#literally just an inaccurate worm

[oetscop]

okay so im making a new post abt this since its a little different from my last analysis post. but @petscopping brought up a very interesting point in the tags! that being "nobody is innocent" and he is so fucking right abt that

that was in regards to the objectification of care, and how paul also contributes to that. but like, even characters that aren't explicitly on screen are culpable. specifically belle.

i always get this impression that shes hiding something. she knows far more than she lets on, and i almost have to wonder if its in a way to protect paul? which is interesting since we know how in denial he is about Literally Everything, which is actively harming himself in some way.

she knows. a LOT about this game. like, paul is only recording gameplay to prove that hes "not lying" about the weird game he found. then later down the line after paul gets to the other side of the quitters room and tells her tiara is gone and her reply is "of course." the way paul replies to that too is telling since hes confused as to why she knows somethings up. even earlier than that paul mentions how he was shocked to find "his room" but isnt anymore since it makes sense that the game would be connected to him through belle. not to mention she knows an older version of the game that had the passageway to the caskets. she had played it as recently as 2004. why lie at first?

a little tangential, but i really gotta wonder about her connection to rainer. obviously they were close enough for him to be doing...whatever the fuck happens during a rebirthing event. or whatever he thinks is supposed to happen, i should say. shes heavily connected to tiara in some way, and has a stupid amount of play time on the damn game. if you ascribe to the theory that tiara and in game marvin are based entirely off in game behaviors of real people playing the game, its no wonder tiara seems to be almost...sentient? all marvin does is run around and say shit and like be weird and the game was literally made for him. tiara like. can edit texture maps, and use that to also speak directly to paul thru tool. and because of that, she can speak more directly, and isnt hindered by the p2 to talk mechanic like marvin is.

point is, belle has logged a crazy amount of time into the game. sure you could probably say the hours played is inaccurate, maybe she just had the game left open on a console for what. 17 years was it? even rainer admits its dubious. but imo, it feels more...symbolic? like sure maybe she wasnt playing it for that long. but she had some kind of passive connection to the game in that time. she is/was in contact with rainer. she HAD to be. (this also might imply the game was still being worked on after 2000. but thats a whole nother can of worms)

i cant think of any other motive for her lying about that other than to protect paul in some way. which, in a way, ties back to cares objectification. paul is absolutely denying any humanity to his child self. its ingrained in the very code of the game.

and in some way, belle is also participating. maybe im reading too far into that, but with how much the series is able to tell us abt characters who dont even fucking talk is really impressive so its not completely unrealistic.

[moongothic]

Yeah hello hi I've been falling deep into the Crocodad Rabbithole and my brain is being consumed by small crocodile-shaped worms

So I've done what any reasonable person would do, I went back to rewatch some scenes from Alabasta and Marinford to psychoanalyze Crocodile and try to figure out what the fuck his deal is because genuinely the more I think about it the more questions I have and the more I want answers. And because I'm deranged I need to write all my thoughts down into an incoherent essay and release it into the world

So please, come along with me while and let's be Extremely Normal About Sir Crocodile Together and speculate about his ~Secret Past~

Quick note, my quickest access to some of these episodes is either through unsubbed episodes (not bothering with getting screenshots since there's no subs, also my Japanese is plenty good enough to not need it here) or through Ancient, Questionable Fansubs so don't get too hung up on the phrasing in the subbed screenshots- like they're not entirely inaccurate but y'know

The reason I want to do this is just that... Like I've been a fan of OP since 2008, when I was in middle school. I don't think I ever really tried to think deeper about this series in general at that time, because I was a kid. For a long time to me Crocodile had just been Some Greedy Asshole who tried to take over a country to obtain a tool of mass destruction and IDK destroy the world? Just a very classic Bad Guy McVillianMan, because I had not bothered to think about his character and question anything before.

But now I have brainworms due to the Crocodad Theory, and this is fucking One Piece, you never fucking know how deep a rabbithole can go with this bloody series. So let's go, let's try to figure out what the fuck is Crocodile's deal, because I need to get these brainworms out of my fucking system

I just want to start with this one quick throw-away line because it's kind of a sidenote. Also like. This is such a funny fucking thing for Crocodile to say if he is Luffy's dad. Like.

That's so fucking funny if he's Luffy's dad holy shit

But what really gets me here is that like... Like while I'm like 70% sure Crocodile is trans, there's still a part of me that's like "there's no fucking way Crocodad is real". Let alone, this be some kind of a hint Oda planted to suggest that this early on. Like it sounds absurd. And yet at this point in One Piece, Oda had already started planning out and laying out the groundwork for so many lore and plot-relevant concepts, ranging from shit like everything about Robin, the Poneglyphs, the Ancient Weapons etc. He had already started the "Prince Sanji ARG" (aka dropping the tiniest fucking hints to Sanji's Hidden Backstory that people were able to pick up on and make accurate predictions with about Sanji's backstory). There's fucking Laboon, and about a bajillion other things. And possibly most importantly, by this point Oda had already revealed both Luffy's father and grandfather to the readers, not to mention he even introduced Ace and vaguely hinted at Sabo! It's not like Oda had everything perfectly planned out from the very begining, that is objectively not the case at all. But it also literally would not be unlike Oda to drop hints to a character's backstory like this. He has been doing that for years, and had already started by the time we met Crocodile. Like it feels insane and yet it's perfectly plausible. And if he had Luffy's dad, grandfather and two siblings planned out in his head already at this point, it should not be that much of a stretch to believe that Oda knows and no doubt has known for the past two decades who Luffy's mom is (regardless of if that's Crocodile or not)

All this to say. Crocodile's comment about what Cobra said to Vivi when they reunited is a funny, sarcastic comment. But it would take a whole new meaning if Crocodad was real. Because it really would be perfectly normal if he did/had wondered what he would say to his long lost child if they were ever reunited. And really that just makes his roast turn sad.

Anyways

In Alabasta, we do get a very clear image that Crocodile does not like the World Government, not just because he's a Big Meanie Pirate who wants to conquer the world, but because he does seem to look down on how the Marines + World Government do their "justice" (which, y'know, knowing what we know now about the Government. Fair. That's entirely fair.)

He also dislikes Vivi's "idealism" of wanting to save everyone without bloodshed or anyone losing their lives (especially for her sake)

We learn that he is a broken man with broken dreams. Also he seems to be aware where he (supposedy) belongs in the Grand Line's power hierarchy, as in, he needs Pluton because he knows he's not strong enough in combat that he could take down anyone, let alone the World Government by himself (though he would still make a beeline for Whitebeard's head the second he saw him at Marinford, which, y'know, bold move)

And of course, we learn in Impel Down that Crocodile and Iva-chan have some beef. We can not say for 100% sure what that beef is (like the theory he's trans is very obvious and plausible, but until Oda spills the beans we won't know for a fact what the beef is), but we know that they knew each other. And if Crocodile knew Iva-chan, a high-ranking founding member of the Revolutionary Army, then it is genuinely plausible that Crocodile could also have known Dragon and/or been a member of the Revolutionary Army as well.

Since overthrowing the World Nobles and the Government are the Revolutionary Army's goal, the fact that they're trying to obtain weapons and people for their cause etc, Crocodile's view of the Government and his "Operation Utopia" does kind of align with the Revolutionary Army's

But we did also learn from Iva that "Crocoboy" isn't quite trustworthy. Needless to say, even if Croc used to be a part of the Army, he most certainly left YEARS ago, and clearly not on good terms.

Also, an interesting note, is that at Marineford when Luffy and co finally arrive at the battlefield (episode 466, 17:25 minutes in), when Garp spots the group, he makes a specific comment about Crocodile being there together with the revolutionaries and the prison escapees, believing they can't all be here to fight for the same cause. Which is an interesting thing for him to point out specifically. Like Jinbei was another powerful person who entered that battlefield at the same time, and while Jinbei did clarify to Sengoku that he's quitting being a Shichibukai and was there to save Ace, it's still maybe a little odd Garp didn't think it was worth mentioning that Jinbei had also "allied" with the prison escapees and the revolutionaries to enter the battlefield. Like it was Crocodile only whom he thought needed to be pointed out. I don't think Garp's comment adds at all to Crocodad because it would frankly make little to no sense (like we're all assuming Crocodile didn't know Dragon's lastname, which is why he never realized Luffy was his son (despite knowing Luffy's lastname), but if Crocodile knew Garp was Dragon's father then surely he'd realize Dragon's lastname would be Monkey, right), but it could maybe add to the idea that Crocodile might've been a part of the Revolutionary Army in the past, as Garp could be aware of something like that, thus he'd be puzzled by Crocodile's presencee. Point is, it's an interesting comment, make of it what you will

EDIT 2: Ended up going back to reread parts of Marineford and turns out ^that^ was an anime-only addition from Toei. Like Garp does make a comment about how these people probs aren't at the battlefield for the same reasons but did not specifically point out Crocodile or anything. So. I wasted enough time adding these paragraphs to the post, I ain't deleting 'em. But y'know.

