting clothes. I don’t like shopping for clothes but it is what it is. Right now I only have cute lounge sets for being at home but when I go out I usually only wear jeans with a basic top and sneakers. I want to look more polished and feminine. I want to stop wearing jeans and focus more on pants, skirts and dresses. Also literally any other shoes than sneakers.

6. go out more. I’m your typical homebody. Movie night? Reading a book? Ordering food? Count me in! I always have fun when I go out but I’m still mostly at home and I want to change that. I want to have a group of like minded friends that want to hang out with me. Maybe even at home. Lol.

I really thought hard about those six points but I think those are the first things that I need to tackle down.

In the end – I was asking myself: what could I do to feel the most comfortable with spontaneous outgoings and meeting new people?

It came down to wanting to look my best. Obviously. I want to make a good first impression and maybe even profit off of pretty privilege.

I’m sure we all know those times when we’re dressed like slobs and suddenly an opportunity to go out arises and we decline because it would take hours to get ready.

That’s the reason why I want to get ready in the morning – so I would only need to touch up if anything came up.

see you soon!

[blossomthepinkbunny]

Poor rendition of queer characters in HH and HB

Here I am again talking about queer representation in Hazbin Hotel and Helluva Boss, this time just more generally. Because it's always a little weird to me when people claim HH/HB to have good queer representation, when in actuality most of the queer characters are either just blatant stereotypes or get mishandled somehow. And with Helluva Boss recently winning the Queertys - Web series reward I think that this is probably a pretty good time to acknowledge that kind of stuff (as people have done before).

TW: Sexual assault, R@pe (when referring to the actions of characters)

Blitzø (Pansexual): is very sexual and seen on screen multiple times either having sex or just having had sex. Pretty much fits the general stereotype of queer men always being sexual and also the stereotype of pansexuals just sleeping with everybody. Like, he literally screwed the mutual Ex of his coworkers even though he knew how much that guy hurt them.

Stolas (Gay): also mostly sexual (from how he was introduced) and he is in a pretty terrible "relationship" with Blitzø, which includes coercion, SA, Power dynamics and fetishization. Another very sex-driven queer man. Also just great proof for the people assuming that queer relationships are inherently predatory, unhealthy and never work out.

Moxxie (Bisexual): is often forced into a very feminine role because even in relationships with women, queer men always have to be pointed out to be feminine and putting a guy in a dress is funny I guess.

Fizzarolli & Asmodeus (Queer): they're actually better than a lot of the other characters here but there is still some of that uneven power dynamic going on with them and there are obvious issues with their relationship. Overall they aren't too bad though. They didn't get that much sexual focus and what they got is kinda warranted since Ozzie is the Lust demon. But there is that one scene with Fizz stepping out of his car with Dildo confetti canons (I think) and that was sorta weird, since in an episode before that they presented Crimson as being homophobic and stereotypical for assuming queer men are all obsessed with dicks. Which is just interesting because thats most of the queer men in Vivzepops stories.

Chaz (Queer): just a sexually abusive asshole because we definitely needed more predatory queer men in this show.

Sally May (Trans mtf): basically the single recognized trans character in both shows and she only had one line. After that they made fan merch for her which consisted of her in a bikini with her bulge being drawn pretty visibly (multiple times). Of course there's nothing wrong with Trans people who don't have surgery but it's just a tiny bit weird to me that fanservice merchandise is what she got reduced to, when something like that wasn't even the joke of the only line she had in the show and because she hasn't recieved any kind of focus after that.

Angel Dust (Gay): now there is a lot of stuff that could be said about Angel. On one hand he is another very sexual gay man whose screentime often just consists of sex jokes and references. On the other hand that's a big point for his character. How he tries to act confident in his sexuality when in reality it's the main source of his problems. Though he does often harass other men in the show and that's just so unnecessary. Talking about Angel mostly leads into discussing if he is good representation for SA victims or not, which is something I don't want to talk about that much because I feel like it's not my place to judge that as someone who never has experienced SA. I'm gonna say that I do find Viv's treatment of him outside of the show insensitive (with the pro-shipping, diminishing Valentino as an Abuser and general sexualization of the characters) but as far as the portrayal of him in the show goes I've heard different opinions and you should read the discussion's of actual r@pe survivors about this topic if you want to know about more about it.

Husk (Queer): I don't have anything to say about Husk. He is a very refreshing queer man in these show's and there is nothing bad about him I could think of right now.

Valentino (Queer): for him I mostly want to talk about how he is treated outside of the show which doesn't sit right with me. He is a villian in HH so it's understandable that he is gonna do effed up stuff. I also like that the show tries to make a point about how men get sexually assaulted too (wether they succeeded in that inside the show I'm not gonna judge too hard like I said). But there are a lot of people who not only sexualize him, but also his actions and his relationship to Angel and from what I know Viv never really spoke out against that. She actually interacts with people who do that stuff and I it's just kinda gross.

Vox (Queer): I also don't have a lot to say about him. He and Val are a couple so he is dating a r@pist but he is also a villain so you can't really expect more from him. Especially since he would still be interacting with a r@pist even if they weren't dating.

Alastor (Aromantic, Asexual): is obviously not interested in relationships or sex but his identity is pretty much ignored by a huge amount of the fandom. Vivzepop never say's anything about people blatantly invalidating him like that. It seems to me like she doesn't care about characters who can't be involved in shipping but still wanted to have more diversity in her show so she just called him AroAce. In Hazbin Hotel he isn't bad representation though. His sexuality is never the focus but thats fine, it's mostly just the treatment he gets outside of HH which I don't like.

Charlie (Bisexual): doesn't have a lot to her sexuality. This is something I talked about pretty lengthy in my other post, specifically about the lack of Sapphic content in both shows, so I won't go into too much detail here. Her relationship with Vaggie would probably be the best in both shows if it wasn't for the fact that they both never get the real spotlight as a couple. And there is that thing in Vivzepops stories where the women are pretty much sexless without men and that's obviously something that is generally an issue when talking about the lack of Sapphic representation (which is also a topic heavily tied to sexism). Charlie's portrayal isn't necessarily stereotypical but that's just because there is nothing to her identity in the show.

Vaggie (Lesbian): like I said I already talked about the Chaggie relationship so now I wanna focus on something I didn't even mention in that post. Her name literally being Vagina and that's apparently funny because she is a Lesbian so she obviously likes Vagina. That's just incredibly stereotypical and also excludes Trans Lesbians and Asexual Lesbians who don't want sex. The whole joke was that Adam named her that because he is obsessed with sex and he's a jerk. But her name was always Vagina even in the pilot (from what I know Adam wasn't conceived then and neither was the idea that Vaggie even is a former exterminator).

That's all the queer characters I could think of. I hope I didn't miss any.

I thought about including Millie here too. But she was also already included in my other discussion post and I still don't know if she is canonically Bisexual of if that is just a headcannon so I didn't put her here.

I'm just gonna say that i don't have a problem with queer men being sexual (or any queer person in that regard). But it's pretty much every one of her queer male characters. This is especially bad when a lot of the relationships are toxic as well.

I just think too many characters fit stereotypes and to me that isn't good queer representation. If you like the depiction of queer characters in HH or HB that's good for you and you don't have to agree with me. But you also can't really deny a lot of this stuff and you can't expect others to just be fine with bland, hurtful and sometimes even toxic representation like there is in these shows.

[gartenofbanny]

WARNING: DIRTY-ISH IMAGES IN THIS BLOG

Guys, I have a confession to make. I believe Sallie May is one of the most overrated characters in Helluva Boss.

I don’t believe she’s overrated simply because she’s trans. It’s just for a different reason that I will explain shortly, but first who is this character I'm talking about?

Who is Sallie May?

Sallie May is Millie’s sister who debuted in Hell of a Boss Episode Five, the Harvest Moon Festival. After some time after the release of the episode she was pretty popular among the Hell of a Boss fandom

So what're my thoughts about her overall? Well, Sallie May is a character, that's pretty much it. I don't have any opinions on her as a character because she isn’t fleshed out. She is Millie's sister who is transgender, that's really what Sallie May is. She looks pretty, but Sallie May doesn't have any standalone character similar to Octavia and Millie.

So that's how I feel about Sallie May, she's overall just a side character. It's cool that they added her to the show, but that's all.

Now that, that's out of the way I'm going to talk about..how Vivziepop and the other creators used her and why I don’t like it. This is going to be pretty controversial for me to discuss so don’t pull out your pitchforks yet.

How Vivziepop and the other creators used her

What I don't like upon Harvest Moon Festival’s release is that a lot of people, including me were not aware that Sallie May was transgender and there was very little indication of that. The only thing that points out that Sallie May is trans is her horns.

As people know, Male imps and Female imps have different patterns for their horns. However, that information is not shared within Helluva Boss.

It requires outside research like in the wikis, Livestreams, or people telling you in order to make sense.

Upon first watching Harvest Moon Festival, I had no idea that Sallie May was transgender until a Reddit post basically told me that she was.

