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maxwell-grant · 3 years

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Cass wouldn’t even begrudingly tolerate [the Black Bat], because she’s even less lenient than Bruce on killing and far more willing to throw down.' - THANK YOU for remembering that.

Cass is my favorite Batfam member, the only one really that I have an active interest in reading about. I'd be incredibly ignorant to not bring bring up such a crucial aspect of her characterization. And even if I didn't personally care for her, well, last thing I'd want is to be another source of frustration for Cass fans. Lord knows there's enough of those to go around.

mousebrass also asked: On that note, how do you imagine a meeting between Cass and the Shadow going?

Fair warning: This one took me 6 hours to write, and it became a hell of a lot longer than I imagined. I liked Cass a lot, but I never quite realized I had this many feelings regarding her until I was tasked with writing this, and a lot of things clicked for me regarding my plans for The Shadow thanks to this ask. @mousebrass, thank you. I mean it. I think I may have found something here I've spent years looking for. Hope you enjoy the post.

I'm thankful that this scenario is only really taking place in a hypothetical fanon where both characters can get a fair shot, because I wouldn't trust DC with this premise. I don't trust DC with either of them as is.

There's a lot of ways that this crossover could go on about taking place naturally, initially because Cass is already connected to some of Batman's pulpier elements, due to her connections to Lady Shiva and the League of Assassins, and one could connect Cass to Myra Reldon (who really should just be race swapped if ever brought back so she can stand out as the cool character she is, without the yellowface gimmick holding her back). There's two things I think are crucial to making the most of this idea, and the first of which has to do with the subject of killing. I usually don't like to come up with hypothetical team-ups for The Shadow that focus too much on the fact that he kills, because it's far from the most significant aspect of his character to focus on, much of it is written from a wrong understanding of the character, and it never amounts to anything other than perfunctory. But here, not only is it completely unavoidable to discuss, here there is actually a very, very substantial grounding as to why this has to be such a big part of the story.

The first and foremost thing that's gotta be established to everyone reading that doesn't know already is this: Cassandra Cain, more so than Batman, more so than any other DCU hero, has a tolerance towards murder lower than zero, and this is completely non-negotiable. She will throw herself on the path of an assault rifle to stop men trying to kill her from accidentally killing each other. The defining moment of her incredibly grim backstory is that she was trained from birth to be the world's greatest murderer, and her first kill traumatized her so badly that she has pivoted as far away from that as possible. I stress a lot that the Shadow should not be written as the trigger-happy maniac comics made him into and that the pulp version killed mostly to defend himself and others, generally left criminals to the police if possible, offered plenty of second-chances, had stories dedicated to the rehabilitation of criminals and so on, but none of this would matter to Cass.

Cass has literally chosen suicide over the prospect of living with murder on her hands time and time again, and The Shadow kills. When he kills, he does so without remorse, with unshakeable certainty. He hates death, he doesn't want lives to be at risk in the first place. But people will die if he doesn't do anything, and what he can do, what he exists to do, is turn the tools of evil against evil, and murder is the oldest tool of evil there is. He doesn't kill because a war scarred him, he doesn't kill because he's got a demon in his soul, he doesn't kill because he's mentally off balance, he doesn't kill because he's evil or sadistic or arrogant or anything of the sort. He kills because the men he fights chose death when they sought to harm innocents and fire guns at him. He kills because he is Death itself.

Regardless of how compassionate he is or can be, regardless of the fact that he's motivated by a desire to protect people, regardless of how justified he is, he is still dropping corpses and laughing maniacally doing so. Cass's real arch-enemy isn't Shiva or David Cain, it's Death, it's the thing that she's fundamentally most opposed to. And guess what The Shadow gets compared to often enough? Literally the very first line of the very first book where we get to see him, this is how we are introduced to him:

So the premise here is that we are taking a character who is defined by her fundamental opposition to death with every fiber of her being, who understands death on a level no other human being does, who is traumatized and hard-wired to detest death at all costs and to choose suicide over it, and asking her to team up with The Grim Reaper.

Even if he received the most abject lesson conceivable on the sheer wrongness of murder, even if he does put down the guns around Cass out of respect for her, he cannot protect his agents and others if he cannot shoot or kill those who try to harm them, and the protection of the agents is absolutely non-negotiable and not at all something he's willing to fuck around with by trying out gadget kung fu superhero alternatives. The Shadow has chosen to throw his life away for their sake time and time again, and no matter how appaling or disgusting Cass finds his deeds, even if he concedes that she's right and should be right on all accounts and that he is fundamentally a monster who has no right to judge others, he would not concede on his mission and he would make it very clear she would have to put him down violently to stop him from protecting others this way, and death has not stopped him before.

And to be upfront in case there's anyone who doubts it, Cass would kick The Shadow's ass, if they had to fight. She is the strongest fighter in the DCU, she lives and breathes fighting and combat in a way no one else does. And The Shadow's not one of those characters who is supposed to be invincible and the best at everything all the time always, he can and does lose fights and scrapes to people far less adept at it than Cass. He's a great fighter, obviously, he hauls bigger men than him through doors and was disabling people with Vulcan neck pinches decades before Spock, and he would definitely have an edge in other areas, but he's out of his league here. Frankly, I don't see The Shadow raising a finger against Cass unless she's been brainwashed into killing people by bad writing. Not because she's a woman, that doesn't really stop him from dealing with evil. But because, for one, she's practically a child compared to him age-wise. Two, he'd obviously know beforehand of her capabilities and how futile it would be to fight or even provoke her. And three, the Shadow's whole thing is knowing. The Shadow Knows and all that. Knowing comes with understanding.

He'd understand very quickly that there is no way someone this young could grow so quickly into the world's greatest fighter without horrific treatment that no one should ever be subjected to. He'd see the movements too practiced and quick, the self-control, the strength and speed far beyond even the trained warriors he's seen, the places where she's been scarred and is good at covering it up. Assuming he doesn't already know about her life story, any meeting between the two would lead to him very quickly figuring out that there's something much deeper about her opposition to killing than just moral reservations, something deeper than Bruce's own gun trauma.

Denny O'Neil's 2nd Batman and Shadow story was about The Shadow secretly helping Bruce overcome gun trauma, and Bruce rejecting The Shadow's intentions to hand him a gun. And to make it clear, people tend to assume that The Shadow only helps people for utilitarian reasons, which is not true as I've tried to demonstrate many times now. I don't want to convey that he would want to help Cass overcome her trauma just so she could be more efficient or something, absolutely no, he'd help her because he helps people in any way he can. I think a story with The Shadow and Cass might involve a similar premise, The Shadow understanding that she has been traumatized very deeply by death and refuses to accept it on any terms, trying to help her overcome it, only to learn that she does not want to "learn" anything she doesn't already know, that she has weaponized her trauma into a source of strength, and wishes nothing more than to help others with it.

And here's where we get to the part that allows the two to be on less antagonistic terms, because one thing that also very strongly defines Cass, at least the Cass I like reading most, is her stubborn, almost desperate need to believe in the best of people, that people can and will change for the better. Like The Shadow, her strength too is knowing, it's perception, the things that she knows about people that words cannot convey. Just as there are many things The Shadow would grow to understand about her that others would not, there would be many things that The Shadow would not be able to conceal from her. Things that no one but her would figure out. Things that, despite her age and lack of experience compared to him, he would have to defer to her knowledge on, which reverses the usual dynamic The Shadow has with people. And perhaps one aspect of that reversal, it's that maybe it's she who winds up secretly manipulating The Shadow into overcoming a deeper issue.

Cass's perspective on killing is shaped not just through trauma, but from a painfully intimate understanding of not just what happens to someone at the time of death, but the cost of murder upon the human soul, the ways it warps people into things they never should have been. Killing is a deeply, deeply serious matter, much more so than fiction seems ever willing to go into. Of course we suspend disbelief for fiction, there's nothing wrong with that, but if a story starts asking questions, starts poking holes into fantasies, they should not be disregarded.

And so it begs a question: How has it affected The Shadow? Is he really as remorseless as he appears to be? Is the fact that he's only killing evil people really of that much use? What's the cost of living as someone who has to know so much about so much evil in so many hearts? Knowledge never comes without price, and knowing evil is his tagline. When he enlists Harry Vincent, he makes it very clear that he has lost lives as he has saved them. From when is that regret coming from? What lives did he lose then? Is he saving people by damning his soul or merely prolonging the inevitable by piling corpses on another end of the scale?

If there's a character that could meaningfully start bringing these questions forth, who could ever truly get The Shadow to stop and reveal things to the audience he never would otherwise, maybe Cass could be that character. A girl who was raised to be a monster, who is treated as a monster and an aberration in-universe (and even outside of it), and turned that into a strength she uses to help others, who cares about everyone and refuses to let others be dehumanized as she was. Who better to know what lurks in the Shadow's heart?

Sometimes when I get an ask, I bullshit my way through infodump walls of text until I can structure it into something vaguely resembling a point. And sometimes, and I know it sounds crazy, but sometimes I get a very, very clear word on my mind related to it before I start writing, that almost seems to be a beacon pointing where I need to get to, and I work my way into getting there. Once you sent me an ask about crossing over The Shadow with Cassandra Cain, the word that came to mind the very second was Language.

It's an interesting relation the two have with language. Language is of course a very substantial part of Cass's character, who does not process language and linguistic development the way most people do, and instead reads body language to the point of superpower. Many stories revolve around Cass's relation to the concept of language, the help she may require from others in getting around things beyond her upbringing, and ways in which she has mastered beyond anyone's scope. Though she is mute, language is her power, what makes her what she is, and she is someone that Batman freely admits could kick his ass if she ever felt like it.

For The Shadow, language is also his power. He speaks all languages and connects allies all over the world, he is an expert ventriloquist, he is able to project his voice beyond what's physically possible, he can imitate voices perfectly to the point of being able to conduct group conversations single-handedly well enough to fool even the people whose voices he's imitating, much of his presence and terror and manipulation are done through his voice, arguably the very reason he exists in the first place is entirely because a radio actor's voice performance was so good and captivating that it tricked people into thinking the character was a real star and not just a glorified narrator. The man you cannot see, but only hear, the perfect hero for radio. And then of course the laugh, which I have a whole separate post on and which, in many ways, acts as a substitute for language in the novels. He uses the laugh so often as a substitute for statements or words, even to himself, that it's pretty much his own personal language. And language is at the core of how he deals with people, as he knows the right language to use to manipulate and move and help them. He knows what to promise, what to reveal, what to omit. He knows what to say, how to say it, when to say it. Language is the strings by which he puppeteers the world around him (and he can talk to animals, at least of one kind).

The Shadow and Cassandra Cain have mastered two different types of Language as throughly as anyone can possibly master them. The Shadow can talk a group of hardened criminals into killing themselves, Cassandra can punch a heart into stopping without killing it. The Shadow echoes his voice "through everywhere and nowhere at once" to whip crowds of thugs into frenzies, Cassandra outraces missiles and was tanking bullets as a child. The Shadow can lie and usurp lives so masterfully to fool even the families of those he's passing off as, Cassandra is a living lie detector who gleams inner conversations from miniscule reactions. The Shadow can speak every language known, Cassandra is the greatest master of the world's most universal language other than music. The two are supposedly human, but every now and then, something comes along to call that into question because of the things they can achieve. They cannot hide secrets from each other the way they do to everyone else. They are driven by a deep desire to help others, to make something out of the circumstances of their lives. To weaponize that which dictates they should be evil and monstrous into a relentless force of good.

Language is the root of understanding. And if nothing else, as impossible as a conciliation of their approaches to crimefighting may be, I think there could be an unique understanding between the two. Perhaps, and this is a bit crazier a concept but one that seems to be where I might have been heading towards all along, even Cassandra Cain finding a calling away from the frayed dynamics of the Batfamily, away from the Bat's looming presence, to become The Shadow's successor, swearing to uphold a mission of justice through non-lethal tactics while he stays on the backseat guiding her. If The Shadow could trust the safety of his agents and the protection of the innocent at the hands of someone as capable and selfless and good-natured as Cassandra, I think he'd be all too happy to be able to trust someone in such a manner, to no longer be the Master of Darkness, but instead to serve the next generation that's weaponized darkness without submerging in it. To achieve, and perhaps return, to his strongest, highest self: A disembodied voice heard, but not seen. Once again the narrator, not the star.

It's a concept I've thought about very extensively for the years I've been a Shadow fan, but now it occurs to me that, if I had to appoint a successor of The Shadow, someone who could take up the mission but shine on their own right, even improve it with the right guidance and circumstances, it would be Cassandra Cain. The Orphan, The Shadow of the Batgirl. Daughter of the greatest assassins, meant to be the world's most lethal murderer, instead pivoted to being one of it's greatest heroes, but never allowed to shine as she should. But in the darker, less restrictive and wilder world of pulp heroes, in The Shadow's world, a beacon would shine all the harder. Perfect strengths attached to perfect opposites, joined together for a greater good, unstoppable after together having weaponized that which most take for granted: the power of language to move worlds.

#replies tag #pulp heroes #comic books #the shadow #cassandra cain #batgirl #i always had a feeling that a successor to the shadow should not be modeled on batman but someone within that range #i never quite found a character i would be happy with taking that role or a similar role #aw shit i just talked myself into a new favorite character #that just so happens to be another character brimming with potential that's denied them by corporate overlords #who could have seen that coming

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wildfey · 3 years

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Anon from yesterday back again! About the set-up, a post on twitter explained the theory much better and I gotta look up the name. The gist is that Phoenix could've proved that he was set up. He did not have the time to have a forgery done since he got the job for defending Zak only the day before. Plus the money. Instead, there is no evidence at all he even tried. Why? Because he'd seen the courts' corruption before and decided it didn't matter anymore, plus too dangerous.

