#guess I'm just predictable

[asideblogofananimelover]

Lately, most of my thoughts are revolving around 3 of my favorite anime characters: Levi Ackerman, Trafalgar D. Water Law, and Fushiguro Megumi. Whenever I see Attack on Titan content I simp over Levi, and whenever I see One Piece content I quickly simp over Law, but then I see Jujutsu Kaisen content and quickly simp over Megumi. It’s one or the other, or three of them at the same time. 

I started to think I have a type lately. And when I analyze their similarities, I found out that yes, I MAY have a type which are dark-haired beautiful males with sugar and ice personalities, who fight with bladed weapons, have soft spot for animals, come from important clans, and coincidentally, are the moon halves in my sun/moon ships.

[canisalbus]

Different Italian anon, but the thing with Tuscan C is that it's pronounced like a very strong H sound, which is extra weird cuz the letter H makes no sound in Italian, normally. It sounds the way Spanish pronounce the J. We say it's "aspirato". So then people from there will say things like Hoha Hola (coca cola), and it's funny. It's also extremely contagious, I got family in Florence, you spend 3 days with them you start doing it too before you even realize.

.

[lucy-ghoul]

can't believe a show based on a videogame (usually games adaptations are notoriously bad, which isn't the case here tho) gave me the beauty and the beast/twisted mirrors/enemies to traveling companions/ruthless antihero+optmistic but still badass heroine who takes none of his shit/age gap but make it sexy dynamic of my dreams. as much as i love maximus and i think he deserves the best writing ever because 1. he's a clever deconstruction of the aspiring Knight bro who's actually a bit of a loser and, as much as lucy, sees the world in black&white at first and then doesn't get what he thought he wanted but what he needs (or at least i hope he'll eventually get it), and 2. he's a cutie and i want an epic love story for him too, it's very funny how they tried to give us a puppy kind of romance and the tumblr girlies still fixated on the "toxic ~she bites his finger off and he cuts hers off and sews it on his hand in what we'll pretend it's a symbolic marriage rings exchange or whatever~ asshole who used to be a nice guy/good girl™ with a lot of spunk and hidden anger but unshakeable morals" kind of relationship.

[normiree]

"Do you ever wonder why it rains?"

[front-facing-pokemon]

[brookheimer]

the one thing i feel pretty certain about for this episode is that america will not decide the election. a decision will be made, a president will be elected, but america will not be the deciding factor.

succession can’t mimic 2016 or 2020 point blank, that would be boring and have nothing to say. it can’t try to outdo trump because it’ll go too whacky and fall flat like veep’s last season (sorry conheads, no way he’s winning). but what it CAN do is illustrate the immensely corrupt, often arbitrary, and hugely influential nature of news media and conglomerations on political processes. i think probably jimenez will be in the lead, then atn/waystar does something to, i don’t know, discount votes or cast suspicion on jimenez or call the election for mencken early, and the tide will shift, even though the votes are already in. the votes don’t actually matter. the actual result doesn’t actually matter. that’s the power logan (and as an extension, billionaires and CEOs in general) hold. shiv says it herself to logan in s4e2: “just cause you say it’s true doesn’t make it true. everyone just fucking agrees with you and believes you, so it becomes true and then you can turn around and say like, 'oh, you see? see? i was right.'” but it doesn’t matter that logan’s “a human fucking gaslight,” everything he says comes true anyways. not because he was right, but because that’s how it works. he says things and then they happen, regardless of what the truth is or what should actually come to pass. that’s been one of the key throughlines since the very first episode of the entire show when, in response to kendall calling logan out of touch because times are changing and logan isn't changing with them, logan hisses that everyone always says you’re wrong until you do it and prove you were right: “you make your own reality.” you can't miss the bus if you're the one driving it. the election, the votes, the political process? none of that matters. it was always going to come down to the roys and their ilk (allies or enemies, just the top 1%) — that was the whole point of “what it takes” (the mencken episode) last season, after all.