EDIT: Minor addition, because I just remembered how Crocodile really went like out of his way to taunt Vivi about how she "can't stop the rebellion" and save her people. Which, y'know, is a perfectly normal Villian Thing To Do. But we know Crocodile does not think fondly of the World Nobles just like he dislikes the Government. Even if Cobra was a "good monarch" who genuinely cared for his people, he was still a king, and the Nefertari family and the Kingdom of Alabasta were a part of the World Government. The thing Crocodile specifically wanted to destroy. And this is just another one of those "surely that wasn't somekinda foreshadowing" but god fucking dammit what if Crocodile telling a(n unknowing) representative of the World Government that she can't stop "the rebellion", or the revolution if I may, (regardless of if he's allied with them or not) was actually meant to be like foreshadowing. Oda I swear to fucking god---

Anyway, so, Crocodile might've been a part of the Revolutionary Army at one point (the army was formed after the Ohara Incident 22 years ago, and for Crocodad Theorizing, Luffy was born 19 years ago), but if he did he must have left on bad terms for unknown reasons, and we can tell that although his goals in general could vaguely match that of the Revolutionaries, his methods most certainly don't.

Whether or not his methods and his worldview tie to his leaving the Army is unknown. Because we don't really know when and how his worldview was formed.

Like did Crocodile leave the Army because he became a cynical asshole who was willing to make any kind of sacrifice for his goals (thus he no longer fit in with the rest of the Revolutionary Army), realized he was far too weak to ever become Pirate King and thus decided to go looking for Pluton? Or did Crocodile suggest to the Army they should try to obtain an Ancient Weapon to keep casulties to a minimum (still in line with the Army), only ending up getting kicked out (big weapon bad), and soon realizing he had no chance at making a change in the world without "cracking a few eggs"?

Like it doesn't nececarily make a massive difference,, since the end result is still the same, but it does kind of affect the context and how one might view him, right

Of course, there's then the Forbidden Third Option, that Crocodile left due to

Gender issues (internalized shame of being trans and not having it in him to stay around people who had known him)

Postpartum depression

Dragon just divorced Crocodile either due to being straight (in a sad, accepting way) or due to being simply unaccepting and frankly homophobic, regardless, Crocodile leaves with a broken heart

Something else and/or a combo of the above, really, we could speculate endlessly here about what could've happened

(Though I will say that Crocodile's '"trust issues"' and how he views people as disposable could like. I dunno. Be explained if he had gone through some heartbreak and was left permanently unable to open up to people, let alone trust anyone)

I dunno, there's a lot of options, a lot of things to considder.

But there is one more thing that I do want to note on as it could potentially debunk the Crocodad Theory entirely.

It's that Iva-chan didn't know Dragon had a son.

(Episode 441, 9:50 minutes) By which I mean, Iva-chan wasn't shocked to find out Luffy was Dragon's son, rather, they were shocked there was a son to begin with. (To the point they thought Ace was also Dragon's son until Luffy cleared it up for them later) While it's not a massive leap to believe that Crocodile and Dragon knew each other (since Crocodile knew Iva-chan), nor is it a massive leap to believe that Iva-chan transed Crocodile's gender after having Luffy... It does become a bit of a leap to believe Iva-chan didn't know about Dragon having a child with Crocodile before giving Croc the Magic HRT. Like if they had a relationship that resulted in a baby and a divorce, how did Iva not know about any of it, especially when it's more than likely that Iva could not have transitioned Crocodile until after the baby was born (let's not think about how Iva-chan's powers would work on a pregnant person too much)

We do also get this flashback (in episode 441, immidiately after Luffy reveals his dad's identity to Iva) where Iva-chan questions Dragon about how he always stares out towards East Blue when the wind blows, wondering if Dragon has family out there whom he's thinking about (Dragon refusing to comment on it). This does very much confirm that regardless of who Dragon had Luffy with, Iva has no fucking clue who, where and how any of that happened. And althought I personally feel like Iva not knowing would debunk Crocodad, if Crocodile still somehow was Luffy's dad, Iva-chan would canonically not know about it. If Iva didn't know Dragon had a relationship that resulted in a baby, then regardless of if Iva even knew Crocodile got pregnant once, they would not be able to connect those dots.

Now let's be clear, there's many potential scenarios where Crocodad could still be real, scenarios that could explain why and how Iva-chan didn't know about Luffy nor about Dragon and Crocodile having a relationship*. Like it would not be difficult at all to come up with an explanation for it. But in my mind, I feel like the more you have to figure out and explain how the theory could still be plausible, the less plausible it actually feels. Like the more I need to go out of my way to explain it, the more forced it seems.

*(For example, maybe the two kept their relationship a secret, and when Crocodile got pregnant he """left on a mission""" that happened to take like 4-10 months, during the time realizing he was trans. Once the baby had arrived he returned the baby to Dragon in secret for him to deal with, got a divorce for one reason or another*, and sought out Iva-chan to start a new life, Iva thus never found out about anything, just knew that Crocodile left one day after coming out. Like that's one plausible scenario.)

*Hey remember the potential Forbidden Reasons to why Crocodile might've left the Army? What if it was Dragon's and/or Crocodile's idea? Remember how when Jinbei is trying to escape Marinford with the unconcious Luffy, Crocodile tells Jinbei to do better job at "protecting those he wants to protect", a line that felt really sudden and odd coming from Crocodile of all people? What if the two knew their child would be in grave danger if he was ever raised within the army (absolutely not a place for a baby)? What if they knew their baby would become a target for the World Government to hunt, much like Roger's lost child was, if the Government found out Dragon had a baby? What if they wanted to make sure nothing bad ever happened to their baby and were willing to do anything to protect the baby? Even if it meant they'd never see their child grow up? Even if it meant hiding your child from your best friend, pretending to have a horrible fallout with them and transing your gender because Oda doesn't know what gender dysphoria is? Just so nobody would ever find out you had a child?

Mind you. I do not want anybody to think this is an actual argument for Crocodad. Like I could write a dozen different fanfics about how Crocodile could be Luffy's other dad, and they would all be just as much pure speculation with nothing to support them as the above suggestions. It is an example of what could have happened, and a deeply interesting thought, but it is just a theory at best.

In the end, it doesn't really matter though, because until the day Oda reveals Luffy's mom and/or Crocodile's backstory to us, we will truly never know for sure What The Fuck Crocodile's Deal Is

And I'll be just stuck with these brainworms, making myself sad by thinking about sad scenarios where Crocodad could be real, because truly, if it's canon, ain't no way it won't be sad

EDIT 3: Originally I thought it'd be good enough if I just rewatched some parts here and there, but in the end I just fucking absolutely caved the fuck in and went and reread The Good Parts of Marineford. Mainly because I knew I was forgetting things and Toei adding/changing things can affect a character reading. Also it was just going to be easier to go through the manga and literally just all of Crocodile's scenes into an image folder for easier browsing, mainly because there's so much shit that happens between those scattered scenes it can be hard to like focus on one thing (especially if you're trying to specifically FIND those scattered scenes and appearances)

So yeah. Coming back a few days later to add shit to this god forsaken post. I need help

Actually changed my mind and made a separate post to continue this nonsense, enjoy

[wilchur]

Daydreaming bg3 scenarios is my full time job at this point and I've had this phenomenal idea on my walk the other day. It's not really a headcanon since it has little basis in canon and directly contradicts some game events and plays with the lore like it's play-doh so more of a AU/fanfic idea, but...

It always struck me as inaccurate for Durge to be referred to as a "Bhaalspawn" since they're literally a PART of Bhaal made into a separate person in an act of (very confusing) divine creation and it really downplays just how powerful and dangerous they are. Especially since I fully subscribe to the idea that Durge is NOT a mortal, but that's simply not in the game due to just how OP it would be to play an unkillable Dame Aylin-esque character and the definition of a Bhaalspawn is "mortal offspring of the dead god Bhaal". So what the hell are they?

The Slayer. Or at least they're a direct vessel for it, more like.

No, really. Hear me out. Have you noticed how Gortash refers to Orin as "The Slayer" in that bit of dialogue when she puts a dagger to Ketheric throat? Except she's not? Not yet at least because the dialogue does not change depending on if you're still the one who has Bhaal's favour or not and she doesn't get it until you piss of Dad enough for him to go "fine have it your way, ungrateful brat". Plus I don't think The Slayer has been used as a shorthand for "Chosen of Bhaal" anywhere else sooo... Does he assume it's a feature of the position since he knew Durge had command over the form before their disappearance?

That's what birthed the first worm in my brain leading to this unhinged infestation, but it's not all -- there's THE URGE itself.

