#magical sorceress c: i love that

[noxtivagus]

i lov rinoa

[regulusrules]

Ranking the best 10 Merlin episodes + a fic rec based on each one:

(absolutely not based on how gay they were) ((no order for the eps; they're all chef's kiss)) (((last two fics have a hold on me that levels the show itself; worth scrolling for)))

1. The Poisoned Chalice

Look. There is something just absolutely entrancing about introducing this episode in the first five of the entire show. Like, this hands-on was the sole reason everyone fell for those two idiots. It beautifully captured how the saving each other thing is reciprocal, because the first three episodes you just have to watch Merlin run around saving Arthur, never the reverse. Producing it early on in the show was the decision that, in my opinion, held everyone in their chokehold for eternity.

Fic rec: you are my favorite mistake (it can only be fate) by @multifandom-jess.

2. The Death Song of Uther Pendragon

I could go on and on for how this episode singlehandedly carried s5 on its shoulder. Like, okay I unfortunately love s5 with all my fucking heart, but this episode was perfect. Ghosts? Check. Banter? Check. POETRY?? Check check. A slap to Uther's face? Oh how beautifully checked.

It's so easy to recall how Arthur truly loved his father, but in this episode, the turmoil you see in his eyes from the actions of his father and how he resorts to saving the ones he loves (Merlin) over his father, is just too beautiful to be overlooked. Ever since Arthur became king, we see him struggle from his father's legacy. But in this episode, he begins to detach both consciously and subconsciously from him. Whether it's in his decision to save the old sorceress in the beginning, or to shun Uther's ghost, both the literal and the figurative, from his life any longer. This was one of the episodes that captured the true essence of King Arthur.

+1: the innuendos of this episode were 🤌. They knew what they were doing, you can't convince me otherwise. (are you threatening me with a spoon? / I'm teaching him some poetry.. he can't get enough of it! / what was that? h-horseplay. why don't I show you?)

Fic rec: My heart is readily yours by @regulusrules. (absolutely love how after all this introspection, i decided to throw it all away and made uther stab merlin in the fucking heart instead. but still it was my honourable attempt to shit on the finale and give them the happy ending everyone deserved).

3. The Sword in the Stone pt. 2

OKAY. This episode! Aside from how badass Merlin was in both pt.1&2, but here, especially in the part where us audience were impatiently waiting for the revival of the sword in the stone, there could've been nothing more perfect. Just like their adaptation of the round table scene, this was perfect in its own way for how different it was. They didn't make it so that people will finally find a king; they made it so that the people believe in their king. And more than that, for Arthur to believe in himself. With the estrangement and losing his crown, the writers gave him the best way to re-establish his inner glory. And Merlin being this guide; what more perfect culmination to their relationship?

You have to believe, Arthur.

Iconic.

Fic rec: Couldn't choose between Only Friend by @captain-ozone, and Fathom Me Out by @supercalvin. Brilliance ahead in both of them, I tell you.

4. The Eye of the Phoenix

Magic. Gwaine. Quests. Need I say more to explain that this was the show's holy trinity?

Fic rec: From Past to Present by flowersheep. (Prince Merlin. Archer Merlin. Perfection my friends).

5. A Servant of Two Masters

Look look; if there's an honourary wall of opinions for all the people who've watched Merlin, I DARE you to find just one who disliked this episode. Like, the series was so full of BS sometimes, but this episode was above all. The level of brilliance in this episode; showing Dark!Merlin, who's at the same time hilariously funny, and seeing him BAMF his way with Morgana, even when he's chained and tortured.. oh dear holy Lord. His "do me a favour, could you? let Arthur know." was able to steal all breath from my lungs the first time I saw it (and until now).

And don't get me started on the Protective!Arthur we got. Caring for Merlin, screaming for him when the rocks fell between them, silencing Agravaine immediately when he told him he's sorry for losing such a loyal servant because bullshit if he doesn't reign down hell before he loses Merlin. And ofc, Courage and Strength on their way to find Magic, which just filled my heart with an 'aaahhh!' moment, because we didn't get enough Gwaine-Arthur-Merlin shenanigans. And at last, the Hug™. Fucking screamed let me tell you.

It is an episode that truly showed everything; from comic elements to fluff and angst and everything. The only thing it lacked was, as always, giving Arthur the space to know. Because ffs what would they have lost if they made Arthur understand that Merlin's under Morgana's control? It wouldn't have exposed shit. It would've just been a plus to us to see Arthur caring for Merlin even more. They tried so hard that it completely backfired sometimes.

Fic rec: Still I Surface in Morning Light by @queerofthedagger. (I swear to you, anything written by this author, I readily throw whatever in hand to read it).

6. The Dragon's Call

Let thy gif caption speak.

No but really, that first episode was the stuff of legends. I could list down tens of tropes they did in just that episode alone. Honestly, no "family" show I've ever seen had started this powerfully. Just the music alone, the beauty of beginnings, not the CGI, was truly so gripping. Also bonus points for just Colin Morgan's sass abilities. None can compare.

Fic rec: This Time Around... series (incomplete) by Oneiric (lkdaswani). (this is a time travel AU, but the way the writer rewrote this episode was one of the best deviations I've read for an episode I already find near faultless).

7. The Sins of the Father

I might be subjecting myself to true wrath with my upcoming statement, but here we go:

S2 sucked.

From the beginning of the season, Arthur's shift in characterization from the honourable lovable prat of s1 to a letting Merlin act as a horse stool got me going wtf? It was like they deliberately ruined everything in their relationship and started out fresh just to force the Arthurian narrative of Arwen. And it's fine by me, truly, even if I'll never ship them, but they could've developed Arthur's character SO MUCH in that season beyond comic relief and romantic rendezvous.

Anyway so that I don't stray so much from the topic; this episode was, by fair comparison, the best in the entire season. By now it's pretty obvious that I gravitate towards all the episodes that give Arthur a semblance of agency. Him going against Uther and his maniac murderous agenda was the start of actually seeing King Arthur in front of us. Also, him listening to Merlin when he was on the verge of committing patricide was one of the things that gave me hope in how there's still hope in them. Even if they ruined it with making Merlin lie to Arthur, but the writers practically ruined every good episode with this.

+1: Morgause's intro was badass.

Fic rec: The Sins of the Father (and how to right them) by @cupcakezys. (what we deserved. to see arthur with agency, with an ability to decide for his future without being lied and deceived to).

8. Diamond of the Fucking Day

No matter how much I hate this episode, I can't, in good conscience, deny its hold on my heart. As I wrote before, there could've been no better magic reveal than this. And for all of my bitterness over their decision to kill Arthur, I sanely admit how it was a decision that insured the immortality of this fandom. It's been ten years since that episode aired, and I bet my ass off that it will still feel the same even after countless more decades.

Fic rec: literally the entirety of the fandom's fix-it fics. We all started from there, didn't we? Choosing only one would be so undervaluing to all the brilliance I've seen. However, my tags filter for it usually include: fix-it, angst with a happy ending, court sorcerer merlin, shitting on bbc writers 101, canon era, not canon compliant, everybody lives especially king arthur you mfs.

9. The Wicked Day

Throw me from the highest tower there is because every time I remember this scene, I just want to fade into the light. The sheer level of love and understanding shimmering between those two. Sometimes I marvel at the choice of bringing Colin and Bradley together, because no two could have achieved such chemistry, platonic or not, as those two did. This whole episode of showing Arthur's grief, and Merlin's desperation to heal it, was truly unforgettable. I try not to linger on its ending, Arthur denouncing magic for the millionth of time, but other than that it was a gem served to us on a silver platter.

Also seeing Uther finally die was a plus.

Fic rec: As much as I'd love to recommend my own fic for this, but honestly, whenever I get the chance, I will always take it to scream and wail about one of my absolute favourite fics of all time, which really isn't given ANY of the goddamn credit or attention or kudos it deserves. Beauty in the Ashes of Our Lives by Fulgance. I swear to you, you will never read something as beautifully heartbreaking as this. This fic resides in my mind rent-free. Basically any work by Fulgance is amazing, but this fic— oh God, my heart cannot take it sometimes.

10. Arthur's Bane pt. 1

Fuck, that episode was a masterpiece. You know, if it was all in my hands, I would've magic revealed at this particular episode. It was just.. the perfect opportunity. King Arthur in his glory, beginning of the season, enough time for Arthur to fully understand the depth of what Merlin did for him. Also, the range Arthur was given starting from here; God it's what we deserved. I always blame the writers for being inconsistent with his characterization (s2 and all), but they beautifully crafted it in the end, and it was their perfect chance to even explore the whole extent if only they made the magic reveal earlier.

Fic rec: Our broken pieces by @aramblingjay. Okay so this fic rec isn't necessarily linked at all to the episode, but I can't, in good conscience, recommend fics and not include it. Technically context wise it fits s5, for in it you see Arthur in his grandeur as king. This shall be my only exception because it's the only fic that was able to make me cry. Truly, I never shed tears, but in this, my heart stuttered. The fact that it is so unnoticed makes my blood boil because of how much praise it deserves. I can never recommend it enough.

To conclude, BBC Merlin has a powerful hold on everyone because of the fact that they knew how to eternalise it. It is significantly unique in its interpretation of legendary figures. I think I watched nearly all adaptations of King Arthur throughout the years, but even with how great some really are, to me none compare with this sword-swishing, banter-driven, CGI-messing, emotionally-killing 2008 show.

