#hate to fall in love with a man doomed by the narrative :(

[duncebento]

maybe i'll write more about it later but what i really loved about bojack horseman is that its message is ultimately anti-fatalistic, and this stance is determined by BAITING AND SWITCHING with what is meant to be their tragic protagonist-- bojack is supposed to die!! as is the trope of tragedy, the show TELLS us that bojack is going to die before the story even begins; his implied falling into the sea is part of the intro sequence that plays during every episode. and if that wasn't enough, it's a motif throughout the show-- like his painting of one horse standing in front of another horse face-down in the pool, explicitly alluded to as as a representation of narcissus (although, symbolically, the horse in the pool is removed when the painting is destroyed!). like the fact that he's a horse, and you can lead a horse to water... like his idolization of secretariat, who chose to kill himself by jumping off a bridge.

the story has set itself up to have its tragic protag, who is famously reckless and self-hating and irresponsible, drown in a drunken haze. to us as viewers, the environment around bojack gestures toward his drowning, both in its symbolism and in the social environment he has cultivated, which would likely accept his death as a sad inevitability. at times WE may want bojack to die, or at least view his death as a necessary consequence to the way he lives, an easier out for the people around him. and in the second-to-last episode he DOES drown-- but we find out, in the end, that he drowns in the pool, and he's found, and he's rescued and his heart starts again! and some of the last words in the series-- "sometimes, life's a bitch and then you live," embody that subversion. he doesn't get to die, and as much as that is a gift, it entails a the hard labor of responsibility. not wriggling out but standing firm.

our protagonist teeters between taking responsibility and blaming his cosmic circumstance, and we are forced to question what we believe about fate-- is it really always possible to change and to take control of ourselves, or is that childish naivete-- or could it be both? we are given so much to suggest that change is possible-- and then that hope is taken away from us. bojack gets sober and starts drinking again. he decides to tell the truth but lies the moment the pressure is too much to bear. all signs point to his end, so the show could have been brutal, could have been cynical, would have been totally within its right to have its tragic protagonist die his tragic and prestated death, and its message could have been "look at this sad, sad man who spun out. good intentions are not enough."

but the genre shifts at the last moment, and it wasn't a drowning after all but a baptism! and in this shift the narrative ceases to be just a compelling narrative but takes a stance on us, tells us that it is never hopeless to try, even when all of your surroundings seem to point to the contrary, even when you fail so many times that the next failure seems inevitable. and that this IS childish, and that cynicism seems smarter and bitterness more fun, and that, indeed, good intentions are not at all enough. BUT! the illusion that you have been doomed is a powerful illusion, sometimes an all-powerful one, but it does not have to be the case. and thats epic

[the-l00ker]

I love how all the winner of the life series could essentially be the main character of their own story.

AND I'M HERE TO EXPLAIN IT TOO YOU!

Grian, the obvious, the original, there in the series because of him they're going through death games because of him and he's the only one who remembers the first one and is the only one who remembers the initial reason why they're there.

He was not doomed by the narrative. He doomed everyone else in the narrative and he asked to watch them die over and over again it's his fault he is the Doom in the narrative.

He's like a psychopathic main character trying to make everything right but it's not working out

Scott, because if Grian isn't the main character then it's Scott.

He figured out what Grian what Grian was BEFORE THE OTHER EVO MEMBER DID-

He knew that something was fucked up and he went against the Boogeyman causing him to move down a placement every other game. To be infected with coral diseases, and give his soul mate intentionally mental harm so that they'd hurt themselves to spite him.

He does everything for his friends, even if they don't remember. He does what he can for his husband, even as he watches him fall for a man other then him everytime.

He's making SACRIFICES for Grian mistakes, making sure that the next winners dont wake up in a cruel soulless void like he did.

Pearl, waking up after winning only to find out that the man she'd been made to hate so much actually let her win, and let her know the truth, and it's her own BROTHER'S FAULT/BESTIES FAULT THAT SHE HAD TO ENDURE ALL THAT.

She's now left with thought of what happened after Evo, how she hated someone that care so deeply for her safety that he literally committed suicide, and how her brother/bestie betrayed her.

Martyn, has been dealing with the voices inside his head for ages now. It is recognised by the previous winners so Scott teams with him to set him free.

He is now left, the winner of a game that he never wanted to play, a broken man. What happened to Ren? What happened to Evo? WHAT DO YOU MEAN I'M A LISTENER?!

It's Grian's fault that he has to deal with the voices in his head? Scott a man who cared for him so much he betrayed in an instant because of the voices he couldn't control? He'd Crawley thrown pearls to the side when it was clear she needed him most?

He has to now look Jimmy in the eyes, knowing what they are and who they used to be and continually failing to protect him, only spurred on by the fact that Scott never gave up on Jimmy too so why should he?

Scar, being the initial Collateral Damage to Grian's doings, once he wins he'll have to grapple with the fact and face his new reality. Like an ordinary man being hit with 10 to 15 trains.

He sacrificed himself in the first game for what he thought was his forever partner, his soul mate, only to be cheated on 2 games later? He was isolated and seen as a liability. You'd have to look pearl in the eyes and recognize their past actions of both torturing themselves and another.

The only man who had faith in him was Scott, allowing him to win that game but at what cost? Did he really have to know?

He's tired of not understanding... And the watchers will use his envy, hatred and raw confusion to there advantage, Grian's foil.

Cleo, seen as the underdog yet brash ally, she clawed her way to victory easily, within a day even.

She's immune to the Watchers effects, as you can see how the other winners were left poisoned.

Her friend Grian, the reason why she's here.

Scott, someone who tried to save her, by giving her knowledge.

Pearl, an evil to ally. An unwary friend.

Martyn, her soul mate and by technicality ex, driven into madness.

Scar, He's Scared he's anxious and he knows just as much as she does. He feels useless because others have treated him as such. Her own son, plagued with self-deprecating thoughts.

And the watchers taunt, as she has to put the piece back together of what they've broken. So that they can overcome and win.

[bengiyo]

Hi! I have a few questions I hope you don't mind me asking. Would you say that you like Lovely Writer more than I Feel You Linger In The Air considering the LW is a 9.5 in your book but IFYLITA is only a 9. And even though IFYLITA is only a 9, do you think you would include it within your Queer Cinema for BL Syllabus considering other notable aspects about it

Hello! I don’t mind questions at all.

Ratings are Recommendations for Me

Before we get into why each show got a different score, I think it’s important to explain my ratings system again. I come from the land of media criticism, and the primary question for me is “How easy is this to recommend to people?” I secretly use a five-stars system (5 Great, 1 Terrible) that I simple double for the 10 stars of MDL that basically works as such:

No one should watch this. It is incoherent, poorly made, and offensive.

Only genre fans could appreciate anything happening here, but it’s still offensive and/or poorly made.

Genre fans can appreciate this show, but it has major flaws in execution, narrative, or themes.

Genre fans will love this. Strong execution overall but requires some familiarity to truly appreciate.

Everyone will love this and is a fine entry point for the genre. Excellent execution and strong storytelling.

Bad Buddy is a 9.5 for me because, while it is an excellent project, the episode 12 first half sucks so hard

So why does IFYLITA get a lower score than Lovely Writer?

IFYLITA is a beautiful show with strong performances across the entire cast. However, it is a time travel show in which I don’t exactly know what the point of the time travel is, other than to enable a historical romance and enable the storyteller to play with that setting from the modern perspective. I don’t know why Jom is being dragged around the time stream or why he’s doomed to fall in love with and be torn from Yai repeatedly.

Additionally, this is a slavery romance. I am a Black gay man born and raised in the South. Solomon Northup’s autobiography is required reading, as are other first person accounts of chattel slavery in the US and the way the North surrendered Reconstruction to the South. I also watched Kindred this year after having not read Octavia Butler’s work in a long time. I am not a person who typically enjoys the power dynamics of historical romance, and I really don’t like slavery romances. I was talking with @lurkingshan yesterday about how much I didn’t like Jom and Maey sitting on the floor as Eaeang Phueng says goodbye to her family.

