#long drawn out meta on a show no one cares about but me

[soarrenbluejay]

Since I’ve been encouraged to actually share my funny little blorbo ideas here’s another one gang;

Danny moves to Gotham on scholarship for engineering, because the Fentons may be infamous but they’re also insanely brilliant and besides both he and Jazz are showing every sign of embarrassed child of a super genius syndrome, so while the bats are keeping a close eye on him Just In Case, duke is also thinking of introducing him to the Our Parents Are Maniacs But Anyway club maybe after the first month or so.

Gotham does not go for standard dorm living bc of his ‘condition’ and lack of wanting to constantly spook/gaslight a roommate. Besides, living with two small children is a dorm sounds like a disaster in action.

So Danny signs up as a mechanic in Crime Alley, buys himself a teeny weensy lil apartment and Makes It Work. He has been all year after showing up with a de aged Dani and Dan in Amnity after all, and that had gone,,, fine? (The entire town, observing how Danny had been getting increasingly more uncomfortable around his godfather prior to the cloning incident, then just dropped off the face of the earth for several months, the first two weeks stuck in Vlad’s basement enduring horrors and the next Too Many desperately fapping around in the Ghost Zone to get everything handled. All the clones live, all 13 of them. Bunch of them are stuck in the Ghost Zone due to constant need for ectoplasm, but eh, plenty of Zone born never leave, so. One, in the future, apprentices under a green warrior lady on Pandora’s suggestion, another is working in the Eternal Library with Ghost Writer, etc etc. so Danny eventually came back to Amnity with one small child under each arm very obviously traumatized by Somethingn with vlad and doesn’t like being alone with him,,, or touched without warning,, and immediately and passionately proclaims the kids his but struggles to explain how or why,, look some very reasonable assumptions are drawn okay. So the town does the very reasonable thing and does the midwestern equivilant of excommunicating Vlad, except it’s a lot more run him out with pitchforks vibes since he’s the Mayor. Anyway)

He is immediately loved, because while non Gothamites are usually more of a pain than they’re worth, everyone in a while someone even from out of town will just fit in so nicely it’s uncanny for everyone involved. Addams family vibes, it’s referred to as ‘making it home’, just personal hc. He is protective of all the kids playing in the parks and street girls that can totally take care of themselves on their corners but find it HILARIOUS when he just tackles a dick like a wild animal full force no warning. He can fix anything it seems, but refuses to work with weapons. Reasonable enough, people get twitchy about gangs sometimes. Danny mentions being not against Hood or anything, but he’s not going to work for him, littles to take care of and all, but had past experience with ‘Dora and that inheritance mess with her brother he was being a real prick about’ so everyone assumes it’s the equivilant of him having Done His Time and being plenty good for a life time and respects it as long as none of that petty midwestern small town hotshots bring any of that shit over here. And they don’t, because said individuals are on the other side of the mortal veil, so happy day.

See I really love deaged!Dan because he’s just a grumpy lil guy. But he’s also killed millions. He’s so protective of his loved ones, but held back by blending in and also being Smol that it comes off more bitey kitten than anything else. Dani, of course, is a terror, so she fits right in with the crowd.

And sorry gang, but a bunch of kids on their own in Gotham in a poor side of the city just isn’t going to get any attention: that’s just business as usual really. What first gets attention on Danny is not his ‘condition’ or being mistaken for a meta (which he legally probs has an argument for even without the gene bc like these bitches don’t know how metaism works anyway so) or alien (I’m 90% sure he’d be covered by the alien protection act by virtue of being half ‘not from earth’), but because Danny despite best efforts is a Weird Guy.

He grew up in what could only be described as a low level villain level and spent most of high school dealing with smack downs and spiritual invasion. He’s never really processed that any of that is not in fact Normal. Also, he’s capable of making Anything if given the insides of a toaster, blender and alarm clock, and could probably rewrite the circuits of the apartment blindfolded and improve them 1000% even if it ABSOLUTELY would not be up to code.

And sure, things slip every once in a while, bits of spectral ice here, small floating incident there, but everyone just Minds Their Buisness ya know? You really gunna mess with the guy that personally ensured that when your car got flattened by a fight with Killer Croc, you were still able to get in to work the next day by some wizardry? Really?

But Gotham is a city so cursed it’s probably in the exponents countwise, so of course there is a) a flourishing community of magic users and assorted supernatural weirdos and b) a whole lot of shit for Mega Overpowered Ghost King Danny to idly pick at day to day in order to help with his protecting other Obsession. Gotham has plenty of heroes, but by god do they need the spiritual equivilant of an electrician/priest.

Still, Danny, as a baby ancient under a facet of Kronos and KING OF THE DEAD is like, way, way out of their scope to be able to grok, so it mostly just comes off as you know, a family of banshees or something. When asked, Danny very haltingly says he was briefly dead but then revived, which neatly explains his Weird Ass aura and makes it SPECTACULARLY AWKWARD to ask further about. So everyone nods politely, and goes back to their lives after double checking no nefarious bullshit was being pulled.

Then, of course, Vlad finally tracks them down. The whole neighborhood is altered in short order because he doesn’t bother trying to hide being a Rich Bitch or how he’s sneering down his nose at people on the sidewalk. Every connects the dots when Danny paniks. Dani and Dan’s daycare are staffed with some extra, very buff set of hands within the hour. Jerry, Hood’s third in command, personally shows up to the garage Danny is working at to talk things out with him bc he knows he does t like the deal with this stuff due to past unspecified circumstances but well, they guys had already started fucking with him, you see. Stole his tires, spray painted the windows, pickpocketed him blind, and when he retreated tipped off the police to the drugs they’d planted in the glove box.

Danny might not have been born in Gotham, but he was one of them. And the Alley takes care of it own.

[difeisheng]

🪷

Happy One Year Anniversary to Mysterious Lotus Casebook, and so, happy one year to this fandom as well!

(I would have liked to have finished writing a fic for this day. As it was, life got to me, so you get these other words instead.)

This little corner of C-drama Tumblr has brought me a lot of joy in the last year. I didn't know how long I'd be here when the show first started airing, or whether or not I'd even finish it. As it turned out, there ended up being a close-knit group of us drawn to the show as it released (I love you guys for the madness that was reacting to and speculating about some of those episodes in real time), and more showed up in the following months as well. And so I wound up staying with this story after it was over, not just because it was a wonderful one, but because I ended up getting to know a lot of other people through it too!

Some of you were here posting in the tag from day one, some of you came along later, but I've really enjoyed getting to talk and exchange ideas with so many of you. Writing meta was never my main contribution to fandom before this (and I do mostly consider myself a fic writer first and foremost) but I've had the time of my life pulling apart and analyzing this story with others, and seeing everyone's own thoughts/reactions to it. MLC is special in that the amount of care and deliberate detail put into it can support that kind of scrutiny, but it also takes the people who want to look at all these things, to have the kind of happily curious atmosphere that this fandom does. I want to thank you all for that experience. It's been fun, it's been eye-opening (I've become a better writer for it), and the variety of perspectives people have brought to discussions has left me with so much more to think about in relation to this show.

And I want to shoutout to all the creators in this fandom— gifmakers, meta writers, fic writers, artists, and everyone else I've scrolled past in the tag who shared something for the rest of us to enjoy about these characters. I check the tag every day. I see you. This fandom has been great in particular for reblogging and responding to others' creations, and it's beautiful to see that sense of community. I don't joke when I say that from the get-go I considered this fandom a breath of fresh air, compared to many others I've been in. You're all very cool and I'm so happy for the things all of us have shared in this space, for the love of MLC.

Through all this, this show and the people who gather around it here have brought me some of my closest friends in fandom today. That includes some people I'd known of for years, but never thought I'd ever really be able to talk to. I've also met a lot of Chinese diaspora through MLC, and gotten to feel a little less lonely about some of my own experiences. Not everyone here in the beginning actively talks about MLC anymore, but you know who you are, and know that I remember you and look back on 2023 very fondly. And to those who came later, or those still here, I love that we're keeping this fandom going. I don't know when the next drama will pull my attention away, but for now I'm still in this corner with the rest of you, and I'm very glad for that.

Mysterious Lotus Casebook is special, and so are all of you. Thank you for this last year.

[ravenkinnie]

thoughts on jinx largely using pink for her graffitis because the color reminds her of vi??

i like to think its true bcs it makes all those years of stewing resentment/longing/grieving before she sees vi again hits a little more harder. vi seeps into even the most trivial parts be it conscious or subconscious. even in her 'JINX' grafitti tag the first letter 'JI' is drawn in a shape similar with 'VI' the letter J is just tilted kind of, which is a blatant visual representation of how jinx's heart and soul yearns for her sister. its these little things that truly make me realize how obsessed jinx is with vi & idk to me the fandom doesnt talk enough ab it.

I mean I'll be real lads, jinx was using pink way before arcane and before her and vi were even sisters and I think they chose it because pink and blue go well together and now shes stuck with it forever ksjsjsj. I'm also glad s2 is coming out soon because the more people try to find VI in every poster the more I'm starting to feel like that encanto tweet that's like were running out of things to say about this movie jaisusj

don't get me wrong, I'm also prone to delusions, like riot renewed their K/DA trademark and I've been reading signs in the water and the sky for an upcoming EP/album so its not like I also don't live in delululand but my stance is we don't need to read the posters for signs of jinx's feelings towards vi when jinx already told us. like vi is one of the two protagonists we already know she's central to the story and we know that the vi jinx relationship is the centre of the show and the heart of it. and if you don't realise that then I think you will really love arcane because clearly you've never seen it before jajsjksks

but like, they are the centers of each others stories, vis entire arc in s1 is basically just defined by her sister and s2 will probably do little to change that at least in the first half. we know jinx defines herself outside of vi in some ways but she can't really cut her off, she says explicitly vi is a voice she heard over the years, and seven years on a bitch that slightly looks like vi is a trigger. silcos dead ass or not, that's not something you just move past, vi will always be the most important figure. esp since based on trailers we saw so far it seems that jinx in her current position is not living her best life, we've only seen her struggling and looking devastated so far and I assume vi will also not be thriving so I think it will only emphasise how they really are all each other has. and you can say vi has caitlyn now but first of all, caitlyn is insane amd also a bitch and now has personal and political beef with her sister. second of all, caitvi fandom simply is classist so you would think its not a problem but the class divide between them is a huge part of vis character in league and I assume they will keep thay in arcane looking at the direction they are going towards. they both will never have another person like each other, someone who knows where you come from

the reason the fandom doesnt care about it is not because its not true and factual to the show, its just how this fandom works. firstly, nobody cares about platonic relationships already. secondly, parts of the fandom that care about jinx don't necessarily care about vi and parts of the fandom that care about vi don't necessarily care about jinx so hilariously there doesn't seem to be a ton of overlap between the two parts of the fandom where you would have that relationship explored. and it's a very messy relationship that doesn't show either of them in the best light and fanon content is chronically allergic to complicated dynamics so at most you're getting like ship fics with background vi and jinx fluff or like few throwaway angst lines. and most meta on them just tries to argue that the other one is the problem kskskksksj

[pointless-party]

alright here we go again, time to talk about the v5 refs now that (presumably) all of them are posted. if someone's not mentioned then i just don't have anything to say about them. this post contains both positive and negative points.

usual warning for text/image heavy under the cut, along with a few preboot images. there's also a very brief s/h mention under doom's part. read all of this knowing i'm an amateur artist and that all of this is my personal opinion.

barry's finally chubby again, you love to see it!! i love that his scars are more pronounced too, especially his new top surgery scars. the yellow threw me off but then i remembered these images from the preboot site that i found which is what i'm assuming it's harkening back to.

i don't really understand the sharp change from a fairly pale green to yellow, but i don't think it looks bad, just kind of jarring. barry's last saturation change also felt jarring to me so i think i personally would just have to get used to it.

overall i really like barry's new ref! the pose shows some of his personality while still making it easy to see his torso scars (unlike the v3 ref where he's standing with his arms crossed). it's one of the better ones imo and that's why i'm starting off with it.

god please let her cane stay. God Please Let Her Cane Stay and be used in multiple scenes without it being a plot thing once like jay's mobility scooter. it's interesting that his feet were also retconned back into being backwards (i believe in newer art they were normal? i could be wrong though, either way it's never brought up). not much to say on this one, just that i hope its mobility aid and disabilities are mentioned more especially since they have a fictional disease that gets more attention.

why is her neck so... scrunched??? she looks like she was too tall to fit into the page. it might just be me but their head looks disproportionately big compared to the rest of them, along with being pretty narrow compared to other art. it just looks odd to me. like, compared to her v3 ref:

where the proportions feel more evened out. she also looks shorter in her new ref which is something i've noticed in quite a bit of kneeby's new art.

i'm glad she's finally getting her gender corrected on refs though; the amount of confusion that's been caused because information isn't clearly stated outside of tumblr asks and the faq is absurd. i know it's been changed on the cast page but still.

only a few points on carrie's. once again, their head looks really... narrow? i don't understand why her stripes are darker either when she isn't more saturated otherwise, so it's clearly more of just a meta design thing than a story element. masky is definitely a choice but i don't have a negative or positive opinion on it. moving on.

following up because similar to masky i also have no real opinion on skully. all of these refs are kinda busy but doom's ref feels busier just because of them having both a coat on and off ref. i like the burn mark on his coat, it's a nice continuity nod while also emphasizing that doom doesn't care enough to get new clothes even though it's damaged. the gloves off arms threw me off because i assumed they're s/h scars but nothing was tagged for it, so it might just be fur, but fur is never really drawn on characters? i'm not sure.

i don't have anything to say except the proportions also look kind of weird here? i don't know if it's just me but similar to uni her head looks disproportionately big compared to her body. my eyes might just be shot from staring at these for so long though.

i love his whimsical pose here! her tail being a muffin is really cute and fits well with the curls on her head to add onto the messy and fluffy appearance. it's pretty busy like the rest of these, but the posing and proportions here feel solid, and it's nice to see a ref where the character isn't just Standing There (plus fitting with funfi's whole theme of being deceptively cheery). this is another pretty good one imo!

i have no gripes with his design nor the anatomy/posing but. i am so confused as to why his tail works like uni's horn? he's a party anthry, but so is funfi, so shouldn't funfi be able to do that too? uni makes sense since she's a unicorn that can do magic, and it was mentioned that spinch dragons can also do the same:

which again, with them being mythological creatures that possess horns and magic in this world, makes sense. which is why i'm confused as to how pinata can do that too? it probably doesn't mean anything but i don't know, it's kind of a weird decision to me.

the way cuddles keeps changing every volume is... something. anyway, i'm actually really glad kit got rid of the wrinkly hands; not great to have a conventionally unattractive trait on the main villain (dismissing every other problem with reboot cuddles). the doll(?) limbs as opposed to stitches gives off the impression that he's one of those cheap plastic toys, which i think isn't the worst thing for cuddles since his whole thing is putting up the front of being a good person, but most of it is definitely kneeby's new art style that shows in some other refs.

his eyes being missing now is kind of an interesting change to me. i still miss his fake angel wings. moving on.

following up with puppy because of the "cheap plastic toy" thing. i don't know if it's just because the lines look thinner, but lov looks so. like. marketable in this. i love that she's chubbier don't get me wrong, that has nothing to do with it, but the combination of the art style with the thinner and rounder lines just make her look kinda weird. that might just be me nitpicking though. i have another separate post on puppy i want to make but that's unrelated to this so it stays in the drafts until later.

i actually don't have anything constructive to say here i just wanted to mention how much i love and miss kills. /gen

i don't understand why she's not saturated? maybe she hasn't been a nurse for long or she stays away from the main stuff the hospital does but like... she was around for the social worker thing, so no doubt she's seen stuff. is she just built different or something??? no complaints on the art itself i'm just so confused as to how she's still pastel.

only one thing to say on reese,

where did their crest go....... i know this one is nitpicky but stuff like this has become more noticeable in a few recent works.

yeah he looks like a dorito here. i don't have an opinion on that but it's there. i'm adding this one to comment on their pose, which looks a bit odd but i think that's just because of the perspective. he's clearly playfully bowing, so his head is in the forefront, but the thickness of their legs along with the very small space where you can see their gown crease makes it look kind of weird. especially with it looking like his head was plastered onto his body; i think it's just the angling and my eyes not wanting to look at it properly (which to be fair could probably count for a lot of these).

was cyn always meant to be chubby?? nothing wrong with that, obviously, but it looks short here, especially when compared to its v3 appearances.

it could be something else retconned but again, jarring.

ohh poor jandy i am so sorry. this time i KNOW there's nothing wrong with my eyes; her head is wider than her chest. again, nothing else to say, but the proportions look really weird. i do like the posing to show off her more brash characteristics!

give him their claws back!!! (and their old name while you're at it). the holes in the mask is kind of the end of an era but it's whatever. anything i'd say here is nitpicky since i kin party so i'm leaving it at that.

they look. fine? the rings around their limbs were nice but i understand why they were simplified (i also wouldn't want to draw them every time). i kind of dislike the bloodied clothes, it just doesn't look that good imo, but that's not really important. their preboot design was still peak.

