#misogyny is calling them irredeemable assholes

[underratedgrapeju1ce]

defending jon and acknowledging that basira and melanie treated him poorly is not misogyny btw

[nekropsii]

Atomic Ask Bomb... 2!!

Hello, all! We are back in the mines immediately, because you all love me and my inbox so much. I still have 200+ more asks to sort through after this and that is not hyperbole!! Oops!!

Content Warning: Long, and Cronus is There.

You can be both. I am both. I think Terezi's easily in the Top 3 of Best Written Homestuck Characters, no competition. AND she compels me.

Mituna Fans and Terezi Fans flocking together like how Gays and Lesbians are supposed to.

------

He doesn't have a Recuperacoon. He doesn't NEED a Recuperacoon. Who needs a Recuperacoon when you have a bathtub? You pile a bunch of slime in there, and then you can pop the drain open in the morning and take a shower right there where you just got up. It's convenient. And not at all sad. It's not sad guys.

Let's pretend for a moment that either Vantas would have regular bathing habits for the sake of this joke.

------

Even if that's the case, it really doesn't change anything. Insecurity doesn't justify literal actual sexual harassment and sexual assault. What?

People will do anything to excuse random shitty men for being shitty. Sympathy is the favorite weapon in Fandom Misogyny's arsenal. So often will fans pull some random bullshit out of their ass just to say that it's fine that a male character is abusive, especially if it's to women, because "He's Sad", so he should never face criticism or punishment for his actions.

We should all start putting people in blenders. We've let these arguments go on long enough. People are far too bold in their abuse apologia. We need to kill them.

------

Yeah. Like, he interests me a lot, he's one of the characters I take the most interest in out of all of the Alpha Trolls. I literally write sov!Cronus. I hate his guts, though. It really is just that easy to be a fan of a character and also fucking hate them. Not once have I ever made an excuse for him. The goal Hussie set out for when writing him was making him inexcusable and irredeemable, down to Cronus literally knowing what he's doing is bad and hurts people, and simply just not caring.

Cronus is genuinely fucking evil. That's the whole point. If you make him misunderstood, if you make him mean well, if you make him lack self awareness, if you make him sympathetic, if you give him any redeeming qualities at all... You are missing the point completely. If you want a sympathetic asshole character, you want Vriska. The point of Cronus is that he's The Worst Character In Homestuck, and that he has zero redeeming qualities and trying to fix him or redeem him is a Hopeless venture. He is beyond saving. Don't you dare even think about trying - to try to make him palatable is to erase Violent Bigotry, Incest, and Child Sexual Abuse. Just don't. Enjoy him as he is, do NOT defang him.

------

He truly is the worst! I think we should explode all depictions of fanon!Cronus. Forever.

------

Yeah, there's a huge reason why I do not say I'm a fan of Cronus or call him a favorite character of mine or anything. It projects a certain... Image. The wrong one. There's just such a strong precedent for anyone saying they're a Cronus Fan or calling him their Favorite Character being a person who just completely fucking ignores everything about him, or even pardons it, saying it's fine, actually, because He's Sad, or that it's Not That Bad, actually. I can't stand it.

I'm aware there are Cronus Fans who are totally normal, but I cannot help but immediately be wary of them, or flinch for a moment even when they offer the reassurance that they know better. It's a natural response, having been here for around a decade and having been a Mituna Fan the whole time.

Liking characters who are terrible people is fine. Based, even, in some cases. But... It's truly difficult with Cronus, because so much of that fanbase relies on excusing/minimizing/condoning abuse and bigotry. I don't have any qualms with people liking characters that suck, but when a fanbase for a character is so heavily focused on pretending that character isn't a horrible, terrible, awful person who abuses people - even children, even people they're related to, even children that they're related to - for nothing but their own sexual gain... I start having issues. That sets a pretty dangerous precedent, to me.

------

It's crazy to me how so much of the apologism is because he's hot. Because he literally isn't. You all have terrible taste.

Let's all appreciate for a moment just how fucking ugly he is. The fan art is lying so bad. He needs a haircut. His shirt doesn't fit him, and honestly looks like women's clothes - you know those women's shirts that have the sleeves that stop halfway down the damn shoulder? He looks like a 16 year old. He's so skinny, and his shoulders are so... rounded and small - which are fine traits to have, but literally every piece of fanart portrays him as broad-shouldered and ripped when the literal opposite is true. You just know he has too much product in his hair. His actual sprite is even worse.

The way his fly doesn't even go all the way up. The way his hair clips into his face. The way he's slightly yellow for literally no reason. The shitty belt. This fucking sucks. He's so ugly. He isn't even hot.

------

------

Mituna having Memory Loss as a result of his TBI is literally a myth invented by Cronus to emotionally manipulate Mituna and perpetuated by Cronus Fans. I think if they were friends in the past, Cronus's actions would be worse, actually.