Finally, I think Lovely Writer is more coherent. It’s a single-season story about a potential romance between a BL actor and a BL writer. The show goes on to unpack all of the complexities surrounding these two as they are forced to collaborate and cohabitate during the filming of a show. IFYTLITA muddles its ending, and we have been reliant on spoilers from book readers to make sense of what the hell happened at the end of the episode. I don’t like that. I hate when we’re reliant on commentary from the source media to understand what the hell happened in an adaptation.

So, because of these particular issues, Lovely Writer is slightly easier for me to recommend to people over I Feel You Linger in the Air. Despite how Nonkul and Bright delivered on what may be the most accessible romantic chemistry of the year, and how much I loved the way this show tastefully approached m/m intimacy and sex, the show has some stumbles that I think diminish it slightly. I think episode 11 is incredible. I think Episode 10 is too pat. I think Episode 12 is hedging too much on a potential second season and doesn’t close off season 1 in a way that’s satisfying for me.

These are all bigger or smaller issues than others. I also very, very rarely go back and change my ratings for shows based on modern circumstances. Lovely Writer was special when it released. We don’t get IFYLITA without Lovely Writer. When I finished Lovely Writer, I thought it was one of the best shows of the year and I thought every BL fan needed to watch it. It doesn’t get a 10 because so much of the drama is about BL itself, and so there is some explaining that’s needed for people who aren’t in genre.

So, to be clear:

For me, Lovely Writer is easier to recommend to people than I Feel You Linger in the Air. That’s the .5 difference between them.

I hope that all made sense. Thanks for the question!

[krikeymate]

I feel like all my anonymous requests are really depressing cause I’m just a lil angst goblin.

I was reading a fic where Sam was getting beat up cause if the rumours about her and I was thinking about how the deaths of the Bailey family would play into that conspiracist narrative. I was especially thinking about ethan’s death I mean even if you just look at the scream fandom there are pages and pages on Ethan who really didn’t have that much of an impact but…SHOCKER, he’s white, male and conventionally attractive so it’s literally impossible to escape him (no hate or anything but cmon fandom let the other characters shine) anyways I got so side tracked there. I can imagine Ethan being really glorified and fawned over by people in the scream universe itself in was way that actual serial killers were because people thought they were attractive (ew). Upon hearing that Tara was the one to kill ethan (i know it was technically Kirby but they did it together) I think the conspiracists would go insane and can you imagine a scene where Tara and Sam are just walking together before they both get jumped but Tara is the target of this attack and Sam is just held down unable to do anything while she has to watch tara get brutally attacked.

Well, Tara is my whump blorbo. There's a place for angst in our lives, because it's not about the pain at all, it's about the aftermath. It's about the being picked up, and the softness and the love and the support. It's about being reminded that no matter what we go through, there is a brighter side to be found and there are people who will help you reach it and sit in the sun with you. Anyway, none of that here.

~

Ethan Landry. Sweet, dorky, Ethan. He couldn't find his way out of a wet paper bag, people say. Soft, and shy, and smiled awkwardly at girls. Always nervous, but tried his best. Murdered. They tried to say he attacked them, that he wanted to kill them, that he was a savage monster. Who would fall for such a lie? He didn't even like horror movies, he was shaky around blood.

Samantha Carpenter is to blame, they know. It's heavily debated as to whether she attacked her sister last year, or whether it was simply a home invasion and she took the opportunity to make it something more, to sate her blood lust. But Richie was innocent, they all agree on that. A wonderful man who was guilty only of loving the wrong woman. That poor teenager, the best friend of her sister's... well of course Samantha decided she had to go, she wanted her sister to herself.

And it works! Because here they are, a year later, and it's the sister who does the deed, who thrusts the knife into Ethan's mouth, who twists it, slices it open. He'd had a crush on her, sources say. She used it to lead him to his doom. It was deliberate, pre-planned, it had to have been. Why else would he follow her there? Tara Carpenter may have been innocent, once upon a time, but not anymore. She's spent too long in her sister's clutches, corrupted, ruined. Just look at how passionately she defends her, as if she were innocent, as if the truth wasn't out there.

We should help her, some say, get her away from her sister, imagine what she could tell us, what she could reveal! She needs to pay, say others, she's just as guilty as her sister, it's too late for her.

No one agrees on how to stop this madness.

~

Sam's walking Tara home from her evening class. It feels a little surreal. A month ago, Tara would never have agreed to this, Sam had been desperate to do this. And here they are, Sam's hand attached to her sister's as Tara waves it around in the air, complaining about the professor. (She's not sure what she's talking about, but she's just happy to see Tara this animated).

They're turning the corner when they bump into someone... someone's. There's a couple of guys in hoodies, with surgical masks on their face. "Oops, sorry!" Tara smiles up at them, pulling Sam to move around them. They step back into her path, and Sam begins to feel nervous. Tara's hand tightening around hers tells her she feels the same.

Sam steps backwards, but before she has a chance to speak, arms wrap around her from behind and she's yanked away from Tara, as her sister is shoved to the floor.

"Hey what the fu-" Sam manages, before a hand is covering her mouth, jaw wrenched closed as her head is forced backwards against someone's chest. More arms appear to grip at her own and hold her back.

Tara is thrown to the floor, and a boot kicks out at her arm, stepping on her wrist as she tries to reach into her pocket. The figure looming over her bends down to reach into her jacket, and pulls out the taser she was reaching for. Scoffing, he hands it to one of his companions.

"What did we ever do to you," she growls, breathing deep to push down her fear. "It's not what you did to us," he says with conviction, "it's what you've done to others. What you'll do again!"

Sam kicks out and tries to speak, understanding setting in. Someone punches her in the stomach.

"We haven't done anything!" Tara yells, watching her sister get hurt. She tries to get up off the floor only to be kicked down again with a boot to the chest. "Just leave us alone!"

"But you have!" The one holding Sam shouts. "You killed Ethan! She-" he shakes Sam, "killed Richie and all those others." "They were innocent and you killed them," another pipes up. A chorus of agreement follows, and for the first time, the girls begin to notice just how many people are surrounding them. 6... 7, no, there's more further back, hiding in the shadows... watching. Some of them have their phones out, recording.

"You're going to pay for what you've done," the one looming over Tara declares.

"It was self-de-" he kicks her in the jaw, her head snapping to the side and smacking back against the pavement. He pulls her up from the floor, hands fisting her jacket and slams her back into anothers waiting arms.

Sam struggles against the numerous arms holding her back, unable to move. Her head is pinned, her jaw is clamped shut, tears begin to fall.

The ringleader leans in close to Tara's face, eyes meeting her dazed ones. "Your sister seems upset. Is it real, or just another act? Is she even capable of caring? I mean, she wanted you for a reason, right?"

"Fuck you," Tara snarls back. He grins, rewarding her with a backhand. "It doesn't have to be this way, Tara," he speaks, voice softening in faux-compassion. He cups her chin. "Just tell us the truth, tell everyone what she did, what she made you do, and it can all be over.

"She didn't make me do anything!"

"So you admit it, you killed Ethan in cold blood?" His voice is frantic, delighted.

"Ethan was a sadistic little fuck who got what he deserved." Tara finds herself thrown back to the floor. "He was a nice boy who never hurt anyone!" the one who threw her shouts, kicking her.

Tired of Sam's struggling, the one holding the taser moves closer, releasing it into her stomach. She groans, body twitching. Her legs give way beneath her, held up only by the formless figures clutching at her. They drop her to the floor and a boot presses down on her back. Sam is stuck, unable to convince her body to move, prongs digging in painfully from their place stuck between her skin and the pavement. She can do nothing but watch as the two figures assault her sister, kicking her, watching them pull her onto her back to hurt her some more.