🙁

what? happened to her?? again with the bloody clothes thing but mostly just... she just looks odd here. her head looks so stretched out. and some of her spots are the same color now!! she's missing her claws too which is a downgrade, why are all the hospital staff getting declawed? compared to her old ref:

it just looks so... i don't know. it doesn't look good imo. plus the claws on her feet being gone too meaning she's been reduced to having flippers like everyone else. i know it's simplified but it still sucks. she faces the same problem as puppy in lov's ref where she just looks kind of marketable.

also, what happened to her it/its pronouns?

this is such a specific thing that probably nobody remembers, but her it/its pronouns were revoked :[ it's probably because she's one of the morally questionable characters but c'mon. it kinda sucks when only two characters use it/its (polly + cyn) and even then other pronoun sets are used. this is excluding things like masky and skully because those are actual objects.

anyway i've been typing for like two hours and i don't have anything else major i want to say so smaller things to wrap it up:

each staff member having a personal badge reel is cute and does well to match their characters

what i can only describe as the gentrification of this art style is made really obvious through some of these. the flipper feet have spread to everyone

why doesn't chip have his overgrown teeth anymore

that said even though i'm personally not pleased with some of these it's still nice to finally have proper ref sheets for everyone that isn't just the main cast

and while the refs are busy i don't think that makes them better or worse

the more diverse body types is a really nice step in the right direction and i hope they remain consistent

polly's mobility aid being in their ref gives me hope that maybe stuff like that will be more casually shown in-comic rather than for plot reasons. i'm holding out hope on that one

i like the slight changes in poses vs having everyone just 🧍‍♀️🧍‍♂️. funfi's in particular is really fun to me

a lot of these probably seem nitpicky since there aren't many design changes but that's just how it is. sometimes i can't articulate any more than It Just Looks Odd, but really some of these look weird to me. along with a lot of kit's new art. sorry none of this is polished my head is starting to hurt from staring at this post for hours lol -🐍

[desultory-novice]

Is it strange that most of my KRBAY OCs are just either alternate universe versions of Tiff/Fumu, or immortal maneating spirits or ghouls who are manifestations of negative emotions which were felt by Tiff/Fumu? Just felt like asking someone who could give a proper response and even some advice, happy early new year though!

As far as I know, Tiff/Fumu is the most interesting character to come out of KRBAY, being a main character (THE main character? "Tiff, Tiff, Tiff, she's the star of the show!") who develops a very strong relationship with Kirby and the rest of the cast. She's also got a very strong personality, that can either be very endearing to people (her sassiness, intelligence, and strong moral compass) or grating (her lecturing and jumping to conclusions.)

<More below!>

So I'd say it's no surprise to want to explore a character who already has so much going on! (The only other characters I know of who get as much love in the fandom are the space mercenary girl, because she's got a cool tragic backstory involving Meta Knight and is just someone we've never really seen in Kirby before, and the GSA because that's basically free reign to make your own Meta Knight-alike/build on the briefly glimpsed personalities of minor characters and have them go on long space fantasy adventures!)

As for the man-eating spirits born of Tiff’s negative emotions, I can't say for sure but...

I mean, I imagine she gets a lot of hate from fans too? People who found her too preachy? So if you yourself identify with her strongly, or just find her the most interesting character in KRBAY...that could be a way to channel the feelings you've seen about Tiff in RL in an expressive fiction environment? Or your own feelings about your life! I don't know all the various terms for it, but identifying with a character isn't anything to be ashamed of.

(Strictly speaking, yes, there’s things you want to be careful of when you’re really close to a fictional character. Make sure to keep your own boundaries, find joy in your own life, and try not to let opinions about that character hurt you too deeply. Be respectful of other people’s feelings and takes. Know that some things you make/think are just going to be for you alone and will never be as meaningful to those around you, etc...)

But yeah! Go for it! I've drawn stuff based on something someone else said that got me thinking. I can see how all the discourse about Tiff would inspire a variety of interesting ideas/AUs/What-Ifs. Is she as hated in world as she is by parts of the fandom? What's she going to be like when she grows up? Better? Worse? All that risking herself and getting into danger... What if she found herself truly out of her element? And maybe you just want to explore what happens when a friend finds themselves put into a situation where they're made the antagonist to their old friend group? Or CHOOSE to become one? Mwahahahahahaha...!

(Just always remember to tag appropriately!)

Frankly, even though I haven't seen enough of the anime, I kind of like Tiff myself. And it's a shame because even though the anime has its problems, and is quite different from the Kirby we know and love now, it too was made with the love and passion of many, many people who clearly cared about it deeply! 

Yet, as there's no way to merge the anime and game canons together properly (even if their could be, I have my doubts that working in a 100 episode series from the early 00s is whats best for Kirby as a game series) she and the rest of her world are probably fated to be retired to the annals of history...

...and fanworks, which you're already engaged in! Go you! (1)

Probably the only point at which it becomes too strange is when you create a story/verse where all the Tiff-alike OCs meet up with each other and begin to create whatever it was that happened with the old, mega-cursed Onceler fandom in its latermost days, where it's now "illegal to be a Tiff OC" and they're all on the run from some evil government agency...?!?  (I have NO idea myself. I only know about the Onceler stuff thanks to Youtube.) 

But I've heard that even a section of Onceler fans ended up turning their Onceler OCs into -true- original characters after all that happened. Imagine if all your creative work with Fumu ends up leading you down the path to make an original book or a comic someday! The best thing about creativity is that it really can turn into ANYTHING!

---

(1) And cameos, like how she and Bumu showed up with Anime Kirby in the 30th Anniversary Campaign!

[phoenixkaptain]

In episode 219, the Gathering of the Detectives! Shinichi Kudou vs. Kaitou Kid, you can tell, spoilers for something twenty years old ahead, the Conan knows that Kid is Kogoro. Otherwise, he never would’ve been so openly intelligent. You can tell from the scene he deduces everything, when one detective mentions that it was Conan’s idea for them all to pretend to die to bait the murderer out. Conan wouldn’t have made such a plan to the others if he didn’t know Kid was disguised as Kogoro.

But, more than that, I love the subtle hints they put in that Kid is disguised as Kogoro. The fact he doesn’t smoke while they’re there. How serious he takes everything is very against his personality, even if you think he’d act like that in such a tense situation. That early in the series, Kogoro really was still the worst at taking serious things seriously. But, it goes even further than that. For most of the series, one of the only good things about Kogoro is how protective he is of his daughter, whether consciously or subconsciously. I don’t think he would’ve let them sit seperately, even if they did play a game to decide seating. Who would begrudge a detective who wants to sit by his daughter during a high stress situation where they’re all in danger? The fact that he doesn’t is telling.

Kogoro as a character is a dick. He’s loud and obnoxious and we all know it. In this episode, he’s oddly laidback. Disguising as Kogoro also means that Kid doesn’t have to be an expert detective, because anyone who’s spent anytime around Kogoro knows that it’s a miracle he ever got a detective job in the first place. He purposefully doesn’t spend much time with Ran and Conan (look how well spending time with Conan has turned out in the past) by sitting apart from them and leaving in the car with the other two. You could view Senma askign for a ride as a blessing for him, since it meant there was less time for him to talk to Ran and Conan.

I love the subtle tricks they put in the show. Earlier in the show, episodes 132-134, you can see how Kaitou Kid would start to piece together that Conan is more than just a weirdly intelligent small child. He can see, from the house, that Conan is hiding behind the tree talking for Sonoko, because otherwise we wouldn’t have so many shots focused on Conan walking to the back of the tree. Shinichi and Kaito are both showmen in their own way, which is why Conan plays it fast and loose pretending to be a child and always does a pretty bad job of it, while Kaito pulls off the performance near flawlessly so the reveal is all the more shocking.

Shinichi is so bad at pretending to be a child that he straight up confronts Kid in the house, while he was talking for Sonoko in the hall of the house. And people wonder why Conan has been found out by so many people and Kid hasn’t.

One thing I love is when Kid, disguised as a random medical student/magic nerd, pops into existence to shoot the bowgun for Ran, making him the most suspicious person in the world as he says “I have experience with this.” You know, as all non-criminal, completely innocent people do. The scene where he randomly punches the ground gets me everytime. It’s so weird. It’s so out of left field. And we know, after the fact, that it’s just Kaito being upset because a magician died and he didn’t want that to happen, but it’s so jarring in the moment that it’s really funny.

We know the culprit from the second part, because Conan outright explains how she could be the culprit while pretending to be a dumb child. But Kaitou Kid is so bad at pretending to be an innocent civilian, he straight up ends up being the most convincing red herring of them all. His only good quality is that he has an airtight alibi, but he’s so good at coming across as a criminal, it’s really a talent.

None of this has any order, but to completely jump ship, I want to talk about Akako. Akako is straight up a witch, confirmed. She knows the future, she talks with Lucifer, she straight up is actually magic and the show, any of the shows, never explain why this one character is actually a witch. I love her. Anyway, her Jii both have scenes warning Kaito. Akako warns him about Shinichi, with her vague-but-clear fortune about the clock. It’s also where she calls him like a devil or demon or something and I sit there thinking “Akako, he’s only seventeen, give him a bit of a break, please.” But then Jii, right before Kaito goes to do the heist he was introduced in, is like “I have a bad feeling about this.” Jii invoked Akako’s name, somehow, and his ‘oh no shinichi kudou’ senses started tingling. Kaito: “What could possibly go wrong? It’s not like there will be a small child waiting on the roof for me to ruin my plans. That would be silly.” (Okay, he doesn’t say that, but it always passes through my mind)

From the very first episode Kaitou Kid is introduced, Conan has a spidey sense for his presence. This sense comes back in every episode with Kaito in it. It is truly unfortunate that Kaito doesn’t have a ‘Kudou Shinichi will be there so I should cancel’ sense. It would help him a lot. The way it’s shot in the series, however, makes it seem like Conan can just feel Kaito looking at him. There are similar scenes elsewhere where he can tell someone’s looking at him, so it makes it seem like Kaito is just increibly nervous and/or curious about this small child and so stares at him. Which is why it kind of makes sense that he chooses to disguise himself as Ran, then as Kogoro. And, when Conan runs back into the house during the mystery fan murders, he passes out with a fever. Kaito as Doi comes in and helps, and says that he studies medicine, but it’s a fact he pulled out of thin air since Sonoko, who had a lot of contact with him prior, didn’t know about it. Kaito must be taking those warnings about demons more seriously.

Anyway, what was the point? I love Kaitou Kid. I love that Kaitou Kid I decided to name his child Kaito. I love Conan. I love how bad Shinichi is at acting like a child and how evil he comes across in these episodes. I love their dumb relationship where Kaito tries to keep his poker face and Shinichi just pokes and prods and tries to bug him. I love them, in short, and I think Kaitou Kid episodes are the best. I also think it’s funny that a bunch of the episodes about the infamous jewel thief have murder in them.

[randommusingsstuff]

Why Ben and Devi are Endgame (Meta)

At the heart of every rom-com, it always comes down to this: what does the protagonist truly want? 

Why Devi and Paxton Don’t Work

In the season 2 finale, Devi triumphantly says “So, I guess I'm Paxton Hall-Yoshida’s girlfriend now”. She got what she thought she wanted at the start of her journey, only it’s not what she wants anymore. 

Although Devi cares for Paxton, she views him as a status symbol. Paxton, for all his growth, still sees himself as cooler than her. And no, he was not just embarrassed because she cheated on him. Before he knew she was cheating, he invited his friends on their first date and refused to call her his girlfriend. In the finale, it once again takes someone else to point out that he shouldn’t blow her off. As Devi and Paxton walk into the dance, he gives his friends a sheepish look while they judge him. Not only does he still have lingering feelings of embarrassment, his friends’ reactions suggest turbulence ahead for their relationship. 

There is also a lack of communication between Paxton and Devi. They have a magical kiss by the window, and makeout sessions afterwards, but they don't actually talk about their relationship in that elapsed time. Devi makes the assumption that they are together and Paxton doesn’t articulate what he wants until it is forced out of him. 

What can we conclude from this? Paxton is a great character, but he is not the one for Devi. They have differing interests and goals, a lack of communication and they do not see each other for their true worth. 

Can the writers surmount all of these issues to give them an endgame? Yes, but it would require fundamentally changing who Devi and Paxton are. 

Why Devi and Ben Work

In episode 1 of season 2, Devi wants to pick Ben but her friends talk her out of it. This is crucial to understanding why they belong together: her gut instinct has already revealed the truth. She had both guys vying for her and she wanted Ben. Just by this one fact alone, we can infer that Devi’s relationship with Ben was more meaningful to her than her pursuit of Paxton in season 1.

When it’s revealed that Devi is two-timing the boys, Paxton is hurt but Ben is devastated. Paxton likes her, but Ben connected with her on a deeper emotional level. Devi follows Paxton out of the party, which is understandable because he is the one walking away. Again, this is cleverly hinting at their communication styles. Paxton wants to avoid the situation and Ben wants to talk about it. From Ben’s perspective, Paxton is the guy she has wanted for so long and he is the second choice. 

Throughout the season, Ben never considers the fact that Devi could want him over Paxton, which is equal parts sad and infuriating. Her therapist asks what she wants more than anything and she says Ben. In context, it’s a comical line, but it’s also Devi revealing her truth. Like she does at the beginning of the season, she makes a choice and it’s Ben. She pursues Ben romantically before Paxton even though Paxton is the one more willing to forgive her. 

It takes Ben longer to forgive her, and yet he is still there for her when she needs help. The little things he does like give her advice about Aneesa and make her feel better about Paxton’s rejection all show Devi’s ability to be vulnerable with Ben. 

As an aside, they had the opportunity to show Devi being vulnerable with Paxon but didn’t take it. In episode 8 of season 2, Paxton sees Devi crying and she reveals that she got into a really bad fight with Eleanor. I was thinking: here it is, here is the moment that Paxton finally helps Devi with her problems... but no. His response is “seems like you’re in a fight with lots of people” and the conversation quickly shifts to her apologizing and helping him yet again. Devi is able to open up to Ben and be supported by him in a way that she can’t with Paxton.

Before I talk about the finale, which is arguably the biggest point in Ben and Devi’s favour, I want to look at the season overall. The entire story arc is Ben and Devi wanting to be together but constantly running into roadblocks in the form of Eleanor/Fabiola, Paxton and Aneesa. It was so alarmingly obvious they belonged together after season 1, that the writers had to find ways to forcibly separate them for the time being. It’s important for Ben and Devi’s relationship that she dates Paxton first. If she had been allowed to go for Ben, they would have had to explore Devi wondering what she missed out on. When Devi and Ben do get their happy ending, it will be because Devi has realized that Paxton is not the person for her. 

In the finale of season 2, we get 3 crucial scenes from Devi and Ben. The first is the bathroom scene which reaffirms Devi’s ability to be vulnerable with Ben and his ability to support her (something she doesn’t have with Paxton). The second is their tension-filled scene at the dance where they longingly stare at each other. This directly contrasts the scene in episode 8, where Devi tries to reframe her mindset and stop seeing Ben as someone she is attracted to. Here, it becomes apparent that she is unable to stop thinking about him in a romantic way despite actively trying. 

The third scene is basically Eleanor saying “you dummy, she wanted to choose you!”. The writers intentionally reference the pros-cons scene from episode 1, re-affirming that Devi wants Ben. The only reason they are not together is because he is not an option. 

Then we get the line “it wasn’t always him”. Many Devi and Paxton fans believe her choice was Ben, but he took too long and now it’s too late. But when has it ever been too late for a main love interest in a rom-com? Mindy Kaling is a rom-com savant, and she knows as well as I do that it’s only ever “too late” for douchey guys who do not acknowledge the self-worth of the heroine. That’s not Ben though, he has always seen Devi for who she is. 

The heartbreak on Ben’s face is infinitely worse than Paxton’s voicemail at the end of season 1, although these scenes are meant to parallel each other. Devi and Paxton are two people who like each other but do not work as a long-term relationship. Ben and Devi are two people who work as a long-term relationship but never acknowledge their feelings for each other at the right time. It’s a tragedy just waiting to be rectified in season 3.