Could you imagine getting sad that your friend doesn't remember you because of a Traumatic Brain Injury, and your response to this sadness is to abuse and sexually assault them on the regular? What, is that Just Bro Things now? Cronus literally says he targets Mituna because he thinks he can get away with it due to his struggles with communication. The thing about them being buddies in the past was one of his trademark Lies. Because he is known to do that, specifically to manipulate people. Because he is known to manipulate people. Emotionally. Because he is abusive. And terrible. And not redeemable. This isn't rocket science! It isn't rocket science to say that pushing the fault of Mituna's abuse onto Mituna is Victim-Blaming!

------

Positively fucking ridiculous that so many people did not recognize their romance within the comic. If they were boys, there'd be no god damn question about it. It'd be up there in everyone's OTP list alongside DaveKat.

I think they're adorable. They're one of my favorite pairings.

------

It's great in the source comic, especially during earlier phases of its existence, but the quality deprecates drastically the further you get from that point. I hate it in Fanon and in Dub/Post-Canon.

It's a great off-screen pairing for a lot of lore reasons - namely it being great to let Dave slowly allow himself to love and be loved in private, with no fear of eyes on him. He's never really been able to have privacy before, with all the cameras and eyes on him all the time, and he's never been able to really let his guard down and be vulnerable. He's never been able to love and be loved, safely. I ultimately think they should've kept their relationship mostly private, even after Dave's recovered quite a bit, because sometimes having something just for yourself without that need to perform it is healing in itself. Mental health maintenance.

In Fanon, it seems like pretty standard yaoi, though. Boring. Tired. Literally everywhere. Voyeuristic as always.

------

Thank you! My Inbox generally really isn't that bad at all, honestly! Most people are pretty cordial! Anon Hate for me is pretty rare. Thankfully, the Delete Ask button exists, so I don't have to worry about those Anons for very long, lol.

------

I hate to say this, but back in my day, plenty of people actually did do that. In fact, people only knowing Homestuck through fan material and then still calling themselves a fan is a big reason why old Homestuck fanon was so bad and so far off the mark!

I have a name for those kinds of fans, because it was such a frequent occurrence it begged for a title. I call them Secondaries. Like "Secondary Source"!

------

World's most based triad, I think. Should be real. It's real to me.

7H15 15 MY 91RLFR13NF, L47UL4. 4DN 7H51 15 7UL45 9R1LFR13ND, P0RR1M.

------

I think everyone should start watching actual horror movies. I think these people should watch Re-Animator and Bride of Re-Animator. I think this would fix the fandom, because a lot of people are just posting about horror movies without realizing they're posting about horror movies. Go watch a horror movie. They even have more and, frankly, more interesting gay representation than... Whatever Dirk and Jake have going on. Sorry.

If you're a gay man, get some hair on your chest and watch a bunch of horror movies. There's more in this life than anime twinks and skinny white pixel men. There's BlackRom Old Man Pet Play (The Lighthouse, 2019), there's Tormented Huge Dirty Bear (The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning, 2006), there's The Bisexual Psychological Torture + Betrayal Chamber (Saw, 2004), there's Dysfunctional Gay Marriage Disputes (Re-Animator, 1985, Bride of Re-Animator, 1990). And way more other ones than I can really list. Expand your horizons.

------

Not much. It's a bit mysterious. Here's what Aranea had to say about Mituna in general, which gives us most of the crumbs we have:

The Heir of Doom was once a powerful psionic. He had much to say when it came to warning us a8out the path of doom and destruction we were all headed for, 8ut no one took him very seriously. 8ut one day he lost all those abilities when he 8adly overexerted himself. It's hard to get any specifics from him, 8ut indications are that he applied every last 8it of energy he had toward some great act of heroism, saving us all from some looming threat. Not only did his exertion permanently 8urn out his psychic a8ilities, 8ut it left him somewhat... er. Incoherent. The entire incident is shrouded in mystery. From his limited and scattered accounts of what happened, it seems very likely that Kurloz was with him at the time, as the only eye witness. And of course it's impossi8le to get any relia8le information out of him. I guess we may never know, sadly.

This does say quite a lot, but not really anything specific. We've got some stuff about how he's the session's Cassandra, the fact that the GAoH was NOT an accident (this is the misconception that pisses me off the most, I think - I hate when people call it an accident), the fact that he was protecting everyone from something... The fact that he DOES remember it, the fact that Kurloz was there, as the only eye witness, and refuses to talk about it.

It leaves plenty of room for speculation. A little too much room for me, honestly, but that's fine, I'm not really pressed about it.

------

[twisted-fucked-up-sunflower]

my thoughts on crime and punishment characters!!

Raskolnikov: he’s so babygirl, he’s just like me fr. Minus the killing people part and the ubermensch complex he has. I’d argue he’s schizotypal but that’s likely not true. So I headcanon him as such. (If it’s unclear, I am schizotypal myself)

Razumikhin: Undisputed best bisexual representation in literature, my GOAT, love him to death, XOXO. No further comments. Perfect character.