"Stop, please, please stop," Sam begs. She's ignored.

It's only the sirens closing in that make it stop, dark figures scattering. She manages to drag herself forward, limbs slow to respond and shaky. "Tara," she cries. Her sister doesn't respond, still and bleeding.

[gyllenhaalstories]

presumed innocent episode 3 word vomit <3

when rusty's face went 🥺 my heart went 💔

THE GLASSES THE CLOTHES THE GLASSES THE ASS THE GLASSES

the moment during which rusty fell in love. "carolyn has kindness" no she doesn't hope that helps.

the softness. the cuddliness. the nuzzling against her face. he is a soft man. i can't hate him anymore. oh my god poor rusty.

raymond i love you. if raymond has 0 fan i am dead and he's probably dead too he's so old. poor raymond. you need to learn how to make better friends. rusty is putting you on the highway to a heart attack.

CAROLYN IS A FUCKING CREEP. I HATE HER. I WILL NEVER SUPPORT YOU CAROLYN.

ass ass ass ass back back back back ass ass ass ass

mya is hot as fuck i'm so sorry i cannot act normal around her i love her already and usually that's a bad sign because characters i like are not good people

GLASSES glasses glasses glasses GLASSES

the judge calling nico 'delay guardia' is so funny yes miss judge <3

carolyn was never in love with rusty. you cannot fucking control falling in love with someone. that's creepy. how she pushed rusty back is so heartbreaking. she broke rusty's heart and yet he came back begging and obsessing over a chance at being with her. i just know he would have left his family to build one with carolyn and she would have abandoned him and their child without remorse.

fucking in missionary right on the spot on the carpet where she was tied up... rusty you will rust in jail you're so doomed

tommy........... tommy............ tommy you are hot. i hate you.

also tommy??? if peter and jake weren't brothers in law i'd fully believe in the theory i had since their first interaction that tommy was in love with rusty and he knew about the affair and he was extremely jealous that the affair was not with him. that will forever remain canon in my heart <3

lorraine is freaky like okayyy that was spicy i can only imagine her telling raymond that barbara is having an affair and raymond would die bye poor raymond

the bartender is hot if i didn't want barbara all to myself i'd allow it teehee

barbara losing her job is so NO I LOVE YOU I WILL CALL YOU MOMMY AND TAKE CARE OF YOU SO SO GOOD I LOVE YOU SO MUCH. the scene in the train bus tramway idk? oof that was so fucking hot. barbara is so beautiful. she is so pretty. she is so magnificent. rusty you are a dumb man.

i'm the worst person for whodunnit media, i fall into EVERY. SINGLE. TRAP. i thought it was carolyn's son. then KYLE? KYLE WHAT THE FUCK. could kyle have done it. was he just following his father around and found his car parked in front of carolyn's house. is this a kyle and barbara project. IS THE EMO SON IN ON IT. what the hell.

KYLE. KYLE WHAT THE FUCK KYLE. what the fuck was that. the theory daphne and i are thinking of makes so much sense and we're so right and we should be defending rusty in court like we are absolutely brilliant the world has never seen genius like ours @sizzlingcloudmentality

RUSTY I LOVE YOU YOU'RE SO PATHETIC BUT YOU'RE ALSO PATHETICALLY IN LOVE AND I LOVE YOU.

also the way i guessed SO MANY THINGS from this episode in a fic i'm writing right now (and started like last week) is actually wild. you guys will see when i post it but i guessed so many elements that it's actually trippy. wow i did that i'm so smart this is the smartest thing i've ever done. thank you presumed innocent for supporting my narrative <3

[morgue-xiiv]

for the ask game: Idiot Doom Spiral

OKAY! I been working on this one for a while so it's gonna be great. Really high concept.

This is tough, not because he doesn't have good or bad thing about him, but because like. Everything about him seems like an opinion or vibe based thing. Like okay he's homeless because he lost his keys and ID and couldn't prove he had a right to enter his own home. Is he a fucking dipshit as I've heard many people say or is he a potent reminder of the insane precarity of our lives? I think the latter. Every person I've spoken to about it has a different idea of how he could get into his own house and every one of them runs out of ideas if you say "and if that didn't work?" even a couple of times. Even the game says there should be an obvious solution yet does not provide one. Oh your landlord would let you in. What if you rented through a managing agency and the staff turnover is high so no one recognises you? How would you even CONTACT your landlord? with the phone number you wrote down and carry with you everywhere even if you're on a jog? Oh your staff would let you in at work. Suppose they don't though? Suppose the main point people are on a week long business trip or your security guard says "look man I know its you but I'm not allowed to let you in without ID I could lose my job", you're a grown man so your parents could easily be dead or very far way. my absolute favourite take was "well the supervisor in your building would recognise you!" Yeah thanks Monica Geller, tell me you're American without telling me you're American. Hell, what if all this beurocracy is HARD and lying down on a beach drinking is EASY. That's the real reason, you maybe could get in "if you tried hard enough" but everyone has a limited ammount they CAN try and traumatic experiences like the cops locking you up for asking for help sap that energy Realllly fast. You, too, are probably 4-8 comedy of errors events from homelessnessliness. It blows!

1) He's very invested in his work and doesn't accept anything that falls bellow his standards of excellent BUT his job is predominately hollow overcompensated manipulative bullshit. BUT advertising is art even if you don't agree with the art or its aims. He's focused on his artistic fullfilment rejecting low concept ideas even if he thinks they would be functional effective ads.

2) I seem to recall him rejecting fascism as 'low concept stuff' but I can't find the line now so take my word for it. And I'm not even sure.

3) IDS was a very controversial Tory scumleech who oversaw massive punitive cuts to financial support for the disabled in the UK and it's funny as fuck now to call him Idiot Doom Spiral because they abbreviate the same. (that's meta as shit sorry)

3) he seems to really appreciate the company of his friends but he clearly views himself as "above" them somehow. Buddy, you had a fancy job but you're here in the dirt those are your mates now. coked up marketing exec aint the win over drunken small business owner and professional non-caller of Abigails even when you were society approved.

4) not above a little beneficial fraud. Does however take a pen "for his trouble" without negotiating or revealing that price in advance. But sometimes it's the racist lady's monkey pen so for the love of god yes please take it I hate that pen.

5) TFC: he's supportive if you tell him you're dating Kim

6) I really feel like there's more but he has so much dialogue goddamn

7) oh he refers to his ex as a "sweet piece of ass" the objectifying misogynistic little cumstain.

8) smart enough to not drink medical spirits

9) If you tury to embark on the cocain skull quest he pretty much looks into the camer and says "not unless we the studio get More Money to make a Bigger Game!" and that's really funny. I mean kinda sad now but that meta shit is funny. I guess in narrative he doesn't know that's what he's doing.

10) he's pretty entertaining and can chat shit on all day if you keep him in booze. We all need that friend.