Honorary mentions:

| The Labyrinth of Gedref | Gwaine | Le Morte D'Arthur | Lancelot | The Coming of Arthur | The Moment of Truth | The Hunter's Heart | His Father's Son | The Darkest Hour |

[Short fic recs]

[Long fic recs]

[closetsof-backlogged-dreams]

opinions on morgwen

OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHDSJFH;DAJKSDJ

hot take of the day: morgwen, when looking at just the plot and its existing holes, actually makes more sense than merthur

ik!! ik!! outrageous. proposterous. INSANITY. but morgwen would actually ASSIST in fixing my biggest problem with the entire series, the biggest hole in morgana's very holey character arc: her hatred for arthur.

ive actually talked about this before, in this post:

"for example, when morgana began to hate arthur and want him dead and stuff—that development came out of nowhere. for the entire series up until that point, she had loved and cared for him. now, all of the sudden, she wants him dead?? now, it had made sense for uther. he had done terrible things to morgana and could very clearly see the line between her love and hate for him. you could to watch her tip-toe along it in real time until she began plotting his murder. that arc made sense. but arthur? there was no point where we saw arthur do anything that would make her hate him the way she did. he was just randomly lumped together with uther as another pendragon she had to kill to get the throne. but, again, it doesn't make sense! she never lumped them together. in the episode To Kill the King, morgana directly compares arthur and uther by telling him that, 'You're a better man than your father. Always were.' again, she never lumped them together! yet, later on, that's exactly what she does."

expanding on the beginning of that quote: in my opinion, this is what a character arc should look like: (and behold, the reason this ask took me a hundred years to answer... a CHART (made by moi))

^that is a very basic idea of a character arc, when a person starts one way and ends in another, all because of different inciting incidents forcing them to change. a slightly more complex version of this will look a little like this:

In this one, there is a very clear "Point B" where you can see that they've changed—that there is still more change to come, but that they have grown. this is how Morgana's character arc is shaped. in season two, you can very clearly see that Point B, and it's actually why it's my favorite season of Morgana's character development. season two showcases her gradual downfall as she struggles being a sorceress in the center of Camelot as Uther's own ward. everything you see her feel and struggle with feels very real.

season three is when it all starts to go awry. we obviously know that this is the season that she reaches that horrible Point C, when her character arc is complete and she turns into that wretched villainess we all know and love.

the issue with this is that there is a very important checklist-style of things she needs to believe in order to turn into this person:

✅find out about her magic

✅hate Uther

✅meet Morgause and believe in her goals

✅hate Arthur

i fully believe that she would not and could not change into the person she became without hating Arthur, because that was why she wanted to take the throne—she believed that both Pendragons couldn't be trusted to repeal the magic ban, and would continue the endless cycle of genocide. if she still cared about Arthur, still had faith in him, then she wouldn't have been so desperate to be crowned queen.

do i think that Morgana's faith in him was already wavering? absolutely. but i also believe that something HUGE had to happen to shatter her faith in him entirely. what could have been one of the best ways to do this?

eating away at her affections for him, slowly, with one or two issues before wiping out every good feeling she has ever felt for him with one big incident. how does morgwen tie into this, though?

it's simple: make arthur and gwen's relationship very obvious to morgana. force her to encounter it often. make her uncomfortable, because SHE loves gwen, has always loved gwen, and now her brother who spent years not even knowing who she was is supposedly in love with her?? that would be enough to eat away at anyone's affection for their brother. morgana wasn't stupid. she figured out their relationship very quickly, and was obviously disgusted with the idea. BUILD on that disgust. and then, once its obvious morgana is heart-wrenchingly jealous of arthur, make arthur do something stupid or harmful towards magic. shatter morgana's faith in him.

it would work so perfectly!! everything would fall into place!! all those weird plot holes surrounding morgana's downfall would make a million times more sense. imagine really only loving two people in the world: your best friend, your maidservant, the love of your life and your childhood friend, your ever-lasting nuisance, your brother. imagine them both falling in love while you can only watch helplessly. that's a perfect villian origin story, paired with uther's abuse, morgause's manipulation, and her own alienation from the people around her.

so, i know this was a lot, and took me a hundred million YEARS to respond to, but i'm literally so passionate about this its not even funny. if you want me to expand on anything or if you have any questions, please let me know!!! i love talking about this part of the show:)

[cetaceans-pls]

Hit Me With Your Best Short

happy birthday to @setsailslash, who got me into this (bat) hole and every day helps me dig it deeper. hope u got SO much good food to eat babe c:

jaybru, age regression, established relationship

-🚸-

Jason's pretty used to all types of things, but this one's a doozy. Villain-of-the-week this week's a frazzled-looking woman who keeps flipping between, uhm, Welsh, and shouting about de-throning Circe while she shoots lightning out her hands. Luckily, Gotham's Hot Swamp Summer is in full swing this mid-spring, and between the rocketing temperatures and humidity so full-bodied you're almost under water, the streets are real quiet as she shouts and zaps and, on 3 occasions, summons tigers.

Phew. Jason sends off a quick message to animal control (the genetic diversity introduced by emotionally-unstable magicians bringing endangered species into existence has, somehow, been a boon) and lets off a few potshots. He's trying to corner her into the deadzone between 14th and Bassett, that funny little intersection where magic and mobile data goes to die. Z says it's some strange trick with leylines, coherent magic waves interacting destructively to dampen power, and they'd only found the spot because there's a Mozambican seafood restaurant there that is maybe a little godly, and in her pursuit of a personal record in grilled prawn consumption Z had gotten her nice blouse all prawn'd up and could not prawn down them with just a spell.

Anyways. It's not the time to think about prawns, even if Jason always wants to think about prawns. He's herding sorcerer-lady closer and closer to Cantinho do Aziz, and he knows that once she's on the sidewalk then her power's going to sputter and die out, and he just needs to keep his distance, keep his cool, keep his-

Ah, shit. She's gotten another tiger in (good!), and she's called it right behind him (bad!). He doesn't have much in the way of Options for Escape, with Stripey roaring at him and lady yelling at him, but she's half a step away from losing power and Jason's a quick runner.

"Ah, shit," he says, dropping his gun then dropping his head before bum-rushing the Boss Babe. This is a good plan! Body-tackle her into the no-go zone then knock her out, preferably before he gets zapped and before he gets mauled!

Well. One outta two ain't bad.

-🚸-

When Jason comes to, he's on the cot in the medical bay, and his head is spinning and the floor looks awfully far far away. "Fuck me," he says, and then "Fuck me?" he says again, because that isn't his voice.

"Language, Master Jason," Alfred says, manifesting from the other side of the divider, holding a tray of tea and fried rice in his hands.

"Am I dying?" Jason asks very intently in his terribly high-pitched voice. He Loves fried rice but one of Alfred's very very few weaknesses is an inability to love and be loved by woks, so the only time they get stir-fry is when someone's not doing so hot.

"No," Alfred says, getting him set up. "And as such, this is not my best work. I just presumed you could do with some comfort, given..."

Jason sighs, and flexes his (tiny tiny) hand. "Yeah, given. How old am I, and do we knows how long I'm gonna stay like this? And did we catch the woman that did this?"

Alfred hands over a spoon after he's helped Jason sit up. "Twelve years old, I would say." Not fifteen, he doesn't say, so at least that's one less thing to worry about. "And we have apprehended the sorceress; she's still unconscious, so no help there. And unfortunately, given your condition and the ongoing situation in the 4th circle of hell, it'll be a while yet before we get a magician to come and check on you."

Jason groans. "There goes date night then, unless I'm gonna recover in 2 days." He tucks into his fried rice, and it's hot and a little greasy and kinda spicy and it's not Alfred's best work but it's nevertheless mighty mighty fine. "B handling this okay?"

Alfred inclines his head. "Once we got you home and checked that you were not injured beyond a, ah, temporal displacement, he left to finish clean-up of a little drug bust along Millionaire's Mile. He's handling this better than I've expected, in all honesty."

Jason chugs down his sweet milk tea, licks his lips. "When'd he go and get himself good at responding to stress?" he says, a little glad and a little irritated that Bruce isn't actually right by his side, hunched over looking like his guts are trying to eat him from the inside out.

"When indeed," Alfred says with great sufferance, face calm and eyes definitely not rolling. "He's been wearing a hole into the ground by the computer to avoid hovering. Do go and ease his mind when you can, Master Jason."

Jason rolls his ankles, his shoulders, his neck. Everything well, everything unbroken. He rubs at his chest, through the linen pyjamas that MUST be Damian's because what other child wears linen pyjamas, and notes the marked absence of an autopsy scar.

At least he isn't 15, though it sure is April. It's a miracle that Bruce hasn't run off to space, or come in here to shout at him. "No time like the present, huh."

Even if right now the definitions of both 'time' and 'present' are a little, uh. Uhm.

-🚸-

As expected, Bruce is by the computer, on a call with Superman and Wonder Woman, likely discussing the last apocalypse they averted in preparation for the next one coming in. Superman sees him first, obvious in his smile widening, sees him clear and dear even through the privacy blur Bruce has on, though the darkness of the cave and the limited quality of even the Bat WebCamera.

(Of course Superman isn't limited to regular human senses, of course of course, but Jason has this, hah, sense that Clark has some typa supernatural eye just on him, just for him, because he's the one that Died and Clark's very human in that he grieves and that he's not maybe too good at grieving, and Clark's very not because some nights when Jason's riding awful close to an edge he'll Feel that he's being watched, like a loving Sauron's got his eye on him in a way that goes beyond X-rays and electromagnetism.

It's almost off-putting, but Jason thinks if he can peer through the fifth-dimension unto a child that died then un-died but keeps doing things that could get themselves killed, he'd be all ogling all the time, so it's hard to keep a grudge.)

Superman's face is gently dissolving around the force of Clark's dimples, and Jason grins with his gappy teeth and says "Hi Uncle Clark!"

"Jason," Diana is smiling now too. "My, how you've grown."

It's silly, and she's laughing at her joke and she's laughing at herself, and Jason can't help but laugh too. "Yeah, yeah, laugh it up." He pauses, clears his throat, because his voice had cracked a little bit and 2/3rds of the Trinity are looking at him so warmly they could melt diamonds, but it's the last third that he's worried about. "I just got up, and I gotta talk to B. Is it okay if I steal him for the night?"

"Of course," Diana says magnanimously. "We will, after all, be seeing you for breakfast."

"Will we now," Bruce says flatly.

"No force on Earth's gonna keep me away from taking young Robin for a joyride 'cross the Eastern Seaboard, B," Clark says, grinning hugely. "If you're interested, that is."

Oh, man. What a flashback to times before. Jason knows he's a cute kid at the moment, mussed hair and big eyed and bare-toed, but he still feels like him, and it's been a while since he as himself had any type of one-on-one time with his (former?) idols. He feels a little wrong-footed, a little like saying 'I'm actually still an adult' and 'where were you when I was young and fresh out the grave', and the spitefulness comes sudden and comes ugly.

Something must show on his face, this soft round one whose muscles he's forgotten, because Clark's dimples smoothen out and it's Superman again, and the eye of Sauron that's on him turns a little cool even if it doesn't turn away. "Plenty of time to discuss this in the morning, so we won't keep you. Speak soon."

Diana frowns a little, before she nods. "Yes, we shall speak soon," she says like it's a blood oath, and then they're both gone, and now it's just Bruce in his BatChair and it's Jason in this body that just barely comes to Bruce's shoulder while he's sat down.

Bruce still hasn't looked at him.

"At least I'm not 15," Jason says at long last.

"That does not make it better," Bruce says, tight-jawed and facing his darkened screen.

"Can't make it worse." Sick of being ignored, sicker still of being yea tall when he used to have the barest height advantage, Jason clambers up on the chair, straddles Bruce's lap and grabs him by the chin as tightly as this child's hand can get. "You look at me when I'm talking to you," he says, voice still too too high to be menacing.

Bruce looks at him, then pointedly looks away. "Did Alfred tell you? I went back out, finished up my work, even after you got brought in like this."

Jason frowns. "Yeah, he did. We both thought that was mighty adult of you, doing the right thing."

"Was it? The right thing?"

Ahhh, there we go. The slightest sliver of eye contact, because say what you will about his obstinacy but once you've earned it, Bruce is so so good at following instruction. Jason snorts, and slides his hand down so it rests gentle gentle on Bruce's neck. "Yeah. I was fine, even if I'm like this, and needs must. Man's got a mission after all, right."