Dunia: [to Svidrigailov] GET A JOB. STAY AWAY FROM HER (I wrote this in the book pages where it was relevant). She’s as smart as Rodia from what I read, though she wasn’t developed a lot as a character I think? I still need to re-read the book later. She should’ve shot the revolver at the guy’s head. Probably didn’t want to end up like her brother, though. Unlikely she’d come out winning from killing a man with connections, as evil as he was.

Pulkeria: Didn’t really find her too interesting, but I think that’s because she wasn’t focused on a lot. Remarkably patient towards Rodia, it was infuriating when Rodia just fucked off and didn’t speak to them (Dunia and Pulkeria) for days. His ungrateful ass. I get this habit, though, since I have it myself. Sometimes people are upsetting to be around, for no reason, might I add.

Svidrigailov: Exceedingly, unabashedly, shamelessly despicable. Hate him with my heart. He seems like a parallel to Rodia, and the book seems to focus on this from Rodia’s own observations. Parallel not in a good way, I’ll clarify, but in a “What if he was completely evil” way. I’ve got 40 pages left to read in this book and I’d like it if within the next 20 he ****** himself. Irredeemable but really interesting at the psychological level. He’s insane, it seems. Or maybe also schizotypal. Either way words cannot describe how much I hate this man.

Porfiry: Not much to say here, he ate Raskolnikov up both times they talked though, gagged him 😭 #embarrassing

Lujin/Luzhin (not sure on how it’s spelt): He’s so laughable. Gets insulted once, subsequently sends word of how it hurt his feewings to get clocked at the psychological level by the brother of the woman he’s going to marry, at his historic age like FOH ☠️. And I was livid when he tried to incriminate Sonia/Sofya (I prefer Sonia tbh) like bro really tried that shit 😂😂😂. He got owned by Rodion every single time he tried to fight back it was so fucking funny. Pathetic ass man. Glad he called off the marriage. Asshole.

Sonia: She’s Rodion’s love interest, it seems. I don’t get why she’s going to go to Siberia with him, though. Her family’s taken care of (by SVIDRIGAILOV of all people) and she hasn’t committed any crimes. Is it just something to do with misogyny or something related to it? She told Rodia to confess to his crime to atone, but in a *catholic* way. It’s crazy she got burdened with the knowledge of Rodia’s crimes and still said “Oh how you suffer! Atone for your sin willingly, it’s your only way to get rid of the guilt!” Her abnegate character showed a bit here, methinks. Still, why the fuck would she go to Siberia? Just because she *loves* Rodia? They both seem like they fell in love with each other for some odd reason, or maybe none at all so yeah. She’s also a favorite because of the way they describe her, the blue eyes seem like something I’d like to draw, when I get to it. Though, it’s curious that it’s Svidrigailov in love with Dunia and Raskolnikov in love with Sonia. Dunia and Sonia get stuck with the two murderous morons. (Well, not Dunia, because she managed to get Svidrigailov to not assault her. Again, DESPICABLE man, that one. Hope he dies :D) 

 Anastasia/Anastasya: I love her so much, I wish we’d gotten to see her interact with Razumikhin more because their dynamic was funny to me. She also laughed with a snort if I recall and that is so real of her. She also helped Rodia with food, basically kept his stupid ass alive for free before Razumikhin came back.

Zamiotov: Not much to say about him, really. Funny when Rodia explained in detail how he ‘would have’ gone about murdering Alyona, though. Fucking hilarious to read that shit. Most obvious criminal of all time.

Marmeladov: God knows how many pages he went on telling Rodia his entire life story. Perfect character. No notes.

Catarina/Sonia’s mother: Very tragic. Her death made me feel sad. But the parts before that when she was just DRAGGING Amelia Lippewechsel, she was so real for that.

I think I might be missing a few characters. No worries! I won’t update this lol. I hope those who read, if any do, find this funny. 

[funky-sea-cryptid]

chapter 3

i've had a red bull (gross), i have 3 hours until im watching pride and prejudice and zombies, lets do this thing

once again jo nesbo cuts from the action because ???

look, i like dramatic retellings as much as the next bitch this wouldn't be a problem if he didn't do it every chapter.

it's the next night apparently

anyways macbeth is relaying the story of how he and duff committed a literal massacre to a very enthralled (and very drunk) SWAT team

take a shot every time angus specifically says "jesus"

he says it a lot, actually, so disregard that unless you want to fucking die

angus is an edgy atheist which is why i think it's funny that he says "jesus" so much.

macbeth is retelling the events to his friends and then seyton shows up

seyton: did you really think duff would care about a bunch of dead bodies? macbeth: sir, this is a chilis.

once again duff portrayed as An Asshole. would be better if he was shown to improve, but alas. we can't have shit in this nameless town

okay another point to nesbo, i like the ping-ponging of the story between macbeth and duff telling it to different parties and both of them LYING

duff's like "hnggg does duncan like me" and duncan's like ":)"

lennox and caithness hiiiiiiii

take a shot every time duff is like "i gotta make linguistics an art" and discusses his word choices to himself

disregard that

cawdor mention hiiiiiiiii

me when i see people from the play: omg hiiiii <3

mention of The Stoke Massacre which does play an important part if you give a shit about this fucking book, which i dont

macbeth: we shot the bitch. but. it wasn't the bitch.