i’ve seen lots of theories about what america will choose and how the candidates will respond and all that and i just don’t think that’s the show’s focus; i think the whole point is to demonstrate the lack of agency, the illusion of democracy. because, i mean, we’ve already seen the fall of democracy via fascist election and fascist election-denial, both in real life and in the countless (usually mid) satires created afterwards. it would be disappointing to see succession use the election to reiterate that same point of 'ohhh alt-right ahhhhh!!!' i don’t think it’ll be about ‘fascism’ at all — at least, not ‘trump-y’ fascism. it’ll be about fascism in the broader sense, the kind that doesn't sport a KKK hood (even when it keeps one tucked away in the attic). it's the fascism that every single roy (very much including shiv and kendall) aid and abet -- the fascism that so many succession fans don't seem to regard as fascism, despite it quite literally being the definition of fascism. trump wasn’t the entrance of fascism into our political process. he wasn’t the lone sign of the failing of american democracy. democracy in america has long been illusory, trump just made it more blatantly evident with his particular brand of hate-speech-ridden masculinist in-your-face fascism.

so i think that’s what this episode will hopefully focus on — america will not decide. corporations, news media, and the roys will. thus, the president will most likely become president not because the country supports his policies the most, but because he’s likely to agree to help block a business deal for a major media empire, and the other candidate is unlikely to. and this will likely come to pass due to said major media empire's interference and influence: they create their own reality. they say it, and everyone agrees with them and believes them, so it becomes true.

[abbeyofcyn]

I'm squinting so hard at you right now (affectionate)

Your Kraangified Donnie comic is so much fun and my disaster twin brain is spinning with theories. My best guess is that the infection has something to do with the technodrome because connecting to a giant supercomputer and then being ripped from it like a USB stick that you forgot to eject properly CANNOT be good for you. But that's just a theory. A game theory-

Anyway, love your art and your comics!!

Lol that comparison to a USB so true 😂

Yes, it does have to do with the technodrome and being ripped from the console. Now I wonder if anyone can guess what the reason is it took 1,5 years to become a problem.

[dnalt-d2]

SO QSMP PRISON, RIGHT???

Day 1 Edition lmao

To start off with, I'm really happy to hear my little theory about the Prison essentially being the safeguard for the Islanders against the Eye Workers was correct (Or at least seems to be so far)

But now for my thoughts on TODAY

THE FIRST DAY OF THIS FOUR THREE(?) DAY LONG EVENT (More on that later)

First off, who else thinks it's incredibly weird the Watcher was suddenly British?? He was DEFINITELY not British before, and unless this was just some unavoidable thing they had to do for just today, that probably means something

Specifically that this might not actually BE the Watcher. Or at least not the same Watcher. Even aside from the voice difference, the way he talked seemed to be a little different to me. I'm not sure what this could mean Lore-wise, or if it means anything at all, but I just really wanted to bring attention to it in case it was

Secondly, am I the only one who felt like today was just too…Casual? For lack of a better word. This didn't feel like some big thing the way Purgatory did. For better, in my opinion. But it's still strange that this feels so lackadaisical considering the circumstances. All the Islanders, and the Eggs are locked up, with the Federation keeping them under lock and key and being MORE THAN GENEROUS with the use of deadly force

(RIP BBH and IronMouse. RIP Over and over and over and over-)

Idk, the vibes here feel really weird to me, and I'm not sure what to make of that either. Like maybe someone's trying to downplay how serious this is all gonna be in the long run. It's hard to put into words

Though I will say they were very FUN vibes regardless. This was fucking hilarious and I enjoyed just about every second I saw of it. Short as it was (Poor BBH once again, having his time cut short. What will he even do for the other 20 hours of the day if he only gets this much time in the server? Certainly not sleep, I imagine lol)

There's also the mystery of that ghost (Cellbit) that's haunting the place, but again, Idk if this is a lore thing, or Cellbit wanting to get in on the action even though canonically, his character is off being insane on Purgatory. He might be kinda the same way Abueloier is most of the time, you know?? I feel like he's definitely gonna be related to any lore that happens, but at the same time, I'm not too sure I'd be surprised if that wasn't the case either