If you're going to have a character with a certain gender identity, establish it within the series. It could've been something simple like a pin of the transgender flag or a button that has the colors of the transgender flag.

The writers of Amphibia did it with Sasha where Sasha had a bisexual heart sticker on her rearview mirror. It doesn't have to be something big, but it can be small and easily noticeable.

I don’t get how people consider Sallie May to be a trans icon when lots of people didn’t even know she was trans in the first place.

Why I believe she's overrated and why she's loved within the Fandom

Now the real question is why do I believe she’s overhyped? Well, simply put it she does not have much screen time overall. Sallie May has around 13 to at most 20 seconds of screentime and Harvest Moon Festival is 17 minutes and 30 seconds long excluding the credits.

Sallie May doesn't make an appearance later on in the episode despite the fact that Millie and Sallie's mom, Lin said that Sallie May would compete in the Pain Games. Not once is Sallie May shown in the Pain Games.

Sallie May also doesn't appear later on in the episode. Viv and Brandon just include her in those couple of seconds and decided "That's all she gets".

But why is Sallie May overrated as a character? Well, it's simple, merchandise.

Despite being a side character, Sallie May is present in a lot of merch. In the Valentine’s and Summer merch sales for Hell of a Boss, Sallie May is highly sexualized.

Sallie May hasn't gone through the transition surgery, which is fine, but the merch puts A LOT of emphasis on that.

What I mean is that…her bulge is showing.

Sallie May's swimsuit and Valentine’s merchandise are clear examples of this, they just let Sallie May’s thing bulge out with no care in the world. Why is it that Sallie May’s bulge is exposing itself in nearly all of her raunchy merch, but none of the characters who identify as males (except for Chaz) are not?

Conclusion

In conclusion, I believe Sallie May is really overhyped because she’s sexualized as hell. I get that people like her because she’s trans and that we have a trans character in Helluva Boss, but then again there are also two other characters in this show that are trans.

And one character in Harvest Moon Festival that is also trans

At least that’s what the horns and hair color imply, but I don’t see the fandom falling head over hills for these two characters.

The trans rep in Helluva Boss sucks, Sallie May has more screen time as merchandise than she does as an actual character. Let that sink in.

I am not transphobic, just stating the truth. Thank you all for reading and I hope you all have a nice day!

(This is basically the transcript version of a video I made not too long ago)

[zynart]

“book lovers” don’t love anything about books and it’s weird (or, defending classic novels)

kevin durant is talking about basketball fans but you’ll understand exactly what he means in a much broader sense if you’re on the basketball side of twitter and immediately recognize the mindset he’s describing — that it’s a sentiment that isn’t really about basketball fans at all, but about how we engage with all sorts of things especially in the social media era. but this tweet is just table-setting. the important thing here is that the rest of this post, about many writers and english teachers and book bloggers and overall people who describe themselves as book-lovers on the internet, can be summed up as a caption to this screenshot that just says “same energy”.

same energy. many writers and supposed booklovers on the internet actively dislike and disparage most literature. and actively dislike and disparage the entire literary tradition of the novel, and the novel as a form, and all the tools or frames of engaging with art, and many of the writers or novels known for beautiful writing, and the books that made up the history and development of the medium and inspired so many more of its writers and inspired stylistic shifts, so much fundamental context for any kind of novel… i’m losing my thread here but the point is, many people who describe themselves as book-lovers, many of them authors themselves or english teachers, will proudly and vocally announce their dislike and hatred of so many classic novels. often what seems like almost all of them.

and will not just proudly say so, but won’t shut up about it. and will bring it up constantly among themselves. it’s not a one-off thing either, this comes up con-fucking-stantly in what feels like almost any conversation about literature. often fully unprompted. and will somehow pretend it's an original insight and that they're being bold and brave and controversial and starting a conversation for saying it, when it's all been discourse every two months for as long as an online commons has existed, and when we all know they got that take from endless cycles of online discourse, and when the reason they say it is because they know people will agree with them, because we've seen how that plays out a million times already, b e c a u s e so many other people who like to imagine themselves as brave bold original thinkers for having picked up that opinion in a previous online cycle themselves will respond enthusiastically through some kind of collective pretense that it's a new conversation.

that's part of it too, everyone involved in that discussion collectively performs some kind of amnesia where this is a take they're hearing for the very first time, and speaking a truth they've always thought but never felt like it was socially acceptable to say. because that way, you get to feel like an original critical thinker without having to do any critical thinking, or to feel like you have a superior understanding of a piece of media without having any media literacy. and you get to feel some self-flattery about your superior insight for having the originality and courage to believe what is now a pretty mainstream view — maybe not mainstream among literati, but absolutely mainstream in the online commons, enough that you know many people agree with you already because you've seen the same agreement and mutual self-congratulation play out in a million online cycles already.

(it feels very disingenuous. maybe it's not consciously and intentionally disingenuous, maybe it's just a lack of self-awareness, but it's like.. you know how we could say a great joke at a family function that we once read on the internet, and they wouldn't know and would just think you're just that witty for coming up wiht it? like that, except we're all on the same internet and we'd all read the same joke already but we all have to pretend we'd never heard it before so we don't break kayfabe, because that way you can convince yourself that nobody else had seen it before and they all thought you were witty. everyone just performs the exact same roles every time discourse about any given book happens every 2-6 months on the internet. next time, can we all at least not pretend like this isn't the 26th time we've seen this conversation and spare all the "FINALLY someone said it!" "someone needed to start this conversation!" schtick? is that too harsh?)

but anyway. the thing is, alright. if you think jane austen is boring. and that the great gatsby is overrated. and also that the bronte sisters' books were super problematic (bc heathcliff and rochester with mad wife in the attic are both kinda misogynistic). and also that hemingway is boring posturing. and catcher in the rye is overrated (because the abused kid processing his brother's death is "annoying"). and that shakespeare is too old english style to be worth reading.

and that only pretentious wannabes read tolstoy or dostoevsky. and as for ursula k le guin or isaac asimov or philip k dick, sci-fi is a boring genre. and that nabokov is weird and kinda suss, and kundera seems like he has an ego and philosophizes too much (will claim to have liked one hundred years of solitude tho bc that’s still seen as fashionable). and only pretentious hipsters read david foster wallace or pynchon or franzen. none of them seem to remember that edith wharton exists. some quote george eliot as another white man, or just don’t mention her at all.

and never even mention chinua achebe or toni morrison or james baldwin or arundhati roy. and — this is something i actually saw being said on twitter in conversations between english teachers, authors, and people who call themselves book bloggers — say "kazuo ishiguro is only read by white people who want to feel smart but is actually full of weird stuff" while including a screenshot from a haruki murakami novel. even though ishiguro and murakami write very different books in very different styles, one has lived in the uk his whole life and his best known books are all set in the uk while the other is a japanese pop writer, and they have very little in common aside from a kinda sparse prose style and being ethnically asian…

at that point, do you even like literature?

having a few or couple of those opinions is one thing, people’s tastes vary and i don’t expect everyone to love every supposed literary classic, i’ll admit to not enjoying ‘a separate peace’ at all — but so many writers online proudly announce pretty much all of this. and it’s usually not even with specific justification about the specific author or book, just broad strokes commentary. a lot of it seems to be half-remembered from bored high school years, books where they barely remember what even happened during them but retained their opinions on them with full unwavering confidence, a lot of the comments that sound like someone who’s only vaguely heard of the book and not even to the level of reading the wikipedia page to check, who misunderstood the main themes and seems to not have tried to critically engage with it at all.

honestly, i know most people online's clever opinions about books are just regurgitated from the internet. i’m pretty convinced this applies to 80% of all mentions of the catcher in the rye online, for example. fuck it, here’s the screenshot of the ishiguro/murakami incident i mentioned a couple paragraphs back:

how is this not, really, just the hardcore marvel-only fan types of the book world? people who aren’t happy with their movies basically being so dominant they’ve outcompeted every other kind of movie in cinemas and make a trillion dollars, but also demand they get the critical appraisal of the godfather, and that martin scorsese praises them without reservation as high art, and also that they should get the same kind of respect and cachet among film artsy types as people who love all the classics of cinema or whatever. it’s the exact same mindset.

in a way, i feel like a lot of how gen x-millennial-zoomers are about art is like a relatively harmless version of how maga boomers are about society, in the sense of.. having the smallest expectation made of you or the smallest amount of effort/inconvenience asked or anything that isn’t super familiar exactly the way things were unchallenging or anyone not praising you for all of it is some kind of horrific thing that shouldn’t be allowed. i think this is a pretty terrible cultural development, as those go. its some kind of social collective self-infantilizing, all propped up by a whole circle of mutual reflexive defensiveness at any criticism of this way of being. and it’s a bit stressful saying all this knowing that there’s a pretty good chance that if the shoe fits, the response is likely not going to be a careful consideration — i mean, why would this somewhat incoherent and sloppily edited rant by some random on the internet warrant a level of careful consideration that people are proud of denying f scott fitzgerald or toni morrison?

