#difficult lovers

[weaversweek]

"Vampire" and "No degree of separation"

Another pair into the #FearOfMu21c project, crowdsourcing the greatest singles of the 21st century. Here’s an index post.

Vampire - Olivia Rodrigo

The greatest singer-songwriter we've found so far this decade, Olivia Rodrigo rose to fame through the Disney Channel. Remember the Disney Channel? It was very decent - well-written sitcoms, acted by great talent. "Bizaardvark" gave Olivia a break, "High School Musical The Series" gave fame.

"Driver's license" was a stone-cold heartbreak song for the dark days of early 2021. "Good 4 u" was full of outdoors excitement, and the album "Sour" held together well. What's Olivia going to do for the second album, "Guts"? Take "Driver's license" and make it nastier.

"Vampire" follows the same aural template as "Driver's license" - it's a melancholic piano ballad, sung in a musical theatre style so we have to hear the words. But rather than stalk him, Olivia takes control of her life, mercilessly disassembling his older ex's manipulative behaviour. Olivia's anger and exhaustion rises through the song, reaching a crescendo of fury as she spits out the title line.

Sounds like nothing else around right now, and all the better for it. Written by Olivia and producer Dan Nigro, it's song of the year, quite clearly.

No degree of separation - Francesca Michielin

Honouring the intention of sponsor Arron, I've limited myself to five songs from Eurovision Song Contests; two very easy picks from Junior, three from Senior. And with two SESC coming through from last year's Uncool50, there's just one place for another song. "Hard rock hallelujah", "Taken by a stranger", "Molitva", "Rhythm inside", "Arcade" - all were inflection points in the journey of European pop, all were worthy of a nod.

But the place goes to "No degree of separation", written by Fabio Gargiulo, Cheope, Norma Jean Martine, Federica Abbate, and Francesca Michielin. The song finished second in San Remo 2016, and with the winner deciding not to perform in Eurovision, the spot was given to the runner-up.

This is a slow-burn love song, Francesca sings of a deep emotional connection that has crept up on her. "È la prima volta che mi capita / Prima mi chiudevo in una scatola (It's the first time it’s happened to me / Before I just used to shut myself in). The second chorus dips into English, to convey the message even more clearly.

The best thing about "Nessun grado di separazione" is Francesca's voice! A beautiful tone, conveys everything she wants to say almost before she's enunciated the lyric.

It's a beautiful song, perhaps too beautiful for the big loud Eurovision Song Contest (see also: "Perta", "Amnesia", "This is my life"). Following this number 1 single in Italy, Francesca's continued to record albums, and returned to X Factor Italia to work with 2020 winner Måneskin.

[kasdim]

Working late...

[dialovers-lover-xoxo]

[mokkacci]

First time drawing Reiji! ( • ̀ω•́ )✧

Im not sure if i should paint it or not, but i hope u like it ˗ˏˋ ♡ ˎˊ˗

[awkward-jester]

That one scrapped ROTTMNT episode where Mikey’s the big brother but in the bad timeline

[redstarfish-art]

Me: I wonder why SonTails is not more popular. Shadow: *exists* Me: Oh that's why.

[casnonotbcofspn]

[sw33tl1es]

Based on bistro Huddy (which is a bunch of shorts on YouTube by this guy that plays all the characters, it's so funny and his voice range of is actually insane)

Non-despair AU, after graduating hope's peak; Kaito is studying astrophysics (because the astronaut thing didn't work out I guess) and needs to maintain himself so he starts working as a server in a restaurant

Once Kokichi finds out, he absolutely won't leave Kaito alone, he eats there at least twice a week and everytime he does he acts like the worst type of customer to get Kaito to yell at him

Things like saying the order is wrong, asking too many times for refills, asking for a manager when Kaito raises his voice then taking it back last minute or even faking an allergy he knows Kaito knows he doesn't have

Thing is, Kokichi always asks for Kaito and Kaito has never once refused him service not matter how much of a little shit he is, always smiling fondly whenever Kokichi enters the restaurant.

