#i still dunno if he is an anti hero or an anti villain

[maria-eve-falcon]

shigure sohma is by far the most complex character ever . period.

[nenoname]

Gravity Falls DVD Commentary Highlights

(just a huge, and I mean huge, dump of random quotes that stuck out to me, which I sorta separated into characters+their relationships and it's probably gonna be obvious that Stan is my fave lmao

I dunno how to make this legible for anyone but whatever, just take all these rando character tidbits. Stan Twin pranks! Sonployee essays! The concept for a post-Weirdmageddon episode that Alex insists is just too miserable but I want it anyway! The Pines family making me cry!)

Stan

"We love the idea of Stan [in Boss Mabel] having a minute to uh, having a context where we want to see him be his worst self and seeing his big brash personality in like a setting that everyone can understand, because the Mystery Shack is a little bit ungrounded because he's in his world of his characters, but seeing him out in the outside world is funny weird."

We really enjoyed the fact that he's as awful as ever and he's rewarded for it. We like those anti-morals where Stan uses his terribleness to succeed incredibly well.

I think it was a little hard for people to understand in the writer's room at the beginning of the series was that, even though Stan is following a lot of these tropes of being a miser, he's not grumpy. Like he actually loves being himself. He really revels in it like even though he's got some kind of sorrow inside, his kind of day-to-day like he's more about just the uncle who loves to hear himself and make dumb jokes than he is somebody who's mean or cruel or cynical per se.

The [NWHS] storyboards managed to make Stan this awesome action hero while still keeping him Stan. Like I like the fact that he steals a wallet in the middle of it. He steals a wallet, he smashes somebody against the wall, he sasses him but he also has this just great Inception moment. And it's because we're building to a big question about “who is Stan?”, I felt a moment of seeing him be kind of awesome further increases your “who is this guy?” He keeps going back and forth between like “oh geez my back” and you're like “all right that's the Stan I know” and then like “whoa, he just did an awesome jailbreak! Is he some kind of super villain? Who is he really?

There's more of Ford in Stan than I think Stan realizes that I think only comes out in certain moments.”

Why did Stan keep a clipping of himself titled “grifter at large”? I think he thought he looked cool in that picture. “You know I kind of have a Clint Eastwood look in this grifter at large photo. I think maybe I'll use this as an About the Author one day. I gotta hold on to this one. You know what, I'm a criminal but I'm a nostalgic criminal! Loving the past is my greatest crime now!”

I know how Stan feels in this [Principal talking to his family] scene, when somebody comes in and says like “You know what? There was a race you didn't know you were running and you're already behind, way behind.” 

And you know even though Stan is a guy who looks like he's having a fun time, I always, in my gut, thought of him as somebody who is a huge well of sadness, a loss of human connection. And that need to please, that trying to get laughs from the crowd and constantly telling dumb jokes and you know putting on a big show in the Mystery Shack, he's trying to get from them the affection that he never got from his family and lost with his brother.

Stan has been waiting for years to have a reunion with his brother. He's always felt like a screw-up. Stan once again had an idea of how he thought things were going to go. He thought that his brother was saying “I need your help” for the first time. He's going to go up there, they're gonna have some drinks, they're gonna catch up and instead he ended up shoving his brother into another dimension and running out of food and money. It's sort of his worst nightmare. But this was Stan's entire character, from the very beginning of the series, was built around this idea that he's living with this tragedy. He's a guy who outwardly seems like he doesn't appreciate family but in fact wants it more than anything in the world and feels like maybe he's not worthy of it and would do anything to prove that he is.

Seeing Stan figure out what he's good at felt important to me. Like he's never been good at anything in his life and he makes a stupid hokey joke and it suddenly turns into a profit. I felt like without [showing how the Mystery Shack was created], I was missing something and understanding why he would do this, how this would be the solution to his problem.

We would like the idea that Stan appears to win through dumb luck, that it's sort of Intelligence versus Guts but Stan wouldn't actually bet everyone's life on a dice roll. He's a cheater! At the end of the day, I believe Stan has been thrown out of Vegas for counting cards and for weighing dies and I believe he could con his way out of any game, particularly for an obnoxious wizard like this. The idea that Stan would gamble everyone on pure chance is like no. No, he's got a plan. This is the guy who escaped prison using gravity leaps, he's got a way out.

The one big thing [The Stanchurian Candidate] does is really highlights Stan's inferiority complex compared to his brother. Part of what he's doing is he's trying to be an important man here and this episode is actually a pretty good setup in many ways for Weirdmageddon Part 3. When we see Ford they're all going on this rescue mission to rescue Ford and this episode shows you just how much Stan wants to be the hero like the reason that he can't shake Ford's hand when they're in that circle.  The cold open of this where he sees everyone loves Ford and now that Ford's back, he's the best. Stan's like “well, how about I run for mayor!” It's just to boost his ego and make him feel better about himself.

Dipper and Mabel

“Straight man protagonists are really hard to write because every other character had a comedic hook. We understand that Soos is kind of this weirdo, his brain is in another place. Mabel has this exuberance and sees the best in every situation and is very creative. Stan is a crooked conman. Dipper is… the normal guy and a character like that can often feel like they don’t have agency, start to feel just reactive.

Waddles is Mabel's only love that lasts the summer. Mabel is very prone to love at first sight and Waddles is able to love back with Mabel's degree of love.

[In Sock Opera] Mabel's in love with Gabe, Dipper's in love with the Author and they're both willing to do something crazy to get get closer to that thing

There kept being layers of adjustment to make it, “okay what would it take to get Dipper to make a deal with Bill?”  1: He would have to not understand the rules of the deal. He's been tricked, he thinks he's just giving a puppet, he didn't know was himself. Classic genie rules, you get what you wish for in a way you didn't expect.  2: There's a little ticking clock that just started, which if he doesn't do it by now, he's gonna lose all this.  3: Bill rightfully points out that Mabel has been kind of not sacrificing for him and he maybe needs another ally right now  4: He was sleep deprived and actually you'll notice that Dipper blinks right before Bill arrives and that's our way of suggesting that that countdown might not have even existed

I think Dipper and Mabel are of equal exact intelligence but Dipper's insecure. He sees his accomplishments as a way to make himself better and thus is motivated to focus on things that are accomplishment type things. And Mabel is very confident and likes having fun and when she's having a good time, she has a little tunnel vision for the people and the things around her. That's one of her biggest flaws. She's actually really, really sweet when she notices and understands your pain but not when she's doing a bit, when she's doing a scene, when she's doing a gag.

Ford

Originally [the fake Author] looked a little bit more like an oddball wacky inventor and I felt he had to be pretty idiosyncratic. There's certain color things about him you'll notice. He's more or less got the color scheme of the Journal, you know maroons and golds, so that you kind of feel instinctively like maybe that's him. A lot of these motifs though we would end up using in Ford's design, as well the gloves and the coat and all that but much cooler later on but preparing you, it's Ford Lite. 

Now this is there's no logical reason that Ford would break [the warnings about the portal] up into all these books this way but up until this point he's been shown as this sort of all-knowing mysterious Puzzle Master that it felt appropriate, even though it's not logical.

It works for the storytelling so when Ford wrote that, that's when he was super sleep deprived. He realized that Bill had betrayed him, he was starting to have a hard time differentiating between fantasy and reality, he was losing sleep and scribbling all sorts of lunatic serial killer looking stuff about the end of the world.

In Time Traveler’s Pig, we see what should be a young Stanford Pines even though again, the design's a little off but we knew big sideburns, bushy hair. Although that Stanford looked a little bit more swole than this guy and that's one of the what we thought were very subtle clues in season one that helped a lot of fans figure figure everything out way too soon.

[Using the memory gun on the agents scene] needs to show that Ford's really awesome and so we could get rid of the agents and show that Ford can pretty much handle anything that Stan can't and also call back to our memory ray all in one.

There was a lot of fan speculation when we first met Ford. Generally when television shows introduce a new mysterious character late in the game, they turn out to be a villain like 9 out of 10 times. They turn out to be a villain or they're there to get killed off to show the stakes of something and like we could have made Ford evil but I always felt that that would be less interesting. The point that I was trying to get to is that Stan and Ford had this relationship that fell apart and it was both of their faults and I thought that if I'm Stan, I'd be more frustrated if Ford is actually a good guy. It would drive me insane if he's pretty reasonable, pretty rational, better at me than everything.

So we've flirted with this brief moment where it seems like he's a villain and we worked really hard to make it so that like his eyes are being covered by the reflection of the light. His dialogue is ambiguous enough here that for a moment you believe what Dipper believes, which is “maybe he's possessed by Bill.” You just saw him shaking Bill's hand, what is he supposed to believe?

I like that Ford has this photo with him, he had for a really really long time all the way through multiple dimensions. And he's probably told himself- I almost imagined if McGucket found that photo in his coat while they were working on the portal or something, like “What's this here?” and Ford would say “oh yes, that's a photo of a very important moment! That's when I…  that's when I first decided I want to be an inventor!” There would be no reference to the real reason he's keeping it. “This is me and my brother.” It would be like, “oh yes I was thinking about science as a horizon, a frontier to reach towards– you know like a boat, like a ship, like science! It's about science!”

Soos

You choose family. That you create over the course of your life and if that somebody earns being your family, like the Mystery Shack. These kids and Stan, they’re Soos' family and he's happy about that.