its normal to have to put in a little tiny bit of effort and accommodation to access great things, like good art or a functional society. it’s good, even. it’s part of what makes life beautiful. there’s so much beauty to be found in art that you have to sit with and dwell on and read criticism of and analyze to find more and more layers of beauty, to find complexity, to develop a personal relationship between yourself and the art that’s so much deeper than just superficial infatuation because it’s something you built. you cant be mad about that expectation and demand praise for not following it. it’s fine to enjoy art on a simple and escapist level, but that’s not all that art is meant to be. insisting that it’s all that art has to be, or that expecting art to also be more is somehow morally wrong or elitist, is just philistinism and i’m only being a little bit hyperbolic when i say the normalization of that understanding of art is detrimental to society.

art is also meant to be something where you understand and respect the amount of craft and learning and attention to detail and thought and transcendent talent goes into making beautiful things, and you want to engage with it to the level that it deserves, to peel through the layers. to see how you interpret and find meaning and emotion in it based on the person you are at that moment in time, the most salient experiences and thoughts as you encountered that piece of art, the setting, the memories, an understanding that you can look back on and see change as you yourself change. to create an emotional correspondence with a mind you’ve never met, one that might have died decades ago and that lived in a world unimaginably different from your own but shared so many familiar thoughts and feelings and hopes and fears.

that carried the torch of a beautiful tradition of the form — the novel from miguel de cervantes through flaubert and tolstoy into the novels of the lost generation, the development of internal life as an art form in a way that’s unique to the medium and that can’t be shown in a play or film, the transition from novels as storytelling similar to a play in its earliest days to novels coming into its own as a unique art form that allows the reader to truly inhabit someone else’s mind, to think their thoughts and feel their feelings, in a way you can’t get from anything else. not from visual mediums, where you can see the action but can’t inhabit the inner minds of characters, only infer it. not from short stories, which even at their most introspective and internally oriented still don’t give you enough time.

i'll quote milan kundera from the art of the novel here, about what i mean when i talk about the development and tradition of the novel, and what only the novel can do: "Since its very beginnings, the novel has always tried to escape the unilinear, to open rifts in the continuous narration of a story ... Through its own logic, the novel discovered the various dimensions of existence one by one: with Cervantes and his contemporaries, it inquires into the nature of adventure; with Richardson, it begins to examine "what happens inside," to unmask the secret life of the feelings; with Balzac, it discovers man's rootedness in history; with Flaubert, it explores the terra previously incognita of the everyday; with Tolstoy, it focuses on the intrusion of the irrational in human behavior and decisions. It probes time: the elusive past with Proust, the elusive present with Joyce. With Thomas Mann, it examines the role of the myths from the remote past that control our present actions. Et cetera ..."

[my note: interrupting kundera here to note that all that's just up to pre-war early 20th century. there's still novels by the lost generation shaped by world wars and the great depression attending gertrude stein's salons in paris, the influence of fitzgerald and hemingway as branches of prose style, william faulkner and southern gothic, stream-of-consciousness and feminism with virginia woolf, chinua achebe and jean rhys with postcolonial inversions of older classics, magical realism with gabriel garcia marquez and salman rushdie and the like, big self-referential playful intertextual postmodern novels like david foster wallace through the weirdness of the 1990s, to this day there's still evolutions in form like jennifer egan with 'a visit from the goon squad', which such a great book by the way but i digress.. all that came after what kundera described here! and so much more that i'm likely forgetting right now]

but anyway, continuing kundera: "The characters in my novels are my own unrealized possibilities. The novel is not the author’s confession; it is an investigation of human life in the trap the world has become ... The novel has an extraordinary power of incorporation: whereas neither poetry nor philosophy can incorporate the novel, the novel can incorporate both poetry and philosophy without losing anything of its identity ... it can blend philosophy, narrative, and dream into one music ... it has [the ability to] marshall all intellectual means and all poetic forms to illuminate “what the novel alone can discover”: man’s being. ... I’ll never tire of repeating: The novel’s sole raison d’être is to say what only the novel can say."

i think that's very cool. i love thinking about what the novel can do and all the possibilities offered to me by its presence and what only the novel can do. when you’re reading a novel, the same little voice in your head that speaks out your own thoughts are speaking out someone else’s thoughts; the same body where you feel sadness or tension or excitement at events in your life, through the power of imagination, replicates those same feelings in you as you read someone else experience them. you get to understand situations and develop insights that you never could’ve if you’d only had your own experiences to rely on, because you could briefly borrow the direct experiences and emotional responses and realizations of others. having that lightbulb moment as you piece together some insight that the writer had laid out the breadcrumbs and guided you to discover. where things that wouldn’t have gotten through if you’d just been told it in bullet points become things you understand intimately because on some mini scale, in that brain-in-a-vat that’s your mind inside your skull inside your body, a book gave you the same experiential stimuli as being someone else and living a different life. that shit is fucking magical. learning about the journey, tracing that development, witnessing writers over the year gradually understand the full power and capabilities of the novel as a medium and experiment in finding ways to use the medium, is just fascinating to me.

reading classic novels to me is discovering a whole parallel history. not just events, not just ideas, but the way we think about stories. aren’t you interested in that? if you’re an english teacher, don’t your students deserve to experience that with your guidance? if you’re a writer, doesn’t taking your work seriously call for a more intimate knowledge of the clay you’re molding?

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i think people give a lot of excuses for their reading choices where they can’t just admit it’s a simple choice with trade-offs, or a preference where what you value in the moment is just different. that’s fine. there’s no need to be ashamed of that and to try to make it out to be anything deeper than that. nobody has to act like a certain type of book is the only kind that’s sufficiently accessible or that has characters of a relevant age or certain background. i mean, there's just straight up books. all kinds of books, a whole wide world of them. i understand being unable to read out of attention span or language level or whatever, but if you can read and its just about needing the book to be unchallenging, there's many many books. relatively short books, readable books, even books with characters in their 20s.

and i would argue that even if there aren’t, its still valuable to read about people with different lives and experiences. marshall mcluhan has a point about how what we call narcissism is a misunderstanding of the actual myth of narcissus from which we get the word. i'll include the quote here first: "The Greek myth of Narcissus is directly concerned with a fact of human experi­ence, as the word Narcissus indicates. It is from the Greek word narcosis, or numb­ness. The youth Narcissus mistook his own reflection in the water for another person. Now the point of this myth is the fact that men at once become fascinated by any extension of themselves in any ma­terial other than themselves... the wisdom of the Narcissus myth does not convey any idea that Narcissus fell in love with anything he regarded as himself. Obviously he would have had very different feelings about the image had he known it was [literally] himself. It is indicative of the bias of our intensely technological and, therefore, narcotic culture that we have long interpreted the Narcissus story to mean that he fell in love with himself, that he imagined the reflection to be Narcissus."

and i think this was really prescient about the state of a lot of modern online criticism and discussion of art. the organizing principle of how some "book lover" communities, whether on YA twitter or fandom tumblr or at your local library reading group, judge the value of media: by their "relatability", whether you can see yourself within the book and setting and characters being the ultimate arbiter of whether a piece of fiction is good or bad. i don't want to call it narcissistic per se, but it does mirror (pun intended...) the myth of narcissus, in that falling in love with a piece of fiction is about whether it's relatable, whether you can see yourself in it.

i'm going to head off a likely response here by emphasizing that this is different from the broader phrase of "feeling seen", which conflates "relatability" and "representation". i'm not here to quell the power of feeling seen, especially for people who have traditionally been surrounded by media where they haven't felt seen, but i think it'd be disingenuous to claim what mcluhan says here is referring to representation. representation is about seeing people *like* you, finding a sense of community in seeing someone who experiences the world in similar ways and would understand how you experience the world as a result. where the myth of narcissus would be applicable is about falling in love with media, even judging the objective value of media and whether it's good or bad as a work of art, based on how much you see yourself in it.