[choctalksalot]

@tipsygnostalgy HELLO HI UH THIS IS AN INCOMPLETE VERSION. i snipped out some bits because im throwing down anxiety in.the ring even posting this. im frankly a little embarrassed i can't give everything tonight even what i have down as okay to upload is not my top form at all, im just really really excitedaaaa i'll probably reblog the lovers post with a complete version eventually, but for now this is the best thanks i can offer for the nigh lethal dose of dopamine you've shot into my skull.

apologies in advance for my verbosity it's chronic

im posting dirk's half first because i definitely talked too much on jake's. it's almost double the length. i think it's partially because ive chewed through dirk so much i can make it through a considerable amount of his sections without dissolving completely. and i'm impatient!

note: my interactions with philosophy are limited to the two month bonanza i spent when i was 14 which i barely remember due to my general memory issues because my philosophy teacher was shit at his job and i took matters into my own hands, and uh. dirkjake! and one character from one other fandom. yeah. i am a nerd who loves breaking shit down, i love information, and i love philosophy nonetheless but i am So unqualified to be doing any of this

entry 1:

can i scream? i'm screaming. out loud. in real life. holy two fucks and a half. what do i even say it's So Good. dirk could excuse his inadequacy with the minute comfort that the brother he idolizes is functionally perfect in a way he could never conceivably live up to be. everything is shattered when he meets a version of him who is on the same footing. Yes. i literally have a post typed up about it.

im copypasting a small segment here but it's so close to exactly what you said im almost unnerved. mostly excited tho i am SHAKING

the most devastating thing to know is that dave is just a guy. dave strider, 16 year old. human and flawed and still enough in ways dirk never could be. what he did for his team his friends the things dirk couldn't, he is made to serve and no matter how hard dirk tries he cannot live up to be the same because this is not his role.

words? words. that's so much many words.

this is not his class. he is doomed to be selfish, his thread is already in the tapestry and he falls right into the path no matter how much he fights it. what can be counted as him indirectly the plot was created at the service/detriment to himself (hal) and what is himself directly aiding his party is in fact orchestrated by other more helpful, more selfless people and he hates it so much.

YES IT'S EXACTLY THAT RIGHT THERE RIGHT RIGHT THERE dirk is so so So aware that he is selfish that he cannot help the people he cares about oh so deeply and the knowledge that dave on his own, after being hurt so much "more" than dirk direct abuse he was able to pull through, he was still enough. shit man !!!!!!!

funnily enough i think dirk might have been able to learned new skills to do with his classpect besides the passive narrative bend it has on everything he does to destroy. this is entirely theory but your classpect and your development with it helps you develop as a person. it's like a muscle if you think about it; the more you use it, the closer you get to its core, the more you learn to bend ithad he tried to use it (resisting the urge to say like dave did because that will stomp on the shattered pieces of my heart) i think he would have gotten a bit more control over his position in the narrative if it makes sense.

ironically, i think learning how to direct the destructice force his classpect gives him might have allowed him to get a hold on said narrative bending, and stop unintentionally wrecking shit. but doing Anything as a prince is the last thing dirk wants.

(god it's so tragic this theory is so tragic without it dirk was always doomed to the inevitable but with it he could have done better in his eyes nevermind that destruction of selves isn't always bad if you know how to direct it, see bgd @ aranea, but it literally requires him to take the path he's trying to hard to fight. you define how your classpect changes you. oh dirk.)

i think a lot about this if you can't tell

FUCK IM GETTING OFF TRACK. STOP OKAY CAN THE THEORIES FUCK.

[insert 2 paragraphs more of me screaming about the katana line hally lieu yeah]

entry 2:

HAL MY FAVOURITE KENTUCKY FRIED FUCKER HELLOOOO HELLO OOHOHOGO

god my old hyperfixation on deep learning models is coming back to bite me in the jungular. delightful slash gen

dirk does love his control mhmm mhmm god im gonna go dig up that picture my friend sent me once one sec

that's who he wants to be. so badly

he Hates not understanding shit prides himself on being the (im quite sure it's part of how he gauges his use. he has a very utilitarian view on it. being the one to pull the strings thus being useful by virtue of organizing their success. proceeds to eat gcatshit trying)

i think a part of why dirk insists so fucking much that hal is Not him and Not alive could be one of two 2 reasons, beyond the already tangled pumpkin patch of conflict.

1) not taking credit for hal's contributions. the fact that hal has served the team without dirk's direct orders + dirk's objective pride about being the puppetmaster, he wouldn't want this tied to him

i doubt this one honestly, it's incoherently explained on its own because it's really late but also it just there's a lot of holes in the logic here. the second one breaks my heart a little:

2) if he accepts hal to be sentient, he has to accept he has created a new conscious person. he cannot cling to any notion that he did help his friends, he created an intelligent AI and that tool he made in turn was used to aid and guide his friends. he is still in control here. he still helped, he built that bot and it helped.

right?

[cutoff point 2. im rushing. im so sorry ajsjaj]

entry 3:

killing me

"He likes emotion, he likes people, he just wants to be completely perfect when interacting with them so that he’ll never lose them." YES. YES. YES YES YES yes okay yes exactly Yes

this is one of the things i headbutt against in dirk fandom stuff a lot (even borzoi's take once i think correct me if im wrong) it's the fact that i think dirk likes people. he's been alone his whole life yet he delights in dialectics and dialogue, he's socially awkward and introverted but he's not socially averse. i am not gonna let myself run over the hills and far away with this tangent but i am hushdhsj AAAAA

what he doesn't like is feeling inadequate interacting with people. he doesn't like being inadequate in general he reflects on his flaws near constantly and the biting reminder of his alternate selves' sins in the back of his mind doesn't help, but with people he Cares About interacting with them he does not like not knowing what to do, he does not like being unable to navigate these situations. he likes being human and experiencing emotions and connection and he hates the fact that it requires error to the trials, he just wants to be entirely logical while still having a metaphorical right brain totally not a big thing to ask for ahshdhskjrh[explodes]

AHAAAAA SISYPHUS YYYES YES YRS EYSBEYDHHWHEHSHEHD FUCK YES oh man i am much more a theatrical literature person so this is ringing off bells in the wrong direction than intended but im reading reading reading chewing

"upon facing the question of the absurd in the fullest extent, one can either choose to kill themselves or make a ‘reply.’" hogh

two roads: become god, or kill yourself. jesus fuck that's a screwed up twitter thread if ive seen one. and of course he picks the secret third option: Both. absolute DiStri Moment™

fuckitweballkind that's joining my regular vocabulary holy shit your language is amazing

this feels like an extension of dirk's dilemma between subjective experience with objective control; coming to grapple with the unpredictability of his absurdist existence and his solution being to take control of the narrative entirely. i feel like there are a lot more dots i could connect here. i will sleep on this

[addition i feel is important even though it has minimal connection as of right Now:

roxykisser put out something about classpects and the ult self being the literal narrative very recently and how they tie into the narrative and it's That it's that. my take is partly influenced by past fandoms but it has always ruined me that in order to god tier, quite literally, you're killing the person you were before the embrace the narrative role. you the actor are giving up your freedom to the performance, and the closer you get to your classpect the more you embrace the narrative. in return, you gain more flexibility and control in said narrative, more ways to use your classpect. to become the ult self is to become the role. you kill the person, you become the role, but at the cost of your self, your mind may be driven by the consciousness of an amalgamation of every You, but your core is now your role.

im incorporating and altering this with my consumption]

really hope this is like at least mildly entertaining i have no idea what im doing but!!!! I Am So Abnormal About Everything i love this i love you i love love this so Much

[lurkingteapot]

Only Friends เพื่อนต้องห้าม Ep 4

Nearly two weeks late and I'm finally, finally getting around to catching up with my favourite mess.

Live watch notes!

Oh wow, we're starting out right away on the heavy stuff, huh

oh god Khaotung's acting, He's so good.

there's that word again, "burden"

thank fuck Mew cottoned on to this being a goodbye

I somehow fully expected Ray to just drop the phone into the tub

he's sitting in the EMPTY tub??? was this just for mess prevention? oh Ray, oh baby.

No, love, no, your mum did not die because of you.

HELL YEAH CHEUAM'S A LESBIAN (sorry, I'm just so excited to hear a girl actually SAY it) (but also Ray being a hit with the wlw tracks)

ooh wait wait, these shirts-- is this the make-out night?

also Ray I get you probably don't mean it like that, but you're sorta … guilt-tripping Mew here.

love the way this kinda tells us audience members a) the backstory of Ray taking that call b) that Mew's rejected Ray before c) that Ray was so desperately seeking connection that he came off weirdly manipulative about it

GOD Khaotungggg

this is shot very prettily but also what the fuck, Boston, is EVERYTHING blackmail material to you

adfsadfa LOVE Mew calling Ray out on the shirt

sleepover!!

