#it’s still manipulation in a sense so it’s still bad

[mermaidsirennikita]

I feel I should say I’m one of those people who read Wuthering Heights as a full-grown adult and was like, “How in the hell is this romantic? Cathy married someone else to get away from Heathcliff, and then her murderous ghost kills him for what he did to her children.”

To only focus on young Cathy and Heathcliff’s doomed romance is to seriously miss the point of the book.

I don't think the novel was ever intended to be romantic (... in a conventional sense), but it has a very compelling romantic relationship between two people that influenced later straightforward fictional love stories, which is why it is what it is today.

However, I will disagree on the take on Cathy's motives for marrying Linton. She doesn't marry Linton to escape Heathcliff; she marries Linton to go TO a level of status that she does not currently have. She does love Linton, in her way, and appreciates the gentleness and stability her offers.

However, Cathy does not present Heathcliff as someone she "will not" marry when explaining her mindset to Nelly. She presents him as someone she CANNOT marry because he's too "low" for her. At this point, he doesn't have the wealth he'll have when he comes back, and I would also say: Heathcliff is NOT the degree of fucked up that he is when he returns. He's super abused and angry... but he's a teenager. He doesn't have shit. He's not angry at Cathy the way he is when he returns, because though he knows she's heading towards something with Linton and is acting differently, she has not married Linton YET. He's possessive of her, but the relationship is not in the place that it is in when he returns from his mysterious absence.

If Heathcliff was not low, Cathy would quite possibly (probably?) marry him. Her big speech is telling Nelly that she loves both men, but her "pretty" love for Linton will fade. Her love for Heathcliff is an "ugly" love, but it is enduring and will always endure. Cathy doesn't see him as something to run from as a person; she sees him as an extension of herself. Catherine and Heathcliff, especially Catherine because she dies so young, lack separate identities. They are basically one person growing up—and in fact, at points Catherine is the worse one, as she takes part, as a child, in the abuse of Heathcliff before growing to love him. (I mean, she's a child motivated in part by jealousy... but still.) She's also manipulative , abusive to Nelly (the "help"), and basically puts on a good face to Edgar Linton that disguises how fucked up she actually is.

Catherine Earnshaw is essentially denying her actual self (not necessarily her best self, but who she is at her core) when she marries Linton. She is turning her back on whatever identity she has, however fractured and enmeshed with Heathcliff's it may be.

Catherine has become somewhat tamed when Heathcliff returns, and she's fully aware of how bad his behavior is (see: Isabella Linton). But that doesn't mean she doesn't want him around. She wants him and Linton to settle their conflict, she wants him to be "her" Heathcliff again (versus who he is when he returns successful and even more embittered) and it reads as very "have my cake and eat it too". Which is consistent with the selfishness that seems inherent to her even in childhood.

She wants her marriage to Linton. She also wants Heathcliff to settle down (emotionally speaking... not with another woman lol) so that she doesn't have to worry about their conflict anymore and clearly has much more passion for Heathcliff. Her death is linked in part to that passion; she's mentally ill, she's stressed about Linton barring her from Heathcliff, she's not eating and isolating herself, all while pregnant. She declares her love for him right before she dies and basically gives him shit for like... not at the same time... because she can't handle the idea of him being alive when she's not. She basically screams at him to stay with her when he's about to dip because Linton is returning from his errand (while Nelly sits there like OH FUCK OH FUCK OH FUCK as her super pregnant and super dying mistress like... basically makes out with Heathcliff.... and her husband is heading up the stairs about to burst into the room....).

And Heathcliff in turn wastes away (maybe self-starvation?) because he wants to be with Cathy's ghost. The description of his corpse indicates that he looks happy to die and be with Cathy. I don't think her ghost killed him by any means—but if she did, it was exactly what both of them wanted. Eternity together in death.

