#i genuinely think at the very least one of these is going to be botched

[prismatic-bell]

So I got part of Avenue Q stuck in my head, and you know how people say something was "a product of its time" when talking about racism, sexism, etc.? It is occurring to me I finally get that. Because while sometimes it's just...wrong and was always wrong, I have to wonder how many people who either weren't into pop culture in the late 90s/early 00s or simply weren't alive then don't realize Christmas Eve is supposed to be poking fun at weeaboos. The show was written at a point in time where America just kind of went crazy about Japanese pop culture for awhile. Like. Everyone. Everywhere. A major pop singer (Gwen Stefani) literally paid for a group of "kawaii girls" to follow her around as part of her image, and Smile.dk (which had zero Japanese members) debuted with a song called "Butterfly" in which the singer "searches for a man all across Japan, just to find my samurai" and featuring some non-lyric vocalizations that I genuinely hope weren't supposed to sound like Chinese tonals because they really sound like someone botching Chinese tonals (and, you know, assuming All Asian Nations Are Japan). Pikachu was on the front of Time magazine, most of the weekday afternoon programming block on Cartoon Network was anime, kimono-style tops (although usually facing the wrong way) were a huge trend, and for those who still wanted tees or regular shirts with long sleeves, well...

Do I have any idea what that says? None. Did I own one of these? I did not--I owned three of them. All three of mine looked like lacquer boxes with koi or traditional flower designs. I found out later the writing on at least one of mine was complete gibberish. The designer just picked some kanji they thought looked cool. And yes, basically every top I owned that wasn't one of these was a kimono-style. Wearing chopsticks in your hair became A Whole Thing if you weren't flatironing your hair (and yes, people used actual chopsticks, not hair sticks--I'm not even sure hair sticks were really a thing in American fashion until this point). On the internet side of things, 2channel was possibly getting shut down and 2chan sprang up, and quickly got so popular in the western hemisphere that we got--yep--4chan, the same year Avenue Q debuted. 4chan is weeb culture, or at least, that's how it started. (In fact I think it's also where "weeaboo" was coined.) A couple of years later, MCR would include Japanese verses in a song just...because. Because that's what we were like at that point in time. 1998-2005 (or so) was when America had its own taste of Japonisme. And into all of this you get Christmas Eve. Who's loud, and brash, and assertive--not at all a docile me-love-you-long-time weeb fantasy. Her English is a little broken, but she's not stupid--in fact as far as we can tell she's the most educated person on Avenue Q (Kate and Princeton both have BAs and Rod probably has a master's in business, but Christmas Eve has two separate master's degrees, which she earned in her secondary language). Her accent is thick, but there's literally a song ("Everyone's A Little Bit Racist") where some of the characters get called out on laughing at her for it. And--crucially--the white man she marries is so far removed from anything related to pan-Asian culture in America he doesn't know he shouldn't call her Oriental. Is this absolutely terrible given he's marrying a Japanese woman? Yes. Is it kind of baffling that another character immediately says "the term is Asian-American," since Christmas Eve refers to herself as Japanese? Also yes. Is it weird that a guy who (according to the timeline) was born in 1970 would be using Oriental? Extremely. Is it a dig at the exoticizing that was going on at the time? Absofuckinglutely. (And that's why that anachronism is there. It's very much pointing out that society was treating Japanese pop culture the same way our Victorian forebears treated Japan in general in the Meiji era.) And like. I'm not saying Christmas Eve is some kind of unproblematic depiction here by any means. Even in 2003 her accent was...icky, and now it's downright unacceptable. And there's the question of whether they fell into one stereotype ("Asians are so smart!") while trying to mock another ("if you can't speak English you must be stupid"), and whether that's an acceptable trade-off. I'm not even going to get into her name being a Christmas cake joke because....look, I could sit here and explain all the puns in the names but that's a whole other post and it's literally easier to say "Brian, Kate, and Nicky are the only characters whose names aren't jokes."

But there's a huge nuance to why she was written as this bizarre stereotype-but-not-but-yes-but-not-but-yes-but-maybe mashup, and I think there's a big possibility you literally just had to be there to understand. It really truly genuinely is a product of 2003. You could not write Christmas Eve in 1983 and have her make any damn sense. You could not write her in 2023 and have her come across as anything but wildly racist. Like. Maybe that phrase isn't just don't-be-mean-to-your-elders bullshit. (At least, not all of the time.)

[tiannasfanfic]

Hit Points

Eddie Munson x Reader (Fluff)

[Masterlist] [Crossposted to AO3]

Summary: Eddie Munson loves it that you play in his campaigns. Even after playing in many of them, you can still really surprise him sometimes.

Rating: General Audiences

Author Note: Gender neutral reader, they/them pronouns. I took a break from smut writing to write something fluffy. ALL of my WIPS are up to scenes of heavy smut and gaaaaah.

CW: Nothing that I can think of. There's talk of D&D characters dying, but no details.

Word Count: 1,252

It was the end of a particularly brutal campaign.

Brutal for the players, that is. This one had been specially designed to be extra nightmarish.

Eddie Munson had been feeling kinda froggy while planning it. He had been feeling that way ever since the group had accused him of taking it easy on them last campaign. Which, admittedly, he had. It wasn’t on purpose though. He was only partially ashamed to admit that he half assed that one. He wasn’t fully ashamed because he had also been busy planning an anniversary weekend at the same time as he was planning the campaign. He’d never been with someone for a year before and had put a majority of his attention into that.

The anniversary weekend camping in the woods with you in his van was a rousing success.

The campaign, on the other hand, was not.

Rather than just admit it was his own fault, Eddie decided instead to crank the next one up to an eleven to teach you all a very important lesson.

Never gripe to the DM about his campaigns.

It was a suitable time to teach this lesson since these were new characters, they were low level, and this was a short campaign anyway.

The whole dungeon had been extremely difficult, making you all burn through most of your supplies, but it all came down to the final monster; a flying Eldritch monstrosity that your characters could barely touch. The table was filled with expressions of dismay and horror as the die rolled beautifully for Eddie, but no one else. Blows were dodged, spells were botched, and it didn’t take long before you all were on your last legs. It was going to take two rounds before the party was wiped and the game was over.

It was the top of the round and your turn. You sat there starting at the game mat with a thoughtful expression. You were silent, chewing on your bottom lip, and thinking carefully over your next move.

“Well, Princess?” Eddie finally asked after a few minutes, then tapped his wrist cuff like it was a watch. “Clock’s ticking.”

Eddie had met you not long after the incident in the Upside Down. While the town was still treating him like a pariah even after getting his name cleared, he never really expected that to change. At least he wasn’t wanted for murder, so he was just back to his regular old status of freak. But Eddie had to admit, now that he had more friends, it was a lot easier to deal with. He ended up spending a lot of time with his newfound crew after finally graduating, which now included hanging out at the video store where Steve and Robin worked. When you started working up there too, the two of you hit it off immediately. It didn’t take long before you were soon dating and soon after that were officially in a relationship.

When you showed an interest in playing D&D. Eddie started teaching you how to play, running one-person campaigns for you at home. While he loved doing this with you, he figured you’d lose interest before long like most people did. Contrary to that, you fell even more in love with the game than he was, if that were possible. His group took to you quickly since Eddie didn’t give them a choice in the matter, but they genuinely warmed up to you after a while.

“Give Y/N a damn minute, Eddie,” Erica said, rolling her eyes. “They’ve got one hit point left and they want to make this one count.”

You nodded in agreement with Erica but stayed quiet. Before Eddie could goad you further, you looked up at him.

“Can you describe the chamber we’re in again?” you asked. “And please be as detailed as possible.”

Eddie smirked, leaning his elbows on the table, and resting his chin in his hands as he gazed over at you.

“You’re not gonna escape me, Princess,” he said, batting his eyes at you.

“Wasn’t trying to,” you said seriously. “I just wanted to make sure we’re not missing anything important.”

He indulged your request, reading off the detailed description of the chamber you were all currently in. To access it, you all entered through a temple and fight down ten floors. The underground chamber was large enough that the monster could fly around in it comfortably. Near the beginning of this fight, one of the first botched spells had collapsed the doorway, sealed the chamber, and cut off escape. There was no other way out. The party had been very thorough in their search of the chamber before the monster found them. They hadn’t missed anything that could help.

After considering the game mat for another minute, you started asked about the chamber structure itself. You asked about the walls, the ceiling, the structural columns, everything. You left no detail unexamined. At this point, Eddie noticed the other players were actually patient for once, quietly listening while looking back and forth between the two of you like they were at a tennis match. They knew you never got any special treatment or hints or advantages being the DMs partner. He was almost harder on you than the other players in hopes of avoiding that accusation from happening. But they also knew if anyone could figure out Eddie’s thought process and understand his mind, it was you.

There was another period of silence while you thought things over again. Eddie could see your eyes shift between the various figures and tokens on the mat.

“And this place is old,” you said thoughtfully, sounding like you were talking to yourself.

“You’ve never seen a place more ancient, Princess,” Eddie said, then smirked. “And aren’t likely to again.”

You nodded then raised your gaze to Eddie with a look of determination so fiery it made him get goosebumps.

“How many hit points do the columns have?” you asked.

Eddie blinked.

Everyone else blinked.

That was a question no one had been prepared for.

“Uh, come again?” Dustin asked.