I feel like Soos gained something out of [Blendin’s Game]. He gains the knowledge that like “I'm tired of thinking about this man who I'm missing, who doesn't care about me. I'm going to concentrate on the people in front of me, the people that are my true family.”

Soos is a fan of the show even though he's in it. He's a big fan of Gravity Falls and [NWHS] killed him.

I always knew what I wanted Soos’ end to be Soos running the Mystery Shack. I imagine that Soos is actually way better at giving tours than Stan is because he loves all that stuff truly and he believes it. That's part of the difference. Stan’s like “um, all right suckers, this stagnant puddle is the befuddle puddle!” while Soos is like “yeah, one time I looked in there, I think i saw like a cyclops dude. Like, I really think I saw one! Like it might have been a reflection combining my pupils, but like?” and people are like “Whoa, really??”

McGucket

They hired a bunch of people and then they erased their memory. That’s my explanation for why there's like such amazing inventions that would take whole teams of people. McGucket secretly hired a number of contractors and erased their minds. Like I think of McGucket as being like a really sweet nice guy completely in over his head who just like “oh well, once I've erased one guy's mind, I gotta erase ten more guys’ minds to cover it up” and it just sort of builds into like “I guess I'm kind of this kingpin of crime and I'm starting a cult I didn't mean to. Whoopsy daisy!”

When we get to Ford and see their backstory and see their relationship, it just makes all the stuff that happens with the portal and what happens with Ford and all that more poignant that he had someone there who was not only his friend but also a voice of reason and telling him to stop and that he wouldn't listen to him, as opposed to Ford being down there on his own with nobody to bounce off, anybody to say “hey wait a minute, is this a good idea?”

“McGucket was the assistant and he was maybe this assistant who was sort of put upon and Ford kind of brought a college buddy together with him. You know Ford as somebody who lost Stan, and even though he rejected his brother, he kind of needs that other person and he tried to find that in this kind of sweet prodigy and he just pushed him too far.

[The test scene] is meant to show sort of what it was that McGucket needed to erase, what it was that drove him to madness. It was partially seeing the Nightmare Verse and the way it messed with his head and also partly just realizing that this thing has apocalyptic consequences and he doesn't want to be a part of it. And if he can't destroy it or talk Ford out of something, he can forget about it.

Because If Ford's weakness is pride, McGucket's weakness is weakness. He's got a kind heart and he can't stop people, he can't destroy things. I mean he should have basically knocked Ford out with a wrench and take this thing apart piece by piece. He's the one who understood how to build it but I think he's kind of a follower and I think he's the kind of person who could get suckered in by a cult leader. He’s the kind of person looking for instruction and he really respects Stanford and can't bring himself to uh, he's like “I just got out of a bunker! I don't want to go work for another guy down in another bunker! This is my third doomsday cult this year!”

Stan and the kids

Stan and Mabel have such a different life perspective it seemed natural that at some point they would get to a major conflict

Seeing Grunkle Stan and Dipper bond like, I sort of believe that both of them are bad with women and both of them would rather believe there's a giant conspiracy than that they have they just can't get ladies 

Can this idea about Mabel's relationship with Waddles actually reveal a rift between Mabel and Stan where Mabel and Stan actually get along pretty well in the series you know? When they they're both such strong stubborn personalities that when they conflict, they conflict hard like in Boss Mabel. But this idea that Waddles is sort of a metaphor for what Mabel loves and Stan loves Mabel but he doesn't really think that anything she thinks is necessarily smart or right. He loves her like “guys she's my sweet niece but she doesn't know anything you know? She doesn't know anything about a pig” She forgives a lot with Stan but like Waddles sort of represents like the purity of her deepest love and the idea that Stan would threaten that is genuinely a shock

In the previous season it ends with Dipper giving up his journal and there was a lot of argument about “oh is it lame if he just gets his journal back?” Another thing we struggled with, we knew that Stan knows the importance of this journal he wouldn't give the journal back to Dipper so it was a bit of a convolution we'd written ourselves into a corner. We wrote ourselves out, we said “okay he's photocopied it. he's giving it to Dipper because he knows that Dipper's really precocious and he'll never stop asking.”

“We knew that we wanted everything to come to a head when the kids are going to discover Stan's secret and they're going to discover it in such a way that they only get little bits and pieces and they have to decide for themselves based on the limited information. Is Stan's a good guy or if he's a bad guy? Ultimately that decision will be a decision of heart versus mind. And Dipper's mind, Mabel is heart and they're fighting with the scraps of information they have.  Should we trust our heart about how we feel about this guy over the course of the summer and everything we've been through or should we trust the clues? That seemed like a believable way to get Dipper and Mabel to begin a rift between them that is resolved by the end of the series.”

The way Stan acts in [NWHS] is like, to me part of what feels so grounded about it is like I'm a child of divorce and like I know that when parents or parent figures know that hard times are coming for the kids. They kind of lay it on thick they're like who wants ice cream you know what I mean? Like Stan being extra nice to them at the beginning is like it's kind of a realistic thing that that adults do when they know like big changes are coming.

I felt it was really important that we added the scene where they're at maximum bonding. They're up on the roof, they're shooting firecrackers. Stan knows in his heart that when his brother arrives everything is going to change in ways he can't predict and he's really savoring this moment because he knows, even if things goes completely smoothly, which they don't. the kids are still going to be mad at him, especially Dipper for basically lying.  They had this big meeting after the end of Scaryoke where of course Dipper also crossed his finger but Stan crosses his fingers and says “oh I'm telling you everything” and he knows that the kids are not going to be happy about the fact that he's been keeping this all from them because they've done amazing things together already and he should have trusted them before now. 

This act break is them saying, “wait, Stan might be a random grifter who maybe killed our real uncle!” That's pretty heavy for any show let alone a cartoon show.

What that would mean for them if all this stuff is true is so much further than just like, “oh he lied to us about a couple things.” It's just like, “no he's straight up just some random dude that we don't even know uh and the guy that I've been pining for this whole time is dead!”  We really try to stack the deck so it's like Mabel's perspective and Dipper's perspective are both kind of racing to see who gets in front and there'll be a moment where it's like yeah you kind of buy with Mabel she feels good about about Stan and then this scene is the most you’re ever with Dipper where we discover this huge crazy curveball and this feeling that you have looking at this newspaper and looking through these fake IDs this is how Dipper feels all the time.  If you want a window about what it's like to be Dipper, this moment where a giant conspiracy reveals itself out of little pieces and seems to suggest that no one is trustworthy like that's that's where Dipper lives and this to him confirms every bit of suspicion and every bit of paranoia he's ever had and he's willing to run with it. 

I love these characters so much that, for me I was like “I need to see Stan saying goodbye to the kids at that bus. And I don't want him to be some guy who isn't Stan, who doesn't even remember the kids.” That would be really dramatic. It might make you cry more but to me it doesn't actually mean anything. Their relationship which they've built, he was willing to sacrifice his memories to save them. That's how much they meant to him but because he was willing to do that, I think he deserves to get him back.

Stan and Ford

But I think Stan's hope is, that in Stan's mind this is going to play out one way which is that; he's going to free his brother, his brother's gonna come out of that portal after 30 years. Stan's probably imagining that Ford is weak, emaciated, wrapped in a blanket, that he'll stumble forward, through a beard. through blurry eyes, he'll be “my brother, is that you?” He'll embrace Stan, he'll hug him, he'll say, “all these years I thought I was goner but you saved me! I was wrong to mock you, I was wrong to call you the stupid twin! Dad was wrong about you! You're the greatest man and let's be friends again and who are these niece and nephew?” Like that was what Stan was kind of hoping. He knows it's there's a million things that could go wrong, including potentially the destruction of this dimension, but he so desperately needs to believe that he can make up for the problems of the past. He's hoping for this but he knows that things are going to change

When I started the series, I always knew Stan had a twin but all I knew about Ford from the jump was that he's everything Stan Isn't. So Stan is a guy with a huge chip on his shoulder, he's kind of a loser at life. There's somebody who is a winner at life or at least was a winner in all these ways that Stan wasn't.

We realized that in order to bring out the maximum amount of frustration in Stan, [Ford] needed to have a bit of a heart. Like here we see him being kind to the kids, he's not he's not all bad which is what's so infuriating to Stan. The idea that he would quickly get along with the kids when he can't get any respect from them. Ford is designed for what would bring out the most amount of conflict in the family. What would be Dipper's hero, what would be Stan's rival and who's somebody that we could empathize with. I mean, it’s  hard to empathize with a character that comes out and punches one of your characters in the face, basically before he almost says anything.

You see that at this age, that all the stuff [in their room] that would cross over, that would appeal to both of them. It's not just like “there's science stuff here” and then there's “what Stan would be into.” but no, they both like all this.

There was also a version [of ToTS] where early on, they'd rigged the school water fountain. They did sort of like a caper, it was science and a scam together when they were in elementary school but we decided to save the science for the science fair stuff.

We played around with the idea that you would see them working together doing little science games or pulling little pranks. There was actually a scene that some of it was even storyboarded where they're in a treehouse together and Crampelter and his friends have tracked them down and are begging for their lunch money and Stan and Ford have used their jerkiness and geniusness to rig up like a water balloon throwing machine that knocks Crampelter in the head. I remember him saying, “oh no, my old-timey paper crown!” We were really hanging a lampshade on all these sort of Little Rascal cliches.