Bruce closes his eyes, and doesn't open them again like they're too too heavy. "You don't think there's something deeply wrong with a person who can look on the unconscious body of their, their, lover son-not-son and make themselves get up and leave? That I made myself decide that the mission is more important? That there's any singular thing would be more important than you?"

Jason usually gets real fed up real quick with Bruce's angst, on account of only one them having been the one beaten to death then exploded then resurrected into a thing of trauma and rage, but... Well. It's April. And dying Sucked Bigly but the whole time through he got to hold on to the truly unshakeable confidence that none of it had been his fault, a 15-year-old dumbass who had wanted so dearly to love so's he would feel all right to be loved in return.

Bruce doesn't get that unbearable clarity of being; the joker did the killing, but Bruce and Jason both know that Bruce has some portion of Jason's blood on his hands. And Jason can say don't mind it and just love me right right now and he gets to mean it because, y'know, it's his own damn blood, but Bruce doesn't have that right. Doesn't get to wash it off, doesn't want to wash it off, and it's his strong point (nobody this damn good at keeping tally of their sins) it's the thing that will kill him (nobody got this much hard hard earned guilt 'round their neck).

Jason presses his thumbnail against Bruce's jugular, and the reach of his fingers looks nonsensical next to the bulk of Bruce's neck, but still the man's breath stutters in response to this thing they've carefully carefully built between them. "First off, babe, I've never once said there wasn't something wrong with you. There's so much that's deeply, intractably wrong with you. You are not regular, you are not normal. None of us expect you to behave the way a regular well-adjusted person should be."

Bruce just grunts, lashes still lowered, demure and gray around the edges, stuffed up with regret and an inability to ease up.

"Secondly, I wasn't bleeding out with a bomb ticking down when you left. I was fine and healthy and whole, in warm jammies in a comfortable bed, and you rightly figured that you could leave me in Alfie's hands while you went and got shit done. When you gotta run for me, you do. Sometimes you don't make it," Jason says, tugging Bruce's hand and resting it on his chest, where a massive scar doesn't rest, "but you're always at least trying. Got plenty for you to beat yourself up over, don't need to be making shit up to add extra."

Bruce finally does look at him, full-on heavy-browed eye-contact. "Glad that you think I'm finally acting like a somewhat reasonable adult." His grip tightens over Jason's shirt. "I don't feel terribly reasonable at the moment. I look at you like this and there's a countdown in my head."

Jason grins, and it's not cute because this isn't a cute conversation. "Well, at worst you got 3 years to figure out how to get better, Bruce." He leans in closer, nuzzles their cheeks together. "I take it you're not a fan of me in this form."

Bruce carefully, tenderly nuzzles back. It's probably not unlike those Cute Animal videos, a panther kowtowing to a bossy tabby cat. "I like the one that came back the best," Bruce says in a quiet murmur. "The you that got to grow up and stayed good and kind despite all of the universe's efforts to the contrary." He chuffs a laugh. "Can't say it didn't feel good to be pursued by the Jason of the present, either. Unfortunately for you, seems like I like my men built solid enough to kill me."

Jason play-snarls, pretends to try and choke Bruce out. "You're such an asshole. Go back to being tormented 'bout how you've failed me, go on. At least you're cute and you're quiet when you're brooding."

Bruce nods along sagely. "Plenty of time yet in the rest of this month for me to put a good brood in. And one more thing, Jason. One more, ah, show of feelings felt."

Jason blinks, a little lost. "The hell are you on about?"

"If this doesn't work, we will not talk about it," Bruce says sternly, before ducking down to kiss Jason very lightly, very sweetly on the lips.

Oh, man, thinks Jason. This exact scenario has played in almost this exact same body, hey. Wait, what did Bruce mean, about feelings-

The combined mass and sudden force of Jason's rapid return to form is enough to destroy the axle of even the BatChair, and they go tumbling down. Damian's pyjamas are tattered beyond repair, torn even further when Jason reaches 'round to cushion Bruce's head before they hit rock(!) bottom(!), and he's Hulked out of his clothes with Bruce in an awkward embrace while a broken chair stabs him in the ass, and all he can see is Bruce's stupid smug face, all he can feel is a rough calloused hand on his autopsy scar, and all he can think of is true love's kiss ass bastard-

God. You can't say they're normal, but you sure can say that when push comes to shove, they sure as shit don't miss.

A/N: ah shit it was supposed to be a little spicy-horny but then it got real depressing but nevertheless kuro hope u enjoyed this!! i think a lot about how conceptually dying isnt worse than being the cause of death!!

[ironstrange1991]

Strawberries and a Horror Tale

Fluffy/Comfort

Pairing: Defender!Strange x Fem!Reader (Established Relationship)

Synopsis: After work the reader finds comfort in the arms of Defender Strange.

Word Count: 2,2k

Warnings: Implied smut, basically just fluffy

A/N: I was having a bad day so I wrote a fluffy Defender. Hope it comforts you as much as it comforts me ;) Read the smut continuation You Look Pretty When You Cum

"The number of unidentified magical events has become alarming in the last weeks" reported Luke Cage.

"And we still need to worry about the rampant violence that has hit our city" Completed Hawkeye.

Wong shook his head worriedly "I was talking to some masters at Kamar Taj and they all claimed to have been harassed within their dreams. Clearly this whole mess is the work of Nightmare, he was not happy with your latest meddling in his business."

"Without my meddling Nightmare would have waged a war against all other realms of the dream dimension which would seriously affect our reality" Defender Strange stated with a sigh leaning his elbow on the table in the Sanctum Sanctorum meeting room and pinching the bridge of his nose.

It was Saturday morning and all he didn't want to do was deal with it. "It's not yet clear whether all these things are linked or not. I need you to keep surveillance on the main streets of the city where the violence rates have increased" Luke Cage nodded. "What are we looking for?" asked Barton.

"Anything that is not up to normal standards. All information must be reported to me immediately."

"What about nightmare?" Wong asked and Stephen sighed "Apparently I'll have to summon and interrogate him."

When the meeting was over and the Defenders were leaving, Luke Cage and Barton still standing in the doorway receiving the final instructions from the Sorcerer Supreme, you descended the stairs ready for work and carrying your 5 year old daughter Kate's bags and belongings. She ran past you to her father and wrapped her arms around his waist in a tight hug.

"Dad is Saturday, you shouldn't be working." Cage and Barton laughed and Stephen picked her up "Did your mother tell you to say that?" She shook her head no, but a mischievous smile on her lips said otherwise.

"Guilty" You said approaching "Good morning guys"

"Good morning" Cage and Barton replied.

"We'll keep in touch during the day, I want to know every step you take." Stephen said authoritative. They nodded and left. Stephen sighed heavily.

"Daddy why are you angry?" He smiled, pinching Kate's cheek "I'm not angry, just a little worried because I heard I'll have to spend the whole weekend without my little sorceress"

She smiles broadly "I'm going to Disneyland, but mommy will take care of you" Stephen smirked looking at you “I’m sure she will”

You smiled innocently "It's already late, grandpa and grandma are waiting, let's go" Stephen kissed his daughter's forehead and set her on the floor "Have fun baby"

You arranged the backpack on her back and gave Stephen a quick kiss on the lips "Is everything alright?" He nodded "Nothing I can't fix before you come home" You nodded "Be careful. I love you"

"I love you too"

"Bye Daddy"

“Bye Baby”

Stephen watched you leave and headed for the main hall where Wong was waiting for him for the summoning ritual. In all the ways Saturday could start... talking to Nightmare wasn't in his plans.

...

You came home right after lunch and were surprised by the delicious smell of strawberry. You followed the scent into the kitchen and found Stephen distracted chopping strawberries for some recipe.

You approached hugging him from behind "I swear I thought today would be one of those days where I would barely see you" He nodded "Me too, but I managed to get everything sorted out in the morning." He dropped the strawberries and turned to you pulling you into his arms "Unfortunately the main hall didn't make it, but I promise I'll restore everything"

You feigned surprise "Really? This has never happened before!" He smiled and you noticed a nasty cut on his cheekbone "You're hurt" He shook his head "It's not like this has never happened before" He replied trying to reassure you. You sighed “The problem is that it happens too often, Stephen." He nodded cupping your face in his big and scarred hands, they were steady and you know he was using magic to work "I'm fine"

You nodded. You would never get used to seeing him hurt, it always broke your heart, but you had to accept that. "So, what are strawberries for?" He grinned "For your favorite dessert. I saw them at the market and couldn't help but buy them, they were so big and red." You stood on tiptoe to kiss him. It was supposed to be just a touch of lips but he ran his tongue over your lips forcing them to part and deepening the kiss with wonderful strawberry flavor

"They're sweet too apparently" You said on his lips and he nodded "Very sweet. I could not resist." You smirked "Can I taste one?" He took one from the bowl "Of course" but instead of putting it in your mouth he put it in his mouth and held the back of your neck pulling you into a hungry and messy strawberry kiss. You hummed wrapping your arms around his neck, melting into his lips, sweet strawberry taste on your tongue.

Your lips parted for you to breathe, you ran your index finger on the corner of his lips and brought it to your mouth, he licked his lower lip devouring you with his eyes.

"Well, I don't want to be in the way, so I'm going upstairs to take a shower and maybe read a little." He pulled you back pinning you to his chest, purposefully rubbing his hips against you so you could feel his arousal.

"You never get in the way, baby. By the way, did you realize we have the house to ourselves today?" He smirked.

"Oh this will help a lot in my reading" You said feigning innocence. He took your hand and directed it to his bulge, he was very hard and twitching and you tightened your hand around him over the fabric, he rested his forehead on yours and moaned softly. "May I know what book is so interesting to be better company than your husband?"

You smirked, stroking him lightly over his pants "It's a book by HP Lovecraft. Very interesting actually..." You replied but were interrupted by another passionate kiss, his tongue invading your mouth, touching, caressing, battling yours for a dominance he knew very well he was always lose.

You broke the kiss gasping "I really want to eat my dessert" You said chuckling "I better go upstairs and stop distracting my favorite cook"

You kissed his lips lightly distracting him enough to take a strawberry from the bowl. He groaned complaining as you walked away "Don't think you'll get away so easily" He said with a smirk.

You smiled victorious biting the strawberry  "I already did. Hmm  it's so sweet"

He smiled that beautiful sideways smile that melts your heart and was reserved just for you. "You'd better go upstairs before I decide to take that strawberry out of your hand" You stuffed the whole strawberry in your mouth smiling mischievously and walked out of the kitchen.

Stephen refrained from abandoning his task and going after you. He chuckled to himself going back to chopping the strawberries slowly. He was still amazed at how you could mess with him. No matter how much time had passed, his love for you seemed to grow more each day. Everything he did was for you, whether it was his duties as Sorcerer Supreme or the simpler household chore like making dessert, it was all for you. He needed to keep the universe safe for you, he needed to please you, pamper you, to worship you because you were what gave his life meaning.

By the time he finished making the dessert he was already too eager to get back into your arms so he cheated by using magic to clean everything up.