“Think about it,” you said, addressing the party, looking at each player in turn as you spoke. “We’re not leaving this cavern. No matter what we do during this turn, we will not survive. But we can make sure that thing doesn’t either. We take out those columns, we bring this whole place down on top of it.”

“And seal all the horrors of the temple away from the world,” Gareth said, realizing what you were saying.

“No one will ever be lost to this place ever again!” exclaimed Mike.

The Dice Gods seemed to be impressed by everyone’s sudden burst of drive, and fortune started favoring you all. The columns were easily dispatched before the monster’s next turn and the temple was brought down, wiping out the party AND the monster in the process.

Despite the fact everyone died, spirits were high. Everyone stayed afterwards to help clean up Dustin’s basement, excitedly talking about the campaign and praising Eddie for yet another fun adventure. Even you gave him credit for it, even though he knew full well that it was all on you. Had he killed everyone off like he originally planned, everyone would be moping, would’ve left immediately and you two would be cleaning up alone. But, instead, you made them all feel like heroes.

That ended up being the night Eddie decided he was going to ask you to marry him.

[szkin-art]

very mixed feelings about the ending of gwitch. Overall I can say I enjoyed the show as a whole a ton, and still think it’s really strong, but the conclusion wasn’t what I wanted. More under the cut.

Gundam Witch from Mercury Episode 24 Spoilers!

I’m glad they didn’t magically resolve the entire central conflict of the setting. The Bennerit Group is gone (good) but Earthian-Spacian inequality isn’t going to go away after just three years, and all those assets *can* just be bought up by Spacians again. If we get a sequel series ala Zeta, this is a clear hook.

We get a brief sketch of how gund-tech has proliferated in the epilogue - Petra’s legs, the nape commlinks Suletta and Miorine have, and so on. All fine, though I still hope we eventually get something set in AS that explores the transhumanist potential that’s hinted at in the Prologue, even if its just a manga or something.

Suletta and Miorine are explicitly married. They are more explicitly a couple than most straights in Gundam. On the other hand, in a show so uniquely focused on their relationship, it feels like a copout to not have a properly romantic conclusion. Let them kiss Sunrise.

Eri becoming a gay keychain is very funny.

Nika’s gay ass haircut singlehandedly carrying half this epilogue for me. I wish we got more of Earth House.

El5n doing his little hiking expedition emotionally destroys me after recently finishing 00.

Guel’s epilogue scene is funny, but I maintain they fundamentally botched his character. After the One earth episode, they pretty much hit the brakes and rolled his entire arc back. Spacian Capitalism and Parental Abuse is Fine Actually, but at least he respects women now.

Shaddiq is just getting sentenced to death or SuperJail or something now? Idk. He feels like such a wasted character to me. Biggest case of “why is this plot in the show if you never intended to do something with it”. I’m glad his mean girl squad are out and thriving.

Idk - the ending feels a bit like an anime that was given a set amount of episodes and then abruptly cancelled near the end. Yet S1 was paced perfectly and we already knew the show would have 24 episodes back then. So I’m genuinely mystified by how this happened and what decisions were taking place behind the scenes. Did they expect a third season and just not get it? That feels kinda insane given how well the show did.

I think with how much they’ve left open, there’s absolutely room for a movie or a new AS show with a different protagonist, but Suletta as a protagonist has definitely concluded her arc. Mind you, it’s satisfying and well done (but also SUNRISE, LET THEM KISS YOU COWARDS)

Above all though - it’s been extremely fun watching the show from week to week, sharing theories, art, opinions and everything else with other fans. It was my first time watching a Gundam series as it aired, and the show will be irrevocably special to me for that reason alone.

[everybody-loves-purdy]

My thoughts on Thunder / ASC so far!

- This is my favorite arc, hands down. TPB was great too, but I wasn’t ever a big fan of Tigerclaw/star as the main villain, as I found him rather generic. Splashtail, Curlfeather, and Berryheart, on the other hand… fantastic characters, I adore how they’re written.

- Frostpaw gets spayed? Hell yeah!! Interesting plot point, and at least we now know that the Erins can no longer pull a Violetshine with her and make her into another boring stereotypical background mother after her arc is over.

- I really like the writing of Sparkpelt, Finchlight, Bayshine, and Myrtlebloom here. I’m glad Sparkpelt and Finchlight aren’t getting demonized anymore

- I’m fine with EITHER Squirrelstar *or* Ivystar. I think it’s safe to say that Squilf didn’t get all nine of her lives - it’s quite likely that Bramblestar only has a few left, so maybe she only got one or two of them? Something is fishy abt that, so I wouldn’t be surprised if we get Ivystar by the end of the arc. If Squilf stays leader, though, I’m cool with that too!

- Finally some acknowledgement of Sparrowtail and Hollowspring! Hollowspring has been a fave background cat of mine for a while, so him getting more development is great

- The way Sunbeam handled Cherryfall’s disrespect was very mature. I really appreciate that, after how immaturely we saw Nightheart handling his own conflicts in ThunderClan back in Sky. Very stark contrast

- The park cats! I was kind of hoping to see WarriorClan initially, but I’m glad we got them instead. I really liked Rook and Bee, was kinda hoping that one of them would be coming back with them - Wasp is a bit of an odd choice, but I digress

- I loved the tasks that Ivypool gave Sunbeam. They make sense, and are completely reasonable - and I believe that it’s leading up to Sunbeam mentoring one of Spotfur’s kits, eventually! That would be sweet

- I kinda hope that Duskfur is morally ambiguous. Perhaps in on the murders of Mistystar and Reedwhisker, but not involved in the dogs attacking Curlfeather: I believe that she genuinely seems to care for her family, and for Frostpaw, and am hoping that she gets a chance to prove herself a better cat by the end of the arc

- SO GLAD the arc’s main villain wasn’t Mapleshade. Don’t get me wrong, I really like her, I just feel that she’s already had her time to shine and that she really shouldn’t become relevant again - it could ruin her character too

- The development for all three protags has been fantastic. Nightheart has matured a lot, and I’m very glad for that - I like him, but I’m not sure how much more Sky-esque angst and whining that I would’ve been able to take.

- VOTE TIGERHEART OUT. I assumed Berryheart was going to be exiled for something atrocious, but instead it was rather for questioning his leadership? What a terrible guy.

- Fingers crossed for Tawnystar. If Tigerheart gets voted out, I’m really hoping that she steps up to fill that role - she deserves it *far* more than he ever did to begin with

- I love Whistlepaw, Her interactions with Frostpaw are adorable, and I definitely ship them!

- Glad to see Smoky, Corriander, and Little Daisy again! Wasn’t expecting that, but hearing that they’re friends of Whitlepaw’s was nice

- I’m loving this arc too! It’s been so good so far and they don’t seem to be losing momentum!

- this whole Frostpaw situation is extremely interesting, I’m just hoping the Erins don’t botch the handling of it. But I am curious as to what role it will play and why.

- I just loved seeing Sunbeam make those friends. And how at the end Finchlight says she’s like kin? I love it.

- I personally think that worse case scenario she only got 8 lives. I just feel that such a deception would just be too big and risky to try and pull off if she didn’t get many or any lives.

- Yeah I’m interested to see where this is going to go with Hollowspring and Sparrowtail. I was starting to think they had forgotten about them like they have Pouncestep but I’m glad to see they’re including them!

- Sunbeam confronting Cherryfall is one of my favourite moments of the book!

- I’m still kind of sad we didn’t see WarriorClan, maybe in a few more years perhaps. I have a suspicion Bee could end up as RiverClan’s next true medicine cat that can have visions. I feel like his vision of seeing cats across and iced river is telling him to take the risk and go and join them.

- I really love how Ivypool’s tasks were all focused on teamwork and co operation, especially since that’s what mainly sets TC and ShC apart, a really interesting detail I love they included in this book actually.

- Yeah I do think Duskfur definitely has an idea about something even if she isn’t in on the full picture, I’ve still got my eye on her.

- Yeah I’m glad it isn’t Mapleshade too, I’m glad we’ve gotten at least one new female villain in her place. Mapleshade is great but given how last arc was all about using old villains, I do like how we’re getting some flesh blood here.

- The development of the protagonists has all been fantastic this book and I actually respect Nightheart a lot now? Wild times we live in

- Yeah I thought Berryheart was going to cause someone to die but instead she just gets told she has to leave because she disagrees with her leader. I can’t help but feel like ShadowClan May heading towards civil war now. Berryheart has allies with her and vocal allies in the clan, we have no idea how many more silent allies she may have.

- Given the end of Tawnypelt’s novella I doubt we’re ever going to see Tawnystar apparently, but it’s a nice dream to have. Hopefully her son is out of power by the end of the arc at least.

- Protip: everyone get yourself someone like Whistlepaw in your life: she’s just such an incredible friend

- yeah it was a nice surprise to see them again! Mainly the kits lol

[phoenix-before-the-flame]

Hey phoenix how have you been this is scar anon if you still remember me! Anyways I just have your laxus fanart rotating in my brain again and I am having so many thoughts like,,,I wonder how he got that scar yknow it's such a prominent part of his character but as far as I can recall (which is admittedly not very much considering I haven't watched or read ft in a hot minute) mashima never explained where he got it? God I wish there was an angsty backstory to his scar (or honestly more laxus backstory in general) but if we're being honest he probably just ran headfirst into a pole or smth.

