#how far is too far gone to save?

[isfjmel-phleg]

I was taking notes and instead got socked with the impact of a storyline that at a glance looks like a random digression before the actual climax but actually is crucial to the themes and arc and now I'm expected to just dry my hair? and go to bed? like nothing happened?

[benoitblanc]

no no you guys don't get it. the x files cancer arc was, excuse the pun, a fucking white whale of a tv plotline that would not have worked nearly as well on literally any other show. it was a complete hail mary. the writers' room nearly didn't make it happen because they were worried it would fall too deeply into soap opera territory. and on any other show, it would! but the x files is about four key things: mistrust in the government, faith in both science and the otherworldly, building a life around trauma, and the fine line between love and codependency. it is the only show where the entirety of this situation- a government experiment on an unwilling young catholic leads to a terminal illness that is counteracted by a literal scientific miracle in the eleventh hour due to her partner's refusal to accept her impending death- could both happen at all and happen well. none of the themes in the cancer arc were new to txf at all. they'd all been lurking, to some extent, in the background since the pilot. the cancer arc wasn't merely milking a left-field catastrophe for the drama, it shoved the overarching themes of the show to the front and said look. look what these people are to each other. look how impossible it is to face the darkness alone. regardless of when the plotline was conceived, it was always going to happen. it was the only way the story could have ever gone. they were always doomed from the beginning

[pokimoko]

The fact that Main-verse Ooo is as good and as kind as it is (relative to the other universes shown so far, at least, it's obviously not perfect) all because of the same character that starts off as the OG series' antagonist, the person we were made to see as the bad guy (albeit an often ineffectual one) for several seasons, is making me lose my mind.

Imagine finding out the guy you spent your childhood beating up and saving princesses from is in fact a driving catalyst behind you being able to exist, and not only exist but also live in a world that knows what kindness is. All because that man, the same man who you've witnessed do terrible things, once met a little girl and taught her how to be good.

Simon's story really shows us that even if you lose your way and forget how it is to be good yourself, the world keeps the memory for you. That act of love Simon showed Marcy by protecting her and seeing her as more than the monster she thought herself to be created ripples upon ripples, small at first but eventually enough to help give their wreckage of a world—a world that easily could have been forsaken, its goodness overlooked because of its inhospitable remains—a chance to grow into something beautiful. Because of those very same ripples Simon created, the people of Ooo grew up in a world where they know enough about kindness that they were able and willing to spare the 'bad guy' some, to see beyond the wreckage and allow him to grow too.

In saving Marceline, Simon helped to not only to save the world, but also himself.

[dykedvonte]

Just now realizing that Sozo was at the top of spore grotto which is the second highest location next to Ratau's shack and he always stayed in the highest part.

Remember how those cordyceps make ants travel to very high points before they burst and spread spores to cover the most ground...

[spacedlexi]

trying to keep all my clemviminnie thoughts contained until i get to episode 3 but

its hard

[atopvisenyashill]

not an f&b aegon ii fan, not a hotd aegon ii fan, but a secret third thing (a fan of the aegon ii that only exists in my mind)

[risingsunresistance]

twitter is entering their "rts > likes" phase now that likes are private after they spent years calling us ungrateful for being demotivated by ratios lmao

[gumy-shark]

god i love thinking about my ocs. figuring out storylines. etc

[suffarustuffaru]

i just. remembered again that i have a fembaru fic but also the premise is. Very Messed Up hah and also it was written before the canon genderbent au with its official genderbend names for everyone so its also outdated on top of that T^T i had like. Genderqueer subtext going on too. but i also wrote this fic like almost two years ago and havent touched it in forever so im unsure if i should go back to it…. o.o but i would love to finish it one day if only for my own satisfaction hah… i had a very detailed outline for ch 2 (its a twoshot) and several scenes written already anyway!! (and also i would probably update those names, make minor edits, etc etc hmm…)

[dragonknightofsummerset]

Cleared the war table of missions (minus the resources/gold ones that are repeatable) before doing "wicked eyes and wicked hearts" & crying cause of all the new war table missions that appeared

[catkin-morgs-kookaburralover]

feeling weird mixed feelings atm and I can't really logic them away, ig? on the one hand I'm completely apathetic about it. on the other hand there's a part of me that's absolutely horrified that I could do something like that. the fact that it's still a consistent low-level pain the whole time also doesn't help. anyway those kinds of thoughts are then making me want to harm again to cope with them but also a) it's manageable and b) I currently have a deep horror of self-inflicted pain after the last few days apparently.

[sumeragi-hokuto]

Set 4 of chapter 3, volume 4 of the Tokyo Babylon manga. 9th chapter overall.

Cleaning/typesetting done by me, official Dark Horse translation used.

Select/open the images to view in higher quality.