(Just to point out, I don't think Abueloier is related to the Lore. Roier just wanting to screw around, and frankly, power to him. Even IF Ratoier would've gone hella hard here. Fuckin rat in the prison robbing people at gunpoint would've been HILARIOUS and I really hope to see it before the event is done)

Though this kinda brings me back to my second point, that I'm actually having a hard time telling if stuff that's happening is Lore, or just players/admins screwing around or changing things for the sake of content or otherwise

Usually, I'm pretty good at discerning what is and isn't incidental, but here, I've said at least a few times now that idk what is and isn't lore. And I think that's kinda what's contributing to this whole thing feeling off to me. (Not in a bad way, I wanna reiterate. I'm having a hell of a lot of fun here)

So yeah, to wrap up my thoughts on this, Prison is fun so far, and I can't wait for the insanity to continue tomorrow

(And note: I do have one additional thing to say about this event as well, but I wanna put that in a separate post so I can make sure I've got all my thoughts together)

Now back to our own Purgatory of waiting for Day 2

[raayllum]

i think one of the main reasons i can't shake the "possession is not how callum is going to be play into aaravos' hands" (or at least not solely, i.e. doing something vile or dangerous in the name of love that leads to a renewed possession) is because like...

listen, as much as it'd be kind of weird for a "Master Manipulator" like aaravos to reveal his final play two seasons in advance from a character standpoint, it absolutely make sense from a story standpoint. you couldn't just whip that out of nowhere in a plot relevant moment without having your audience feel cheated, so it had to be established earlier on. now instead of surprise, you get to cultivate a nice feeling of dread. (although i've said before that there were other ways to cultivate said feeling of dread / set up the possibility of possession, i.e. callum learning that its possible out of a book when he was canonically reading about dark magic, him having nightmares or premonitions that aaravos is tethered to him, etc. it didn't have to be so blatant so quickly.)

those are, however, neither of the points i want to get at today, because like - if it is JUST the possession, and there is no choice that leads to it directly before or after in regards to helping aaravos...

Then why the absolutely, continually ramped up Viren-Callum parallels?

Cause like, as of S5, absolutely none of this is Necessary. Callum doesn't necessarily have to exist as a contrast to Viren at this point, given that Viren himself has changed his mind and disavowed dark magic and Aaravos; Callum finally freeing himself from Aaravos (and dark magic?) will likely now have more parallels to Viren's arc, rather than the two being disparate. He'll be following in Viren's footsteps, but in a positive way.

None of this is required for the possession plot line, either. That got kick started all the way back in 2x07, like, seasons ago. If anything it'd be kinda more 'tragic' if Callum really had never touched or been tempted by dark magic again, but he couldn't (or wouldn't) take back his prior choices. A consequence of being controlled by forces well beyond your conceptualization and a price you had no choice but to pay, literally, if they're going the removal of agency arc (which has its own merits) / leaning into the eldritch horror aspect of it all.

Like if it's just possession... Callum does not have to be like or be compared to Viren, in either similarities or contrasts, like - at all. Viren and Callum are both characters who have a relationship with destiny (Viren tended to believe in pre-determined destiny, but Callum decidedly didn't as of S2; even if that still started to change in S4, that alone is not enough of a singular parallel to warrant all the rest) but they're not the only ones, nor is that exclusively related to Aaravos - even if their parallels between each other are constantly circling him, their families, and dark magic / justification(s).

Which makes me think there's two main avenues they could be taking this with:

1) S7 endgame is Callum walking Viren's path regarding the rise, but in a more literal, dramatic sense. Again, Callum proving that he's not like Viren doesn't really need to happen as much now that Viren is 1) no longer a villain and 2) will be a parallel for Callum's positive growth as well. So it's still about similarities, but positive ones: "No matter what you've done, no matter where you are on the path, every step forward is a choice" (cue Callum literally regaining agency) "I am free, and so are you." This is also the avenue where it being mostly just the possession > a choice that leads to Aaravos getting out (choice made before that leads to possession, or choice post-possession) would make more sense, but just the Rise doesn't account for the well, ominous foreboding of all this, lmao.