He knew he should take care of the damage to the main hall caused by the stupid fight with Nightmare, but the desire to be with you made him leave that for another time.

When he walked into the bedroom he found you lying lazily on the bed in your comfy knit pajamas, your wet hair splayed across his pillow, your legs crossed, your nose buried in the book you were reading.

"Baby you're wetting my pillow again" You put the book down staring at him with puppy eyes "I am sorry"

He sighed. He didn't really care. "How's the reading?"

You cleared your throat dramatically and started reading aloud "St. John is a mangled corpse; I alone know why, and such is my knowledge that I am about to blow out my brains for fear I shall be mangled in the same way. Down unlit and illimitable corridors of eldritch phantasy sweeps the black, shapeless Nemesis that drives me to self-annihilation."

He raised an eyebrow "Sounds interesting"

You agreed "I just started, want to read with me?" He made a motion with his hands, exchanging the black and red robe he was wearing for comfortable pajama bottoms. You didn't let that go unnoticed, your eyes devoured him and a smile played on your lips. He sat beside you on the bed. "Reading with you, or reading to you?" You grinned handing the book into his hands "Read to me."

He positioned the bookmark and placed the book on the bedside table "First let me take care of this wet hair" He said and you stood up. He moved his fingers in a simple gesture and an instant later your hair was dry. He did the same with his pillow and then lay down crossing his legs "Come here"

You cuddled with him, your head on his chest. He picked up the book again and started reading from the beginning with that baritone voice that made you shiver. "In my tortured ears there sounds unceasingly a nightmare whirring and flapping, and a faint, distant baying as of some gigantic hound. It is not dream—it is not, I fear, even madness—for too much has already happened to give me these merciful doubts. "

You sighed contentedly, letting yourself be carried away by the sound of his voice, the sound of his heart beating in your ear and the terrifying story he was telling. You wondered if there was a better way to spend your Saturday afternoon, you were sure there wasn't. Not when you had your man safe at home with you reading a tale from your favorite fantasy writer to you.

You could tell he was enjoying the story by the tone of his voice. Stephen was an extraordinary reader, he didn't even realize he was doing that, but he always created a different tonality of voice for each character in the story, or in the case of the tale he was reading to you now where everything was narrated through the protagonist's vision, the tonality of his voice changed according to the character's emotion making the reading incredibly immersive.

"Madness rides the star-wind . . . claws and teeth sharpened on centuries of corpses . . . dripping death astride a Bacchanale of bats from night-black ruins of buried temples of Belial. . . . Now, as the baying of that dead, fleshless monstrosity grows louder and louder, and the stealthy whirring and flapping of those accursed web-wings circles closer and closer, I shall seek with my revolver the oblivion which is my only refuge from the unnamed and unnamable."

He closed the book and kissed your forehead.

"I think they got what they deserved" You said still gaping at the story. He chuckled "So you liked it?" You shook your head excitedly "They should make a movie with this story. Something dark and gothic"

He denied putting the book on the bedside table "Every time they make a movie based on a book the result is disappointing. Besides, how are they going to show the unimaginable?"

You sighed "You're so annoying sometimes." He brought his hands up to your hair slowly stroking "I know"

You smirked "You read so well, you could work recording audiobooks." He chuckled "Baby, how would I make time for this?" You agreed snuggling closer to him "You're right, besides I wouldn't like to know that other people could hear your beautiful voice. I'd rather it be mine alone" He lifted your chin to kiss you "My voice is yours, as well as everything else" He ran his hand down your waist, tucking it inside your pajama top and up to your breasts.

"No bra?" You bit your bottom lip when he circled a nipple with his thumb "The idea is to get comfortable" He nodded in agreement "You're right, comfortable is good..." He kissed your lips softly and bit your bottom lip "You know I live to make you feel good."

He cupped your breast, squeezing it gently in his rough hand and returning to kiss you now with passion, his tongue penetrating your mouth and dominating yours demandingly. You moaned into his lips "Looks like I'll have to pay for your reading services after all" He hummed lowering his lips to your chin "What's fair is fair"

You hummed excited.

"But today baby, I am in control" He whispered in your ear

You grinned "We'll see."

Leave a comment if you liked it. Interact! I will love to read all of your comments and opinions. It inspires me to keep writing ;)

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[thewitcheress2389]

hey! if it's okay for cou could you write a geralt and ex lover,fem!reader fic? reader has some witchy powers, but she doesn't prefer to use them. when geralt is looking for ciri, he founds reader, thanks to dandelion. because she let ciri stay at her home in novigrad. she decides to help him. during their way, she confess her feelings again. thank you!

Sure!💖 Hope you like it!

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A Trip Down Memory Lane

While searching for Ciri, Geralt’s trail leads to you, a woman he was once very close to.

It’s not like Geralt has a lot of intel. Not so many people kept in touch with a witcher, but Geralt was desperate for information on Ciri. Yennefer was in Skellige, Triss was in the wind, and his fellow witchers couldn’t do much to help. However, there was always one man he could rely on in cases like this.

Dandelion.

The bard didn’t have much information as to where Ciri was of course because he’s Dandelion. That said, he’s still able to help Geralt in some shape or form. Apparently, Dandelion was supposed to be sent to prison or executed or something for crimes that Geralt wasn’t entirely sure of. He was saved by a mutual friend of theirs.

He was saved by you.

Your history with the witcher is rocky. Like with most women, you fell in love with Geralt and him you. But things didn’t work out, like always. Yennefer came along and sparked things back up with your witcher, making him leave you. You had similar powers to Yennefer, but that apparently didn’t matter much. Because of this, you guys haven’t spoken for a long while.

But according to Dandelion (loosely translated), you were in Novigrad. And even more so, you encountered Ciri.

It was the one thing that motivated him to see you again.

Being a user of magic of any kind meant you had to hide well in Novigrad, but that didn’t stop Geralt from finding your home. It was just where he remembered it to be all those years ago. I guess the witch hunters left you be for the most part, leaving the real work to sorceresses who are causing problems and actively using magic. 

As he walked up to your door, he felt a pit open up in his stomach. The witcher doesn’t fear much, but this worries him. When you guys left, things weren’t on good terms. But if you cared for Ciri, then you most still hold some care for him.

Right?

He knocked on your door, waiting for what felt like forever for a response. Geralt was so deep in thought that he barely heard a familiar voice that sent a chill down his spine.

“Why are you here?” Your voice caused his cat-like eyes to flicker down and meet your own e/c eyes. They were narrowed and you didn’t seem so happy as you peeked out from behind your door.

“You should know why...Ciri.” The witcher rolled his shoulders, bringing his composure back to him. You might’ve been an ex-lover, but you still had information on his surrogate daughter.

“Figures...come in I guess.” You said while frowning a bit. Still, you opened the door for Geralt to come in your home, which still hasn’t changed much.

The tension was there, and the conversation was awkward. You did admit that you housed Ciri, confessing that you too had a soft spot for the young woman. Geralt was pleased to hear that, but the faraway look in your eyes told him that you weren’t too happy about it. He then changed the subject and asked about your magic, which made you confess that Novigrad wasn’t too happy about magic anymore, so you didn’t do it as often.

“Look, I just housed her for a while. I know nothing else.” You told him, a clear sign that you were ready for him to leave. But Geralt had other plans.

“Wait. I could use your help.” He said in a serious manner, and you were flabbergasted.

“Me? Why?” You asked while folding your arms.

“Yen’s in Skellige, I can’t find Triss, and Dandelion is less than helpful when it comes to actually helping me. I need someone like you to help me find some clues.” Geralt thought that he explained himself rather well, but he sometimes forgets that he’s talking to a woman, much less a woman he used to have close contact with. You glared at him.

“So, I’m last pick? Again? It’s always like that with you. Just using who you need at the moment till their not needed anymore.” You growled at him, but Geralt kept his composure. He knew you were hurt, and he knew it was wrong to ask you for help. But he really was running out of options.

“It’s not like that Y/N. I know you don’t want to help me but do it for Ciri. Please. She’s in danger. This you know.” Geralt pleaded with you as your eyes glared out the window nearby. You gripped yourself as you kept your arms crossed as you mulled this over. Eventually, with a slightly flustered expression, you spoke up.

“Alright. I’ll help.”

The two of you left Novigrad that very same day to continue the search. The city itself was too dangerous for Ciri to have stayed. At least, that’s what you told Geralt. Plus, if she stuck around, it would’ve been known. With a goodbye to Dandelion, who truly hoped that you guys would have luck, you guys were back in Velen.

Little did you know, it was the bard’s plan to get you guys back together. It was he who sent Geralt to you, was it not? Yennefer scares him too much, so he can’t support that. You were perfect for Geralt, and as the witcher’s wingman, Dandelion was going to make this happen.

He knew your feelings never left.

“Sorry if it tastes like shit. You know I was never a good cook.” Geralt said with a slight smile. You laughed in spite of everything as you guys made camp for the night in one of Velen’s less nasty swampy areas. Geralt had caught a fish, and now here you were.

“You almost burned my house down.” You said with a grin. Geralt eyed you from his place poking the fire.

“Almost.” He re-clarified, and you laughed again. You hated to admit this, but it felt like old times again, when he loved you. Not that Geralt hated you, but you knew he had this thing with Yennefer. You also knew that as a grown woman, you should respect that, but you can’t help but feel that pang in your heart whenever you thought about that.

It wasn’t your fault. You still loved him.

“Y/N, something’s bugging you.” Geralt’s voice snapped you out of your thoughts. Looking at him, you noticed his gaze was in your direction as he ignored the fire.

“You don’t know that.” You immediately defended yourself, and Geralt gave you a look that said “really”. 

“I’m a witcher, I can sense it. Also, your magic always gives you away.” He said while pointing towards the base of the log. Looking down, you noticed all the grass and flowers that were by your feet had turned dark and died. You grumbled to yourself, hating how your magic does little things like that when you’re emotional.

“So, you gonna tell me what’s bugging you?” Geralt pressed again, this time moving to sit next to you, his eyes never leaving your form. You pressed your lips in a thin line. Shuffling slightly, your knee nudged against his, causing a bunch of old feelings to resurface. Your face turned red, and you knew that Geralt could hear your heart speed up. 

“I still love you, Geralt...” You confessed quietly, moving to hug yourself.

There was no change in Geralt’s stature or emotion. He continued to stare at you with that neutral expression, blinking every so often as he looked at your softly. 

“Y/N...” He started to say, sadness in his heart.

“I know you have that whole thing with Yennefer, but isn’t it just a djinn’s magic? I’m not saying you guys don’t love each other, but I just can’t stop my own feelings. It may be selfish, but I-” You started to say, but Geralt cut you off by saying your name again.

“Y/N. Enough. I understand.” Geralt said, putting a gentle yet strong hand on your shoulder. You froze at his touch. The witcher sighed through his nose, loosening his grip a bit on your shoulder. 