Ford's not a villain. You know he's getting in Stan's face and saying “I want my life back” but hopefully by the end of the episode even though you don't root for his perspective, you understand his perspective where it's like Stan ruined his science project, Stan shoved him into the portal, Stan took over his house. He’s not completely unreasonable to want it back and he's not completely unreasonable about his request. He says “okay you've got till the end of the summer” and Stan's little look there tells you everything you need to know about how he feels about the situation.

We needed pressure to be at the point where Stan and Ford recognize their lifelong rivalry and Ford does a sincere apology to Stan and almost more importantly, he acknowledges Stan's intelligence. He says “you wouldn't have fallen for Bill's nonsense.” He recognizes that his brother has a kind of intelligence he doesn't.

I always imagined that as kids, Stan and Ford were like this dynamic duo. They were getting into scrapes and like planning pranks and with Stan's creativity and Ford's genius that they were an unstoppable awesome team, before life turned them against each other. I imagine that as kids they were always swapping glasses and tricking their parents so that they could get double presents. And this is a move they did back in New Jersey constantly. We had to figure out who's gonna make a sacrifice and how and even though it's Stan who agrees to be “I'll be the one erase my mind, it's fine, it's worth it”, it's a sacrifice for both. Ford at this point is willing to get his brother back and he has to lose him again. 

Stan and Ford, when they can finally work together, do bring out the best in each other. They just have been missing it for so long.

Post-mind return, Stan and Ford get along and that scene where they both threaten the bus driver gives a hint of what would happen if their powers were combined. We've never seen them working together as adults, they would be a really formidable duo.

Pines Family

[The Blind Eye has] such a great scene between Mabel and Wendy. We don't have a lot of scenes that are just them hanging out and she can kind of be like the cool older sister. Mabel's so obsessed with boys and Wendy's just like "yeah, whatever. They're a dime a dozen."

“in the storyboard, the postcard that Soos is holding up from New Orleans actually said Vegas and at the last minute we got really worried that people were gonna see that and think that that was a clue that Stan was Soos's deadbeat father. And because like our audience, we've trained them to look for clues and to connect dots, they start connecting dots that are not connected. And I called a late retake because, and I see people be like, “wouldn't that be cool if Stan was actually Soos's father” and I hate that headcanon. Whoever's listening and you think “that's a great idea!”-- that's a terrible idea!! Because it means that Stan ran out on his kid and then came back in his life. And weirdly pretends to not be his dad. It flies against the moral of this entire episode which is like, you know this guy who is Soos’ blood relative like cast him out and didn't come back and didn't make time for him and all these people did. These people are Soos’ real family and to say “Stan would be Soos' real father more if he was genetically–”, I'm like “no, no forget that!” Like relationships are about what you do. To me friendship is thicker than water and family is something you can create so I really didn't want anyone to think that we were suggesting that because to me, it actually wasn't just the wrong idea, it was like thematically against what the show's about.” "

"[In NWHS] Every character faces their worst possible choice, which is “Mabel must choose between Dipper and Stan” and “Soos must choose between Stan and the kids,” like “guard that thing with your life. I'm not going to explain to you why.” I believe that Soos would do anything to guard Mr Pines's secrets and these are the only two characters that could possibly make him doubt Stan, these two kids that he loves so much."

"For [DD&MD], you want to set it up as being like [Ford]'s like the coolest toy that's down in the basement that Dipper really wants to play with and he is not allowed to play with him."

"The first three quarters of the series are sort of about Dipper's crush on Wendy and this final quarter is sort of about his crush on the Author. He's such a fan of this guy and he's so used to being denied that which he's a fan of and he's never found anybody who cares about his nerdy stuff. Mabel doesn't care, Stan doesn't care, Soos cares but on a different level. He's so hungry for the approval of somebody like Ford This idea that they would bond over a nerdy board game felt like sort of the way to do this big idea in a sort of grounded way that I like better than like Ford presented Dipper with the Five Trials of the Genius Boy. “I passed these when I was your age! Can you do it too?” and it's like nope he just likes the same dork game that he does."

"The arrival of Ford is creating the two sets of twins starting to pair off between the Brainiacs and the Maniacs"

"Actually I enjoyed that [Ford putting the die in a cheap plastic case] got a little bit of a reckless side because it shows you the Stan part of him. The Stan part of Ford, the little bit that likes a little bit of danger, he likes a little bit of risk. If he would show that side, it would be in when he feels at ease, with a kindred spirit. Around Dipper he’d be like “isn't this pretty cool?” He'd never be that irresponsible around Stan.  I like that Dipper is sort of a little bit of a Achilles heel for Ford as well. Ford has certain blind spots and Dipper exacerbates some of those just because he's willing to encourage, he's willing to “yes and” Ford towards whatever dumb idea he might have."

"Dipper, Mabel, Stan and Ford, they're all characters who need each other. Without Dipper, Mabel's just in a fantasy land. Without Mabel, Dipper is just sort of just spiraling into misery, spiraling into his own neurosis and not being pulled into those social situations, not growing as a person."

"You want [Stan] to be true to our various awful grandfathers, so I feel like for the most part you know that [being shitty to women] a plausible thing for Stan to do, that you only forgive because you know he's not a role model. Nobody wants to be like Stan. The kids never look up to him. The only person who looks up to Stan is Soos and Soos is enough of a comedy character that you understand the joke is “oh this guy thinks the worst way to live is good.” And then at one point you realize why. We made it clear why Soos looks up to Stan is because he gave him his job. He gave him a father basically, he’s essentially Soos’ father. And of course Stan who's had a life of just chaos and disappointment, the only person who would be a surrogate son is [Soos] but also Soos has the biggest heart in the world. So only the biggest heart in the world could forgive all of Stan's many flaws and also if Soos can love Stan, then maybe there's something in there worth loving, then maybe we can too."

"Stan, even when he's sweet, he still has to threaten to murder his niece and nephew."

"I do think the value of [Stanchurian Candidate] is that we're learning just how important it is that [Stan]’s seen. At this point, the kids have become a surrogate family. At the beginning of the show, they were just kind of a little nuisance and then he kind of tried out getting the family from them that he never got from his brother and the idea that he would lose them to his brother is his greatest nightmare and the only way he can really express that is by trying to be impressive to them and trying to be his brother's rival."

"Ford offers Dipper this apprenticeship because Ford sees Dipper as somebody who's special like himself. That Ford's great flaw is arrogance. He believes that there's special people and everyone else and that you can be held back by your siblings. That human attachments are actually weaknesses. The song and dance that he's giving Dipper right now is the exact song of dance that he gave McGucket back when they were younger which is like “sure you could continue working on your job and computers but you and me are different. We're better than everyone else, we have a path that no one else can understand. Only us can do this.” And it’s a very seductive idea for Dipper but he starts to be a little insecure here. He’s kind of “I can't believe it” and he's sort of right to be suspicious because Dipper is a smart kid but Ford's projecting. Ford loves Dipper because he sees someone who tell him yes to everything. He'll never challenge him and if Dipper had taken Ford's apprenticeship,Dipper probably would have gone the way of McGucket, turned into a kind of insane paranoid hermit with no friends, just kind of losing his mind. Like it's a seductive offer but also ultimately Dipper needs to learn not to try to grow up too fast."

"This entire time Dipper's been having this journey of self-discovery and seeing his future as this wonderful thing that he can't wait for. Mabel has been, piece by piece, seeing her idea of the summer fall apart."

"As Ford and Dipper's relationship grow stronger, Stan and Mabel also find much more sort of connection. They both feel like the sibling that's getting kind of sidelined."

"I think [amnesiac!Stan] would be hardest on Soos, second hardest on Ford but Soos would show it. Probably third hardest on Mabel, fourth hardest on Dipper just because where their hearts are. Dipper's not heartless, that's a testament to just how heartbroken those other characters are."

Series goal+ The Finale

"So our idea was; the memory gun can erase a concept as designated by the dial. It stores it. It records you and it keeps that recording and that if you watch that recording things start to come back a little bit, that it hasn't actually completely erased it from your mind. It's more sublimated somewhere where it's really really hard to reach and in the series finale, my concept of Bill is that; if he hadn't gotten in all those forms and fought Stan, Stan is the one that destroyed Bill. Were it just the mind eraser itself that he would be sublimated somewhere but he was weakened in the mindscape and destroyed in the mindscape. But Stan's memories were being sublimated and by looking at the scrapbook in the same way that McGucket's memories come back, they start to come back to the surface."

"I think part of what makes [NWHS] work also is that it has the strongest ticking clock. Yeah, I mean. it has a literal ticking clock. Also the sun is going down it's also, the town is starting to drift apart as the characters are starting to drift apart. There's just such a sense of Doomsday and even though we have like a three-part apocalypse, to me nothing feels as apocalyptic as this episode now."

"The entire purpose of [ToTS] is that Stan and his brother have had this huge rivalry that remains to this day and threatens to tear apart Dipper and Mabel and briefly does, and then Dipper and Mabel are able to find their way together, which is meant to repair Stan and his brother's past."

"Here we're teeing up the rest of the conclusion of the series which is just “whoa this is different. The status quo is shifted and is it going to shift us?” and that was the mission of this entire story was shift. Shift things such that it pits Dipper and Mabel against each other so that they can ultimately make things right and fix their uncles’ trauma in the process."