[fauville]

inspired by some posts i've seen floating around: who would your detective romance if they couldn't romance their current love interest? 👀

[yardikins]

Hi Skyblr is this anything

[bonefall]

What did Sagewhisker do? All I remember was that she was Yellowfang's mentor, and I used to love YS. (I was a lot younger at the time, though.)

oH Lord, a lot of people who read YS when they were younger kinda don't pick up on how shitty Sagewhisker is. It goes over their heads that she is the one who's actually responsible for Yellowfang being forced to be distant from Brokenkit

From a young age, Sagewhisker is pressuring Yellowpaw to be a medcat, when she doesn't want to

Yellow LIKES the satisfaction of healing itself, but LOVES being a warrior more.

She's a fantastic hunter, has always wanted a family, and is just genuinely filled with a lot of self-satisfaction when she gets to do her warrior duties.

(They also had to retcon the stupidest magic power, super-empathy, into Yellowfang so that she nonsensically wouldn't like fighting. Yellowfang. The cat whose first appearance in TPB is attacking Firepaw and didn't hesitate to blind Brokenstar. THAT Yellowfang.)

In contrast, when she starts healing, she's constantly filled with shame or horror. She also gets bullied viciously by several cats, while others do that Thing that an older family member does when they don't like what you're doing. You know;

"Ohhh that's so good, for you. If it makes you happy it's good!! I mean, but, wouldn't you rather do Other Thing? I mean no, I understand, you like This thing, but Other thing would... no no it's okay, nevermind. I'm happy for you."

This while she's already courting Raggedpelt, and planning a future with him.

So to begin with, she has a lot of negative feelings when Sagewhisker tries to pressure her into this role, especially as Sage insists she "Wants HER" and "It's your destiny." But that's not all;

When Cloudpaw (later Cloudpelt) gets viciously mauled and might not survive, Sagewhisker takes one look and says, "It might be kinder to let StarClan take him now."

Yellowfang is FURIOUS at how quickly Sagewhisker gave up, and Sage just waves this away with "oh I won't stop you but be prepared for heartbreak lol"

Sage continues to tell her shit like "You can't save every cat" after Cloudpaw's mother sees her son all cheese-grated up.

So... either Sagewhisker was going to just leave Cloudpaw there to bleed out or die of infection, OR she was implying euthanasia.

And it's probably euthanasia, because when Yellowfang is pregnant later, she says,

Sooooo... considering how WEIRD WC generally is about abortion, acting like it's not even an option and giving Clear Sky some Angel Fetus Children in DOTC...

Sagewhisker was probably implying that Yellowfang would smother infants. Or do whatever Sagewhisker was planning to do with Cloudpaw.

I don't even know if pressuring Yellowfang into an abortion would have been better... honestly this exchange is uncomfortable no matter how you slice it.

It gets worse ofc. Yellowfang gets this warning from StarClan about how “Only one thing can stop the tide of hatred this birth cursed cat will bring: the courage of a mother to know her destiny.” Silverflame also suggests just being his friend, if she can't be his mother.

Forget that though, because Sagewhisker continues to snap at Yellowfang and remind her that she can't look at him for too long, else people will get suspicious or something.

"It's a woman's responsibility to have children for our glorious war society, Yellowfang, unless they have A RARE GIFT THAT MUST NOT BE WASTED."

In the same conversation she's then like, "Also don't go into the nursery, the child I forced you to give up needs a chance to bond with the abusive foster who hates his little guts."

In general Sagewhisker also prevents Yellowfang from standing up for herself or her position in a way that is absolutely infuriating. Foxheart comes in and starts bellowing about "HOW DARE YOU HAVE APPRENTICES RUN ERRANDS FOR YOU?" and Sage is just like, "Turn the other cheek uwu"

Yellowfang is punished constantly for the sin of being Yellowfang. She is not allowed to be snarky at all. It fucking sucks. This book is MISERABLE

SO basically, Sagewhisker forces her into a role she isn't very happy in, stops her from standing up for herself ever, guilts Yellowfang over "wasting her special gift," gives up on cases that are too hard for her, suggests killing kits, says some wildly misogynistic stuff, prevents Yellowfang from doing anything about Brokenkit, and then dies.