yeah sweno's still alive.

good for him tbh

duncan is COMING for duff's ass fr

it's kind of amusing because duff is such an irredeemable asshole in this book but it also makes me so upset because duff is - thats my boy, okay?

jo nesbo has NEVERRRRRRR engaged critically with this text fr

not to repeat my rant on how macduff is supposed to be a narrative foil and therefore morally superior to macbeth but

even if he wasnt the man has the straightest moral compass in the play. he's fully prepared to beat malcolm's ass and then go save scotland by himself because malcolm's like "i will be a bad king and fuck the entire country up" like the man is so good. how could you do this jo nesbo

duff calls duncan an "arrogant fool"? or is it sweno? unclear

duncan's worried about shit getting stolen out of siezed goods - THEN FIX THAT SHIT??? arent you in CHARGE?

real drinking game take a shot a woman is described as "looking less capable bc ulterior motives (sex) but shes capable tho!" . i do like the part where her whole face sparkles bc of a candle flame because i too like women

lennox is like "hmm today we're gonna casually discriminate against macbeth"

everyone's clowning on duff rn (for good reason though) augh jo nesbo what are you DOING to my BOY

banquo's like "macbethhhh stop lyingggg" and macbeth's like "what are you talking about aha"

LADY MACBETH HIIIIIIIIIIIIII

banquo HATES her thats misogyny actually

duff: i'm going to commit more crimes on duncan's dollar

her name is just. lady. just lady. what in god's name-

her name is GRUOCH

anyways macbeth is a total malewife i think thats cute

first mention of lorreal. oh boy.

LADY MACDUFF HIIIIIIIIIIII

me when women

she's doing her best rn

okay it's now revealed duff and macbeth are fucking lying bc duff shot the bitch wearing sweno's helmet without checking, so macbeth stabbed the other one to hide the evidence

"now i've paid my debt to you, duff." reoccurring motif here that duff and macbeth have Issues.

duff commits crimes and forces an interrogation in a hospital asmr

[maxwell-grant]

OK, I know this will probably be painful, and I may be a bad mutual for asking but...would you be willing to identify what, in your opinion are the bottom five worst Shadow adaptations, and give a detailed breakdown of why they were so lousy?

Oh christ, okay. I don't think you're gonna get as much of a detailed breakdown for these compared to some of the others, because I take more issue with adaptations that do have good qualities but also big or deep problems to talk about.

For example, I can't include Garth Ennis's Shadow in this list because the comic has a lot of strong points to it, despite a deeply, deeply detestable take on The Shadow's character, where as the rest of the Dynamite run doesn't reach neither the lows or highs of his run. Likewise, Andy Helfer's run has a couple or a couple dozen moments every issue that make me want to tear something to shreds in frustration, but it's also at many points a really good comic with great art and some occasionally very inspired writing. Really, I'd just be repeating myself talking about what I hate in those.

But, fine, let's list some of the others.

I think I'm just gonna have to get the elephant in the room out of the way here, and address that I won't be including Si Spurrier's 2017 Dynamite mini in this list, and I think at least some of you might be angry it's not Number 1 by default. I'm doing this because I intend to one day really revisit it, think about it and it's reception and what it was trying to do, and talk about it on it's own, now that it's been 5 years and everyone has moved on and we can maybe talk about it without kneejerk hatred driving everyone nuts (your mileage may vary on how warranted it was).

I'm also not going to be talking about James Patterson's new novel, because I haven't read it. It seems to be considered a forgettable potboiler by mainstream critics and a resounding failure by everyone who likes the character whether they've read the book or not, and frankly I don't have it in me to learn what the fuzz was about anytime soon, I got my hands way too full as is.

And I won't be including the Batman x Shadow crossovers here, because again, they do have a lot of virtues that put them far ahead of some of the really worst Shadow media, and I've talked enough about how badly I think they mangled The Shadow, which is really the big problem I have with them (well, that and Tim Sale blatantly copying a Michael Kaluta cover, that was really shitty). I don't really hate them anymore, I just get tired and frustrated thinking about parts of them, I said my piece as is. Really, my frustration over this comic is what inspired me to start writing about The Shadow here, so I guess in a way I do owe it at least that much.

5: Archie Comics's Shadow

I think some of you might be wondering why this isn't ranked higher, but to be honest, I don't actually harbor any hatred towards this. I mean, I have to include it, but I find it kinda silly that some people even today actually care about the existence of this comic enough to hate it.

For fans back then? Oh yeah, obviously, but this dropped to such instantaneous backlash that it never really got to live past 6 issues. Really, everything wrong about it can be understood immediately from the covers, and I've actually read the comic in it's entirety to see if there was anything worth taking. I found only a couple of things of note but, no, this really is just a painfully mediocre superhero comic that happens to have a couple of Shadow names in it. If anything, it gets too much credit.