Anyways sorry for my ramblings this was a poorly disguised request for some laxus headcanons if you have the time! (Can you tell he's my blorbo? That fanart you did genuinely restructured something in my brain and I still can't stop thinking about it to this day) Aight that's it from me have a good day! 👍🏼

Finally i can get around to answering this lol

With regards to Laxus' iconic eye scar I don't really think there was any deep reasoning or logic behind it on Mashima's end (from a character design stand point at least) other than having it be a visual tell that yup, this guy's got lightning powers so he's got a lightning shaped scar to let the audience have a clue about that. It's a similar thing with like, giving your fire characters flame printed clothing, or your evil characters red eyes or your yugioh character crazy hair to let the audience know that this is the protag.

It's more of an element to add some interest to his design and key readers into his magic before the big reveal than something i think was definitely added to tie into any backstory related thing.

And if it is connected to anything backstory related that was revealed later down the line a la 100yr quest i dont care because i dont care about anything to do with the sequel lol.

That being said, i've had this old ass concept regarding Laxus' scar that i've always meant to get around to and you've given me the perfect opportunity to talk about it.

So like, in my head and my tweaked version, Laxus' scarring is instead of a random cool looking lighting scar it's literally lightning scars.

Like scars you get from being struck by lightning. Lichtenberg figures.

(Took off his tattoo and guild mark for the sake of clarity)

Enter Phoenix- verse Laxus lol

Reasoning for this is because I've always figured that the operation that dropped that lacrima in him was a botched one. A sorta test run of making a 2nd gen slayer to work out the kinks down the line for better and smoother operations.

So that being said, in the initial months after the operation the lacrima did not adjust smoothly to being in Laxus' body and adapting to work with his natural ethernano so the lacrima would often times send out shocks through his body during that time as the dragon lacrima's and his ethernano particles would slowly sync up and work in unison

Hence resulting in the all over lichtenberg scarring starting from his chest (i always hc the lacrima's somewhere in the chest near the heart or so) and going through the head, arm and leg as exit points for the electricity when he used to get those shocks.

And the scarring would sorta wrap around his head too! If you shaved his head (sorry King) you would see that it would stretch across the scalp as well.

This whole thing also left his right eye slighter weaker than the other (not enough for him to be completely blind in it but it goes kinda fuzzy sometimes).

The whole full body scarring never really raised much questions though, a lot of people who see it just assume that it was a really bad magic accident (I hc that some elemental magics are more volatile and trickier to master due to the danger they could pose to the user so stuff like lighting and poison for eg are less commonly used than say water or air related magics). But those who know, know (Hello Makarov and Thunder Legion).

So uh, yeah. My headcanon and slight redesign regarding Laxus' scarring lol. Probs a lot more extra than you were bargaining for but i wanted to be able to visualize my idea properly 😅

Also bonus the scarring glows when he uses his magic :]

[nomsfaultau]

12) Hiding an injury//Enemy to caretaker// “Do you trust me?”

Disclaimer: this blurb is set in the SCP SBI AU I have called Fault, specifically mid Part 2. Explanation of AU; tldr. 

Tubbo flinched anytime he moved too sharply. It was a fact Philza noticed quickly, and one he had very little idea what to do with. It wasn’t the full-on recoiling The Blade was regarded with, so there was that at least. Actually, Philza was very proud of The Blade for leaving Tubbo alive. He’d never managed to allow a survivor before, so it was real progress that he’d only maimed them. Not that, uh, that was a thought he’d share with Tubbo, given they were utterly traumatized. It made his heart ache with the need to help relieve that fear. 

Only problem was Philza terrified Tubbo. So tender, fatherly advice wasn’t exactly going down smoothly at the moment. 

They bristled protectively whenever he brought up Tommy in a way that was positively adorable, and they straightened like a little crow puffing to look bigger to threats whenever he approached, which was…decidedly a tad concerning. They put up a stoic front, antennae flat and expression flatter, thinking any obvious vulnerability to be a death sentence. A useless gesture, since Philza obviously didn’t want to hurt Tubbo, and if he did they wouldn’t stand a gods m̷̤͋̔ṷ̵͚̆f̸̼͐f̸͈̾͜i̷͖̪͑̕n̸͎̟̄̏ed chance against a dragon-god regardless of a brave act. 

He suspected they tracked his every movement like a rabbit waiting to bolt, but then again it was very hard to tell with Tubbo, their obsidian eyes wide and watching. From what he could tell, that observance was the crux of the issue. Tubbo saw, and Tubbo never forgot. Which was a problem, because Philza couldn’t remember exactly what happened. Or, he had a vague idea, but every time he tried to examine the memory it crackled like static, a bristling briar that was by all technicality passable but all together unpleasant. The recent past only netted pain, pain, and surprise surprise, more pain. But apparently in that haze of drug-induced madness Philza had done a Foundation-wide massacre or two, and Tubbo was staunchly disapproving. Naturally he’d tried to emphasize the part where he was being mentally tortured and had every right to lash out, but Tubbo remained unconvinced. Fair, given Philza planned to annihilate the Foundation long before the amnestics were involved, but also Tubbo would have no way of knowing that! 

Previously, his Collected’s opinions on murder ranged from ‘hell yes’ to silent acceptance, so how was he supposed to know it was suddenly frowned upon? Sure the memory of his beloved children was ripped cruelly from him, but he hadn’t any acquaintance with Tubbo prior even before then. Philza would’ve had no way of knowing he wasn’t supposed to murder all those villains. 

And now his newest kid thought him a monster.

Frankly, it was all very awkward for Philza to have so completely botched their initial impression, especially given that Tubbo saved his immortal soul. That certainly deserved a life debt, but Tubbo refused to accept cash, check, or any type of affection. But Philza had worked with difficult kids before, and was above all a patient man.

It helped that he did genuinely like Tubbo. Or, at least the idea of them. He was endlessly thankful to them for rescuing him from the Foundation. Especially if they apparently loathed him and did so anyway, their morals outweighing even their immense disdain. The, uh, same morals that got him in trouble with them in the first place, but still! Admirable conviction and dedication to their tenets. It reminded him a little of himself for the few principles he claimed. Not morals, ye gods no, morals were a terrible idea for an immortal. But Philza was painfully diligent in his principles, and he could appreciate someone cut in the same shape if not from the same cloth. 

And Tommy just glowed whenever he talked about Tubbo. In glimpses, he caught just how sweet they were when the friends interacted. It was really just the cutest thing. And he was pleased Tommy was making friends, especially given, ah, recent horrendous misunderstandings. He was endlessly grateful Tubbo had helped Tommy while he was suffering.

Not that they weren’t suffering in their own right. Philza always had a weakness for hurting children. Instinctively he’d wanted to protect Tubbo the first moment he saw the wounds The Blade inflicted. Not that Philza had the greatest grasp on pain, let alone for one so far from human anatomy, but it had to be agonizing. They were so strong for enduring it all. Truly, he thought them wonderful, and couldn’t wait for their relationship to get through this rocky start.

Okay, sure Tubbo didn’t even view him as a person, but all relationships had their stressful moments. Open and honest communication was the solution to that. For example, Wilbur didn’t stop trying to run away until MONTHS after they first met, and now look at them! They’re a wonderful loving family. And in time, Tubbo would be just the same. Philza was certain all it would take was determination. Patience and warmth would lower their defenses. He was certain of it. 

.

It wasn’t that Tubbo could hide the injury. That would’ve been impossible after what The Blade did to them. 

No, what Tubbo hid was the fact it was getting worse.

The pain meds ran out quick, which really wasn’t a surprise with how heavily they relied on them. About all Tubbo could do was grimace and cope. That was pretty much the summation of how Tubbo was dealing with everything right now. Run out of literally the only thing getting you through the day? There’s no replacement, so tough luck. Oh there’s a world wide secret organization hell-bent on your torment? Not like they could dismantle an entire system. Helplessly watching your best friend’s toxic father figure slaughter hundreds of humans who refuse to listen to your pleas to run because they’re brainwashed by said evil organization’s cultish rhetoric? Haven’t we ALL been there? Forced to rely on God m̴̤̂͝u̶͙̠͛f̵̝͉̌f̵̛̠i̷͍̓̈́n̷͉̺͛ monsters for protection even as their actions fueled the Foundation’s cruelty? What else could they possibly do? All Tubbo could do was survive and swear to themselves that they’d grab Tommy and run the second there was a chance. The moment they were done healing Tubbo was gone. 

The Foundation was right. Monsters were real, and Tubbo lived among them, watching their banter and grins and affection. Nearly mistakable as people, had Tubbo not seen atrocities pour out from their hands. 

And Tubbo wasn’t so indistinguishable from them as they’d like. The most insidious part of the Foundation was that they bent and broke people into the shapes of monsters, regardless if they were anomaly or human. Broken down into awful creatures just hurting each other as they tried to survive. Tubbo was not exempt from that not matter how hard they’d struggled to resist. 

So if they were hunted, if they were horrified, if they were hurting– Tubbo couldn’t claim none of it was deserved. 

.

Philza was trying to give them space. Their irrational fear would no doubt be soothed by exposure to kind interactions, and if Tubbo felt safer at a distance then by all means he’d support that. Just, as long as they weren’t actually distant, since he didn’t want them to be in danger. But sitting at the edge of camp or perching high in a tree overhead was perfectly alright. And as days passed their unease did seem to fade, joining in more in conversations or meals. Still, it was a maintained separation. 