which i think kind of defeats the point of books, the reason why books and reading got this semi-mystical reputation in the first place. the concept of the empathy machine was coined, to my knowledge, by roger ebert referring to movies. art forms in general have the power to be empathy machines, compassion machines, tenderness machines, sympathy machines. empathy as feeling what it's actually like to be someone else, compassion as understanding that someone else also feels things you feel, tenderness as feeling seen and empathised with, sympathy as sorrow and commiseration because you see someone else, maybe the exact way you'd define them might be different but let's phrase them clumsily like this. the machine doesn't operate by itself, it needs you to plug directly into it, and the machine works differently based on your own nature and what you put into it and how you engage with it. most art has the capability to be empathy machines for someone empathetic willing to engage enough, but the barrier of entry is different

the magic of books is that they are a special kind of empathy machine that puts you directly inside the mind of another human being, almost like an other-selves simulator. other-interiority simulator, other-inner-self simulator, whatever you'd like to call it. which makes them uniquely powerful as an empathy machine, even compared to other types of art. how it feels to be someone else is the most unbreakable, most fundamental barrier in existence. it's the AT fields from evangelion and the argument for the human instrumentality project, the impenetrability of that barrier is the reason for wallfacers in the three-body problem, its how sufis and ascetics fall in love with god when nobody else but the omniscient can ever ever truly know what it's like to be you and feel what you feel

this can't be conveyed in the same way in mediums like movies or plays where the medium itself is from an external point of view and is viewed through this barrier of the mind, and is harder to convey in structured forms like poetry which may not be able to capture the endless variety of form and expression within our thoughts and feelings and experiences (or, going back to kundera, the freedom of form within the novel as enabling polyphony). i think the closest art forms in that sense may be music, which also has a relative freedom of form and the ability to express depths of feeling both individually and through the interaction of music with words and even the sequencing of tracks across an album, and video games, which may not directly put you in the mind of someone else the way books do and which may at first glance seem like they belong alongside movies in being seen through the AT field but where the difference is that in a video game your character makes *choices* and you feel how it feels to make those choices as an agent — even if you're not inhabiting someone else's thoughts, you're feeling how it feels to be someone who experienced and did certain things and made certain choices. but i think there's still plenty about books that is unique. the empathy machine has to be collaborative, your imagination is a necessary creative or generative aspect for it to be a novel and not just a report of events

"book lovers" often act like books have some kind of sacred and mystical power but don't seem to be able to justify this idea in how they engage with books as a whole, beyond this sense of books as an identity signifier or aesthetic or accessory. but books do have a certain sacred and mystical power — that they are invitations, almost portals, you could call them pensieves even, where someone gives you a window into another mind. (not necessarily their own mind — the mirror of books as an empathy machine is how even writing itself is an empathy machine of an activity that asks the writer to empathize up a creation — which is also partly why i think that to be a good writer you should also be a good reader).

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in much of online, the idea that any book or piece of media that isn't personally relatable would naturally be boring and impossible to connect with is so widely accepted that it's never even really a point of dispute. i want to say it should be, and that we should start disputing it. because i think the magic of books and fiction in general is that it's a way for you to exercise your empathy muscles. the characters or settings don't have to be "relatable" for you to be able to relate to it: it's just about stretching your capacity for empathy a little bit, inhabiting someone different from you with a life different from yours, seeing the world through their eyes, and ultimately learning something about yourself, the world, and humanity as a result. i think it's important to make this argument forcefully and not let this narcotic view of art — that it's natural and expected for us to only be able to enjoy art that is relatable, that relatability is a merit and unrelatability is a flaw in itself — not become even more hegemonic.

but ultimately, prioritizing enjoyment or relatability is fine. there's no harm to the preference. life is short and exhausting, free time is limited, and what we do for leisure can just be about having a fun time, or about getting a guaranteed emotional hit from a genre or medium that you know will fill whatever you need emotionally from reading right now. it's fine to read romance because it's fun or sexy, or fanfic because it'll make you cry. even "narcotic" isn't an inherently bad thing to be: even in a very literal sense, we all accept that it's perfectly normal to unwind with a glass of wine or a joint. it’s fine to prioritize other things. but for people who make their whole brand being about books specifically, i think it deserves far more harsh criticism that so many are so wilfully against engaging with the majority of books. a lot of it is an echo chamber where everyone else in the same circles feels the same way, i guess, but society in general has given this obviously ridiculous state of affairs a free pass for so long.

maybe the internet just isn’t real life and i’m seeing an unrepresentative subset of people. but at least going from “book lover” twitter, which is a loose amalgam of authors and english teachers and people who run wordpress blogs with book reviews, it feels like a lot of it is a whole generation of people who got into writing through fanfic and exclusively read YA or fanfic and felt embarrassed about it being seen as dorky, so they made their whole identity and personality and mission to be about validating kids like their imagined younger selves, without ever really growing up in that aspect of their personalities, and without doing any further developing/exploration of their tastes.

you know what i really don’t understand coming from an author, or even an amateur writer? having zero interest in reading the classics, even just to see if there's anything worth learning from great prose stylists to improve your own craft. i mean, if you think there's nothing in classic novels worth learning from, not even like 5% of it to try find what details or specifics you might find from widely respected prose stylists or lauded writing, like that its not worth reading it even to find just a few points you can use to develop your own writing — let alone that whole thing about all that art has to teach us about the human experience, which is so much more than the ground covered by contemporary YA and fanfiction, and what value that could add to the actual lives of yourself or your students —

if you're blinkered enough to think that your subset of writing is all there is to take value from, and you're basically just doing the reverse of all your "people who respect the classics don’t bother to see that there is insight and value and quality to be found and learnt from within pop fiction like YA and fanfic!", and arrogant enough to believe that you don’t need any more than that —

clearly you don’t actually love writing, or language, in that case. and that’s the truth. none of it was ever about a love for literature or writing or language as much as it was about validating the child version of themselves by coddling it and saying it’s actually fine to feel superior about it. what’s missing is any process of validating what does bring them out further, for getting into writing/reading in the first place being a starting point for growing and branching out and discovering how much more there is to art, rather than using it as a reason to just double down and shut out anything else.

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i may not be able to do some critical meta-analysis of all new literature but look, a generation of writers filling a whole genre not actually wanting to learn from all the lauded writers before them to improve their prose style or get ideas or insights isn’t going to be doing the best job they can. it’s a mindset that is actively damaging to the genres you claim to love, one that’s going to lead to stagnancy and decay, and one that disrespects an audience of voracious readers who want to get the best art they can. i don’t think this should be all that controversial. people might try to argue with me about whether old books are better than new books or whatever, but that’s not a point i’m interested in arguing — survival bias does mean that often only the very best from the past is what makes it through the decades to still be widely known to us, and i’m not qualified to compare the absolute very best of modern literature to that of the past and i’m not even sure that’s possible — but that’s not a point i’m interested in arguing.

thing is, it doesn’t matter which were better, what matters is that there’s definitely unquestionably indisputably a lot to be learned from books that have connected with millions across generations, and inspired movements and moved critics, and led literature lovers to their spark of love, and that passing up all of that is a cynical, nihilistically arrogant, aggressively anti-intellectual approach to art.  if i tried to build a plane engine without ever really studying, i might wing something that gets you off the ground by watching some youtube videos, but it's likely not going to run a plane as well as something built by engineers who've spent years learning from the lessons of masters and geniuses before them honed through the mistakes of thousands before them.

and if i respected the craft, i’d bother learning. and when i pick up those textbooks, they’re going to be boring or hard if i never bother doing much study, or doing any complementary readings, or doing the exercises or discussions of the material, or even doing any close reading at all. i can’t slack on all of that and then say the textbooks or lectures are just impenetrable and too hard to bother with. that would be an asinine way to approach any other craft or skill. and i think authors and english teachers and people who love books should respect the art enough to take it seriously, and not just blow it off as “who needs to study or learn or read up on it? anyone can write, it’s just putting some words down!”. we shouldn’t be saying that. that’s for my parents to say

work with me here. at least try put aside your prejudices about some of those classics, or what you vaguely remember as your first impressions, and actually engage with them in good faith. reading commentary or discussions and critics' views on them, paying attention to spot the metaphors and turns of phrase and motifs and how the sentences are structured to make something sound beautiful or how something is set up to come together later. you don’t have to love it, but you can at least engage with it in good faith first, with an approach of respect and seriousness. it’s a fun way of socializing with like-minded people when you can make it an identity signifier thing, where you have an imagined view of classic novel lovers as aloof opponents making fun of you in class and you stake out an identity as being anti-that and pro-ya or fanfic, like a fanfic or YA protagonist who learns to embrace their differences and acknowledge their specialness against the world or whatever.

where it genuinely depresses me is to see it coming from english teachers. from anyone who influences what young people get to read, really, but especially coming from english teachers who take pride in denying their students the opportunity to learn many of the great novels that they could be learning, and that they could be finding beauty in and enjoying if you could bring that same passion and approach to teaching them instead of letting your dislike show. i understand that the way those english teachers may have initially been introduced to the classics in their high school years was probably not pedagogically ideal, but it's really not an excuse for an adult making a career out of it. at that point you have a responsibility to your students and sometimes that responsibility requires you to get over yourself and do right by your students. no copouts here. no avoiding responsibility. it's an understandable excuse for why any random adult might not be a fan of the classics. if that same random adult claims to be a book lover literature fan i may find them a bit of a fraud for it, but they aren't doing wrong by anyone. an author who does it should think their readers deserve better. an english teacher doing it is self-centered and malpractice.