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[birdmenmanga]

sorryyyyy sumiko is still the fucking character of all time like at the beginning of the series you're like yeah whatever. mom's not in the picture. dead anime mom we've all seen it. and then you find out she's not dead she's just like. wandering the country doing deadbeat mom business. whatever. more important things are happening. her first appearance in person is her dropping a dragon on top of her son. she doesn't even say hi. then someone comes in and says "hello I'm the supernatural government and your mom has been committing god murder aka supernatural treason. how are you feeling about this, besties?" and then you find out her husband really really loves his wifey (despite her being so absent). and then you actually meet her for real and you're like oh! oh. oh yeah she's so fucked up hahaha jesus fuck

[lestatlioncunt]

❝It was believed that the marriage between lady Arianne Aspasia of House Vance of Wayfarer's Rest and Colton of House Celtigar was one of love. A claim that held only a partial truth: the affection lord Colton felt for his dear wife was undeniable, while the rumors surronding lady Arianne spoke of a deep closeness she only ever shared with her childhood friend, princess Rhaenyra Targaryen. Though, the union gave life to two twins: Visenyra Cornelia Celtigar and Maegar Lucretio Celtigar. At their birth, the siblings were graciously gifted with two dragon eggs of princess Rhaenyra’s she-dragon Syrax, a most precious gift from the woman they would grow to consider almost as a second mother. The favoritism and even the curious naming of the Celtigar twins, undeniably reminiscent of House Targaryen offspring, kept the realm whispering about the true nature of lady Arianne and princess Rhaenyra relation.❞

[lynaferns]

I love how I have a playlist for Richard that starts with crazy songs or about questionable decisions, continues with random music and ends with depression.

It's funny because it's literally the order in which the character has developed inside my head.

[bionicbore]

Y’know I kinda wanna elaborate on the HC I mentioned, where I said that if Donald hadn’t found out what Douglas was doing and intervened, Douglas would’ve eventually cracked and fessed up

Mostly I wanna elaborate that he wouldn’t have fessed up because of ethical guilt (though I do think he may have something somewhere inside him that would give a damn about ethics. He did seem pretty excited to do good things after all) but more because he’s got the emotional strength of a wet tissue and would feel personal guilt after getting so attached

I’m gonna put most of it under a cut ‘cause it turned into a full on Douglas study I guess

Like... obviously I’m prefacing this with it being my own interpretation of the guy, but Douglas was a pretty emotional dude in the show. His entire redemption was rooted in his emotional attachment to his family. His morals never 100% improved, and the growth we did see was almost entirely motivated by “My family won’t like me if I’m a bad guy :(”

And while he’s not a particularly GOOD dad, he is a dad. Literally every kid Douglas gets more than 2 minutes of screen time with, he goes into some kind of Dad Mode

So, the way I see it, I don’t think Douglas would’ve lasted if he got to keep the Rats for longer than he did. It’s never actually said how old the kids were when Donald found out, but they couldn’t have been older than like... 3? Tops? Possibly even younger, technically. If Douglas actually got to watch those kids grow up in whatever messed up environment he had them in to keep them hidden (Which, I’ll be honest- based on comparing the brothers’ lab quality, was probably a worse environment than Donald’s lab) I don’t think he would’ve been able to commit. Not with the original trio, anyway

ALSO. I wanna bring up Donald, ‘cause he’s also a factor in of himself

Yeah, the brothers fight a lot, and did fight a lot. But I think it’s worth remembering that despite that, these two founded a company together. They invented things together. They work together seamlessly when they get in the zone. Douglas, despite all the animosity, was ecstatic at the prospect of getting to work alongside his brother again, and was genuinely sad when Donald didn’t feel the same, but chose not to fight Donald’s decision

Douglas cares what Donald thinks of him, and I bet he cared a lot more before Donald discovered what was happening and made his own judgement call. The two of them had to have been incredibly close, and that probably would’ve weighed on Douglas, too

But Donald found out on his own, and he didn’t waste time. He saw the children, he saw the conditions, the plans, the schematics. There was absolutely no way to rationalize what was happening here, Donald had to get these kids out and away. His little brother was using their assets to make deals with terrorists regarding the creation of bioweapons in the form of children

And Douglas was left ghosted by the most consistent presence in his life for the past 20+ years, locked out of the company he helped build from nothing, and separated from these kids who have also been a consistent presence in his life for entirely different reasons

And Douglas is notorious for deflecting and pushing back when someone else decides that he’s in the wrong. All that potential turmoil means the time between Donald finding out and Douglas “dying” was probably like. Intense. To put it mildly

All this to say: Douglas is still a DICK lmao and the point of this post is NOT to be like “Douglas deserved better” or even “Donald is to blame.” It’s more about how Douglas is a notably emotion-driven character and how it affects his dynamics and actions, both positive and negative

It’s also my favorite kind of angst- where technically, things could have turned out okay, or at least better than they did, if everyone involved hadn’t been such a mess