(continued) You could even point at his reply to the Judge's words and wonder if Phoenix has nothing to say because he knows it's useless to argue. Hidden powers have already decided that they will attack him and try to drag him down.

okay, okay, hello again anon, good to see you back with another excellent ask.

I always think that there are two ways to look at Phoenix's disbarment:

a) that the problem was straight-up with bringing forged evidence into court, no matter what the circumstances were.

b) that the problem was that Phoenix was assumed to have created the forged evidence and bought it into court intentionally.

Ace Attorney really flips around on which of these is true in universe (it's a plot point to some extent in 1-5, 3-3, 4-1, and 4-4) but considering that Phoenix gets his badge back almost immediately after it's proved that the second wasn't the case, I'm going to assume that presenting forged evidence accidentally is either not an issue or less of an issue. This tends to be the fanon majority stance too. (It's worth noting that Edgeworth is implied to have pulled some strings irt getting Phoenix's badge back. Ymmv and so on.)

With our framework safely in place, the question arises: If Phoenix could have avoided punishment, or at least public shaming, by revealing the set-up, why wouldn't he? As you point out, the forgery doesn't make sense once you start to look into it and we know that Phoenix did put a lot of these pieces together. Hell, he could have made these arguments when Misham testified during the Gramarye trial. But he doesn't. (Warning: this is a more headcanon-y meta than my last one, because the 7yg is... a gap and we have very little concrete info on what the fuck Phoenix was up to. He got a kid, worked on jury trials, played good poker + bad piano, and had some sort of frenemyship with Kristoph. That's pretty much all we've got).

Firstly: Corruption. The AA court system is ridiculously corrupt, and at the point that Phoenix is disbarred, he becomes emblematic of this - he's a man with a history of revealing injustice - notably Von Karma & Gant, but even without them he still won some high profile cases - and once he's disbarred, it's implied that the narrative is flipped, turning him into a figurehead for that which he fought against (dark age of the law, etc). The obvious conclusion is that his disbarment was a convenient way to discredit him - powerful and corrupt figures (and in AA there are many) don't need to fear Phoenix Wright if he isn't a lawyer and his reputation is ruined. The counter argument is that Phoenix... has always done some questionable things with evidence (1-5, 2-4, and 3-3 stand out to me). But no more so than anyone else in this fucked-up universe. Either way, Phoenix has always worked in a system stacked against him, and it's very possible that he suspected there to be manoevering behind the scenes (and there was! We know Kristoph existed and was purposefully working against Phoenix.) HOWEVER, I don't believe that any of this would stop him on it's own, because it's been long established that Phoenix Wright does not give a shit about bad odds.

So, what would make him accept it? Anon, you mention danger in your ask, and I do see that as partially true - Phoenix isn't concerned about danger to himself, but he has a kid to care for. I would say, however, that especially when we come to Kristoph, as much of a bastard as he is, Phoenix had no evidence that he could be violent to the point of murder until 4-1. Before that, his influence was long-distance life ruining, rather than active threat (though long-distance life ruining is pretty scary on its own when you're raising a small child with low funds). I do see that as a cause, but one of many, and this is the point where I'd like to go back to the conversation on motivation.

I am going to make the argument here, as I did in the other answer, that Phoenix, in the 7yg and possibly elsewhere, is depressed, and that one symptom of that is a loss of motivation. It's implied by the game itself, and makes more sense than most of the alternatives.

(I won't get too personal, but the years of my life where I dressed like this... not good years lol)

My headcanon has always been that by the point that Phoenix had sorted out his guardianship of Trucy and got himself out of that initial low that came from having his life ruined, it was too late to fix his disbarment and he had to change tracks, and that's when he became interested in MASON. (Not to self-promote, but I'm realising that a lot of what I've said here is rephrased ideas from The Path Once So Clear, so if you want 15,000-ish words on the subject, it's there). Of course, when talking about Phoenix's 7yg depression, I think it's also important to mention that Phoenix in AA4 is very much implied to be putting on an act (which is pretty common in AA4 in general. Most characters in that game have both a public and private face). Being 'Beanix' - eg. the piano/poker player with no prospects who works in a shitty restaurant and takes nothing seriously - is a convenient cover while he works on the things that he doesn't want to be targeted for (and here we come back to the corruption angle).

As to how far the depression helps that act... well, that could be a whole conversation on its own. Once again, I'm very much coming into headcanon here, but I'm reminded of the phenomenon where someone with depression will deliberately exacerbate it, either as a form of self-harm or as some attempt to fit a role (artists are especially prone, due to the 'depressed artist' stereotype. I see it most in the emo scene). Beanix has always seemed to me as someone who is deliberately messing up his own life - he repeatedly provokes Apollo, essentially sabotaging their relationship, he puts himself into dangerous situations for no real reason (this is a general Phoenix trait), and despite the fact that we KNOW Maya and Edgeworth were supportive of him during this period, we never actually see them around, presumably because he's keeping them at a distance. How much of this is for the act, and how much is real?

Again, we've come very much off topic (whoops) but I see a lot of this as another aspect of Phoenix's low self worth - is there a difference between the image he projects of a man who has given up due to being disbarred, and the real Phoenix who is still actively working behind the scenes but is very obviously not doing well because he can't 'save people' - the thing which so much of his identity relies upon? I think there is, but I also think the image too often becomes the reality, and AA4 does carry this underlying theme of how wearing these masks of a public persona can affect your 'true self'.

As always, I genuinely love to see other people's takes on this, either in the tags, in reblogs, or via asks. This one is very headcanon-y, and I know there some entirely different perspectives out there, some of which I really like. (Also this one got to be heavy. Look after yourselves guys.)

#my post #ace attorney meta #Ace Attorney #Phoenix Wright #depression cw #a big one too #and minor mention of #self harm cw #Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney #replies

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jiangwanyinscatmom · 3 years

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From @ednamrenee 's comments that are way too wonderful and insightful to keep to the notes only and I'll try to go point by point with this since there is so much I agree to with this (excuse the messy thoughts as I go)

Lol, and I enjoy hearing the perspectives of those who have a harsher take on JC than me. 😂 I agree with you re: CQL, it definitely didn't seem to know where to put JC's character, which is a shame because he's a very interesting one. I don't mind if CQL-onlies want to that to that version, media consumption being a very personal experience and all that, but if I have to read one more interpretation like JC thought the life-debt between WQ and him was paid..

I do think that it's a detriment to the adaptions closer to the novel and the AU that CQL is to be so heavily tied together into the western fandom. Since they are so different from each other they really can't be compared to each other. The characters are not alike which lends to the very out of place interpretations that become so heavily popular.

...when he got her out of prison, I'm gonna go insane. Never mind that it's not what happened in novel canon (or even donghua canon, I don't remember about the manhua), never mind that it was an added scene to go forth with the one-sided JC/WQ thing, never mind that even if it had been canon, it in no way balances the life-debt JC owed the Wen siblings (and I'm not even considering the golden core transfer, we can't hold over him what he doesn't know).

In terms of the debt he owed even with the awkward romance they tried to make, if it was "payed back" it does not excuse him from essentially hiding that away and letting it be buried under the calls to exterminate all Wens. It does not erase the fact that they had helped, and he chose to just not expand upon this when their safety was at stake out of, I suppose, petty jealousy of Wei Wuxian (I really don't know what CQL was going for with his resentment towards Wei Wuxian since he'd had that since he was young. But, it also makes whatever love he did have for Wen Qing and Wei Wuxian so much more shallow then it was in the novel and starkly more cruel for a character they tried to humanize while keeping the novel points skewing the themes of Jiang Cheng as a character.

It just feels like a sorry understanding of life-debts and that's why culturally huge thing, so...no? Don't do that? It's fine having JC not pay much attention to the debts. It makes him interesting, it makes him coldly pragmatic over valuing even things that his own culture holds dear. It's a great trait, and even a good one for a leader maybe. I am up for JC deviating for the norm when it's about such virtues while WWX sticks to them, and JC wasn't exactly sneering...

Yes! This is Jiang Cheng as a character at his simplest and why I personally find him fascinating! He is pragmatic and cold to a fault that works well in the cultivation world MDZS set up, however, it doesn't work the same in CQL when you have the boogyman story of the Yin Iron as the root of all bad instead. The character actions no longer line up with the theme of the original work since so much emphasis is placed on a piece of metal ruining everything instead of the cruelty of humans alone.

...at the mo dao until it put him in a politically delicate situation. That's fine! Interesting character traits! But like. Fanon perception more often than not strips all of these from him and that's just unacceptable to me. I'm not even going to speak of the entire genocide thing, despite knowing about the innocence of the Wens and how they're just feeble old people and women and children.

The bleed over of CQL trying to make Jiang Cheng softer in his youth made headcanons with no true base for it in his behavior as an adult a lot more muddied. As an adult in any adaption, he's not really shown to have any positive sort of sentimentality towards Wei Wuxian. Certainly with Jin Ling in CQL it implied heavily that he did hit him just like Madam Yu to Wei Wuxian, where at least in the novel he was just... a very aggressively, unkind, cruel uncle that spoiled his nephew and gave in with that cycle of negative action over progressive action (The massive narrative mirror between how Jiang Cheng and Lan Wangji raised a child left to them suddenly). He was not sorry for the hand he took in killing the Wens, he blamed them for taking his right hand man away and putting his sect, in what he thought, was unneeded trouble, morals be damned like his mother. Like she had said about Lan Wangji and Jin Zixuan, they stuck their head too high and they brought death upon themselves for talking back to a higher power for acting on their kindness over politics.

(Lol, this got long, sorry!) I absolutely agree that in terms of interpersonal relationships, Jin Ling is the only one with whom Jiang Cheng can begin to grow. The thing about the Yunmeng brothers is that whatever was between them is now tainted by bad blood (quite literally) on both sides, both of them have hurt each, knowingly or unknowingly. Both of them are a source for mental stress for each other, that's canon for any adaptation.

I understand the urge to want a rosier, I guess, take on this. I'm more used to the novel interpretations and neither ever really use the wording of being like family, or brothers, this was left to Jiang Yanli specifically calling Wei Wuxian her brother as the only Jiang to do that. The barrier of their social class is still a backbone of Jiang Cheng's possessiveness in thinking Wei Wuxian was his to order about as a sect leader twisting the innocent promise Wei Wuxian gave. But both don't associate anything positive with the other anymore. Wei Wuxian certainly isn't sentimental for Yunmeng Jiang as a home when he is resurrected or Jiang Cheng. He was planning to run off in the opposite direction of it to start as someone new! That does not read to me as pining or love anymore for the past (and I've written a piece before how CQL sanitized his longing of Lan Wangji solely by replacing it with Lotus Pier want and Jiang Yanli as a parental figure).

Can we not act like "ohh it's just miscommunication, they're both just dumb and horrible at feelings". It's not that simple. MXTX establishes this painstakingly, and just loving someone has never been the point. YZY loved JC too, she still managed to mess up his head. Love isn't the point, which sounds very hurtful I know, but it's also true. Reconciliation after all this bad blood takes a huge amount of emotional labour on both parts.

I can not reiterate enough that love was not the only thing needed between the Yunmeng siblings. None of them really ever understood each other and had different wants. Jiang Cheng never understood Wei Wuxian and his fascination of Lan Wangji out of discomfort. He did not accept whatever was going on there and later used it as shaming fodder. Both have done an unforgivable disservice to the other and really, nothing can mend old hurts as bad as they were. The kindest option is to leave each other alone and move on with a happier life for the self. The codependency of this is more than disturbing when used in reconciliation material especially for Wei Wuxian who was never that and is the one who actively asked for Jiang Cheng to move on, because he does not have the will to extend the effort of rebuilding a relationship anymore. It's a very human response to a broken relationship and not cruel, it just is a realistic view of a bad relationship that always ended for the worst when they tried to talk. Their own ideals are nothing alike and clash, they are not what the other needs and Wei Wuxian by the end of the novel is ready to leave it and move on with others without Jiang Cheng.

And, never apologize for long thoughts! I love it! This is why I very much enjoy interactions on here that are productive. Seriously I am a Jiang Cheng fan, I am just not into the gum drop sweetness for reconciliation. They are a disservice to him and his end that can better him without the crutch of Wei Wuxian there, which is exactly how his resentment spawned in the first place. He has a chance to do better by himself on his own terms, that doesn't need to be ruined with a codependent bond that had been forced and very one-sided in the end and remained as that for 13 years.

#mdzs #mo dao zu shi #jiang cheng #I do love him as the antagonist he is #wei wuxian

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vickyvicarious · 3 years

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idk if this is controversial or not but, i don’t think it’s all that important to meta analyze media to death. like if it’s fun i think that’s great but analyzing all the ways a show may or may not be problematic seems pretty silly to me. i mean it’s a tv show? not activism? (this isn’t me saying you shouldn’t analyze stuff btw if that’s what you enjoy, more in response to some of your statements saying that it’s important/a responsibility)

(to be fair though i’m just kinda upset that people seem to spend so much more time talking about problematic tv content than about the real life issues happening)

(also not saying you need to talk about irl issues on your fandom blog, just that grouping them under the same umbrella makes it seem like they’re equally important when stuff in media isn’t as big a deal as the stuff happening irl you know?)