if what you’re modeling for your students is that they should also feel comfortable or even empowered flippantly dismissing the books they’ve been told make up part of a great education, you’re not all that far removed from the people in school telling kids that books are lame and for nerds and that they should just watch a movie. it’s only different in degree, but it still communicates the exact same concept to students. what an english teacher is meant to do is to at least try inculcate a love of books in students, a sense of awe and respect for the power of the written word. that books are amazing and that there’s so many kinds of books out there that they should give a real chance to and that they’ll find some book they love and that it’ll open up whole new worlds. don’t you think that out of all your students, the book which makes some of your students fall in love with reading might be one of those great novels of history?

i’m not saying that assigning books that kids will find easier to read and engage with isn’t a perfectly fine approach to involving students, especially if other approaches aren’t getting them as involved. but anyone reading this essay in good faith already knows that thinking that’s what i’m criticizing is defensively propping up a strawman, because i’m not talking about the english teacher who clearly loves novels and goes with a book at the class’s overall level while still encouraging students to go seek out more and pointing them toward the wide world of great novels out there that they can try read and engage with in their own time if they want. i’m talking about this very common attitude and phenomenon of people disparaging most novels, this often being english teachers who discuss this mindset informing how they teach their students. who proudly tweet about how they shut down some kid’s curious question about the catcher in the rye or the great gatsby or the grapes of wrath with some soundbite from the internet detritus that’d do great for clout, telling their students something like “ugh, those books are so boring”. which i think is something that an english teacher should feel embarrassed to admit.

at that point, it’s not really about those kids’ education at all, its about the teacher themselves. or it’s not about their young readers, it’s about the author’s need for personal validation in their tastes and choices, and seeking that validation from people who are influenced by and take cues from them in the first place because that’s a way to receive uncritical validation without much pushback. it's just a kind of self-laudatory narcissism that claims to be supporting kids, when it’s really just about those teachers or authors themselves in some ways never having moved on from childhood. not saying they're immature or childish as a whole in their lives but in this specific aspect, it is absolutely an immature and childish approach that casts themselves and their students/readers as characters in a high school setting fanfiction or YA story. just people congratulating themselves for teaching their students that a lot of reading is lame and uncool and boring and elitist beyond an entertaining subset of it. which, to clarify, is something which i think should be considered malpractice for an english teacher.

that’s just doing the kids they're teaching (or writing for) a disservice. it’s basically making them just a prop in your exercise of validating your aggrieved younger self, while dismissing the possibility of actual real kids' intelligence or interest in expanding their tastes or intellectual curiosity — a perspective where you can look down on everyone else, including those other kids who want more from class, as somehow being snobby villains in your life story or in the life story of an imagined self-insert high school version of yourself that you're projecting on some poor kids you identify with in class. i think this is something people who do this to their students need to sit with and be introspective about, because personal psychodrama shouldn’t be taken out on students.

 -

you can’t dismiss the classic novel or literary canon like that. that dismissal is either a bad-faith argument or an unserious and ignorant one. there is so much literature that has so much to say about actual cultural evolution from gender repression in victorian times (jane austen, bronte sisters) or the force of tradition in 19th century russia (tolstoy) to the world wars (elie wiesel, erich maria remarque) to the despair of the lost generation after the world wars (fitzgerald, hemingway) to 60s counterculture (hunter thompson, kerouac, ginsberg) to life through postcolonial revolutions (achebe, rushdie, camus) to socialist republics and revolutions (kundera) and latin american corporatist coups (gabriel garcia marquez) and indian caste conflict (arundhati roy) and postmodern disillusionment and absurdism (david foster wallace, delillo, pynchon, etc) and warnings of futures like theocratic conservatism or authoritarianism or classifications (atwood, orwell, huxley, ishiguro, philip k dick)…

and i do think calling the overall literary canon of classic novels "straight white male" (notably, a claim often made by straight white people) is often just a crutch to moralize their own personal dislike of something for aesthetic reasons. and i often find that just fundamentally dishonest, because its not like they're replacing hemingway with chinua achebe or james baldwin or allen ginsberg or ralph ellison or toni morrison or edith wharton or arundhati roy or gabriel garcia marquez or salman rushdie or kazuo ishiguro or ursula k le guin or margaret atwood, all of whom are either people of color or gay or women or some combination of the three. they're dumping all of those out too as distaste of classic novels and replacing it with diverse YA novels.

the real truth is that it’s not about straight white maleness at all. there’s plenty of novels universally considered ‘great novels’, ranked in lists of the great novels, available for teaching in schools, subject of plenty of critical praise, with huge legacies in the development of the medium and of culture as a whole. it’s not about that. its about genre and about the idea that literature should just be a rollicking read that is nice for the imagination and feels fun, and this continued idea that any art being challenging is bad.

and thing is, ironically enough, this is actually erasing the contributions of those famous and respected and influential non-white/straight/male literary figures, and the art that they created engaging with and in reaction to their circumstances, while doing so. because discarding the classic novel or literary fiction or whatever you want to call it, swapping out influential classic novels for ya, is just throwing out all of their work and their legacies. you can’t pretend that that recognizing diversity is your actual justification when you're throwing out the study of classic novels alongside their historical and cultural context, which includes a ton of the contributions of non-white/straight/male people.

and the charitable interpretation of that for me is that it’s just a bullshit excuse and lying to themselves. that a lot of it is just people working out their own personal insecurities about not being taken seriously, by digging in the trenches real pre-emptively and casting themselves in the role of righteous rebels overturning an establishment that propped up bad things while suppressing the good things they liked. none of this is to be dismissive of either the young adult genre or fanfiction, which i’m fully sympathetic to as genres that have put out a lot of great art that shouldn’t be summarily dismissed but often have been. but at this point, all of it begins to feels like a whole psychological mess that's making childhood resentments and aggrieved persecution complex about not having your tastes be universally praised no matter how mainstream or popular or successful they become.

i compared it to maga boomers or marvel fans before. to paraphrase dril, i’m not going to “hand it to” maga boomers and have no reason to. but at least marvel fans who act like that have much less weird psychodrama going on, because most of them don’t go on to become filmmakers or film studies teachers themselves and aren’t producing art where they imagine themselves in the position of the superhero. they're just occasionally annoying fans, who don’t really have much negative impact beyond their dollars dictating what gets made. which i don’t really blame ppl for because its individual tastes driving their individual ticket purchases that adds up to a lot of money and makes it profitable. but your average marvel fan doesn’t themselves either teach or create content where they can perpetuate it within culture. and at least marvel fans just call themselves marvel fans, they don’t insist they're the true actual film fans while shitting on the godfather and proudly announcing how they won’t watch anything from before 2008. many “book lovers” and “literature fans” who actually hate pretty much most literature and great novels could do with that level of specificity, without trying to take on the mantle of being so in love with books and the english language and the written word. it’s not true. it’s denial. it’s a cope.

and that’s the charitable interpretation. because the alternative is just being too ignorant of the presence of all those writers and their contributions within the canon in the first place. in which case, why do people talk so confidently disparaging classic novels if they don’t actually know anything about them beyond recognizing maybe the great gatsby and moby dick, and don’t actually know enough to even know about all these non-straight/white/male writers of classic novels and their role in the evolution of the novel as a medium? it’s just a fully unjustified level of confidence in that situation. and neither one of ignorance about their subject or uninformed confidence, let alone both, paints a great picture of people who've supposedly made a career out of writing or literature or the english language.

i don’t love getting into neat little psychological explanations for things but then again, fuck it. all the “essays” on here are just ruminations on culture and whatever psychology it feels like is driving that culture, after all. it’s not like that’s out of the overall scope of what’s going on here so why not. the reason i hesitate here is because there’s a lot of reflexive thin-skinned defensiveness that seems to be part and parcel with this attitude, given that i think a lot of it is birthed in a sort of understandable insecurity anyway — and i don’t say insecurity as an insult, i think insecurity is a very understandable and pretty universal aspect of being human — but the rest of this is going to be pretty harsh. and maybe that harshness isn’t the right approach to persuade people who i’d hope would be persuaded, but i don’t know, honestly i think we’re long overdue to start being harsh about it and i’m going to give that a little nudge. at this point, my visceral reaction to seeing this is just thinking “grow up”, and that they've been indulged and welcomed and catered to enough already now.

that’s my screed. me to classic novels, the most dickish love letter in the world

update, now that people have discovered this post and are actually reading it: i don't mind any of this being shared or reprinted anywhere if it's with attribution. whatever gets people to read it to change the conversation works for me. i hope it reaches enough of an audience to make the right people mad, to be honest.

if you liked this, feel free to check out my other 'essays' on internet/pop culture stuff on my homepage. here's a selection:

· humanity is worth loving, humans are worth saving

· there are things we owe to each other

· i trained a neural net on 10,000 irony-poisoned tweets and it just gave me cringe?

· what makes someone good, bad, cancelled, or redeemed? i don't know either!

· please tell me if you have a definitive answer on what makes someone a bad person

· ok, fine, my social justice politics feel a bit like religion sometimes and that’s ok

· after the deluge (short story) (dispatch from an island state post climate apocalypse)

[rainbowsky]

Perspectives on a debate

I see a lot of people still steeped in the debate about GQ.