She's the worst and no one ever talks about how fucked up this character is. and I really mean AS A CHARACTER

Because her PURPOSE in the story is to do all of these things and be hailed as a good mentor in the end. But the fandom is REALLY bad at analyzing characters as narrative tools.

She's right to pressure Yellowfang into her role, with the ending comic even trying to have Sagewhisker apologize for pressuring her and Yellow going "d'aww dwai you didn't force me into anything 8) ignore the entire fucking book before this point"

Giving up on a battered teenager is supposed to show Yellowfang's talent and resolve, not reflect poorly on Sagewhisker.

WC fully believes that "wisdom" she espouses about Lizardfang. Lizardfang is a bad woman because she doesn't accept her place as a queen. This kind of guilt and blame is reserved exclusively for mothers in WC, not fathers, note how Mudclaw doesn't help at all but no one gives a shit.

Killing the baby would have been the best option because, again, Brokenkit is BORN. EVIL.

I'm pretty convinced that "Courage of a mother to KNOW HER DESTINY" refers to the fact she is supposed to be a medcat, who kills her child. What FINALLY ends Brokenstar's reign of terror is being poisoned-- not the kindness she was finally able to show him in TPB while he was prisoner.

So Sagewhisker guilt-tripping Yellowfang into a position she doesn't like, keeping her away from her child, suggesting murdering the baby... that's all good, actually. That's something that is framed as correct.

And I think people really sleep on it. Sagewhisker is like this perfect little encapsulation of how shitty clan culture is in WC, an enforcer of the series' misogyny while being a woman herself, someone who makes Yellowfang's wife HELL.

But because she didn't do it violently, no one notices it.

[icewindandboringhorror]

What would you choose? :0c

(note: original image is from HERE (link) - but I edited it to add a wider variety of options.. also added $3 extra to the total, even though I know that makes it more uneven lol, I thought if you're adding 10 whole extra items, the money to spend should at least be increased slightly, if that makes sense..)

[karleksmumskladdkaka]

RukiYui (+Mukami fam) scans from the Vandead Carnival Official Fanbook (*´ω｀)♡

Spoilers for Ruki's route below!

[feroluce]

how do u imagine natasha + sampo’s relationship?

I. Feel a little bad for leaving this in my inbox as long as I did, especially since I said in this post I could write a whole essay on them. But then when I tried to actually answer this, I realized ah shit, I can't really articulate what I think of them at all OTL

(so have a bajillion words of meta analysis of them instead fklajklasjf)

Just! Sampo is very mysterious figure, and we know so little of his background and his motivations! So it's really difficult to get a solid read on some of his relationships with other characters. Regardless, I do think that Natasha is perhaps the one he's closest with, and that she is the one person who knows him the most intimately in all of Belobog.

And a lot of it IS hard to pin down because of Sampo's slippery nature, but also because it's like. If you look at just Natasha's dialogues about Sampo, it doesn't really look like much. It only becomes more meaningful when compared to how everyone else talks about him.

Most other characters just comment on what Sampo does, as in his observable actions that are easy to see on the surface or from a distance.

Natasha is one of the very, very few that actually speaks to Sampo's personality or philosophy. Like she not only is able to describe a certain behavior of his, but she's able to explain the why behind it.

At least part of this is probably that they spend so much time together- Hook even comments on it during her companion quest.

And tbh I don't really think it needs more proof or anything with such a flat out statement like that, but this is actually further supported by the fact that Seele is the only other character in Belobog to sorta-kinda comment on Sampo's personality; if Sampo were hanging around the clinic with Natasha all day, Seele would probably be the person he would see second-most there. Of the dialogues posted further up in this post, Hook obviously sees him all the time, but it's not always in the clinic, and besides she's still very young...she wouldn't have the same read on him an adult would. Luka avoids the clinic whenever he can because he's worried about taking up Natasha's valuable time. And the Landau siblings aren't even present in Boulder Town until after the Stellaron is quieted.