I agree with you to an extent, but not completely. When I was saying it's important or a responsibility, I didn't mean quite for everyone to meta in depth or have these big long discussions I've been having lately. It's totally fine to just want to enjoy media without getting into what's problematic about it, and it's not as important as any real life events. I mean, I personally don't really like to talk politics and real world stuff on this blog just because that generally is a stressor for me, and I come here to destress. I actually don't even get into critical meta myself very often either, for similar reasons at times. So I'm definitely not throwing any stones here if individual people don't enjoy metaing or dissecting the media they consume. Having a break from that kind of stuff is important.

(And like. If you only ever worry about problematic stuff on TV and never ever real world stuff, then that's not the best priorities obviously. But people online always have personas and compartmentalize. I mean, Vicky isn't my real name. It's my fandom name and I answer to it as well as my real name and have for years, but I have a real-world life that's mostly separate from my fandom life, and I personally like to keep it that way. So I always assume that even if I only see people online talking about media, it doesn't mean they don't care about RL concerns. This may just be where they take a break from that.)

At the same time as all that is true, I do think it is important to recognize themes in media that we're exposed to. Critical thinking is a skill that has to be actively taught (which it isn't as well lately, it seems, which I know I ranted about like last year or something on this blog) and it's one that can be applied all over the place. For example: double-checking sources on news articles; noticing the ways an ad tries to manipulate your perspective; spotting logical fallacies in arguments; noticing propaganda in media. There's no such thing as a person totally immune to propaganda or manipulation, and a lot of corporations actively try to use stuff like color theory and certain phrases etc. to manipulate consumers into choosing their product or associating it with a certain thing. Food, technology, medicine, toys- pretty much any industry you can think of I'm sure it happens. There's also a lot of propaganda and tropes in media that can absolutely inform your opinion if that's all you see and you just accept it at face value. There's all sorts of levels of extreme to that too - blackface or straight up slurs in older films, or the tendency to only ever depict Africa as a monolith/small villages instead of many different cultures with different identities and levels of wealth, or even stuff like the cast of mostly guys and one girl or primarily white/straight casts with only one or two other identities represented. Dolls being primarily white-skinned, or the marketing of "boy toys" and "girl toys" affecting representation and consumption in children. I've been watching a lot of youtube essays lately on colorism, and have seen a good number of people cite negative body image directly to the kinds of things they saw represented on TV and in toys not matching their skin as they grew up.

I'm not saying all of this stuff is deliberate propaganda. Some things are, for example if the army sponsors a war game then uses a tournament for it as a recruitment strategy their motive is pretty clear there. But a lot of the time it's simply the media reflecting and perpetuating the culture in which it was created. Maybe it's something like the Hayes Code, which among other things didn't allow for heroes to be shown as gay-coded but didn't have all the same restrictions on villains, so there were a lot of gay-coded villains cropping up. Which may be better than no gay-coded people, but also associates those characters with certain other negative traits that can actually influence peoples' opinions in real life. Or maybe it's just something like all the cop shows that are popular for their serial mystery/monster of the week format, but which always hail their cop heroes as being honorable and good even if they have to break the rules/law sometimes. This reflects a society, and can reinforce it also, where cops get away with a lot of awful stuff because the bias is always in their favor. Or maybe even the trope where you give a villain a reasonable stance to begin with or at least a sympathetic background (movie Magneto was a Jewish kid put into a Nazi camp, and then as an adult people start talking about registering and restricting mutants) but have them go too far and their methods be deplorable enough (he decides that mutants are the superior race and all normal people should be killed or turned into mutants against their will) that they must be defeated - and their reasonable point is never actually addressed.

So I do think that it is important to be at least aware of stuff like this, even if you don't want to talk about it. That's more on a personal level, it's good for an individual to know how things may be affecting their own opinion beyond the obvious. On a larger scale, racist tropes that go unaddressed in canon and are just blithely accepted and perpetuated in fanon can lead to a fandom experience that locks out people of that race. Or really that goes for any minority.

So... I don't think people have to discuss this stuff to death or anything! But at the same time, I do feel being at least aware, even if it's not what you focus on, is somewhat important.

#anonymous #replies #fandom #my meta #i guess?#hopefully that clarifies my stance!#not saying everyone has to agree with me but this is how i look at it

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azuzulira · 3 years

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My hero academia concept time: Making Mineta likeable by a general audience.

It's no secret that a lot of people HATE Mineta, which, given how he be, is totally understandable. He's a huge perv. But the thing is, anime can have pervs that are well liked by the audience. A lot of Mineta fans will claim that it's because the characters are attractive, but that's not really true. Take Jiraiya, for instance. He's an old lecherous man who peeps on women in hot springs (sound familiar?), And he is closely associated with Toads. He's not really attractive (in my opinion, though some people may find him attractive. Keep in mind some people also probably find Mineta attractive). However, he is liked by a wide audience. Why? I believe it is because he has a few thing Mineta lacks; namely character depth and relationships with other characters. That is what I aim to fix, without making him much less perverted (to prove Mineta can be likeable even as a perv).

First, character depth. Mineta only really ever shows the perverted side of himself. There are exceptions when he shows his determination, or heroic potential, even if those are related to his perving, and also his entirely-understandable cowardice. So to make him a bit less of a one note character, let's give him an outlet to show both his determination and his cowardice. He is supposedly someone Horikoshi sees a lot of himself in, so let's give Mineta some artistic talent. Let's suppose he is really good at drawing, especially the human figure (female, for subtle reminder he is a perv). But no one knows because he fears people will say his art is bad. We're showing determination, in that he took the time to get good, and of him being afraid of being rejected (which can then, for people who analyze characters, reflects on his interactions with women). We can steal a little more from Horikoshi, and give Mineta an interest in American culture. Not to an All Might degree, but enough to get passing references and recognize some things. This doesn't even have to affect his goal. He could still want to be a hero to get chicks, but ateast now there's more to him than that.

Next is his relationships with other characters, which for most, are neutral or some degree of dislike. The notable exception to this is Kaminari; they've bonded over mutual perviness (Kaminari's one of my faves, but he does have a couple instances of perviness). However, we can deepen this bond by suggesting Kaminari has some degree of interest in American culture, from a literary perspective (which I suggest, since Hemmingway is one of the few things we know Kaminari to know about, and he seems to suggest he has read at least one novel by him). From here, we can also extend a bond between Mineta and both Bakugou and Midoriya (who both likely have their own interest in American culture due to All Might) Have home carry on a normal conversation with them about an all might movie, where he is comparing it to other similar films and Midoriya and Bakugou are looking it from the perspective of it being about All Might. Boom, Mineta's got a connection to two classmates beyond being classmates (American All Might movie night). It would also give home a connection outside of 1A; specifically with Pony Tsunotori. A non-sexual connection to a girl would do good for his character Now we can use his skill as an artist to draw connections between him and other characters. Once people find out, Aoyama might ask Mineta to paint a portrait of him, since that seems very Aoyama. Or, potentially for another non-sexual connection with a girl, he could draw a portrait of hagakure so other people know what she looks like. We could also see him have a non-sexual connection with Midnight, where he is actively known to enjoy her class for it's actual content. Finally, let's use a stated but rarely shown fact to give him connections. He's very smart, even among class 1A, even though he places just ahead if middle of class in terms of grades. Say we see him doing homework with a few of his classmates. Pointing out a mistake they made. The great part about this is that it could reasonably be a significant portion of class. Let's say Kaminari, because already friends, Sato, because size dichotomy, and Sero, since they were final partners. We can also lean into our meta knowledge of Mineta, knowing he is intended as comic relief, to give him connections to the audience, in the form of different gags other than perviness . Like sticking by his head to walls or ceilings. Heck, we can throw in another reminder he is a perv here, by having him complain about being stuck, but instant shut up or go "this isn't so bad" when a girl walks by, since he is now at or above boob level.

Anyway this has just been a ramble to explain how I think a fanon Mineta could be good while also keeping him largely in line with canon, and also proving that he can be less disliked by simply adding a few things and removing nothing.

What are some things you think could be added to Mineta to make him likeable?

#my hero academia #mineta minoru #mineta analysis #mineta fix-it #fanon mineta #just give him more than one note and he can be good just like any other character #minoru mineta #kaminari mineta friendship #sato rikido mentioned #sero hanta mentioned #pony tsunotori mentioned #hagakure tooru mentioned #Bakugou katsuki mentioned #Midoriya izuku metioned

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madara-fate · 4 years

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Hey, Maddie! I appreciate your blog a lot, but this is the first time I'm sending an ask to you. The reason of my ask i's abt a thing that is bothering me a lot: the "war" among Skr and Ssk fans between the SS fandom. How can I start that? Okay, after years of the heavy angst inherent of the ship, the hateful content of the ASSes and the almost 6 years of cannon, I never expected to see the fans bashing each others for like Ssk or Skr more. Cont (1)

Cont (2) But I'm noticing that there are more Ssk fans complaining abt the "awful" side of the SS fandom than Skr fans, so I thought it would be good to show how the things aren't not so simple. To see Skr more popular among SS shippers nowadays is a big surprise for me. I'm of the time when Skr was treated as nothing but an object that exists only for Ssk's pleasure and joy (sex, children and love). Cont...

Cont (3)I may was rude with my words and I feel sorry, I don't want to hurt others Ssk's fans feelings, but as a huge Skr fan, I got a bit upset in how some Ssk stans are playing victims of this whole situation. Look, there are a lot of people who call themselves "skr fans" and really hates Ssk, we can see it more clearly comes from KS/NS fandom, but there are a lot of skr hate from Ssk fandom too. Cont...

Cont (4) And the reasons they hates Skr is even worse like "She has no big boobs", "Ssk should make a lot of strong babies with Karin/Hinata/Ino, bc Skr comes with a normal family, so she's trash", "she's a obsessive bitch". Some Ssk fans are so cruel that like projects a distorted image of Ssk being evil (only with skr) and got pleasure a lot from that. Even though these things harms Ssk's character as well, I rarely see Ssk stans complains abt that. Cont...

Cont (5) It seems like Ssk became treated like the way Skr was always been treated by many people in the ss fandom hurts some Ssk's fans feelings. But, as a huge fan of both(together and individually), it hurt me 10 times more. I see the main problem in the way many people who like SS just because think they are hot together or are biased by the fanfictions standards(that in most cases are pure ooc),not because their cannon story. Cont...

Cont (6) I don't mind if they like them only bc of these reasons, but I got rly upset when they try to put fanon stuff into cannon stuff. In the middle of all that, as I always talked with my friends, it's indispensable to understand the character as a whole, not thinking abt romance. And I think I find another problem: some people follow some series just bc of ship. Again, I have no problem with it, I made it a lot of time before. Cont...

Cont (7) But these people need to understand that in a Shounen manga like Naruto, the main focus isn't Ssk and Skr living a sweet romance and, tbh, the obsession with romance make many fans lost a lot of good content, even between SS. For ex, in the chapter 181, Sakura say to Sasuke that "he always hated her". Cont...

Cont (8) OMG, it hurted me a lot, bc this same guy was dispose to die to save her from Gaara, he associates her with his dead family two times in part 1 and hear her talk as if him don't care about her probably was awful. But at the same time, we can see how much Skr feelings changed (for better). Cont...

Cont (9) Even in that moment with 12 yrs, she doesn't want make him hers, she knew him deeply(he isn't her old childish fantasies… He is much better than that, but also full of pain…)and saw how lonely and broke he was, but also saw the good things inside him. Even in that time, she didn't want see him become that man we saw in the Iron Land. Cont...

Cont(10) Meanwhile some people prefer to reduce the whole context in "Sasuke been an idiot once again", the true fans can see the connection between them. The fact that they know each other so well always touch my heart. And abt MultiSaku and Ssk hate, I have been analyzing how many of these "multisaku" fans are only self-insert. Cont...

Cont (11) They like imagine themselves involved in some fetishism like "student and teacher", "old man and young woman", etc. It is why I would like some Ssk stans be careful when they claim that "SS fandom only cares abt skr", it isn't true at all. Many so called "fans" even don't know the cannon Sakura. Cont...

Cont (12) It is pretty funny, look: we know that Skr(as all other Naruto women) could be much more active in battle if Kishimoto himself isn't insecure of write women as he write abt men, but there are features that Skr has in cannon and some fans put them in fanfictions like if it was something new. XD And abt multisaku shippers hate on Sasuke, I got so tired of it. Cont...

Cont (13)They use the moments where she looks sad for Ssk's bad actions and contrast it with Nrt makes her smile, etc. There are also the idea of a man like Lee is much better than Ssk bc he never was afraid of show his feelings for her. Seeing by this perspective, we can almost forget that Ssk isn't the badboy who gets pleasure from Skr's pain, he is a survivor of the biggest genocide of the shinobi world. Cont...

Cont (14)One of the most interesting thing I love abt SS is how they aren't just the stereotype of "bad boy x good girl/fangirl", in fact they are a deconstruction of that and it could be even better if Kishimoto wasn't so shy or if these two belonged to a seinen manga. And speaking by skr side, I also noticed that most men who has no "afraid of showing their emotions to her" are just her fanboys. Cont...

Cont(15) They think she's pretty and want to be with her. They don't know she deeply for treat her like a queen as some people argue. It's like a female version of Ssk. XD And Maddie, I've reading your texts and I also agree that Skr don't want to be treated like this. What she wanted was to be acknowledged as a full human being/shinobi. Skr had a big inferiority/ superiority complex and to be in the same team with Ssk and Nrt made it even worse than her time with Ino. Cont...

Cont(16)Although this aspect didn't received much attention from the author like her teammates issues, it was still there and it is the one of the roots of her sadness, not the simple fact of Ssk's existence as many haters and KS/NS shippers say. And speaking abt that, one of the most enjoyable things I found in SS is that Ssk never saw her in a idealized way(like "that pretty, perfect girl"). Cont...