There are a lot of claims being spread around about GQ, including:

They are huge GG antis

They posted hateful slander about GG

They were one of the primary agents of 227 and GG's cancellation

They boycotted GG

They keep bringing up 227 to hurt GG

Here are the primary pieces of 'evidence' of these claims:

Two articles published by GQ, one in 2020 shortly after 227, and one a year later. Both consist of interviews with a media/culture scholar who specializes in danmei and fan culture, discussing the phenomenon of 227 and some other related sociocultural topics.

I urge every fan to read these articles and draw your own conclusions about whether they constitute 'anti-GG slander'.

Initial article

Follow-up a year later

Once you've done so you can read on if you're curious to hear my thoughts on the issue. (Please don't read my thoughts until you've read the articles and formed your own perspective.)

My thoughts

These articles are overall pretty rational, intellectual and inquisitive. The conversation primarily revolves around fandom and fan culture, and GG isn't even the central focus. Particularly the second article, which only mentions him briefly at the beginning.

Instead, the articles cover a broad range of entertainment business and cultural topics, and ponder the factors that played into 227.

They are not critical of GG, so much as they are critical of his fans, which is why his fans are so angry about the articles. It's not 'slander against GG', it's a critique of fandom and fan behavior.

I suspect this is why XFX have been so vocal about spreading the rumor of a GQ vendetta against GG. Because saying, "GQ has been critiquing XFX" wouldn't garner nearly as much sympathy or outrage.

Most people don't actually bother digging into or examining these claims. Instead, they take it all at face value and assume the claims to have at least some merit, and buy into the narrative that GQ is out to get GG. They in turn spread the word about GQ's supposed vendetta against GG, thereby doing free XFX legwork.

The reality is that 227 was a very big deal at the time. A massive cultural phenomenon. Of course those interested in culture would reasonably want to discuss and examine it. It's been discussed all over the world, not just in China.

It's not unreasonable for a magazine to do this type of examination. We can agree or disagree with some of the opinions presented in the article, but they're not anything unusual for that region of the world. However, in my view, characterizing them as anti-GG slander is just a bridge too far.

[g0nta-g0kuhara]

The Chapter 4 Essay Part 2: Gonta Gokuhara

A metapost on my thoughts on Kokichi’s overall motivations and Gonta’s actions during ch4. Split into two parts. You can find Kokichi's half here: (LINK)

This section is admittedly a little bit shorter than Kokichi’s, but that’s just because Gonta’s motivations are a lot more clear than Kokichi’s. That being said, I’m also worried that since I am so obsessed with Gonta I might forget something important that supports my point because to me its kinda self-evident. So if anything seems like it’s missing or doesn’t make sense, please let me know!

In my opinion, nothing Kokichi did to Gonta was personal, in both positive and negative ways. He didn’t target Gonta because he hated him in particular, but he also didn’t team up with him because they were already friends. Gonta was just an easy target for him to take advantage of, both for stopping Miu from killing him And in progressing his plan to stop the killing game. Gonta’s actions in chapter 4 are a combination of genuine manipulation by Kokichi using what made him an easy target, and motivation caused by Gonta’s desperation and preexisting insecurities that had been growing since the start of the killing game.

Throughout v3, the one thing that Gonta wants more than anything else is to protect his friends from the killing game. It’s pretty clear that he trusts his physical strength more than any other part of himself. The literal First thing Gonta says in a group setting with everyone else is this:

(prologue)

He doesn’t even know anyone yet! But he’s already prepared to physically defend them from the exisals! He also tries to stop Kaede’s execution along with Kaito and Tenko:

(post trial, chapter 1) (And- wait- is Gonta missing his bug box in this cg? Oh my god….)

Gonta is shown to be most confident when doing things that involve his physical strength. There’s less hesitation and uncertainty in his actions, unlike what you can often see in him during class trials or group discussions.

Gonta is also more than willing to give up his life for his friends, even as early as chapter 2.

(post trial, chapter 2) (he’s the first one to make this suggestion)

Outside of physical defense against active threats, Gonta really just wants to help his friends in any way he can. Here’s a couple examples:

(post-trial, chapter 1) (daily life, chapter 2) (daily life, chapter 3) (investigation, chapter 3)

On the other hand, Gonta has really bad self esteem issues. It’s telling enough that one of Gonta’s common floatlines is literally “Gonta idiot…” When he’s not casually calling himself dumb he’s apologizing for it. For this (and honestly, many other parts of Gonta’s character that I’m pointing out here) I really recommend just paying close attention to Gonta on a replay of the game. I could literally sit here for a week finding and listing all the times Gonta calls himself stupid, but it feels pretty self-evident considering how much he does it. Here’s just one example:

(investigation, chapter 1)

It’s the combination of his deep desire to be helpful and protect the people around him, and the repeated deaths of his classmates, that really start to wear on him as the game progresses. I think this mixes with his already present self worth issues to form a pretty nasty complex; Gonta explicitly blames himself for almost every single victim’s death in the game. Let’s walk through the chapters for a moment here:

Ryoma: “Gonta coulda saved him… No, Gonta shoulda saved him…! // When piranhas attack Ryoma… If Gonta had dived into tank… / Then… Gonta coulda help Ryoma. But Gonta got scared. Too scared to do anything. / Sorry! Gonta really sorry!”

In chapter 3, Gonta joins Angie’s student council out of his desire to protect everyone. This is made clear in how, before pulling him in, Angie compliments Gonta and calls him smart. She then says this:

(daily life, chapter 3)

This time, organized as a part of the student council and with Angie’s god on his side, Gonta hopes that he can finally be useful and successfully protect someone.

Angie: “Maybe Angie got attacked while she sleep in her room, and get brought there? / If so… Gonta coulda saved her! If only Gonta saw! / But Gonta was sleeping… Sorry, Angie… Gonta no could save you!”

…To quote my favourite V3 lets play (shortonegaming) on this moment: “He made up a version [of Angie’s death] so that he could blame himself.”

Tenko: “T-Tenko…! Gonta so sorry… Gonta no could protect you!” and then a little later “It’s all Gonta’s fault…! Gonta fail to protect friends again!” and AGAIN later “Gonta so ashamed…! Why Gonta no could protect friends!?”

That’s two deaths in a row that Gonta (at least believes) he was right next door to and failed to stop. You can see from how he says this repeatedly, with lots of dialogue from other characters in between, the sheer amount that this is impacting him.

Miu: “But… why this happen…!? Why… Miu killed!? / Gonta not understand… Gonta not understand anything… /…But Gonta frustrated and sad! Gonta no could protect Miu! // Gonta so sorry! Gonta sorry he no could protect Miu!” Even with Miu’s death, to which he’s waking up disoriented and confused, he blames himself for failing to stop it.

(Sidenote: Looking at all these reactions back to back makes Gonta’s disorientation after waking up from the virtual world SO much more visible. I left the beginning out of the quote I took, but when you first talk to him during ch4’s investigation, he doesn’t say anything for a few moments. This is very unlike his immediate, intense reactions in the earlier chapters. When he does start speaking it feels kind of disjointed, uncharacteristically calm, and confused before he starts riling himself up blaming himself for Miu’s death. I never really noticed it before looking into this. It’s kind of disturbing)

The only reason I personally think he doesn’t react this way about Rantaro immediately is due to being in shock that someone died to begin with. That doesn’t stop him from saying this not long after:

(investigation, chapter 1)

This complex- made of the desire to protect everyone, self loathing, and feelings of uselessness at being unable to help investigating due to being “stupid” and failing to protect anyone physically, the only thing he thinks he’s good at, every. single. time- only gets worse with each chapter. And in Chapter 4, Gonta finally reaches his breaking point.

At the beginning of Chapter 4, you can talk to Gonta as Shuichi is leaving to meet up with Kaito and Maki to train. He tries to stop Shuichi, worried about a murder potentially taking place at night (again), but Shuichi reassures him that he’ll stick by his friends and that he can’t break his promise to meet up with them. Gonta responds like this:

(daily life, chapter 4)

Which leads to him saying he’s made up his mind, and has a plan. Which is, of course, to try and take down Monokuma physically, even if it costs him his life. He initially drops the suggestion after Miu starts talking about the virtual world, but the day after, it’s still bothering him.

(daily life, chapter 4)

Almost every free time event you have with Gonta this chapter (except for like, one, where he talks about the “tiny bugs” he can barely see), Gonta is trying to think of ways to help.

(free time, chapter 4) His last possible free time event before Miu takes everyone into the virtual world has this dialogue, which is just so sad to me.

(free time, chapter 4)

“Helping everyone” and not being “useless” are almost the only two things Gonta talks about this chapter. It’s this mindset and motivation that made Gonta an easy target for Kokichi to take advantage of. He’s in a bad place mentally, and nothing he does seems to help anybody. Not to mention, with the student council gone, he’s suddenly just kind of… alone. There’s no one there (other than potentially Shuichi, during free time) to keep him steady.