“And you’re right. Yen and I are connected by magic...and perhaps if it’s broken, then my true feelings will be revealed. If it’s you or her, then that will be decided. But for now, let’s just enjoy each other’s company.” Geralt said with a slight smile. 

That wasn’t quite the answer you were looking for, but it wasn’t entirely a hopeless answer either. His true emotions were clouded by a djinn’s spell, so perhaps you were the one for him. And he was right. Until that was decided, you could enjoy him right here and now.

That’s why you didn’t stop Geralt when he kissed you. 

And once again, your magic acted out before you could think. The dead plants by your feet began to grow again, causing flowers to bloom beautifully. However, the romantics of the scene began to fade as the smell of something burning caught your guys’ attention. Looking towards the fire, you realized that Geralt’s cooking skills haven’t changed a bit.

“Geralt!”

“Shit!”

[tripleyeeet]

this is my tiefling baby, saphyra zarashi !

she is a sorceress for hire, a woman of very lil words, and entirely stubborn. she grew up in baldur's gate w/o parents, and can be mean sometimes, but became motivated to help ppl upon coming across the tieflings in emerald grove! she's also pretty tall and has an enchanted eye. c:

okay but we love a stoic tiefling woman with a good moral compass!! i bet she kicks absolute ass with all that magic (and height!)

also enchanted eye???? sounds like there’s a story somewhere in there 👀

[original-character-championship]

Bracket G Round 1

Poll 16

Cherish (@kindledrose) vs. Royale (@ittybluejay)

415. Cherish (@kindledrose)

he/him

• this boy. THIS BOY. mans is one of those flirty vigilante-type characters you know how it is. canonically ace tho (he is just in it for the bit and we love him for it <3 terribly flustered whenever anyone actually tries to reply to him. good at cracking one-liners and absolutely nothing else. zero thoughts in his head)

• his name is literally cherish. nicknames include cher. cheri. cheryl if someone's trying to piss him off. various cherry-flavored drinks and desserts because his friends are dorks.

• he's also lonely as heck!! wow how relatable am i right!! he has like two friends one of which he believes dead for a while (she's not) (it gets better for him of course but it does take a while)

• absolutely HATES taking off his mask. never does in front of anyone. for a while it was a ""hmm yeah nope not doing that"" thing but now it's a ""if i take this off everyone will know and try to kill me and it will suck"" thing

• super galaxy-coded his whole shtick revolves around stars it's awesome

• used to be a fnaf oc. somehow lmao. he was like one of those mop robots except homicidal. that was a while ago and now he's just a human guy but i still think that part's funny

• has a whole entire story (lives in a post-apocalyptic city! everyone wears masks!) but i'll save that for another post

• super beloved. please appreciate my little guy :]c

the only design part i will note is that he has velcro sneakers because he does not know how to tie shoelaces <3

416. Royale (@ittybluejay)

He/him

Royale is an awful, Irish wizard guy. His real name is Darien, but he does not use that name at all now. He was raised by his awful sorceress mother, who treated him awfully, and he had no friends until he became an adult. He eventually made friends with a man named Toal.

The two of them went to a temple to undertake some trials in order to become Chosen (a whole subclass of people in this context). Royale was under the impression that only one of them could become Chosen, so obviously he tried to backstab his friend. This was the wrong choice, and the being running the trials cut his arm off as punishment.

Toal became Chosen, and Royale ran away from home after realizing he had no reason to stay there. Royale later joined a cult, changed his name, and did many nefarious spells to extend his lifespan.

Then like 800 years later, he met Toal again (Toal is a skeleton now). He pretended to be Toal’s friend again, but it was a ploy to get Toal to help him with his goal. Royale’s new goal was to become the vessel for a god, he ends up succeeding, but then getting his butt kicked anyways and the god leaves him.

The god did still grant the immortality he wanted, so now he’s kinda depressed and can’t die. He’s pathetic, but very magically powerful. Also he cursed a guy to make him into a greed-based werewolf one time. Very petty guy.

(art by catniipped)

[masterqwertster]

H/c spells- Modify Memory with the soulblooms au? (Characters up to you, but I would love Orym, Ashton, and/or Milo to be in it :) )

Prompt The thing about the Soul Bloom AU is that it's supposed to be canon compliant for anything not directly impacted by the blooms being present. And Modify Memory hasn't been (explicitly) used in this campaign (yet). So instead of the actual spell, I've gone with the second mind dive on Ashton, where they were kind of trying to figure out if his memories had been magically messed with. (Which, honestly I feel like there's a chance his memories after setting off the trap but before falling got blanked. Like a brief conversation/deal made before someone shoves them out the window off the balcony)

27 Modify Memory

You attempt to reshape another creature’s memories. One creature that you can see must make a Wisdom saving throw. If you are fighting the creature, it has advantage on the saving throw. On a failed save, the target becomes charmed by you for the duration. The charmed target is incapacitated and unaware of its surroundings, though it can still hear you. If it takes any damage or is targeted by another spell, this spell ends, and none of the target’s memories are modified.

While this charm lasts, you can affect the target’s memory of an event that it experienced within the last 24 hours and that lasted no more than 10 minutes. You can permanently eliminate all memory of the event, allow the target to recall the event with perfect clarity and exacting detail, change its memory of the details of the event, or create a memory of some other event.

You must speak to the target to describe how its memories are affected, and it must be able to understand your language for the modified memories to take root. Its mind fills in any gaps in the details of your description. If the spell ends before you have finished describing the modified memories, the creature’s memory isn’t altered. Otherwise, the modified memories take hold when the spell ends.

A modified memory doesn’t necessarily affect how a creature behaves, particularly if the memory contradicts the creature’s natural inclinations, alignment, or beliefs. An illogical modified memory, such as implanting a memory of how much the creature enjoyed dousing itself in acid, is dismissed, perhaps as a bad dream. The DM might deem a modified memory too nonsensical to affect a creature in a significant manner.

A Remove Curse or Greater Restoration spell cast on the target restores the creature’s true memory.

At Higher Levels: If you cast this spell using a spell slot of 6th level or higher, you can alter the target’s memories of an event that took place up to 7 days ago (6th level), 30 days ago (7th level), 1 year ago (8th level), or any time in the creature’s past (9th level).

Orym is rather glad in this moment that nosebleeds don't cause soul blooms. Otherwise whatever Imogen and Fresh Cut Grass are doing in Ashton's head would be giving them all a nose full of thistles, which sounds deeply unpleasant.

Hopefully they won't have a knuckleduster of thistles to deal with when Imogen and FCG are done this time. But that really depends on what the duo digs up and how Ashton feels about it, Orym supposes. At least if it does come to that, Ashton's target before was a wall, not friends. And they seem to be consistent in things like that.

In time (and after the weirdness of the people-like specks in the glass), Imogen, FCG, and Ashton awaken from the trance of the mind dive.

All three are shaken.

Imogen's hands tremble as she cradles Ashton's face to speak with them. The genasi heaves unsteady breaths. Letters jitters in place just the slightest bit.

The sorceress and aeormaton weave a story of the profound strangeness they encountered within Ashton's mind. To have a universe in his head sounds entirely inhumanoid to Orym. Another point in which Orym is Just A Guy while his friends are... simply more.

But even Just A Guy can help. Especially when it comes to his soulmates.

Orym has always found that a nice scent helps one breathe more calmly, and Ashton's breath is still hitching every now and then. Normally, he would turn to lavender as a simple soothing scent, but given that's what blooms upon his soulmates for him, Orym has a sneaking suspicion that none of the other members of Bells Hells finds it particularly soothing. So he turns to another fragrant plant: mint. A quick squeeze of the leaves between his fingers releases the bright scent before Orym tucks the sprig into Ashton's lappel.

"Oh, that's sharp," they mumble, not quite in complaint.

"Just breathe," Orym gently instructs them, taking in the crisp smell for himself.

And they do.

They all breathe and find their way forward.

[birindale]

Etymology: She-Ra

What’s good, it’s time for another foray into etymology, this time featuring the resident magical alter ego, She-Ra! As you may have seen from my Larry Ditillio/Lou Scheimer quotes, the actual etymology is pretty straightforward--She, plus Ra. So we’ll cover that first, then move into homophones and proposed alternative etymologies (largely by people who didn’t know about the actual one).

Section One: She

‘She’, of course, is a third person pronoun in English, here the feminine counterpart to the masculine ‘he’ of He-Man. I’m reasonably confident y’all are familiar with the idea of personal pronouns, given we’re on Tumblr, so we’re just gonna jump right in here.

From Middle English sche <ʃeː> (~’shay’), though it could be rendered scho and ȝho (both pronounced ~‘show’) before we killed the yogh. Luckily for us, in ȝho it’s just pronounced like ‘sh’. 

Don’t let the sch fool you, the c in sch was often silent in Middle English. How exactly we arrived at sche, though, is a matter of some debate. This paper summarizes most of the proposals, which has saved you all about eight paragraphs of me rambling about phonemes.

Regardless of its derivation, the vowel situation in ‘she’ is pretty weird--I’m assuming like half of you are familiar with the Great Vowel Shift, but for those that aren’t, the 15th to 18th centuries saw a.... well, great shift in vowels. It’s why so many of our words are spelled so fucked up; one day our long vowels just did an electric slide to the right & suddenly bite was pronounced like byte instead of beet. But one would expect the “e” in sche to unravel into an “o:”, not the “i:” sound we wound up with. It could be the influence of ‘he’, which would be convenient for us, looking at the word as a counterpart to the ‘He’ in He-Man, but historical phonology is a tricky beast. And it could just be an outlier--commonly used words have a tendency to mutate faster. 

I think that’s enough about vowels, though. Moving on!

Section Two: Ra

Ra. Good old Ra. God of the sun, the sky, order, kings. Ruler of all three realms, sky earth and underworld. Creator of all life (sometimes). Kind of a big deal.

Not to pat Larry Ditillio on the back too hard here but it was a great choice, phonetically and theologically. There’s even a precedence for using his name as half of a compound, as with Amun-Ra, the New Kingdom’s fusion with Amun. There’s his association with the falcon, shared in MOTU by the god Zoar (and the Sorceress), but he was also usually depicted with the head of a ram in the underworld. And I mean. Skeletor’s Havoc Staff is literally a ram skull, is all I’m saying. Like Ra is a pretty incredible option, here.

A little more Egyptology, because the coincidences don’t stop there. Ra had three daughters, and since this is appending Ra to “She” and they’re all--as the “eye of Ra”--sometimes considered feminine aspects of Ra, I think it’s relevant. And funny, because all three were depicted as cats at one point or another & Catra is right there.

Hathor was goddess of the sky, the sun, music, dance, joy, sexuality, beauty, love, motherhood, queenship, fate, foreign lands and goods, the afterlife, and more! This is a bonkers number of things to be god of, but I don’t think it was ever all at once. Most consistently, she was the embodiment of the Ancient Egyptian perception of femininity. As women’s role in society changed, so did Hathor’s role in the pantheon--for good or ill. 