Season 3 Predictions

Now that I've given my analysis on why Devi and Ben are meant to be, here are some predictions I have on the Devi-Ben-Paxton love triangle for season 3.

Fabiola/Eleanor will be the ones to help Devi act on her true feelings for Ben. This one is a no-brainer for me. After sabotaging their chance to be happy in the first place, Fabiola and Eleanor will decide that they want their friend to be happy and set things right. It will also parallel Ben mending their friendship in season 1.

Paxton and Devi will have some sweet moments in the first half of the season, but not without their issues. The lack of communication and their respective status (the way they view each other) will cause them to fight. They will break-up mid-season, but the ending will leave hope for reconciliation.

On that note, I do not think they will kill the love triangle. Even though we will likely see Devi confessing her feelings for Ben and saying that she wanted to choose him all along, this is still a TV show. Contentious love triangles = buzz and money.

Ben and Aneesa will break up by mid-season, but probably earlier. Ben will find it hard to be in a relationship with Aneesa as he grapples with his feelings for Devi.

Ben will be a pillar of support to Devi as she navigates how to be a girlfriend. It’s the classic trope of the guy helping the girl win over the man of her dreams, only to realize that the person she wants is right in front of her.

 Devi and Ben’s friendship and lingering feelings will culminate in an epic finale confession and kiss. Everything that they were unable to say to each other last season will be spoken aloud in season 3.

Ben and Devi are soulmates, drawn to each other and unable to avoid their feelings. I can’t wait for them to take over my life again next year.

[sokkastyles]

Girl, I love your metas and analyses, they are so well-thought and beautifully written. Hence, I want to share with you a particular problem that has been bugging me for quite a long time: Ursa’s role in forming her children’s moral compasses, particularly Azula’s.

I chanced upon a meta on Ursa, claiming that if she laughed at the idea of burning down a city, then she certainly didn’t try to correct Azula’s cruel behaviours. Instead, Azula was capable of figuring out the rights and wrongs on her own.

I disagree with this opinion. There were, of course, debates among fans on Ursa’s stance on war effort. It’s revealed in the comic that she was forced into a marriage with Ozai. While the purpose was said to yield a bloodline of great power, I think another reason is to lend authenticity to the raging war, which can explain why Ursa, being a Roku’s descendant, wasn’t at least aloof of Fire Nation policy, if not protesting against it. During the flashback in Zuko Alone, we see Ursa crying when she found out about Lu Ten’s death. She also seemed to have a pretty soft spot for Iroh. This combined with her committing treason to save Zuko implies that she’s the kind of character who values family above everything else, who only supported the war because people she knew personally were involved in the conflict. Moreover, during the scene in the turtleduck pond, we see her sleeve dipping into the water when she gave pieces of bread to a turtleduck, which shows that Ursa was likely the one who enjoys the simplicity of life rather than the “goody two shoes” who even cares about the life of Ba Sing Se’s civilians, that brings the shade of grey to her character (I’d hoped that the Search would explore more on this side of Ursa but you can’t have everything)

Back to the main problem, we know that Ursa encouraged behaviours and social skills based on love, trust and empathy. Notice the phrase “behaviours and social skills”. A family is a unit of society, the way you interact with outsiders stems from your bonding with family members as well as your people. Azula, meanwhile, had already drawn a fine line between weaklings and strong beings (Eg: her relationship with Zuko, the way she fed the turtleducks or in a more “subtle” way: burning off the ugly flowers), punished people for excelling at things she couldn’t, showing emotions and paying attention to other people rather than her, manipulated others into doing what she wanted, openly wished for a family member’s death, etc. Ursa was deeply concerned about Azula’s growing propensity towards cruelty. We only see she scolded Azula (in the flashback in The Search and Zuko’s memories) after these internal toxic behaviours were shown.

Zuko altered the course of the ship for the sake of his crew, Iroh and Lu Ten showed genuine father-son bonding moments (their bow in Legacy of the Fire Nation) during the height of the war or in formal situations, and they hadn’t changed side yet. We, however, have stopped seeing them as cut-and-dried antagonists at these points. Ursa, within her ability, only planted the seed, it’s up to the individuals to nurture it no matter how things may seem to change. That’s why Zuko’s first step toward redemption is unfolding the lies his family has laid upon the Fire Nation people (starting with the 41st to his confrontation with Ozai), and Azula’s breakdown started with her realisation of what she’d done wrong to her so-called best friends. 

It’s also doubtful whether Ursa could have differentiated Zuko and Azula’s views on the war tho. Like, it’s obvious that Ozai was the more powerful one in their relationship, and this attempt would clash aggressively with what they’d been taught and grown up with, so yeah, there’s nothing much Ursa could do anyway.

I hate it when people say that Ursa’s love is conditional, and she made Azula think that she is a monster. If Ursa’s mindset had really worked that way, that she had raised the bar, deemed her irredeemable, and decided not to love Azula as she wasn’t as sympathetic and gentle as Zuko, she wouldn’t have tried to steer Azula’s behaviours and relationships towards a healthier path, because monsters don’t know right from wrong and are hopeless. However, I do believe that Ursa also had her own doubts about whether her love was enough (I know she said this while not knowing what was going on around her but still), whether Ozai’s ideology had been too deep-rooted in Azula’s mind that even her wouldn’t be able to reach out to (Hence the “I don’t fear you”). Furthermore, as I mentioned above, Ursa enjoyed the simplicity of life, and with her humble background, Azula’s extreme behaviours surely went against her norms; thus, creating a rift between the mother and the daughter no matter how the former tried to deny its existence. That’s why the quote “My own mother thought I was a monster” is so powerful, because it spoke out of a relationship, though louder on Azula’s part. I’m gonna say something that might seem to be totally out of context, but I appreciate ATLA for its smoothness of dialogue. Azula’s “sob story” in “The Beach”: “I could sit here and complain how our mom liked Zuko more than me, but I don't really care. My own mother thought I was a monster. She was right, of course, but it’s still hurt”. Of all people, Azula must be the one who thought that her mother’s love is conditional since she was raised to believe that everything around her is a game in which she is always the winner. Admitting Ursa loved Zuko more means admitting her defeat, her mourning for the lack of a love, which is something she’s never resigned to, so she leant on apathy, convinced herself not yearning for that love since she had accomplished a greater thing: her mother feared her. Embracing the monster status, apart from being Azula's coping mechanism against conflicted feelings, I think, was her attempt to invalidate both Ursa’s opinion and Zuko’s “victory”, so she’d always be the controller of the game because again, monsters don’t know right from wrong.             

This got much longer than I expected 😅 . TL;DR: Ursa deserves better. 

P/s: I hope I’ve phrased my opinion clearly. I’m looking forward to yours!

Thank you for the compliment. You also raise a lot of really good points and all this is really well said, and I'll try to address it all.

If she laughed at the idea of burning down a city, then she certainly didn't try to correct Azula's cruel behaviors. Azula was capable of figuring out the rights and wrongs on her own.

As you've pointed out already, we know this is wrong because we've SEEN Ursa correct Azula's cruel behavior. We also saw her correct Zuko when he was cruel to a turtleduck. Zuko also laughs at the joke about burning Ba Sing Se but then tries to appeal to Azula's empathy when she says Iroh should die so Ozai can be Fire Lord, saying how would she like it if Lu Ten wanted their father to die. Iroh MAKES the joke himself yet still we see him encourage Zuko to be empathetic in the series' present timeline and is horrified by Ozai burning him.

First of all, I want to point out how Ursa gets disproportionately criticized for not being a good enough mother or not teaching her children right from wrong, even though she clearly did. We put disproportionate pressure on mothers to be moral bastions and endlessly sacrificing saints, while I've read so many metas "explaining" Ozai's completely amoral treatment of his children as "just the way the Fire Nation is." Even by Fire Nation standards, Ozai clearly crossed a line.

Also on Azula being capable of figuring it out on her own, there is some truth to that to some extent which I will get to, but as a generalization it's just completely counter to child psychology. Children need to be taught social skills, they need to be taught right and wrong, they need boundaries. We know that children actually crave rules and rituals and boundaries and need them in order to grow up to be well-adjusted adults. Children who grow up in chaotic environments with little discipline tend to have trouble interacting with the world because they haven't been taught how to distinguish boundaries, they grow up unsafe and anxious and unable to make sense of things because they haven't been taught how to. I actually think that Ozai letting Azula run rampant contributed to her poor development in this area, and Ozai letting her do whatever she wants and then being surprised when she doesn't do exactly what he wants in "The Phoenix King" is pretty typical bad parenting. Children act the way you teach them to act.

I'd also point to Zuko's moment of "Oh, wait, we don't hit the turtleducks" as another example. Zuko does have natural empathy but didn't realize that his actions would hurt the turtleduck and cause the turtleduck to hurt him back, because children haven't developed that cognitive skill yet, and need guidance to develop it.

With Azula, I believe that she does know right from wrong to an extent, but a lot of her behavior that we see in the flashbacks reads like deliberate choices she makes. She knows both what Ozai expects from her and what she can get away with. And maybe resents her mother a little for trying to discipline her because she knows that Ursa is the less powerful parent. Azula is extremely perceptive even as a child and likely picked up on the friction between Ursa and Ozai and Zuko, and I think that's part of why she acts out around Ursa. I see a lot of Ursa criticism that treats Azula like she genuinely didn't understand why her actions were wrong, and didn't understand why Ursa was scolding her, but would say that her reactions show that she does understand. She knows enough to hide it from her mother when she's tormenting Zuko, and she also explains to her mother WHY she thinks Azulon or Iroh should die. Her actions are pretty distinct from Zuko's pretty innocent one at the turtleduck pond, and show much more deliberate intent. That's why Ursa treats them differently.

I think you raise a really interesting point about marrying Ozai to Roku's descendent being a way to bring authenticity to the war effort. The Avatar is the biggest threat to the legitimacy of Fire Nation expansion and the fact that the last Avatar was Fire Nation and still opposed the war is a constant wrinkle. And since nobody can find the current Avatar, aligning Roku's bloodline with Sozin's does seem to make sense as a political move. And it's the best reason I can think of for that particular plot point.

On Ursa as a gray character, I absolutely agree that I wish we had gotten more about how she feels about the war. It is not out of character for her to be ambivalent about the war and still be an empathetic person elsewhere. The war is a long way off, and you are right that the thing she cares most about is her family. And, like Iroh, she can compartmentalize her empathy to where it does not extend to these people that are seen as the enemy. The Fire Nation has been at war with the rest of the world for one hundred years, and in that time there has been loads of propaganda about how it was the Fire Nation's divine right, as the superior element, to invade. Like Iroh, I don't think Ursa would say she wants Ba Sing Se to be burnt to the ground, but would probably rationalize it as these savages who are so ignorant they resist what is good for them. That's the joke. It's a way to justify colonization and even people who consider themselves otherwise good are not immune to it.

Azula and Zuko, of course, laugh because the adults are laughing, because that's what kids do. But that also has its psychological affects, and both Azula and Zuko suffer from this cognitive dissonance. Azula does her best to repress it but it's still there, otherwise she wouldn't say her mother thought she was a monster. Zuko does, too, he's just not as successful at it as Azula is, but even Zuko, when he's a villain, is able to distinguish right from wrong, and has his limts, for example agreeing to leave Katara and Sokka's village alone once he has Aang. He just has a warped sense of what he is able to justify as right.

I think Ursa justified a lot in her mind in order to keep the family together, and I do headcanon that once she is exiled, she is able to finally start breaking down those walls, similar to what Zuko did. Because her exile brings the wrongs Ozai did to their family personally into the political realm. Just as Ozai's abuse of Zuko was inherently political and his understanding that he was abused was concurrent with his understanding that the Fire Nation itself was rotten, I headcanon that Ursa also came to the conclusion that the war itself was unjust, but she can't come to that conclusion until she's out of the midst of everything and can see it more clearly, just as Zuko did. I've actually been writing a fic that has an alternate take on Ursa after her exile and in it, she comes to hate the Fire Nation and everything it represents, not least because it turned her own children into little war machines. She knew that was what was happening to Azula and it's not a stretch to believe it would happen to Zuko once she was no longer able to influence him. It's likely that they would end up either hating her or dead like Lu Ten.

About Ursa apologizing to Azula for "not loving her enough" in The Search, I agree with you that she did not have enough context for that to be taken as true, and any mother under that circumstance would say that upon being forced to abandon their child that way and then feeling guilty about forgetting them. Ursa doesn't remember her own actions, she is reacting based on Azula, who is there because she clearly is missing something and needs that love, and that is what Ursa is responding to. For Ursa to do that even while Azula is threatening her life also defies the idea that Ursa was afraid of or thought Azula was a monster as a small child. Azula here is much older and is play-acting the monster but Ursa sees the girl who needs her mother.

I also think people forget or ignore that Ursa said the same thing and made the same apology to Zuko. Because, again, she doesn't remember what happened, she isn't reacting to her children based on what they have done, she is reacting to the fact that she is their mother and they needed her when she wasn't there. The fact that Zuko is standing there at all, with that scar on his face, means he needs something from her, and it's not a physical need because he's practically an adult now, he's the Fire Lord, he doesn't need his mommy to tuck him in at night. But he needs her on an emotional level, because she wasn't there, and even though it wasn't her fault, she can still recognize that.

There's also no evidence that Ursa loved Azula conditionally. We have a few scenes of her scolding Azula in the flashbacks and no scenes of them bonding but that doesn't mean those things didn't happen. Most of what we get in "Zuko Alone" is meant to tell us about Zuko's past, so Zuko is the focus, which is why we only see Azula interacting with Ursa when Zuko is present. We don't see scenes of Ursa and Azula alone because they aren't part of the story being told, but that doesn't mean they didn't happen. We don't see Ursa disproportionately criticize Azula (the way we do see Ozai do to Zuko), we see Ursa scold Azula for specific behaviors that are harmful to people around her. Ironically, we do see Azula be disproportionately criticized by an adult who focuses on the negative instead of her positive accomplishments, but that's Lo and Li criticizing her for having a hair out of place while perfectly performing lightning bending.

I DO think the show could have benefitted from more female characters interacting without a male character present, and that's a symptom of sexist writing, but to attribute that to malice on the part of the characters is just silly, and is misogynistic itself when it focuses on disproportionately criticizing a mother for not having enough loving scenes with her children, and coming to the conclusion that she must be a bad mother instead of the conclusion that mothers need more narrative focus, not just as mothers but as people. Ursa is barely a character as it is and she's fridged by the narrative as part of Zuko's story. Maybe the Netflix show will try to give her more of a life of her own and maybe that will also include exploring her relationship with Azula more, but don't tell me she's a bad mother and Azula's badness is all her fault.

And yes, you hit the nail on the head about Azula saying Ursa thought she was a monster as being about control, about being the "winner." Even in the moment when she reveals this, it's about controlling the narrative. I also agree with you about the dialogue there being excellent. The way Azula says it tells us so much. She simultaneously denies that she has a "sob story," while dismissing her friends' and brother's stories as weakness. A part of her does want to reveal that weakness and be vulnerable, which is why she says it, and the voice acting makes it clear that she's surprised at her own vulnerability, but she quickly denies that she even cares. Being a "monster" allows Azula to feel like a victim in a way that's also a power fantasy, because if Azula really is a monster, then she doesn't have to care or worry about how she could have been different, how her choices could have been different. It's a deliberate contrast to Zuko in the same scene agonizing over not knowing the difference between right and wrong, which, ironically, proves that he does, because a monster who doesn't know the difference wouldn't care the way he does. Azula resents him for caring because they aren't supposed to care, they are supposed to be the monsters.

I also agree that it's a victory over her mother and Zuko, because remember that Ozai raised them with the all-or-nothing mindset that Azula was the golden child and Zuko is the scapegoat. Zuko and Azula are a dichotomy. One deserves love and the other doesn't, one is always better than the other, and that's the way it has to be. In that system, Azula defines her existence as "not Zuko." She's better, she's the one worthy of being loved and adored. When you are used to an imbalanced dynamic, equal treatment looks like unfair treatment. "You can't treat me like Zuko," remember? Therefore if Ursa loves Zuko, who does nothing to prove his worthiness of being loved, it must be because Ursa loved Azula less. Or at least, that's how Azula sees it.