Cont (17) He saw her flaws and told her abt them face to face (and it made her improve her behavior), but he also showed sensibility to see her heart (when he cheered her up in front many people or the way he compared skr with his family). Cont...

Cont (18) All of this is away better than the idealized "queen" worship, bc he is seeing her heart and not the surface. I also read an excellent analysis abt how Ssk see skr as the same way he saw Itachi (like as if her was a bother to him, which is untrue) and it could help more people understand him. Cont...

Cont (end) To finish this long ask, there are a lot of fake ss fan in the fandom of both sides and it isn't a new thing, but we, the real fans, will overcome that issues. Our ship is already cannon and they are in the new phase, some people need to grow up with them, too.

To describe that as simply a “long” ask is one hell of an understatement Anon, holy fuck. I usually include screenshots of the ask if it spans more than one part but I wasn't gonna crop and edit 18 different screenshots, lol; Copy and paste will have to do in this case.

Now having said that, yes I agree with the basic gist of what you said ^_^

#Sasuke Uchiha #Sakura Haruno #sasusaku

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incarnateirony · 4 years

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S15 Remaster: Grace, Souls, Conversion; Effects of the Fall; The Journey of Man; Self-Godhood and Free Will.

Alright, so over in another thread (x) @curioussubjects evoked an interesting take about the effects of the fall vs grace/souls and the meaning of the two, and I remembered having an old post that was a bit of a mess from early S13 where I applied Qabbalistic concepts to SPN not long before the actual... Qabbalistic and Hermetic elements started manifesting (The Shadow, the Empty/Ain Soph, etc) and before I pretty much started flipping theological shit.

The other thread was already becoming titanic with a hodge podge of other philosophical musings between users (I think @winchestersingerautorepair and @thecoffeebrain-blog are still pending to add their additions to it once life clears them), so we sort of mutually agreed to save this discourse for another thread while I took some time to remaster and update the old talking points.

It's a fundamental point that is generally vaguely brushed over, or often has modern concepts plugged into it in streamlined media form rather than exploration: What makes a soul, what makes existence, what makes meaning in our lives.

This, in fact, is the fundamental question and exploration *of* the soul, which Dabb's SPN seems to be tackling fairly directly.

So let's explore the differences and transitional conversions of grace and soul as we've witnessed in SPN. I'll be starting with my take, but of course, as all philosophical discussions go, this is best a conversation of shared concepts.

Also uh, this post was kinda on-request but is literally ridonculously long. Fuck Andrew Dabb for being the only person on the face of the goddamn planet that can make me write infinite words about esoteric philosophy about a TV show.

So this conversation gets a bit difficult to even know where to begin. I'm going to notch a few notes for everybody to keep in mind: Season 6: Death can not destroy souls. Souls are the most powerful known force in the universe, and he who has the most Is Become God. Season 13: Only god can create new angels, they are the biological definition of an asexually reproductive species (as opposed to sexual orientation identity) -- they are unable to create among themselves, and must be created by a supreme force in command of the grace that creates them. This will passively brush over the oft-discussed topic of angel sexuality as well, but that is far from the core point. Season 14: God calls souls "complicated" to handwave away making new ones. Season 15: Yet again, Belphegor tried to consume souls to become a great power, reflecting S6/7 Castiel's arc.

Now that I've sort of dropped those as a lead-in of applicable concepts, I'd like to move forward.

Now as per my S13 listing, we've all seen this fandom turn over and try to apply human sexuality and identity labels to angels over and over again and, while I understand that and mean no offense to that in general, I feel like approaching it from that angle of the human perspective and lens makes a great deal of the substantiative qualities of SPN's discussion of the human soul vanish into the aether. How are these things related? Let's talk!

Sex isn’t the only part of this discussion. As they are wavelength lifeforms, rather than biological, they aren’t really dependent on biological functions. Many of their native elements pass to their vessels: They don’t eat, sleep, or have general body functions… normally.

Their senses are all sorts of different, too. They see in the astral, they taste and smell in molecular compounds, and especially early-vessel-claiming, they seem to have next to no actual pain response. It’s like, well, some giant wave form stuffed in a meat sack they use like a marionette more than having genuine attachment to. Early on angels could waltz through gunfire without flinching and take a knife to the chest with a very bland look of, “Really?”

When it comes to discussing angels and grace, I'm going to pull some sections from the linked post at the start of this:

We know the biblical concept that all things are made by grace; we know Chuck controls his fake construct, but not the free will of the human soul. Consider Gabriel’s constructed worlds where he can manipulate the fake people inside it and snap them away in veils of blue, they’re just pieces of a machine. “I’m the cage.” The human body is part of the sandbox, but the soul is something beyond it.

If angels are living aspects of grace, wavelengths of celestial intent for Chuck’s machinations, the programs that keep the matrix in order – and fallen angels are the rogue programs – they’re still relatively connected to being just… an animated, if intelligent rock or any other piece of the universe. To use more Matrix terms: Just more lines of code. But Castiel’s break in that was contact with his profound bond with Dean that left a mark on him, a brand, just like Balthazar’s soul claims. This tie was powerful enough to be stronger than even Amara’s connection to Dean, for example.

The human soul is the essence of the one true good, realistically – The One Thing that exists, truly, by which all other things come, the Prima Materia – “What Jack did wasn’t evil, it was the absence of good.” – this is actually a hermetic concept but that’s a whole other bag of words, that’s how I quoted that line before the episode aired from the title alone but MOVING ON

If we look at Eileen for example, her ghost is still deaf. Her body/cage/vessel in life never introduced her consciousness, her humanity, to the tactile sense of sound as it exists within Chuck’s sandbox, ergo her spirit doesn’t know it. But it is the soul, like the sleeper, seeking the meaning of its existence and where it is home that commands the body, and leaves the body, and ends up in chuck’s other matrixes of control like heaven and hell that keep people distracted, keep humans from returning to the primordial man that rivals or maybe even betters God.

That all said, human Cas for example suddenly had the full awareness of experience, rather than an autonomous sentient part of the universe chained to divine intent, free or not; that freedom and liberty came by way of the human soul. (Per metatron, Season 8 finale, “When you die and your soul comes to heaven,”) But with his tie to Dean, and humanity, and a soul his hands laid on, the extraction of his grace also left… but what? A soul born of Dean, really.

Whenever his grace came back, that universal power and awareness, he lost those senses, but he didn’t lose many of the attributes that came with. In fact he pined for them.

Also if we go Jungian with the inky man/shadow as the primordial man or spirit of man, Anthropos, while it didn’t reflect Lucifer, Billie, or soulless Jack it reflected Castiel.

I’ve held the theory that Castiel still has a soul like the nucleus of an egg buried beneath a titanic presence of universal power.

I’d also further endorse this by pointing out while metatron cited Cas having a soul in the S8 finale, when Jack lost his, neither Dean nor Cas thought Cas could empathize as well as Sam could.

In example, Castiel is the only one the Shadow reflected, not Billie, not Soulless Jack, not Lucifer, just Castiel; I’ve even gone so far as to speculate that the smiley attempt at communication was the sort of subconscious borg having the essence of Jack’s soul trying to communicate with his spirit/mind otherwise alert based on consumed grace in the Empty. Speculation, yes, but… potentially loudly resonant.

The journey of man to self-godhood is a complex and tangled affair, traveling through facets of the self represented by a wide array of *ideas* we have begun to face in the show (including color schemes Dabb has actively employed)

If you venture into my shorthand visual post about The Shadow, Anima, Animus, and the Self (x) you'll find how the show has chosen to address this. Similarly, the masculine and feminine paths of universal progenation would be worth a cursory read (x).

Similarly, @winchestersingerautorepair recently sent me a chart from a 1973 book titled "The Colors of Love" discussing Hellenistic use of color in association (which, minding alchemy's growth path through time, is hugely relevant). As Maeve said, "John Allen Lee is the mvp by the way. Hes at the crossroads of psychology and LGBT concepts of love and sexuality, and has a fascinating career and life story."

Before I fully locked on to just how loud Dabb was being in his use of alchemy rather than casually tapping on it, you may remember a series of color metas I built specifically on these very colors (and, let's face it, black light doesn't exist, but blue does, and has similar psychological associations). Click this (x) to go to my color metas on tumblr regarding Optimism, which follows this path. Unfortunately my Nihilism one is either untagged or I only posted it on Pillowfort. But you’ll take note I just sort of avoided/dodged/ignored established fanon color meta in favor of other stuff, just a heads up there if you’re expecting me to follow anyone else’s pre-existing fanon -- it ain’t there.

This is all an aside to the actual question of *souls*, but an important framework to how Dabb is choosing to explore the journey of the soul through its many aspects of Being.

To defer back to what I quoted from my other post about Gabriel's universes: What makes humanity different from the moving bodies performing functions of controlled story, rather than guided elements, inside Gabriel's world? If we were to, say, drift into Doctor Sexyverse, or Cop Proceduralverse, nobody seemed to flinch or even be aware of Sam and Dean breaking the script, they continued on their own paths until Sam and Dean "played their parts". But what made Sam and Dean *different* from them?

Explaining freedom to angels is "a bit like teaching poetry to a fish," said Castiel, now bound to humanity since laying his hands on the human soul in hell that, even the S8 DVD commentary mentions, is how he has come to know, love and, as they say, be "enamored with" humanity. We have seen it now-- blank stares of confusion from breaking their course of action, their function. Their predesigned purpose that they were wavelengths of intent for within the machine. They aren't all so different from Gabriel's creations in the end, with Doctor Sexy's Nurses being not too unlike angels to Chuck. They are there for a path and a reason, and should they be somehow interrupted from that function, they seem to lose all purpose.

To convert this to another method of understanding than "matrix code", in case that isn't sinking in with anyone, think of angels as forces of nature. The hurricane means no malice, it simply exists as a function of or even result of universal laws, and often evokes great rebalancing effects that change the course of history for a huge amount of humans and other creatures that it's basically oblivious to. The hurricane does not understand your feelings much less care about them. It is here to do what it does until it is done with what it does. This very concept is why so many ancient gods are primitive archetypes of natural forces.

If we cease trying to box angels into human perceptions for the want to identify with them in such a representation-light landscape, the field opens up to something infinitely more complicated. Such as: what makes Castiel so different? I've already addressed that, of course, in this post, but let's pitch that as a conversational hook again.

"You want to know why we're meant to stay away from those humans? It's not because we're a danger to them. It's because they're a danger to us."

Now BECAUSE sexuality is the angle this fandom has heavily thrown its discussion chips into beyond the other senses, I'm going to move forward into that topical field:

Anna, talking to Dean, lists a long flurry of reasons to become human, among which sex was stapled. In later seasons, Cas comes up with a different list, but it’s more reflective of his emotive view of humanity, and doesn’t include the sex. Either way, it actually leaves interesting take on the human soul’s function (which is also a silent part of something I’ll get to later** ) as per the trinity of mind-soul-body sometimes called “The Threefold Nature of Man” in a lot of classic mysticism. **

So why would Anna include sex in the list if others can enjoy it? There’s various reasons of taking this into consideration, and I consider most headcanon potentials valid since… you know, there’s really no clear statement on this.

- Most angels have a copilot and that’s just creepy AF - It could be subliminal commentary of wanting to enjoy a native drive for it rather than a learned one, since affections and emotions are also canonically attached to the human condition (as well as the 3fold Nature discussed later). - It could have to do with gradual humanization effects (will discuss shortly) - Misc other.

Barring our specific presumption of why this hangs in the air, the detail is that it simply *does*. Perhaps the truth is between all of these, with each angel unto their own.

Anna lurked, invisibly, on earth observing men as long as she knew. Now, gradual humanization effects is a complete headcanon proposal associated around all elements to be covered in this discussion. That is to say, most angels that have exhibited sexual behavior and enjoyment of various goods have either been fallen or in their vessels for a LONG TIME, perhaps gradually removing the disassociation from the body and gaining familiarity with its functions.

Yes, we can evoke Balthazar’s sexual activity, but we must also evoke his appreciation for wine and food and music and all of the other things that we have canonically, even mechanically witnessed in Castiel (inability to appreciate food or drink, in example, as an angel.) So WHAT makes Balthazar different that he CAN experience all of these things (beyond the potential of Plothole AF)? There is literally something he has that other angels don’t. The second Cas clicks back to angel, he can’t appreciate food anymore and beer does nothing for him, but Balthazar can enjoy alcohol? There is LITERALLY a difference of template of EVERYTHING going on here, not just sexuality. We can postulate it all we want, but the only one that immediately comes to mind is “gradual humanization”, as we haven’t the FOGGIEST idea how long he has had his vessel. Unless we assume various appreciations of his are Just An Act, but then why not assume it’s performance behavior on the sexuality too? Pick one or the other, don’t run the line on both. (Also if you want to be under the assumption that despite terminal soul dealing it was his first vessel run, I’m going to leave this as a note, and a REMINDER of his meddling in attachment to, handling, trade and use of human souls for his own means, and tuck this aside until we GET to the meaning of human souls.)

The VERY SAME can be said of Gabriel. And Gabriel we KNOW has been on earth as Gabe for a VERY. LONG. TIME. His sweet tooth is what got him busted. Again, it’s not just about his sexuality, it’s his entire composition is somehow DIFFERENT from otherwise canonical function of angels.