And yeah, I am definitely not including Kokichi here. A strong reason I don’t think Gonta chose to go along with Kokichi out of friendship was because of this interaction early Chapter 4:

(daily life, chapter 4)

Gonta’s trust in Kokichi was broken because of the events of the insect meet and greet. The insect meet and greet’s implications for Kokichi and Gonta’s relationship are a bit strange, but since it’s not super relevant to chapter 4, I’m not gonna get into it. The point is, regardless of the nature of their relationship in chapter 2, it’s clear that Gonta doesn’t consider Kokichi a very trustworthy person in chapter 4. It’s likely that he doesn’t consider him a close friend either. I hesitate to say that Gonta didn’t consider him a friend at all, because he’s Gonta and he wants to have faith in everyone, but at the very least he was trying to be wary around him.

This explicit distrust in Kokichi might make it seem strange that Gonta went along with Kokichi at all in the virtual world. But in reality, Kokichi was very aware of Gonta’s distrust in him, and used it to his advantage in setting up his plot.

(daily life, chapter 4) (I skipped some dialogue in this exchange, but it hits the main points)

Kaito inadvertently eggs Gonta on here, but Kokichi literally drops the idea at Gonta’s feet. Gonta isn’t going with Kokichi to help him look, he’s going to make sure he doesn’t get into any trouble. And as Kokichi said, he knew Gonta would offer to do something like this if given the chance.

Kokichi uses Gonta’s distrust in him again when they encounter the flashback light holding the secret of the outside world together. Gonta’s immediate instinct was to go find everyone else, but Kokichi yells for him to wait, and then this happens:

(post trial, chapter 4)

He KNOWS Gonta doesn’t trust him, and with that distrust, he can make him doubt anything he says. I’ve already talked about how Gonta is ready to give up his life for everyone else, especially this chapter, so suggesting that he check if the light is a trap set up by Kokichi is guaranteed to make Gonta pause.

But it doesn’t stop there. Kokichi pushes harder:

(post trial, chapter 4)

Gonta thinks for a moment, but this is what made him choose to come back and look at the flashback light himself. Here, Kokichi uses the thing that has been haunting Gonta more than anything else all killing game, especially this chapter. He knows Gonta has tried and failed to protect people, he knows how upset it makes him. What better way would there be to convince him to do whatever he wants than to offer a way for him to finally be “useful” to everyone after failing them again and again?

Anything after this point and before Miu’s body discovery is purely headcanon, so I won’t get into my thoughts on that. But I think this moment shows that Gonta was under a lot more control that people often think. I don’t mean to say that Kokichi is entirely blameless, or that Gonta wasn’t manipulated at all. But AlterEgo!Gonta says himself, “No, [we] not tricked,” because he wasn’t. He made the choice to see the secret of the outside world on his own, and made every choice after that to continue with their plan. There was no trickery involved. It was Kokichi’s carefully chosen words that dug right into his insecurities, doubts, and hopes that directly influenced him into making the choice that he did.

You also have to keep in mind how absolutely unstable Gonta must’ve been at this point. He was already nearing a breaking point with his feelings of powerlessness before going into the virtual world, but then he got hit with the secret of the outside world. AlterEgo!Gonta openly admits that it made him feel suicidal. (“Cuz, when Gonta remember the secret of the outside world, Gonta think… /…it would be easier… to die.”) With the outside world and the killing game both inescapable hells, Gonta just couldn’t imagine any way out. And then Kokichi suggests the mercy kill plan. In his state of mind, Gonta truly believed that this could be the way to finally “save” everyone.

Of course, Kokichi had only just recently seen the secret of the outside world too. Even though he must have known it wasn’t true, he had no idea the extent to which it was a lie versus the truth. He probably wasn’t in a very good mental state either. But still, just like he would do again in chapter 5 to everyone else, Kokichi used the despair caused by the secret of the outside world to get Gonta to go along with his plan.

This is what I believe was the driving force behind Gonta’s half of the Kokichi and Gonta dynamic in chapter 4. Gonta’s self loathing, which was present before the killing game began, compounded with his desire to be useful and protect everyone else from the threats of the killing game. As more people died, Gonta became more and more desperate to do literally anything to help everyone else. Kokichi used these things about Gonta to push him to do what he wanted him to.

…To close off, there’s this moment right before Gonta and Kokichi leave to kill Miu that’s really stuck with me.

(daily life, chapter 4) (Read left to right, top to bottom)

It’s not common for the other characters to defend Gonta’s intelligence. But Kaito, unknowingly, says just the right thing to Gonta at just the wrong time. Knowing that Gonta was about to set things in motion to mercy kill everyone for this exact reason… I wonder if Kaito remembered this moment. Maybe it was just another reason he got so defensive over him during trial 4. I just wish he had said something like this to him sooner.

If you got all the way here and read all this… first of all. THANK YOU! Oh my god. I’ve been working on this essay for several days now between studying for my finals. It feels really great to have it all written out after literal years of loving V3 and loving this chapter. Please, please, please let me know your thoughts! Even if you disagree with me! Chapter 4 is so special to me and I love talking about it!! o/

(Screenshots taken on youtube from justonegamr, Bittersweet Gamers, ShortOneGaming, ProZD Plays Games, and my own copy of v3 on IOS. Thank you @/ishimaruhourglass for helping me find some of these!)

[franki-lew-yo]

An 'A-ha!' fandom moment, ft. The Owl House

These comments I screencapped from a user I watch elsewhere really hit like a brick in the face to me. I'm blotting out OP's name, mostly cuz this was just a shower thought they had rather than any meaningful open discussion with people, but it ended up making me realize something (also NO they're not some contrarian AntiSJW type or even hate TOH; they're a very gay+trans writer themselves. Sorry if youknowwhoyouare sees this and recognizes ur posts but you don't allow reblogs or comments and I wanted to present it on my own):

The Owl House was always hampered by being killed halfway through, writing wise and that will always be it's greatest 'sin'. However, OP's comment made me realize how much the show kind of tells you it's characters are flawed rather than actually give them arcs to suggest it, especially in season 1. When I say flawed I don't mean lacking quirks that are relatable but human: Eda is a recluse criminal; King thought he could kill people and acted like it; Luz is a genki girl; Amity starts off as a bully; Hunter...is unfortunately Hunter, ect. Those ARE flaws, character wise, but in the presence of the complete story (as complete as the show will ever be) they really aren't actually flawed, bad people in anyway.

Before I go further, two things: 1, IN ALL FAIRNESS, this is why myself and others particularly LOVE the characters and why TOH was a comfort show for me rather than a 'high-tension narrative'. The characters are a lot of what you want and hope to be like and I think that's really sweet and enjoyable, especially for horror and especially for kids.

2, NO! I DON'T think any particular bad faith cartoon reviewer opinions about coddling certain characters and punishing others IS WHAT DANA and co did at all here! Steven Universe and certain crap-reviewer's takes ON Steven Universe and how it's characters were flawed but overly forgiven by the fandom the show itself are NOT the b-all end-all of this discussion, nor are they the reason The Owl House is the way it is!

The context op was talking about was how in the upcoming hate crime The Last Airbender live-action show the showrunners are going to tone down Sokka's sexism because they think it's 'unlikable'. Even though, we all knew as children that this was an arc for him and it was WRONG, so axing it because we the audience lack nuance to recognize characters we love doing problamtic-sisms is BEYOND annoying.

Op's point is how The Owl House in particular doesn't actually expect much or want much out of it's characters. Or audience. For any infighting early on about how much Amity should 'die' because of reasons, that's really just fandom infighting when you get right down to it. There's nothing on par with the disagreement people have over, say, the Diamonds from Steven Universe and how Steven 'totally forgave them or 'should have murdered them in cold blood' about The Owl House. And like...from a fandom point of view that's good, but otherwise the show is pretty concrete the way you're supposed to see certain characters vs other shows which allow you to make up your own mind.

Avatar, Star vs the Forces of Evil (pre finale), Centaurworld and Amphibia all showcase your protagonists being genuinely, intensely flawed. Sure, maybe some neckbreather crap-pseudocritic complains that they 'made the unlikable' or whatever (i.e. me with Friendship is Magic) but overall the actual point is HOW the characters actually have grown and have ended up with the ending and morality they need. The villains, no not Zukos or 'redeemed' villains who joined the protagonist squad, VILLAIN-villains, will always be at least one serious step behind the protagonists and that's what give the protagonists the cautionary wherewithal to end them like they should and not 'be like them'. It's such a fufilling narrative, there's a reason people like it so much because it's really good when it's delivered well.

Removed from my fandom gaze; the Owl House feels like it's saying it has that ultimate messaging and character arc when it actually doesn't. Your protagonists have the endearing aspirational-part totally covered, but as far as the actual 'edge' and nuance? Well...