I mean, who knows what Catherine Earnshaw would've bene like as a mom to Cathy II. But I kind of highly doubt she would've been a good one. As soon as Heathcliff was back on the scene, she started denying her husband and obsessing over him, and if she'd made it past the birth, I don't think that would've changed at all. Catherine is, from jump, a shitty person, and I feel that her ability to be shitty and passionate and very much a partial architect of her own destruction (mutually with Heathcliff, and she in turn his a mutual architect of his downfall like, she and Heathcliff are essentially planning their long game suicide pact in their last scene together lol... and it's Heathcliff's bitterness and determination for vengeance that keeps him dying sooner, versus a lack of desire to be dead with Cathy) is what makes Catherine such a fabulous character.

Heathcliff is a horrible person, but Catherine isn't THAT much better, and she does not seem to truly WANT to be that much better when we take away what she thinks she should be.

[jumpscart]

more info on your ‘what if Dipper never unlearned his toxic masculinity’ au? I’m literally obsessed with it and I’d love to learn more

YES i was going to make a post about it thank you for letting me yap :) So canon-divergence-wise the main thing is that Dipper never met the manotaurs/multibear and so he still feels insecure at Mabel and Stan poking fun at him and his lack of 'masculinity'. Additionally, in this AU, Mabel keeps a diary of all of their adventures!

Dipper (as per in the show) sees "The Author" as the pinnacle of masculinity, he's mysterious and from the Journal's POV Ford presents himself as very logical and justifies his own poor treatment of others as part of his Lone Wolf Scientist persona---but when Ford comes through the portal, he's older and has had some time to reflect on his past and while he still carries some bad habits, he's remorseful and embarrassed of how naiive he was in his youth.

Dipper is insecure of the diary being mushy and feminine and so he says he had no part in making it, so Ford takes on Mabel as his apprentice instead (which also makes sense as he surrounds himself with people who are creative, actionable, like Stanley), and Dipper grows resentful because it was supposed to be HIM and Ford growing closer, and if he has to go back home without Mabel standing up for him-

So Bill comes in and sees this angry insecure sweaty preteen boy and realizes he is the EASIEST target to manipulate, and convinces him to distance himself from his family because Ford has become Emotional and Soft and isnt the same man he was as The Author, and then the Weirdmaggeddon plot is basically the same but swapped with Dipper being the one to hand over the rift but he finds out Bill was trying to get at Ford the whole time and everything he thought was "Facts and Logic" was actually just Old Man interpersonal messy relationship issues but everything is fine in the end and he learns not to get pipelined The End

[piratefern]

that's was Long and great explanation you can actually wrote a wattpad book of it! And I actually like the storyline it's really great and really felt bad for scp 049 :( honestly it was too much for poor birdie TvT

And yea why bother! I will like to read scp 035 one too ☆(≧∀≦*)ﾉ Thanks for taking my questions ( ˘ ³˘)♥

YIIPPEEEEE, thankyou so much :’D

alright with dyo, we’ll need some context too, in the sense that you will need to be aware of the original lore for Alagadda so id recommend reading the wiki if you haven’t already)

(Another note is that my version of Alagadda’s time doesn’t work linearly, so in this sense, it is entirely possible to enter alagadda during any time it exists, and exit to earth in a different era than when you left. It explains how the culture is affected by different eras in time, and this will be also important narratively!)

(He is originally from Alagadda as per the usual lore, except in my au he wasn’t banished to earth, and instead took refuge there, fleeing execution from the ambassador and other lords.)

In my au, dyo has a toxic sibling relationship with the other lords, ontop of this he’s also the shortest and the runtiest of the few and so was picked on, which lines him up to becoming the hanged king’s favourite as he was the easiest to manipulate.

Originally working as the jester for his king he is killed by a peasant uprising (as per the original lore) and is brought back to life three days later, offering his king a cup filled with the blood of his enemies gifted by the brothers death.