Her declaring that her mother thought she was a monster is a way to dismiss Ursa's love of Zuko because it doesn't compute with her worldview. It doesn't mean Zuko is worthy of love, it just means Ursa unfairly hated Azula. Because if it means Zuko IS worthy of love, it means that her father is wrong, and that the way he treated HER as if she had to be perfect to deserve love, is wrong, too. That's why she can't let go of this belief and why it is so tied to her seeing herself as better than Zuko.

[florrickandassociates]

hello -- I wanted to thank you for your brilliant metas, I wanted to read something of sonia saraiya's red team/blue team episode analysis calibre and it's so wonderful to have found this tumblr archive. Love it when someone loves a show for the same reasons I do (the pleasure in TGW for me has always foremost been seeing well-drawn characters interact with each other in ways that are pleasurably predictable/unpredictable). I'm rewatching s4 for the 4th time now and I was wondering about (1/2)

your take on the kiss. Josh Charles' acting choices in that moment suggest (apart from lust/heat) someone who has understood, oh shit, Alicia is *hurt*. Maybe she *is* the injured party here. It feels like the kiss is part comfort, or the only comfort Will knows how to offer Alicia. Alicia is blazingly wronged here and so magnified, which makes me think of Will in the 5x10 fantasy sequence saying "I don't like it when you're weak" (is he saying the truth? or does he have a soft spot for her weakness? I also imagine Peter, per your excellent observation of his feudal psyche, would love to help Alicia in a truly weak moment; I don't know if he'd be so all right with this blazing spitting martyr version). Anyway, do you have any thoughts on Will's motivations for kissing Alicia in that moment?

Hi hi hi and thank you for the excuse to put back on my TGW-meta-writing-hat – it's been a while and writing about TGF just isn’t the same. It’s been a while since I’ve rewatched season four, but I’ve seen RTBT a ton of times and just watched the key scenes again, so I’m ready to go!  

So, the first thing I need to say about the RTBT kiss scene is that... I don’t exactly think it’s the best example of character-driven writing on TGW. It feels very TV to me, and also like it has to happen when it happens to motivate the return of the love triangle and drive the central conflict of the rest of season four. I’ll try to set that aside, because as annoyingly cliché as I find the scene... it’s also a good scene.  

Second, I have a vague and possibly incorrect recollection of the writers saying that Will and Alicia had a ~passion~ that never faded and the line between a passionate emotion like anger and a passionate emotion like wanting to kiss someone is a thin one. So there’s passion in the moment and it suddenly transforms into a different type of passion. Meh. I’m not satisfied with that; it’s not specific enough for me. Also, it feels a liiiiittle questionable and Kalinda/Nick-esque (oh wow I had not thought about that in a while), but since I might be misremembering it, I’m just gonna let it slide instead of arguing against something it’s very possible no one actually said! 

Here's an idea I'm toying with: Will is furious because he knows Alicia’s right and he’s wrong – and he’s pissed that she thinks he’s the enemy when he’s not the one who decided to take away her partnership. He likes to think of himself as Alicia’s protector, the one who hired her when she was poison (I know that line’s from later on, but I think it’s safe to assume it was on his mind long before Hitting the Fan!). It upsets him to see that she’s angry and raw; it gets under his skin that she thinks HE – the one that fought for her! -- is the appropriate target for her frustration.  

But he knows that he and his partners did something that would piss off anyone – he says this himself in an earlier scene. He loses sight of that when Alicia acts out in mock court. She makes a snappy comment about not getting partnership, and his first thought is to clarify that he, personally, didn’t have anything to do with it? Who cares! Alicia doesn’t know the specifics, but she knows (actually said out loud, like, two scenes prior!) that Will and Diane aren’t totally free, either. That’s objectively the wrong thing, as a managing partner at a company that just fucked over an employee, to say.  

He continues to see the tension as an interpersonal conflict between himself and Alicia up until the moment just before the kiss. He seems to think that Alicia should’ve brought her concerns to him and trusted that he’d help her out. She didn't – and he feels a little betrayed. So he goes to confront her, feeling confident and justified in his anger, and then she calls him out. She looks passionate and she’s making no attempts to conceal her emotions. It startles him. He sees her weakness, he sees her pain, and he recognizes the truth of what she’s saying. She IS the injured party. She is obviously the injured party. Maybe she’s acting out in borderline (?) unprofessional ways, but she’s ABSOLUTELY the injured party. He looks at her for a few seconds, and then can’t resist reaching out to comfort her with a kiss. After all, he cares about her, he needs her to know that he's not the bad guy, and he hates seeing her this way.  

That brings me to the whole “I don’t like it when you’re weak” thing, a line I have always struggled with. I’ve probably interpreted it, like, fifty different ways over the years, and I’ve read countless great takes on the line before. I think it’s a fantastic line... but I also don’t really know what it means. Where my head’s at now: Will doesn’t like it when Alicia’s weak because of what it brings out in himself. On the most basic level, he hates seeing her be weak because he doesn’t like watching someone he loves suffer. He can’t stand to see her diminished and arguing against herself (like the job interview in 5x14) and he can’t stand to see her victimized by a company that bears his name (in the RTBT scene). He doesn’t like it when she’s weak, so he does whatever he can to give her comfort and strength. But that doesn’t really explain the tone he uses when he says the line in The Decision Tree. He's not saying that he can’t stand to see her suffer; he’s admonishing her for showing weakness!  

But what if, taking into account the context of The Decision Tree and Will’s feelings of betrayal, that line is Will re-contextualizing all of his earlier interactions with Alicia and realizing that there’s a pattern? Alicia shows weakness, he swoops in to save the day, he suffers for it. In this new view, Alicia uses her weakness to her advantage; she acts weak to manipulate men (yeah, this would be a super misogynistic view for Will to have, but a looooot of his thinking in The Decision Tree is misogynistic, too). Will, instead of blaming himself for being unable to keep himself from comforting Alicia in her moments of weakness, blames Alicia for showing weakness.  

To bring this ramble all back to RTBT, I think he wants to comfort her and acknowledge her pain. At this point in the story, I don’t think Will is thinking about his own behavior or patterns: he seems Alicia’s pain, he hates it, he reacts. He doesn’t want her to feel pained and he certainly doesn’t want her to see him as the one inflicting it, so he tries to offer her comfort in the form of a kiss. And in doing so, he makes things worse for everyone. 

[inhonoredglory]

another character based question - how do you feel about mikasa? a lot of fans dont like her, im curious about how you feel! - armin anon

Hellooooo Armin Anon. OMG it’s been forever since I had the time to sit down and do a proper meta, and I apologize.

First off, I finished the manga!!! (So, spoilers ahead for anyone else reading this.) I had to lie down after reading 139. It’s a tremendous story and I’m still taking it all in. The set pieces and personal/emotional stakes of everything that happens is just astounding. If it’s one thing Isayama does good, it’s the gut-wrenching personal anguish that underlies the action. I’m absolutely floored. My favorite bit was probably the timey-wimey stuff in Paths and Eren. That blew my freaking mind. But onto Mikasa!!

A Cruel Yet Beautiful World

I remember way back when I started the anime that I started liking Mikasa first out of the group. I liked how sullenly silent and no-nonsense she was, and I liked her loyalty to Eren. Her emotion, especially when Eren died in Trost, was palpable and terrifyingly beautiful. Her grief was incredibly realistic––rushing off with a death wish that even she couldn’t succumb to in the end, because of the drive to fight that she got from Eren. In a world like SNK, her relentlessness breaking through her grief was incredibly moving. And her philosophy is basically the driving theme of SNK: “This is a cruel world, and yet so beautiful.”

This is the same moral message she gives Eren when he can’t find the strength in him to fight Annie––and gives him that warm, understanding, inscrutable smile that allows him to finally accept his own monsters, fight Annie, and save her and Armin. (One of my favorite panels of her from the manga, actually.) Mikasa is basically the first character we meet who embodies this contradictory morality, which grows to engulf SNK and other characters as well (Levi, Reiner, and Armin especially come to mind). Which could be why I was drawn to her at the start, since the complex moral outlook of SNK was the primary reason I fell hard for this story.

(And gosh, it’s tragic to realize that it’s teaching moments like the scene above that made Eren into the person who could influence his own child self to murder, the person who could wipe out so much of humanity, the person who could take Ymir’s challenge to free her by destroying the love of the person who cared the most about him. I’m still processing yo.)

Acker-parallels

I started really analyzing Mikasa when I had to defend her from a friend of mine who accused her of resenting Levi (for beating up Eren) and that’s why she attacked him so violently in the RTS serumbowl. Because of my research into rebutting that, a lot of my affection for Mikasa now comes in seeing the little ways in which she cares and trusts other people, including Armin, Levi, Gabi, and Jean. And her quiet sensibility that goes beyond her love and protectiveness of Eren.

With Levi in particular, I find a lot I like about her. Because you can definitely see her annoyance at him, but she also trusts him more than anyone else in the Corps outside of Armin. After Levi’s violent encounter with Historia, she was the only one who implicitly trusted Levi’s judgement, backing up Armin’s more reasoned logic. She sees beyond her own emotions and even moral feelings and realizes the world is cruel enough that sometimes people have to do dark things to help others and survive.

This is very much the same statement Levi made to the 104th when he had asked them to follow Erwin’s orders when the commander’s plans were questionable on the surface: “Do you trust him? Those dumb enough to say yes… come with me.” These two understand each other on a moral level, and they ask for their comrades’ loyalty without demanding it, because they each know that everyone’s conscience is their own.

There’s a clear parallel between Mikasa and Levi, not only because of their Ackerman heritage and sensibilities (loyal to a fault to their chosen person, impossibly strong, quiet and grim), but their frustration when they cannot protect the people they are responsible for. They both know they are the strongest around, and if they cannot fulfill on that power, a lot of people will die.

There are many moments in which Mikasa puts aside her personal feelings to do her soldierly duty, from leaving Eren to help with the evacuation of Trost to leaving Eren and Armin to fight the Colossal Titan alone in Shigonshina.

And then there’s the fact that Levi’s the one who could break past Mikasa’s headspace and distraction so that she can do the right thing. He understands her strong emotion, he respects it, but he also knows when that has to be put aside for the greater good. But he doesn’t put her down for having those emotions, either.

Strength from Eren, Humanity from Armin

Mikasa’s love and loyalty to Eren challenges her tremendously after the timeskip and her sorrow at Eren’s change is what really stands out to me about her character in the Marley arc. The absolute grief in her eyes when she tells Eren what he’s done is devastating, and it shows just how much goodness and compassion she does have.

And yet she longs to understand Eren, to trust him, to believe there can be something redeeming, and not merely jaded and tired, in what he taught her so many years ago––to fight, to win, to live.

There’s such a difference between these same words said here by Mikasa, so many years later, after so much heartbreak, to the anger and flame that were in them when she first heard them, back when she realized that this was the way of the world. That death and killing happens in the natural world everyday and that’s how you survive. That the world is both cruel and beautiful.

And yet as the years wore on, as Mikasa grew closer to others, found purpose in protecting others, sought a life with Eren… as she wandered further into the forest of life and society and relationships, she lost some of that simple injunction... to live is to fight, to fight is to win. She, like so many of the 104th and the others on this journey, found that it’s not enough to just fight and live and be satisfied. We really want it all to mean something, to have our actions be redemptive. To allow ourselves to believe that we do what we’re doing because we’re not just saving ourselves, but saving others, “saving the world” like Yelena points out (in the forest therapy session pfff). And it’s that drive for something bigger in our actions that grieves her so much with Eren, because as she wants her own actions to be fundamentally good and selfless, she wants his actions to be moral as well.

So while Eren is the person that frustrates Mikasa and motivates her to become stronger and braver than she ever was, Armin is the person who humanizes Mikasa and allows her the space to be gentle and vulnerable. She comforts Armin, confides in him, puts her faith in him, and puts her life in his hands.

She trusts Armin with Eren, and she values Armin’s intellect and compassion, qualities she doesn’t have in nearly as much quantities as he does: “There are only so many lives I can value. And… I decided who those people were six years ago. So... you shouldn’t try to ask for my pity. Because right now, I don’t have time to spare or room in my heart.”

This bit from her confrontation with Ymir and Historia was a defining moment for me with Mikasa. It’s honest and realistic in a way that few of us care to admit about ourselves, and it’s just super chilling and badass coming from her, too. It also shows how much she fights for Armin and Eren both. They are the two people she loves the most in the world, and she never gave up on saving either of them––from death or from themselves.

I’m looking back on Trost now and finding so much irony with the ending to SNK. In Trost, she was the one to give up on Eren, telling Armin that it was hopeless to try to extract Eren’s personality from his Titan form. And yet, like in the end, it’s always been between Armin and Mikasa to try to salvage Eren’s humanity. In Trost, Armin tells Mikasa to leave––to go do what she’s good at (saving lives)––and to entrust Eren to him.

It’s a huge expression of both Mikasa’s trust in Armin, and her belief in Armin’s abilities and friendship for Eren. And in the end, it’s the two of them again debating on if there’s any humanity left in Eren. The bond they share is intimate and deep. With all the military doubting Eren and scheming to take away his Titan (with even Jean and Connie unavailable to them emotionally), it’s only Armin and Mikasa against the world––the only two people who can truly consider Eren’s actions and hold off on judging him. And you can feel their love for him even as they doubt him.

And like back then, it has always been Armin who understands Eren most, the one who recognizes his own evil and Eren’s and finds a redemption in having others stop you, because you cannot stop yourself.

And that’s the thing I really take away from SNK and from Mikasa’s journey, that we all have devils inside us, and yet there is still beauty to be found, within us and in the world––from the natural wonders that Armin dreams of, to the comfort of purpose and companionship that Mikasa has in Eren. Love and wonder is what redeems us of our devils. And yet love itself is complicated, and can turn ugly in its obsession. That giving up that love is what makes the love selfless and beautiful, what absolves us of the selfishness within us. That’s what Mikasa learned. And in the end, she was able to release that love for the good of the world.

So I guess to sum up, I really love Mikasa. I can see why her dogged loyalty to Eren might annoy some fans, but I think there’s a lot more to her than simply that, and in fact, her journey and growth is heart-rending and one of the most symbolic arcs of SNK and fundamental to its entire theme. She’s a badass with a lot of emotion and depth behind her cold mask.

[brokensoulmates2000]

Sooo, this was heavily inspired by many bthump’s metas that I will be linking accordingly. Hope my rambling is intelligible lol. Btw, this includes a major spoiler of the ending from Naoki Urasawa’s Monster, and some images with Casca being raped by the Beast of Darkness. Proceed with care.

To me, the Beast of Darkness is one of the most interesting concepts in Berserk. A physical manifestation of Guts’ self-hatred, malice, trauma, and pretty much anything negative inside of him. Not only does it constantly push Guts to chase after Griffith (as we see when it calls Casca “the wound Griffith left”), but it’s a manifestation of Guts’ neediness. The night Gambino sneaks into Guts’ tent to kill him, he says that he sold Guts to Donavan bc 1. Guts was a bad omen for being born from a corpse and ergo, responsible for the death of Shizu and all the bad things that happened after it 2. Guts followed Gambino around like “a lonely puppy”. And I mean, the imagery to suggest it is kinda amazing imo

On a side note, I checked two different translations and they gave different ideas from what Gambino said, but in general, it just furthers the point that Guts seeks Gambino’s love and attention like a puppy does for its owner.

Honestly, I trust the second translation more than the first one, but just putting it out there lol.

So as bthump said here, the parallels between Gambino and Griffith are undeniable, therefore it’s no wonder Guts seeks in him the love he couldn’t get from his father figure. When Guts hears Griffith’s speech to Charlotte, he wants to seek his approval and recognition as he sought Gambino’s. Later, he compares both of their attitudes:

Nobody needs me to explain what happened in Guts’ quest and its fucked up results. So, while Guts was looking for revenge, the beast was foreshadowed while Guts was walking in the woods after killing Rosaline, and it appeared again when Guts knew that Casca ran away.

Let’s put a pin in the beast emphasizing Guts being alone and burning in his malice, fear and hatred cause it’s going to be relevant later. But for now, let’s talk about another aspect of the beast: how it longs for Griffith and to be closer to him.

(On a side note, don’t you guys love that the wound is drawn exactly like the beast’s eyes?)