Bastet & Sekhmet are a little more focused. Originally, they were both fearsome warriors, protectors of Egypt & specifically of the pharaoh, but over time Bastet became a gentler take on protection, often with a maternal slant as she became more associated with the house cat than the lion.

Sekhmet on the other hand was (and always would be) literally bloodthirsty. She could breathe fire, cause plagues, and almost destroyed the world once! But she was also a goddess of healing, called upon to ward off illness & injury, patron of healers and physicians alike. [holds up a picture of She-Ra] 🤌 It’s about the duality.

Alright, onto the etymology. ‘Ra’ is pretty straightforward, it’s just how we most commonly transliterate the rꜥ hieroglyphs (though he is often called Re) & Demotic script.

So there are three kinds of hieroglyph, right? Phonetic, like a letter in English, logographic, like a morpheme in written Chinese (which is typically logosyllabic but bear with me here), and determinative, to disambiguate meaning between homophones.

D21, the mouth, provides the ‘r’ sound, as a phonetic hieroglyph. As a logogram it could mean ‘to turn the other way’, but we’re just after the sound here.

D36, the forearm (palm upwards), gives us the ‘ ꜥ ‘, which is... okay, hieroglyphics were an abjad, right? There were no written vowels, you just spoke them. But ꜥ, ayin, was a voiced pharyngeal fricative, which is basically a semivowel (like the Y in English ‘yes’ or the W in ‘west’), which is why its use here can be spelled either ‘Ra’ or ‘Re’, because it’s not representing a distinct vowel sound. One of its descendants, ע, is usually rendered as a glottal stop in Modern Hebrew (or omitted entirely), but another descendant is the English letter O, through the Phoenician ayin. We can’t pronounce the ancient Egyptian ayin based on its derivatives, but we can take historical cues from them.

A glottal stop (like the break in uh-oh) is abrupt, right? Ayin is more like... a glide. A pause. When people make an “I don’t know” sound, that’s the sort of sound. This video is as close as most native English speakers will be able to approximate.

But I digress. We’re only halfway through! Those were the phonetic hieroglyphs, but there are other words pronounced rꜥ, so there are some logograms to help us narrow it down. Unsurprisingly, first is N5, the sun, followed by a Z1, (the numeral one), which indicates that the previous glyph is an ideogram--it’s like a one-character version of “←literally”. Now, by themselves those four glyphs could still just mean ‘the sun’, so to specify that it’s the god being spoken of, in come our determinatives.

This could be either C1, C2, C2A, C2B, or C2C. All depict a god wearing a sun-disk on his head. The C2s are all falcon-headed, and C1, while human, has an uraeus (the little rearing cobra you see on pharaohs’ headdresses and crowns) to emphasize divine authority. Some spellings outside the Unicode standard mix and match accessories, or omit the phonetic hieroglyphs entirely to rely solely on the determinatives. Generally, if you see a god with the sun on its head, it’s either Ra himself or invoking/referencing him (which was done frequently in pharaohs’ names).

Okay. Switching gears.

So hieroglyphs are kind of a bitch to write out, right? You don’t want to take the time to draw a whole little guy when you’re just making a list of supplies or something. So they invented this shit called hieratics that was basically cursive hieroglyphics, which eventually became the Demotic script! Ra was written G7-Z5-N5, (still rꜥ), or pꜣrꜥ (conventionally pronounced pa-re), with the pꜣ functioning as a demonstrative determiner to indicate that yes, they mean the god.

Section Three: Homophones

Those of you who have tried to google ‘She-Ra bible’ may be familiar with Sheera of Chronicles 1 7:24. Chronicles is the last book (split into 2 for Christian bible) of the Tanakh, wrapping up the Ketuvim with a genealogy and history of Judah & Israel. To oversimplify: David, Solomon, Babylonian exile, Cyrus the Great swoops in and lets everyone back in & okays the building of the Second Temple around 539 BCE. Only non-Jewish messiah in the Tanakh, and relevant here because the Ancient Greeks thought his name meant ‘Sun’, from Persian خور, ‘xʷaɾ‘. It’s also been translated as hero, humiliator of enemies, youth/young, and one who bestows care. It is almost certainly unrelated to C’yra (of D’riluth III), but the possibility remains until Scott answers my fucking email.

Anyway, Sheera/h. שארה‎ (שֶׁאֱרָ֔ה, with niqqud). That ה (funnily enough, named he) is a suffix indicating a singular feminine noun, which has been applied to שאר‎, sh-’-r (or sh-a-r, depending on how you render the aleph. I used an A in my post on Adora with אדור but it feels weird as a infix, especially given what I did with the ayin in section 2). Let’s take a look at its definitions:

Sha’ar means to remain, to be a remnant, and its derived nouns she’ar and she’erit mean remains, residue, etc. In the Tanakh it refers almost exclusively to survivors, people or things left behind when everyone/thing else has died, often violently. Noah & his passengers on the Ark after the flood, Lot & his daughters after Sodom and Gomorrah--did y’all know the town they went to after was called Zoar? The aforementioned falcon god in He-Man? It’s a coincidence but what the fuck. Naomi and her sons in Ruth 1:3, then just Naomi in 1:5. Oh, and she renamed herself Mara like ten lines after that. Shit like this just kept happening, I had to stop looking at examples bc it was freaking me out.

She’er, meanwhile, means flesh, both in terms of flesh for consumption & one’s flesh and blood. It can also mean physical power (Psalm 78:20), but I for one assumed that shit was metaphorical. On the other hand, who am I to deny another fun little parallel with our Princess of Power? A lot of people prefer this for the underlying meaning of Sheerah’s name, since she’s explicitly someone’s daughter & it could just be like “(singular feminine) kin”. But I think that’s boring (even if the prospect of like, “Fleshella” or some shit is both objectively hilarious and kind of in line with MOTU names) and a little unremarkable to name three cities for. Did I forget to mention they built three cities named after Sheerah? #girlboss

Last of the שאר is she’or, meaning leaven (the noun, not the verb). In Modern Hebrew it’s more often spelled שאור, with a waw added in to disambiguate the pronunciation.

Onto some other homonyms, bc that was technically just one!

Shir, an anglicization of شیر, Classical & Iranian Persian for ‘lion’, one of the plurals for which is شیرها‎ (šir-hâ), which admittedly is more like “sheer-ha” but say it out loud before you judge me for its inclusion here, huh? The singular’s also part of شیرزن‎ (širzan, “heroine”). 

There’s Macedonian and Serbo-Croation шира/šira , "must" (fermented/ing juice, not necessity).

Cira, which is Sicilian for “wax”.

شيرة and شْيَرَة, Hijazi and Gulf Arabic (respectively) for syrup, from Persian شیره‎. There’s a lot of Persian origins here huh. Shame Purrsia isn’t canon, could’ve had a field day. 

Okay one more in Hebrew. Shira/h, שירה, is poetry, verse, singing. In Modern Hebrew shir is a song and shirah is a poem, but that distinction didn’t always exist. The other derivatives of the שׁ-י-ר stem are all related to this. You’ll note that the second letter is a yodh, not an aleph as in the above שארה‎, whose stem was שאר. There’s like a 99% chance that Larry Ditillio’s niece Shirah’s name is derived from this.

Section Four: Shit I’ve Seen People Claim it Means

Most understandably, I’ve seen people claiming they just stuck an S on the rejected name “Hera” and broke it in two to mirror He-Man. So just to cover our bases, Ἥρα (Hera) is of uncertain derivation. Potentially a feminine form of ἥρως (hḗrōs) or related to ὥρα (hṓra)--the former being the ancestor of our word hero, in epics specifically heroes of the Trojan War, but generally humans or demigods venerated at local shrines. The latter refers primarily to time--hours, years, seasons--and youth. The youth reading is supported by the Roman name for her, Juno, which is also of uncertain derivation, but one of those likens it to iuvenis, young (like the juve in rejuvenate).

Asherah the ‘mother goddess’. I admit I wasn’t expecting this one. Asherah (the spelling I’ll be sticking to for consistency’s sake) was, admittedly, kind of a big deal in the ancient Levant. In the interest of not going full theology essay while I’m trying to talk about names, suffice to say she was the consort of the king of the gods (El, Elkunirsa, Yahweh, ‘Amm, Baal, etc.) in quite a few religions, some of which have dropped the polytheism thing & Asherah along with it. (The others are dead).

It’s written אשרה in Hebrew, so roughly ‘sh-r-’ if I’m sticking to my aleph conventions. She was also called Athirat in Ugaritic, an extinct Semitic language ( 𐎀𐎘𐎗𐎚, ʾAṯirat), though before 1200 BCE she was almost always referred to with her full title, 𐎗𐎁𐎚 𐎀𐎘𐎗𐎚 𐎊𐎎, rbt ʾṯrt ym. This is another abjad so we gotta adlib our vowels, but most people go with rabītu, for ‘lady’. The ym could refer either to her son, Yam, or the sea which he was the embodiment of, but the middle bit is tricky. It’s her name (that Athirat), but some people think it’s derived from the Ugaritic ʾaṯr for ‘to stride’, so her full title could be translated as Lady Athirat of the Sea, Lady who walks on Yam/the Sea Dragon/Tyre (the city). However, a more recent translation derives it from the root y-w-m, ‘day’, which would make her Lady Asherah of the Day/s (or even just Lady Day).

Another epithet was qnyt ʾilm ( 𐎖𐎐𐎊𐎚 𐎛𐎍𐎎), variously ‘creatress of the gods’ (page 58), used in the Baal Cycles recovered from Ugarit. Since it’s a port city, her association with the sea was emphasized, and in this version she had 70 sons (though the Hittites claim 77 or 88).

She’s also called ʾElat, 'goddess' (from El, as in names like Michael or Gabriel), and Qodeš, 'holiness', from q-d-š, which makes some people equate her with the Egyptian goddess Qetesh, which is pretty flimsy but funny here because guess who she’s associated with? (It’s Ra. She’s also sometimes depicted as a lion/with Hathor’s wig. It’s a small ancient world after all)

Asherah & her iconography are mentioned 40 times in the Tanakh, but that’s cut way down in most English translations, where ʾăšērâ was almost entirely translated as ἄλσος/ἄλση (grove/s) in Greek, except for Isaiah 17:8; 27:9, where it's δένδρα (trees) and 2 Chronicles 15:16; 24:18, where it's Ἀστάρτη--Astarte, a goddess of war, sexuality, royal power, healing, and hunting more associated with Ishtar than Asherah. Possible consort of Baal so almost certainly not actually Asherah. She did turn up in Egypt in the 18th dynasty as a daughter of either Ra or Ptah (Bastet’s consort), though, which is fun for me.

Asherah's very associated with trees though, so it does make sense they’d translate it to groves/trees. Found under trees in 1 Kings 14:23; 2 Kings 17:10, carved from wood by people 1 Kings 14:15, 2 Kings 16:3–4--there in reference to poles made for her worship, also called “asherah”. The Mishnah defines an asherah first as any tree under which there’s an idol, then specifically as any tree which is itself worshipped.