The lore follows the original story line from here in which he invites a bird like doctor to the palace to cure him of his influence of the hanged king (remember how time in alagadda isn’t linear? Yep, thats hasel! He finds a broken passage to alagadda after the point in which he has left dyo and just before the foundation finds him. He researches it and fixes it, hoping to find the “cure” for the vine on the other side)

Hasel doesn’t recognise dyo’s old form as the black lord and dyo at this point is yet to even meet hasel, and so neither of the two realise that they were intwined from the beginning.

after being cured by hasel and attempting to fight the influence of the hanged king, his execution is plotted against him by the other lords and the ambassador, and so, he escapes to earth.

yet, in my au the lords and the ambassador are still after dyo, but are unaware of his ware-abouts, Dyo destroys the portal which in turn wipes his entire memory, hoping that it will never be rebuilt again.

But didn’t hasel rebuild the portal? Uh oh! He did! Meaning he had unintentionally both freed and doomed his lover. Not only that, but the foundation had been tracking the signal that the portal had been omitting, causing the capture of both the portal and hasel! And, of course, the foundation would absolutely never destroy it!

On another note, sometimes memories of Alagadda will seep through the cracks, instances from the past that dyo forged reflect memories from his childhood and experiences in Alagadda.

Dyo landed in ancient Greece, and genuinely believes he is from there. He believes that he was a balatro (roman jester) for the king, and was fused to his mask by the ancient Greek gods as a punishment for stealing the golden wreath from the king of Rome.

However, it is evident that this story isn’t true, at the time Rome had a consul system not a king, and despite the fact Rome had capitulated Greece they didn’t share the same gods despite their similarities.

He makes his way through life, but aware of his immortality he drowns himself in alcohol and lavish parties. He doesn’t get close to anyone as he knows that they will one day die and that he will not, causing him to build bad behaviours, appear overtly cocky and confident, a tendency to avoid rejection as a side effect and a need to convince himself that everything is alright.

So! Imagine dyo, an immortal being, avoiding close relationships with anyone he meets and putting up a persona to avoid anyone liking him, finding another immortal being!I

He grows incredibly attached to hasel, for the first time in almost two millennia he doesn’t have to be alone anymore, he can finally learn how to open himself up and build on his issues and break down his persona.

But this causes abandonment and attachment issues, so you can imagine how he must have reacted when hasel leaves!

He can’t handle this, and embarks on a journey to find him again, this journey spanning over a century from WW1 to present day, in which he is also captured by the foundation and placed in the same facility as hasel… and the portal!

They are given their numbered codes 035 and 049, but with dyo being so close to the fixed portal he gradually begins to remember his past…

So yeah thats all im up to so far :3

i haven’t written anything past the foundation and the portal plot, but technically in the original draft i made with my partner a couple years back they escape with the help of Laurence (106). They learn to mend their broken relationship and also learn how to get along with laurence despite his creepiness, but that part is all old stuff so i might rewrite it. But the fact hasel leaves at WW1 was important, as this is around the time Laurence becomes anomalous, so it ties their stories in too :3

[triglycercule]

nightmare viewing the murder time three as little toys but more in like a little spoiled kid kinda way. because it would be funny and if you take into the account that he was like 6 before getting corrupted and do some mental loopholes it would be even funnier. like these are his dolls (killer dust and horror) and this is their barbie dreamhouse (his castle). they all have to stay in one room because nightmare needs to keep his toys in a toy box. the toys only ever come out when he wants to play but oh damn it they keep on breaking out!! silly toys,,, and then he locks them into the room again.

nightmare serves them food with plastic tea cups and plastic plates and there is no food. there is no tea. they have to imagine the food because dolls can't literally eat. there are food containers and stuff in the house but its all just a bunch of empty boxes. horror starts tweaking out after he scavenges the kitchen and finds a cereal box and milk carton that have NOTHING in it (why keep empty boxes?????)