The beast spits out all of the complicated feelings Guts refuses to accept or pay attention to, and we know how hard it is for Guts to continue sticking to Casca’s side. He has her no patience, he tried to sexually assault her (twice if you count how awkwardly close he got to her in Godo’s cave after making a mess of herself, chapter 93 to any one who wants to refresh their memory). And the beast makes it clear that Guts needs to lose everything to keep chasing after Griffith, and it’s working relentlessly for that to happen:

And what the beast says here resembles a lot what Gambino and the other mercenaries would say:

Gathering my thoughts again, we have the beast as a traumatized, thirsty for revenge version of Guts’ puppy need for love, acceptance and attention that also works to self-loathe him even more. The beast insists to Guts to kill those he cherishes in order to make him succumb to his darkness, therefore, making him a monster.

The beast wants Casca and the gang, those warm lights, as food for Guts’ malice. Then, he will be able to pursue the true light that burns him and crash it. I think I’ve made my case showing how the beast is ultimately looking for Guts to be alone, consumed by his negative feelings and kill Griffith. And here’s my main point: if Guts kills Griffith, he completely loses his humanity and that’s the last thing he needs. This is when the pin I put in how the beast talks comes in handy: the beast wants Guts to be alone, consumed in the darkness forever, to crush the light that he still longs for.

Even in this part of the journey, Guts continues to consider Griffith his true light and he has a lot of reason to do so. He met Guts’ emotional needs, gave him a place to belong and loved him and if he kills Griffith, he would be proving that everything the beast says it’s right. In my eyes, Griffith became a monster because he believed all of what his insecurities, repressed guilt and trauma said about him, so he was consumed by them. If Guts kills the last thing that brings him light and warmth, he would be proving right his own insecurities, guilt and trauma, be consumed by revenge and turn into a monster too.

All of this to say… I don’t think Miura was planning for Guts to kill Griffith. Not only because Guts doesn’t stand a chance against him, but this revenge lust he has is shown as a terrible thing that would end him. His feelings for Griffith are too precious in the end, they continue to affect him even in this point of the story, and they actively stand in the way of Guts becoming a monster (one of the many reasons the beast is eager to chase after Griffith). I can only speculate about what ending Miura intended to give us, but I’d like to imagine it as them realizing that their feelings for each other continues to keep a human part of themselves alive, burning, and they can’t kill each other.

This ending would resemble Monster’s a lot, in the sense that Tenma can’t kill Johan because if he does, he becomes a monster (and proves Johan that his whole philosophy of “everyone is equal only in death” is correct. What Johan ultimately wanted was for the most noble man he’d ever known to get blood on his hands). Johan and Tenma’s conflict is ultimately a philosophical one (besides Guts lacks the morality compass of Tenma lol), but it serves to illustrate my point. Continuing with Monster, who shoots Johan in the end is a third party that wasn’t part of the conflict. However, Berserk does have a third party that is indispensable to its conflict.

Casca intervening in the last duel between Guts and Griffith would be… everything I long for and need lol. Berserk has proved time and time again that victims kill their abusers, so Casca has no reason to be the exception. Besides, she wanted to interfere in the two previous duels, but didn’t because 1. Griffith ordered her not to get between them and 2. was dragged out of it. In the last duel, I doubt Griffith has any power to hold her down and I doubt she would let anyone stop her.

Idk, I just think her killing Griffith, or Guts or even both of them is more satisfactory. It would drive home that 1. darkness cannot exist without light and vice versa, 2. you turn into a monster when you believe and succumb to your insecurities as well as your trauma. This would be a happy ending at least to me. I’m craving for a moment of connection between Guts and Griffith, and they later dying together by the hand of the woman they used as a device to channel their sexual desire for each other. Besides, it would be a good ending for Casca’s terrible character development. All of this assuming Miura was telling the truth when he said that Guts would remain human, and viewed a happy ending as one that closed its themes correctly.

The alternative ending is Guts killing Griffith and being consumed completely by his own beast, which… it’s tragic and part of me loves it, but idk. It would feel empty somehow.

But I guess we’ll never know what Miura had in store for us. However, we have fanfiction, free time and Tumblr so we won’t be short on speculations lol.

Btw, I told my bestie about this theory and they really summoned up my thoughts on this one: “They should just make out at this point. There’s nothing else to do, they can’t kill each other”

And to me, that’s the only fair answer lol

[onebizarrekai]

v3′s art is comically terrible for a professionally distributed game in a series: a compilation

in this not-essay I will list all of the mistakes and problems I have spotted in v3′s art. don’t worry, it’s entirely for fun and I’m doing this on a whim, so please feel free to not take this seriously but also it’s hilarious and embarrassing how ridiculous this is like what happened did they speedrun the whole production or what

see, there are some things you can take as meta like “they made it bad on purpose to allude to the downfall of tv shows that have been on air for much too long” but I have a very strong feeling this is not the case due to the nature of some of these errors

disclaimer, the more I study this art, the more I fear that the artists were underpaid and underslept, so if this is in fact the case, I am so sorry to all of them but also I’m going to make fun of the art anyway

anyway let’s get started!

if you study this image for longer than 5 seconds, you will see that kaede is the only one fully shaded and keebo is literally just his normal sprite pasted into the image. every other character is just an ordinary ref, hence most of them facing the exact same direction with neutral expressions on their faces. it looks like a bad edit, and is probably one of the worst pieces of art in the game. it kind of gets better from here on, but my roasting will not.

with that out of the way, here’s the problem that officially bothers me the most and clarifies my viewpoint of “this is not meta and an actual lack of company communication”

this freaking cg, which seems normal at a glance, but some wiseass was like “oh, kaede is a girl, so obviously she’s going to be shorter than the Male Protagonist™” ah, that’s funny. because if you look at the character bios, kaede is, in fact, one inch taller than shuichi and not like 6 inches shorter as she is shown here.

also shuichi’s shoulder is disproportionate and horrendous and he looks vaguely like a jojo character, but I wasn’t even thinking about that until right now.

thanks guys, 50% of the fandom who has never bothered to check these bios thinks that kaede is like 5′3 (did the developers really put so little thought into her to the point where drawing her correctly in the game didn’t even matter??)

also I would like to point out that, even though this isn’t related to the art itself, yes, a character kaede’s size being only 117 lbs is unfeasible, but this applies to literally every character in danganronpa ever and it’s not new news that it’s unrealistic

update: someone in the tags informed me that in versions of the game that use centimeters, like the japanese version, kaede is actually shorter than shuichi, which just adds another thing to the list of weird decisions the localization team made for no reason. that said, after confirming this, kaede is 167 cm in the original, while shuichi is 171 cm, which are approximately 5′6 and 5′7 respectively, but one inch is still nowhere near as drastic as it is depicted above. (in spite of this, I would rather depict kaede as slightly taller, so I’m probably going to keep doing that.)

the journey continues!

bro if you want kaede to have shoulder length hair then stick to it to begin with

you can pretend this is at an angle all you want but they definitely committed the shorter kaede sin a second time

wait a goddamn second.

DO YOU SEE THIS

no………… it wasn’t kaede who shrank. it was shuichi who got taller

speaking of which, can we talk about how shady the perspective is in this elevator pic? look at shuichi and kokichi in comparison to kaede. kokichi, who is canonically 7 inches (edit: or 5, if you’re loyal to the original) shorter than kaede, looks taller than kaede. he’s growing too. what steroids are these gays taking

running into the room, electric boogaloo: I don’t think tsumugi is supposed to be the same height as kokichi

gonta… gonta you’re lookin a bit like a jojo character there

I love how kaito’s head looks kind of like it was pasted onto his body. why is he the same size as shuichi? shouldn’t he be high school bully size or something? his torso is teensy

ah yes, white angie.

I love this cg but why is shuichi’s right hand so much bigger than his left hand

I also love how this cg looks like they literally took pictures of trees and pasted them into the background, especially on the left. the shadows are so weird, especially closer to the ceiling, it’s difficult for me to believe they didn’t do exactly that.

return of Enlarged shuichi

puberty update: kokichi is now taller than shuichi in spite of shuichi never missing leg day. what crimes will he commit

I have to mention it, guys. this has to be one of the worst danganronpa cgs. kokichi’s facial proportions look atrocious. look at the way his face sticks out like his jaw is in the wrong place. his scarf is a pasted texture. that’s it. this moment was so iconic but the cg just looks so… so… off. like something is terribly wrong, but you can’t put your finger on it.

you know what? let’s get into that ‘pasted texture’ thing.

let’s imagine you’re an artist working on a professional game. you’re assigned to draw cgs of kokichi ouma, who has a checkered scarf from hell. sure, it will be terrible to draw, but you only have to draw it once at a time! plus, perspective is pretty important, right? can you be bothered? nah, actually. let’s just copy paste a checkered pattern into the cg, because I’m sure nobody will notice. it’ll blend right in with the other cgs that someone actually put effort into drawing his scarf in, right?

no. the answer is no and I very much noticed. this genuinely looks terrible and I would understand taking a shortcut like that in fanart or even an indie game but this is a full price pc and console distributed game

(an addition: look at kokichi’s TINY HANDS in that last one)

meanwhile, they straight up forgot to color in kokichi’s scarf in this cg.

dude. I forgot about whatever the hell this cg was. anyway look at keebo please just look at him

lovin kaito’s baby arms

real talk, maybe you could argue that he’s missing muscle because he’s deathly sick, but most of his cgs don’t line up with this, and his arms just look disproportionate to his torso size (granted this is a consistent problem across all danganronpa games and a lot of characters have this weird problem, like hajime, but also kaito is bigger than hajime so I kind of have higher expectations of him) maybe it’s his stupid goatee and the way he reminds me of yasuhiro?? it creates this illusion that he’s older than he is and so I keep expecting him to look more like an adult

oh, also rantaro is missing some of his accessories in that video he made–you know the one–but I don’t wanna go back and screenshot it

also you may have noticed that I’m skipping all of the monokub cgs because I literally do not care about them and I’m not even bothering to check and see if they have artistic mistakes in them

JIMMY NEUTRON???

hey um uh kaito you seem to be missing your neck

hey guys do you like my pregame fanart

so, that done, the sprites are also pretty terrible at times. they’re not as interesting to go through, however, and downloading the full sprite sets for every character and studying every single one of them will drive me insane, so I’ll just sum some of the ones I noticed up. I made things for kaede and shuichi before deciding I wasn’t going to get into it, so here are these.

that said, other mistakes include kokichi missing his purple highlights in all of the sprites encompassing a specific pose, stray pixels all over the place on everyone, and everyone also has heavily inconsistent shading, but literally all I think about is how pregame shuichi is unshaded and two of kaede’s pregame sprites have glaring outfit change mistakes in them

anyway, thank you for taking the time to read my ridiculous ramble. in all seriousness, there’s this looming presence of some lack of communication in the development team, like with all the art and design inconsistencies, pieces and sprites that look rushed, stray pixels, and missing basic proportional stuff. these are the kinds of things that you supposedly have to pretty much have in the bag in order to get jobs in professional businesses, so it’s really weird to me that this game suffers from so many of these problems. it’s like they tried to make the art so much more crisp than the other games, but it fell on its face as they realized it was going to take longer to draw everything and they started to rush. it’s weird, because the coloring itself looks normal–it’s just sloppily drawn, and the proportions are a mess once put into the context of perspective. many of the cgs look like they were drawn by different people, and I’m still not over the fact that half of kokichi’s cgs have his scarf pasted in as a texture.

the moral of the story is that if you’re selling a game at full price that also happens to be in a series that has had 3 very good games in it already the stakes should probably be higher than this. v3 has been out for more than 3 years and it’s still $40 (did it cost more than that before? I sure hope not), and the overarching quality of the game is just not as high as the other games. I’m not saying that the other games don’t have any problems with their art at all, they’re just not as glaringly obvious and every artistic choice in those games feels intentional.

regardless, I had a blast roasting the art at 2am, so maybe you got a kick out of all this chaos.

[consumeconstantly]

Speak My Name In Tongues

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Summary: Bruce Wayne is determined to get his daughter to safety and aid (read: take over for) the Parisian heroes in capturing their supervillains of over six years. Unfortunately, these two goals are in direct conflict. (all of biodad bruce things can be read as stand alones but I do post in chronological order)

________________________________________________

Let it be said that Bruce Wayne is a persistent man. 

When he wants something, he does not stop on the first or second failed attempt. It doesn’t matter if the world believes something to be impossible. It doesn’t matter if he fails spectacularly to achieve his goal multiple times, in fashions that would likely result in any man of lesser wealth becoming the laughing stock of the global community for months. In order for him to cease his pursuit, he must come to the realization that whatever he’s pursuing is not worth the effort. This is a very rare occasion. Most times when Bruce comes to this conclusion, his decision can be traced back to the trauma of his parents death and the subsequent consequences of his vigilante life style (read: not pursuing Jason’s death, letting Barbara get shot.)

Thus, when Marinette turns down his offer of a safer life, he will not take her rejection at face value. A lesser man might. But Bruce is not any such thing.

Anything that Marinette is involved in-- and he finds that she does a lot-- all oh-so-coincidentally happen to be things that Wayne Enterprises invests in as well. He marks down each and every charity event and gala that she is scheduled to attend and makes an appearance there as well. When he finds that she supports all of her collége friends in their pursuits, he attends too.

Somehow, she manages to skillfully evade being drawn into any long conversation with him and always ensures that there’s a third person involved when he even says hello. If Bruce weren’t trying so hard to have a talk with her, he’d say that her ability to do so was really quite impressive and spoke to the reach of her network. But again, Bruce is trying to convince his daughter that he’s not safe in Paris by herself when the League most likely has a bounty on her head. If Talia finds out that he had a daughter not borne by her-- she’s certainly changed in recent years, becoming more volatile and much less like the woman he fell in love with all those years ago.

He half believes that with Marinette’s wit, intellect, and escape abilities, she may even be able to hold her own against the League. Unfortunate that the League has weapons training and she does not.

“Marinette,” Bruce approaches her at a Bourgeois evening party. She has friends in high places, that’s for certain. Chloe Bourgeois works at her company in the public relations department as does Adrien Agreste, which definitely turned a lot of heads in the fashion industry as nobody expected the boy to work for anybody but his father, nor did they expect him to stop his modelling career in the prime of his life. For modelling works, she turns to Juleka Couffaine and occasionally Olympic hopefuls Kagami Tsurugi, Alix Kubdel, Ondine and Kim Le Chien.  Thanks to her connections to Rose Lavillant, she’s produced an entire line of scents that go with MDC’s evening wear. MDC is extensively covered by Aurore Boreale, one of the youngest talk show hosts in the industry, Alya Cesaire, a young journalist who’s won international acclaim with her writing, and Nadja Chamack, a Senior Executive producer of TVi. Though Bruce is rather impartial to the music industry, she’s well known for working with international singers Jagged Stone, Clara Nightingale, and Luka Couffaine as well as an up and coming EDM artist named Nino Lahiffe. In the film sector, she works closely with Tom Astruc and Graham Industries, with Adrien’s cousin, Felix. 

As the saying goes, Who you know is everything.

Marinette smiles, teeth bared. Even the way she stands is sharp. 

It’s difficult reconciling the girl in front of him with the pictures he saw while doing background checks on her, or even the girl he saw at the bar just three nights ago. At least, it’s difficult for Bruce to reconcile her when she’s around him; Marinette seems to be very much the same girl around her friends, which is almost just as frightening. When she’s with Adrien or Alya of Kagami, it’s as if her parent’s death didn’t even happen. All smiles and sunshine and good will. She still attends all of the charity events she signed up for, has increased the amount of hours she spends volunteering at homeless shelters and akuma shelters-- and Bruce has no clue in hell how Paris’ supervillain situation has gone unchecked for so long, but he already has several agents tracking down Hawkmoth and the Miraculous team to no avail-- and goes to work on a normal schedule. Since Tom and Sabine’s death, she’s taken no time off. 

In the presence of Bruce Wayne, however, there’s a great shift in her demeanor. There is nothing warm about her, and despite the fact that Marinette is his daughter and that she’s more than a full foot shorter than him, he finds himself wary of her. That says something, considering the types of people he faces down as Batman near daily.

For the first time, she allows him to approach without dodging him. 

“M. Wayne.” Marinette begins to meander to a less public place, all while maintaining a pretty media smile and waving to acquaintances as she passes them. The moment the door closes behind him, a flip is switched. 

“Leave me alone,” she growls. “I don’t want or need your protection.”

“Your parents were murdered.”

“You don’t think I know that? I was the one who found their corpses.”

“They’ll come after you, next.” The League of Assassins never leaves their jobs half done. Marinette is more of an achilles heel than Tom and Sabine were-- despite not being in her life, he cares for her. He can’t deny that if she were murdered, he’d probably get caught up in a fit of rage. The Lazarus Pits have not been good for his mental state over the years.

Marinette crosses her arms, sleeves fluttering around her. “You think you know who did it.”