The game fucks it up SO bad on the whole front because it's reluctant to take choice away from the player, which is maybe understandable, but absolutely WRECKS the narrative that it's something to be afraid of. There's what? Alfira and the squirrel? Those are the only unavoidable consequences of having these supposedly violent and divine compulsions baked into every cell of your damn body. Saving your partner from a gruesome death by your hand needs a dice roll of 15, for fuck's sake! It was harder to convince a bunch of goblins to not turn me into an arrow pin cushion. Durge themself has been scared shitless of it their entire life and you're telling me the thing mostly boils down to dialogue choices? That just won't do for me, sorry. In the game The Urge's source is also never really explained beyond "of course you have unstoppable violent compulsions, you're 100% Bhaal's flesh and blood" which is fucking BORING and doesn't make sense to me because as far as I know Bhaal loves murder because that's his domain as a god, he was not a compulsive killer as a mortal so why would it be something that's passed down? No, The Urge is a fucking Slayer thing!

"It also had the ability to incite attraction in others, and remove any negative feelings they felt, or compel an urge to slay in any intentionally malevolent being, whenever it chose."

To be fair this is from a 2e sourcebook, but COME ON. Didn't it strike anyone else as weird that young Durge is mentioned to have slain an entire PALADIN ORDER before making their way to the temple if you're playing as an oathbreaker? Like, HOW? Slayer form bay-be, that's how.

(Can you tell by now I'm not normal about the idea? Yeah.)

All living creatures learn the best from their own mistakes and I think that letting The Slayer take over would be Bhaal's version of letting your incessant kid touch the clothes iron because they just refuse to leave it alone. Bad parenting, but it's Bhaal we're talking about lmao. "Oh you don't want to kill? No biggie, fuck around and see what happens then. I'll wait." is way fucking scarier to me than him just forcing Durge's hand with the butler basically being like "Heads up, master. Your father is pretty mad and your Urge is hungry so you might commit a murder tonight!" right beforehand.

Just the mental image of Durge thinking "I've done it! I've saved Isobel!" and then having the starved Slayer rip itself out of them like it does out of Orin when Bhaal forces her to transform... You see my vision right? RIGHT? And then the beast gets slain because what else is there to do and since Durge is immortal they just come back to themself instead of becoming goo (which is a game mechanic already since their sis is not so lucky, rip). The drama and angst potential is INFINITE. The sheer raw power of THAT being the "Bhaalspawn" reveal because if Isobel is alive that means Jaheira must be there like "what the FUCK are you exactly??" and no one can pretend that Durge is just Bhaalspawn+ like they do in the game. Do they kill anyone? People are bound to be at least heavily injured, especially since they've JUST fought Ketheric's bossfight and are not rested and at full potential.

GOD, I am rotating this thing in my head so fast the friction is bound to make my brain melt.

[marciabrady]

What is Cinderella's hair color?

This is totally up to interpretation! Ilene Woods was pretty much the basis of everything when they were creating Cinderella, from her temperament to her facial structure to her coloring to her sayings to her eye placement when she smiled, and even Ilene's hair color is hard to read. She was definitely objectively blonde- she was referred to as such on radio shows and even in the press announcement that was released when she was cast as Cinderella. But in a lot of photographs, her hair appears brunette on camera- and there's a few reasons for this. First and foremost, the relatively primitive nature of cameras from that time period really couldn't capture nuances in natural tones- so unless your hair was platinum white or bleached, it would probably read brunette, and everything else would register as darker, inevitably. Plus, we're used to seeing people with bleached/colored hair these days, so what is truly considered a natural blonde- albeit dirty or a darker or just a more "natural" toned blonde- many contemporary people refer to, on a superficial lens- as brunette. So, I think Ilene was a dirty blonde, even though I've seen pictures of her later in life where she looks like a neutral blonde that is neither very light or very dark.

When it comes to Cinderella's intended/official hair color, that's also a can of worms. So, people are quick to discredit the platinum blonde Cinderella has appeared with in the 80s/90s/2000s/2010s merch and say she's a 'strawberry' blonde. They claim this is because of how she looks in the 'original' movie, but they're using the 2013 blu ray/2005 dvd master to go off of, which is even influencing current artwork of Cinderella in the Disney Princess franchise, and that master- beyond scrubbing all the linework out of the film (see screenshot below- look at how even the 1988 VHS maintains the lines in the bedding better than the 2005 and 2013 rubbery effect) also had inaccurate representations of the color relationships between elements in the film, which- again- means that you're not going to see what was intended.

The team that worked on remastering the current 4K edition of Cinderella that came out this year (which I love btw! I'm still not super pleased with certain changes BUT it's a MASSIVE, MASSIVE improvement over the 2005/2012 master that had been done in 2003 and is far more pleasing to look at and, generally, my favorite restoration Disney has officially done) said that they referenced the original cel artwork, as well as promotional materials like lobby cards to better understand what the artistic intent was...and that's tricky. Because, while they interpreted it better than remasters of the 2000s/2010s which sought to LITERALLY make the film look exactly like the raw cel art, these movies were not meant to be viewed as, I do think they still stuck too close to the cel colors. Due to the nature of technicolor, a lot of color tests had to be done so that the artists could see what the finished product would look like after it had gone through the process of being printed on film- because it was always apt to differ greatly from the artwork on cel. A good example of this is the fact that blonde hair didn't read so the artists had to color it with a green tint on the original cels (see first screenshot below) so that it'd appear blonde on camera. However, again, I think the team looked too deeply into this and now we've ended up with a master, a gorgeous one, but a faulty one that depicts Cinderella's hair as almost green in 2023 (see right screencap from 4K remaster)

When it comes to lobby cards, they're not going to be accurate either. I've seen lobby cards that were released in 1959 that depict Aurora as a brunette, blonde, and redhead, and they even change the color of her peasant dress to green, blue, pink- anything you can think of. And Cinderella's hair differs greatly in the lobby cards from the 50s themselves

The funny thing is, it really seems to be decade dependent. I actually have access to a 1973 print and I think that's what the basis for the 2005/2013 master was, because the colors are very similar to that strawberry blonde and even the hues of the hallway in the chateau look nearly identical to the 2005/2013, and we never seen those colors again outside of those two masters. It's so odd it premiered in the 70s, that specific master, because in that decade, and in the 60s, they marketed Cinderella more as a brunette and gave Aurora the blonde title (which was reversed in the 2000s, where they almost made Aurora a light brunette and made Cinderella platinum beyond belief):

You can even see Disney's confusion at what her hair is supposed to be; in the sequel, they gave Cinderella the platinum hair of the marketing at the time, but in the third movie, they tried to be more 'faithful' and cinematic and went off of the current, faulty, master of the time...which resulted in an unappealing turnout, imo? Like her skin and hair shouldn't be that close, color relationship wise, on film? (again, merch is always a different color)

Also in House of Mouse, which is generally accurate with a lot, they make Pete put a red wig on when he's in Cinderella garb, indicating they thought that was the color of her hair at that point:

Also, I feel like she's not supposed to be a true redhead or lean as close to strawberry blonde or people say she is? Again, cels shouldn't be viewed strictly for the color themselves, but if we observe the color relationship between her hair and that of Anastasia's- who is a true redhead- there's a huge difference:

There are also a few production notes that we do have that can help a little. We know Cinderella's Prince was made to have much darker hair to contrast hers, so they could be visually striking with one another, again leading us to the conclusion that she does have light hair (which kinda dodges the 60s/70s artwork where she's a dusty brunette). We also know that Disney tried to make the Prince in Snow White sandyhaired, but it came across on camera as dark brown and didn't provide that much of a contrast to Snow White, which they were able to capture more successfully in books of that era, all through even the 80s/90s. I, personally, really love this book especially and I find the colors of everything- the interiors, Cinderella, her dress, etc- ring true to me, personally:

And this color can be seen anywhere as brunette to some, to sandy, to blonde, to dirty blonde, to slightly red- and that's how I think Cinderella's hair is. I think she's a warm level 7, if we're going by a professional hair chart, and it's like a russet blonde color? Hints of red that could make someone see her as a redhead, or just a blonde, or to some who view blondes as solely being platinum, she'd almost even appear as a brunette. That being said, Aurora is definitely a blonde and in the current master we have, her skin appears pink/red and her hair looks greenish, so if anyone who's working on the future 4K master of Sleeping Beauty could fix that, it would be greatly appreciated!!

[kinaesthetiqueer]

Ok ok ok, so I found "Her Pulse in My Throat" through just having the weiss schnee brain worms, and with those, I know I could rant endlessly about her and/or headcannons I have -w-

But! Her Pulse in My Throat is also one of the most interesting depictions of Nora I have read, and makes me wanna just Know More, and see sides I hadn't considered. Have you made a post that's just Nora rambles or your thoughts about her? Because I'd love to read your takes and interpretations of her!!! :3

hhhhrghshshahshssjshassakwoeusnxnkNna

oh gods. oh fuck. uhhhhhh let me go find them i don't usually tag them as her bc im shy about saying things that have probably been said a million times since im pretty new the the fandom

i have a rambly post about nora self-sacrificial tendencies and a headcanon chain on her semblance that is actually a bit outdated/inaccurate for krwbyverse at the moment because i did some additional biology bullshitting since then plus my jnpr's adhd/autism status

truth be told, my ssvau!nora has a fair amount of AU-influence compared to my canon compliant interpretation of her but it's all rooted in canon compliant feelings. chs 3+6+7 are the closest to non-AU influenced nora.

but i have. i have thoughts about her all the time. i literally have not rewatched the expanded epilogue at all because it caused such a 48-hour nuclear autism event the first time that i could not legally bring myself to inflict it on my friends and discord servers again. nora is a rare topic that i am willing to be insufferable about for infinity 😂 i'm more likely to vibrate out of my bones than willingly shut up about her. still though.