And it was the distance that disguised the growing problems. No one close enough to realize how tormented their sleep was, their little jolts of pain so easily mistaken for flinches. How much were they dissociating just to get through the day? And why hadn’t anyone noticed? 

Slowly but steadily the injury reknit itself in a horrific, contorted fashion from medical neglect.

There were excuses, of course. There were enemies to fight and limited supplies and simply Philza didn’t know what was normal for Tubbo. But crucially, Tubbo refused to tell anyone. How much of this was because Tubbo was terrified even a glimpse of weakness would get them torn apart? Abandoned to the wolves the moment their burden on the group grew too great? But Philza didn’t care if Tubbos’ needs outweighed their use to the group; He cared if Tubbo was okay. 

But why should Tubbo believe that? They were monsters, weren’t they? 

Tubbo grew more and more quiet as Wilbur paced frantically, trying to plan impromptu corrective surgery. Weighing just how much of Tubbo needed to be cut away so the corruption didn’t spread. “I could sedate you,” Philza offered hesitantly. “Build a fire, wait for the smoke to anesthetize you before the surgery begins. Do you trust me?”

Tubbo laughed at him. It was a short, acerbic bark. “It can’t be any worse than when they were destroyed to begin with.” An inclination of the head towards The Blade. He shifted awkwardly, this flavor of guilt still novel to him. He left quietly, giving ample space, and Philza didn’t miss the way the line of rigidity down their spine eased. 

“I just don’t think suffering is necessary,” Philza tried

“Oh don’t lie to us. We’ve seen your view on suffering, and it’s rather graphic.” But that was different! Tubbo mattered, unlike those vile humans. 

Philza didn’t miss the way being sedated would also leave Tubbo vulnerable to the imminent attack Tubbo always seemed to be bracing for. Were they any other of his children, he would’ve anesthetized them regardless since it was obviously the kindest option. But he knew that would only exacerbate their strained relationship. Tubbo didn’t yet realize he had their best interest in mind. 

So Philza left, too, hoping they would feel safer. Even if every instinct in him demanded a vigil, that wasn’t what Tubbo wanted, even if it was what they needed. Bees slipped out over head, desperate to gain distance, because apparently, that’s what Tubbo did when hurting. The small miscalculation Tubbo made was in how far inhuman ears could hear. Because they weren’t anywhere near far enough when they broke down and started screaming. Philza and The Blade shared an uneasy glance. 

It only grew worse as the surgery drew on, ragged, tormented buzzing contorted in the shape of Tubbos’ agony. Aching with sympathy, Philza’s tail wrapped around himself. But why should Tubbo ever accept his help? 

Desperation came the answer. A swarm beelined for him, spasaming wildly. Distorted words staticked out, incomprehensible but frantic. But in the frenzied panic, he caught a single fragment of a human word.

Help.

It was all Philza needed. He jolted into motion, fire already building in his throat as he blitzed for his suffering kid. Smoke spilled out, smothering the scene until Tubbos’ body slumped beneath Wilbur’s scalpel, slumber offering respite from the agony of consciousness. 

Philza knelt by Tubbos’ side as Wilbur worked, and remained long after, softly billowing smoke and allowing them the peace so long denied. He hated that he was such a last-ditch option, but at least he was an option. This was progress, as depressing a sentiment as that was. The fact they'd ask for help at all was as heartening as it was distressing they'd waited so long. 

Hopefully, it wouldn’t come to this the next time they needed him. Philza was tired of being regarded as an enemy. 

[brandwhorestarscream]

Idea for Amnesiac!Shockwave: he was a warframe who didn’t want to serve his designated function and instead wanted to become a scientist, so he used his size-changing powers to appear as an altmode that was deemed “appropriate” to have such a job and ended up interning at the Autobot Ministry of Science. However, upon finding out the Ministry of Science’s more unethical projects, he was horrified and attempted to share the horrors of what they had done to the rest of Cybertron, only for both his plans and true altmode to found out by the Autobot High Command, who subjected him to empurata as punishment for his “treason”, spreading of “malicious slander”, and refusing to serve his function, alongside shadowplay so that he would be incapable of telling anybot what he had discovered.

Amnesiac!Shockwave is a huge dork, very emotional and socially awkward but very earnest and passionate about both equality between frametypes and his line of work (Basically, you know Milo Thatch from Atlantis: The Lost Empire? That’s him full stop.), at least assuming that the shadowplay isn’t in effect here. If it is, however, he still displays that persona but as a form of masking to try his best to retain a sense of normalcy and hide the fact that something is “wrong” with him. (To potentially make it even more angsty, given how Animated!Shockwave has been shown to be kind of sassy with a dark sense of humor, perhaps the shadowplay was botched and left him incapable of feeling positive emotions/genuine happiness that isn’t derived from another’s misfortune or just unable to feel love and empathy.)

He also ends up forging a close bond with Bumblebee and acts as an older brother to him, similar to his dynamic with him in his Longarm disguise except 100% genuine. Whether Bee feels the same or is deeply uncomfortable by it depends on what point in the series he loses his memories and whether or not Bee knows the truth about Longarm yet.

(Oh, and he’s still devoted to Megatron, just in more of a ‘squealing fanboy’ sense. The dude’s super upset he can’t find his copy of Towards Peace anywhere because if he did he would be BEGGING on his servos and knees for Megs to sign it.)

We have almost exactly the same ideas about amnesiac Shockwave XD I originally didn't include him cuz he's not part of the earth cast, but I can delve into it real quick

Amnesiac Shockwave in TFA is reverted back to a young, idealistic, and incredibly passionate mech. Shockwave is the most curious person you've ever met, always humming and hawing and investigating anything he can get his hands on. He's overflowing with energy 24/7, a whirlwind of emotions, constantly bouncing from one topic to another at the drop of a hat. He always has like a minimum of three projects going on at once, and the fastest way to get his attention is to offer a kernel of knowledge he doesn't yet have access to

He's so eager and overly friendly he's honestly A Lot to deal with. He talks a mile a minute (not super speed enhanced speech like Blurr, but rather a sort of autistic/ADHD rambling infodump) and will follow around anyone that will listen. As a born war frame and stuck on the southern half of the planet he didn't naturally have access to higher education or even of-quality information a lot of the time, so when he was young he may or may not have spent time teaching himself how to hack and manuever around firewalls on the internet just so he could read and learn.

Big agree on him using his ability to shapeshift to infiltrate the north and go to school--he wanted nothing more than to learn. Science is his greatest love and he always pushes for more, more, more!

But, enough backstory. With him stranded on earth with no memories, he's just an overly-excited neurodivergent science student that is over the moon to be on an organic planet. Think of all the things to study! Carbon based life forms, evolution on micro and macro levels, a functioning water cycle, weather patterns, polar vertices, planetary rotations, everything you could imagine! He's never been so excited! Starry eyed and full of joy, it's tangible even tho he doesn't have a face anymore

Since TFA Shockwave is considerably more expressive and sassy than, say, his Aligned iteration, I hc him to either have not been shadowplayed, or having a very minor case. So his mental state is still pretty stable, but the changes to his body... they definitely come as a shock. The usefulness of his hands has been severely cut down, only 3 barely-dexterous claws instead of fully articulated fingers and a thumb is a huge blow. Not to mention his face--he doesn't even look like a person anymore, and it's the cause of much despair. Yeah, he can shapeshift, but it's not the same. This could also open the door to the earth team being introduced to what empurata is, another horror of the autobots' past that has been erased for the sake of making them look good. State-funded mutilation of citizens isn't exactly a good look, after all

[demetriandelibinaryboyfriends]

Pride Month Character Sexuality Headcanon Moodboards 1. Yasmine - Lesbian 2. Demetri Alexopoulos - Gay 3. Moon - Bisexual 4. Eli "Hawk" Moskowitz - Bisexual

Next up is my favorite little gayboy in the whole world!!! Why am I so dead convinced he's a little gayboy and not a little biboy??? I'm so glad you asked!!!

Yes obviously he's in love with Eli, a boy, but I firmly believe Demetri has never once genuinely yearned for the touch of a woman akidjsilufhk

MF literally spends his first scene of the show limp-wristing. I am not kidding in the least.

Like even Eli is sus in the first pic akajsldibhodfku

"But that's circumstantial evidence, tumblr user demetriandelibinaryboyfriends!!!" you say. "He starts simping for Yasmine immediately after, so doesn't that cancel it out?"

Well, see, that's exactly what he wants you to think.

The reason he does this imo is actually kind of sad. Miguel comes to the table (Demetri's first potential new friend in like 10 years!!!) and immediately shows an interest in girls, establishing that he's probably a Regular Straight Guy. Miguel has seen Demetri talk in a slight gay lisp (he does!!! Don't @ me!!! Like maybe they were going for "nasally nerd voice" but it just sounds like the stereotypical gay guy voice???), have Some Kinda Fruity Vibe going with Eli, and limp-wrist all over the place, and Demetri knows this. He's also just met Miguel, and has every reason to believe this straight dude will ditch him immediately if he suspects Demetri's gay (high school kids really ARE that cruel sometimes), so...he tries to cover his ass and pretend to be straight so Miguel will stay :(

Speaking of Yasmine, though!!! Basically every time throughout the series that he shows an interest in her, it feels extremely performative. Like he's just saying what Miguel (or whoever else) would expect him to. And it's only ever about looks and social status in a way that suggests he sees Yasmine as a kind of placeholder/cover-up--"the conventionally attractive girl I act obsessed with so no one suspects I'm gay."