The actual contents of what it is are never going to justify it's reputation, but the existence of it and the disproportionate response to it is the funniest and most enduring legacy it could ever ask for. This whole comic is The Shadow's version of Spongebob's embarassing Christmas photo.

4: David Liss's The Shadow Now

This is another "The Shadow as an immortal in modern times" comic and I think you may have noticed the pattern with those by now. I may revisit this eventually and I do have some moments from it saved for reference, but overall: It sucks, and it doesn't even suck in a way that lets me talk much about it, it's a diet version of Chaykin's Shadow. If Archie's Shadow is a generic mediocre superhero comic wearing The Shadow's name, this is a generic crime story playing beats from movie. The Shadow is an asshole and not even a grandiose or sinister one, he just feels like a sleazy douche in a costume. The art is a 50/50 coin toss between appropriately moody and "Google images with a filter on them", I don't remember anything about the plot other than Khan had a bomb again and he had a daughter, and there were new versions of the agents and the Harry stand-in turned evil and Lamont shacked up with Margo's descendant which, uh, no. I don't really hate this but I really have nothing nice to say about this comic other than Colton Worley's art is nice sometimes. I can't really muster anything else to say here.

3: Invisible Avenger

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

ZZZZZZZZZZZZ

ZZZZZZZZZZ...

...uuh, wha-

Yeah, I remember nothing about this one other than it's painfully boring and nothing about it, nothing at all, works in the slightest and I drift off to sleep even now trying to give this a rewatch. To be honest pretty much every other Shadow serial not starred by Victor Jory sucks and I don't really have anything to say about them, this one is just the worst of the lot. I dearly wish there was a good Shadow tv series but, if it was going to be like this pilot? Good riddance.

2: Harlan Ellison's The New York Review of Bird

This isn't really a Shadow story as much as it's a Harlan Ellison story that happens to feature The Shadow, but man am I glad that Ellison's "Dragon Shadows" was canned, because holy shit what a goddamn nightmare Harlan Ellison writing The Shadow for real could have been, going purely by the one time he ever touched the character. New York Review of Bird is a purely farcical parody story that wears real, real thin even before "Uncle Kent" shows up, and we get to see in it what is by far the most detestable and irredeemable take on The Shadow ever put on print, and not even in a critique or deconstructive way or anything that could be remotely worth discussing.

I don't hold any particular affection for Harlan Ellison and his writing (despite liking some of it) and I've come to notice the major red flag that is finding someone who looks up to Harlan Ellison in any capacity as a person, and this story in particular really feels like Ellison aggressively trying to channel his jackass tendencies through every line, just him being nasty because he built a personal brand on being nasty. The only reason this isn't Number One is because it's a very short story that saw zero influence or reputation, and thus it only exists as a brief mention in The Shadow wiki, and a brief mention is all it really calls for.

1: Howard Chaykin's Blood & Judgment

I'm guessing most of you already knew this one was in the top spot before I started writing.

I would actually rather not write a big piece on Blood & Judgment, because I think (or at least I hope) it's influence on The Shadow has waned a lot over the years and I would prefer to draw it the least amount of attention possible, but if I HAVE to talk about this, I guess I'd rather just vomit this out of my circuits now instead of giving it it's own post.

I would prefer to use a less unpleasant image on my blog, but if I'm going to talk about this comic, there's no image to better convey it than this drawing of macho asshole Cranston holding a sexualized mannequin at gunpoint. By leaps and bounds, Blood & Judgment is the most misogynistic Shadow story I've ever read. It's ironic that Chaykin justified the rampant misogyny he gave The Shadow with the idea that this is just a man from the 30s would act like, when he admits in the same breath that he never even touched the stories, and he wrote a story more sexist and demeaning to it's female characters than anything, literally anything, written in the Shadow pulps. It's almost impressive even.

I'll paste some segments from Randy Raynaldo's review

In Flagg, he intended to present his own point of view on American society while keeping his work tongue in cheek and acessible. But this vision dimmed, and Flagg had become a vehicle by which Chaykin could play out fetishes and portray gratuitous and stylish violence.

In The Shadow, stripped of the political and social veneer which was supposed to make Flagg unique, Chaykin's sensibilities and excesses become disturbingly apparent. For all of his liberal posturing, Chaykin's work demonstrates zero difference from the same kind of mentality exploited and made popular by similarly violent popular culture icons like Dirty Harry and Death Wish.

More than half a dozen individuals are indiscriminately and violently murdered in the first issue. Although the victims are characters who played major roles in the myth of The Shadow, we feel little sympathy for them, even for those of us who knew these characters at the outset. Who dies is unimportant, it's how they die that is the fascination.

Chaykin uses sexual decadence as a means by which to establish villains, and undercuts this device by making the protagonists as promiscuous as the villains. For all of Chaykin's seemingly liberal leanings, he demonstrates very little sensitivity in his portrayal of women.