*vibrates*

[triptychgardener]

The official height chart for Homestuck is so funny because... like literally why. It feels like it's just content for content's sake. Any misgivings about the heights don't matter, first of all because there are. No interesting height takes at all there lol. And secondly it goes against Hussie's stated canon that like. The kids dont really have a ton of distinct "canon" features (which is a whole can of worms) so it contradicts that philosophy. And no one is going to ever be like "well your art is canon-inaccurate because you drew Roxy taller than Jane. Blocked." I'm not mad in the slightest it's just such a nothing move

[sexyleon]

Your post about people complaining about how dare Dracula adaptations not be 1:1 adaptations of the novel is absolutely correct, and I'm sorry the usual DD fans who attack everyone who doesn't conform to Accepted Dracula Daily Fandom Opinions and can't take fandom criticism jumped on your post to deny it.

There was absolutely a ridiculous popular post this year about how Nosferatu is a bad adaptation bc how dare the movie not have the Demeter captain successfully ward off Dracula with a rosary like in the book, and how this means Murnau is yet another idiot director who didn't understand the novel because he didn't understand that the novel is about hope and humanity. People have complained about the recent Demeter movie disrespecting Jonathan because the movie ends with an original character going after Dracula, even though it's obviously a somewhat original take on one part of the story.

And I understand being disappointed that Quincey is often cut, but there are practical reasons for why adaptations have to cut or merge characters sometimes, and Quincey is the character who just happens to make sense for that because he appears the least and his roles can be given to others without completely changing the story. Yes, re: dracula is an adaptation that is word-for-word book accurate, but that's because it's a literal audiobook, a very different medium from film or television, which have their own medium constraints like run time and budget.

Mmm, I definitely do not want to get into the fandom politics of all this because that's opening a way bigger bag of worms than I would like to deal with. Other people are entitled to their opinion in the same way that I am entitled to mine.

That being said, I do agree that there is an emphasis on adaptations being bad media specifically because of the way they handle characters from the book, without regard to any other aspects of film/tv/stage. I spoke about my intentions of that post in a bit more depth here, but basically I am of the opinion that a lack of book accuracy does not automatically equate to a bad piece of media, and to make such a comparison does a disservice. I think the black and white language doesn't do the conversation any favours either. What truly constitutes something being a bad adaptation? Wouldn't "inaccurate" be a better term if we are talking specifically about how loosely something relies on the source material? Why is it bad? Isn't whether something is bad or good all subjective anyways?

Anyways-- I really didn't think this would be such a controversial take and I didn't realise how many people would misread me.

[human-adjacent]

episode 40 - human remains

- my perception of elias is so incredibly inaccurate to his actual personality he’s such an average regular normal guy and i’m not gonna change the way i see him i just think the juxtaposition is so funny

- elias is really good at just lying and gaslighting people tho. he’s kinda like the distortion if it was normal.

- i never understood why so many artists draw jon and the others with holes in their bodies but apparently i just missed the detail where tim straight up says that he (and presumably all the characters) literally have holes in their bodies from the worms😟

- MICHAEL MENTION!!!!!! MICHAEL MENTION!!!!! MICHAEL MENTION!!!!! only 7 more episodes until i finally get to hear him speak!!!!!!!

- the way it literally was not a mystery at all that sasha was replaced and yet i genuinely had no idea until the end of season 2. they even say “notsasha” in the credits like😭😭

- jon starting to figure things out oh boy here we go things are about to get crazy

- and that’s the end of season one😔

[hellosaysnoxx]

Why hello there! I would like a platonic matchup for south park!

I have short fluffy brown hair and average height. I usually wear comfortable baggy clothes usually with a nice looking jacket.

I am considered a someone trustworthy from people I know and I will drop something I'm doing for a friend and usually let my friends vent to me. I am also and INFP :)

I really like FNAF, Drawing, Martial Arts,( and South Park obviously lol)

I really dislike people in my class who are always saying awful stuff but that is kinda a given. I also am really afraid of worms for some reason. Even I don't know why.

Some boundaries of mine is that I feel uncomfortable when someone touches me unless we get really close.

I usually look for a friend that doesn't mind me rambling about something. I also want a friend that would like to spend time together like watching a movie or something!

Thanks for reading this! One last thing is that I am Aroace and use they/them pronouns but I also don't mind he/him :)

HI @ar-cade77 !! I'm also aroace, so I kinda also took some from my perspective as well (I hope that's okay)

Also, again, I am really sorry if this is inaccurate because I haven't watched South Park that much at all (I have forgotten most of it)

Also, wanna talk about FnaF? *leans on Freddy plushie very cool*/hj

ANYWAY!! Your matchup is....

Stan Marsh

Trusts you and is literally so grateful to have a friend like you, but might not express it that well

Tries to make you happy too!! (In his own special way)

Was low-key scared of you at first because you go for martial arts😭

If anyone from our class says something awful to you, he will defend you with his life

Will tease you for your fear of worms💀(/lh)

"Hey [readers name] I have a gift for you"

"Aww you shouldn't have!"

*Shows a fake worm*

(I think) Stan isn't really a touchy person so he understands that you don't want to be touched

Will give you space if you need it

I guess he doesn't mind you rambling about something

(But it is canon that he is a really dry texter)

Since you let him vent to you, then he'll probably let you ramble about your interests to him

Sure he'd love to watch a movie with you!

Or just spend time with you

If you feel alone or just left out (in some way) Stan wouldn't mind you being with him for a while

He's there if you ever want to be with him

I hope you like it😭 Have a good day/night Ar-cade77 ♡:P/p

(I apologize for the matchup being so short :<)

[transsexualunderground]

ttte oc musings

(or just an excuse to spit random thoughts at ttte tumblr)

below the cut is an infodump about:

forsythia and nicolas's nature as mischief makers and how they differ from bill and ben

the contrasts of edward and wesley

sycorax and what creative outlets look like for rolling stock

clara, scrap accuracy and ghost story night

my ocs and their ghost stories

wesley and idioms

elias, an eels story, how quickly word spreads on sodor, especially the NWR (cw for discussion of pet death basically, specifically that of eels)

Forsythia and Nicolas's brand of mischiefmaking vs. Bill and Ben's. Forsythia and Nicolas feel like they're less apt to have falling-outs and squabbles tbh. I find it interesting how between the two of them there's a clear clownery leader. overall a fun duo to think about. not to mention their contrast and comparisons; Nicolas is much more quiet and Forsythia is much more talkative yet they bond over the sheer desire to Have A Good Time. And they use whatever people think about them at first to their advantages. That and I think they're more likely to back off. Guess despite everything, the UHR ain't as brutal as the NWR LMAO

the interesting contrast between Wesley and Edward. Edward really doesn't seem to think about himself as old as often, when you compare him to someone like Skarloey. (In an... expressing it way, for lack of better articulation?) Wesley, on the other hand, I feel like he's very much so a "Yes I think I am a bit old. Maybe more than a bit actually. And that's just that." But the thing about them is. They're both somewhat close to the same age, and yet, here we are, Edward, the one who doesn't see himself as old as much, being the much more experienced one, and Wesley, the one who perceives himself as Some Kinda Old having little experience when he first arrives on the railway. I just think they're neato

Sycorax is turning out to be a very fun exploration of what a creative outlet looks like for a locomotive in the RWS/TTTE universe. I didn't touch on it much in my infodump because I hadn't developed it as much yet, but Sycorax is turning out to be a very artsy and creative soul. And they yearn to create. How does a locomotive express (hah) this? Firstly, they definitely hum a lot. And they admire things. And imagine. But they're still looking for more, as am I. They wish they had a claw like Diesel 10 so they could sculpt.

Any time a ghost story involving scrap has something inaccurate, Clara wants to correct it, but often doesn't. She wants to laugh at it, almost, but mostly she fears that, if this was taken inaccurately, what did the others think of her before she worked on the NWR? She always feels rather uncomfortable when ghost stories are told due to her close experiences with the dead, but something almost compells her to tell a hauntingly accurate tale... but something's also stopping her. the thought doesn't make her feel happy. at least Wesley's telling stories about weird real things and not ghosts on nights like these.

quick note on ocs and ghost stories: Forsythia is bullshitting it, Nicolas is telling ones from the rather unique coach or truck POV, Sycorax has wormed their way into accidentally telling Gothic horror, and Wesley is detailing random weird shit humans have or do because he knows Human Things because of how long he was isolated from enginekind.