2) S6 and S7 are working together with S6 being Callum mirroring Viren's Fall (whatever you want that to constitute) / helping Aaravos regardless of the possession - taking an understood risk for love that leads to the possession, or post-possession due to another form of coercion/susceptibility - and S7 being the Rise. It gives the ominous foreboding of it all, particularly highlighted in S5 / 5x02-5x04 and 5x08 somewhere to go, while also providing Callum with a balanced negative and ultimately positive character arc. It ties in the possession then as a plot element / vehicle to explore their similarities and differences but keeps everything tied together with choices/agency (rather than solely removing it), which is what Viren and Callum have both reaffirmed ("No choice? You made the choice you always have" etc) in S5 in particular. It also explains why and how all these forces - the parallels, the patterns, both their individual arcs, and their connections to Aaravos, his plans, and the possession plot line could be brought to fruition, and why they've all been included.

[jennycalendar]

ah MAN season one in particular seems to have me in my xander feelings this time around, specifically because he is so WILDLY and OBVIOUSLY incorrect about buffy and about buffy/angel!!! like, okay, in the pack he is talking incessantly and obsessively about how buffy wants her men "mean and dangerous," and we will see this line repeated by him many, many times -- his perspective on the buffy/angel relationship is that buffy wants a hot older guy & that xander himself is the nice one who deserves to be rewarded! which, again, of course, disturbing gross i understand why this would hit a Really Really Specific Button with viewers.

BUT THE THING IS -- buffy's draw to angel is not because he is Mean and Dangerous, it's because he is guiding her! from the very start, he's been demonstrating that he cares about her, albeit through cryptic warnings and shop talk, and she is at her core this little girl who wants someone to look out for her and protect her. angel is someone who is objectively very attractive, QUITE emotionally unavailable, but consistently through s1 and s2 providing buffy with a place of cozy, cuddly vulnerability where she gets to be seen as a little girl. AND YES sometimes that can be patronizing as all hell but it also means she gets to feel like she's being protected! THIS, not the danger, is why she is so into angel. he is older and he is strong so he has the capacity to (ostensibly) keep her safe.

and so i'm looking at the people going "xander is gross because he thinks this way" and i'm like. yes. fully. absolutely. but i feel that then this line of thinking is continued on into "xander is gross because he thinks this way and the show agrees with him" which i do not agree with at all. we are shown very consistently through the way that buffy/angel is presented that xander is misguided as hell in the way he frames the buffy/angel relationship and that it's only in s3, when he is very clearly over her, that his anger starts coming from this very anti-vampire specific place.

[c6jpg]

classic genshin trailer making a story quest seem a lot more dramatic than it actually is LMAO

[wrenhavenriver]

i have lies of p and ff 16 installed and ready to go so i can do something mildly enjoyable my last few days before the school/work death spiral starts up again and instead i'm just sitting here refreshing Webbed Sites and watching nothing interesting appear like

[thesaltyace]

Anytime my partner is away overnight, I rediscover that ADHD is, in fact, a whole-ass disability.

[gingerbreadmonsters]

it's wip MERMAYnesday, babey!!

(technically it's thursday, ignore that, we're sticking to a theme here)

thank you to the lovely @k9rage for the tag - i'm actually relatively early for this one for me at least, so let's have a quick, no-pressure look..... @zozo-01 @lovelylonerliterature @romirola @autisticempathydaemon @sealriously-sealrious @epsi-l0n @danislitllelounge how are we looking this week?? 👀👀

i'm not normally very good at AUs, but @sri-rachaa has some EXCELLENT ideas when it comes to these sorts of things - consider this wip a love letter to her magnificent solaire pirate!au 🤩🤩🤩

[crucialmistake]

just had a thought that maybe that's gonna be some timey wimey stuff happening and the person that's dropping ruby off at the church is ruby herself???? like after a season's arc of ruby and the doctor figuring out their pasts she has to learn to love what she is not what she could've been (same for the doctor)???

[bloodsoakeddoodles]

Food group swap!