Seele, on the other hand, is extremely loyal and devoted to Natasha, and seems to worry about her a lot. She doesn't have the same reservations as Luka, and it would feel right to see her in the clinic frequently, taking orders and missions and trying to make sure Natasha doesn't run herself in the ground. So it would make sense for her to see a lot of Sampo if he's always in there, too, enough that she would have things to say about his personality, whether she likes that or not haha.

Of course we know from Sampo's lines that it's not that he's sick, he's just reporting back to Natasha. Sampo not only smuggles in supplies across the border like what most people know him for, he's also Natasha's source of intel.

Bringing back intel doesn't necessarily have to involve a lot of conversation though, especially because it would make more sense for Sampo to be turning in written reports. It decreases the chance of Natasha mishearing/misunderstanding something or having to rely on memory alone, neither of which are really things you probably want to be doing when bad intel can mean the difference between life and death in her circumstances. So I do really wonder what it is Sampo does in the clinic all day haha. Given that he's a big believer in the power of small talk bringing in big clients, it's entirely possible Sampo is just in there being chatty, happily making conversation and keeping Natasha company most of the time...which is kinda cute. He also really could just be talking shop, too, of course- Sampo does a lot of work for Natasha, and I don't think it'd be a stretch to assume she's his main client. There's probably a lot to discuss about supply quotas, incoming intel, scheduled drops, etc.

My favorite option, though, is actually based on one of Sampo's options from the main quest, where he says:

Because like! The way he says this, the way he specifies that this is his opinion, but no one seems to care what he thinks? And how he calls them stubborn in particular? It really sounds like Sampo has been trying to get Wildfire to operate in a different direction. And if you look up the exact definition of "artless," you get this

which very much fits Sampo, and how he does things. He has guile and deception down to an art form. Sampo goes on to call Wildfire "do-gooders," but then cautions the trailblazer not to underestimate them because of that- indicating that Sampo sees that type of philosophy as something naive, or at least just ineffective. Something that you would underestimate a person for.

And the person Sampo associates with the most in Wildfire, the one he's always seen with, the one who would hold the most sway to change the modus operandi of the organization is...Natasha.

So I wonder if Sampo has been trying, possibly for years now, to get Natasha to see what he thinks of as reason, and start playing dirty to survive. I wonder if that's what he spends so much time in the clinic for, is because he does care, and he wants her and the rest of them to live, and he has been trying to convince her to go with his way of doing things, but Natasha has been refusing him, refusing to compromise her morals.

Because we know from some readables and from the general Vibe, both up on the surface and down below, that things were getting pretty dire. Rivet Town has fallen. The Silvermane Guards are being whittled down and broken. The Fragmentum was right on everyone's doorstep, and I'm sure that if the Astral Express hadn't arrived- and that if Sampo hadn't set the stage so perfectly, if he hadn't played his part just so- then all of Belobog would have eventually been snuffed out. Sampo had to have known it was happening. He must have known the end was upon them.

He doesn't even have a stake in Belobog- he's not from here. He could, assumingly, call it quits and leave when shit got tough by whatever means got him there in the first place.

And I'm sure Sampo wants to save all of Belobog, but I think he's particularly endeared by Natasha. He famously phrases his view of Elation as "true happiness always entails the manifestation of the dignity of mankind." And like. Who else embodies that so much as her?

Maybe it is a little vague and up to interpretation, but I feel like Natasha is FULL of that kind of dignity. She has been doing this since before the blockade. She willingly chose to stay in the Underground where she could do the most good. She has seen so, so much death and you can see how it weighs on her; she's become bitter, and wary, and weary. She has it out for the Guards (understandable), and she openly taunts Gepard and goes right for his throat when he shows up in Boulder Town, ten years too late, trying to help with the Fragmentum.

Natasha even seems to have given up any belief she may have once had. She's completely lost faith in Qlipoth.

All of this, and yet she still chooses to be kind. She still chooses to help people. There is something immensely admirable in all of that.

And I feel like you can see how much Sampo admires her in just how often he thinks of her, especially when someone needs help. Sampo smokebombs everyone and needs to get them somewhere safe in the Underground? He takes them to Natasha. Svarog is about to fucking kill everyone? Go get Natasha. He finds the trailblazer passed out in an alleyway? He carries them to Natasha. The trailblazer is seeing weird shit out in the Fragmentum? Recommend they go get a check up. Specifically from Natasha.