Wesley struggled with engine idioms that came from human ones for much of his time on the railway because of how they tend to be so much more literal than their human equivalents, which Wesley knows the meanings of due to his time as a show engine. When he first heard the phrase "see a coach about a train" he put two and two together with "see a man about a horse" INSTANTLY and started to become very concerned that engines did Whatever The Humans Do In Bathrooms and that he was doing something wrong because he hadn't and he was very relieved whenever it got confirmed that, no, he isn't doing anything wrong, it's just literal in loco-lingo.

Elias. I haven't spoken much about him yet. But he's essentially my take on a pre-James red engine like the ones we saw in the RWS in the first book. He came to Sodor in the early days of the NWR, left, and came back in modern day. His stories start with a tale about how he has EELS in his TENDER and he is a LIVING ECOSYSTEM and he BRAGS ABOUT THIS and he LOVES HIS EELS. The story immediately after is when things turn sour and him and his eels are harmed with some feed water heating (one even dies) and he realizes he has to let them go for good. Normally, him and his crew released them seasonally to ensure the population was doing alright, but now this was his final time keeping them in his tender, by what was partially his own decision. He was crushed but realized it really wasn't a good home for the eels. Back in the early days, essentially the entire NWR would've known about this already, but upon his return, it sure wasn't a well known tale. Those who knew him in the early NWR days assumed he hadn't made it past nationalization. Anyways, Elias ends up sharing this story with like two others and it spreads like wildfire, and somehow indirectly becomes a cautionary tale. Elias... doesn't mind, actually. Better others learn from his mistakes than make the same ones. Funnily, it can't even directly be applied to some who learn the story, because they're diesels or helicopters. But it still counts, sorta. (The Secondman asks him about any stories he wants to have told on paper. Elias tells him these and asks the Secondman to dedicate them to the eels he's kept over the years.)

[xtruss]

Freshly picked "Yartsa Ganbu"—Cordyceps—are counted in the market of Yushu City. The popular medicine made from parasitic fungi are in danger of being over harvested and face environmental risks from climate change.

The Fungus In 'The Last of Us' Is Real—And It's Very, Very Expensive

The parasitic fungus ophiocordyceps sinensis is a popular traditional medicine and essential source of income for some of China’s poorest citizens. But now climate change and capitalism spell an uncertain future.

— Story and Photographs ByJustin Olsvik | January 4, 2024

QINGHAI, CHINA — Ma Beng sprawls on his stomach, his nose nearly touching the dry, brown grass. He army-crawls slowly across the mountain, inspecting the ground inch by methodical inch. Nearby, friends and family likewise creep along, carefully studying the tangles of grass and shrub. At 16,400 feet above sea-level, close to the height of Everest’s Base Camp, exertion in the oxygen-deprived air seems to phase no one. Chatting as they crawl, the group trades idle gossip, but their eyes never leave the ground.

They’re all searching for the same thing. It’s a prize often worth more than its weight in gold: ophiocordyceps sinensis, or more simply, caterpillar fungus.

From a distance, another man cries out in excitement. A short fungal stalk just barely pokes out of the grass, marginally thicker than the vegetation that surrounds it, and he carefully begins excavating around it. Onlookers gather, pulling out their smartphones to take photos; one woman begins a livestream on Douyin (China’s version of TikTok). A few painstaking moments later and he has freed his bounty—a small caterpillar perhaps an inch long, caked in earth with a reddish tendril of fungus sprouting from its head. He produces a tobacco tin, gingerly wraps his find in plastic, and secures it inside as the crowd disperses again, resuming their hunt with renewed enthusiasm.

Called yartsa gunbu in Tibetan, the literal translation becomes “winter worm, summer grass”. It’s an apt, if scientifically inaccurate, name for a macabre instance of symbiosis that begins when the underground larvae of the ghost moth are infected by ophiocordyceps spores. Scientists think the fungus takes control of the caterpillar’s nervous system, forcing its host to dig upwards, then ­killing it just before breaking the surface. Dormant through winter, the fungus reawakens in spring, consumes the corpse’s interior for nutrients, and sprouts out of caterpillar’s head into the sunshine.

Cordyceps have long been a local folk remedy, but within the last few decades Chinese demand has mushroomed, driving up prices. Since the early 1970s the cost of a kilogram of high quality cordyceps has increased up to forty thousand-fold—fetching as much as $110,000 per kilogram. The result has been an annual “wormrush” on the margins of the Himalaya, what is historically one of the poorest regions on the Asian continent.

Part social gathering, part livelihood rivalry, villagers scour the slopes together in Yushu Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture. For many, this will be their only source of income for the year.

At these extreme elevations, hats and masks are a necessity to protect pickers from the harsh light. Specialized tools are carried to carefully extract any finds without damaging them.

For many pickers, the cordyceps harvest represents their only income for the entire year; so, every May and June, the plateau fragments into thousands of hyper-localities where only residents are permitted to enter.

Regardless of how or by whom the worms get dug up, there’s one alarming thing everyone on the plateau has noticed: there are fewer to find every year.

Locals and scientists alike offer the one-two punch of overharvesting and climate change as means of explanation. With hundreds of distinct sets of regulations governing their harvest, there remains no cohesive system, or incentives, to ensure a sustainable harvest. Simultaneously, new sprouts require a specific range of temperature, moisture, and snow cover. Those variables are no longer so predictable, and the fungus today cannot be found at the lower elevations where they were once plentiful.

Part caterpillar, part fungus, cordyceps are prized in traditional medicine for being both "plant" and animal. The industry here is worth billions of dollars.

The World’s Most Expensive Fungus

Roughly sixty miles away in the city of Yushu, it’s barely 8 a.m. in the cordyceps market, but already it has the frenetic energy of a stock market trading floor. Hands are grasped beneath towels in the traditional means of bartering, whispers circulate the crowds, and prices fluctuate from shop-to-shop, minute-to-minute as every node in this supply web tries to eek out a couple more yuan per worm.

Middlemen purchase worms from the pickers for approximately $5 and will sell them to established shops in Yushu and other urban centers for a 10-20 percent markup. From there, they enter a well-oiled machine. The cordyceps are cleaned, counted, sorted, and packaged in vacuum-sealed bags before being shipped off that same afternoon. During peak season, a single worm broker can buy over 1,500 pounds of product per day, spending tens of millions of dollars in the process.

By the time they reach the gleaming shops of Beijing and Shanghai, the price of a caterpillar fungus has at least doubled. They’re more likely to be found in a luxury shopping mall than a pharmacy. The perceived value of the resource is now so high that it’s a fashionable gift or party favor among China’s elite. Counterintuitively, demand for cordyceps doesn’t remain high in spite of high prices, it remains high because of them.

One saleswoman in Beijing’s high-end Wang Fu Jing district suggests buyers are primarily interested in the social status the worms provide rather than any purported health effects. She points at the different ornate boxes of dead caterpillars, secured behind glass.

“High-quality” cordyceps are priced based on a fungus’s size, color, symmetry, ratio of stalk-to-body, freshness, and any other variables that makes them more uncommon or visually appealing, and therefore more desirable. The very best are priced in excess of six figures per kilogram; their uglier counterparts are more likely to sell for around $40,000 per kilogram. The least aesthetic will be ground to powder for supplements and additives in other products.

A growing interest in alternative medicine from Western markets also suggests demand will continue rising.

The product appeals to a diverse cross-section people: it has been sold by celebrity Gwyneth Paltrow on her controversial Goop website, as well as by right-wing conspiracy theorist Alex Jones’ Info Wars. Recently, the hit HBO series The Last of Us put a spotlight on the fungus, introducing it to new audiences.

Left: Local shops have taken to social media to help grow their businesses. These women are brushing the dirt from fresh yartsa ganbu while being live streamed to Chinese viewers. Right: This buyer samples the aroma of some dried worms for sale before making an offer.

The dried fungi are less desirable than their fresh counterparts and are sold by weight. Fresh ones are sold per piece, but only last a few weeks, so will be packaged and shipped out the same day.

A Moral Tradeoff

Escalating demand means more pressure on an already fragile ecosystem, but a company from Guangdong province, Sunshine Lake Pharma, might have a solution. For decades, many have tried to cultivate cordyceps artificially, and until recently, the complex life cycle, interactions, and environment had proven too difficult to simulate. But in 2014, Sunshine Lake made a breakthrough, producing lab-grown cordyceps with a highly secret procedure, for the first time. Studies indicate that the medicinal components of cultivated cordyceps were equivalent to wild ones, and better yet, lack the heavy metal pollutants often found in the natural variety.

Since the discovery, Sunshine Lake has been growing, and by their own estimate, project their production could make up 20 percent of the entire market. Lab-grown cordyceps should reduce pressure on wild fungus, giving populations a chance to recover. However, that environmental win jeopardizes what’s now a lucrative resource for some of China’s poorest citizens.

There's little time for rest during cordyceps season. Here, a buyer inspects the haul of a picker's family by headlight, extending his bargaining well into the night.

Many pickers have responded by using social media to create a distinct “natural” brand identity. Scroll any number of Chinese social media apps in May and June and you’re likely to find livestreams of these businesses picking, processing, and packaging their products against dramatic mountain backgrounds, and encouraging you to purchase directly from their online stores.