On that topic, the irt S1 Demetri, the fact that he picks a very unattainable girl to show blatant interest in is huge. Like what better cover than "pining" for a girl who you believe there is 0% chance you could ever actually date??? Indefinitely permanent beard without once having to fake a straight relationship!

I also think this is why Demetri is so gloriously unbothered when he botches hitting on Yasmine in 1x09. Like sure, he's socially inept, but he's not unintelligent; anyone with two brain cells could tell Yasmine wasn't interested (and he doesn't have the Eli-esque ego-driven delusion to think he's doing better with girls than he actually is). So why does he happily say "I think that went well!" when Yasmine walks away??? Because he's filled the Expected Straight Guy Quota beautifully by shooting his shot with a hot girl, and now that that failed he's off the hook!

Another funny thing is that he ONLY goes and hits on Yasmine after he's seen Eli making out with a random girl. I think it's both a mimicking kind of thing ("well, shit, if this is what Eli's doing I'd better do it too!" they're like cats I love them) and an "I guess if Eli's gonna start kissing girls and be unavailable now, I have nothing to lose so I might as well" kinda thing.

Generally speaking, S1 Demetri, um...sure does procrastinate getting romantically involved with girls. We're meant to believe it's solely a lack of confidence and his general defeatist nature, but like. Every chance he gets, he puts off making a move on girls. He straight up tells Miguel he's going to wait until he gets a well-paying, respectable job before asking any hot girls out. Homeboy literally putting off dating girls for like 5 decades. Not to mention the Halloween dance, where he tells Miguel to "slow his roll" asking girls to dance and says it "could've been worse" when they in fact don't end up dancing with any girls. Both rather flippantly and cheerfully, too! Like Demetri only ever seems to care about girls when Miguel is around, which goes back to my theory that he's worried Miguel would abandon him and Eli if he figured out Demetri was gay.

Tbh I don't think Demetri's lack of initiative with girls is because he's a defeatist because...he seems indifferent (sometimes even chipper) about his lack of luck with women. But when it comes to Eli being bullied??? He is ACTIVELY bothered. Like he's clutching the back of a chair in a silent rage during the library scene. He looks heartbroken when the cafeteria kids start snickering about Eli's mom calling the school. He goes off at Johnny when he makes fun of Eli's lip! Clearly Demetri doesn't like being at the bottom of the school food chain, even though he's also a defeatist about getting bullied. But when it comes to girls??? Every time the loser trio fails with women, Miguel tends to take it 5000% harder than Demetri, who legit barely bats an eye!

I feel like I don't need to convince you of the Demetri-Eli subtext, because otherwise you wouldn't be on my page, but...it's worth mentioning that Demetri spends all of S2 being a sad little simp for Newly Evil Eli and completely forgetting Yasmine's existence while she's in France. Moon is the only one who acknowledges Yasmine's existence all season, but that gay subtext is a conversation for another day XD In any case, Demetri quickly 100% forgets the girl he was supposedly "so into" during S1. Wack! Speaking as an ex-high schooler, btw, you don't just forget your crush over the summer if you really liked them that much. You yearn and talk wistfully to your friends about what they might be up to XD

Also worth noting that as soon as Demetri does drop the Aggressively Straight facade and forms genuine relationships with women, platonic bonds with girls seem to come second-nature to him! He very easily befriends Moon and Sam, despite being scared to so much as interact with girls for years. But as soon as he does, connecting and being amicable with girls seems effortless as long as it isn't romantic. It brings to mind how gay men often have a lot of close female friends and tend to be more at ease around them because there's no concern of underlying sexual/romantic tension.

Tbh you could argue the only time Demetri's relationships with women suffer is when he Tries Too Hard To Be Straight. He has healthy and solid friendships with Sam and Moon, and he has never once tried to flirt with either. Among all the girls in the cast Demetri regularly interacts with, Yasmine is actually the one he has the most contentious relationship with. And why's that? I would argue it's because he feels obligated to hit on her whenever they're together, lest his hard-earned new friends suspect something is abnormal about him. Not Moon as much, but Sam and Miguel for sure--as far as he can tell, they are both 100% straight and it's very possible he's worried about them abandoning him for being a "weird freak" the same way Eli did. In any case, him hitting on Yas makes the atmosphere between them tense and uncomfortable, making his relationship with her feel more stilted than his more organic-feeling interactions with Moon and Sam.

Worth noting that he only really brings up Yasmine/waxes poetic about how "into Yasmine" he is around the people he MOST wants to think he's straight--Sam, Miguel, and Eli. Sam and Miguel are his best friends sans Eli, and Eli, well...of course he would constantly bring up his Girlfriend He Totally Likes So Much around the dude he absolutely does not want to suspect he's into!!! In S4 especially he just got Eli back, and shies away from anything that might open a rift between them again, especially a big fat gay crush he's been harboring since the jump!

The whole Demetri-Yasmine relationship is super shallow and performative--in my opinion, from both sides, but Demetri's side especially. He seems to see Yasmine as more of a concept than a person, calling her the "girl of his dreams" and saying he's "101% in love" while...not appearing to know anything of substance about her. He literally never alludes to knowing anything about her personality except that she's hot and mean. And sure, you could chock this up to him being a shallow, horny teenage boy, but...we know he's anything but shallow, given how he loves his childhood best friend so much and so deeply that he forgives him for all number of horrible things in 3 seconds flat because he is that certain that Eli means his apology and is a good person deep down. Given that he has absolutely undying loyalty to his other best friend Miguel Diaz, despite Miguel being (indirectly) part of the reason that he and Eli got estranged in the first place. Given that he also has so much undying loyalty to Sam LaRusso that he backed her up in a dangerous gang fight and got his arm broken for it. Demetri clearly sees and understands the nuance and complexity in people. So why does he talk about his own girlfriend as if she has none???

Something else to note is how in S5, Demetri reveals that he and Yasmine fight so frequently that her arm is literally weighed down with all the make-up bracelets he buys her. This is just supposed to be a Funny Bit, but...I can't help but notice that this is a stark contrast to S4, where they seemed to be all over each other every time we saw them together. Maybe because when they're alone together, the facade falls away and their "relationship" doesn't really have any leg to stand on? Also one has to wonder why anyone would stay in a relationship that dysfunctional. Makes a lot more sense looking at it from the perspective that Demetri feels like he needs a beard, and isn't sure he'd be able to find another girl willing to date him. Besides, as far as fake-girlfriends-to-make-people-think-you're-straight go...well, you're really not going to do much better than Yasmine.

Mentioned in many other posts, but I firmly believe that Yasmine is a closet lesbian and she and Demetri are a case of "gay and lesbian date in high school because they subconsciously detect the gayness in each other and mistake that sense of kinship for romantic attraction."

I also think it's very possible that a little ways into dating, one or both of them realized they were gay, and they made a mutual agreement to "stay together for appearances." Yasmine's social status plummeted after the end of S1, and it's possible she had homophobic family in the picture who would make publicly coming out impractical. And Demetri, while definitely more popular than he used to be, likely thought he could stand to lose all that if it got out he was gay.

Tbh maybe it was a mutual fake dating situation from the jump!!! Point is that this relationship is WAY too stilted and awkward for me to believe one or both of them ISN'T hamming it up a little. It just does not feel genuine or natural at all :/ Although they DO actually have a lot of platonic potential (especially taking the mlm/wlw solidarity aspect into account, or even just the trope of a popular alpha bitch having a sassy gay best friend aidpsiufhodly), which leads me to believe there's more going on than just Demetri using Yasmine as a beard. I do think he likes her and admires her a lot, just not romantically or sexually!

I've actually heard from my mlm friends that it's relatively common for gay guys to be drawn to powerful and outspoken women, and mistake that admiration for a romantic crush! This is probably what happened with Yasmine, if Demetri did believe he had genuine feelings for her and wasn't faking a crush to actively hide his sexuality. I'd also imagine this is where the "bitchy queen bee girly-girl with a gay best friend" stereotype comes from!

A big part of my gay Demetri/bi Eli belief comes from how different their relationships with women are. Demetri is more comfortable with women from the jump, befriending Aisha, Moon, and Sam fairly easily in a way that could indicate a lack of attraction (so, once again, less pressure and more freedom to be his authentic self). Eli, on the other hand, seems to have more trouble with girls in a way that leads me to believe he IS attracted to (and intimidated by) them to some extent. Although he does form a close friendship with Aisha, his other relationships with girls seem to consist of him awkwardly flirting with/trying to impress them, antagonizing them (e.g. Sam in S3), or not really interacting with them at all. In S2, Eli doesn't even seem at ease around his own girlfriend! He's quick to jump to snapping the MOMENT Demetri says something that might make him look bad, like he doesn't trust Moon to like anything other than his "coolness" (which, to be fair, she...doesn't really lmao). He does befriend Tory, but it's more of a casual "work friendship" and it's nowhere near the kind of easy, close-knit friendship Sam and Demetri have. Even Dem's relationship with Yasmine is amicable enough when he's not trying too hard to hit on her. Point being that Eli struggling with girls more than Demetri kinda gives me the impression Demetri doesn't get (romantically) nervous around girls much at all. Not to say someone like Tory wouldn't make him nervous about getting punched in the face or knifed in the gut XD But nervous about dating girls??? Nah. He's only nervous about keeping up the appearance of wanting to date girls!