“I don’t think I know; I’m sure who did it.”

“No,” Marinette says in a strangely detached tone. “You think you know who did it. You don’t actually know, do you, Dark Knight?”

Bruce’s stomach fills with dread. Something about her statement makes him feel nauseous. Queasy, even. “I do. The League of Assassins--”

“You think everything revolves around you, don’t you? Bruce Wayne and Batman are not the only ones with enemies.”

“You’re suggesting that you have enemies who would be willing to kill your parents?” Bruce isn’t sure how to take this. Marinette does have a fairly large following, runs in the most powerful and influential Parisian circles, and has money to spare. But as far as his research told him, she didn’t do anything to egregiously offend anybody, besides maybe one Lila Rossi and Chloe Bourgeois, though the latter of the two rectified their relationship eventually. 

“I don’t,” Marinette denies. “But Ladybug does.”

“The superhero.” Is his age finally catching up to him?

“The superhero,” Marinette agrees, looking at Bruce contemplatively. 

“Ladybug and I-- we’re close,” Marinette settles on. “Close enough for our bakery to become a safe house of sorts for the Miraculous team. Hawkmoth--no, Pavona. She either acted out of anger for her past with me or just wanted to strike a blow at the Miraculous team.”

Bruce feels a migraine coming on. It’s on days like this when he wishes he were a drinking sort of man. “Why would Pavona be upset with you?”

Marinette laughs, humorlessly. “World’s greatest detective, huh? Maybe you’ll figure it out eventually.”

He gets the feeling that their conversation is quickly coming to a close, and figures that whatever issue Marinette and Pavona have is something he can decipher later, “It doesn’t seem like Pavona has done much with this information. The Miraculous Team seems to be in high spirits, and there haven’t been any akumatizations in the past two weeks.”

Another dry laugh. “Wrong move at the wrong time. And besides Ladybug and you, nobody else knows.”

Marinette pushes past him, back to the door, back to the party. She pauses at the door. “I’ll put the two of you in contact. Until then, keep a lid on you and your operative’s emotions. I’m sure trained agents like yourselves can restrain yourself from feeling anger or sorrow for a while.”

Bruce is left with two horrifying realizations: Marinette is in a situation where she’s in over her head, and Sabine and Tom’s deaths have not been publicized.

#

Batman and Bruce have never liked magic or metas, and Ladybug seems to be both. It doesn’t help that she’s so high strung and seems to be inexplicably angry at him from the moment that he steps foot at their prearranged meetup.

“I sent you the ground rules if you want to operate in Paris. Forward it to your operatives. Follow the rules or leave.”

“I’m here to take down Hawkmoth,” Batman says with a bone-weary tiredness. 

Ladybug crosses her arms in a fashion that’s achingly familiar. “I know that. That’s why I’m giving you and your people the ground rules and a chance. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be allowed here.”

“Ladybug, you and your team have failed to catch Hawkmoth for six years now.”

“You and your team have been fighting the same set of villains for over thirty years. I wonder which one of us is really worse off.”

Batman grimaces. 

The heroine looks out at the night sky and sighs. “Look, this is a very stressful situation. Pavona acted out in one of the worst ways possible, and even though she and Hawkmoth seem to be MIA, it’s still not ideal.”

He remembers that Marinette said Ladybug and her parents were close. Batman stumbles over his words. He’s never been the best at comforting people, and healthy coping mechanisms simply don’t run in the family. There’s definitely a reason why he and all of his children take to vigilantism so well. “Tom and Sabine-- they were great people.”

Ladybug stills. 

Batman doesn’t know how old she is, or how old any of the Miraculous team is, besides from Chloe Bourgeois, who used to be Queen Bee. Something in the way her shoulders hunch, how her jaw trembles, and eyes water makes Batman feel like she’s just a child. But she can’t be. Not if she’s been protecting a city for six years. If he had to guess her age, he’d put her in her mid to late twenties, maybe even early thirties. 

“They were the most loving people I’ve ever known,” Ladybug says. “It was a privilege to know them.”

He’s not sure who made the decision to not release Tom and Sabine’s death to the public, but Batman recognizes it as a tactical decision. It only took a short amount of time to hack into security cameras near Marinette’s residence and filter through the sighting of the Miraculous Team at Tom & Sabine’s Boulangerie, stopping to chat with Marinette or one of her parents, sometimes eating there, sometimes staying the night, using their living room as a gathering point. From there, it’s not difficult to realize that Marinette or Ladybug is keeping this information from the rest of their team in order to ensure that their civilian or superhero identities don’t get compromised by an akuma or a sentimonster.

In comparison to the Scarecrow, who makes his victims fight their worst fears, Batman can’t help but think that turning people into their insecurities and angers is worse. At least with Scarecrow, there’s a chance that people can win against whatever they’re fighting. Once a Parisian is turned into an akuma or sentimonster, they just have to hope that somebody else will come in and save the day. Victimhood with the cruelest twist, similar to when the Joker tried to make Dick into the Joker Jr.

“Pavona. What’s her deal with Marinette?” 

Ladybug’s laugh is hollow and familiar. “Didn’t Marinette tell you to figure it out on your own?”

“I need to know,” Batman insists. “I want to protect her. I don’t want her to get hurt like that again.”

“You have noble intentions, Batman,” Ladybug says quietly. “A kind heart. But you are mistaken in thinking that Pavona can hurt Marinette anymore. Even if Pavona tries to, she won’t be able to. Tom and Sabine-- they were the weak link. Everyone else she loves is safe.”

Ladybug pauses, looks sideways at Batman, then stares out at the Parisian skyline again. “Everyone except for you. You’re not safe, here in Paris. You know that, don’t you?”

“She--” his mouth dries. There’s a lot of information to process, but he focuses on one thing. “She loves me?”

He doesn’t think he’s heard those words come out of any of his kid’s mouths. He knows that all of them do love each other in their own messed up ways and knows that his sons and daughters are more likely to show their affection in actions instead of words, but Marinette is a biological child that he’s never interacted with before this month. How can she love him when all he’s done is push her away?

“She loves you.” Ladybug closes her eyes. “But that makes her a fool. She’s clung to the hope that she’d get to know you for years. Look where that’s gotten her. She gets to meet you at the price of her parents' lives. So please, don’t mess this up. The best way to protect her is by making sure that you’re safe. Really, I’d want you to leave Paris and forget about her. She’ll be okay. We’ll keep her safe.”

Batman says nothing for a time. Ladybug is right in thinking that Marinette shouldn’t love him, but she’s not right in her belief that she can protect her. After all, Tom and Sabine are still dead. “But I can make sure no one hurts her. I may not be someone she interacts with normally, but I can’t see her die.”

Ladybug makes a keening sound in the back of her throat. “I know, Batman. We’re not as trained as you and your team. I know you want to keep her safe. That’s why I’m letting you and your team help us. Because we’re just not enough.”

“You’ve done a lot to keep this city safe.” He wants to be mad at her for involving a civilian family, but he can’t find it in him. She seems so young. Does she have parents? Do her parents know that she’s Ladybug?

“But not enough.” She wanders to the edge of the building, yoyo in hand. “When this is all over-- maybe the two of you can spend some time getting to know each other.”

Batman stares at the spotted heroine. “Maybe someday.”

“That’s not very convincing.” Ladybug turns so that he can’t see her face. “Be kind to her. She’s alone.”

“She has you. She has your team.” Neither Bruce nor Batman has been very good at comfort during a time of loss. 

Ladybug fiddles with the chain around her neck. Two rings as a pendant. She clenches her fist around them and goes still for a moment. “We’re too similar to comfort each other. And we both agreed that telling the team… it would be disastrous. Tom and Sabine were parents to all of us. Pavona is scheduled to come back soon. If we tell them now, it might end in another mass akumatization. That’s something we have to avoid.”

Pavona is coming back? How did Ladybug even know that she left? How— 

Batman stills. The muggy Parisian warmth is only alleviated by a brief breeze that makes Ladybug’s hair ties fly in the wind. Anger wells up in the back of his throat, and he feels the Lazarus in him spike, knows that behind the white film of his cowl, his eyes are turning green. “You know who Pavona is. Why hasn’t she been brought in yet? Why—”

Ladybug could have prevented Tom and Sabine’s death. She could have saved Marinette the loss of her parents. 

Marinette could have retained her innocence. Been kept out of the world of superheroes and supervillains, been kept safely on the sidelines if only Ladybug weren’t so selfish, wasn’t so foolish to bring in a civilian family with no training and no background.

“Marinette and I have known for a long time,” Ladybug cuts him off, and he’s ready to put his hands to her throat, but no. Justice, not vengeance. He will make sure that Ladybug’s wrongdoings are brought to light. He will right her wrongs.  “For four years, it was Hawkmoth and Mayura. Once Pavona showed up, we thought-- we thought that between her and Hawkmoth that she’d be the lesser of the two evils. We had no clue who Hawkmoth was, but we knew that they were working together. Pavona was left free to roam in hope that she’d lead us to Hawkmoth. That we could finally end the fight.”

 Ladybug’s back straightens. She turns, and her eyes are all blue steel and pain. It’s then that Batman realizes that Ladybug truly did love Tom and Sabine with her whole heart.

“I see that I was wrong. Hawkmoth kills indiscriminately. But Pavona-- her grudges run deep. Mayura was the kindest of the three. The reason Pavona killed Tom and Sabine was petty.” Ladybug’s voice crumples, as do her legs. She hunches in on herself, hugging her knees. Batman watches on from a distance. 

What was it she said? That she and Marinette were too similar to comfort each other? One day, Batman may find himself furious at Ladybug for making the decisions she did. But right now, all he sees is a child. 

“I’m sure you’ve looked into Marinette’s past,” Ladybug starts. 

Batman makes a noise of affirmation, but she clearly wasn’t looking for permission to go on. She was trying to collect herself in order to tell a story.

“There was a transfer all the way back in collège. She was very popular amongst her classmates. Beautiful, well connected, charismatic. There was no way people wouldn’t love her.” 

Ladybug glances back at him. “Come, sit, Monsieur. I do not know you well, but I don’t bite.”

Bruce— Bruce does not want to sit with her. But Batman says that he has to hear her out. To give her a chance, at least. Batman has made mistakes over the course of his career as well, his actions and inactions affecting too many for him to keep track of. He would be a hypocrite if he didn’t let Ladybug speak, even if Sabine and Marinette are two people he never would have dreamed of involving. Still, he keeps one hand firmly on a batarang. The videos shows that not much damage can be done to the superheroes when they’re suited up, save for attacks with magic, but nothing is absolute. There’s always a way to bring an opponent down. “Is it that shocking of a story?”

“No. Not at all. If anything, it’s a typical story of teenage drama, except perhaps a bit more than that. But I need the reassurance that you won’t run off once I finish.” She lets the two rings go, gentle thud of the two rings pressing against each other and her collar bone. The rings seem familiar. 

Batman sits, albeit warily and at least five feet away from his companion. Ladybug hasn’t proven untrustworthy so far, but she is still part meta and a magic user, from what he’s gathered. He wouldn’t put it past her or one of her team, particularly the one who creates illusions, to do something. He just doesn’t know what.

“This beautiful, charming classmate easily swayed Marinette’s class to her side.” Ladybug peeks at Batman through her bangs. “Understand that the classmates are children. Children in a class where power means that trouble and responsibility never stick. They learned that taking action meant you would be blamed.”

Batman wonders how Marinette and Ladybug met. Maybe it was through this very class she’s talking about now. If that’s true, it does not bode well for his perception of her.

“Marinette recognized this classmate for what she was. A liar. She promised all sorts of beautiful things-- things that played to their classmate’s biggest dreams. Working with their favorite artist. Meeting olympic athletes and musicians. Trips to impossible places. Perhaps if Marinette wans’t who she was, she would have believed her, too. But this classmate lied about two things Marinette knew were false. She lied about being a hero. She lied about me.”

“How do you and Marinette know each other?” It was incredibly difficult to find the video evidence of the Miraculous team going to Tom & Sabine’s Boulangerie. Batman had to call in a favor from Zatara and avoiding her questions as to why— he’d much preferred it if he were able to go through any normal channel instead. 

“We’ve known each other since the beginning.” Ladybug fiddles with her yoyo, refusing to look him in the eyes. “Marinette tried to get her friends to realize the truth. But everybody wanted what she was saying to be real. It’s hard to say otherwise when everything they ever wanted could be found in a single person. And Marinette didn’t pick the smartest ways to try to reveal her lies. 

“That beautiful, charming classmate didn’t like Marinette trying to debunk her entire persona. She grew to be very cunning. She hurt Marinette in so many ways. I lost track over how many times Marinette got suspended or temporarily expelled, only for her to be brought back at the behest of the one other person in her class who knew the truth. Her designs were stolen. The boy she loved grew into a shell in order to protect himself. Her friends drifted away-- not that they were cruel or anything,  they were taught inaction above all else, to not say a word about whatever happened in class ever since ecole-- but Marinette was really lonely. 

“It was sort of a blessing in disguise. During this time, a lot of the Miraculous Team went on a break of sorts, and it was only Chat Noir and I. We had to get stronger and smarter and Marinette and her family provided relief and moral support. If her friends were close to her during that time, things may have ended really badly. Hawkmoth may have caught on to more secret identities than he already knew.”

“Does Marinette know who you and Chat Noir are underneath the mask?” To put the weight of their alter egos on a civilian is cruel. It’s why his own was so closely guarded. He’s not a fan of Marinette knowing his existence as Bruce, let alone Ladybug. 

“The more people who know our identities, the greater a chance Hawkmoth has at taking our Miraculous.”

A non answer. Clever wording on Ladybug’s part. Although he can imagine Sabine agreeing to put up a bunch of teenage superheroes in her bakery, he knows that it’s impossible for anything to escape from her eyes for very long. He’d bet anything that she figured out the majority of the team’s identities. And by extension, anything that Sabien finds out, Marinette is bound to find out as well; her past indicates that she has an equal, if not higher level of intelligence and creativity that Sabine had.

Had. They went for so long without patching anything up. Why was he so foolish? So Hard headed? She offered him so many chances to reconnect, to connect with Marinette, to be a second father to her. She didn’t have any romantic feelings for him left, that much he knew, what with how utterly in love she was with Tom, and he was happy for her. Happy that she found somebody more stable than him. 

If he and Sabine were closer, could he have prevented their deaths? Would he have been clued into the situation of a magic supervillain in Paris sooner? 

He can’t be mad at Ladybug. Not when Batman, a hero with decades of experience on her, failed to step in. Refused to look old problems in the eye. Let loved ones die for his own inability to communicate. 

“For a while, Marinette didn’t fight back. She didn’t want the boy she loved, her best friend, to get in any more trouble than he already was, trying to protect her. She laid low. But the classmate was very interested in this boy as well. The classmate tried to break him to get him to love her.”

Ladybug smiles wryly. “You can imagine that was the end of her rope. Marinette thought that the only person the liar was targeting was herself. After three years of bearing the weight, she finally snapped. She started using the resources she had. And the wasn’t any grandiose thing, though in retrospect, perhaps it should have been. She wouldn’t have ended up in prison, no she’s too young, and one of the two main victims was under lock and key, and Marinette was never hurt to the point where the liar would face real consequences for her actions. All that happened was a restraining order and her removal from Marinette’s school.”

“The girl’s name is Lila Rossi. She was already a suspect for working with Hawkmoth at the time by helping him turn people into akumas. Then Mayura stopped showing up and Pavona took her place. Pavona was clearly targeting everything and anything near Marinette. I should have seen the signs, but I had years of experience on her, and the Miraculous Cure--” Ladybug breaks off. “From one point of view, even Hawkmoth is better than her, because at least he didn’t cause any irreversible deaths.”

The Miraculous Cure is cruel. It only reverses the damage done with a Miraculous or while Ladybug is transformed. When Tom and Sabine were murdered, Pavona and the Peacock Miraculous were nowhere in sight.

Batman can’t say whether Pavona is better or worse than Hawkmoth. But Lila Rossi-- he recognizes the name. He knows what she looks like, since her image came up when he was doing a background check on Marinette. It’s quite possible that she has some type of mental disorder. Now is not the time to think about that. Hawkmoth’s identity needs to be revealed, and quickly. “How did you connect the two with the magic protecting your identities?”

“I used a little magic of my own.”

Beneath them, more and more lights begin to flicker out. Even though Paris is nicknamed the City of Lights, due to the extensive drain on energy, shops are required to turn off their exterior lighting after 1AM. 