Again I point out there’s also a big ??????? on Naomi because again… 400 year old Crowley in Mesopotamia. We have no educated way to even ADDRESS that one because… is it a time warp? WTH??? Even Mark called this a plothole. Literally we have to headcanon how they were even there together before we headcanon what was even going on in a big old pillar of ridiculous headcanon, so I’m going to float that off in a box labeled with a question mark and admit, it’s just random AF. The “fling” is also implied and unclear. So I mean- we’ll just… note that and keep moving on why it’s never impacted my perception of this much.

How long fallen was Lucifer?

Hannah brings an obvious question to mind in challenge to all of my surrounding premises, but this is literally where “choice of experimentation within a vessel” comes into play, as with all of them. I’m human now, this seems like a fun thing to humans, let me try the thing; that’s all I’ve ever read that as. You may have your read of it otherwise, but angels try a lot of things. And I’ll bring this up during canon talk.

The concept of humanization-with-time does have some further established presence of S13. When Lucifer is still an angel but largely drained of his grace, he too begins feeling compulsions of hunger, cold, and basic human instinct he was previously immune to. Diminished power, and the closer one comes to being of Soul Rather than Grace, the more they seem to resonate. Anna carved out her grace to fully enjoy humanity and was born into it, experiencing its gifts of awareness. Cas can no longer fully enjoy humanity as an angel. We don’t know what Balthazar’s status is. And so on. But it appears that by VARIOUS METHODS, such as the depletion of grace or just being a long-assed time to attach to a specific vessel, they do end up ATTAINING various behaviors.

Preparing to speak on Humanized Angels.

What really triggered this premise to me was the recurring humanization of Castiel. And again, this goes far beyond just sexuality preferences. I’m going to do a brief break to get to that ** I marked above about the threefold nature of man before expanding.

** Mind-Soul-Body trinity:

Angels have the mind/spirit (grace) and body, but lack a soul; grace is closer to their natural body’s composition than molecular and transmits a wavelength thought into whatever sack they’re using to operate. But there’s a disconnect here in classic mind-soul-body structure (which is sometimes alternately listed as Body-Spirit-Soul, with Soul as the mind instead, and Spirit in place of the alternate listing of Soul? People swap these terms interchangeably but you’ll find a common pull). There’s multiple takes on this. For example, we’ll go with the standard accepted biblical take as a first ideation of it, considering the various judeochristian influences of SPN.

Please NOTE I’m going to list several variations of this, and have no hard cast “this is the exact model” they’re using, as much as “this is a recurring theme in religion and philosophy”, which, while SPN is rarely 100% accurate to any one specific model, they often call on.

The EXACT itterations of this vary, and there’s no real saying which exact respective “silent ven diagram” they’re using, but as if a triple circle overlapped with Mind, Body, Spirit with the balance we as humans know at the core. Removing a rung of this strips out major overlap of function.

The inner spirit, insight, will and memory reaching from spirit/mind to body by WAY of the soul, for the spirit to engage the human senses within the constructed universe

CASTIEL

Well, perhaps I’ve been down here with them for too long. There’s seemingly nothing but chaos. But not all bad comes from it. Art. Hope. Love. Dreams.

HANNAH

But t-those are human things.

CASTIEL

Yes.

To fully understand this chart, I again point to (as earlier in this post) this previous post about primordials, explaining the chain (x), Anima Animus and the Shadow (x) and also its association with the paths on way to enlightenment at the source of creation which is explored, for a particular path, right here (x)

Just another way to stack out this chart, including the adventure of Anima and Animus, as well as the id/ego/superego I’ll discuss soon; However, you can see the literal concept is the same. There’s an inner mind, a central essence of the inner court that reflects close to the aspects of Humanity Cas told Hannah, and then the “living room” of the body, and the senses. Same deal. Again, "I'm the cage."

You see a running theme here?

The Soul is essentially commonly received as a vehicle between the higher mind and the body (as well as possessing aspects of our emotion, and sense of self, such as how Sam lost parts of himself without his soul) That, without which, we are lacking various critical anchors of the human experience that we often see lacking in angels.

This therein raises the challenge, “But Soulless Sam was ALL ABOUT the sex.”

That’s where species difference comes in.

We’ll talk psychology a bit, wherein we have the psychological variances of id, ego and superego rather than just body-soul-mind/spirit. They essentially perform the same functions (base instinct drive, early personality function, learned and refined function with choices etc, to boil it down to super-simplistics).

“According to this Freudian model of the psyche, the id is the set of uncoordinated instinctual trends; the super-ego plays the critical and moralizing role; and the ego is the organized, realistic part that mediates between the desires of the id and the super-ego.” – Freud, Sigmund. The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud. Vol. XIX. Translated from the German under the General Editorship of James Strachey. In collaboration with Anna Freud. Assisted by Alix Strachey and Alan Tyson, Vintage, 1999. [Reprint.] ISBN 0-09-929622-5

A Sam with no soul has his base species survival instinct but his acting mind. A Cas with no soul has HIS base species survival instinct (in lack of sexual reproduction as much as potential learned appreciation under the above spoken methods) for an id, if any, and a curiously arranged body until other elements come into play. The ego and superego, such as the application of a soul, leaves room for the gradual inclusion of preferences to anything within this model, such as angels developing their own ORIENTATION once having a vehicle by which to come through.

There’s a few other points to notice about the transition. The Mind/Spirit is capable of questions and doubts, or faith. “I’m not a hammer, as you call it; I have questions, I have doubts.” - S4 Castiel.

The mind is capable to think and to reason, but complex emotions are a challenge to it without a soul, which also filters our thoughts and memories from upper mind into the body, wherein we gain connectivity to the physical senses and the realm we experience.

But the universe -- the wavelengths of intent that make it function -- simply can not experience itself, any more than any other code running on your computer can experience itself. It is you, the human, that experiences the results of that code, and views and understands it and reaches out to aspects of life through it. Grace, should all things be made by it and through Chuck, as the thing that creates this code/intent of angels -- it simply is, and runs, and functions.

So BACK TO THE HUMANIZATION OF ANGELS,

Castiel has humanized or near-humanized three times and we're pending on a fourth. Briefly in the hospital, he was braindead (lacking Jimmy’s brain function, but instead having his own mind) while his heart remained pumping, meaning the body/vessel was alive, but the remaining grace WAS in fact functioning in place of a mind.

CASTIEL 5.21 I just woke up here. The doctors were fairly surprised. They thought I was brain-dead. (…) CASTIEL You could say my batteries are – are drained. DEAN What do you mean? You’re out of angel mojo? CASTIEL I’m saying that I am thirsty and my head aches. I have a bug bite that itches no matter how much I scratch it, and I’m saying that I’m just incredibly… DEAN Human. Wow. Sorry.

However, it was depleted, and this is addressed in effect later on by Metatron removing grace. As grace is removed,

METATRON 8.23 And now something wonderful is going to happen, for me and for you. I want you to live this new life to the fullest. Find a wife. Make babies. And when you die and your soul comes to Heaven, find me. Tell me your story.

Now Castiel goes on to return to himself by going all cannibal and whatnot, but that’s its own story. The simple fact of it is, with the mind housed in a vessel, but the grace attached to it depleted, the body seems to generate something like, equivalent to, or equal to a human soul in its function.

Now to reflect back

2014!CASTIEL 5.04 So, in this way. We’re each a fragment of total perception—just, uh, one compartment in that dragonfly eye of group mind. Now, the key to this total, shared perception—it’s, um, it’s surprisingly physical. 2014!CASTIEL spots DEAN. 2014!CASTIEL Oh. Excuse me, ladies. I think I need to confer with our fearless leader for a minute. Why not go get washed up for the orgy? The WOMEN leave. 2014!CASTIEL You’re all so beautiful. 2014!CASTIEL stands and stretches his back, grunting. DEAN What are you, a hippie? 2014!CASTIEL I thought you’d gotten over trying to label me. (…) 2014!CASTIEL I wish I could just, uh, strap on my wings, but I’m sorry, no dice. DEAN What, are you stoned? 2014!CASTIEL Uh, generally, yeah. DEAN What happened to you? 2014!CASTIEL Life. (…) 2014!CASTIEL You want some? DEAN Amphetamines? 2014!CASTIEL It’s the perfect antidote to that absinthe. DEAN Mmm. Don’t get me wrong, Cas. I, uh. I’m happy that the stick is out of your ass, but—what’s going on—w-with the drugs and the orgies and the love-guru crap? 2014!CASTIEL laughs. DEAN What’s so funny? 2014!CASTIEL Dean, I’m not an angel anymore. DEAN What? 2014!CASTIEL Yeah, I went mortal. DEAN What do you mean? How? 2014!CASTIEL I think it had something to do with the other angels leaving. But when they bailed, my mojo just kind of— psshhew!—drained away. And now, you know, I’m practically human. I mean, Dean, I’m all but useless. Last year, broke my foot, laid up for two months. DEAN Wow. 2014!CASTIEL Yeah. DEAN So, you’re human. Well, welcome to the club. 2014!CASTIEL Thanks. Except I used to belong to a much better club. And now I’m powerless. I’m hapless, I’m hopeless. I mean, why the hell not bury myself in women and decadence, right? It’s the end, baby. That’s what decadence is for. Why not bang a few gongs before the lights go out? But then that’s, that’s just how I roll.

Now, we can try to extrapolate that it’s “all the drugs,” but drugs or not, while decadence includes MORAL decline, it also is this:

dec·a·dence ˈdekədəns/Submit noun moral or cultural decline as characterized by excessive indulgence in pleasure or luxury.

And Cas doesn’t get words wrong (unless he’s trying to make an awkward conversation starter with Dean as what’s almost a routine for them, always in idioms and never in definition). In fact, he has a very on-point vocabulary. How often does someone evoke “Insouciant”?

Calling it decadence defines this as a luxury to Castiel. The entire episode is like One Giant Exposition of the differences: being breakable, prone to decadence, bang a few gongs on the way out. Yes, it includes drugs; hell, he’s now subject to being INFLUENCED by drugs, contrary to being able to drink down the entire bar before “starting to feel something” or needing to drink the whole liquor store before the grace stopped implicitly filtering it enough for him to stagger in on Sam. At some point, Castiel decided these were ALL his coping mechanisms, but this is an adaptation of some period of humanization between late 2009 and 2014.

This could be considered a one-off of Zachariah’s manipulation or whatever if we choose to ignore Edlund saying it was a real universe, but then we get the SAME THING hitting us again in season 9, if under a different, immediate scope rather than “end result.”

9.01 CASTIEL looks at his bloody palm. CASTIEL It hurts. (…) MAN How about we get you some water, hmm? CASTIEL I, uh, I don’t drink water. (…) CASTIEL It’s okay. I don’t eat.

and

9.03 CASTIEL (Chewing on the toothpaste) I’ll be moving on tonight after work. It’s time. The MAN nods and hangs up his towel. CASTIEL Can I ask you something? MAN Sure. CASTIEL walks into one of the bathroom stalls. CASTIEL Do you ever tire of urinating? I’ll never get used to it. (…) HOMELESS MAN You’re new at this, aren’t you? CASTIEL Food… sleep, or passing gas, it’s all very strange. And it’s occurred to me that one day I’m gonna die. CASTIEL and the HOMELESS MAN just look at each other curiously. CASTIEL Well… I better try falling asleep. It’s quite a process, isn’t it? (…)

Now, we’re going to take to the raw moment of Castiel and April,

She kisses him gently on the cheek, but stays close and eventually kisses him on the lips. CASTIEL seems surprised at first but then joins in.

Cas is surprised… and then joins in. Castiel did not expect this, but falls into it of his own action. No force was implied, and the moment leading into it was all of a few seconds, rather than any persistence or insistence.

A few more bits,

APRIL So, that was okay? CASTIEL Very much so. Um… what I did, that was, uh… correct? APRIL Very much so. CASTIEL (Smiling) (…) APRIL So what happens next for you? CASTIEL More of this, I hope. They smile and start making out again.

I don’t exactly get the feeling that she’s entirely leading this situation on all by herself, to the dismay of several gatekeeper ship or sexuality stans.

More elements with regards to humanity in this episode,

CASTIEL I am really enjoying this place. Plentiful food. Good water pressure. Things I never even considered before. There really is a lot to being human, isn’t there? DEAN It ain’t all just burritos and strippers, my friend. CASTIEL Yeah. I understand what you’re saying. SAM You do? CASTIEL Yes, there’s more to humanity than survival. You… look for purpose, and you must not be defeated by anger or despair. Or hedonism, for that matter. DEAN Where does hedonism come into it? CASTIEL Well, my time with April was very educational. SAM Yeah. I mean, I would think that getting killed is something. CASTIEL And having sex. DEAN chokes on his burrito for a second. DEAN You had sex with April? SAM Yeah, that would be where the hedonism comes in.

This isn’t just Castiel talking about having sex for the first time. This is Castiel acknowledging the allure of hedonism for the first time (…not minding the timewarp of 5.04, which didn’t happen Because AU.)

And here, also 9.03, before meeting April CASTIEL is once again wandering through the noise and the people. He is trying to take everything in – he glances from a hot dog stand to a woman’s breasts to a supermarket. The whole place is noisy and crowded and confusing. He is overwhelmed.

In 9.03, among this onslaught of Castiel’s change in visual, sound, sensory, and other instinctual acknowledgment of a change in the senses (see back to the 3Fold Nature and the acquisition of a human soul), we also get Castiel rubbernecking at a woman’s chest for the first time, before encountering April; the transcript doesn’t do the moment proper justice with the pure level of focus directors and editors called to it. In fact, we get slow camera pan and a rubberneck that might as well have ended with him walking-flipping into a trashcan blindside.

With all of these stacked connotations aside, I find it difficult to interpret anything but it being installed as a yet-again evocation of a difference in function.