"not your type" huh. HUH.

Ray really is hung up on him, huh.

Proud of Mew for setting that boundary.

Sand is not buying it.

Oh Sand, oh Sand.

Ooop put your foot in it

Nick, what are you lying to Sand about that?

oof "he's not normal, his reputation is bad"

oh man the employees all wai'ing the boss's son … urgh god I hate rich people, sorry Top I'm sure you're not actually that bad but URGH (also yes I'm aware of the double standard I've got going here, the way just-as-rich-kid Ray is my little meow meow)

wait, is this the photo booth where Top and Boston made out?

is this just a common architecture feature in spensive hotels, or is this the same hotel they shot Chaan's apartment in LoA with?

ooooh that plane is Boston's, isn't it

Ray and Sand may be doomed by the narrative but I love every second I get out of them anyway.

I love Sand so muchhhh

First is really good at that searching eye contact thing

ถ้ามึงอยากเป็นเพื่อนกับกูอยู่นะ คิดถึงความรู้สึกกูบ้าง BOUNDARIES we love to see them

the way they put the asshole angle on Boston here, I love it

oooh you made Boston mad just now

hookups so you can sleep, hookups to let off steam

oh man, Nick, oh man, this is not okay behaviour and you KNOW it

"I can't" -> the way it's put in Thai is กูไม่สดวก which is basically 都合が悪い but feels like 困る. Gotta ask teacher about that one.

is this why physical pictures are all you deal with, or are you just … talking out your ass because you know Nick is dtf either way for a bit yet

Mark Pakin, the actor you are

this is not news but I'd like to reiterate that I love how we have Rich Boys and Poor Boys are a theme here

asdfadfasdf "stay away from Boston" Nick, Top's been TRYING

but oh man Top is an arrogant ass. like. scary slick.

Ohhhh wow Nick, wow, wow wow. at least you're self-aware? ish?

Oh fuck of course he ran over Sand

Go go go Sand

oooof there's history here, I see. I still think it's about someone Sand liked before.

I really hope Sand's bike is fine

Nickkkkk how about you don't lie to Sand? but urgh you're also getting him in trouble which. ooof I can see this making things really complicated for him and Ray going forward.

Sand is like "oh bruv NO"

CALLED IT

Mew is so unimpressed. I'm impressed with Ray for owning up to it though, and for apologising – it's so easy to fall into the "I'm an awful person and they'll hate me anyway" spiral.

okay so at least Sand and Ray can bond over hating Top

Mew, please get mad about Top being a controlling ass like that

You've got nothing to hide, right, Top? Right?

sooo was that Not Mew in the car with Ray, then? Photoshop?

oh we're going here, huh

oh wait, was that him again just now?

that's a really good line to draw, Mew, and also you've got an excellent point about addiction here

oh man oh man oh man I'm really liking Mew more and more this ep and Top is doing nothing to endear himself to me.

oh man, someone's gonna drink that water and it's going to be a Situation™

Top, you asshole, if you could not question every single one boundary Mew sets, that'd be ace

so the thing is. Top. Why would you think Mew would believe that? you talk big.

!! this is a song from the playlist!!

fuck, Sand is so gone on him alreadyyyy, I really thought he had more distance than that, but nope nope nope

I continue to be so impressed with this show. The preview is nerve wracking, but I'm going to be strong and only watch that when I've got another 5k or so of work words done. One more ep, and then I'll have a day to wade into the tag! EXCITED.

[angelsdean]

What bothers me with DeanLisa is that Sam pushes Dean toward Lisa because of something Dean fantasizes about... 40 years earlier. Before the Apocalypse, before knowing angels and God exist, before being tortured 30 years in Hell (and spending 10 years torturing)... Sam, being oblivious, doesn't take any of that into account. Dean has changed too much since he dreamt about this for their relationship to work (I think DeanLisa could have worked if they were both in the same mindstate than s3 but)

yea there are a lot of reasons why deanlisa was never going to really work out in that context. i think if circumstances had been different then maybe. but i just have a lot of issues with deanlisa, they're not my fave and i can't get over how plot device-y they are, but that's an issue with the writing and i don't actually hate lisa as a character or anything. i know a lot of multishippers like deanlisa so i don't wanna step on any toes and i think in fanon, giving them more depth than the narrative ever did helps make them more interesting and complex. but when i'm like putting my analytical hat on and looking at what the text actually does and critiquing what they actually gave us versus what they didn't give us or what they could've done it's well :/ like narratively she, and ben, are presented as this ready made family fantasy and that's about it. that's their sole "function" and lisa never gets much depth or complexity to her character and it's just very :/

i think dean has a huge heart, and i while i def question him showing up out of the blue to move in with a woman he knew collectively maybe 2 weeks out of his life, i do think dean IS the kind of person who "falls in love" a little bit with everyone he meets that treats him with genuine kindness and affection. and i think there are different degrees and shades and intensities to that "love" and it's not always the kind of One True Love definition of love. like he also only spends about 2 - 3 weeks with cassie but says she was his first love. and that love is important and meaningful but also very different from say, his love for cas which gets 12 years to grow. but neither is "better" than the other, they're just different! so like, i think he definitely cared for lisa and loved her in some way, and maybe if, like you said, circumstance had been different, they could have worked out and maybe grown to really love each other deeply. but in the circumstances they were in it always felt a little doomed. (here's a really good post about this).

as much as we can debate whether dean really loved her or not, i think dean would probs Never have sought her out if sam hadn't pushed him toward her w/ is "dying wish" of dean being a happy little suburban man. i don't think dean was thinking abt her all those yrs or holding a torch for her. and dean might've wanted that fantasy family life at one point but yea for dean those dreams were a long time ago. i think by the end of s5 dean doesn't really think that life is in the cards for him anymore.

my reading of the situation is: dean is numb with grief. dean has lost nearly everyone (bobby's still around but that's about it, and they don't seem to be in contact). dean is trying to honor his brother's "dying" wish. except sam isn't actually dead! (i forget who brought this up but i saw it recently and!!!!) sam literally isn't dead when he goes into the cage !!! he's spending eternity being tortured by the devil as far as dean knows. i think that would cause dean a great amount of stress / worry / anguish on top of his grief. i don't think dean would be able to just move on and play happy family forever. so, he's numb, depressed, going through the motions, and holding on to this one (1) thing he now has, this perfect little family. and it's what he should want !! it's what he used to dream about !! but so much has changed. and he cares about lisa, he does. she's great and she's trying to help him. and ben is a great kid and dean loves him too. but it was never going to work, not really, because dean's issues are SO huge and all encompassing at that point AND this life wasn't really his choice. it's not what he would have chosen if sam hadn't nudged him in that direction. he's there, and he's trying, but it's not enough. he's got unresolved hell trauma, unresolved grief, probably constantly thinking abt sam being tortured in hell by the devil after dean very recently spent 40 yrs !! in that place. he's also lost cas, his best friend, who in dean's eyes abandoned him for heaven. based on past and future behavior he's probably also feeling like he doesn't deserve to be alive, possibly is passively suicidal. he's got a lot going on, and of course you don't have to be perfect or have your shit together to be in a relationship, but i don't think dean was in the right place to be in a relationship or to be playing the role of suburban dad and husband. and i think that's kind of the point, i think the narrative wants us to see that friction and see the cracks in the fantasy.

[teorrvs]

One of the most complicated relationships in the entire marauders fandom is not wolfstar, jegulus nor the relationship between Sirius and Regulus. It’s actually the relationships between Bellatrix, Andromeda and Narcissa, whom since the beginning have been doomed by some sort of a narrative. The narrative implemented by the society they lived in or by their parents because, even if they didn’t have any sons, they had to maintain the highly established name that the Black family already had into the wizarding world.