Because everything works on rules of three, this comic also follows the pattern with other works mentioned here, as this isn't Howard Chaykin writing The Shadow: it's The Shadow reimagined as a Howard Chaykin character. He looks and acts exactly like Reuben Flagg and the typical macho protagonist of Chaykin's other works, he's a cynical sleaze with an entirely new origin who half-assedly dons a garb to machine gun people, and I already wrote a separate piece on why the machineguns are kind of emblematic of everything wrong with this take.

I understand that Chaykin has, or used to have, a big following of sorts, and I've tried to wrap my head around this for years, but I genuinely still don't get why Shadow fans stomach this comic unless they happen to be Chaykin fans first and foremost, I really don't. Everything, fucking everything Shadow fans hate about modern depictions of the character can be traced right back to this. The parts that stuck and changed the character for the worse, like him being defined as an immortal, bloodthirsty warmonger who got all his skills and powers from a magic city in Tibet, or Lamont Cranston being a coward who fears and hates the Shadow, or his agents being expendable slaves, stuff that has been ingrained into the mythos through this and the Alec Baldwin movie and other comics, to the point that people now think of it as the norm, that it's the baseline of what The Shadow is, and I hate it, I genuinely fucking hate it,

I hate it so much that it's a big part of the reason why I created this blog and why I want so badly to get to write The Shadow, because I plainly couldn't stand not having ways to tell people that this is all wrong, that this is actively shooting down the character's odds for success, and that they are missing out on something really great, because the well has been tainted with garbage that won't go away and everytime I read the words Shambala in a Shadow comic, even an otherwise good or great one, I get just a wee bit cross.

The only semi-redeeming aspects I can think of for this comic is one or two cool moments, like when The Shadow hijacks a concert using his Devil's Whisper or when he tames dogs with a stare. Just breadcrumbs of "not garbage" amidst an ocean of anything but. I hate that talking about why I hate this comic in-length can almost feel like I'm still enticing people to check it out of curiosity, but if you wanna do that, fine, just know this: The worst part of Blood & Judgment, even if you don't care at all about what it did to The Shadow, is that it's boring.

It is a deeply boring comic. If you like Howard Chaykin to begin with, you'll probably like this okay (although even Chaykin fans told me that this is his weakest work and that even he seems to agree). If you don't, I plain don't see what you could get out of this.

The comic itself is just nothing. It's the comic book equivalent of a pre-schooler trying to get a reaction by swearing. It has nothing whatsoever other than half-assed attempts at shock value. The plot isn't there, the ideas are stale, the dialogue is needlessly oblique and comprised entirely of unfinished sentences, interrupted conversations and one-liners without build-up. The characters are all unlikable and uninteresting stooges with no personality, or joyless cartoons. There's no heart or emotion or logic, and it isn't even funny enough to succeed as just an outrageous exercise in 80s excess. There's nothing in here.

I get "why" it was popular enough at the time, a rising star creator penning a modern revival of an old character based on controversy that pissed off the old fans, it's an old story that still gets repeated today. But manufactured controversy is not a replacement for storytelling and it rarely ever exists to benefit the people who actually want to enjoy the stories, it only benefits those for the crude benefit of those who want to sell you something out of the controversy.

I guess they got their money's worth back then.

------------------------------------------------

Phew, okay, I did it, I finally vomited out a piece on Blood & Judgment and some others, allright, let's put this piece of negativity behind us now.

[ato-matsuri]

On Agartha

Been a while since I’ve written a long text post, most of all one about Fate. It honestly inspires a lot of rambling in me, after all. But I don’t think, this time, it’s due to its good writing, the emotions it makes me feel, or anything good. This, my friend, is about Agartha. I should probably prelude that this contains a metric shit ton of Agartha spoilers. If you haven’t seen Agartha, and you’re actually wanting to see the story -- scroll past. But, having played through Agartha completely and rested on the story for a bit, I think I want to repeat what everyone else has for ages lol.

Agartha, on paper, is incredible. A subterranean world built off fantastical story off fantastical story, made by a woman known for her ability to weave story after story, within stories, on the fly, and from a database of every possible Arabian Nights tale. Where the fear Scheherazade has due to Shahryar's endless abuse and fearmongering has stretched even to men as a whole due to literal years of having to survive Shahryar. Where the only leaders were queens, where the only rebellion force was a man so horrifically corrupt that he'd easily fall for the tricks she played. Her intent -- to reveal magecraft forever, removing any power magecraft has, saving her from ever having to fight and face kings -- and die -- ever again. That... sounds pretty good when I describe it that way, huh? Now if only it were executed with any modicum of sense.

From the beginning, Agartha's writing struck me as remarkably odd. It was like I was watching someone desperately try to emulate Nasu's writing style -- but had absolutely no idea what made Nasu's writing so good. Its exposition dumps, rather than being interesting, ended up being thoroughly boring -- as they focused on the mundane, like the fact that moss glows to light up the landscape -- instead of the magical implications of a world like Agartha even existing to begin with. Albeit, with the mystery of Agartha at that time, we can safely assume that there wasn't much to focus on, but then why spend so damned long talking about this stuff?