"“Let's try to set things into motion such that all of these characters who we love, who love each other are placed at maximum odds”. So Ford's entire existence in the series is basically a wrench in the relationships between Stan, Dipper and Mabel, that Stan has had a sibling who he didn't get along with and they've grown up having this horrible rift. Dipper and Mabel are these two twins who love each other but are very very different and are at this sort of volatile growing up moment where if something goes wrong could they turn out like Stan and Ford."

"[The convincing Gideon] scene works for me because it sort of represents the full completion of Dipper's Wendy Arc. Even though he's talking about Gideon and Mabel, he's really talking about himself. That idea that you can't force someone to love you but you can strive to be someone worthy of loving. It really does come down to like be the best you, you can be and the right person will see and feel that."

"It was gonna be W1, W2, W3 and then some kind of goodbye story. I remember it being something vaguely about some sort of other time travel. Bringing Blendin back because he just kind of vamoosed in the middle of this big story. There was that discussed like time traveling back to the first day when the kids arrived. The challenge was thinking of a valuable arc. So like each episode needs to have like a new problem and a new resolution and I was trying to brainstorm what's something that could feel valuable for like a final episode after the apocalypse, after Stan's mind has been erased and he's in the process of getting it back. "

"The thing I remember I wrote one out it was it's the last day of summer. Dipper and Mabel are packing uh they're planning to go home, they're feeling like nostalgic, they kind of don't want to leave. Blendin shows up and he explains that there's all these time bubbles left over, these weird anomalies because of all the time business and what Bill has done and just to watch out and be careful. Then Dipper and Mabel actually accidentally trip into one of these bubbles that are sent back to the very first episode or actually beyond the first episode, their first day in Gravity Falls um and somehow this was meant their character arc was to go from being like a little sad that they're going to leave Gravity Falls to seeing what it was like on the first day. When they were scared to be in Gravity Falls. The idea is like their first day they're like “oh Grunkle Stan, he's this weird old man and we hate living in this house and like we missed our place of comfort back home! And this is a kind of scary new adventure that we don't like.”  The kids see their own growth and realize like “the way we felt about going to Gravity Falls like we don't think we can handle it, is how we feel about leaving.” That feeling of going into a new experience means that something new and exciting is going to happen you're going to grow. There was some thought that maybe over the course of that episode, Stan would get his memory back and something that the kids had done in the past would help him in the present, get his memory back.

"What's supposed to be happening here isn't that Stan's entire memory reappears in an instant. It's supposed to be a couple days of work and we see the beginning of that process when he looks at the scrapbook and then we're kind of jumping ahead a few days. maybe a week of just intensive memory therapy with Stan before he gets there."

"When we were trying to crack the half hour episode after Weirdmageddon, it felt like we were just kind of wallowing and Stan not having his memories. It was a very depressing thing. And we didn’t get to have Stan for the last episode, which was like “it's a great it's great i think you get the emotion like in this episode. It tears you apart when you see it. You could last a little bit longer on it. But going much longer, then you just feels like well what are we doing? Why are we just kind of wallowing in our own sorrows for no good reason.”

"When we had discussed the idea of an episode beyond this episode, a fourth episode, it was basically 20 minutes of [amnesiac!Stan]. This is so intense, you might think you want it but good lord, this is enough."

"Bill singing “We’ll meet again” was something that just felt like the perfect reference because this is kind of an ending about endings in a lot of ways and we know we know Bill's going to be defeated. We know that people like Vill and have grown attached to him and for him to sing “We’ll meet again” is sort of the perfect mysterious way to say like “I might be going, I might not be going.” It’s a reference to Dr Strangelove, a movie that famously ends with nuclear apocalypse and the song “We’ll meet again” so it's for those pop culture savvy. It's already tinged with a kind of a fear and an irony and the apocalypse built in, so it's perfect on a number of levels."

"The concept of the Zodiac as existing in our current canon is this idea that the prophecy was that friends and enemies would need to come together, seemingly impossible alliances would need to be made to stand up to Bill for this prophetic moment. You know that characters like Gideon who was who used to be an enemy, characters like Pacifica, like Robbie, that we've reached the point where thanks to the kids’ kindness and growth, they are now friends with Pacifica, they've resolved Robbie's jerkiness, they've helped McGucket with his memory. They've even overcome this issue with Gideon in W1 and so it seems like friends and enemies have all been restored, leaving only one thing which is Stan and Ford have to shake hands. And their pride once again is what dooms the entire world but they get so close."

"It's clear Stan, even though he's being stubborn here and holds things up, he's ready to do it.  He clasps Ford's hand and then Ford can't help but correct his ignorant brother with something that doesn't matter at all after professing how important all this is and how important it is to put pettiness aside, he's the one who ends up being petty in the end."

"I like that Stan [during the deal] is just thinking “all right, think white, think white, think white.” He's like “think about nothing but sitting on your lazy boy.” "

"Stan and Bill had never interacted in the series up until this moment  because he had just been taken over when he was asleep. We'd seen a lot of Ford and Bill, but Stan and Bill has never happened. And Bill sort of represents all the mystery and weirdness, and Stan is the guy who just wants to have a good life and protect his family. He's the one who never invited Bill in but he's willing to take Bill out."

"If Mabel's going home with a pig, Dipper's going home with this symbol of his friendship with Wendy. And even Stan he's wearing that Mabel sweater. That's a visual symbol of; he's softened up, he's embraced family, he doesn't need to be the tough guy all the time."

[jamesunderwater]

1. Tell us why you like James Potter! I want a whole essay please and thank you!

"Why I Love Like James Potter" by jamesunderwater 1/27/24 

So, I think an important context for my feelings about James Potter is that (as you know) I am a fandom elder. Which means, I already had an extreme attachment to James Potter and his pals before we ever even got the Snape’s Worst Memory chapter. I just looked it up, and somehow I was only ten when OotP came out, so evidently I was massively in love with Sirius Black and obsessed with the Marauders before I hit double digits. (Jesus, no wonder they’re molded with my identity.) The point being – before he was anything else to me, James Potter was the man who bravely sacrificed himself for his family, whose core feature was defined by Sirius’s declaration that they “would have died rather than betray their friends.” He was the guy who figured out how to become an animagus just to be a supportive friend, and based on the few lines that the Marauders have through the Map in PoA, he was hilarious. And really, the fandom kinda just took that and ran with it. So by the time OotP came out and we got so much more information on him – and his dynamic with Lily (cue me sighing dreamily here) – James Potter was already a venerated figure in my mind. -- OMG I just had a buried memory pop up of the Harry Potter Trading Cards as well, which, I don’t think I had one / there was one for James, but there was one for Lily, where she was holding toadspawn?? Or something? and I was in love with her just based on her cute face and red hair and bright eyes, so obviously I’m gonna also be infatuated with the guy who got to marry her.

Okay I got a bit off the point. 

I guess reflecting on it, the way I fell in love with James as a character was very different than how I did for Sirius, and it’s in part due to Sirius being alive in the books, but also speaks to who James is, too. I fell in love with Sirius for who Sirius is, all by himself. I fell in love with James for who he is with other people. I loved the guy who would do anything for his friends. I loved the guy who had this magnetic dynamic with the fiery redhead. I loved the guy who was brilliant and loved by all, and didn’t think twice about sacrificing himself for his family. And I think that this has, for the most part, remained the core of why I love him. 

But of course, I’ve grown up a lot since then, and so have my feelings and opinions. 

– intermission to say I looked back at the ask and realized it only asks about why I like the character, which…somehow changes some of my answer, but we’re gonna try to roll them together – 

Okay, so why I both like and love James as a character now has a lot more to do with the nuances of him. I love that he isn’t perfect. He’s multi-dimensional, and I think his character is a great opportunity to investigate growing up. I think that progression is harder to see in some of the other characters (I have thoughts on why but they aren’t the point right now), but James is just this splendid example of how someone can be so fundamentally good, and also be a fucking kid. He’s messy and that doesn’t make him any less of a “hero” or a “good guy,” but not in your traditional anti-hero or villain arc kind of way. I dunno, maybe it’s in part because I relate to this feeling of not always being a “good person” growing up. I could be arrogant, and mean, and over-dramatic, and stubborn, but people still saw me as a good, likable person, and eventually I did grow out of a lot of the harsher aspects of those characteristics. I love that James gives permission for that, to inspect the dualities within people. 

And on a basic level, I think he was kind of the picture of everything I wanted to have and be. His physical looks / physique is what I’ve been drawn to in men, and eventually realized it’s what I wanted to look like myself; he has this found family that he’s built that is truly a family, this best friend who accepts him fully and he accepts fully and they’re attached at the hip; he becomes a person deserving of and complementary to a strong, independent, kind woman; and his kid is Harry Potter, who truly is one of my favorite characters of all time. So. 

I dunno, I feel like this isn’t as eloquent as I wanted it to be… I’d be very curious to hear other people’s thoughts added onto this (yours and others’!) because I know there’s so much more that I’m missing that other people would say. 

I got to nearly 850 words, though, so hopefully this essay is sufficient enough to earn me a B, at least.

[Submitting for Extra Credit: Photo of the frogspawn card from the Harry Potter Trading Card Game]

[stop-breaking-my-heart-telltale]

favourite twdg villain?