Just LOOK at what this mf wears!!! Like he LITERALLY has the mlm flag on a hoodie!!! With fucken purple-ass skinny jeans, the fucken bottom stripe of the mlm flag and also the gayest color alive!!! Like all throughout the show this mf's color motifs are CONSISTENTLY blue and green. The blue we could say comes with the Miyagi Do color motifs, but what of the green??? Why he wearing so much green, though??? To match Eli??? His BOYFRIEND???

Yes, it COULD be a reach, but like. It's SO CONSISTENT throughout the show!!! So much blue!!! So much green!!! And when he's NOT wearing those colors, whatever colors he's wearing usually match with Eli's outfit!

Sorry but color-coordinating your outfit with your bestie shows the fashion sense and awareness of a gay man. Demetri Alexopoulos...

As always, pic credits available upon request!

[deliciouskeys]

001 for Butchlander and 002 for Homie, because I love to be obvious!

Tackling them out of order.

002 | Homelander

* How I feel about this character: 

I want to mush him and squeeze him and torture him and pet him and never let him out.

Oh and he’s a very interesting character and a joy to write. Somewhat as a result of the writer’s room, and somewhat as a result of Antony Starr’s acting.

* All the people I ship romantically with this character: 

I’m a whore, I will read him having sex with just about anyone, and I could make a case for him getting romantic with many characters on the show. Top romantic (heh loaded word) ships are Butchlander, Homewell, Maevlander, Starlander.

* My non-romantic OTP for this character: 

I honestly don’t know what this question means because all my ships are horny ones. But I wish we got more Black Noir being a father figure to him (I wish Noir had more to do in general before they decided to give him some background just before killing him off).

* My unpopular opinion about this character: 

Hmmmm. I’m a little afraid that if Kripke writes him a “redemption arc” in the show they’ll botch it with some incoherent drivel à la s3e8 so I’d almost rather they just didn’t.

* One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon:

I have more than one.

I’d rather see him depowered and live than die at the end, somehow.

I would have liked to see more of him trying to parent Ryan with Becca around.

I kind of wish he hadn’t killed Stillwell but mostly because I thought she was a cool character.

I wish he hadn’t taken over Vought because that decreases the chance we’ll ever see him operate outside of it.

* my OTP:

Billy Butcher reprogramming HL with tough, but genuine, love. And sex, definitely lots of sex. [refer to section below for much more word vomit about them]

* my cross over ship:

Heh, I think Makima from Chainsaw Man has a nice parallel to the Homewell dynamic. I’d read Batman x HL, I feel like Batman could deal with his bullshit effectively.

* a headcanon fact:

Homelander prefers his sexual partner be strong and wield soft power over him.

============================

001 | Butchlander

* when I started shipping it if I did:

Because I was watching the show very rapidly, I didn’t start shipping it outright until S1E8, but if I had a week between each episode it probably would have materialized no later than E6.

* my thoughts:

Scorchingly, achingly hot. The show canon is stingy with their onscreen time together, but each scene they meet in is glorious. One of the reasons I’m willing to overlook the inconsistent writing in s3 is that they are ramping up the butchlander element in the show. I love that they have ended up sharing a child while both being utterly unequipped to parent. I don’t remember any other enemyslash pairing setting that up and it’s so damn fun.

* What makes me happy about them:

I like to imagine scenarios where their respective traumas and defects (I don’t think they’re “the same”, kripke) fit together in such a complementary way that they end up accidentally helping each other become a little more emotionally functional.

* What makes me sad about them:

One of them lost his wife because of the other and that is a hard wound to heal.

* things done in fanfic that annoys me:

I don’t like when Billy cries too much. I don’t like when writers go all out with Butcher’s cockney but it sounds like Dick van Dyke (easy to criticize, hard to adhere to this rule). I’m more tolerant of different HL characterizations because I think canon has shown us more variety from him in different scenarios, but I tend to enjoy it less when he’s written as a sadist monster with nary an indication of any other emotions.

* things I look for in fanfic:

Generally prefer Bottom the Homelander [not because he has a better ass, but] because the fic is more likely to characterize both of them in ways I find more IC. Generally like when they at least start out antagonistic and hating each other if it’s a multichapter. Love when there’s an element of coparenting Ryan involved. Love when it’s an E rated fuckfest because [I’m here for the porn canon won’t give us, and] they are both presented as characters with energetic libidos.

* Who I’d be comfortable them ending up with, if not each other: 

Honestly? I feel like they’re both likely to end up alone, because I feel bad for whoever ends up with them if they’re not a strong person. Billy with Maeve, as alluded to in the Maevlander post seems fine endgame to me. Butchie is a big fat nope for me, not only because of Annie but because it gives me incest vibes since he sees him as a younger brother. Billy with some strong woman like Rainer probably works. Homelander… needs someone who can spank him if he gets out line. If Victoria Neuman can become that person remains TBD.

* My happily ever after for them:

Haha, I’ll take almost any iteration where they end up together and parent Ryan. I’m intrigued by Billy getting upgraded with Compound V and how they’d keep from becoming a terrible powercouple of supe cunts. I’m intrigued by HL getting depowered and Billy having to rehab him into being a functional human being out of that mental wreckage. I’m intrigued by them staying as human x supe, with both of them having a weird love hate relationship with being involved with a “race” they generally looked down on.

* who is the big spoon/little spoon:

Billy is the big spoon. I will only entertain the thought of HL being the big spoon if it’s written in Russian for reasons I can’t quite fathom and must have something to do with early childhood traumas 😂

* what is their favorite non-sexual activity:

They are pretty different people in terms of pastimes in canon. I named enjoying the outdoors in another meme. I’d like to think they’d also both enjoy having (or aspiring toward having) a normal family life, raising a child as if they’re normal, well-adjusted adult men, doing normal domestic things. Emphasis on the as if.

[fishcemetery]

I am NOT the character's original creator. I AM, however, the character's current owner (technically), and I'm curious.

The situation is as follows. A few years ago my good high school friend was running an MLP ask blog for a pony photographer named Photobomb. They eventually grew sick and tired of everything pony-related and, as they had a lot of important real-life stuff on their shoulders, decided to wrap it up. I was sort of in on the thing, although far removed from the fandom, so I jokingly said "shame, that's a nice OC, sell her to me" – and that's the story of how I bought my first and only pony adopt for a piece of chocolate and history test answers.

I then proceeded to mostly forget about her, and she rattled about somewhere at the bottom of my OC container up until a few days ago, when an art suddenly surfaced featuring this Photobomb pony, which is kind of wild considering she hasn't been relevant for at least 6 years?

Then another one of my high school friends sent me a photo of a random owl saying "hey look, this is the owl that was on your userpic all throughout high school!" – which is like, thanks mate, I sure don't remember it whatsoever, but I'm glad you still do.

Then the Winx Loki thing happened (btw cheers to people who genuinely like the concept, you're a bit weird but I admire your unconventional tastes), so I had a lot of time to muse about childhood cartoons, and with this memory lane going on, I found myself coming back to the pony thing.

Basically, in the end I decided to try my hand at a subject that I usually don't care much about, and at the same time check if I can find someone who still remembers this character, because at least one person does, aside from the original creator and I.

I have good memory for OC designs, but I've most definitely botched some of the details. Like, I never really bothered to remember what her butticon was, only that it very obviously alluded to her (nick?)name. And I've already lost my only reference and haven't been in contact with the original creator since graduation, but I think in general she's pretty recognizable.

So, have you seen this pony?

[dowagersqueen]

Oh you didn't disappoint me don't worry!! I'm not looking forward to al*smond either, especially not in the "it was a genuine, tragic love story" way the shippers do. That wouldn't make any sense given his character and I would also dislike if they went that route in the show. However I just don't really trust the writers and I believe they're going to include at least the pregnancy for the drama (the marriage is very unlikely imo). I believe they're not going to miss the opportunity to paint the Greens as hypocrites: being against Rhaenyra's Strong bastards yet fathering bastards - and a Strong one, in Aemond's case - of their own.

yeah i feel like a marriage would be so silly 😭

i feel like obviously the greens would be hypocrites if they went either way (alysm*nd or helaemond) but for me personally helaemond makes more sense simply because the circumstances of helaemond are set for them to grow closer together. aegon never wanted helaena, i doubt helaena was much overjoyed with her marriage, they never grew close and aemond has shown interest in helaena and there have been hints all over imo. imho i don't even think that if aemond would ever have a child with helaena, he would even think of them as a proper bastard, because he's a bit of a narc at times.

meanwhile for me alysm*nd is just doing too much from an aemond pov. i was told once i don't know about narratives and how cosmic irony is a thing (lol), but eh... wouldn't it be a little overkill to have aemond accidentally start a huge civil war by killing a strong bastard, leave KL to fall in team black's hands and thus resulting in the imprisonment of alicent and helaena, meet a strong bastard woman, father a bastard by her, botch his promise to the baratheons and then sorta stay in harrenhal? idk. i feel like for someone who basically (accidentally) started this huge conflict, he'd be doing a lot of damage to the greens cause that would make him look so goofy

then again, with that cursed quote from ewan and aemond being ryan's main baby girl i dread the misunderstood lovers shunned wrongly by society meet and fall in love and break all rules. especially because it feeds into this bratty version of aemond who really has zero self awareness or is grateful for alicent who often if not always stood by him. it's the same crowd who say alicent parentified aemond. and repeating myself here but am so not here to watch this man mope around about life being unfair as his mother and sister are prisoners and could be killed. i heard in the book aemond says something about rhaenyra not having the guts to do kill or something, idk i read this quote a while ago, but b&c happened by that point... he should be fearing for their lives, especially after he lost his eye.

i know many come in with their book pov, but i am watching the show as i see it and it would suck to see another man have aegon's entitled "i try so hard" speech

[gayspock]

ok but other thoughts

like i alreadyyyy said a bit about it but what also kinda irrrritates me about the d'argo / chiana / jothee is that theyre all SUCH good characters, and for them to be tangled up in this laziness... ARGHHH!

bc its CLEAR they only did it to like act as a catalyst for d'argo/chiana relationship problems and to write jothee out of the show .... and for what!!! for what man!

d'argo/chiana ALREADY HAD much more organic problems you could explore. but tbh u didnt even botherrrr to build the relationship properly... so like ofc you couldnttt really explore those, either, and instead had to contrive some bs....

meanwhile d'argo, up until this point, his wholeee arc in the whole show has been about him fighting so hard to find jothee- so you're really going to write him out like that, in the space of a few episodes? its disappppointtting. bc, like, i WANT strife between them; i want the struggle, of them not seeing eye-to-eye, bc of course they dont with what they went through...