The worldbuilding, while passable, feels fairly flawed in execution. The idea of a world made the way Agartha was could've made for some interesting commentary about the way men treated (and still do treat) women in modern society, but Agartha not only misses the point, but tumbles head-over-ass into the uncanny valley and makes the whole thing sound like a continent-wide BDSM session. There's barely any actual subtle or well-done symbolism to showcase misogyny in this way -- and while hyperbole can serve a good point at times, the hyperbole combined with the strangely sexual writing of these segments makes it feel less like commentary and more like a badly-done doujin.

For example -- El Dorado was as simple as it gets. Men are slaves/breeding machines/whatever. The whole 'breeding machine' thing is played off extensively, even with Penth -- a minor at this stage, mind you -- comments on using the protagonists as such breeding machines. I'll come back to this later, because this serves as another point.

Ys was a fucking cool concept -- a world ruled entirely by rampant consumerism and chaos. Men, in this world, are still second-class citizens, pretty much the playthings of the women around them. I say that Ys is the best kingdom comparatively, as it was at least more bearable than its other kingdoms, but it still felt weirdly sexual in its writing tone. Of course, following tone, Dahut (who I'll get back to later) smashes men constantly, and is very keen on fucking Guda as well, following a trend. It's played for comedy, mostly, but it's still uncomfortable as all hell. Even so, I note it's more bearable because it's a very slightly more subtle take on the whole 'misogyny' allegory -- these people are using men for basically whatever they want, and tossing them away after. I'd compare it to a few true crime cases of people who murdered, or assaulted women for no good reason at all, purely out of a want that was either denied (for good reason), or that the want itself was to inflict harm. While the allegory still does feel unintentional here, it's at least slightly less unintentional. It was probably mostly just by accident due to Agartha's generally uncomfortable writing style, but the allegory here feels a little more potent when it's not so blatantly a BDSM fic.

I hate the Nightless City, despite it again being a cool concept. A 'utopia' where speaking out at all means death -- where men are in concept free citizens, but in practice fall victim to the law if they look at someone funny. Again, in concept, great allegory. The law does not treat men and women the same -- and while it differs depending on the case which is preferred, the vast majority of the time, women are pretty much shafted by the legal system (see Brock Turner), especially in very conservative areas. Cases can be made for both genders being shafted, of course -- but for the purpose of this allegory, picking out the prejudices of the legal system against gender is a fair critique. But, like everything else Agartha does, these neat ideas fall flat in practice.

They barely touch at all on the allegory, and nobody seems to even realize it in the cast, making me further believe the allegories aren't intentional at all. In due fact, it's as if the writer didn't even realize that this could be read as an allegory. The men's plights make some sense, as they were yoinked out of nowhere into a world that hates them. But the Servants and Guda don't think about it at all past the 'wow men are slaves that sucks' -- barely even considering that this could be an allegory the world's creator made due to their own horrific circumstances. They do point this out, but to my knowledge, it's very late -- when Scheherazade's called on her bluff, only then is it ever mentioned, and only in passing at that. If anything, the fact they point this out so close to the ending makes the ending itself that much more insulting. But before I get to the ending, I think there's something else about Agartha that sets the scene for just how awful it is -- and that's the way the characters are written, and the dialogue that comes of it. For this, I'll split it up into the characters who portray this the most. I'll even describe their personalities in Agartha's context.

Guda: Crouching pervert, hidden Mash stan. A few non-sequiturs of Guda complimenting Mash despite the mood being completely broken by it. Guda's incapable of taking a situation seriously in Agartha, even when the world's basically due to be changed forever. They keep cracking jokes, creeping on Astolfo/d'Eon, and other such things even when people are literally dying all around him. For that matter, I clearly recall the scene where -- for no real reason -- Guda just changes gears with Mash in tow, and starts trying to decipher d'Eon's gender. There's absolutely no real context to this, nor any reason for Guda to do this. Further noted is the fact Guda has worked with d'Eon before, and should've probably realized d'Eon's situation by this point. The Nasuverse has always been a bit, er, behind on gender norms and such, but it's so prevalent in any scene with d'Eon it hurts -- especially in that particular scene.

Astolfo: Oddly enough, the most tolerable person here (sans one other person). Agartha's refusal to take itself seriously works remarkably well for Astolfo. And while Astolfo isn't exactly written well here either, the fact that Astolfo's always been a bit loopy makes them seem, well, more in character. They're responsible for some of the funnier moments in Agartha, with their input composing approximately 3/4 of the, like, seven or eight funny moments in Agartha proper. Even so, Astolfo's appearance sometimes hurts Agartha as much as they help it, probably since Astolfo is a bit of the reason Agartha won't take itself seriously.

d'Eon: Deserved fucking better. The previously mentioned scene was the worst offender by far in my eyes, with it coming out of fucking nowhere. d'Eon's paired with Astolfo as a buddy and fighting partner, which itself could've made for good material -- instead, d'Eon is constantly dragged into Astolfo's fanservice-y gimmicks, and d'Eon themselves are pretty often creeped on by Guda. I'd go out on a limb to say that d'Eon's implied dislike of gendered clothing (see the maid outfit) made their scenes wearing such outfits far more uncomfortable, especially with how distinctly sexual the Agartha humour is. I just hated it.