It lists associated plants: grapes, pomegranates, and walnut shells (invalid to eat or drink if from an asherah), and that myrtles, willows, and etrogs (but not dates?) were invalidated for Sukkot if from an asherah. I think the implication is pretty much any plant with a use can’t be utilized if it was an asherah, but there’s no like, description of what an asherah is or isn’t (except not allowed, which like, fair).

Regardless, to relate it to She-Ra is like... like you can’t just say that, man. The Da Vinci Code of fandom over here, except I’m personally upset about the false etymology instead of the disrespect to my boy Leonardo (da Vinci isn’t a name), and it pisses off every Abrahamic religion and like half of all neopagans. Are you happy? Now this whole section is blasphemous and heretical.

Let’s end this on a sillier note, shall we? It’s time to talk about questionable MOTUC decisions again.

No one sincerely suggested these for our world, but MOTUC established “the sword of He” as the ‘real name’ of He-Man’s sword, and it was later clarified that ‘He’ is the Ancient Trollan word for ‘power’... which, as you can imagine, led to a lot of confusion. It was never established if ‘Man’ is also Trollan, so the apparent translation is Power-Man (leading one forum user to jokingly ask if that made She-Ra ‘Iron-Fist’, after the Marvel duo). Naturally, people have speculated about possible translations for She-Ra, but the guy responsible for the Sword of He stuff left the company in 2014, so it’s likely to remain speculation.

Primarily people suggest ‘She’ might mean ‘protection’ or even ‘honor’, but very few people try to account for ‘Ra’. Most likely because it doesn’t mirror an English pronoun, so there’s little point in drawing parallels. The one and only theory I’ve seen is that it’s a feminine version of ‘Ro’, from He-Ro (a historical figure in MOTU), but it’s logically fraught, imo. Although frankly so is the Sword of He to begin with, so maybe I should just relax for once.

What do you think? What does She-Ra mean to you?

[sebastianshaw]

Shaw had come to Asgard to court the goddess Loki. How did he get there? He was granted passage by Odin. He was also granted Loki’s hand already by Odin, so he didn't see why any courting was necessary, let alone such ELABORATE courting. Why could the marriage contract not be made and be done with it? So he and Odin could both get what they wanted from this binding? But Odin knew magic better than Shaw did---hardly an accomplishment, Shaw knew nothing of the sort, despite being the descendent of a Sorcerer Supreme---and had told him that rituals demanded this, that in their culture a marriage required a courtship, or else the old magics would not recognize the union once it happened. And all Shaw’s Midgardian money and power couldn’t rush it. Which bothered him, since Selene could strike any time. That was why he was doing this at all. He had never even met Loki before all this, let alone sought to marry her--- he would rather not marry ANYONE. There was but one woman he had ever wanted to wed, would ever want to wed, and she was long dead. Even with all his affection and commitment to his spitfire Madelyne when they had been lovers, marriage had never been on the table. But this was not a matter of love. It wasn’t even a matter of business. it was a matter of survival. For Selene, sorceress and mutant and Black Queen, had finally decided to stop toying with him. He’d yet again barely escaped with his life but emphasis on BARELY. Shaw had contacted earthly sorcerers, and they’d put up some wards for him, but he had been warned that these were fading fast. Selene was serious, and had likely made a bargain with something greater than herself. So he did the same, and reached out to forces beyond Earth as well.  And who but Odin had a bargain for him? For Odin too had a need---a need to wed one of his children to a monarch on Midgard, to a king. It was apparently a requirement for some sort of prophecy that would bring him some sort of power or object he desired. But all ACTUAL kings on Earth had refused, not wanting to give Asgard any claim on their kingdoms through a half-Asgardian heir, nor did they want a goddess of lies and trickery on their throne. But as was often the case with magic, there was a loophole, a technicality---the spirit of this prophecy need not be followed, just the words. And the words had said: king. Shaw’s title was Black King of the Hellfire Club. So they agreed. He would wed Loki, and Odin would get what he wanted. And by wedding Loki, Shaw would get what he wanted---magical protection from Selene on a scale she couldn’t hope to overcome. She called herself a goddess, but Loki was the real thing, and part of this contract would channel her powers to Shaw’s protection. Whether SHE wanted to or not. Notice that LOKI wasn’t asked in all this. Was that regressive and unfair? Shaw would say so, actually. He just also didn’t care, not when HIS life was on the line.  But whether he gave a damn or not, whether Loki could actually refuse or not, tradition had to be followed to make this work. So here he was to court, carrying a gift “I have brought you a star, my lady,” he said, “One that shines perhaps not as brightly as you, but perhaps a worthy satellite to your own brilliance.” He lifted up the velvet bag, and extracted from it. . . “This 94.8 carat diamond is called The Star of the East. One of the most famed jewels in Midgardian history. Its exact origins are shrouded in mystery, but  first surfaced in the collection of the Sultan Abdul Hamid. It was later acquired by the great French jeweler Pierre C. Cartier, then bought by actress  Evelyn Walsh McLean. It remained in her hands til her death, and then made its way to King Farouk of Egypt, then back to a New York museum. . .and disappeared entirely. I decided that finding a lost star would be a worthy quest to carry out for the wedding of a goddess. And I present the star itself to you now as proof I tracked it down---and as token of my sincerity in asking for your hand.” Sincerity in that he wanted not to die horribly at the hands of Selene, but sincerity nonetheless. @hraunwyf

[elfyourmother]

out of the blue random ask but what pets do gisele and the elfpile have?? mounts and housecats n everything

Gisele has two cats. Lady Belle Meowington (Fat Cat) was a tiny bedraggled little stray kitten that wandered into their camp one night on the road trip, and Gisele kept her. Mimi is much newer, a Yanxian cat that she got in Radz-at-Han; Ahewann’s cat had a litter of kittens and he was trying to find homes for them all so Gisele ended up with one. Belle washes her a lot. And then there’s Nosferatu the little bat, who flew up Gisele’s sleeve after her fight with Hesperos and followed her home through time from Pandaemonium XD I would also be remiss if I didn’t mention the Great Serpent of Ronka, who similarly followed her home from the First. Belle washes him sometimes too. And Gisele makes little outfits for all of her pets btw.

Simeon is Aymeric’s cranky old white Persian kitty who doesn’t like anybody except the elfpile. But Aymeric is a crazy cat lady and feeds all of the neighborhood strays and has named all of them. There are a few he rescued and brought to the Congregation, all of whom are honorary knights with names like Ser Whiskers and such.

Stephanivien keeps an orange tabby at the manufactory named Allan (after the wrench). He was a stray that Steph kept feeding and decided to keep him as a mouser. Even though he’s Steph’s cat he’s sort of the community kitty for all the machinists there, everyone spoils him (especially Joye).

Ysayle loves all sorts of critters, and specifically keeps birds; her family trained falcons for the Ishgardian nobility (it was what Falcon’s Nest was known for, hence the name) and so she was around them from a young age. But she’s especially fond of them because they were some of her only companions when she was in the wilderness as a child (she used them to hunt). Which you would think is not terribly compatible with all the cats around but 🤷🏾‍♀️ Anyway nowadays she has a small peregrine falcon named Anaïs whom she found in Dravania with an injured wing and nursed back to health.

Estinien doesn’t have any pets of his own and helps take care of the others. He loves animals and always has; he’s as much a Disney prince in that regard as Haurche but people never suspect it. He had a sheep dog as a boy on the farm but unfortunately lost him along with everyone else.

Haurche is similar; he did have a cat as a boy growing up but the Countess got rid of him after he clawed her favorite chaise and Haurche was quietly devastated by the whole thing and was never allowed another pet after that. It’s why he got so invested in raising the chocobo, that was a practical thing he could justify as knights needed mounts. But there’s an old mouser at Camp Dragonhead that he was very fond of, a Scottish Coerthan fold named Valiant. He “retired” under Emmanellain’s command of the fortress and enjoys a comfortable life in the commander’s quarters.

As mounts go, everyone’s got chocobos

Gisele: a white one named Kael’thas, ostensibly named for a dashing Elezen prince in one of her favorite romances, but is actually a reciprocal meta gag. In my Warcraft fics, Prince Kael’thas’ white hawkstrider (the WoW knockoff of chocobos) was named Gisele, ostensibly after a beautiful Quel’dorei sorceress in one of his favorite stories as a child. White chocobos ofc being historically associated with magic in FF because they used to restore your MP in the older games. Anyway the black chocobo Haurche raised and gave her is named Chretienne.

Haurche: another black one named Vivi, and this isn’t actually an FFIX reference but rather a joke about his pony play kink because “Vivi” is Gisele’s affectionate nickname for Stephanivien.

Ysayle: yet another black one. Victoire is her name.

Aymeric: a blue one obviously. Her name is Mireille.

Stephanivien: a yellow one named Parcival. But he tends to prefer his mechanical mounts.

Estinien: a black one named Reinette, for the Saint.

In addition:

Gisele’s unicorn from the CNJ quest is named Soleil and is her mount of choice, though she also kept the White Devil from Livia (she took it to get out of Castrum Meridianum after their duel).

Steph is the sort who names all his gadgets and such so has a manacutter he named Bleu (after Aymeric 🥰) and Cid gifted him a custom SDS Fenrir motorbike for his nameday that he named Silver (after Haurche 🥰). And he absolutely anthropomorphizes them too. He takes care of Maggie for Gisele, like she’s his child even, and sometimes rides her around (she loves him nearly as much as she loves Gisele).

Estinien hangs out with various dragons.

[relatable-pictures-of-orko]

WHY LESSONS EXEMPLIFIES EVERYTHING WRONG WITH 200X

It’s sad, because it was my favourite episode as a kid. It was the only He-Man episode I had saved on my computer from age 12 to 19, when I finally rewatched it and fell back into the motu fandom. However, each time I watch it, I find another thing that holds it back. And now that I am slowly rewatching the show, I find these flaws are inherent to it as a whole, and plague the show.

EXHIBIT A: INABILITY TO FOLLOW THROUGH ON ESTABLISHED PLOT POINTS

In Lessons, the main plot is kicked off after Orko preforms a Classic Screwup and destroys billions of dollars worth of statues. Crucially shown is Duncan’s role in the disaster: Instead of thinking logically to try and find a way to safely get the levitating statue down, he simply grabs Orko’s arm to cancel the spell and is surprised when the statue falls and breaks.

And from here, we could get into a whole discussion on whether it makes this Duncan’s fault, or we could argue that it was still Orko’s fault for acting without permission in the first place, or then argue that it’s in fact Duncan’s fault after all for this or that or-

Regardless, it doesn’t really matter who’s fault it is.

What matters is that Duncan and Orko literally never interact again for the rest of the episode after this scene.

The episode establishes a conflict between two characters, and then fails to even acknowledge said conflict for the rest of the storyline. 