As the sun approaches the horizon, Ma Beng heads back down the mountain empty-handed. When asked if he’s worried about the cultivated fungus, he just shrugs.

“This is a traditional medicine,” he says. “You can’t replace tradition.”

[crappy-doodles-and-more]

WORM

[rivalry-trope-enjoyer]

Autumn Troupe: When they have nightmares

(PSA: this one’s a little self indulgent since I can’t sleep tonight so apologies if the headcanon’s inaccurate to the character ^^’)

Juza

Juza’s one to hide whatever gets him down because he doesn’t want to burden those around him.

He wants to be a good influence for Muku and Kumon and he tries not to rope them into anything negative that he has going on.

He tried to have a positive impact on you, too, so most times he doesn’t know how to express or want to express his vulnerabilities to you.

It was inevitable the night he had a nightmare, unfortunately it was you turning your back on him and was suddenly scared of him and thought of him as a monster.

Juza woke up in a cold sweat next to you, and he had no time to panic as he quickly rose up, reaching the air in front of him in a frenzy.

It would be best to hold him and/or reassure him. He needs to know that he isn’t alone and that it’s safe to open up to you, he will melt and quickly try to forget what happened in his dream.

He won’t tell you much about the dream, he won’t resist your efforts of getting close to him. In fact, it’s all Juza would have ever wanted. The love and care of someone that would accept him for who he is.

He’ll silently accept the love you give him, holding onto you tightly to steady his shaking and reassure his head.

Banri

Banri didn’t care much about nightmares, it never really bothered him and he kind of blew it off as some meaningless sign to ignore.

He never read much into things and didn’t see the need to start now. He was just rolling through life without a care in the world.

That was, until you came into his life.

He cared for you greatly and the feeling of putting in time and effort into someone that wasn’t his own self was almost foreign.

You had genuinely supported Banri throughout acting and everything he did, and he returned the favor which he had never thought he ever would.

Every bit of affection, every compliment he’d shrug off from literally anyone else meant more to him than anything.

To the point where waking up from a nightmare felt different when you were involved.

He was terrified that this meaning that he found in his life was gone, he woke up trying to laugh it off but saw his hands shake from the after math.

Just a simple “I’m here, I’m here” would ground him and bring him back to reality. Your voice was like a song to Banri, one that he would never get tired of.

He’d laugh still, but in a more genuine manner, tease you and asked if you actually worried about him.

Inside, he was grateful that you affirmed you were there with him, but it’ll take a while for him to admit it.

Omi

This boy has a lot to unpack.

He’s riddled with nightmares ever since his best friend had died. Despite all the changes in his life it still comes back in his sleep to bite him in the back.

He convinces himself that he’s gotten used to the nightmares and accepted it all as what he has to live with, but it deeply bothered him.

Despite this Omi tends to put a strong face for everyone; his brothers and father, the Mankai company, and for you, too.

Initially, he saw his weak points as being a burden to you, so Omi likes to perform acts of service to you like making you food before he goes to work or to rehearsal, get groceries with you, and of course also make sure you get a good night sleep before he would have to leave to run errands of his own.

He rarely takes rests and keeps himself busy a lot, he loves to help the people he cares about, but at the same time he will over work to avoid the nightmares that come late at night.

It was bound to happen that he would knock out fast asleep next to you. He had a whole day of errands, photo shoots, a lengthy practice and cooking for both you and the troupe. Omi deserved a rest.

However he started twisting and turning in his sleep frantically and you woke him up in fear of what was going on.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you” he immediately goes, rubbing his eyes to hide the clear discomfort, stretching to get up and make himself some tea.

Refuse his offer to do anything, right now it’s best for him to recover, and even without any cooking skill, offer some calming tea and some snacks or comfort food from the fridge or pantry.

He’ll be endlessly grateful, laughing as he constantly reassures you that he would have been perfectly fine getting it himself, but still thank you in the process.

“I know you’d do the same for me, it’s time I help you, too”

Those words hit him in realizing how much he has already done the whole day, and how acts of service doesn’t need to be a one-way path. Showing how much you cared for him gave him a sense of trust and security with you almost instantly.

Taichi

He admired you so much, and he would desperately try to hide anything that made him seem uncool.

He still fears being alone more than anything, despite wanting to stand out, he hated the feeling of isolation.

Often times it comes in his nightmares ever since he left the God Troupe, he had been scared of being singled out as a traitor and left neglected.

He woke up in tears that he sobbed out, carelessly forgetting that you were sleeping right next to him, but were awoken by his cries and immediately got up to go to him.

“Taichi, are you okay?” “Yeah! Yeah I’m perfectly fine-“ “Taichi.”

You sounded stern but he was still stubborn and tried to convince you that he was in top shape.

“See? I got all my fingers and everything! Still the same-“

You didn’t believe him but instead pulled him into your arms and his tears bursted out even more, taken by surprise of the overwhelming affection and support that he loved from you so much.

He shamelessly cried in your arms and soaked your shoulder, apologizing for his uncool he looked, but you not caring made him cry even harder.

After that nightmare he was truly happy to show this side of himself, even if Taichi had thought of it to be shameful in the beginning. He felt that you would stay at his side even with his true colors, he was open to accepting his own self as much as you accepted him with open arms.

Sakyo

In comparison, Sakyo handles nightmares as if they were nuisances like a fever. He still has difficulty sleeping after them so he lies awake just staring at the ceiling for a while to let it fade away.

In his past he was not able to have a lot, and often times because of his past affiliations he did not have much room for error.

As much as possible he did not want to mess up anything with you as well. Upon meeting him, he did come off as cold, and it took a while for him to warm up to you and was careful when talking to you about his previous encounters with the yakuza, as much as what didn’t scare you off.

When realizing you had done more than stay, but instead support him with being the actor who Sakyo was trying to be today, he was thrilled.

As much as he’d lecture you about running water and spending on groceries, it was his own way of trying to be helpful and caring.

In a way it showed that he knew what he was doing, but when it came to seeing him in shambles after waking up after a nightmare of his ugly past, he froze.

You were lying right next to him and he didn’t know how to cover up his own tracks of vulnerability. The ice he encased himself in melted away when you crawled up to him and asked him what was wrong.

He never wanted to involve you in the dangers of what his line of worm was before, realizing how much he wanted you in his life, but you still being there after learning all about it was reassurance to him.

With that he was able to go to bed easier, knowing that act of his life was over, and he was able to start fresh with a life with you, in an arc that he hopes to never call the curtain on.

[philipkindreddickhead]

I often seen critiques of make up from an existential/philosophical perspective, but I rarely see criticism of cosmetics from a stand point of the very physical bodily harm it does. I think this is because the number of dangerous ingredients is so massive, and overlapping its an absolutely daunting task. So I've compiled the information I've found and bear with me its a lot. (This is from an American perspective. Sorry, thats what I know. However I would love it if people from other countries had things to add.)

First I want to get the "simple" stuff out of the way. I think almost everyone has heard about bacteria and fungi in makeup and that makeup causes acne from clogging pores. Makeup has a pretty strict shelf life, yet consumers are entirely supposed to self-police as Ive never seen a single expiration date on any cosmetic packaging. (I guess consumers are meant to pull this knowledge out of the ether or something. I only found out about it in a tumblr PSA. I did read that expirys are on products in Europe.) Beauty blenders are the worst offender because theyre almost always moist. When I was taught makeup I was told to wet my sponge so it would soak up less product. If you apply makeup daily your sponge is likely constantly damp. USA Today had an article which said that 96% of sponges had fungi and over 60% had E. Coli in them. But I think what people talk about less is the complication of problems from using other products in conjunction with dirty beauty blenders. USA Today warns its especially dangerous to use beauty blenders if you have damage to your skin like acne, cuts, or dry skin. However the most popular beauty products for washing your face contain walnut pieces for literally scrubbing your skin and creating microabrasions. If youre a frequent makeup user you probably know about the cyclical nature of applying foundation, breaking out, and then applying more foundation to cover the breakout. You may even be using scrubbing cleansers more frequently to combat the acne creating more tears. This can lead to "blood poisoning" and, though neither USA today or Forbes mentions this, blood poisoning (not a medical term btw. Its sepsis.) according to numerous medical sites has the potential to be extremely lethal. The symptoms are so similar to a regular flu its nearly impossible to self-diagnose.