Their relationship might have been strong in their younger years but as they got older and got out into the world their perspectives on it have changed.

We see it especially in the way they decide to “rebel” against their parents and their views.

Bellatrix being the oldest believed her parents and their views and had to set an example for her sisters, so this is why in her Hogwarts years she never actually rebelled because she knew what the consequences if she disobeyed her parents, but she always felt incomplete, she always wanted to do more with her life. So, when she finished Hogwarts she joined the death eaters, even if her parents already arranged for her to be married to a Lestrange, whom were already part of Voldemort’s circle, but that didn’t satisfy her urge for power. And with that she became Voldemort’s most loyal servant and got involved with the politics and war of the Wizarding World, which based of the old age views that The Noble House of Black had, must have been the mildest way of rebelling.

Andromeda on the other hand, never really understood the things her parents taught her. Whenever she wanted to ask the why’s and what’s about it, she always went to Bella, her older sister, her idol. Bellatrix, in her eyes, knew more than she did. Whenever she told her that she shouldn’t fill her head with irrelevant questions and concerns, Andromeda always believed her, at least till she met a boy. This boy who would flip her entire world upside-down and he would make her see that all of her concerns about her family’s view were actually right. Andromeda rebelled against her parents and the old and morally wrong views that her family had followed for centuries by falling in love with a boy that was everything that those prejudices, that she has been told to follow blindly since a young age, were against. In the beginning of her rebellious act, Andy tried to tell Bella that what if their parents were wrong. That they didn’t need to be hateful towards the ones that weren’t like them. She even tried to talk to Narcissa about this, but before she even tried, Bellatrix stopped her. With all of that arguing between the oldest sisters the bond between them thinned even more. Bellatrix wouldn’t listen to Andromeda because of the fear of their parents’ wrath. Narcissa didn’t understand what Andromeda was trying to do but she knew deep down that this argument would be the last time the sisters would be together. And Andromeda, even if that meant losing her sisters forever, she would listen to her mind and heart and free herself from the shackles that The Ancient House of Black put on her.

Narcissa was the luckiest out of the three sisters. Never actually rebelling in front of her parents. Well, not through the classic ways of rebelling like her older sisters did. She married into a good family with a man who actually loved and cherished her. Had an heir with him, a boy that could carry the family name and legacy. But even if she had everything that she was taught, was good and right, Narcissa did not want her kid to grow up the way that she did. In an unloving home, where even the tiniest mistakes would be looked down upon, with the constant fear of disappointment that she had to live in after her sisters choose not to follow in the way they were all pushed towards. She heard the way they talked badly about Andy after she was disowned. Narcissa didn’t realised until much more later why her older sister did what she did, even if she was hurt, she understood in the end why Andy questioned the way she was raised, they were all raised, because of love. Cissa also understood why Bella, the oldest, the one that both her and Andy would follow blindly around in their first years at Hogwarts would seek power and would get involved into the war and pledge her loyalty to Voldemort and also protect her from getting the dark mark after she married Lucius. Narcissa might’ve not rebelled against the ways she was raised when she was younger but with the birth of her son, she took the decision to raise him the way she was raised but not how her parents did. How her sister did, even if they did not know it, with their decisions they taught their baby sister things that she wouldn’t have known if she followed the actual rules of The Nobel and Ancient House of Black.

[silvysartfulness]

12, 17, 19, 22 for the choose violence ask game👀

12. the unpopular character that you actually like and why more people should like them

Oh man, like. All of them? I tend to only fall for unpopular characters, so that's a long list. But keeping it just to a few choice people in the Untamed;

Xue Yang. Obviously. He's brilliant, he's dedicated, he's fucked up in some really interesting ways and he got so close to having a redemption arc and happy ending before everything came crashing down! If he'd been the protagonist/viewpoint character, you know he'd be getting the fandom's WWX cinnamon roll treatment. But alas.

Jiang Cheng. That so many people dislike him honestly baffles me? I see so many takes that are frankly based in extremely shallow readings, disregarding his trauma, his world context, the impossible balance between his crushing responsibilities and the people important to him. He's not your homophobic dad or schoolyard bully, he's a deeply traumatized person doing the best with what he's got despite losing everything dear to him over and over, and he's trying so hard. He's loud and has a hot temper, but for fuck's sake, there's so much love there and you'd almost have to be willfully blind not to see it!

Jin Guangyao. Another of those "if he'd been the main character/viewpoint character, people would have loved him" ones. He's intelligent, determined, hardworking and loyal - though frequently pushed way beyond his breaking point in that loyalty. Pragmatic to the point of ruthlessness, but it's because the world's one big trolley problem to him - he sacrifices the few to help the many (even if yes, that does include himself in 'the many'), but he doesn't take pleasure in the hurt he causes (except in that one pretty understandable case of his dad). He deserves so much compassion, or at the very least understanding!

Should I put Song Lan on here? A lot of people seem to hate on him for very shallow, ship-related reasons, but within the plot, he tried his very hardest to set things right. It's not his fault they were all already doomed by the narrative and he walked into Yi City that day as the unwitting catalyst.

17. there should be more of this type of fic/art

For fics, Yi City fix-its that don't count killing Xue Yang as "fixing it". Stories digging into the hot mess of the complex, fascinating canon-verse, or at least reincarnation.

More fics with characterization I vibe with - a complicated, rough-edged but ultimately lovable Xue Yang, a compassionate but stubborn and somewhat brittle Xiao Xingchen and a Song Lan who feels so much and is so bad at showing it. More SXX fics overall!

For art, more art with the CQL character designs! The designs for the other adaptations are kind of cute, but they're just not my guys, and I feel pretty lukewarm toward them on the whole.

(And fellow artists - please, please, please don't forget Xue Yang's missing finger! 😭 I see so much fanart with either 10 intact fingers, or a glove with a fully articulated left pinky. His lost finger is the driving force of his entire character arc, don't just forget about it...😢)

19. you're mad/ashamed/horrified you actually kind of like...

Hmm... 🤔 On the whole, I don't feel a lot of shame for my tastes in fiction. I'm surprised I actually ended up really liking the main couple as much as I did - in a love story, no less? That literally never happens, I always go for the sideline gremlins.Other than that, though...

Trying very hard to hold up the blorbos and my usual go-to tropes, groping around for any sense of horror or shame, but I can't think of anything really. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

22. your favorite part of canon that everyone else ignores

I guess I'm that one (1) person who actually likes the Yin Iron plot? I genuinely think CQL made a lot of good choices to tie the sprawling narrative together more cohesively, and I liked the introduction of the Yin Iron and how it led into the creation of the Yin Tiger Seal rather than tossing the latter in as an "Oh yeah, this was a thing that totally existed all along, forgot to mention". (I know MDZS was written and posted in installment, and that can make it hard to work with foreshadowing etc, but even so. I do think CQL did a good job tightening up the story in many ways.)

And don't get me wrong, I absolutely don't mind the idea of Xue Yang as an absolute nobody clawing his way up from nothing! It's a delicious version, too! But there's just something about the idea of a family he could have belonged to, a sense of community he could have had, ripped away centuries before he was even born.

If I want to be a petty, I guess I could put "Xue Yang is canonically brilliant" under this question, too, because I wish that was explored in more fics and meta. The boy is a prodigy. He's a genius. He's also a street-brawler, petty thief and murderous little piece of shit, but that doesn't take away the first point. Let Xue Yang be the highly, dangerously intelligent Problem that he actually is!

[lilacs-in-space]

1. How many works do you have on AO3?:

9

2. What's your total AO3 word count?:

87,894

3. What fandoms do you write for?

I only write for Star Trek these days. I muddle between all of them as I tend to write for small background characters I've developed unhealthy obsessions with.