“Please,” Ladybug says. “Please help me find Hawkmoth. Please help me put them in prison. I-- I’ve been fighting for so long, and it was a duty I didn’t even want for the longest time. I just want all of this to be over. I want to be able to scream and cry and mourn without Hawkmoth and Pavona trying to manipulate me. Please.”

Batman has never been one for physical affection, but he pats Ladybug awkwardly on her back. She launches herself into his arms, curling into him and sobs as he awkwardly rubs her back. He keeps his eyes trained at a distance, watching for any akumas or amoks.  

“Please,” she warbles, eyes watery. “Be good to Marinette. Be a good father. Be someone for her to lean on.”

His muscles tighten. He’s never claimed to be a good father, let alone a good man. He tries to do right, but Marinette is different from all of the other kids he’s taken in over the years. She’s not from Gotham. She had parents who were kind and stable and normal. He doesn’t think he can be a good father to her.

Somehow, Ladybug guesses exactly what he’s thinking. “You just have to be yourself. It may be stupid and foolish, but she loves you. She really does.”

For a long time, the two of them stay on that roof, Ladybug buried in the crook of Batman’s arm.

_____________________________________________________

@biodad-bruce-month

Maribat tag list(to be added onto this pls send me an ask/dm): @our-precipreciousss @my-dear-friend-anxiety 

Who Are You (and what will you become) tag list (to be added here just comment): @anjuschiffer @theunquiet-dead @certainmuffinbagelcalzone @cresentmo0n @allulily @myazael @zalladane @rebecarojas07 @keepingupwiththemalfoys @frieddonutsweets @all-mights-asscheeks @thornalchemist23 @trippingovermyfeet @jiso-lee @redscarlet95 @ira-sairain @screechingflapbiscuitpeach @ramos123 @cutechip

also if i missed you please just lmk in the appropriate place again! and is it a me thing or a tumblr thing that some of these tags just wont WORK AUGH. thank you all for the support on the fics i’ve posted so far! i’m quite bad at posting regularly because all sense of time has been stripped away

hahahaha consistent chapter length? what’s that? (jokes on you these aren’t chapters just loosely related chronologically told one shots. what even makes a cohesive story a story)

[marshmallowprotection]

By no popular demand, let’s talk about the Children’s Day Title Screen which is the first time that we’ve seen everyone together at the RFA party. I think we’re all crying about it but I’ve definitely had the time to sit down and think about all of the little details for Saeran. We’ve all met me. We know that I’ve been trying to make sense of everything that I see to rationalize and explain in some kind of meta way. 

There’s going to be spoiler CG in this for Another Story, like, all of it, so you have that warning now. 

My apologies in advanced because we know that I don’t know how to shut up when it comes to Saeran.  Look at him. Look at him. I swear to God, you have to look at him. Okay, now that we’ve established that you have to look at it so I can cover this:

Finally, we’ve got a canon party outfit for Saeran to talk about and cry about, frankly. I knew that he would have something pink because you will never see this man far from something pink, black, or red. That’s just what his assigned colors are. I’m not surprised that it’s pink. I love seeing Saeran in pink. 

He really can’t be separated from the color pink because we’ve all given it to him tenfold at this point. 

I’m just assuming this is GE Saeran, to be clear with you, because that seems to be the most possible option. Now, they gave him a blue rose, which could mean that they’re covering their bases so it’s not a spoiler for people who haven’t had the chance to play Ray Route and see what plays out, so they may think it’s just Ray, but we who have already played know that it’s GE Saeran. 

His eyes in this style are very light and they’ve styled them to look a though he’s truly happy and not masking with a false smile. 

You can usually tell them apart by the way their eyes are drawn in this game, honestly, but I have a post about that if you need to glance at that for more of my info-dumping for no reason at all. 

Anyways! Saeran has seemingly styled his hair differently, or had a haircut. It’s definitely shorter than what it is in the route, which is, quite reasonable, honestly. He’s had to take care of his own hair for the most part. 

He carries around a brush at all times according to his diary, and Ray mentions that he often takes care of Rika’s hair for her as well, so he’s got his own knowledge of how to at the very least, take care of his hair to keep it out of his eyes.

It’s quite possible that he’s been able to get a haircut for the first time after the events of the good ending. That’s a positive sign of progress. It’s a small trim of course, since it’s just a bit shorter than what we’ve seen in some of the ending CG for the route. 

It could just be the art style, but I have the tendency to look at style choices as something reasonably meaningful for what happens in the life of a character. 

I’ll slap a CG for comparison if you want to check that out for yourself. It can be a style choice. It can be a healthy step in him living a normal life. Because that’s seemingly a very casual thing that all of us contend with, but that’s a move for him that seems like he’s comfortable with it. 

I just think that’s a neat touch, no matter if it’s just a style choice. 

His little suit is a lot more detailed here than the suit that we see VAE Ray wear. That is a pink suit as well, but that one is much lighter in tone than the one that we see here. I sat here comparing the two for a little bit because I wasn’t sure if it was the same suit top or if it was two different outfits entirely. 

At the end of the day, I’m definitely sure that it’s not the same outfit. They’re both pink but it’s not the same shade. 

However, it’s close enough that you could frankly assume that they’re the same in the long run, but I think I’ll leave that up to you guys to figure that out because the CG with his suit in VAE doesn’t show the front of his outfit. 

So, we can’t see for sure if it’s the same. Artists can have had to take some liberties to draw it in their own way because of the reference that we received! It appears as though the VAE suit is lighter and the suit in this title screen is a little bit warmer. 

What do you guys think? Either way, I’m in love with the little bowtie. Frankly, he always chooses bowties. We’ve seen Saeran use them, Ray use them, and if we count the Christmas DLC, Unknown. The only one that we haven’t seen use the bowties is Suit Saeran, who wears an actual tie instead. Bowties are a bit more slender and pop more. You tend to see them on more boyish characters. 

I tend to think that Suit Saeran wears a tie because he feels like it adds maturity and makes him look stronger, but they all just generally prefer bowties. I do think they’re really cute myself. I tend to draw him wearing bowties myself. It could just be a style choice, rather than him deciding between if a tie is mature or a bowtie is youthful.

Speaking of that, I think the buttons are really cute. There’s no purpose for those buttons on the chest of his jacket but they’re neat. The pockets are asymmetrical for some reason that I can’t discern. I think that’s an interesting choice to have in the outfit but I’m not sure why he’d pick something like that. 

He tends to be the kind of person that makes style choices because, “I think it looks cool,” or “I kind of think this reflects my emotions.” Which is why all of them, if they had a say, would’ve picked something dark and edgy looking as that reflects “power from being sharp” and “I feel dreary and I feel like I should dress that way.”

Pink is a color that often means hopefulness, light and care, and innocence. It’s a love for others and for yourself. So, by him choosing this, it’s reflective of the fact that he’s learning how to love himself and we love to see that. Saeran’s love for the world and his growth is... honestly, something that helps me feel like I can wake up in the morning. 

The funny part about this is I think his favorite color is blue. It has to be blue. Because the sky is blue. 

That, my friends, is a carnation. That is a pink carnation. Pink carnations tend to mean I'll Never Forget You, that’s one of the more popular meanings that comes to my mind. I think one of the other meanings is gratitude. 

It’s the official flower for Mother’s Day, as well, in America, anyway, if you didn’t know that fact! I think they gave him carnations because it’s about his faith and love for his MC that has shown him how to have strong gratitude and how to be thankful for every breath in his body. So, I think we should go ahead and cry on this one.

[thebigbadbatswife]

The Witching Hour - Chapter 1 - All Hallows’ Eve

Summary - When her friends dragged her to Gotham’s old cemetery for some Halloween ghost hunting fun, Y/N really didn’t think her life would end up changing like this.

Chapter Warnings - referenced/implied character death

Word Count - 3.3k

The cell phone on your nightstand buzzed incessantly as your friends continued to spam your messages. They had been doing so for the past hour or so. You were surprised that the damn thing hadn’t vibrated off of the nightstand yet. When it finally stopped, when you finally thought they had given up, you returned your attention to the document you had open on your laptop. Just as you were about to start typing again, your phone resumed its buzzing.

Huffing, you shut your laptop’s lid, placed it on the bed next to you, reached over and grabbed your phone off the nightstand. Over eighty messages both from your friends individually and within the group chat, begging you to come along with them to the old cemetery that sat outside of town. They wanted to go because it was Halloween and that meant it was the best time to go ghost hunting! And they wanted you to go along because of how you were usually drawn to this type of stuff. As well as how this type of stuff was also usually drawn to you.

Come on! For old time’s sake? Plus we’re going to have a much better chance at actually catching something if you come along!

The message was from your friend John, the ringleader of your group. The reason you and your friends had always gotten into trouble at school. Now he was trying to work his magic once again.

Only because I’m a meta with an uncomfortably close relationship with death…

As far as you knew, your powers were genetic instead of being caused by that arc reactor explosion that had given a lot of metas their powers. You were able to look past the “Veil”, as it was called, and see and interact with spirits on the other side. Not that you did so often or even liked to do. It creeped you out and you sometimes saw things that would certainly traumatize most people if they saw them. Not to mention the strain on your body and mind each time you did it. 

Why the obsession with the old cemetery now?

It had been years since John had mentioned ghost hunting, let alone the old cemetery. Back during your last year of high school, it had been all John could talk about. He was convinced that it was where the “cool” ghosts would be hanging out. None of you had ever actually gone because your last year had passed surprisingly quickly and before you all knew it, you were all moving to different parts of the country for college. In all that time it had never been mentioned again. Until now.

Ha! She finally replies! I knew you wouldn’t leave us to scream into the void forever!

The next message was from Tom, your oldest friend. Unlike the others, you two had known each other since kindergarten. If anyone was capable of talking you into going, it was probably him.

It’s been years since all of us were in the same place at the same time! Not to mention it’s Halloween and a full moon! I don’t think it could be more perfect!

Well, he wasn’t wrong about that.

You know you want to come! And don’t you dare lie!

He wasn’t wrong about that either. You were a little curious. The cemetery was on the outskirts of Gotham City. According to the internet, the cemetery had members of Gotham’s oldest families buried there. If you were to use your powers there to look past the Veil, there was a chance some of those people could still be hanging around. It would certainly be an unique opportunity to converse with them and, perhaps, attempt to help move on. Or maybe you would find inspiration for your next short ghost story. You certainly had been struggling with inspiration recently so maybe this was exactly what you needed.

Okay! Fine! I’ll come!

You scoffed as you hit ‘send’. Once again, Tom had talked you into joining them. A small part of you was convinced he was a meta with some sort of manipulation power.  

That’s great! ‘Cause we’re already outside your house!

John replied, causing you to roll your eyes. Of course they were already outside. Why wouldn’t they be?

You locked your phone, got up from your bed and slipped your phone into your pocket. You grabbed your jacket from your wardrobe and made your way out of your bedroom and down the stairs. You grabbed your keys from the bowl on the table, near the front door.

“Y/N? Where are you going at this hour sweetheart?” your grandma called from the living room.

“I’m going to meet up with some old friends. I’ll be back soon!” you replied. You didn’t tell her where you guys were going since you knew she would most definitely disapprove.

“Stay safe!”

“Will do!”

After your parents’ death, your grandma had not only raised you, but helped you learn how to use your abilities so that, should you choose to, you’d be able to use them. Not that she would approve of you constantly using them. Looking through the Veil could sometimes draw the attention of extremely unwanted creatures that were looking for a route to the physical world. You knew how to defend yourself from them, but that didn’t mean you really wanted to get into that situation to begin with. If you were going to use your abilities tonight, you were going to have to be extremely careful.

The entire drive there, your friends excitedly talked about what they could potentially capture on either video or audio. John was driving, Tom sat in the passenger seat next to him and you were sitting in the back with Rebecca.

A couple of hours later and the car finally pulled up in front of the cemetery. John turned off the engine and you all got out. Since it was pretty much pitch black out here, you all got out your phones and turned on your flashlights.

Tall stone walls covered in moss and vines surrounded the cemetery and an old rusted iron gate stopped the car from going any further. Threaded through the bars of the gate was large rusted chain with an equally rusted padlock. Even if you guys had the key, you seriously doubted it would have worked anyway.

“Are you kidding me?” asked Tom, as he useless pulled against the chain. “This is so unfair!”

“Uh, maybe we could try to scale the walls or something?” Rebecca suggested as she walked over to where the vines seemed at their thickest. She gave them a gentle tug. “Looks like it might hold our weight, if we go up one by one.”

Tom shook his head. “And get covered in spiders? Yeah, no thanks!”

Rebecca frowned as she used her phone’s light to have a closer look at the vines. “I can’t see any spiders.”

“That’s because you’re not looking in the right spots,” he replied as he walked over to her. He shone his own light up at the vines.

While you walked over to them, to get a better look at what Tom was trying to show her, John shook his head and walked back toward the car.

“See all of those tiny turquoise dots shinning back at us?” he asked her as he pointed above where there were a lot of tiny turquoise dots sparkling in the light.

“Yeah, they’re like little drops of moisture right?”

“You would think, but they’re not! Those are the eyes of all those horrid little spiders!”

Rebecca squealed and immediately backed away from the wall. “Tom! Why the fuck would you tell me that! Fuck! There’s probably going to be so many of them inside the actual cemetery! And now I know how to spot them!”

“I don’t think that’s going to be much of an issue considering we can’t get in anyway,” you said as you gestured toward the very locked gate. This whole thing was starting to feel like a massive waste of time.

“Oh! But we can!” John announced as he strode on over to you three with a large pair of bolt cutters in hand. He also had a backpack slung over his shoulder. As he cut the chain, John explained how he had swung by here earlier to see if there was anything that would stop you lot from getting in. When he saw the chain, he had gone to the hardware store, that was located in the worst part of the city, and bought these. “Only place I could find that had bolt cutters big enough for a chain like this!”

“Aren’t we like breaking the law or something right now?” Rebecca asked just as the cutters snipped through the chain and it clanged against the gate.

“Probably,” John replied very nonchalantly. “But we’re pretty much committed at this point now. Besides, look at this place! No one’s been here in years! I seriously doubt we’re going to get caught.”

The iron gate creaked loudly as it was pushed open and you all headed inside. The others walked ahead while you trailed behind. The way they were talking, discussing who was buried here and therefor who they could potentially “contact”, made you feel like you had time-travelled back to high school.

When you all got to the centre of the cemetery, John took the backpack off and opened it. It was filled with all sorts of equipment that was used in modern day ghost hunting. Voice recorders, emf meters, even a couple of high end night vision cameras. Damn, he had really gone all out for this. After the gear had been handed out, John began to give everyone directions as to where they were off to investigate.

Tom and Rebecca were going to be investigating the southwest of the cemetery, which was the newest part, John was headed up to the north, where some mausoleums were shaded by an old willow tree and you:

“And Y/N, you get the oldest part of the cemetery which is toward the east!”

“Right, of course, send the meta to the creepiest part of this place,” you said, playfully rolling your eyes.

“Well, you said it, not me! Good luck and we’ll meet back here in a couple of hours,” John replied. With that, you all split up and went your separate ways.

The cemetery was vastly overgrown. Most of the headstones were buried beneath the long unruly grass, brambles and vines. Every now and then your flashlight would catch a glimpse of the grey stone underneath. You also caught more glimpses of those glowing spider eyes and were doing your best to ignore them. You really hated Tom sometimes.

Thanks to all of the plants, you could barely see the path. The only thing that indicated you were walking on one was every now and then you could feel a stone slab shift underneath your feet.

The further east you walked, the darker and darker the cemetery seemed to get. It also seemed to get creepier and creepier, which was strange to you because you never really found cemeteries creepy. Instead you had always found them peaceful. A lot of people found you weird for that. There was also the feeling that something was watching you. The uneasiness that came along with that feeling was enough to prevent you from using either your recorder or your abilities. If there really was something watching you, you got the feeling that the last thing you wanted to do was attract its attention. After all, who knew what truly lurked here? Especially on the other side.

You eventually reached a group of mausoleums. Much like the rest of the cemetery, they were covered in bramble, vines and other plantlife. They were tall and the parts of them you could see, you could tell were certainly made of far more expensive stone than the rest of the place. This wasn’t just the oldest part, this was also the richest part.

You approached a few of the mausoleums and managed to clear away some of the plants covering the name plates. The majority of the names had been erased due to the elements, but not all of them. The names that were still readable were also names you recognised. Kane, Elliot, Crowne. Three of the First Families of Gotham.

You were about to approach another when you saw something large and black move, out of the corner of your eye. You spun around and shone your flashlight in the direction of the shadow, but there was nothing there.