The very first thing I was told when a friend handed me a jar of finishing powder- popular with many beauty gurus for the "baking" technique and considered a must have- was a joke about "clown lung." This was a reference to the main ingredient talc. Talc causes lung problems including cancer and respiratory illness. If anyone remembers the large Johnson and Johnson lawsuit from 2019 it was because theyd been putting talc into baby powder. Talc is dangerous because it's impossible to mine and seperate from ASBESTOS. Some high-end finishing powders will try to sell you on safe talc-free formulas but all the products I looked into contained mica instead which causes pneumoconiosis, colloquially known as "black lung disease." Like fucking coal miners get. Its not just present in finishing powder either. In my research it turned out that talc/asbestos are also present in many eyeshadows and other powder products. [Googleable, evidenced in J&J lawsuit]

Another industry to examine is nail salons. Toluene, Formaldehyde, Dibutyl Phthalate, and Methacrylate compounds are all dangerous ingredients and present in various salon products. These ingredients cause a range of problems from dizziness, drowsiness, birth defects, slow fetal growth, future intellectual disabilities in the fetus, eye skin and throat irritation, coughing, allergic reactions, asthma-like attacks, short-term memory loss, nausea, dermatitis, cancer, and misscarriage. Some nail products advertise that they are 3-free meaning that toluene, formaldehyde, and DP should be absent but often the labels are found to be completely inaccurate. It should be noted that the risk is mainly to salon workers and not patrons but ask yourself if it is right to place other people at serious risk for your aesthetic. OSHA does make an attempt to mitigate these risks however not once in my years of makeup queen did I see a salon following these directives which include constant air monitoring, half mask respirators with chemical cartridges, gloves, long sleeves, and safety glasses. (And Im not even going to touch issues of human trafficking/slave labour out of nail salons one case of which occured 5 days ago two hours away from me) It should also be noted that formaldehyde can also be found in hair relaxers and hair dyes. [Found articles in Scientific American and NYT]

I also found on the FDAs website that many cosmetics include heavy metals like arsenic, mercury, and lead. (Usually accompainied by a picture of lipstick so I assume that is the product most likely to contain it, however campaign for safe cosmetics lists foundation as containing heavy metals, and The Guardian has an article about skin lighteners from Asia and Africa containing mercury.) The website stated that the amount of these heavy metals in cosmetics is "safe" if used as intended. (and I'm going to come back to the concept of "intended use" later because thats a can of worms too) However, when searching for info on heavy metal safety I found this quote in regards to metals in food:

"Certain metals, such as arsenic, lead and mercury, have no established health benefit, and have been shown to lead to illness, impairment, and in high doses, death. Understanding the risk that harmful metals pose in our food supply is complicated by the fact that no single food source accounts for most people’s exposure to metals in foods. People’s exposure comes from many different foods containing these metals. Combining all of the foods we eat, even low levels of harmful metals from individual food sources, can sometimes add up to a level of concern"

So like, which is it? Is it a "safe amount" or is no amount of metal safe? I understand that in the case of certain foods like fish some amount of mercury poisoning is always expected but fish is also something you feed yourself and nourish your body with while cosmetics are completely unecessary to your survival. The mercury problem in fish is also mitigated by health warnings when mercury levels are particularly high but cosmetics have no such warning. Another warning on the site indicated that children should ingest NO amount of lead AT ALL because it is particularly harmful for kids yet theres no effort to stop children from using lead-containing cosmetics. I worked next to a Five Below where I was shocked to find they sold Jeffree Star and Anastasia eyeshadow dupes for five dollars which amounts to fucking pocket change for a lot of kids and kids do buy that stuff. I also think its ironic the FDA would have anything to say regarding cosmetics because in the very same article about heavy metals in cosmetics the FDA says that they DO NOT REGULATE cosmetics beyond the color additives.

Mascara, eyeliner, lipstick, and brow tint often contain carbon black. This is a color additive that is an incomplete combustion of carbon-based products. It can cause lung disease, cancer, and organ system toxicity, and eye, nose, throat irritation. The effects are mainly studied in rats and those at biggest risk are industrial workers but why do other workers have to endure lung problems for something so unecessary? [Easily googleable, NIH, CDC, WHO Europe]

This next bit I only want to mention briefly because I didnt find any particularly reputable sources about it, but its a claim that cropped up repeatedly and I think its an interesting one. Parabens, estrogen, phthalates (again), and pesticides in cosmetics are apparently linked to endocrine disorders and hormone dysregulation. Im not entirely sure what is meant by this accusation. Endocrine disorders include female diseases like PCOS and possibly endometriosis. None of these diseases is very well studied and the female endocrine system itself is not well studied either. Im not saying "cosmetics cause PCOS" because we dont know if PCOS or these other endocrine/hormonal disorders are genetic or environmental or both (it appears that PCOS is largely genetic and Endometriosis is likely autoimmune related) AND we dont appear to know for sure that cosmetic ingredients cause endocrine disorder. But I include anyway for a number of reasons:

If you happen to struggle with hormonal problems you may want to know cosmetics is a potential environment factor.

These conditions are incredibly painful. It will be a battle getting your doctor to even acknowledge that pain for diagnosis. PCOS is linked to diabetes, and heart disease. [Thanks @mother-of-pearl ] There is no cure and the treatments are often throwing hormonal birth control at it and hoping for the best.

I dont anticipate the link between cosmetics and endocrine disorders being studied any time soon or any endocrine disorders studied at all because the medical/scientific field is sexist. I dont want women to suffer in the mean time.

Now again, take this with a grain of salt because I couldnt find scientific or news sources for it. Dont fucking come for me. Im not gonna respond to you. [Most reputable source was a paper from the library of medicine at the national institutes of health but it was behind a paywall and I dont have 39 dollars to be right on tumblrdotcom]

Avoiding these ingredients is not as simple as scanning the label for them. As many beautubers and the community are no doubt aware considering multiple scandals over veganism. Products advertised as vegan or cruelty free but contain non-vegan carmine or are sold in China which legally requires the products to be animal tested. Cosmetic companies will hide ingredients claiming they are "trade secrets" or they will be placed under "fragrance." Many ingredients will be known by six or seven different names and asking consumers to be aware of seven different names for multiple ingredients requires consumers to be aware of innumerable different, often complicated ingredient names. I shouldnt have to point out that's a ridiculous burden to place on women. The EU banned 1,300 hazardous ingredients that the US did not. Cosmetic companies rely on women being unwilling/unable to bring in a list of 1,300 ingredients- with multiple names- every time they pop in to the drug store, sephora, or wherever. Buying "natural" products will not help you either. Theres no established criteria for natural/organic in costmetics, the FDA doesnt test these products, and "natural"=/= safe anyway. Plenty of plants and minerals are poisonous. One good example is traditional kohl products which advertise their natural status but also naturally contain lead and reiterating that natural powders contain mica. US courts are rarely on the side of consumers either. I found an interesting lawsuit against St. Ives for their apricot scrub taken to court for their "dermatologist tested" label despite it causing breakouts and cuts to the skin. The courts ruled that this label was fine because it only indicated that the product was TESTED not APPROVED by dermatologists. However I think any rational consumer would look at this label and assume the tests concluded it was safe for use or else why put the label on there?

[Googlable XMONDO drama, googlable laws wrt china and eu, already stated about FDA, FDA website about Kohl. Googled St. Ives lawsuit.]

I want to return to the idea of "intended use." This is sort of a fucky concept a lot of companies have ways of getting around. My "last straw" with makeup had to do with a run-in I had with Anastasia over their "Riviera" eyeshadow palette. In this pallette they had two colors that were the real feature of the palette, an electric neon purple and a radioactive pink I mean every photo, every promotion has these two colors swirled together around the eye. Because again, its an eyeshadow palette. When I buy the eyeshadow palette of course there's a little insert warning in the package that says these two shades are not intended on the eye area. In an eyeshadow palette. Contacting their customer service they told me that these two shades were meant to be used as a blush. neon purple blush. Not only that, but their website and instagram featured NO models wearing the shades as blush while EVERY model one or more of the shades as eyeshadow. When asked about this discrepancy ABH stopped responding. What I find egregious about this is the amount of people who dont know, and then more staggeringly; dont care. The sephora clerks didnt know, the in store abh representative didnt know, their customers didnt know, and when I told them they would respond with "oh, [brand] did the same thing with their [shade]." Sure enough, when I demanded that store clerks open the packaging to look for warnings nearly every product had an "eyeshadow" that was not intended for use on the eyes. Relegating dark, red-toned teal to "contour" and neon grean to "highlighter" US-based cosmetic junkies will say that these pigments have been approved for use by the EU however I found absolutely NO evidence of that. I googled it a thousand ways but all I ever found were blog posts, reddit comments, and one quote from an apparently nonEuropean layman in an Insider article. I even changed my location to France on ABH's website and the Norvina palette still contains the same warnings (not to harp on ABH in particular. I just know which shades in particular are the problem there). The Insider article noted that brands who were selling pressed pigments declined to comment. If the pressed pigments were EU friendly, I would think companies would be clamouring to say so. It also still makes their market as eyeshadow colors illegal in the US. (If any Europeans would like to chime in I'd love that.) Another problem I find with cosmetics companies and their reps is the claim that the worst thing that could happen is eye irritation for those with sensitive eyes and staining. How could they possibly know? The FDA doesnt test, or approve these cosmetics in the eye area, so ostensibly no one should be using it that way.