Eda is, at most, naughty. She really isn't any kind of morally sidetracked character. She's an outlaw because literally her society is awful to her and she's in the right to be against it. She's cursed but she's not addicted to her potions or hiding it or not really taking care of herself or her loved ones because of it. Her actual biggest flaw is that she's been 'running away' from problems rather than dealing with them, but I'd be lying if that wasn't suggested more than it's actually portrayed; or at least, dealt with fast enough in "Eda's Requiem". A bigger issue I see, even if it's what's also endearing about her, is that she REALLY isn't a flawed caregiver at all. It's portrayed as her most redeeming feature that she's otherwise a good mom and mentor, but Eda having virtually no problems in raising Luz and King just, again, makes her feel ONLY aspirational. All of the angst about 'failing' to parent and making up for it is moved all onto Camilla and sadly all of that angst for her is mostly within an already bloated episode. Eda, while an absolute mood, lacks any real kind of edge. Does she need it or not? I don't know. Discuss, kids.

Luz, like OP says, is treated like this high-energy super-optimist. She's like Star Butterfly in that her fangirlism and impulsivness are supposed to get her in trouble. But, she absolutely just isn't one when you break it down. Besides episode 2, Luz really is never that inconsiderate or lost in her fantasies ever again throughout the show. She never has anything like what Steven goes through where he hops into Larz' body and makes things worse for people by trying to fix things- which is not only good filler but it calls forward to the ultimate ending of Steven's arc for the series - Luz is just sort of adorable. Luz has blindsided by hype moments of weakness, like when she accidentally hurts Owlbert or messes with Amity's secret room, but still always level headed and down-to-earth. Her impulses are always kind of treated like...excusable? Because, again, they usually are. This is a large part about what makes her self-hatred at the end of the show about accidentally helping Belos' feel 'forced'. Even MOREso than what Hunter and Daddy Titan explain about Belos using her, we the audience never see Luz's choice to go back in time and try and get answers from Philip as being anything other than just, you know, logical. Because it is. The show acts like what Luz did was reckless and bad and that she was SOOO overtaken by her fangirlism about Philip and now just how much she has to live with the guilt and regret of helping being duped by him...it just doesn't come off that way at all. She was only so much excited about meeting him and her interest was getting home to her mother. In terms of comparing her to Philip, that's all fine and good, but again it's not 'flawed'. Not really, anyway.

Lilith absolutely has it the worst...but I kinda think people know that. She arguably does have the most morally-gray turning point in the show given what she did to her own sister. But neither the characters nor her nor the show really hold her accountable in any lasting way for cursing Eda. Lilith is the closest we get to that 'Diamond'-dilemma. She does 'make things right way too quickly and it's obvious to even her biggest fans that her character is really rushed in this area. They lampshade what Lilith did and that she was their villain in season 2 and 2B, but lampshading isn't the same thing as progress. As a result, as a Lilith fan you kind of never really forgive her for what she did. None of that's her fault, cause' you know...she doesn't exist, but it makes it frustrating that you the fan watching the show is doing the heavy-lifting in your mind in this area.What you come away from is this feeling of loving the characters for being able to work everything out. They're engaging and nuanced in theory, but you also feel robbed, w or w/o the Disney interference, of them being fully rounded or WHOLE. It kinda feels like 'and suddenly, he wasn't racist, anymore' all the time with every character ever with except Amity's mom, the Titan Trappers and Belos.

The reason everyone dunks on Star vs the Forces of Evil's finale, (besides being salty over ship wars and declaring THAT'S the reason for the drop in quality) is that 'Cleaved' could have not only worked but REALLY worked. It just needed to be better written and processed as an ending. Instead people reviled Star, the protagonist we're supposed to be rooting for, for what feels like impulsive apathy and cruelty towards everyone else by destroying magic, as opposed to it being an actually selfless sacrifice that makes her different than Toffee. Ultimatley, I do prefer The Owl House, unfinished as it is, to any of that. But yeah... I can now never unsee the characters as being what they are: fun but indulgent when they're supposedly complex. Indulgent is never bad u guys, but the problem is when you only have that to go on while insisting you have fully developed characters, there's a lot of the show telling you how to feel and how to come away from it rather than letting you, the audience, make of that yourself. As annoying as fan-wars can be over this stuff and when people are either WAAAY to forgiving of their villain blorbo or form hate-campaigns over Glub Shitto for ruining their life, it is ultimately a good thing that shows give you that chance to really see the characters that way at all.

The Owl House is, as OP calls it, "tumblr feels" not for being gay and magical and fun and wholesome and indulgent like that stuff is GREAT. It feels 'tumblr oriented' in that it all kind of feels too easy even when it's not for your protagonists. It's never actually "challenging". I guess, in as far as 'good' indulgence is concerned, it's as warm and fuzzy and a happy AU fanfic you found but not so much the Pacifist Ending of Undertale where you really do feel bad if you rectify the good ending in anyway. It's fun and it's comfort food, but not entirely lasting as you want it to be???

Amphibia, I think, was also way better than Owl House in this respect. It wasn't perfect cause nothing is but you really got a feeling for HOW flawed Marcy, Sasha, the townsfolk and even Hop Pop throughout their arcs-- which made it so SO rewarding to see them get their happy endings and come together to defeat the core and be the better people they needed to become.

The Owl House is my favorite where I think Amphibia is the better of the two.

[alicefromwhichplanet]

I’m going to voice my opinions on G1 Elita One here for a reader asked me this on ao3 at my fic Heroic Nonsense. I want to keep a record here as well for my future references and maybe find someone with similar ideas. So I still decided to use tags for content classification. Anyone who might feel irritated about me deconstructing this character may leave. But if you resonate with me or are interested in my analysis feel free to discuss.

I guess my view on G1 Elita One is basically negative, both in terms of her characterization and her representation of women.

If we genuinely talk about characterization, I think G1 Elita One is a very one-dimensional and uninteresting character. Because: 1) She doesn’t have a consistent personality or motivation of doing things. Of course you can say that her motivation is to save her boyfriend and lead the “femme bots”, but these don’t look natural, with the lack of a background story. She looks like a puppet squeezed into the show to be the protagonist’s girlfriend.

2) Also about her role. I feel that Hasbro made Elita One a shadow of Optimus Prime, giving her exactly the same position and constantly stressing her importance, when actually she contributes zero to the overall plot development. The “femme bot squad” in the show is an awkward duplicate of the male team, with every femme bot assigned to the male bot at the same position as their girlfriend/love interest(Elita One—Optimus Prime-leader, Chromia— Ironhide-second in command). I do not know the reason why “femme bots” in the play need to fight alone, and I do not know why Elita One is the leader except the fact that she is Optimus’s girlfriend. So what is the play implying by making such a character? Honestly I think this is even worse than having no female characters in the play.

3)Her plot is totally predictable. It’s a classic Hollywood hero-saves-damsel in distress story. From the moment when Alpha Trion asked her to go on a mission on her own (for what? Why? Till today I still think Alpha Trion is doing this simply because he is an avatar of the playwright) I know she will be caught and rescued by Optimus Prime. Such stories are easily guessed and easily forgotten.

If we talk about gender representation, I have to say Elita One hardly represents any pioneering thoughts of feminism or gender equality. To begin with, I want to clarify that feminism/gender equality aims to question and overthrow patriarchy system, which includes breaking the gender stereotypes and challenging fixed gender roles, heteronormative relationships included. Unfortunately Elita One just repeated/ reinforced the stereotypes/ the fixed model of heterosexuality. She is in bright pink, an assigned color to represent females. She is abruptly introduced as Optimus’s girlfriend, without any background information (how they fell in love, why Optimus chose to have a relationship with her in particular, without the biological need to reproduce, what kind of person she is before she met Optimus). It feels like the playwright cannot bear an action hero not being able to “win over” some pretty chicks. She is made/resurrected by Optimus’s parts, which is just like Adam and Eve and confirms her position as “the second sex”. All of her plots are rigid and boring and she lives like a duplicate, or a moon revolving around Optimus. What’s worse, in her very short debut she is still portrayed as “sweet, understanding, and loves her boyfriend so much that she becomes irrational when he is in danger”, the most typical stereotype of a hero’s wife under male gaze.

Judged from my analysis, I think she is basically a functional character. This means she is created to fulfill a purpose in another character’s characterization, rather than existing on her own. In particular, the purpose of her creation is to add a girlfriend to Optimus Prime, so that he fulfills some people’s fantasy of a “normal” male action hero. With this function as the very beginning of her characterization, the playwright will not be able to make her a round character, or give her any believable motivations. Nor does the playwright actually care.

Now that I think about it, this kind of character may work for some people, because they genuinely believe it is necessary for heroes to be paired up with an opposite sex, or like to imagine themselves as “the lucky chosen girl” through this character (this might be harsh). But I just want to say, it doesn’t work for me. In years of reading and using feminist criticism, it has become harder and harder for me not to be picky about characters, or not to be sensitive about gender issues in any show. Repulsion is not the only way I feel about her. She is my least favorite character.