they have to go where he wants them to go. nightmare gets to dress them up in whatever he wants because theyre his dolls they can wear anything he wants. it gets incredibly embarrassing when the trio is forced to wear pink pretty dresses and fight like that. or they have to go around the castle doing stupid fucking roleplays and it gets weird because theyre being forced to reenact a bullying scene and nightmare's giving them the death stare if they don't get it right (is this projection. this must be some form of coping mechanism dust theorizes)

and then you know nightmare's not exactly the best toy owner so he loses a few of his dolls here and there. maybe they get destroyed when he was playing a bit too rough with them! (killer dies in battle for like the 29th time) but its okay because he can just go back on down to the store (something new) and buy. wait no. steal another doll and then put it back in his dreamhouse and BOOM he has a full set again!! so sweet so cute. his dolls don't have consciousness what are you talking about theyre begging to be let go?? that's all just your imagination. what do you mean you're asking about the several slowly dying bodies with removed arms or legs in his dungeon. oh that's just where the broken but not yet destroyed toys go dw theyre fine its humane

[lovesickeros]

now that natlan is out it's tsaritsa yearning hours again because i am one nation closer to either being horribly disappointed or foaming at the mouth!

creator!reader w a little side of conflicted tsaritsa is such good food I can't not yap about it. a woman who has dedicated so much of her life to severing herself from "love" of all kinds and succeeding and. just being so confident that when she meets you she's bitter and angry and mean. because she can't stand you. she isn't supposed to love yet you worm your way into her heart anyway and you don't even know it.

especially in smth like an imposter au. she tells herself your just a tool for her to use but your treated like the Divine you really are, pampered and spoiled every step. tells herself it means nothing when she indulges you – let's you hold her hand in private, eventually let's you move aside the veil, just a little.

and she hates it. hates how easy it is to let you break down the ice she's built up for years.

all you do is smile and she feels like she can't breathe. because despite how violently she rejects love in all aspects, it always bleeds through eventually. she despises it but the way you brush your thumbs over her cheeks makes her bitter and warm and it infuriates her to no end.

she hates you and she loves you and she can't stand you and if you were ever taken from her she'd destroy every inch of teyvat if she had to go get you back.

and ironically enough I think she'd also be the one to initiate any first kiss. maybe she's still trying to convince herself it's just a fluke and itll make her realize it meant nothing, it means nothing. desperate to fix whatever you've done to her and instead it just makes it worse.

a horrible mess of a woman who gave up on love just to be confronted with it when she finally accepted it's absence.

[volivolition]

suggestion do you have... any wants? like obviously you do but like? suggestion my guy my ourple boy. both the easiest and hardest to write. you need a skill to say something to move conversation along but it doesn't fit any skill in particular? about 80% of the time you can have suggestion say it and it will make sense. but like actually characterizing him... how do i define you dude... what makes your character tick... urgh. i dont get you yet. im trying to understand but you are difficult.

[zukkaoru]

kind of obsessed with how fukuchi's line about "if you attack me one by one, i will kill you one by one" has held true through this entire arc. tachihara fought him alone, and he failed. jouno attacked him alone, and he failed. even when ranpo and fukuzawa went to confront him, they did it one by one (ranpo first with poe's book page, and fukuzawa second with his sword), and fukuchi eliminated them from the fight one by one. the only time anyone even escaped a confrontation was when atsushi and akutagawa finally worked together, fully and entirely trusting each other. it was when they finally attacked him as a combined force. if characters keep fighting against fukuchi one by one, they are going to continue to be defeated one by one.