The next one is a bit of a "duh" but I'm going to talk about it anyway. Counterfeit cosmetics are a booming market full of untold dangers. Untold primarily because these products could contain literally anything. Ive read about glue, arsenic, lead, feces, staph, and horse urine to name a few. The labels and ingredient list on these products are fake. Legitimate brands often unintentionally play into the counterfeit market. They create artificial scarcity by making less of the product than is actually needed for consumer demand to create an even higher demand. If consumers miss out often their only chance at getting the product is to turn to counterfeits. I found examples of women who had their lips superglued, lips "turned to goo" and burned to blistering, throat closures, women with stys, contact dermatitis, eye infections. I think we as a society turn a blind eye to this problem because we think "hey, if youre buying counterfeits for a discount and you get hurt you deserve it." We imagine idiots buying products for 4 dollars from ebay or perusing Canal street for FEИTY beauty. But these counterfeits can be really convincing. I myself received a gift of a huda palette that I only recognized something was weird about it because I'd swatched it at sephora about five times earlier that month. The person who bought it for me actually paid MORE than the usual cost for the palette because it was advertised as a newer, better edition. The websites can be disturbingly similar. For instance Kylie Jenner's legitimate website is KylieCosmetics.com but you can find fakes at kyliecosmeticsshop.co.uk. These fakes can buy ad space and be one of the first sites that populate when you google the products instead of typing the legitimate site into the address bar. Counterfeits can also be bought and sold through third parties on websites like ebay, wish, and amazon. (My gift actually came from Amazon.)

[Netflix doc "Broken" ep "Makeup Mayhem" Corroborated by personal experience and google]

[hahahax30]

Honestly, reading Lili Elbe's *actual* memoir, I have come to the conclusion that the Danish girl's author is more fucked up than I had thought.

He treats Lili's sporadic nosebleeds as a fantastic aspect of the story, as if her intersex condition had granted her a mini uterus in her nostrils, when in reality it was most likely a result of the anxiety/stress her dysphoria brought in (literally a two-minute search will tell you you can bleed from stress and anxiety), because they were only present when 'Einer' came forth, never when she was embodying Lili; with Lili everything was happiness and tranquility. And he doesn't even *mention* the 'mysterious fits of depression [...] and violent pains [...] disconcerting fits of sobbing' (a direct quote) that came with those nosebleeds, and which he would have somewhat explained them when, physically, Lili was fine. Instead he just implies the nosebleeds are there because she has rudimentary ovaries, and that's low-key infuriating.

Not to say that he completely sexualised Lili's childhood? The only actual thing she did as a child was get into fights to proof she could be 'like the other boys' and play with her sister's dolls when no one but her sister was looking. She didn't have a friend whose penis she gawked at 24/7 nor who tried to assault her at like 11.

Just, please, I wish I could get the Danish girl out of the market and erase it from existence. Or at least have a preface written by one of the numerous trans women (which I'm not lol, but I'll leave one under the cut) who've rightfully complained about how horrible the book is, because I know the Danish girl gets randomly recommended to people who have had no contact with trans people in their lives in order to 'understand' trans women, and that's fucked up.

By Gwen Sund:

I hate this book on so many levels. I will say one good thing. It is a very well written book. The prose is lovely and the author does a good job with descriptions. His handling of the characters and parts of the plot though are pretty offensive. I will not go too far into the history and how inaccurate this book is because as the author mentions in his afterwards Lili Elbe is the only character based off of a real person. Everyone else is completely made up. It's okay that the story isnt' true to life, but that opens up an entirely different terrible can of worms that I'll get into. The order of events is different, how things turn out is different. This is "Base on a Real Event" in the same way Exorcist 2: Bazuzoo Boogalu is based on a real event. There will be some spoilers, so if that bugs you stop reading here. Just know I can't recommend this book in any way. I barely recommend the movie, but at least that doesn't have as many issues.

My biggest problem with this book is the handling of Lili. This author made up pretty much the entire story, so even if there might be historical context for some of the details he still chose to describe Lili the way that he did. I am a trans woman and I found his handling of her to be one of the most offensive that I have ever read. He treats her being trans as multiple personality disorder. Since he chose and created so much of the story I'm not going to give historical leeway on this. He chose to do that. Trans people do not experience their identities that way. We are the same person before and after transition. It's not like a demon possession story where over the story the demon slowly starts taking over. It would have been so much more powerful to have Lily come to terms with herself and her past. Have her find a way to love herself in her own skin. Something more true to the trans experience. This story is nearly entirely fiction, so there's no reason why the story couldn't be told in a more positive supportive manner.

And that point ties into another thing. This book won the Lambda Literary Award for Transgender Fiction. For one the author is cisgender so why didn't the award go to a trans author. They existed. Susan Striker, Jennifer Finney Boylan, Kate Bornstein, and Leslie Feinberg were all actively writing in the year 2000. And that's just a few trans authors at the time. There were plenty more. On top of that the book is very bad at showing the trans experience. It is a slap in the face. I can't even say 2000 was a different time and Lambda Literary has moved on from that because after the Danish Girl movie came out they worked with this author again to help him set up a trans charity. They support this story. They still support it. That sucks. I hate it.

One more thing with the handling of Lili is that she has no agency in this story. People keep making decisions for her, they move her around, they treat her like a child, and they make medical decisions for her. The only decision she makes in this book is the one that killed the real life Lili. Some how Greta is treated like she's supposed to be this super supportive partner, but she just controls Lili to death. There's a part in the book where Greta starts telling Einar to become Lili constantly. Not to be supportive but because Greta has become famous for painting Lili and she constantly wants Lili to model for more paintings. What in the world is supportive about that? Greta literally uses Lili for personal financial gain to the detriment of Lili's mental and physical health. Multiple times Lili asks to stop and is told to stay put.

While we're on the topic of Greta let's just talk about how weird that character is. She is very loosely based on Lili's real life partner Gerda. She was a famous painter that was part of the Art Nouveau movement. She is an important painter in history and for some reason she is turned into this bland concerned straight lady. She is so much more than that and I suggest anyone reading this maybe look up some information about her. The end of her life is sad as hell, but the real life Gerda is so much more interesting that Greta.

Speaking of endings I don't understand why the author changed Greta's true life story so much that she gets to live happy and rich while Lili still ends up sad, lonely, and probably dead from having a uterus transplanted into her. Why the hell did he go out of his way to give so many of the cis characters happy lives only to keep the trans character's sad ending? Why? That's awful. That isn't support or visibility. That is voyeurism. "Look at the old school trans woman that thought she could give birth and died. Oh isn't that weird?" Screw that. If everyone else gets happy endings then cut the last chapter, and have Lili exit the story with the guy that asked her to marry him. Have them go off to New York and live to be happy. This is fiction, give fiction Lili the chance to be who real life Lili didn't get the chance to be.

I hate this book. I hate how many awards it has gotten. I hate that so many cisgendered people have made money on this story. I hate it. I don't necessarily hate the author, I just hate this story. Why did I make myself read the entire thing?!

[ashdumpsterpile]

I'm new to the sherlock fandom, so Idk shit bout Moffat.

Could you please enlighten me?

Oh you just opened a huge can of worms.

My brain isn't really working right now, so this is going to be mostly incoherent ramblings. I think if you click on the #anti-moffat tag you'll get a better worded response, but I'll do my best to explain my own personal feelings on this.

The main problem with him lies in the fact that he's a misogynist. I haven't touched the Doctor Who or Sherlock fandoms in a while, so I don't really know what people are saying about him now, but there used to be so much controversy around his work.

Take Doctor Who for example. His series--although there are things I enjoy about it--falls victim of the male gaze constantly.

There's a character who literally exists to be in love with the Doctor, all of his female companions are in love with the Doctor, and basically everyone they meet falls in love with the Doctor. It's super condescending tbh.

The worst offender is his token lesbian couple. He writes them like he's never interacted with a woman in his life and doesn't know how to write f/f attraction.

Which leads me to the next part.

I don't know if you've finished Sherlock or not, but the deal breaker for me was his adaption of A Scandal in Bohemia. It was so so sexiest and lesbianphobic that I could barely finish it. Someone pls drop into my inbox and ask me to write a more detailed meta on this episode, bc I could Go Off for hours. Here I'll simply remind y'all that Moffat writes Irene Adler as a lesbian who falls in love with a man.

It's really fucking disgusting. I have literally no respect for this man.

Oh yea we also have to talk about the ableism.

Moffat likes to throw words like psychopath and sociopath around a lot without actually knowing what it means. I think Sherlock says in like every episode that he's a "high functioning sociopath" or whatever, but really he's just on the autism spectrum. But, of course, it's not badass to say that you're on the spectrum, so instead Moffat uses an already stigmatized term.

He also calls River Song a psycho/sociopath which is also wildly inaccurate bc she's an incredibly empathetic person! It's just cool and sexy for him to say that the Doctor fell in love with a psychopath or whatever.

Don't feel like, btw, that this means you can't enjoy Sherlock or the fandom. There are many things I still enjoy and love about Doctor Who, even series 5-10, because of certain writers, the actors, etc. I even like certain things about Sherlock (Martin Freeman's Watson is like my favorite Watson ever except for Elementary's adaption). It's just unfortunate that certain aspects of these shows suck bc their showrunner is kind of a dick.