I'm a fond enjoyer of the St. John's as villains. I don't know if they're my favorite just because they're only in one episode, but I love the concept of this family almost immediately jumping into cannibalism toward the start of the outbreak, dealing in human flesh to bandits, and casually feeding this group their friend's legs.

Like... what the hell was this family like before the outbreak that all three of them were like, "Hey now listen... nothing should go to waste, the dead are eating people so why shouldn't we? We gotta survive and in our defense, we only target those who were gonna die anyway... like y'all."

Dude, Mark was shot in this shoulder with an arrow. He wasn't going to die from that injury. It's so fucked that these seemingly friendly people took the group into their home and then fed them Mark's legs.

If we take the idea that everyone is infected and have the capacity within themselves to become walkers, to become monsters, then the St. John's were infected long before the outbreak, y'know? Not literally, but something was wrong with them and the outbreak just further spread that infection and changed them.

But again, are they my favorite? I dunno if I can say that since I have a lot more appreciation for Lily now. Yeah, some of her writing gets a little wonky in ep3 of TFS when she goes on her monologues and shit, but y'know what? I'm into it.

You have to remember who we're talking about and the fact that she's the antagonist; Lily isn't some anti-hero in TFS who secretly has a heart of gold that's brought to light because she reunited with Clementine... she's a fucked up woman who did fucked up things in the name of survival. She's full of rot now. She sees kidnapping children and turning them into soldiers to protect her home as a means to an end, but she doesn't actually give a shit about the people she's taking. They aren't people to her, they're as the episode title suggests, toys in her game. The only one she sees as a person is Clementine, and while that makes her hesitate at first, she sees Clementine's a prize to bring back.

She remembers what happened in S1; her father had a heart attack and as she tried to save him, Kenny smashed his face in with a saltlick and then expected Lily to just stand up and help him get back to his family because "he did what he had to, he made the hard choice." Yes, Larry was a piece of shit. No one liked him, and you can even question Lily on him and she'll tell you that he has a lot of pain. Yes, it makes him an asshole, but he's still her dad and he's all she has. I mean... the simplification is daddy issues, but in all seriousness, I don't doubt for a second that many of Lily's issues stem from Larry being a shitty father to her.

Then everyone thought she was losing it when she insisted there was a traitor in the group, which she was right about, but she was unstable. She was unwell, but how do you help someone like that when you don't have training to go about it? Then Lily ends up killing either Carley or Doug and the group turns on her, and either she's left behind or she steals the van and runs away.

Then we don't know what the hell happened to her until we see her again in TFS, but like... a lone woman with decay festering inside of her joining the delta? Exposing her to their methods? I mean, what else did she have to lose? She had nothing, she lost everything, and she has a lot of issues. Survival is easy when you're numb, when you don't care about the individual; they're all just cogs churning to make the system run, and if a piece doesn't cooperate, you get rid of it and find a new one.

Plus I think there's something to say about Lily not wanting to be perceived as weak again. That whole display she put on in the cells? Telling the story of what happened to Minerva and Sophie? I get the criticism that it feels like Lily did a 180 between episodes but like... yeah dude, because it's a performance. It's not just her and Clementine anymore. It's a display of power and authority. She's playing the part and thriving in it as she ensures everyone else is terrified of her.

But then when Clementine and AJ get the upper hand? Again, she's not afraid to play up the pleading to earn enough sympathy to spare her- hell, just to let their guard down enough to strike and get the upper hand again. I mean, she's got nothing else to lose, right? If she doesn't go for it, she'll be killed and sure, you can kill her anyway but at least she tried.

Honestly, I look at Lily in TFS and still see that scared little girl playing the tough bitch, just like Carley said in S1. It's just now escalated from "tough bitch" to a downright vile person. She's so... lost? I suppose? Lost within herself and the monstrous means she's taken to survive.

I get the criticisms of how she was used in TFS, but for me, it's like when people complain about Minerva not getting the redemption arc she supposedly should've gotten, y'know? There's no saving her. Lily was never on our side, and there was no getting her on our side. She wasn't ever going to redeem herself. Even if you spare her and she drifts away on her raft, can someone like her actually find redemption? Or will she just find another group that'll feed into her rot?

Truly, I say let her be horrid. Let her be the piece of shit villain with a few fleeting moments of humanity. Let her drown in the blood she's spilled.

[dokidokitsuna]

New Game?

So recently I was scrolling Twitter’s dying remains and found out that Kirby character “discourse” exists (which is just hilarious to me…how can you look at these adorable friends and decide you need to use them to start arguments).

And while I was laughing, I was reminded of something that I did find weird about the Magolor Epilogue: the idea that it’s supposedly Magolor’s ‘redemption arc’. Even in the game, one of the pause screen descriptions mentions something about ‘atonement’...

But I dunno, maybe it was an error of localization, maybe it’s just my bad sense of humor, but nothing that Magolor says in the game mode gives me the impression that he’s the slightest bit sorry about anything he’s done. ^^;;; Like, that little ‘sad sigh’ that we all saw in the trailer and used to extrapolate the tone of ME (which turned out to be hilariously inaccurate) was pretty much it. After that, he’s just like “screw this, I’m getting my powers back” and that sets the mood for the rest of the game. Determined, resilient, triumphant…those were the vibes I got from Magolor Epilogue. ‘Apologetic’ or even just ‘regretful’ was not among them. XD

The little dialogue blurbs he does when he’s upgrading his Magical Skills (you can read them here) were what really convinced me-- they’re 100% Magolor’s usual cute, funny, conceited self; if you read through them without knowing the plot of Magolor Epilogue I don’t think you could figure out that this character is supposed to be at his lowest point. ^^;; He’s still making world-domination jokes, even! THIS LITTLE--

…I hope I don’t sound angry; I actually find it really, really funny and fitting for the character; personally I wouldn’t have it any other way. XD But yeah, I’m not seeing a redemption arc here. The whole time I was just thinking “THIS BOY DIDN’T LEARN A DAMN THING” over and over as I watched…he hardly seems to feel sorry for himself, let alone for what he almost did to Pop Star. Essentially, it would not feel out of character at all for him to just go back to being a villain. 

In fact, I have to wonder…if he didn’t go through another dimensional rift at the end of the game mode…if he destroyed the Master Crown and was just stuck in interdimensional purgatory, left to figure out what to do with his life…would he consider it his second chance? Like, maybe he’d realize he never needed the Master Crown…his little anti-hero’s journey taught him that he has the potential to become an evil overlord all by himself~

[chocogoblin]

ToA x LMK (?)

Had a random crossover idea. Spoilers for people who haven't seen the last season of Trollhunters, but then again that show is years old so like :p

Basically, in the final fight between the Trollhunters and Morgana, when Claire and Morgana go into the shadow realm. Yano how it's not shown? Yeah had a funny idea if Macaque from LMK was coming through, and looked at the two and was like (to Morgana) "Bitch for the last time I told you not to start fights here," and beats the ever loving shit outta her.

Anyways, bro is looking around and is like "oh shit kid you're still here-" as he looks at Claire, who is still recovering from the fact Morgana is dead and gone now, and everything is over, and hey the shadow realm is nice without the fear of Morgana being there looking over her shoulder.

This is my convoluted way of saying that Macaque after seeing a baby shadowmancer, (cause you can never find any of those these days who aren't absolutely ancient) just looks at Claire and goes "you can do better than that" and starts helping her with shadow magic. Maybe at first it was a way to get more power and then he just starts to care for her. But in my head a majority of the reasoning that Mac decided to help her is because it's a dying art and she's probably the youngest shadowmancer in the world at the moment.

I can see a lot of stuff coming out of this. Like just from the top of my head:

-Claire becomes one of those immortal wizards and flash forward to the future meets LMK crew. (from this idea stems my second idea of Pigsy and Tang trying to unlock Claire's tragic backstory(TM) even though there isn't much of that here.)

-Dad Macaque, because, come on.

-ROTT movie just, not happening now that there's a monkey on par with the guy who beat up all of heaven including all it's gods on their side. I'd imagine Demi-gods (because that's what arcane order is listed as on the wiki) is alot easier than gods, and def a lot easier than losing (lol) to Sun Wukong.

-Angsting to eachother. Think of any lmk x toa pairing, and you can make an angst conversation out of it some way or another.

-Half-troll Jim just going to Megapolis with Claire to visit Mac and becoming obssessed with the anti gravity arcade because it's open at night and just hell yeah.

-Lore building perhaps with the two universes mixed together??

-Claire helping out with the shadow play stuff while she visits Mac. Bonus points if she gets a mention in his vent play about the hero and the warrior.

-Toby and Mei playing games together, and Toby getting his ass absolutely handed to him.

-Mac going away to visit Claire during s3 or between seasons to vent about "what the fuck is going on kid- " because alot of the lmk villains don't go outside asia except if they want to rule the world (cough, lbd) so they can't really find him all the way in California, America lol.

-Bonus points if Claire learns how to speak Mandarin or Chinese (i forgot what the LMK gang spoke originally because i'm a silly lil english speaker who only watches the eng dub) so now she's trilingual. Spanish, English, whatever the hell the lmk gang speaks.

I dunno the ToA fandom is pretty dead, and I don't know how many LMK fans know about ToA, so. rip me ig. if this post gets a few notes i'll consider posting the art i made for this so far ('art' as if i'm not talking about a few sketches in my lil book of sketch).

[eway]

Why am I like this?