It's a little silly, but I think you can also see some of this when Sampo is being melodramatic about being caught red-handed in the museum event. He echoes a very important sentiment to Natasha and Wildfire;

And the mission where this ideology was displayed strongest was titled, "To Rot or To Burn."

(Hell, in the dream sequence of Penacony- regardless of whether that dream bubble came from Sampo or Sparkle, it had to be informed by Sampo's tales of Belobog. Sparkle has never been there herself. And the kind trashcan that immediately helps you and sets you on the right path, that tries to rally everyone together, the only one with a name so clearly and obviously taken from someone Sampo knew in Belobog? Is Shatana- an anagram of Natasha. Even from a meta perspective, they have the same VA. No other trashcan there gets that treatment. None.)

I think they have the same goals, and even hold some of the same views. Natasha's are much more obvious, but still. Sampo says this about Belobog's circumstances:

And he says this as though it should be obvious common sense. That when things are rough, you share and make sure everyone has enough. I think they both share this belief, it's just that they disagree on how to go about making things even. Natasha believes in rallying people for the cause and giving as much of herself as she can to make up for whatever people lack. Sampo believes that if some dipshit with more money than what they need falls for his bullshit and he gets to spread it around? Well hey, that sounds like a whole lot of their own fault.

Natasha is definitely aware of this, and she has no problem threatening Sampo whenever she thinks he's stepping out of line.

She keeps him on a very short leash, which like. Yeah no that's valid fjkdlsajfdklj

Even so, the way she talks about him, like... Maybe it's just me, and my rose-colored glasses, but she doesn't seem to dislike him nearly as much as she could? She kind of just. Says these things as statements about him, without any real vitriol behind them. This is just kind of how he is. She even seems to have a sense of humor about it.

And again! She has so much more to say about him than almost any other character.

I'd like to think part of her...affection? of sorts? for him is simple camaraderie. Circumstances are dire. Past, present, and future are all bleak. Things like that deepen bonds with your foxhole buddies. Sampo is dependent on Natasha for work and pay and a place to get away from the Guards. Natasha is dependent on Sampo for food and medicine and life-saving supplies. They both heavily rely on each other in this harsh environment, and they have a really nice back-and-forth that I appreciate with how they help each other out by owing favors as payment.

And the other part, I'd like to think actually IS because she knows him very well- maybe not things like his past, but she knows some of his personality and beliefs, and finds them agreeable enough. She even has the audacity to call him a poor liar at one point- Sampo! Of all people! Known by someone well enough to be caught out as a poor liar! He's either intentionally leading her on and letting her think she's caught him, or Natasha just really is that good. Neither would surprise me tbh

I think Natasha is also just uniquely prepared to understand Sampo, and is able to see his better sides without letting her judgement be clouded by his slimy manner. She's able to appreciate that his actions ARE extremely helpful, regardless of how he does them.

Even as she acknowledges that he isn't always trustworthy, she does still choose to rely on him and give him chances. She was pleasantly surprised by him here, but she still chose to trust him with this in the first place. She never treats him harshly, and she never seems to bear any kind of grudge with him.

But my favorite example of Natasha being able to understand Sampo? My favorite is this. This one little throwaway line, that didn't even involve him, wasn't even about him. I feel like Natasha is capable of knowing and understanding Sampo on a deeper level than most people can, solely because of this.

She gets it.

(As a fun bonus: In the current trashcan event, there's a simple mechanic where you get one trial character for the initial battle. Then, for the harder stage, you get that same trial character, plus a couple of extras. This is true for every Proof- except for Sampo's. In his harder stage, you use Asta, Black Swan, and Luocha. But in his initial stage, in an event all about friendship and relationships...)

[bottledclxuds]

and you just know every one of those renters walked in and thought buddie were a married couple who hadn't completely agreed on moving out of the house 🙄🙄🙄

[ruvviks]

he tripped over his own feet and ate shit on the sidewalk don't even worry about it

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