[mad-hunts]

barton being awkward at first or even completely throughout a whole interaction whenever he's trying to comfort people is so in character for him TBH and let me tell y'all why because i think it's important to his character:

he can fake a lot of things. barton can fake being nice to people, he can fake being innocent, and he can even fake having a much stronger sense of morality around people if he wants to — but whenever it comes to empathizing with someone on an emotional level... barton finds himself often struggling with faking it because of the nature of it. and this is due to it being different than whenever he's trying to feign something easily comprehensible like innocence. but empathy is something that's usually viewed as innate in us as humans and has to do with love, which doesn't depend on logic. it's something that comes from within, so it doesn't have clear parameters as to how you should do it, so whenever barton tries to fake it in the event that he's trying to make someone feel better; he'll stumble. and so although barton can cognitively empathize with someone, his efforts to actually put himself in other people's shoes fall flat, as he just can't physically imagine himself being in someone else's position probably more than half the time.

so if your muse were to ever come to him seeming upset, barton would likely not know what to do / how to comfort them, at least for a bit before referencing back on how he's seen other people do it. because i hate to say it (i don't, in reality, but y'all know what i mean LOL) but barton does actively mimic behaviors that he sees people do whenever he feels the absence of a certain emotion. he especially does this whenever he's trying to appear charming to other people, but like i said, he'll also try to use what he's seen his peers do as a guide as for what he should do in regards to empathy. and sometimes he may even seem a bit flustered before he's able to do this because he knows that it is expected of him to be able to empathize with people and can identify it in other people BUT knowing how to approach faking it has always been sort of hard for him even as an adult.

but yeahhh, that's just my own two cents about how barton sometimes break character that he is quote unquote ' normal, ' though he does try to mask this around people who aren't really familiar with him as simply being social awkwardness. however, it is part of a larger thing with him as despite the fact that he can blend in with the population REALLY well and also is pretty good at manipulating others, i suppose you could say that barton is still not an expert at ' constructing empathy ' because whenever someone is visibly hurt in front of him... he is more liable to act like he isn't sure what to do, than to put on an act immediately since he is likely to feel nothing first before anything else. and i realize that that is a rather unsettling thought, but i think that he is a lot more suspectible to doing this with people he doesn't know well / who he isn't particularly close to, as he's got a lot more practice with being falsely empathetic towards friends and/or sometimes even family members.

[lisxdumbr]

The whole "if a person is mad at you it's their responsibility to tell you" thing just made me realize how fucked my situation is. Like just. woah

[fuzzbuns]

Arlecchino discourse is really awkward because both sides are so convinced they are right and that the other side just lacks media literacy but 9 times out of 10 the take in question is also wrong and it leaves me scratching my head a little bit….

[rotisseries]

😐 this is worse than I remember but definitely salvageable if we put our heads together

[widowkills]

they saw laurel arguing for working with malcolm AND still didn't tell her that he did after all kill sara?????

i forgot just how fucked up (& just plain bad) that whole arc was aaaaaaa

[fearcicada]

I think the worst thing is that like if it's an archives polycule/any fic with those characters as the main ship etc. Then you automatically Know that they're gonna have the worst Elias characterization known to man. if the fic is not EXPLICITLY elias focused then get ready for the worst depiction of that man ever. Anybody who's not an Elias fan just does not seem to even try to write him properly and immediately jumps to "dastardly villain twirling his long evil mustache while petting a cat in his spooky office"

[hella1975]

by pure evil accident taob zuko's current mental state is the exact same as the one ive been stuck in for the past few weeks and that's a bit funny to me. like i started writing this chapter months ago and knew what i was doing with it even longer ago and suddenly ive manifested it into reality. we are both facing the horrors rn

[rosykims]

me pleading with astarion through the deluge of his act 1 disapproval like please i swear bro viera is evil yeah yeah i know shes super chill to everyone she encounters and is honest to a fault but. no, lissten, jsust listen hang on. shes LAWFUL evil man it still counts !!!! i know shes loyal and selfless to her allies and refuses to harm animals or children and will actively intervene on children's behalf BRO STOTP LAUGHIGN PLEASE I SWEAR and and um i know she respects ur autonomy nd doesnt let u ascend and has done literall.y all of the good options so by game mechanics shes indistinguishable to a hero character bbt. but i swear bro. bro i sw. where are you going

[carrieway]

i just think ghosting someone should be illegal