So I had an idea inspired by the Sonic Runners Puyo Puyo crossover. It's obvious Puyo and Sonic should crossover. Because of this

But I think we are forgetting. Puyo wasn't just reskinned into a Sonic game. It also became this

And I had a dream about a Kirby and Puyo crossover. Focusing on my favorite Puyo and favorite Kirby characters. Schezo and Taranza...

And it takes place in the Mirror World. I mean already you can see why Schezo would be a good protag, given he became the Dark Mage after entering a Mirror World. And Taranza has a history with that Mirror.

But really, I think the interesting bit would be how it would get Schezo's character back on track. He went from a kid who wanted to be a hero, to corrupted by the Runelord, defeated by Arle and possessed by Ragnus, and he started to become good ish. He refused to take Wish's power when she couldn't fight back. He sacrificed himself for Arle and Rulue, not knowing he would survive. Yeah he's still goofy innuendo man, but he was a Chaotic Neutral. Waku Waku Puyo Puyo has his power drained and put into Doppelganger Schezo, and as he trains he realizes he doesn't *need* to take magic. He still does, but he's not evil about it. He went from naive kid, to villain, to noble demon, to anti-hero. Modern Schezo is just a grouch. Not an anti-hero. Aside from chasing Sig and then not even doing anything he hasn't done anything remotely bad to qualify as an anti-hero.

And that's where this crossover could come in. A dark Schezo reminding him of what he used to be. Corruption setting in once more (we know this mirror can corrupt) and ending with him becoming an anti-hero once more. Still stealing power, but from those who can fight back, and maybe if we want him to become more heroic, only from villains, at least lethally. He still wants Arle's power, but doesn't want to kill her. He values his few friends, but is still a dangerous person who can and WILL kill. He's not harmless, as Amitie said in the Sonic crossover anymore.

As for Taranza, he lost his lover to the mirror's corruption. He doesn't want to see another fall to it. And also has another reason for the quest - to destroy the mirror once and for all. Also, because this would have dialog, he could be fleshed out. In terms of personality we only really have Tripple Deluxe and Star Allies to work with. Plus him and Schezo could become friends.

I dunno. It's an interesting idea. Sometimes I wish I didn't come up with ideas because then it's up to me to make them happen in fics haha

But this will be on the backburner/probably won't happen. Maybe I'll commission some art of this tho

[thelastbicorn]

The Metaphor: Re Fantazio hype train isn’t quite chugging at full speed yet, so I thought I might share some of my theories regarding the plot: Specifically: who is the *real* villain? The Big Bad? The final boss? I can identify a few candidates, who I’ll list in order of increasing likelihood (in my opinion).

1. Louis - This is the obvious one. Too obvious, methinks. I honestly think this guy is going to turn out to be an anti-villain/hero in the end. We’re probably still going to have a big climactic battle with him (bonus points if he has an archetype), but it won’t be the final battle. I predict that he will be defeated, die staring into the Protagonist’s eyes as they realize they weren’t so different after all, and then...the Prince’s curse doesn’t wear off. Uh-oh. We did exactly what another bad guy wanted us to do. Fuck. Who is that nefarious villain, you ask? Read on...

2. More - I’m not sure I trust this guy. We know he’s a prisoner in Akademia. For what? Writing a book that the powers that be didn’t like? Maybe. Or perhaps there’s another reason that he’s not telling us? I dunno. I might just be having P5 flashbacks. (They wouldn’t pull that twist AGAIN, would they?)

3. Forden - This is the “other bad guy” I was talking about. The game seems to be setting him and Louis up as foils and rivals for the throne, and while we’re being led to believe that the latter is the more dangerous/evil one, I don’t buy it. I seriously wonder if Louis is really the one responsible for the Prince’s curse. We see the masked figure cast the spell, but how do we know it’s Louis? If Forden wants the throne himself, he would have just as much reason to want the King’s only heir dead. As the leader of the Sanctist Church, he’s already seen as a de facto leader, and he starts the election in the #1 position anyway. He probably wouldn’t have killed the King with his own hands like Louis did, but as a Rhoag (with their long lifespans), he could afford to play the waiting game once the Prince was out of the picture. I’m rambling now, but you get the picture. This guy is potentially just as villainous as Louis, if not more so.

4. Hythlodaeus V aka the late King aka the Big Giant Floating Head of Doom - Yes, I’m serious. I mean, just look at him/it! That thing is just screaming Final Boss. Hell, it could be a final dungeon in itself, like Sin in Final Fantasy X. It’s present in the battle UI from the moment it appears. Why? Because it’s watching you. It’s watching *everyone*. In-game they mention a “royal magic” that only the King can wield, which isn’t described in detail but is said to be a deterrent to invasion. That sounds pretty damn powerful, whether it’s defensive or offensive in nature. It sort of seems like it has a will of its own, activating after the King’s death right in the middle of his funeral. The election “seems” a tad fishy to me too. Sure, it seems progressive for a high fantasy setting, but consider this: What if the purpose of the election isn’t necessarily to find a new ruler for the kingdom, but for finding the royal magic a new *host*?

Honorable Mention: “Scheming Man” - As shown in the latest preview, this character appears in the beginning, breaking the fourth wall to ask the player for their name. So...what exactly are they scheming, anyway? If they can perceive our world, then they could easily know some things that no one else in-universe does. That already makes them more dangerous, potentially. There’s also the possibility that it’s someone we know already. It could be More; I need to listen to their voices again. If it is More, then he belongs at the top of the potential villain list. If not, then he stays where he already is. This is why this entry is off to the side. I don’t know if he’s somebody we’ve seen or not.

In any case, I’ve talked enough. I can’t wait until next month, when all of my predictions get proven completely and utterly wrong. I’m honestly hoping for some kind of mind-bending twist at the end of the second act, but only time will tell.

[demonsfate]

shipping questions // accepting // @juanalmada1234 asked . . . shipping questions: 1, 18, 20, 22 and 28

1. what’s the best thing about shipping for you?

It's hard to say! There are so many great things about shipping! But I think it may just be delving deep into the characters' feelings. Often, people may behave differently toward those they are in love with. I feel that in ships, you can view a side of a character that isn't often seen. Like Jin may be more affectionate and more willing to make physical contact with a lover than he will with a friend. They may know stuff about each other than nobody else does. And we get to see just how far the characters will go for their lovers. I just think it's a great opportunity to flesh out two characters.

It's also interesting for Devil, because he used to be somebody who couldn't really love anyone. So, it's a new experience for him!

18. is there a ship you used to like, but not anymore?

I'm trying to think but... I don't think there really is? Usually it's rare for me to start disliking a ship I've enjoyed. I guess the closest thing to this would be that I used to consider the idea of Jin & Julia (they have stuff in common!) But I pushed that aside in favor for Jun & Michelle. Dunno why! But I just prefer the moms together lol

20. is there a ship you wanted to play, but couldn’t yet?

EEEEEYAHHHH!! As I said, I do have a soft spot for the Jin & Alisa ship, so I would not mind trying that one out!!! I also have a super secret soft spot for the Jin & Miguel ship! Y'know, it's not as toxic in MY portrayal 'cos Jin isn't actually responsible for the sister's death. But y'know, the guy who did get her killed still exists within him... so that would make things AWKWARD. Anyway, I like the Jin & Miguel ship just because it seems Jin has a thing for the hot-headed aggressive guys. And well... also just look at how TALL and HANDSOME he is! I thiiiiink those are the only ships I haven't really gotten to play yet? I'll probs get to play 'em eventually, tho! Frick, it took over a year for me to get a Xiao & Hwoarang to ship with!

22. is there any ship you will likely never play? (apart from the obvious in/cest, pe/dophilia etc, i want to believe you guys are Good)

Hmm. I think I'm pretty lenient on who I ship Jin with - like I'm VERY easygoing when it comes to writing ships! Hell, somebody could be like "do you wanna ship?" and I'll be like "SURE!" But I do have some dealbreakers, or more so, Jin has some dealbreakers. Like for example, I don't mind the Nina & Jin ship (I don't ship it but it's not something I dislike) but... I just don't see Jin dating an assassin. I see him dating a former assassin who now wants to make amends. But he's not going to date somebody who's still actively hurting or killing people. So like, that means Anna is also off the plate! I also don't see Jin with Marduk or Ganryu either luls. And obviously, Jin would never date Ogre for obvious reasons lol. He wouldn't date Azazel either. But honestly, I don't think those two are capable of romance.

Devil, on the other hand - I feel like there would be a lot more ships I'd be willing to do with him, but it also depends on the timeline. I'd joke that pre-purified Devil would go after Ogre, and he may! But Jin's hatred for Ogre is too strong, and thus, it influences Devil to be furious with Ogre. Devil, would however, go after Marduk - purified and not purified unfortunately. Like Jin though, he wouldn't be interested in Ganryu.

28. would you play a “bitter exes” relationship?

The funny thing is that out of all the years I've been RPing (11 years now...) I have never written a breakup with mine & my partner's muses, I've never written exes before. Isn't that weird? I always thought I'd get breakup threads 'cos I happen to frequently write problematic muses. (Like Devil - villains. Or if not villains, then morally gray / anti-heroes) Yet... nothing ever happens! The only time I wrote a breakup was in private discord RPs (back when I used to do those) and they got back together anyway lol.