Episodes 1 and 3, the first two episodes Castiel is in during season 9 after losing his grace at the end of season 8, DELUGE us with a current of differences of all of his sensory faculties.

Once his state is “corrected,” (for lack of a better term - Castiel seems to yearn for his humanity back through the show) the show makes a point of showing us a reversal as applicable,

SAM What? What are you talking about? CASTIEL When I was human, you know, I had to eat constantly. It was kind of annoying. SAM Yeah, a lot of human things are pretty annoying. CASTIEL But…I enjoyed the taste of food – particularly peanut butter with grape jelly, not jam. Jam I found unsettling. SAM [sitting on the table next to CASTIEL] So, what? Now you can’t taste PB and J? CASTIEL No, I-I taste every molecule. SAM Not the sum of its parts, huh? CASTIEL It’s overwhelming. It’s disgusting. [looks longingly at the sandwich] I miss you, PB and J.

Once again, paradigm shift. What he once appreciated, amidst the VAST wash of senses they told us about, just seems… null now. Something is missing, and something is different. Again, the universe can no longer experience ITSELF.

Now, I’m going to fall back a bit to cover what would possibly be framed as an argument against all of this, but frankly builds into it,

Back in season 6, Meg was UNABASHEDLY FLIRTING WITH CASTIEL and trying to prompt him to “move some furniture around,” and, in a learned “last night on earth” move, Castiel makes a motion in 6.10

Meg grabs Castiel by the neck and kisses him, at the same time removing his sword. Castiel pushes her up against the wall and returns the kiss with interest. MEG: What was that? CASTIEL: I learned that from the pizza man.

NOTICE. LEARNED THAT.

With FORWARD PROMPTING from Meg, and existing example (porn), Castiel did in fact make a move. That is to say, “learned behaviors” and “personal orientation” beyond “species reproductive instinct”. But as made clear by April, this never led anywhere particular, never completed, and while he expressed wanting repeats with April during being human, this is the only actual example we have of it.

In short: throughout the show, Castiel finds new things and tests new things. These new things become bizarre little childlike obsessions at times even. This one… obviously a little less childlike. (clears throat) But again, this is a process of “learned motion.” (though I’m somewhat disturbed that canonically Emmanuel-Cas sees her face and is absolutely horrified at her appearance, meaning this is also not likely even by nature of physical/spiritual attraction as much as personal, almost a demisexual trait with experimental curiosity which, as an independent idea beyond “holy shit she’s a demon”, is a healthy phase.)

But by way of learned motion/acquired taste and function, we then have the question of “why doesn’t Cas repeat this if he clearly enjoyed season 9?” Well, I can name a few. We can go over the fact that Cas simply doesn’t explore social venues that make it ready. Or we can mention his seeming lack of compulsion for it which ...is a topic of this post. Or we can simply reflect to the *challenges* of hedonism and what it will, in this post, continue to implicitly adventure as the cage and trappings of the human body and experience within what we call “life”, which the human soul extends well beyond.

But it leads us to an interesting series of questions about Castiel and Dean’s seemingly changed interactions in season 12, on a subliminal level.

And no, I’m not implying they’re boning. When Dean is no longer getting strung across a variety of cosmic elements to save him directly from the crosshairs of, or from himself, we’re getting this weird vibe of gruff jealousy, bickering, and infighting. As if Castiel, settling in more among them, is channeling increased humanity. Despite being an angel in some crippled capacity still, personality traits acquired from his human period are still there, leading to believe the soul element never ENTIRELY disappeared, as much as with further ding-dang-donged up grace, we have to wonder - is this almost a sliding scale? Or can both run mutually when one doesn’t overshadow the other? The exact specifics of this mechanic would be unclear.

But all of these complexities is why I find it nearly impossible to, in my head, reduce it to the simple “well some like it and-” because I have always read an intentional base-beat of differentiation between the human and angelic experience including, but not limited to, sex.

There’s a subtle hint of some osmosis of this in what I mentioned above with Hannah. “Perhaps I’ve been with them too long.”

CASTIEL

Well, perhaps I’ve been down here with them for too long. There’s seemingly nothing but chaos. But not all bad comes from it. Art. Hope. Love. Dreams.

HANNAH

But t-those are human things.

CASTIEL

Yes.

And so why I find it impossible to just address “angel sexuality” as its own topic. This may just be my brain at work, but I don’t see all of this effort in dividing their experiences, in a show that addresses theology and concepts like the human soul, to be arbitrary and random and I just see SO much beautiful complexity IN the shift of his sexual behaviors, among other operations. It’s not just about Castiel’s sexuality, it’s about addressing the complex creatures that are humans, and what builds us at a core. Frankly, from that end, it doesn’t matter if Cas is bi, ace, straight or pan – Castiel has been human, and wants to be so again. And it, along with other things littered throughout the show, have given us great insights on the soul, or the lack thereof, and all of these beautiful building blocks.

And so to roll away from approaching sexuality so heavily, and instead ball and bundle that up as part of the human experience within the body, the reflection of the human soul, I hook again: The universe can not experience itself more than Windows OS can experience itself; it requires the essence of man to experience the result of the work of grace and by which it finds many things of itself, even within the trappings of a human life.

The fact that humans are afterwards caged elsewhere is a whole other discussion me and others have been holding in the original linked post, so let's step away from that and instead go back to the concept of, far and away beyond sexuality, what makes a soul, and how is it different from the created universe.

If we were to apply these concepts -- angels, bodies of grace, as parts of the universe and how it functions -- versus the irrevocable free will fundamental to the human soul, dividing bodies from just being roving parts of the construct like Gabriel's realms -- to our dialogue in regards to Castiel as our seeming oddball with a crack in his chassis, "And the universe came to humanity, and laid hands on humanity, and fell in love with humanity to come to know it; it abandoned its own purpose and functions due to this connection to the concept of the human soul, and began to live and dream and love as a man, rebelling against its predesigned function; and one day, the orphic child of both the universe and man looked through the eyes of the universe to first see man, and itself was born from the universe unto man, to live and learn as a man and hold its dominion of both human sovereignty and creator of grace, mastering both realms." in regards to Jack's very creation, and why he is such a huge threat to Chuck's power and control of his realm.

As a powerful creature of grace, he can take and reroute those elements without issue by authoritative command of the independent liberty of the human soul, free thinking and not just a Doctor Sexy Nurse in motion.

But the question is conversion, which we've seen in both directions, be it Castiel acquiring a human soul or Jack converting humans into angels with his command of both of these dominions. The best I could liken it to is AC/DC energy conversion. It is worth noting, however -- grace can be drained without permission, it is not tied to freedom. Humanity is the body of choice: be that humans choosing to surrender that in the name of glory and power to simply become part of universal functions, which isn't so different from choosing to burn one's own soul away in the name of spells, magic or other power; or the human spirit attached to its cage of a body and life still needing to concede and give permission to be taken BY the forces of the universe, surrendering the potential impact of their own choices within their own moving cage to what the universe would will of it.

Ironically, if you use an AC inverter to power a computer or television, the power supply in the device is converting the 120-volt alternating current into a much lower voltage direct current. The sensitive electronic circuits in these devices need low, regulated voltages to work, so you're actually converting DC to AC so it can be changed back into DC again. You can't use straight direct current without the AC to DC inverter because the device's power supply needs the AC power in order to properly step down and regulate the voltage. That is to say, in conversion parts are lost, but they can still be transmitted; so while Castiel was subject to the human experience, he still struggled with parts like dreaming. It was a young, small spark of a soul, converted from another energy form, and likely with his connection to Dean acting as the inverter.

Demons go to the empty; demons are former human souls that corrupted and lost the light that made them inherently "good." That which defines them. They have collapsed to the pressures of Chuck's universes and let their flame go out. But realistically, that's also antagonized by other human souls in hell trying to escape their own torment.

It has been seen, time and again, that the only thing that can destroy a human soul is... the human soul.

*takes a breath*

And now to explore what @curioussubjects has been saying about The Shadow as a recycling Bin of souls, which would predate the universe and even Chuck, I simply repeat this segment, to help master-off this post:

If we take the Shadow as the reflection of the collective soul, which then becomes the substantiative Prima Materia through which all things come (x), including even the potential of Chuck and Amara as manifestations of the primitive concept of masculine and feminine, light and dark as among the first thoughts in the cosmos. But in such by it all things are born, even the universe or the gods, in this proposed theory. It is the primitive self asking (per the far-above chart), first–well, WTF, why am I thinking, but after that – who are they, and then who am I, and then eventually who are you, before the end of the soul’s journey on its path is Who Art Thou, long ventured within the constructed realm to learn what it means that we even exist.

Those first thoughts then create the totemic pillars of creation by which it can explore the very meaning of existence, even if its own thoughts have made cages and trappings for itself in the expansion of infinite time, but those cages are themselves the vehicles of higher learning and experience, and without those cages, the rest is for naught.

This is the nature of the Prima Materia, the One Thing by which all comes which I linked above. If the soul and Prima Materia are synonymous, then while the universe comes by grace, then all things -- even grace -- come by way of the raw template of the collective soul, which then structures all resulting thought and experience through an infinite series of independent human experience that defines who were are, independent to ourselves, beyond the vat of primitive consciousness that binds us.

The question even comes, why not just reset time? But I am good with who I am. I am good with who you are. This isn't just a story. It's our lives. So god or no god, you go to hell.

And so the reincarnate journey of the man, through the many deaths and rebirths of Sam and Dean and lessons gained within the universe, begins to lock on to the meaning of the independent self in what it means in full, beyond the challenges sent by the creator that may very well be a reflection of our own primal thoughts, our doubts, our fears, our internalized challenges not too unlike the Shadow which again I raise, and point back to the above-linked protogenic discussion of the masculine and feminine paths: In this premise, are Chuck and Amara anything less than the Animus and Anima of humanity, should the Shadow be their forefather?

The path of alchemy, before it became pursuit of literal gold, was about self completion and sovereignty. The phases I have listed above, as well as a brief overview of Dabb's use of it, but if anyone wants a visual aide in these, check out these three videos (x) (x) (x) and remember that Chuck desperately wants them to believe that nothing Gold can stay, should it complete this path; because should man become Gold, they also become God, and he has no authority here. Because in the end, if we abandon the cages -- be it human bodies or heaven -- in here, in this headspace that is Chuck's, we're all just projections of the primitive man trying to find our independent meaning in life. So in here, we're all the same. So in here, Chuck's all talk. And Chuck's afraid, and even wounded by elements of his own creation fallen into the free hands of man.

And so to FULLY hook back, the effects of the fall --

To be detached in various tiers from the divine spheres of constructed intent, and surrendered unto man, or touched by man, or tied to man, or even converted unto man simply seems to be removing the lines of code that defines the constructed universe and instead leaves only the experience of soul, be it directly gained or by proxy. And with that comes many things -- be that the oft-discussed sexuality of angels or any of their other senses, but also their ability like Castiel to understand "complex" ideas like independent thought and function that is otherwise like "explaining poetry to fish" to his kin. I remind you of Agent Smith in the Matrix, who was essentially infected with the power of the One that completely started warping the laws of the universe and, eventually, left the universe, to become the body of man outside of the universe.

It is the universe falling into man, as man at some point seems to have fallen into the universe. And their child now waits beyond the universe, holding council with Death and the Inky Man over what to do from here.

The human experience is double-sided. By it we learn, experience, and exist; but as chuck designed the sandbox, so too did he the bodies as cages. So be that "hedonism" or anything else, these are limitations and bindings. It is not the limits themselves, as much as what we learn in facing them, that becomes who we are as people, and what meaning we bring to our own existence. And this, some angels themselves have chosen to convert and surrender themselves to, some more successfully than others, but the ultimate point between all of them is "Free Will", whether they like PBJ, sex, or good water pressure at the same time -- something that only comes from divorcing themselves from the divine spheres, when otherwise they're numb to bullets or a knife through the heart. The universe simply operates. Man experiences. The universe learns more of itself only by way of man, as man learns the universe.

There are those who fall that do not embrace humanity, but instead explore their creation. These are rogue programs, but still limited in their function. Be that angling out a line at a river, or just needling humanity as lesser ants. But these do not come to the same essence of humanity that those who choose to fall into it and truly experience it do. They still lack a great deal of motivation or purpose, as in breaking away from their programming without gaining genuine compulsion to want, to seek, to find, they find fascinations between their own strips of code that immerse themselves in, and sit, and observe, still not too unlike Anna before completely divorcing herself from her grace.

It is humanity, be it indirect or direct, that proxies the ability to experience, desire, and enjoy, and that more than anything is the nature of man and his power. It is the path of the Soul between Gevurah and Hesed; from the divine spheres descending, passive intellect and active intellect from the different pillars, and hidden higher learnings, reach by way of Spirit and Mind towards the individual self, strapped across passive and active emotion to learn the individual self. From the angle of man, in the material world, and the body as a manifestation of it, our ego, identity, and other evolutions of the mind TOWARDS the self of individuality lead from Tiferet, by path of the soul, into those emotions to climb the tree towards the divine self. Hell, I'll repost the chart so you don't have to scroll.

Castiel, the consciousness of the divine, with active spirit and mind, and intellect, descended towards the individual self within the realm of ego and super ego, and learned of them through Dean Winchester, while hedging at the sphere of emotional complexes and the identity of the self by which he chose to fall into the world and humanity, into and below and between the cross paths of the soul, and in those paths attained a soul. Dean Winchester, on the other hand, was lifted to explore the upper spheres in reverse, to understand the divine self gradually, and with time, as we now prepare to face within season 15.