LIKE. thats genuinely an interesting conversation to explore families separated, unwillingly. the conversations around cultural genocide. how jothee can never be the son he lost, and expected to return to him - and has instead had a very hard fucking life. struggling to piece themsleves back together. how jothee is cold, and doesnt understand his heritage- but also kind of has every right to be self-preserving at this point.... LIKE COME ON. SOO much wasted potential

i really justdont want d'argo fr to become worf 2.0 where literally there's a good, and complex father-son story IN THERE but the writers literally just shove the kid into a cupboard and forget they exist and never bring it up ever again until they get bored, like... its such a disservice man.

and i thought jothee was REALLY great when first introduced- like he felt... very balanced and realised, do you know whatr i mean? i think younger characters, and/or the "children" of main characters are the hardest to get right, or at the v least tv struggles a LOT with them. not that jothee is that young, but like... again even just as the kid (or, really any random introduced relation - this happens with fridged wives, etc. a lot too) of an mc - so often, they're reduced to just motivations for the main character in question, don't really have their own agency, and just become weird... kind of one note personalities or exist just to cause problems which inherently makes them annoying which is sooo unfair but like

jothee really DID not wholly feel like that. he had his own personality that made senseeee... WHYYYY CHUCK IT AWAY.

bc then again i also also ALSSOOO said i did prefer him/chiana then d'argo/chiana IF you gave me, like, a blank slate. they make more sense to me and i find them more compelling - although that might be because they didnt have a chance to doa botched run at them, like how they have with chiana/d'argo. like i JSUT. AHRGH.

whole thing is sloppyyyy....

i was gioing 2 rant about chiana too but im running out of steam BC i love her and i love the exploration of her, and her sexuality more but ARGHGHHGHGH .A RHRHHG. HRHHA

whatevernight night

[lettuceflower]

Alright, now that the episode has officially aired and everyone has seen the iconic Akito Flying Choke Slam™, here’s a compilation I would like to call:

Season 3 Moments I am Worried About 

(aka moments that are already dramatic enough but the director is probably going to turn them up to an 11 because more intense = better, apparently. 🙄)

spoilers under the cut of course.

kyo’s dream

kagura SLAP

haru’s rage

ren shenanigans 🤪🔪

attempted stab 

the actual stab

tohru’s cliff fall

kyo and yuki FINAL FIGHT

[trashgalactica]

So I finally got around to watching the Killing Eve finale and...hoo boy. I have some thoughts. Buckle up because this is gonna be a whole essay.

I knew going in to the finale that the ending was likely to be...not good. The mishandling of the Eve and Villanelle’s relationship, the meandering plot and subsequent rush to tie off all the loose ends did not exactly fill me with hope. I had avoided all spoilers and discussion of the finale online, which meant swearing off Tumblr entirely, but still I felt the rumblings of people’s displeasure and thought, oh, this is going to be BAD. Even then, I could not have prepared myself for just how profoundly they botched the ending. It honestly beggars belief. To somehow make a worse, less satisfying ending to this show than what we got, I feel would take genuine deliberate effort. Some part of me expected Ashton Kutcher to pop up after the credits to tell me that I just got punk’d.

I think it’s important to explain WHY this ending was so bad, because already I’m seeing smug responses to the controversy asking why anyone should expect anything but death for these characters when its been clear from the beginning that this isn’t a story with a happy ending. There’s a real ‘I told you so’ vibe coming from these kinds of takes and its frustrating to me to see people upset about the finale being painted as naive petulant children who are mad about their toys being taken away from them, because I think it fundamentally misunderstands the source of  (most) people’s ire.

The issue isn’t really that Villanelle died. I think the majority of us knew, going in, that one or both of Killing Eve’s leads dying was a very real possibility. I honestly would have been surprised if they hadn’t killed at least one of them off, despite the way the books go, because much of the shows length was spent foreshadowing that outcome and showcasing Eve and Villanelle’s mutually destructive behaviour towards each other. The issue is that they executed her death so INCREDIBLY poorly. I’m not a person who thinks you can never kill a queer person in a film or TV show- the rate at which popular media does so given how few LGBTQI characters of significance are represented on our screens is of course a concern- but I do believe it is possible to have a queer character die without invoking the bury your gays trope.

BUT.

You have to EARN it. If you’re going to kill a character off it has to make narrative sense. It should fulfil that character’s arc in a satisfying way without feeling like they’re being punished for their queerness. Villanelle’s death achieves none of this. The show spends its run building up to some final showdown with the 12 only to have Villanelle easily dispatch a bunch of faceless randos in the last five minutes of the show, while Eve is dancing at a wedding (???) I guess (???), and then have another (offscreen) rando dispatch her with a sniper rifle. The End. Literally- that’s the title card. It’s abrupt. It’s pointless, sloppy. It doesn’t tie into any of the thematic elements of the previous seasons. And it does so after it spends an entire season not knowing what it actually wants to do with its leads and wasting much of the run with new characters and subplots which ultimately serve no purpose.

It’s possible to imagine an ending where our leads die but it feels like the right narrative choice. Perhaps instead of resetting the board after season 3 and have Eve and Villanelle once again on opposing paths (the writers never did seem to know what to do with Villanelle and Eve once they actually were in the same room together, preferring instead to use the tension of their cat and mouse game to see them through the wobblier sections of the show), we actually see them trying to make a partnership work from the beginning of the season. Maybe, despite knowing that they will ultimately lose, they decide to take on the Twelve together, who, in this alternate universe, are actually a real threat instead of some mooks on a boat. Imagine, Eve and Villanelle- hand in hand, each with a smile and a gun, preparing to infiltrate some grand estate, knowing they’re hopelessly outnumbered but believing it better to go out in a blaze of glory than live long and dull empty lives or submit to the control of someone else. Fade to black. Or maybe they end up killing each other – the weight of everything that they’ve done to to the other too far a gulf for them to actually overcome, their collective darkness bringing out the worst in each other leading to their ultimate demise. Either of these options would be narratively consistent with what the show had built up until now, and provide some emotional weight to their deaths and close out their arcs in a coherent way.

Instead they fell into exactly the same trope that so many films and shows do which is to have these characters consummate their relationship at the Nth hour and then kill one of them off to wring an unearned sense of pathos out of the shock value. That’s not some shakespearian tragedy like Laura Neal seems to imagine it is. It’s just lazy writing. It’s like the episode got written at 9pm on a Friday night and everyone just wanted to get it over with so they could go to the pub.

Worse, it’s obvious that the showrunner FUNDAMENTALLY misunderstands who these characters are and what they want. To frame Eve’s survival at the cost of Villanelle dying as a ‘rebirth’ and that now she can ‘move on from their toxic and obsessive relationship’, to ‘rediscover what the normal world has to offer’ as if Eve hasn’t spent the last four seasons making it clear that she was miserable in her old life, that she felt trapped and isolated, and that Villanelle was the one person who she truly connected with- seems laughably tone deaf. And given how soon it occurs after Eve and Villanelle actually get together, frankly homophobic. Much like other examples of Bury Your Gays, this framing- consummation of a queer relationship, followed shortly thereafter by death, the implied return to the status quo, makes it feel like Eve is being punished for stepping outside heteronormative boundaries, especially with that brutal hard cut ending. Villanelle, as the ‘instigator’ and clearly the more ‘deviant’ of the two is killed as a lesson to Eve about what happens when you follow in her path. It implies that Eve’s growth over the show isn’t her embracing her true nature, but rather a corruption of it. Its Hays code era messaging, even if that’s not what Neal intended. As Eve herself says- somehow I survived, but for what? Everyone is gone- Villanelle, Niko, her friends. Carolyn betrayed her. It’s remarkably cruel and yet Neal frames this as a triumph.

It’s honestly like she didn’t even watch her own season. Some of the things she says seems fundamentally at odds with what we see on screen. Yes, Eve and Villanelle’s relationship to each other has been toxic and obsessive and destructive, but it feels to me that the show has spent the last two seasons exploring how their relationship has grown out of obsession and into something resembling genuine connection, even if the way they relate to each other and the world is warped. It asks the question- can these two fundamentally fucked up people form a relationship without ultimately destroying each other?  Now it’s okay if the answer to that question is no, but if that’s the direction you’re going in you need the rest of your narrative to support the conclusion. If you want your audience to go with you when you say clearly this relationship is destructive, that it doesn’t work and can never work, maybe don’t spend the only episode where they do get together, demonstrating how well it IS working. As the writing maxim goes, show don’t tell!

