#have done so right from the beginning

[backjustforberena]

Rhaenys Targaryen being perceptive as HECK:

Devotion has never sat well with him. Where he goes, he wishes to be his own master. [...] Not as such (will he challenge her). But neither can he allow her to command him.

"Neither can he allow her to command him." - We never see Rhaenyra actually order Daemon's flight to Harrenhal. Not directly. It was his choice to go when he did, it was his plan to being with, at the start of the whole thing - to create a toehold in the Riverlands. It was Daemon's instincts and feelings. He follows his own path.

Again, Jaehaerys's murder was done without Rhaenyra's sanction, he chafed against staying on Dragonstone whilst she searched for Luke's remains, and he took charge of the war council and drew his sword against Otto without waiting for her leave to escalate. He addresses Otto's terms before she does. Whilst he shows loyalty and believes his motives to be selfless and his allegiance as true, it's not true deference. He seeks power/independence where he can.

Devotion and love don't sit well with him, though he has great capacity for it - we see him struggle with those feelings and the warring sides of his nature during Harrnehal: his brother, his niece, his second wife. His ignorance of his daughters. There is a corruption to his love. An acidity.

"Where he goes, he wishes to be his own master" = he goes to Harrenhal, and wishes to be his own master, and even King.

He doesn't not challenge her "as such" = he never raises banners against her, never pushes for his own claim other than in private conversations. Still, his behaviour causes Rhaenyra to have doubts in herself as Queen and others to have doubts in her as well.

It absolutely challenges outside perceptions of her rule - his lack of communication creates fractures in her council, leading, amongst other things, Alfred to question her suitability. It also makes her strategy wayward as they cannot be sure of ground support for any campaign. She's doing things she shouldn't have to do because of his behaviour.

His behaviour also challenges her because the things that he does impacts how her cause is received. Her name is cursed in King's Landing because of what he enacted, leading to the death of Jaehaerys. They blame her for what he did in her name.

Otto Hightower would never have allowed this. Hotter blood has prevailed, I think. The young men have taken the bit in their teeth. They wish to punish, to avenge. Soon they will not even remember what it was that began the war in the first place.

Otto Hightower did, indeed, not allow or know anything about sending Arryk to assassinate Rhaenyra, leading to the death of both twins. In fact, Otto was appalled by the scheme.

It was, as Rhaenys surmises done on the orders of the "young men" (Aegon, and the less young Cole) - as punishment and revenge for the death of Jaehaerys.

Aegon has "declared" war following the death of his son and has seized on offence. He did this whilst his blood ran hot: a scene where he is smashing up Viserys's model.

We teeter now at the point where none of it will matter. And the desire to kill and burn takes hold and reason is forgotten.

The deaths of the children (Luke & Jaehaerys) in the scene with Alicent and Rhaenyra, ultimately don't affect the idea of peace or war. Alicent does not change her behaviour due to the loss of a grandson, and Rhaenyra does not for the loss of her son, either to make war or peace more or less likely. The road is already set. They reach a point where it doesn't matter.

Rook's Rest represents a point of no return. They pass the point.

Rhaenys sees "the desire to kill and burn" take hold over reason in close quarters - she sees Aemond burn his own brother. That is the kind of savagery: the unforgivable. The bloody war between dragons and the hateful act of kin against kin. It's chaos.

Rhaenyra’s council is wayward. She has a hard task. I must hope she will rise to it, but I fear she’ll need you by her side sooner than late.

After Rhaenys dies, Rhaenyra has one council session, where each of the men around her have individual ideas - they argue amongst each other but none of them have no true plan to offer her. There is no progress.

Nor does she rise to command them: they continue to ignore her, shoot her down, not work with her, leaving her isolated. As Rhaenys fears, she needs Corlys. Rhaenyra soon offers Corlys the role of Hand.

[lyxchen]

I've seen a lot of analizing outfits and pictures of the actors and trying to figure out if they have hidden meanings for season 3 of Squid Game. And while that's also really interesting I think the best indicator for what might happen and which characters survive the longest in season 3 is who is the most present for promotional stuff. The actors of characters that aren't going to be as important are a lot less likely to appear in interviews, in little promotional videos on the social media accounts and at live events. Now there's obviously always the possibility that an actor just didn't have the time to appear at live events or be a part of a lot of shoots for other promotional stuff but if we ignore that for a second I think it's very likely that three of the most important characters of season 3 (aside from Gi-hun and In-ho obviously) will be Hyun-ju, Geum-ja and Myung-gi. All three of their actors are in a lot of the promotional videos and photoshoots, especially when there are only a few actors that are part of it. Both Park Sung-hoon and Kang Ae-sim were present for the Tudum live events and while Yim Si-wan wasn't there he was the person who got the card with 'two' written on it in the days leading up to the Tudum live show and Myung-gi has also been very present in a lot of the official posters. Often with posters characters of bigger importance will be bigger/more in the front and I don't think they'd put Myung-gi this much in the center if he didn't have a more important role this season. I think Jun-hee might also get pretty far since Jo Yu-ri was also part of that Tudum countdown and that photoshoot of some of the actors with the light shining on them in the shapes. The only other actors of players (once again excluding Gi-hun) in that photoshoot were the actors of Hyun-ju, Geum-ja and Myung-gi. So in conclusion if we look at a lot of promotional content for season 3 that has been put out by Netflix and especially everything that has a limited amount of actors we can see that it's always the same 4 actors of players that are still alive (Myung-gi, Hyun-ju, Geum-ja and Jun-hee) which is why I believe that these four characters are most likely to survive the longest or maybe even make it out alive

[rangersoup]

I’ve decided. Turn and Burn (the Carlos horse girl fic) is gonna get a rewrite/revamp once I’m done with The Lone Ranger. It’s gonna be the second installment of my Rangers spinoff fic. It will be both a direct continuation of the Lone Ranger and set up for some other stuff on down the line.