But I wouldn't mind doing a bitter exes relationship! Though... I'm not sure how bitter Jin would be. I think Jin would only be very bitter if the relationship ended due to betrayal. But I'm not so sure 'cos I never had the opportunity!

Devil, on the other hand, would be a very bitter ex no matter how the relationship ended. Just because Devil, even after purification, is a jealous and possessive man. He may not be as aggressive about it as he once was, but he still feels those two emotions, and he still has to cope with them.

[blueikeproductions]

For a while I’ve been wondering if the Transformers might be in a bit of a rut with its villains. Ever since IDW in particular leaned hard into making the Decepticons more of an oppressed group fighting against (implied) tyranny, it kinda feels like the series has lost its primary villains, especially Megatron who has fairly consistently been portrayed as more of an anti-hero in more recent stories.

Because of this, a lot of stories post Aligned have desperately tried using other villains but none of them have really stuck as mainstays.

Cyberverse and WFC tried bringing back the Quintessons, but neither really left much of an impression, despite CV handling the group better. Both Quints just kinda confusingly show up with an intent to destroy for vague reasons, and then leave. Both shows also tried to use the Mercenaries but both just used them so horribly… Not helped is both sets of Mercs were all Decepticons, making it feel more tonally confused. RiD15 got this right by having Autobot bounty hunters in addition to Decepticons post war to make it less … one sided.

Prime Wars tried to have non Decepticon antagonists as well, but Starscream, Trypticon, Menasor, Overlord, Rodimus Unicronus, and Megatronus are all labeled Decepticons, so … which is it…?

It feels like, similar to Sonic fans making observations about Eggman, that Hasbro and current creatives want to move away from using the Decepticons as villains, but don’t really seem to know what to do without them.

There’s this confusing back and forth where they can’t seem to fully divorce themselves from the Decepticons, using some in non Decepticon but still Decepticon roles that I don’t understand, especially in Cyberverse’s case, why they just weren’t rabble rousing Decepticons in a post war setting. (There was Megatron X, Tarn, and the Perfect Decepticons, but they too feel like they were meant as a separate, non-Decepticon faction at times like I dunno, Horrorcons or Vehicons.)

The live action movies are similarly in a weird spot where Megatron steadily became less prominent in favor of other villains, one villain being an Autobot even, to the point he has no role in Bumblebee and Rise of the Beasts. While the Bee Movie did use Decepticons effectively in their traditional roles, we now have Beasts…

Now you’d think the obvious thing would be to use the Predacons as galactic beast machine overlords or something, opposite the Maximals, but instead we have the Terrorcons led by Scourge. That in itself isn’t bad, but it still feels like that same reluctance in using Decepticons, as the Predacons are typically the descendants of them, so a weird reluctance by association… (Doubly confusing as some Terrorcons are former Decepticons, continuing that weird tonal confusion.)

This wouldn’t bother me so much if Hasbro just came right out and admitted they want to retire the Decepticons as antagonists and they want to focus on a new evil faction going forward in newer (non-G1) media. Rise of the Beasts feels like that’s them indirectly admitting it, but then we have EarthSpark.

EarthSpark is basically Rescue Bots but aimed at teenagers. (They say it’s a kids show, and it is, but let’s be honest, most children’s media above kindergarten nowadays is more openly made for teens and college aged adults. Quick aside, Rocko’s Modern Life and The Brave Little Toaster is a fun instance in the 90’s where both was actually made with adults in mind, but when they found out kids were watching the most, they toned it down. Gargoyles meanwhile, was made for kids specifically, but was also made by a team that wasn’t trying to make (as much) of a point above all else…) Anyhoo like Rescue Bots, the focus is more on a team of young new Autobots (again let’s be honest, until told otherwise the Terrans are all functionally Autobots) navigating life with their new found family. While the Decepticons are villains this time, they’re limited to mostly being an inconvenience in favor of the new lead villains Agent Croft of GHOST, Dr. Mandroid and his Arachnamech droids. Both are a call back to Marvel TF human villains who don’t trust any Transformer and want to hunt and exterminate them all. These two are really fun, though they admittedly lean a little too much into a current “only white people can be villains thing” I’m not fond of (some of my favorite baddies from other stuff are other ethnicities as well!), but they’re both otherwise very solid and have that honesty of Hasbro wanting to try new villains outside of the Decepticons. But because fans are always weird about humans, the Decepticons have to be the “true” focus, but that doesn’t really work very well in a show that wants to paint the Earth bound Decepticons in a sympathetic light (particularly Tarantulus and the Cassettes) like IDW and Cyberverse did…

It does appear ES is at least partially aware of this, and it feels like they’re making Shockwave the new Decepticon leader in the absence of Megatron (again kind of harkening to Shockers’ role in Marvel), with the assumption Shockwave will take control in season 2. It would be fittingly logical, still having the new human villains but also reinvigorating the Decepticons with a cold, merciless yet logic driven leader not bound by petty things like a conscious. However there’s still the mystery of what happened to Cybertron. The earth bound Transformers are cut off from Cybertron and seem to assume the planet is gone and their race near extinction up until the discovery of the Terrans. Now there’s a separate discussion entirely here, but what I want to focus on is Cybertron. Some of us have wondered if the planet is not only still intact but the remaining Autobots and Decepticons are still fighting up there. Why wouldn’t they? Shockwave wants to continue the war, and other Earth Decepticons are also itching to settle old scores when the time comes, so it stands to reason the Cybertron Decepticons are doing the same. It’s led to some theories that the Cybertron bound Transformers may reestablish contact with Earth, with the Decepticon leader of Cybertron looking to rescue Megatron and take over the mudball he was trapped on for decades. Who would be the leader? A friend has been gunning for Deathsaurus in particular, but I’d say any previous Emperor of Destruction type Decepticon would work well: Deathsaurus, Scorponok, Galvatron, Magmatron, Cryotek, Overlord, Tarn, Straxxus, etc. Some theories have also leaned on a group of evil Terrans, possibly led by a Terran version of Beast Wars Megatron as synergy for RotB and general Beast Wars resurgence purposes. Both takes would be interesting, especially with the ever common observation the wars never truly end (it’s why I don’t have high hopes for the returned peace in Cyberverse with the twitchy Shadow Striker and immature Bumblebee as new council members), that it stands to reason the Terran Transformers might have their own war later on…

My point otherwise is if Hasbro wants to truly commit to non Decepticon villains going forward than actually commit to the bit and not be wishy washy about it. Mandroid, and Scourge seem to be the step in such a such a direction.

However if they want to retain the Decepticons as the primary villains, but not have Megatron as the leader anymore, then pick a new leader and commit. Part of why I enjoy RiD15 so much is that it wasn’t afraid to experiment in that context, with such leaders like Steeljaw, Glowstrike, Scorponok, Saberhorn, Cyclonus and Motormaster all serving as fun leader types for what they were at the time. Personally I’d enjoy Optimus vs Scorponok again, or an Optimus/Predaking, Fire Convoy/Black Convoy, and Bumblebee/Steeljaw style match up. Bumblebee continuing to be the main focus probably implies more of a Bee/Steeljaw thing in the future and I’ll gladly take it.

I think what I’d prefer at this point is a new evil faction since that’s what it feels like it’s going anyway, be it something like Blendtrons, Terrorcons, Predacons, Vehicons or a brand new kind of ‘Con. Terrorcon feels like the faction Hasbro wants to use specifically from Prime and now the Movies, though it’s continued usage will likely depend on RotB…

[violetlunette]

Slight twst spoilers below;

He’s probably not going to make an appearance in the Halloween Event, but a part of me wants to see TWST’s Coachman. The Coachman is one of the top 5 best Disney villains. He’s not popular or has a cool song but The Coachman is one of TWO Disney Villains who is never defeated by the hero. He does terrible things, gets everything he wants, and still continues to do so. Yeah, The Coachman is STILL out there turning young boys into donkeys and selling them as slaves. Think about that; Ursula, Maleficent, Jafar, Hades, and all the other top tens were defeated. As bad as they were, they were stopped. The coachman wasn’t. He WON. And again, is the only one of two Disney Villains who were never defeated, the other being the Firebird and even then the latter’s damage was undone. Then again, this is why another part of me doesn’t want to see the TWST version of him as I like the Coachman as a baddie, the baddest of the bad. The very premise of TWST is taking the baddies and turning them into anti-heroes, or at least not as bad. There are only two straight-up villains so far; The Phantoms in Chapter 6 and Henrik from Chapter 7. I dunno, does anyone else have any thoughts on this?

[splodey-goat]

I don't think there are good enough words, in the English language generally but in Fandom Jargon in particular, to describe how someone can have a rich and complex inner life and backstory and all the unassailable justification in the world to believe what they do and act how they do, and still fall very straightforwardly into broad black/white distinctions.

And I tend to think of this as a very fandom-y problem because that's where the stakes are low enough but emotions are high enough that you see the most bombastic fighting about it, but also because I think if we can address this on the media literacy level we can stop it on the consequential political level.

Like I'm not a sociologist or a wordsmith so I hope this is comprehensible but like, The MCU and its fandom are the masters of this, right? Their recurring villain problem of "This person has real and valid reasons to be a villain, but since they're killing babies we don't have to address it" is more often (rightly) seen as just bad writing, often because the horrific action is non-sequitur to the sympathetic reasoning, but the mirror is "Oh Tony Stark has ptsd and ended up being right about his alien paranoia so you can't call him bad just for being Fascist American Exceptionalism: The Person" and because no alternative is never called you're encouraged not to think about it.