The mischaracterisation of Eve this season is probably the most egregious, but nobody comes out of this season unscathed. Villanelle’s growth over the previous three seasons is thrown out almost entirely, Carolyn, though charmingly mercenary in previous seasons, is downright sociopathic here, and her constantly flip flopping allegiances and unclear motivations- while I think meant to demonstrate her lack of loyalty and capacity for betrayal- end up just making her seem silly and incompetent. The Twelve, a mysterious far reaching, dangerous and seemingly unbeatable organisation? Turns out you can find them all just hanging out on a wedding boat, and despite their importance and the fact that they are surely aware that somebody is killing a bunch of them off, it’s super easy to get on board by pretending to be a celebrant!

So to conclude this rant, like most of those criticising the show’s ending I’m not angry that they killed Villanelle. I’m angry that they squandered the incredible potential of this show, the talents of its actors and insulted the intelligence of its collective audience by killing her in the most cheap, lazy and unsatisfying way possible. Sandra Oh and Jodie Comer are incredible actresses and they did an admirable job with what they had, but I’m devastated for them that the show went out this way. No real resolution, or sense of thematic closure, just a rushed hack job by someone who doesn’t understand the characters that she’s writing. Laura Neal, may you spend the remainder of your miserable days haunted by angry, shitting seagulls.

[lepusrufus]

Double edged scalpel ch. 2

Ch. 1

Summary: Cassanda Awkward Asshole Dimitrescu

---

After a couple weeks of doing normal maid chores, Nicole was not expecting to see the dungeons again. Not after Cassandra’s little “failed experiment”. But all good things must come to an end eventually, don’t they? And to an end they came when a faint buzzing reached her ears mid-mopping the floor in one of the main halls.

 Two gloved hands were placed on her hips, pinning her in place, while Cassandra's chin came to rest on her shoulder. She inhaled deeply before finally speaking. 

"I hope I'm not interrupting anything, am I?" 

Yes you very much are. 

"Of course not, my lady." 

"Good good. Sadly my study is quite a mess again and I was wondering…" one hand came to teasingly caress Nicole’s cheek. “You aren’t busy tomorrow, are you?”

She wasn’t. In fact, tomorrow was Nicole’s day off, something that she would bet on a lifetime supply of coffee that Cassandra was well aware of. It took every ounce of self control not to let a groan accompany her next words.

“I am not.” Asshole.

She felt herself being spun around, Cassandra’s face uncomfortably close to hers. “Be there by ten then.” And, with the sickle now under Nicole’s chin, “Don’t be late.”

And just as easily as she appeared, Cassandra dissipated into a cloud of flies and made her leave. A sigh of relief got caught in Nicole’s throat when she noticed the other two sisters standing in the doorframe opposite from the one Cassandra flew out of. They both gave her an amused look, seeing the faint blush on Nicle’s cheeks and, to her dread, they both approached her. Bela was the first to speak, thankfully keeping her distance.

“So what exactly is your deal? Immune to all the blood and gore, hm,” she hummed, eyes inquisitive .

“It’s been a while since Cassie was so dead set on scaring someone,” Daniela chirped in from behind and Nicole had to force herself not to snort at the nickname.

So that’s what this was about. Lil’ old Cassie was throwing a hissy fit because one person in this castle wasn’t cowering and bowing at her feet the moment they saw some blood splattered on her otherwise beautiful face. If she had to work in this hellhole of a village, then at the very least she could get some mild satisfaction out of annoying the family sadist. With the other sisters however, there was no point in hiding what her “deal” was. 

“I worked as a medical examiner.” At a raised blonde eyebrow she specified, “I used to examine dead bodies. Autopsies and all that.”

Bela’s face turned from mild shock to amusement, her eyes darting to the younger sister who straight up started laughing while the eldest, at least trying to keep her composure, chuckled. 

“Oh this is gonna be interesting,” the redhead said through giggles.

---

Nicole really had hoped that Cassandra meant 10 pm, with how the Dimitrescus were nowhere to be found during the early day, and she would still have the day to herself until night came. That idea went completely out the tinted windows when, at nine thirty, the head chambermaid came to remind her of the change in schedule. She quickly downed the remaining coffee from her cup while mentally cursing and bolted to her room to change into proper attire, then out the door she went. 

Where was she even supposed to meet the brunette? The doors to the dungeons were bolted shut and she doubted Cassandra would oh so graciously escort her this time. Then again, Lady Dimitrescu did say that she had to be supervised. She got her answer when the doors opened with a click and a drawn out groan from the heavy wood. Cassandra was standing there, eyes scrutinizing as ever while giving Nicole a once over. Then she pulled out a pocket watch that looked at least a century old.

“You’re…” eyes narrowed at the small silver object. “Seven minutes early. Oh you’re as annoying about being on time as Bela aren’t you?”

Well you did make it a point to tell me to be on time, you absolute hypocrite. Instead of voicing her opinions though, Nicole settled for following the other girl deep into the castle’s undergrounds, through damp and oddly warm corridors. The giddiness was back into Cassandra’s demeanor, golden eyes occasionally turning to the small redhead walking behind her with an expression of barely concealed glee. This was definitely not good news. 

It took about .5 seconds to notice what got the brunette so happy when they entered her study. The room was definitely cleaner than the first time, only a handful of devices were dirty and the floor needed some mopping. The tables however... One was covered in fresh blood and the other had a dead body sprawled on it, partially covered by a stained sheet. Oh the irony.

While Nicole was cleaning the unoccupied table, she was facing the brunette, somehow trusting her even less with a scalpel in hand than with a sickle. Not that watching her absolutely botch an autopsy was much better mind you. 

Has nobody taught you about the Y incision?!

That's too dee- congrats you’re making a mess.

That cut needs to go lower. What, are you afraid of some balls?

Oh my god are you trying to take the heart out before even taking care of the guts-

“What is it?” Cassandra’s voice came with a low growl, then a slight cock of the head. “You’re staring.”

“N-nothing,” Nicole stumbled over her reply, realizing too late that her hand had stilled on the rag she was using to clean the blood.

“One thing that I hate more than being disrespected is being lied to.” The warning was clear in her tone. “So I’ll ask again: what is it?”

Nicole was sure that being criticized was something she would hate even more, so she made the split second decision to go with a white lie.

“I just...find autopsies quite fascinating.” Well, in a way she did.

“...You do?” Golden eyes widened in what was probably the first truly genuine emotion Nicole has ever seen on Cassandra’s face: surprise, and a hint of curiosity. 

When Nicole reaffirmed her reply, the brunette’s eyes stayed on her for a few long seconds, trying to find the traces of a lie. When she found none, she just dismissed the other girl with an awkward cough and a “Those knives won’t clean themselves.” 

A tense silence fell on the room, only disturbed by the occasional clink of metal tools or the sloshing of organs being handled by the brunette. After the table was wiped to a reflective surface, Nicole moved on to mopping the blood trails on the floor. She was grateful for the chance to step away from Cassandra, if only for a bit. After the floor too was clean, it was time to wipe the few dirty blades, thankfully not as many as last time. She took a dagger from its holster on the wall and carefully ran a piece of cloth over the blade, washing away dried crimson clots. 

As much as it was probably a bad idea, she couldn't help throwing a subtle glance behind her at Cassandra. A few organs were placed on the table at the body’s feet, and she was taking notes in a leatherbound notebook that looked well used. The idea that she had any interest in the bodies beyond being food gave Nicole an oddly nostalgic feeling. It sent her right back in high school, when one of her friends who took art history classes was telling her all about how da Vinci used real dead bodies in order to study anatomy. Yeah, da Vinci but the more attractive versio- fuck.

She hissed and retracted her hand as she felt the sharp blade cut her wrist and almost dropped the dagger. The effort to conceal the pain was there, but useless as Cassandra was by her side in mere seconds. 

"Oh did you cut yourself?" She asked with feign concern, and grabbed her hand. "Here let me help you with that." 

"Oh no I'm okay really no nee-" 

Nicole's words died in her throat when Cassandra stuck out her tongue and dragged it, slowly, across the cut, collecting every last drop of blood. To top it off, she let out a low moan and gave the soft skin there a small nip, successfully making the redhead’s breath hitch. Now any normal and sane person would think I still have a knife in my hand, I should use it, but Nicole would be lying to everyone and then herself if she said she didn’t have a thing for danger. And it doesn’t get much more dangerous than this, now does it.

“Mm...you taste wonderful.” 

Was she supposed to thank her?

“You’re lucky you intrigue me, otherwise you would make for some fine wine.” She finished with her trademark cackle.

Oh she was definitely not getting a thanks now. Nicole rolled her eyes slightly, tugging her hand away. She was half expecting Cassandra not to release her, but instead she let go of her wrist and, with a giggle, she returned to her work without another word.

---

That night, Nicole made damn sure to wash the cut until her skin felt like it would have a permanent sensation of pins and needles. Once a bandage was securely wrapped around her wrist she sat down with a cup of tea, not quite ready to sleep yet. How ironic would it be if she died of an infection while living in a castle where people are literally turned into food and wine.

Although in all honesty, she was quite certain her death would be far more entertaining.