Back in my fanfiction.net days I predominantly wrote Star Trek Enterprise and Stargate Atlantis but I took a 20 year hiatus (more or less) in writing fanfic. I only really started writing again about 6 months ago because Star Trek Picard made me simultaneously so happy and so angry that my creativity just exploded back to life.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Not Your Typical Disaster Scenario (Discworld - Terry Pratchett) 

Eight Down. Yellow Bird Who Goes 'Quack!' (Discworld) 

A Way With Wordes (Discworld) 

Come freely. Go safely; and leave something of the happiness you bring. (Star Trek: Picard, Star Trek) 

Where the falling angel meets the rising ape (12 Monkeys (TV))

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Absolutely! Nothing makes my day like receiving a comment on a fic. I always make sure to leave them on fic I enjoy too.

6. What's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

I think my fav kinds of endings are bittersweet rather than angsty. A lot of the time they end with lovers parting, willingly or not. Love me a 'doomed by the narrative' type.

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

A Way With Wordes - it ends with a wedding announcement!

8. Do you get hate on fics?

No, which given that I've written for an insanely unpopular ship once or twice, is actually a little surprising.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

My good man/woman/rogue, I only write smut these days. I used to live for fluffy friendship fics, and I like to think I still inject a lot of tenderness into my work, but I am more motivated by the idea of becoming a good erotica writer than anything else these days.

10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?

I don't. I thought about writing a 12 Monkeys/Picard crossover but never went through with it.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Yes. I had a bunch of Spock/McCoy poems I wrote back in 2002 reappear over a decade later on AO3 under someone else's name. Not an archive, just some guy pretending he wrote them. I honestly didn't care. They were exactly the kind of mawkish tripe you'd expect a 12 year old to write.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Nope.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Back in my day, sonny, we wrote fics round robin style through hotmail.com or on the yahoo message boards. (So yes, but we're talking like 20 years ago. I don't do it anymore because I'm in too weird of a niche these days!)

14. What's your all-time favourite ship?

Nebula class. Looks like a frog. I have a Nebula model on my desk that I replaced the decal of to make it the T'Kumbra!

OH, you mean like...OTP? Uh... I don't think I have one anymore? Back in the day I used to read a tremendous amount of McKay/Weir(SGA), Archer/T'Pol (Ent), and Jack/Sam (SG1) but these days I really enjoy reading about niche characters and ocs. Some of the best fics I've read this year have been oc/oc fics or obscure character(OC) and original character(oc) fics.

15. What's a WIP you want to finish, but doubt you ever will?

You got me in between the devil and the deep blue sea - I was so taken with this idea when I started, then I got super sick and now whenever I think of working on it, I just feel tired again and don't. We'll see if I return to it.

16. What are your writing strengths?

I feel like I'm really good at setting a mood and drawing a person in with all their senses. I get a lot of comments about that.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

I don't use one word where many will do. My chapters are way. too. freakin'. long.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

I do this a lot, but I always put in the translations. If it's a sentence, I will place the translation after the sentence. If it's just a word, I'll put in a glossary.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Ever? Star Trek TOS and it was a Spones fic. On AO3? Discworld and it was Vimes & Vetinari.

20. Favourite fic you've ever written?

I am obsessed with A Perfect Match. I love delving into Romulan and Vulcan culture and exposing the similarities and dichotomies of two arrogant characters like Letant and Solok.

However, I am also very proud of Not Your Typical Disaster Scenario which I wrote based on a piece of art I found super inspiring.

If you’re reading this and want to play, I hereby tag you with no pressure. 🥳

[spitfiregal]

How Ahsoka Sees Anakin

Clone Wars Ahsoka has faith in Anakin, they’ve saved each other’s lives multiple times, he’s mentored her, and cheered her up, he’s family. 

A sith tells her Anakin will Fall. A sith who she knows hates Obi-Wan with his every breath, why should she believe him? 

When everything goes wrong, she senses Anakin in a conflict and then her bond with him feels as if he is dead. In the book, she believes that he is dead, and she remembers him well, no one wants to remember the bad parts of a friend that they lost, they want to cherish the best parts. That’s just how people work. 

She didn’t know Anakin committed genocide for sixteen years. She didn’t know Anakin was Vader. I feel like some folks in the fandom forget that.

Then in Rebels she senses him in Vader, and then she’s filled with turmoil. The pedestal she’s been putting him on for more than a decade crumbles and she’s filled with self-doubt. 

In the Lothal temple, she denies to herself what Anakin has become. But wouldn’t you? Imagine, there’s a good chance your best friend betrayed you and everyone you loved, what wouldn’t you give for it not to be true? 

In the Malachor temple Vader tells her Anakin’s dead. To me, I think she’s aware of the double speak. She says she will avenge his death. To me, she’s saying the man I remember would abhor you, the man I remember is gone, and only you who has destroyed everything remains. And so they fight. 

Then Vader says her name. Anakin says her name. 

That’s the whole point of Star Wars, you know. That there is still good in Vader. 

And it’s at that point Ahsoka recognizes that there is still good in Anakin. Anakin whom she left behind then lost forever, of course she regrets how they parted, who wouldn’t? They didn’t part well. Part of has to wonder how much of it was her fault (even if it could never be her fault). She’s only been dealing with the weight of his Fall for a few months at this point. 

She says, I won’t leave you. 

Anakin is alive. Anakin is Vader but Anakin is and always has been capable of good. Just as every human is. 

And yes, her declaration is a show of loyalty, a demonstration of love, for the man she once knew, for the man who was once her brother. 

She doesn’t say, I forgive you, or I love you, or anything that absolves him of his guilt. Only I won’t leave you. 

And maybe that’s selfish of her, maybe the right thing for her to do is to run away to fight another day, but isn’t that a lot to ask? She loved Anakin. She mourned Anakin. But Anakin is now a monster, and at some level she believes it’s her fault, that her choices could have changed everything.  

Narratively, Ahsoka cannot bring Anakin back to the light (that’s Luke’s role). 

But she doesn’t know that. 

And that’s what makes her character interesting. Ahsoka always tries to do the right thing but the greater narrative negates all her efforts. 

Ahsoka almost always fails, but she never Falls. Anakin almost always gets what he wants but he Falls anyway. 

Ahsoka isn’t a perfect character, if she was she wouldn’t be interesting. She’s a tragic character, just because she doesn’t die doesn’t mean she isn’t doomed from the start. 

The question isn’t just about Ahsoka’s morality, it’s a story: the question is about our own morality. 

What would we do if our loved one made terrible choices? And what if we thought those choices were our fault? 

[beevean]

For the character thing: Zero and Hector!

Zero:

favorite thing about them: his character arc in the Zero series and his cool attitude. His gameplay is also super fun too :D

least favorite thing about them: how he stole X's role as the protagonist in his own series. Good thing he eventually got his own series, but man, in games like X4 you'd almost forget the blue guy is there.

favorite line: "I never cared about justice, and I don't recall ever calling myself a hero… I have always only fought for the people I believe in. I won't hesitate… If an enemy appears in front of me, I will destroy it!"

brOTP: XZero, I love their close friendship <3

OTP: Zerociel. Very much like their development and how they make each other better :) and, yeah, XZero works romantically too, I just think their bond is wholesome no matter what.

nOTP: uhh I don't know? Does... Does Zero/Sigma exist? Don't answer it.

unpopular opinion: don't think I have one, I don't closely associate with the MM fandom lol.

song i associate with them: Falling Down, his most memorable moment of glory.

favorite picture of them

Hector:

favorite thing about them: his whole character arc of him learning to accept his own humanity and worth <3

least favorite thing about them: the implication that he fell in love with Julia because she looks a lot like Rosaly. Dude. That's a dick move >:( and it's not like the narrative is complex enough to explore the kind of trauma that would lead him to latch on people like that :\

favorite line: “Even if the world of man rejects me… Even if I were to not have a place to exist… Even if I were to be hated… Even so… I am human. I sought this power so that I could remain human! Not for anyone’s sake! For me!! For myself!! Not to be the pawn in some ridiculous plot for revenge!!”