It's all the idea that like, if you can humanize someone you can't help but empathize with them, so you focus on the reasons and intents for the characters you wanna sympathize with, and then you focus only on the ACTIONS of the people you want the audience to hate. Heroic actions are FOR something but villainous actions are in a vacuum.

I guess you have anti-heroes and anti-villains but that's such a specific breed of thing and very definitely does not apply to the real world. It's easier to talk about in media because there IS a central narrative trying to push things and you can just blame the writer/exec/the framing, but irl anyone pushing a framing is also an actor in the system with independent motives informed by every other actor in the system. I dunno, I'm rambling but please someone tell me you get it, how blorbos and pathetic meow-meows are actually a hop skip and a jump away from "well my uncle's a cop and he's not racist!".

[ninjadudettekira]

Happy American Thanksgiving, here’s art I did.  A few days ago was my birthday, got a new iPad been drawing and ended up with this.

Y'all know that post I did a few weeks ago about the Charmcaster, Darkstar, and Albedo team up? I'm writing a fic on that, it's not out yet because I'm trying to finish the damn thing before I post it so it's not stuck in editing hell like my other fic is.

Anyway at some point Sunny joins the group, and somehow I ended up with a new ship. (There isn't gonna be any Charmcaster x Michael in the fic btw.)

Full disclosure: The hands I had to trace from the reference I was using cause I couldn't get it right, and the background was from the show that I blurred and edited to make it fit the box. Maybe I’ll art dump on here or my DevaintArt (Kira-Sema) one of these days since I have drawn a lot from my phone, my sketch book, and my old iPad. I just haven’t posted any of them anywhere public cause it’s either traced from references/screenshots I used, traced of old drawings, or it just didn’t come out the way I wanted it to. (Or it’s for my Ben 10 AU that I haven’t made public and the drawings are spoilers for the story.) 

Under the cut I explain some of the story I’m writing and how this ship came about from it. (If y’all want to wait till I get to posting the story ignore the ‘keep reading’ cause it spoils the story.)

Aight so by the time I get to this point in the story, Charmcaster, Michael, and Albedo are more anti-hero than full on villain. They're more friendly with the Alien Force Trio, but not going out of their way to do anything "good". (Canon still kinda happens except that Enemy of My Frenemy happens before Girl Trouble.)  Michael has a better grasp with his powers and doesn’t have to feed on people to get mana, Charmcaster ended up helping with that by giving him tiny bits of her mana at a time till he turned back to normal. He still can accidentally absorb mana if he touches someone who has a lot of power so he refrains from having physical contact with Charmcaster and Gwen. (And if he does it’s for a short time or it’s channeled through someone else to channel back to the original person. Is that possible? Idk but I’m doing it lol.)  Albedo is able to use mana too, but it’s weaker. (The same level as Kid Gwen’s when she was just starting out, so his mana is blue over being pink/purple. He has to rely on using spell books over being able to channel mana by itself.) He’s been trying to use mana to try and get back to being a Galvan, but he can only be a Galvan for a short period of time. Instead of Sunny being taken back to Anodyne by Verdona, Gwen makes the suggestion that they take her to Hex’s mansion and have her be with Charmcaster, Michael, and Albedo to try and get Sunny to change her attitude a bit. Michael is smitten as soon as they meet, and for actual reasons not because of her being a more powerful Anodite.  In order for Michael to be able to touch Sunny without draining her, they use Albedo as a conductor since his mana is still weaker than theirs. During this time Albedo is working on refining Michael’s gloves so they can be an insulator so it limits him being able to absorb someone’s energy. At first it’s only so Michael can be able to safely have physical contact with Sunny, but after some time Albedo gets feelings for Sunny too. (She also constantly flirts with him as well.)  The way I’m writing this is that Michael and Albedo are both with Sunny, but the boys aren’t together. Could that change? Dunno, but I don’t think so cause before this point in the story I already established that they, along with Charmcaster, see each other as siblings. (Which is why Michael isn’t with Charmcaster, their relationship is platonic in here.) 

[faroreswinds]

Embla's "I was Lonely" story works because the loneliness she experienced, at first, was completely out of her control. Her rare kindness to mortals was taken advantage of, and the only one on her side was the one egging on her already existing wariness towards mortals. Askr's relative nonchalance over her concerns and his readiness to accept betrayal from mortals angers her because SHE knows how painful and terrifying it is to actually BE betrayed and actually HAVE her life threatened. In that regard she's GENUINELY tragic, but her hateful and spiteful actions afterwards towards innocent people is - RIGHTFULLY - called out as horrific.

Even if she's sympathetic to a degree, she's still evil in the end because she let her hate consume her. She saw one of her descendants - Bruno - befriend people he was taught to see as mortals enemies, and instead of that changing her mind or making her reconsider she takes advantage of that to make ALL of them hurt even worse. She takes control of Bruno's body and forces him to hurt Alphonse and Sharena. She now instigates the very sort of betrayal she once tried to warn Askr away from, along with all the other shit she did to innocent people.

"Did You Consider That I Was Lonely Once" fails so fucking often because it's nowadays rarely ACTUALLY any part of the reason why the villain/antagonist/anti-hero/etc. is doing such shitty things to people. It's often just a crutch shitty writers use to make their morally black asshole look uwu sad so people can swallow them easier. But here Embla's loneliness is GENUINELY and NATURALLY integrated into her character and story, and it's only used as an EXPLANATION for her horrible actions and not an outright justification for them. It makes her sympathetic without overlooking everything she still did to everyone. There's something actually there that can let someone say "okay yeah, if she wasn't lonely this-and-that wouldn't have happened" because her loneliness/sense of betrayal genuinely are the catalysts to what she does later on, but without erasing what she DID do.

I dunno, at first I was plenty ready to write her off as another "UwU I'm Lonely pwease overwook my rancid crimes" but she actually has SOMETHING there to her which genuinely shocked me. Made her my fave from the book lmao.

That's exactly why I was like "Huh. Actually, not bad."

Because she does have the makings of "UwU I'm Lonely pwease overwook my rancid crimes" but it never comes to be. She is never excused for her behavior, she is never explained away with brainwashing or "I just loved him soooo much." which is just degrading and poor writing.

It's not like she's a brilliant character or anything, but she had more depth to her than Hel and nightmare goat, but wasn't "she's actually a victim" white-washed either like Aversa or something.

My biggest issue, though, is how Askr sort of gets away with his behavior. Embla had legitimate concerns and frankly, just wanted to be left alone. Askr basically put her in a spot she didn't want to be in, and yet absolutely no blame falls to him. He actively ignores her concerns, brushing off the attack that fell upon her.

I like Askr, but man that was disappointing.

But everything you wrote is pretty spot on, nothing more to add, really.

[kisilinramblings]

Hi!!! I've seen people theorizing that Adrien will be villain or at least an anti-hero later in the series, mind if I ask what do you think about it? I'm curious to see your view. Thank you!

Villain? I dunno. Though I admit it would be tempting as a What If scenario to explore. But despites having his load of potential angst, I'm not sure what would be his motivation? As a person, Adrien is pretty resilient to a fault. Especially if Ladybug is still present, as she is a symbol that mistakes can be fixed, that there is always a solution or an alternative. So yeah, that seems unlikely for him to go against her. Not by his free will anyway. So far, he has always prefered to resign than to hurt her (Gamer 2.0, New York Special) or was tired how things were going behind his back and felt like unwanted (Syren, Kuro Neko).

Even in the case of discovering his Cataclysm hit his own father. Because it is Monarch who chose this path, but also because they maybe still have a way. My theory is they could be using again the combo of the Rabbit and Dog Miraculous to recover the Lucky Charm they have lost (especially if they want to save Gabriel's life and have him be alive to face his consequences). But right now they can't because the Dog isn't available and the Rabbit alone would potentially create a time paradox as they would have to untie Monarch themselves. Fetch would be more discreet and be similar to how the Lucky Charm would disappear naturally. I'm just unsure how they could make Fetch first hit the Lucky Charm without being noticed in that wax room though. Maybe they would arrive before themselves and hide under the veiled wax statues while waiting for the small window to throw the ball once Lucky Charm is activated and no one is looking?

All that to say, I don't think Gabriel would die at the end of S5 because I want him to live his consequences.

Anyway, while I don't believe Adrien would become a villain and be minded to fight Ladybug (again, not on his own will), I do however believe this season is brewing another akumatization for him. And not a What-If. The real thing. That one shot during Jubiliation where Chat Noir and the Unpurified Akuma are sharing the frame felt like a foreshadowing to this for this season.

[burningfudge]

Hey, what's your opinion on Venom? Personally... I don't see the appeal? Like, yeah, it was originally created so it could be explained how the hero's clothes remain intact (because of inconsistent drawings), but whenever I read that symbiotes need a host, I keep thinking: did they eat each other all the time on their home planet then? I find the idea of a self fixing suit cool, but the alien part? Not so much, dunno if it's because it's too messy to think about, but while I find Eddie okay (as much as I can before he went anti-hero, kinda tired to think about where the villains get their resources... or if they still have a home or money), I feel more bad when he was fired than in ANY actual appearance he had later (don't follow the comics by the way).

lol that's why venom was created? i didn't know that

but i don't have much of an opinion about him. cool dude