EXHIBIT B: A FUNDAMENTAL MISUNDERSTANDING OF THE ORIGINAL SHOW AND CHARACTER DYNAMICS

In most aspects, the episode follows a standard Orko Runaway Plot: Orko is sad and wants to leave, and characters convince him to stay. However, how this diverges from the Filmation show is the reason Orko is given to stay.

In Filmation, the Sorceress shows him his worth as a person. She shows the others looking for him, missing him, that there would be a significant impact if he was gone. Furthermore, it is made clear that it does not matter whether he is good at magic or not: He is family to the other characters, and they’ll love him regardless of any percieved use to the group. 

Lessons, meanwhile, takes a different approach. Orko is instead shown flashbacks of his past, to exposition to the audience his backstory. Among this is the main argument as to why he should stay: He cheered up the king when he was sad. 

So the lesson is this: It doesn’t matter if Orko is good at magic or not. As long as people can laugh at his failure, he has worth. 

The episode tries to backpedal on this in it’s moral segment, where Orko claims that your friends will like you even if you make mistakes. But that still does nothing to prove that “Who you are” is more than just the jester that makes you laugh. 

And in the episode itself, no one even notices Orko’s gone. It was pure chance that Skeletor just happened to target Grayskull while Orko was there. It almost seems like they were going out of their way to make it feel like no one truly cared about him. The only evidence we see against that is Adam being motivated to raise himself from an injury and fight again after being told that Orko was in danger. But that’s not something you really notice unless you pay attention to it, and it’s outweighed by everything else. 

EXHIBIT C: NOT LETTING CHARACTERS OTHER THAN HE MAN SAVE THE DAY

Uh oh! He-Man has been taken out of commission! Now only Orko can save the day! What will he do?

.... 

As it turns out, his actions consist soley of providing a brief distraction and then getting knocked out. 

But luckily, He-Man is conveniently back now! Good thing He-Man is always here to save the day!

...Huh? What did you say about Orko having a character arc?

So first off, it’s made very clear that Orko being written out of the climax is incredibly forced; Orko is dropped literally two feet and it somehow knocks him out for several minutes. Despite having shrugged off worse injuries before and after this, being very lightly tossed in this scenario is somehow just too much for his little body to handle and he simply must sit the rest of this fight out. 

Secondly, it’s ALSO incredibly obvious that the writers were mandated to include He-Man saving the day in every. single. episode. 

Now, it’s understandable. If you think about it, Filmation most likely had the same thing. But the reason it wasn’t quite so obvious in Filmation was because the writing was better at keeping He-Man distanced enough from the other character arcs enough so that the others still had a chance to shine. Take Dawn of Dragoon for example. Even though He-Man defeated Dragoon, Orko was still the one to revive Dree Elle and the others. Even though He-Man did a fight against a bad guy and won, Orko still fulfilled his character arc of the episode without much interference besides a brief pep talk.

However, 200X struggles to accomplish this same subtle workaround. Oftentimes, it’ll have He-Man either do Too Much, making the other characters feel like they aren’t contributing enough, or Finish the Job, making it feel like he did more purely on association that he did the last notable thing in the climax. 

Lessons is no different. Orko contributes nothing to the final battle of the episode. Even though the Sorceress claims that Orko is needed to fight against Skeletor and co, the average audience member simply does not get that impression because Orko contributed so little to that plot. 

I’m pretty sure the only one who has it worse off than Orko in this regard is Teela, considering how many times she had to be saved in the episodes specifically dedicated to showing how competent she could be. However, this happens to several other characters as well, like Buzz Off, Mekaneck, etc.  

I could go into a whole other rant about that, but this is an Orko blog so I’ll save you the off topic rambling. 

Anyways yeah this show is a mess

[likeniobe]

And we are like the person in the fairy-tale for whom a sorceress, at his express wish, conjures up, in a supernatural light, his grandmother or his betrothed in the act of turning over a book, of shedding tears, of gathering flowers, close by the spectator and yet very far away, in the place where she actually is at the moment. We need only, so that the miracle may be accomplished, apply our lips to the magic orifice and invoke––occasionally for rather longer than seems necessary, I admit––the Vigilant Virgins to whose voices we listen every day without ever coming to know their faces and who are our guardian angels in the dizzy realm of darkness whose portals they so jealously guard; the All-Powerful by whose intervention the absent rise up at our side, without our being permitted to set eyes on them; the Danaïds of the unseen who incessantly empty and fill and transmit to one another the urns of sound; the ironic Furies who, just as we were murmuring a confidence to a loved one, in the hope that no one could hear us, cry brutally: “I’m listening!”; the ever-irritable handmaidens of the Mystery, the umbrageous priestesses of the Invisible, the Young Ladies of the Telephone.

the narrator speaks to his grandmother on the telephone in the guermantes way, trans. c. k. scott moncrieff and terence kilmartin

[edgar-allan-possum]

Actually, how did Girlboss Rat get anthropomorphed in the first place? I think I remember you saying something about a magician doing it out of kindness to her, but that's about it.

Also for Muroidea, if the works of C. S. Lewis exist in the Morrowverse, what are her thoughts re: the talking animals of Narnia? Does she find them silly? Is there a degree of relatability there?

Thank you for making me actually think about all this stuff, by the way.

For your first question, the sorceress who lived in the area also had the ability to speak to animals, but not the ability to heal the sick. They had a few passing conversations and the sorceress eventually turned Muroidea into a human as best she could do that she could talk to her love before he died.

For the logistics of this, I'm working up a post about magic in my setting that I'll probably post soon.

Muroidea certainly wishes that she had been a talking animal, because then she wouldn't have had to go through this whole process of becoming a human. Frankly, it was nice not being quite as sentient as she is now.

[aetherose]

THE TAGS LIST

For you and I's convenience, an organized Tags List! SEE THIS POST FOR HOW TO SEARCH FOR TAGS ON MY BLOG.

MUN POSTS

&& ooc / your local queen of brainrot

&& rose plays hi3 / ellie herrscher ballista go

&& rose plays gi / this is my third playing gi tag jfc

&& rose plays hsr / screams in kafka simp

&& rose plays lc / im a sadomasochist confirmed

&& rose plays lor / screams in angela simp

&& rose plays lcb / 12 idiots and 1 simp

&& rose plays bg3 / who knew cats can get you so far

&& rose plays ptn / sapphic fever dream time baby

&& rose plays pgr / my impulses won and now we're here

&& aetherose pinned post / do not reblog; non-rp blogs dni

Spoiler tags to block: hi3 spoilers, genshin spoilers, hsr spoilers, lobcorp spoilers, ruina spoilers, limbus spoilers, bg3 spoilers, ptn spoilers, pgr spoilers

GENERAL

&& ic / give all to the present for the sake of the future

&& thread / the hearts that can bend shall never be broken

&& commentary / live to the point of tears

&& open starter / freedom is nothing but a chance to be better

&& asks / seeking what is true is not seeking what is desirable

&& drabbles / a nostalgia for innocence

&& memes / there is not love of life without despair about life

&& dash games / there is scarcely any passion without struggle

&& crack / oh lord save us from ourselves

&& incorrect quotes / just a rose tradition!

&& headcanons / man is always prey to his truths

&& oc lore / the gentle indifference of the world

&& gallery / at the heart of all beauty lies something inhuman

&& edits / the glimpse of an eternity stretched across time

&& mun art / rose can draw sometimes

&& aesthetic / an appeal to the essence of being

&& musing / can you see the meaning inside yourself

&& music / where words fail song speaks

&& announcement / gather around rose’s garden

&& patch notes / just a rundown of the updates to the blog!

&& psa / you should probably read this

&& starter call / where there is no hope it is on us to invent it

&& inbox call / a day will come when revolutions will have need of beauty

&& promo / a beautiful twilight that enhances everything

&& self-promo / heyo its me rose

&& discord chronicles / hidden beneath the surface lies treasures

&& signal boost / a little can go a long way

&& misc / rose doesnt know where to put this

&& munday / stuff about rose!

&& saved / rose’s most beloveds

&& wishlist / rose’s hopes

&& queue / rose remembered she can queue stuff

MUSES

&& c. elysia / miss pink elf

&& c. aponia / disciplinary perdition

&& c. mobius / infinite ouroboros

&& c. fu hua / taixuan impression

&& c. dr. mei / ward of humanity’s flame

&& c. seele / swallowtail phantasm

&& c. veliona / starchasm nyx

&& c. theresa / valkyrie pledge

&& c. senti / herrscher of sentience

&& c. binah / degraded arbiter

&& c. faust / representation emitter

&& c. rodion / what is cast

&& c. furina / endless solo of solitude

&& c. focalors / lady of all waters

&& c. columbina / the damselette

&& c. sandrone / the marionette

&& c. la signora / the fair lady

&& c. lumine / the abyss princess

&& c. klee / fleeing sunlight

&& c. raiden ei / plane of euthymia

&& c. raiden norika / guardian of eternity

&& c. zero / song of the end

&& c. kafka / twilight trill

&& c. black swan / loom of fate’s caprice

&& c. hsr bronya / windrider bullet

&& c. hsr seele / butterfly flurry

&& c. layla / silent nightingale

&& c. lumia / niveous eminence

&& c. rosemary / nocturne illusion

&& c. pamela / paradoxical heart

&& c. arabella / bloodied blossoms

&& c. lynn / starlight’s embrace

&& c. gabriella / tempestuous waves

&& c. daphne / flowing gales

&& c. calista / transcendent damnation

&& c. radiata / crimson lily

&& c. sylve / tempest archer

&& c. raven / lunar songstress

&& c. nimue / ethereal sorceress

VERSES

&& v. crossover / and we come together despite all odds

&& v. unspecified / dance in a world of endless possibilities

&& v. genshin / step into a vast magical world of adventure

&& v. hi3 / for all that’s beautiful in the world

&& v. hsr / may this journey lead us starward

&& v. lobcorp / face the fear; build the future

&& v. lor / book; librarian; star; and city

&& v. lcb / face the sin; save the ego

&& v. projmoon / hominem te esse memento

&& v. stp / you are on a path in the woods

&& v. bg3 / to become more than what we were made to be

&& v. d&d / our adventure begins here

&& v. fe3h / promise me you won't forget me

&& v. ph / there is no black and white; only our will

&& v. pgr / reclaim the world for humanity

&& v. dod3 / the songs of oblivion

&& v. modern / a world not far off from our own

&& v. ce / the ethereal abyss

&& v. ce: rein / reborn into peace

&& v. tenebra / repetition of history

&& v. herrscher of death / birthed from broken serenity

&& v. older layla / the nightingale’s metamorphosis

&& v. younger layla / from the embers

&& v. little layla / still-burning flame

&& v. white witch / the monster they made

&& v. star of the head / flickering lights in an empty city

&& v. shining star / reignition of lost light

&& v. fallen star / all-consuming darkness

&& v. chosen of bhaal / the embrace of her rancid blood

&& v. young nimue / unknowing accursed daughter

BONDS

&& complicated found fam / butterflies daffodils and birds

&& layla + crystal / the sweetest devotion i’ve ever known

&& calista x aelia / light up the night sky together