brOTP: Helia! I want them to be friends :D

OTP: Hectaly my beloved ;A; they're so stinking cute and they have a warm chemistry and FUCK YOU ISAAC YOU JEALOUS SLUT. Also yeah I very much like Isaactor in that "they could have been something more, if life didn't doom them to grow apart" way.

nOTP: Lenector lol. Absolutely disgusting and disrespectful. Don't really have one in game, but I guess my least favorite ship with him is Aluctor (I just don't feel they'd have an interesting chemistry)

random headcanon: he names his Devils after mythological Greek figures, to honor his origins.

unpopular opinion: he's not just Angry Dude lol. Even more unpopular, N!Hector started out as a perfectly valid interpretation of pre-betrayal Hector, what with his very alien view of humankind, and if he only betrayed Dracula of his own instead of being used by Girlboss Vampire (with all that it lead to), I would have had far less problems with him.

song i associate with them: Awake by Ok Goodnight. In my opinion it perfectly fits Hector's growing sense of self worth and his escape from Castlevania. (the bridge is ofc the fight with Isaac)

favorite picture of them:

[icharchivist]

Set up of the scene aside (i still hate those Specters), this is just lovely, and the fact Tifa is the one who chases them away makes me emo.

Like... man everytime Aerith is lost in some way, every single time, Tifa is there to reach out for her and hold her hand and guide her outside of it.

She is always promising Aerith that she will find a way for her to get out of it, and it's just. so lovely. They care for each others so much.

also major major MAJOR spoilers under the cut:

(from late OG stuff that weren't adapted in Rebirth yet and from the Movie in particular)

I think it's especially lovely because of how Tifa is set often as the guide in a spiritual sense in the story, and it's why her last name is "Lockhart", "Locked Heart". Where Aerith represents the Earth itself and the nature that keeps on living even after countless abuses, Tifa represents more this determination to carry on while wearing your heart on your sleeve, and more specifically, she's therefore the one who is often used in the OG to navigate the deepest problems in your heart.

more precisely, i'm thinking about when Cloud is completely vegetative again, after Aerith's death and after having had his mind totally broken by Sephiroth, and that because the Earth is destroying itself to invoke the Weapons to protect itself from the Meteor. In that bit, Cloud and Tifa gets to fall into another opening of the Earth and are brought in the lifestream inside of Cloud's repressed past, and it's Tifa who has to therefore walk him through his heart, literally, to help him out of it. All while also the implication is that it's Aerith, from the otherside, now that she is one with the lifestream, who is helping making the situation possible while putting Tifa in this position of a guide.

And I especially find it, so, so lovely, that because Tifa has this role as a guide in the depth of your heart, guided by the lifestream, Tifa is the one who can reach out to Aerith, she is the one who can promise her they'll find a path together, she's the one who is chasing the Specters away.

And it makes me think especially on how Tifa grieves Aerith by repeating multiple times everything she knew Aerith wanted out of life, that "she wanted to live, more than any of us", and the way to set up Tifa here as the person who wants to keep Aerith outside of those darkness? is so lovely to me in particular.

Finally it also makes me think of the movie. I cut it from the screenshot bc it was weird in the narrative, but Aerith mentions "follow the yellow flowers" and then yellow flowers breaks, and it reminded me how in Advent Children, when Tifa has this fight against Loz in Aerith's Church, she is always trying to keep him out of the flowers while the yellow petals keep floating around her, and the director for the movie said that it was an indication that Aerith was trying to protect her from the otherside.

And later in the movie when Aerith fixes everything and everyone rejoice, and Tifa is the only one (aside from Cloud) who feels Aerith's presence and goes "somehow, i knew you were here. Thank you."

Like.... There is this thing in the OG and in the movie that marks how Aerith has been protecting Tifa and how Tifa has been protecting Aerith, that Aerith helps Tifa being a guide through turmoils, and here we see it set up nicely with how it's Tifa who is constantly looking to get Aerith outside of this doomed path, she is the one who is constantly trying to find her, to keep her out of the lifestream influence, from her fate, just like Tifa is the one who especially resents how Aerith got her life robbed from her.

SO I MADE MYSELF PARTICULARLY EMO ABOUT IT.

Fuck the Specters, i fucking hate this added plotline, but using it to clearly showcase Tifa's role as the Guide, and showing how desperately she wants to keep Aerith away from her fate, how she is the one defying the odds for her?

Yeah it's getting to me. I'm in fucking shambles.

[starw1sh]

finished if we were v*llains and damn it, I really enjoyed the last 30 pages. Which is so unfortunate, because I hate read most of that book and only finished it because I bought a physical copy and there's no way I'm wasting money like that. More thoughts (with major spoilers) under the cut because jesus christ

Oh man, I am not immune to whatever the FUCK was happening between Oliver and James. There's a comparison to be made with their dynamic and Hannibal and Will in NBC's Hannibal that I can't quite put words to it yet. Like they made each other so much worse but would do anything for each other. Oliver finding out James literally MURDERED Richard and then deciding he would take the fall for the crime like 2 hours later was crazy. AND THEIR ONLY KISS BEING ON STAGE???? PERFORMING THE SAME SCENE WHERE IN REHEARSAL JAMES BROKE OLIVER'S NOSE???? Insane. Insane. How am I supposed to be normal about this. Yes he loved him. But the truth was, he still did. I need to run laps over this.

And God I LOVE an ambiguous ending. Like I do think James is dead at the end, but that one quote from earlier in the novel (and I'm paraphrasing) where it was like 'a tragedy always has you hoping everything will work out until the very end'. Like I do think ultimately Oliver's life IS a tragedy and it's that hope that will keep him going even if it's doomed. That’s why we don't get any confirmation that James is 100% dead or if he's 100% alive. There has to be hope. It's kind of like Richard not dying immediately in the water but being left to die, like he COULD have survived but he didn't. James COULD have survived but I don't think he did. That being said, Richard could have survived if he has been helped and Alexander ended up surviving his OD because he was helped. So maybe since it's implied that Oliver is going to go searching for James (and since he's already helped him by taking the fall for the crime), he will be able to "save" James and find him alive.

But what then? James is still overcome with guilt about Richard's death and Oliver is still Oliver. How do they move on from that?

Other than the ending, this book pissed me off. The way characters found out information felt contrived (ESPECIALLY Oliver having to do "work study" by cleaning his own house?? Which leads to him overhearing a bunch and finding a bunch of spooky clues. That was so stupid), the pacing felt unintentionally slow, and I think the whole book was bloated with characters that didn't really matter. Like I enjoyed Alexander and Wren, but besides occasionally pushing the plot along they didn't really do much. They just weren't fleshed out besides "queer guy who does a lot of drugs" and "weirdo rich blond girl who I imagine walks around with the scariest blue eye stare". And don't even get me started on the handful of side characters who get even less attention.

Also I UNDERSTAND the author has a masters in Shakespearen literature but god damn did a lot of that fly over my head. Honestly I didn't dislike the book more or less because of it but it was a little frustrating. The characters kept getting casting lists and I was like "wow :) idk what that means but congratulations or I'm so sorry"

Ughhhh I also feel like because of how HEAVILY this text relies on theatre and Shakespeare, it would be better in a different medium - like theatre or tv. I have not read a book in a while that I think could benefit so obviously from a good adaptation. Especially since Oliver is so oblivious, his internal narration could translate to just staring at people intensively without loosing much narrative weight.

Final rating is probably 2 and half stars out of 5. The ending did save it for me and there were some really compelling scenes but most of the time it was just. Annoying.