Man is freedom. And some fall into it. But man can conquer the tree of his own ironic fashioning. The only absolute is what thou wills of it.

The rest is commentary.

Let there be gold. But all that is gold does not glimmer.

#supernatural #spn #meta #my meta #mine #pagan life #souls #angels #the fall #tree of life #spirit #mind #body #physical realm #hermeticism #qabbalah

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the-lightning-strikes-again · 4 years

Note

I read your post about lotura. I have a faint feeling you believe Lotor is *actually* a two-faced, manipulative and murderous guy. Like, if I had not know it’s you who wrote that post, I’d assume it was made by some... anti. Or, at least, by those people who call themselves “allura stan” and “pro-voltron”. However I may have misunderstood the post. Have a nice day.

Hi anon, thanks for the note!

Um, I guess I’m pro-Voltron if you think calling Voltron a hypocrite with moral failings is being a stan?? Not including my various previous posts here and here about the damaging messages associated with team Voltron as a result of VLD, my post said:

As I talk about in my post, I believe the show itself made Lotor an unnecessary scapegoat, and the paladins unnecessary hypocrites, for the sake of “uwu big robot fights,” which is why it’s very easy for me to just straight up reject canon as ridiculous writing at a certain point and do my own thing.

I ultimately don’t think Lotor wants to be any of the things s6-s7 canon accuses him of. In my post, I detail how he made objective strides to confirm himself a true ally of Voltron from s4-s6, to save the paladins from Zarkon at risk to himself, even willingly being physically vulnerable with Allura at the time of his accusation. These are details that support external EP confirmations that Lotor was genuine in his desire for real peace and in his love for Allura, regardless of why ever he was hiding the colony from the paladins.

A true, murderous psychopath would never put himself in harm’s way for the sake of others and would never intentionally put himself in a situation where he’s not the one in control.

As I talk about in my meta, the dev team admits to jerking around characters for the sake of robot battles and for funzies to trick the audience. Lotor sacrificing non-military combatants, and Alteans especially, makes zero objective sense to the overall VLD world-building. There was zero reason for him to need Alteans at all to break into the quintessence field, when there were several other canon-confirmed ways to get pure quintessence/open a rift. Other details of the colony plot and about Lotor himself are so contradictory (example: Lotor is immune to quintessence, but oops, suddenly he’s not so the show can really force him to go crazy?), it’s wild.

And sure, VLD does get a really well-animated robot battle out of s6, but at what cost.

From a purely internal canon perspective, there’s some implications in the way that Lotor gets energy from Altean civilians (at least, based on the information we got in the show, not including fanon interpretations) that I’m personally uncomfortable with.

But if I have to play by canon rules, then I think he knew there was something not right about all that colony business, whatever it was, and that he desperately wanted to get to the quintessence field to actively fix not just the universal energy crisis fueling his empire’s slave labor, but also to restore those Alteans who were sacrificed to get to the quintessence field in the first place. Allura in s8 even confirms that what she learned from Lotor had to do with “life-saving energy.”

It’s wild to me as well that for all the hullabaloo canon makes over the colony and the sanctity of life, Allura ultimately comes to reject her previous belief that Lotor was a liar and deceiver. She exonerates Lotor of his accused crimes in s8--like she suddenly realizes after all the death and sacrifice in s7-s8 that oops, Lotor really was genuine and had simply been unable to make the best choice, and that whatever the colony meant, he really did deserve happiness. And then she sacrifices Alteans (herself and Honerva) to save the universe? And the paladins are totally accepting of this strategy suddenly?

So at the end of the day, why even play by canon rules? VLD took a serious nosedive for the sake of just generating pointless battles, lol. Lotor and Allura deserved a better story line than this. Voltron was better than this. The franchise was better than this. And for me personally, Lotura fandom has a lot to offer in terms of developing a better, more moral Voltron and a more positive, uplifting story for Lotor as well. I like those things.

Heck, if there’s other ships in the Voltron sea (or even gen fics, le gasp) where people can explore those concepts, I’m all for it. Let’s fix this thing, y’all. There’s a million and one ways to do it. But I’ve really enjoyed the Lotura environment personally for what the ship has the potential to do and be.

Feel free to reach out in private messages if you wanna chat more. Peace and love!

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moondriftingold · 5 years

Text

some kh3 Hot Takes, saïx/isa edition!

i will admit that i don’t hate the subject x thing as much as i did yesterday, but i still like... hate it. it’s just, like. unnecessary to isa and lea’s journey and their story, in my opinion? i won’t be completely casting it out of my canon, because the idea that isa and lea came across something so disturbing and horrid (in this case, a live, human prisoner) that it would motivate them to continue their search into the castle beyond just curiosity is something i’ve had in mind for a very long time and has been part of my portrayal for years, and this can fit that category. but, this mysterious girl being the motivation for isa and lea to become apprentices? for it to be the sole/largest factor in isa becoming saïx? for saïx/isa to have apparently been so obsessed and concerned for this “friend” that he only mention her now, at the end of this journey, and in his dying speech of all things? absolutely fucking not. as per my canon, that isn’t a thing. he absolutely still cares for this girl and wished to help her, and i can buy them becoming guards to give them time at the castle without suspicion to try and free her, but at the end of the day, x was not saïx’s sole fucking motivation for everything he did.

i am really, really fond of isa’s ending. i was spoiled for it basically the second week of the game’s release (thnx guys), but i didn’t know the entire circumstances over how he was saved. and i am. just. God. Fuck Me Up Fam i am So Happy. roxas and xion finally seeing saïx be vulnerable kicked my entire ass dude!!! all they’ve seen of him so far is this horrible beast of a man that doesn’t reflect isa at all, so it was really nice for them to get to see him in a weaker, quiet moment where he was more... who he was meant to be. i was also spoiled for the end clocktower scene a week or so ago, which really fucking sucked, but watching it play out was such an experience. i think i screamed? i think i screamed. i really truly adore that isa has been accepted into the sea salt trio because that’s some shit i’ve been dreaming about for ages, but it did feel rushed. as much as i want isa to be an important and positive figure in their lives from here on out, it’s also highly unrealistic for them to just accept him back into their lives the way he is, after all that saïx had done to them. it’s true that saïx ≠ isa, but isa also isn’t exempt from the consequences that saïx’s actions leave him with. i do think that for them to get to the level that was shown, deep connections need to be made. they really need to talk about what happened between them and move past it in a healthy manner, or unsettled, toxic feelings will still remain buried underneath. my isa will likely still be wary around roxas and xion, feeling a guilt and frustration around them that he hates and feels terrible for, and also hates that he even feels terrible for. from his perspective, whatever he did, he did to survive, and he shouldn’t have to apologize for taking actions that he had virtually no choice in taking if he wanted to simply live --- but the fact of the matter is that he did have a choice in many of the things he did to roxas and xion. and that, he knows he must atone for.

i really love the big implication that saïx was the one who formulated a plan with vexen to use the replica bodies against the organization??!??! I LOVE IT DUDE IVE BEEN LIVING FOR AN ANTI-ORG SAÏX REVOLT FOR FOREVER?? it isn’t the most ic thing he could’ve done, and also isn’t confirmed canonly (ive seen some people predicting ansem sod as well? which is equally as dope imo), but i do adore the idea of saïx silently sticking it to the org. me vc are ya winning son

isa playing frisbee with lea and ven in the epilogue made me cry. like. he looked so happy. he was so carefree. he was finally having fun and around people that aren’t fucking terrible, and he’s the closest thing to being at peace for the first time in over a decade. i love him so much. i lov ehim. os mcu h. oh mh.y . god. tTATTOO THAT SCENE ON MY FACE

i h8 the fanon implication that isa now lives in twilight town with the sea salt trio bc ive always wanted him to go home to radiant garden and make peace with his time there, but him also choosing to make a sacrifice in his life to show his loyalty and love for lea is something that i absolutely do not hate, so. his whereabouts post-kh3 r up in the air ig? i want him to have a sweet little cottage in radiant garden but moving to twilight town and living in a lofty studio apartment to be closer to lea/xion/roxas is also sweet even though he probably wouldn’t enjoy it much there. i. sigh

on another note like... i really think isa wants to see more of the worlds? he didn’t really travel around much as saïx, as he was most often needed at the castle to attend to briefings and missions and meetings, and whenever he left the castle on his own, he knew he was being watched (important vessel! recusant’s sigil! yikes!), so he couldn’t really enjoy it. as much as he needs to settle somewhere and anchor himself to a place he can finally call home, he wants to have adventures of his own, too.

i am... disappointed in the lack of overall backstory to him, though. ya i understand he’s not main cast and that there was a LOT going on in this game, but we still don’t know what the early years of the org were like? how baby akusai formed their plan? no further details on how active saïx was in the org and how determined he was to get moving on things (lea saying “i couldn’t keep up with you!” in their first clocktower scene)? nothing on when saïx was chosen as a vessel, when his eyes first turned gold? when he got that giant X-SCAR ON HIS FACE? NOTHING?? THANKS NOMURA AT LEAST I CAN WRITE MY OWN CANON

if yall want me to talk about isalea im gonna have to make a whole ass separate post for them bc this post is already so long and i am already full of tears please have mercy i will cry specifically about them later at an unknown date. but i can, for now, absolutely, say they are boyfriends. bye

#OUT.#kh3 spoilers /#kh3 spoiler #im having big feelies folks

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scripttorture · 6 years

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So this might be a difficult question but I need to ask. You’ve mentioned torturers don’t necessarily have less empathy and can nice to people they like outside of torture. You’ve also mentioned torturers as very toxic even to each other when in the torturing environment. I’m writing a short scene that looks into torturer group from the POV one torturer. I want to show the toxic environment but also don’t want the characters to come across as without feeling or depth (1/2)

(2/2) because I want torturers to seem ‘normal’ rather than ‘stereotypical media sociopath’ (portrayed as someone who does bad things because they lack empathy for others.) Could I show carry levels of enthusiasm or a character being nice to another (but not nice to victim) without looking like I’m trying to make look ‘good’ or sympathetic? And without diminishing the toxic culture? My group is a subset of the police if that helps. I’m debating them failing to recruit MC into torturing.

Ithink you’d find the appendices in F Fanon’s TheWretched of the Earthvery helpful.

Inthem he discusses a handful of the cases he dealt with as a mentalhealth professional during and after the Franco-Algerian war. Amongthese cases are two torturers who were responding very differently.

Fanonconcluded that they were at different ‘stages’ of the sameharmful process. Personally I’m not convinced that the evidencewe’ve gathered since supports that conclusion. But regardless ofFanon’s theories his accounts of these two men are very interestingI think they help shed some light on what seems like an almostcontradictory set of statements: that torturers are not necessarilyawful to people they aren’t torturing and yet they’re so much ofa risk to each other.

Bothof the torturers Fanon treated were married but they had verydifferent home lives and I think that helps illustrate the point.

Onevery much gave the impression of loving his wife and having apositive relationship which was now under heavy strain due to hismental health problems. This distressed him.

Thesecond torturer was also an abuser who admitted to regularly beatinghis wife and children, including a very young baby. This only seemedto cause him distress in one particular incident when he ended upusing torture techniques he employed at ‘work’ on his wife.

I’mnot a psychologist and Fanon doesn’t give a diagnosis for either ofthese men. My impression from their accounts is that the firsttorturer had very depressive symptoms while the second torturerreported a lot of aggression and seemed to read every situation as apotential threat.

Nowit’s tempting to hence draw a conclusion based on symptoms atorturer experiences but I think that’s getting ahead of theevidence. In the same way that concluding torturers and abusers‘must’ have low empathy is getting ahead of a the evidence.

It’sreally easy to other a person who does awful things. It’scomforting because it helps us convince ourselves that wewould never be capable of that. It reduces responsibility across theboard: our own by offering a reassuring platitude that exempts usfrom self reflection and the abusers’ by placing the blame on adisease rather than a person.

Mentalhealth problems can make people difficult to get along with (I know Ihave my moments) but they don’t make people monsters.

Socialstructures and reinforcement on the other hand can encourage horrificabuse. In the case of torturers that seems to be what we’re seeing.

Rejalidescribes the sub-cultures torturers create as divisive, highlycompetitive, hypermasculine and toxic. Which is a great descriptionbut doesn’t really conjure up an idea of what it’s like to be inone.

Ithink the main point to grasp when you’re writing a torturer’srelationship with other torturers is that torture is a zero sumgame.

Actualpolice work allows for multiple people to receive praise andcommendation for the work they do. Every piece of evidence andinformation is important so everyone’s contribution has thepotential to be rewarded.

Buttorturers only get rewarded/praised if they personally were the onetorturing the victim at the time there was false confession or‘believable’ lie. This creates a highly competitive environment.Acknowledgement and ‘success’ become much scarcer resources andtorturers are in direct competition with each other forthose resources.

There’sno team work. There’s nothing to foster a sense of unity exceptopposition to the way things are supposed to be done.

Atthe same time this ‘competition’ creates an intense pressure tobe more violent and do thingsthat are at least perceived to be ‘more brutal’. Someone’sworth at work is literally measured by how inventively violent theycan be.

Everyoneis actively competing to be seen as the most violent, leastcompassionate, aggressive, pumped up parody of masculinity they canpossibly by.

Torturersegg each other on. At the same time they can’t rely on each otherbecause they’re in competition and any hesitancy or sign of‘softer’ emotions is read as weak.

Atthe same time this isn’tthe atmosphere these people are spending 100% of their time in. Theseare ordinary people and when they clock off they’re often goinghome to families, partners, childhood friends. These people may haveno idea what they’re doing. They might be ‘supportive’. Theymight be opposed to torture.