“Hello?” you called out, which was probably a terrible idea, but it was the only thing you could think of doing. “Who’s there?” You waited for a reply, but no reply came.

Was your nerves making you see things? It couldn’t be a spirit; you weren’t using your powers. Unless… Throughout your life you had heard of non metas who had “seen” things in their peripheral vision. Sometimes they were spirits that had briefly broken through the Veil, other times it really was just people imagining things. Until now you had never experienced it before and you hated how impossible it was to tell which one it was.  

Turning on your phone’s screen, you looked at the time. You still had an hour before you had to head back to meet back up with the others. Turning the screen off again, you looked back in the direction you had seen the shadow move toward. Did you follow? It sounded like an awful idea, but the only other thing you could do was head back early and then wait around for everyone else, and that sounded incredibly boring.

‘ Okay, guess I’m doing this then,’ you thought as you began to head down the path, in the direction the shadow had gone.

You had previously thought that there was no way this cemetery could be anymore overgrown than it already was. This new part you were now walking through proved you wrong. Extremely wrong.

Branches hanging low off of trees and thorns from the brambles tugged at your clothing as you passed them. You had to keep an extra careful eye out on where you were stepping so that you didn’t trip over and injure yourself. There were more mausoleums, but you could barely make their shapes out through all of the greenery.

As you walked, that feeling that something was watching you increased tenfold and you found yourself constantly glancing back. Each time you looked you were met with the same result. There was nothing there.

‘ It’s just my overactive imagination ,’ you told yourself, but that did nothing to soothe your growing fear. What if the thing you had seen had been an actual person? And not a good person at that. This was Gotham after all and for some reason Halloween was when most, if not all, the psychopaths suddenly came out to play. Were you about to become another notch in some serial killer’s knife hilt? Oh, you really hoped not. That was not how you wanted to go.

Before your mind could lead you down a dark path of all the vivid ways you could be brutally murdered right now, the path came to an end. At the end of it sat a lone mausoleum. This one didn’t look nearly as old as the others nor was it as covered in plants like the rest. As you walked over to it you saw one of the large iron doors had fallen off its hinges and now laid on the ground.

Cautiously, you approached the entrance. When you were close enough, you shone your light on the name plate. The name ‘Wayne’ was engraved on to it. You got a feeling that that was somehow important, but you really didn’t know why. Nor why you were so drawn to it. Almost as if you were now on autopilot, you stepped inside the mausoleum.

The first two names you saw were Martha and Thomas Wayne. Even years after their deaths, you knew the names well. Before their untimely deaths they had been trying to use their fortune to help the city and its more vulnerable citizens.

The next name you saw, you didn’t recognise. Jason Peter Todd. You were shocked when you saw his death date. “Fuck, you were barely sixteen years old,” you whispered. That was... that was not fair at all.

The last name was Bruce Wayne. It stood out to you a lot more than the others had. Almost as if it was…. Glowing? What? That made no sense. Okay, you were definitely just seeing things now. To prove that to yourself, you turned your flashlight off. The name continued to glow, in fact now it was a hell of a lot brighter.

“What the fuck?”

You peered closer to see if there was any small lights or something similar causing it to glow, but there wasn’t anything. The name was actually glowing! Freaked out, you took a picture of it (without the flash of course), and sent it to Tom. A few agonising minutes passed before he finally replied.

Why are you sending me a completely black photo?

What? You checked the picture you had sent and, yeah, the name was definitely visible.

Can’t you see the glowing name?

If Tom couldn’t see it, then what did that mean?

What are you on about? There’s nothing there. Are you okay?

Was this somehow related to your powers? Is that why Tom wasn’t able to see it? If that was the case, and with each passing second it seemed to be, then he or the others couldn’t help.

Yeah, I’m fine. Nevermind.

Sighing, you checked the time before you shut off you phone and slipped it into your pocket. Thirty minutes before you had to head back. You were on your own. If this was related to your powers then what exactly did you do with it? Your grandma had never mentioned anything like this before, so you had no clue. You still felt uneasy and this new discovery had done nothing to help so you really didn’t want to peer through the Veil, unless it was absolutely necessary.

Would anything happen if you reached out and touched it? You sometimes got flashes of memories or feelings when you touched some items. Maybe this could be the same? You supposed the only way to find out would be to touch the stone. Cautiously you reached out and pressed the palm of your hand against the cold stone.

Images flashed through your mind. Movie tickets, a pearl necklace, a gun. There was the sound of the gun firing, a child’s blood chilling scream and the loud wailing of police sirens. Then it was over and you were brought back to reality, with far more questions than you had previously started with.

Before you were able to question or make sense of what you had seen, your phone vibrated. Taking it out, you saw a text from John, as well as several others.

Are you nearly here?

We were supposed to meet up fifteen minutes ago. Where are you?

Did your phone die?

It did, didn’t it. Unless you’re currently doing one of your meta things?

So what had simply been mere seconds for you in reality had been forty five minutes for everyone else. Which wasn’t all that unusual for you, but could certainly make people that didn’t deal with it daily worry. With that in mind, you fingers flew across your keyboard as you typed out your reply.

Yeah, meta thing, sorry. I’m on my way back now.

You turned your flashlight back on and walked back to the entrance. Before leaving, you looked back to where the glowing of Bruce Wayne’s name was now slowly fading away. Whoever he had been, he was asking for your help. You were sure of it and that’s exactly what you were going to do.

[everythingsinred]

Let's Talk About NatsuMikan: The Anime (pt. 1)

I could go on and on about these two and I think I will, just because I don’t often see people talk about the analysis behind them. The meta I have seen about them has included a perspective that equaled the anime and the manga and I don’t think that’s an accurate way of viewing their relationship.

The anime is a different species than the manga, something that frequently happens during the adaptation from page to screen. Since they’re so different, I’ll analyze them separately.

There's going to be many parts to this so I'll keep a table of contents right here so people can more easily navigate (though you can also read through the "let's talk about natsumikan: the anime" tag on my blog):

Anime Analysis

Part 1: Exposition & Episode 7

Part 2: Episodes 8, 9, 10, & 11

Part 3: Episodes 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, & 17

Part 4: Episodes 18 & 19

Part 5: Episodes 20, 21, & 22

Part 6: Episodes 23, 24, 25, & 26 & Conclusion

The anime makes changes, as anime adaptations often do. The most outstanding changes are appearance related, as Natsume now has brown eyes instead of red, in addition to other characters who have hue-shifted eyes and hair. But there are also story changes, and I’ll be focusing on the changes that occur, specifically in regards to Natsume and Mikan and their relationship.

For one, their relationship starts evolving much earlier in the anime. I think it’s pretty undeniable that in the anime, Natsume started liking Mikan at the end of the dodgeball game. That scene never happened in the manga, but in the anime, it’s a crucial step in making sure nothing seems too sudden or forced.

The anime is 26 episodes long. If Natsume only starts liking Mikan after she saves him during the Reo Arc, then we’re already halfway through the show when positive feelings between the two appear. On the other hand, the feelings develop more slowly in the manga because there’s more time to properly develop the relationship in a more drawn out way.

My analysis will start with the anime, because it’s shorter and easier to discuss.

Exposition

It’s impossible to say that the anime was completely loyal to the manga. It very frequently couldn’t be, because it needed to fill in time in episodes or give closure early before the manga even addressed it (Natsume’s backstory in the anime, for instance, is vaguely referred to and implies deviation from the manga).

The most obvious difference between the manga and the anime from the get-go is visual. Not only do they have differing art styles (I don’t dislike the anime style but Higuchi Tachibana’s art style is so distinct and unmistakable while the anime’s isn’t so unique), but the setting is also different.

While the manga started in the depth of winter, the anime starts off in summer/fall. It always struck me as odd that while the first page of the manga has Mikan running after Hotaru in full winter-wear, the anime starts off warm and idyllic. You could almost think of that as a general warning for the difference between the anime and the manga. After all, while the anime has a reputation for being a cutesy and upbeat story about friendship and magical powers, the manga is much darker and discusses many morbid and depressing themes that can and WILL fuck you up. Warm vs. cold seems like an accurate difference, though I don’t think that was intentional.

We see way more of the village life in the anime, including Mikan’s efforts to keep the school from closing. This is a welcome change because Mikan’s passion to keep the school open is nothing compared to her friendship with Hotaru, and even after the school is saved, she runs away to see her friend, even if it means she goes to another school. The manga doesn’t imply that Mikan knew already about the school’s fate, and since she is always so preoccupied with Hotaru anyway, we don’t really get the impression that she cares very much. To Anime!Mikan, Hotaru is more important than saving the school, something she was so passionate about she rallied to get signatures. It’s an extra scene to prove just how much Hotaru matters to Mikan, and to show even more how selfless Hotaru was to go to Alice Academy, since she knew how much the school mattered to Mikan.

“Sign my petition to get a Gakuen Alice anime reboot!!!”

My boy Natsume is only introduced properly in the second episode, when we actually see his face and he speaks. His appearance is different from the manga’s too. I’m not sure if this was to appeal to a younger audience or what, but Natsume’s eyes are changed to brown instead of their iconic red, something that was always my biggest peeve about the anime adaptation. His hair is also somewhat purplish instead of entirely grey/black and, although this does bother me a lot less than the eyes, I wonder why they made this change when other characters have black hair. It might have been to differentiate him from Hotaru, another main character with black hair, though I’ve never had issue in the manga telling them apart.

His first interaction with Mikan is a lot more pleasant in the anime than in the manga, although that’s not really saying anything. Mikan’s skirt simply falls off and Natsume draws attention to it, rather than the unpleasant events that took place in the manga. This different event makes it a lot easier to support a relationship between the two of them right off the bat. They are still antagonistic but it’s not as terrible as it is in the manga. This makes it easier to establish romantic feelings earlier on, and might have been changed in order to achieve just that, or possibly also to appeal to a younger audience. Maybe both? Who knows.

“You can’t sit with us!”

With Natsume presented the way he is in the anime, it’s easier to make the claim that he’s simply a good guy who acts the way he does to protect people. And it’s true! He is! But he is also so much more. In the manga, he’s a more complicated character. Although he is a good person, he still requires character development, which is something he does go through, and something I’ll talk about more in his meta analysis later.

Most of the events at the beginning of the anime parallel the events of the manga. Mikan goes to Alice Academy at the same time of year, Natsume shows up with an explosion, Mikan has to go through the Northern Woods, she discovers her powers in her fight with Natsume, etc. Some of the continuation from episode to episode is different than the transitions between chapter to chapter, there’s extra scenes inserted to fill up time, and some of the exposition seems strangely presented (in the anime, Mikan finds out more about the school when she finds Narumi and Iinchou waiting for her at a tea party, which is…. Super weird…), but all in all the information and events are mainly the same. The big differences start with the dodgeball episode.

“Look how happy she is. Makes me wanna barf.”

Episode 7 vs. Chapter 9

I love the dodgeball episode. I feel like for the most part, the anime does deviation from the manga pretty well. With the last arc as an exception, I generally enjoy their changes and additions to the plot. The anime has to be different, has to progress at a different pace, has to introduce topics at different times. They have an episode to fill, and less time to build relationships. Natsume and Mikan are both different characters in the anime but it’s very subtle and has to happen due to the fact that the anime is shorter and seems more designed for younger audiences, in addition to wrapping up before the manga could explore more of the story.

Anyway, let’s talk about the dodgeball episode. AGAIN THIS DOES NOT HAPPEN IN THE MANGA THE SAME WAY so when discussing NatsuMikan as a concept, the anime events cannot be treated the same as the manga events. A lot of people maybe forget that the manga is very different than the anime when it comes to this episode. I see the two media conflated in plenty of fanfics, where seventeen year old NatsuMikan reflect on the dodgeball game from their youth that changed everything, and I get it because the anime version of the dodgeball game is cute! It's shippy! It's fun! But it doesn't happen in the manga the same way.

There's a similar trope with the sakura tree, which I can only remember from the anime, and yet it's such a fundamental aspect of NM fanfic it might as well have played a vital role in both anime and manga. Nothing wrong with any of this, of course. I'm just making it clear that my analysis will cover the two media as separate for the sake of a cohesive essay. Separating them in fanfic is far less important.

This look could probably kill someone. I’m surprised Mikan is still alive, TBH.

The chapter’s focus is Mikan starting to feel more at home in Class B, making friends with her once-hostile classmates, but the episode is more preoccupied with Natsume and Mikan’s perspectives on each other. While in the manga, the game ends with a tie and Mikan accidentally hits Hotaru in the face with the ball, the anime draws out the game to fill an episode and to introduce an evolution in the way Natsume sees Mikan. The first part of the anime episode is Mikan introducing her friends to her new senpai, Tsubasa. After she invites her friends, we see Natsume glowering at her and promptly ditching the next class, saying to Ruka that he can’t stand being in the same class as her. This addition to the plot already foreshadows that their relationship will change in some way by the end of the episode.

Tsubasa tells a frustrated Mikan that if she wants Natsume to be less unpleasant, he’d need to release some of his toxic energy. Thus, the sporty Mikan introduces the concept of dodgeball to the unwelcoming class. When they finally agree, Natsume gives one condition: that they play with the notorious Alice Ball, which is powered by the thrower’s alice (a detail absent from the manga). This Alice Ball is particularly terrifying with the threat of Natsume’s dangerous fire alice. Mikan also needs to get more people on her team, another aspect absent from the manga. While in the manga, Mikan only had her few friends on her team (including a wandering Ruka) and this ended up playing to her advantage, the anime has a humorous plot of Mikan tracking players down for her team, including a fake mustache she makes with her pigtails (she’s so cute, I love her), paying Hotaru to be on her team, and blackmailing Ruka to participate. This was mainly to fill time, but it makes the dodgeball game more important as well.

In the manga, we don’t see how the game ends, just that the teams tied and that everyone in class is having fun and bonding. In the anime, more emphasis is put on the “Mikan vs. Natsume” aspect, so a tie like the manga’s would be anticlimactic. Thus, the anime concludes the dodgeball game with Mikan and Natsume being the only kids left on the court, and Natsume not using his alice when he throws the Alice Ball. Even Hotaru leaving the game is something she does out of boredom instead of injury, further separating the other characters from the plot. It’s about Natsume and Mikan, and everyone else is mostly a side character. (Though Ruka also plays a vital role to this episode AND chapter, and it’s at this point that I think he started developing real feelings for Mikan as well. So when it comes to the anime, he and Natsume fall for Mikan around the same time, but in the manga, Ruka likes her first and the “he liked her first” argument for Natsume vanishes, though he never had that “advantage” to begin with.)

“Thank you!”

Natsume wins (something that shocked me at twelve years old) and is ready to walk away with his handy “tch” and all but Mikan thanks him for not using his alice and he goes off on her, demanding to know why she’s still smiling despite her loss. She says she’s happy that he had fun and was involved with the rest of class for once, and that in a way that means she wins. For Anime!Natsumikan, this is it. This is the turning point. “I just wanted you to be happy and have fun,” is what Mikan might as well be saying. “Really, this was all for you!” It’s sweet and it’s thoughtful and I don’t think Natsume ever imagined he’d be on the receiving end of her kindness, especially after all their beef. Manga!Mikan would probably not say these things to him, even if she meant them, for the sole reason that Mikan is stubborn and holds onto her pride, especially when it comes to her early relationship with Natsume, but Anime!Mikan is much more forgiving and much more willing to extend an olive branch, like in the dance episode. In any case, Natsume starts falling right then, and it’s obvious too, because he is pissed, and even more angry because he’s not even mad at her. He’s angry with himself for his change of opinion. This is the girl he was fully content to hate forever and yet here he was, starting to like her. Not ideal.

This scene, something so crucial to the development of Anime!Natsumikan, is completely absent from the manga. In the manga, Natsume still dislikes her by the end of the game although he does have fun.

He's not angry, just disappointed. In himself.

I’m not going to say one is better when it comes to starting up NatsuMikan because they’re very different creatures and I actually thoroughly enjoy both.

Anyway, the NatsuMikan after episode 7 is almost the same as in the manga, but the events carry a different weight since we know Natsume likes Mikan now (even if he would never admit it).

Summary

I hope this first part was interesting, and that it introduced the idea of Anime!NatsuMikan as being a little different from the manga's version. Yes, it is more or less the same story, but with so many thematic and plot changes, they take a different form as well, in a perhaps more subtle way, kind of like a slightly canon divergent fanfic. Fanfic where Natsume starts liking Mikan a bit earlier on in the story.

Next Part ->