[al-mayriti]

idk if it's because my mum worked in a tv magazine or what but all the media wars and backstabbing and stuff happening behind the cameras is so so interesting to me

[alackofghosts]

[emerges from my cave covered in blood] so i've been playing avowed--

[fionnaskyborn]

People like this have made me terrified that I am mischaracterizing my favorite character by playing into his strengths and emphasizing them so much... That I'm making things "too anime", "too over-the-top", and by doing that straying away from the groundedness that made the character compelling in the first place... But I think it's better to be a fan who loves someone so much they're willing to step into goofy over-the-top showcases of strength and morals out of love than being a fake fan who only ever rags on what they proclaim is so dear to them. I dunno. I don't think I'm wrong in saying that. I'm hella insecure when it comes to my own writing, especially with this guy because I want to do him as much justice as I possibly can as a writer. But I have to convince myself that it's not too much.

[heireign]

she is absolutely hypercritical toward herself, and no one else — she’s never quite ? she’s rarely ever wholly satisfied with anything she does, and more often then not believes that there IS always more to be done.

[usertoxicyaoi]

INCOMING MARRIAGE OF CONVENIENCE -> LOVERS?? ITS WHAT I DESERVE.

[justalittlebluetiefling]

Something I've seen a couple people saying is that they want to make sure that Laudna understands that she's not the only one who has been through trauma. But like. Laudna is not the only one who needs to learn that lesson. Actually, it's not even that Laudna needs to learn that she's not the only one that's been through trauma at all, because they're all very aware of what they've all been through. This became an inevitable confrontation when Laudna decided to let Delilah back in, though, and after rewatching the scene, I actually think the only people who managed this situation correctly were Imogen* and Ashton.

Orym and Laudna are both more focused on their own pasts with the sword and not thinking about each other. Orym should have talked to the group and come to a decision with them about using the sword and Laudna should have talked to him about it instead of trying to steal it.

*my feelings about this are still up in the air don't read into this too much

[touchlikethesun]

okay so. don’t crucify me. but su she and jin guangyao do actually make some pretty compelling points.

[spooky-something]

These playlists are gonna make me cry, I can't, they're so bad...

Don't you dare try to gaslight me, Victor would NOT listen to Will Wood, leave him out out this...

Like, for actual characterization, this one had it, a lot of these songs are actually on our own Frankenstein playlist...

Heavy on HAD...

[faeyun]

i think it’s time to admit that i have writer’s block… i feel really bad because i’m not sure if i’ll get the stupid cupid! rework done for valentine’s day （◞‸◟） the event collab fic will definitely be out on the 28th, but that might be all you guys will be getting from me for february unfortunately TT

[wonder-worker]

Any judgement on [Richard III's] reign has to be seen as provisional. The critic of the reign only has to consider how the Tudors would now be regarded if Henry VII lost at Stoke, to realize the dangers of too many assumptions about the intractability of Richard’s problems. But it would be equally unrealistic to ignore Richard’s unpopularity altogether. The fact that he generated opposition among men with little material reason for dissent, and that the disaffection then continued to spread among his own associates, says something about what contemporaries regarded as the acceptable parameters of political behaviour. There is no doubt that Richard’s deposition of his nephews was profoundly shocking. To anyone who did not accept the pre-contract story, which was probably the majority of observers, the usurpation was an act of disloyalty. Gloucester, both as uncle and protector, was bound to uphold his nephew’s interests and his failure to do so was dishonourable. Of all medieval depositions, it was the only one which, with whatever justification, could most easily be seen as an act of naked self-aggrandizement.

It was also the first pre-emptive deposition in English history. This raised enormous problems. Deposition was always a last resort, even when it could be justified by the manifest failings of a corrupt or ineffective regime. How could one sanction its use as a first resort, to remove a king who had not only not done anything wrong but had not yet done anything at all?

— Rosemary Horrox, Richard III: A Study of Service

[eta-volantis]

I am starting to get annoyed with people calling LycaHugo and PhaiDei "bait" like there isn't even a canon straight ship wtf do you mean??? This is a game where they sell you characters, not ships. They can add them in as best they can while avoiding censorship, but they also have to allow player freedom to interpret relationships how they like because a lot of players are going to be attached to the chars they potentially paid for. If the game is full of confirmed straight ship then sure! Yes! The most crazy part is that the only confirmed ships Hoyo have are both wlw from HI3 like??? Not straight, last I checked. Hoyo does a lot of scummy stuff, but disregarding attempts to add gay ships around strict censorship that could fuck up their game as bait is starting to really annoy me. If they don't have it, they're scum, if they do have it, they're bait. Like what?? If you don't like the games then just don't play it, why is it so hard!!? Move on to something you like!!?? Continue to call for better ratio between male and female chars instead of trashing something they already actively do maybe??!!

[fridgevespidae]

the thing is that id love to go in the ocd tags but i fear the advice would kill me and also whenever someone says something about how 'oh x is actually not good for your ocd' i end up obsessing over whether or not i have 'good' ocd and am 'actually doing enough on my end to combat my ocd' then it spirals into 'im not doing enough to combat my ocd and because of that im bad and not good and am evil and terrible and deserve bad things to happen to me' so i can safely say i dont know if the ocd tag is quite healthy for me

[shikai-the-storyteller]

Alright, wordcount of the current "Love will cost you an arm and a leg" chapter (only including the "finished, I don't need to edit this" part) is 5,700+ words.

That's not including the second half of this chapter.