Anotherinteresting account Fanon reports is that of a young French womanwhose father was a torturer during the Franco-Algerian war.

Shedescribes the complete breakdown of her relationship with her father.He never abused her or her family. She doesn’t really talk aboutany mental health symptoms on his part. Instead she talks about adeep and visceral negative reaction to torture. A sense of shame andbetrayal of the people she grew up around andthe hypocrisy of colonial society.

Shesaid she was relieved when he was killed.

Sowhere does that leave you?

Witha short scene I think it’s difficult to convey all the nuance youcould. These situations are often complex, though not in the way theytend to be presented as complex. Torture is not morally complex. Butthere are significant psychological and social complexitiessurrounding it.

It’sa difficult balance you’re trying to strike, especially if all youhave is one short scene.

Theeasiest way to deal with that is probably to give the scene itself(and indeed the torturers generally) more narrative space. But that’snot necessarily something that fits your story and that could resultin the torturers taking over more of the narrative then you’recomfortable with.

Ifyou think it couldwork in your particular story then I’d suggest showing the point ofview torturer as he is beforehe goes to work. That way you contrast the person he seems to bearound family or friends with the person he is around other torturersand victims.

Thereare several different ways you could handle that.

Ithink playing the family/friends as ignorant could work, but I thinkit might demand a greater contrast between the character at home andthe character as a torturer. A really big and sudden shift, played ina way readers don’t expect would undermine any sense that thischaracter is sympathetic.

Anotheroption is having the friends or family aware of what the torturerdoes and extremely concerned for the torturer.If they’re living in close quarters with this character or haveregular contact it would be impossible for them not to notice theeffect this has had on the torturer. It is noticeably anddramatically unhealthy. It’sprobably not helped by the way police generally tend to put in quitelong hours.

Soeven a character who thinks torture is ‘necessary’ or could bejustified might very well want to stop a torturer going to work. Andthat can easily be written in a way that conceals the true motivationfrom the reader until the torturer actually arrivesat work and their nature is revealed.

Somethinglike: ‘It’s so early and you barely slept last night.’

‘You’reworking so hard it’s killing you. Let someone else do it today.’

‘Pleasejust phone in sick. Can’t you see how this is effecting you?’

Allof these things could sound like a ‘normal’ hard-workingpoliceman in a particularly violent area. Writing this from thetorturer’s perspective, with them moved by this person’s concerneven while they’re dismissing it, also creates that impression. Itgives you a chance to show this character as a person withcompassionate feelings before showing them in an environment wherethey’re encouraged to crush those feelings.

Ascene like this could also be played out with a friend or familymember who feels rather like the torturer’s daughter Fanoninterviewed. The torturer might then reflect that they didn’t usedto be so cold and distant. The torturer might make some efforts atsocialising, normal things like asking about the other character’shobbies, their friends, hoping they have a good day-

Againthis establishes a sort of ‘normality’ and that the character iscapable of empathy before showing them in that toxic environmentabusing other people.

Ifyou feel like you need to stick to a single short scene then I thinkstressing the macho competitiveness between torturers is key toportraying that toxic environment. These people might be nominally onthe side but this isn’t a unit or a team. It’s a collection ofindividuals who occasionally close ranks but are very much competingagainst each other.

Idon’t think there’s necessarily anything wrong with leaving it atthat. Empathy doesn’t make people nice. You could construct thescene with the pov torturer reflecting on his competition, using hisempathy and judgement of theiremotional state (or mental health problems) in really nasty ways.

Seeingthat a colleague is showing obvious signs of anxiety and respondingby verbally punishing them for it isn’tlack of empathy. It’s having the empathy to judge another person’semotional distress and then responding to that judgement in a toxicway. A sentiment to the effect that this would be acceptable in a‘soft’ job but it isn’t here would be perfectly in keeping withthe kind of toxic sub culture torturers generally exist in.

Thefinal option I can think of in a short scene is to include a briefinteraction with a non-torturer who is not a victim for contrast.

Ina policing context- Well I keep thinking of Zootopia and OfficerClawhauser, the friendly, non-threatening, overweight cheetah manningthe reception desk.

Someonesweet and smiling who is neither a threat nor competition. The kindof a character a torturer could easily see as usefulbut less important than they are. They sit at the desk and greet thetorturer warmly every day. They tell the torturer if anyone has madeany breakthroughs the day before (ie ‘Oh so and so confessed lastnight’) and a little bit of what the others are up to (‘Officer Ais in the interview room with suspect B’).

Notethis character doesn’t necessarily have to be aware of torture intheir department. They might well be completely ignorant of it. Andthey’re removed enough from what the torturer sees as ‘actualpolice work’ to be completely non-threatening.

Asa result a torturer could easily and believably be pleasant andfriendly towards them. Then turn around and be utterly toxic towardscolleagues the torturer works with much more closely.

Itis difficult striking thissort of balance in a narrative. Choosean option you feel fits your story best and don’t be afraid ofrewriting the scene a few times to get it right.

Withdifficult scenes like this, where there’s a lot of elements tobalance, I think writing groups are incredibly useful. Gettingfeedback on the scenes from other writers (or just readers you trust)is a great way to find out if a scene is working, if the informationis all there and if the emotional tone is where you want it to be.

Don’tworry if you don’t get this scene right the first time. That’sOK. Stick with it. Commit to improving it until it’s the best itcan be.

You’llget there. :)

Disclaimer

#tw torture #torturers #effects of torture on torturers #effects of torture on organisations #tw police brutality #writing torturers #Anonymous

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sometimesrosy · 6 years

Note

What he means when he said non-romantic because that it is not what we see ,every person who sees bellarke in the show knows they are romantic, those looks are not precisley non-romantic, and the way they love each other 2.199 calls, becoming the man who he is because of her, i am just a casual fan, but every person i know that watch the 100 is like where bellamy and clarke will get together? I do not know what he is doing, but is not fooling anyone when you witness this every episode.

This question is a lot harder to answer than it looks. Because I can’t tell you what JR means, I can only analyze the situation, which is not just about what he SAID, but also what his agenda is, the medium he is speaking in, how the fandom interprets it, what happened in canon, his marketing strategy, the politics of fandom and the media and hollywood. And none of what I interpret about this is a fact, except for the canon, the show that we see on screen. I am not in JR’s head, and even if he answers directly, there is no guarantee that what he says is genuine or straightforward. He has been proven to be tricky and ambiguous in his interviews and social media ABOUT The 100. He is simply not going to tell us, and in order to avoid telling us, he tells us things that are inconclusive.

What JR says in the media, social or otherwise, is commentary and interpretation, not canon. The way I look at it is the way I look at ALL non-canon information and interpretations. His statements are a way to LOOK at the canon that we see on screen, and can give us a good lens with which to interpret the show. But canon is ONLY what we see on screen. Not even the scripts count as canon, because we do not know how they have been changed to get to the screen, and they do not take into account the actors, directors, cinematographers, costume and makeup people, editors and composers who’s work went into telling the story in the script. Scripts and writer/actor commentary can help us with how we look at the canon, but is only for interpretation. WHY? Because 20 or 100 years from now, the show The 100 will probably still be here to be seen, but none of the commentary, politics, fanon, or fandom interpretation will be a part of it. Just like we’re reading Shakespeare plays, and not what Shakespeare himself said about them, nor any of the fans who loved Hamlet, nor the Queen’s opinion on Gertrude or whether she thinks Hamphelia is true love or Hamatio is her OTP.

Canon is ONLY the show. Anything else you take into account is, honestly, moving into cultural criticism and sociology and psychology etc. Which, yeah, you can DEFINITELY explore, but it’s not about the story of The 100 anymore.

SO.

When you are looking at what JR says about Bellarke, first you have to consider his INTENTIONS. He has stated, with 100% clarity, that he is not going to spoil the story. He WILL NOT TELL YOU WHETHER OR NOT BELLARKE IS GOING TO BE ROMANTIC. He refuses. None of them are allowed to speak about it. Whether or not that’s a bad policy is not the point. He won’t tell us.

So I have to ask myself, then what does he mean when he says Bellarke is “non-romantic partners and soulmates.”

JR (and the cast) talks about the characters and show ONLY at the point of what we have ALREADY SEEN on screen. They do not project or speculate, or tell us about storylines that we haven’t seen yet (unless they are approved by spoiler police as part of the marketing strategy.) So when JR talks about Bellarke, it is either what has already happened, what the characters themselves have already been shown to feel, or marketing strategy.

The marketing strategy is a game. It is NOT to be trusted. It is NOT about understanding the story. It is about getting an audience. The story and the marketing strategy are two separate things. I do not trust JR’s marketing strategy, but I do trust his story. When JR is marketing, he says things that are intentionally vague and ambiguous so that the fans can read into it whatever they want. So when I listen to him, I ALWAYS compare his words to what I see on screen, and if the canon and his words contradict themselves, then I the CANON is the authority, and JR is playing word games. In my three years of analyzing his tweets, I have seen him do this over and over. He does not LIE to us. He tells us something ambiguous that we can take to confirm our desires, and then doesn’t clarify. He manipulates the words.

His declaring them soulmates is new. He only started saying that when he was writing s5, after s4 was over. Whether he uses the qualifier “non-romantic” or not. Which he has done twice. First it was “non-romantic soulmates” and now it is “non-romantic partners and soulmates.” He did not use the word “platonic,” although fandom keeps saying he did.

Within the show, “non-romantic,” “platonic,” and “soulmates” are not ever used. The word “love,” however, was used. And that is the first time their relationship has EVER been defined as love. And implied to be romantic love, at that, with the comparison to Bellamy’s girlfriend being made. Bellamy loves Clarke, and this is now canon. That makes it ROMANTIC. Whether confessed to her or not, Bellamy’s interest is romantic. Therefore the relationship is not platonic. Whether it will be endgame OR NOT. Their relationship has romantic elements. They have declared a Love Triangle between Echo-Bellamy-Clarke. And that makes it, by definition, romantic. Whether he eventually chooses Clarke or chooses Echo. It is a romantic situation.

Clarke is declared to “care” for Bellamy. This is the word that has been used since season 2. “you care for him,” “i always cared,” “do you know how MUCH she cares for you?” And the 2199 calls were used as proof for just how much. I do not think it is a coincidence that it is only after we saw the 2199 calls that JR started calling them soulmates. Because this story is a classic romantic soulmate story. if people don’t want to believe that clarke loves Bellamy, they can ignore it, but that’s pretty bad analysis to ignore the evidence of how much she loves him, when trying to figure out how much she loves him. We see her SHOWING how she loves him more than we see her saying it. THIS story element is reinforced by JR calling them soulmates and the unknown question of romance within it does affirm the “non-romantic” statement. But…the scene where Clarke is shocked and horrified by her “non romantic” soulmate kissing someone else, put the question of “non-romantic” to the lie.

The canon shows a great deal of romantic development for Bellarke, if not in declaration (which it has, as shown above) then in film making and narrative techniques. All the people who have been watching and reading love stories all their lives can see, straight up, that Bellarke is being told as a love story and a romance. Even people who don’t like Bellarke see it. This means that, in canon, Bellarke is a romantic story. The list of evidence is too long for this post, you can search my #bellarke development tag. But it is DEFINITELY there. In canon. On screen. We’ve all seen.

Calling Bellarke “non-romantic” seems to contradict what we see in the canon. So it is either a lie, or it’s a vague statement that does not contradict the romantic portrayal of Bellarke on screen. JR’s past tweets have NOT been lies, but sometimes they are ambiguous and misleading and if you define the words used properly, are actually true. You have to consider the tweet from HIS perspective, not the fandom perspective. The fandom interpreted it as platonic. But he DIDN’T say platonic, although platonic is a TYPE of non-romantic relationship. But to say the clearly romantic development was platonic would be a lie. So THAT IS NOT HIS MEANING.

So we MUST examine “non-romantic.”

Okay.

I told you this was a harder question than it looked. SO.

Non-romantic.

Doesn’t mean platonic

Is a statement only about what has happened on screen until this point.

Does actually describe their partnership, which, outside of feelings they have not shared with each other, is not related to romance.

The comment was, before the season “non-romantic soulmates” and after the season “non-romantic PARTNERS and soulmates.” I might be splitting hairs, but that might ALSO be an upgrade as the soulmate part has been separated from the non-romantic part, while keeping their partnership, in canon, non-romantic. This part COULD be seen as the soulmate being also romantic in nature while the partnership is still non-romantic.

Bellamy now has a romantic partner and a non-romantic partner. THAT… is a story. He now has TWO relationships that will be and already are compared to each other. The comparison has not been defined yet. It seems like it is ABOUT to be. Also, the romantic partner is not the soulmate.

ALSO, JR said “as of yet” about a million times.

So if I put all of this thinking together, here’s what I think he was saying.

As of yet, at this moment in the story, Bellarke have not admitted or pursued their romantic feelings, so their relationship is a soulmate relationship that is yet to be explored and their partnership remains non-romantic. Which will incidentally be a problem next season when Bellamy must deal with both his non-romantic partnership who is his soulmate and his romantic partnership who is not his soulmate. This is a current storyline that is actively developing but as of yet, it is non-romantic as far as the characters can tell, because they do not realize the other returns their feelings and/or there is a real canon romantic relationship that serves as an obstacle to the realization of their feelings. I will not tell you how it turn out because that would be spoiling, but if you follow the story, you can see how it’s set up.

that took a long time. I don’t know if i got everything.But i’m gonna post it anyway.

#the 100 #the jr whisperer #bellarke #platonic my ass #soulmates

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