Columbus: I can't fucking believe I'm saying this, but Columbus was the funniest character in Agartha. And I don't even think that was intentional. Something about how unabashedly horrible he was caught me completely off guard -- I thought he'd end up sort of like Napoleon at a glance, someone whose Spirit Origin was completely changed due to Europe's collective worship of the dude -- but holy FUCK was I wrong. Something about the hilariously cursed faces Columbus pulls, combined with his loud-and-proud irredeemable evilness, made him a blast to watch -- and an even bigger blast to beat the shit out of. His, uh, toothy grin still cracks me up even a few weeks after playing it.

Penthesilea: One of a very large amount of people who really deserved better. She barely ever shows up -- and when she does, she voices her desire to turn Guda and co. into a breeding machine/slave (recall she's like. 16?), and pretty much throws the whole 'reasonable-ish zerk' thing out the window instantly, because Agartha decided to forego decent writing in favour of 'funny berserker hates achilles haha brrrrrr,' therefore losing pretty much all the characterization they could've given her. The lack of 'alternate views' that show her in greater detail make this far worse, which I'll go into later.

Dahut: God, wasted potential out the asshole! A woman who made an entire world that fucked around and needlessly consumed stuff, she's the epitome of such a belief. But that's all she is. I'd be able to forgive this awful writing if Scheherazade, who 'implanted' Drake onto Dahut, was a bad writer -- but she's fucking Scheherazade! Dahut's a completely flat character, who constantly tries to bed (and kill) Guda, and generally likes the idea of needless consumption. That's literally it. Again, could be explained if Dahut had difficulty keeping control of Drake's body and conscience -- but this isn't explored either! She's just a walking, talking missed opportunity.

Wu: God, look at her design. Do I even need to say more?! She falls under the same problem that the other rulers do -- shallow characterization, no opportunities to flesh them out, etc.

Scheherazade: She could've been so fucking amazing. Scheherazade's story is one ripe with interpretations the Fate series so loves to utilize -- and on paper, her character is amazing. It'd only be natural for someone like Schez to be this deeply traumatized after so many days on death's door -- not many could really get through that okay. The incredible storyteller who fears death, kings, and unconsciously, men as a whole -- creating Agartha as a subtle way of ensuring none of them harm her while she prepares her ultimate plan of revealing magecraft to the entire world. However, as with the other Agartha characters, she becomes cripplingly one-note. Bringing her fear of death above all else, she comes off as an unreasonable asshole, constantly freaking out about death and preserving exclusively herself to a fault. While one could argue it's partially due to a Pillar's influence, Phenex doesn't seem to have a hold on her at all -- it's a basic alliance, and nothing more, as the ending shows us. It just leaves her as a one-note death avoider, with no other character traits at all. I'd go into further detail, but I'm saving that for later.

Fergus: God fucking damnit, man. A literal child version of Fergus, who the entire cast constantly expects to sexually harass every woman in sight. He's a one-note flanderization of Fergus, just without the one character trait Agartha gave Fergus. It just makes him... boring, a character whose only character trait is his refusal to hit a woman. Like... Come on. The fact the entire team is so sure this literal child will start trying to hit on women is just uncomfortable to witness, and the fact he slowly starts gaining these traits feels less like him 'meeting his fate' as Fergus, and more like Agartha wants an excuse to sexually harass more of the cast.

The Fucking Ending I'm giving this its own category, because of just how much of a punch to the face it was. In short -- the plan to reveal magecraft is revealed, more jokes are made, bla bla bla. Agartha can't keep a serious mood at all. ...But the final few scenes take it to a whole other extreme.

Wu Zetian comes out of nowhere despite being squashed by Megalos earlier, stuffing Phenex into a pit of her weird water shit, placing Phenex in a state of 'life and death.' Child Fergus then sac's his own Spirit Origin to summon Fergus inside himself(???), thus gaining the power of Caladbolg to weaken Phenex enough for the player to destroy. ...However, Child Fergus just summoned Fergus inside his own body. So, what happens when you put Agartha!Fergus, a one-note sexual harasser, into the body of a child? You get the final scene of Agartha. For some reason, I guess you need more help from others to take out Phenex. To this end, Fergus decides to convince Schez to join their side. I'd like you to recall that FGO!Scheherazade is implied to have the trauma of Shahryar's abuse, sexual and physical, burned into her memory -- not just the whole death thing. In every form of the story, Shahryar abuses her in such a fashion almost nightly. It's to the point where Schez' first line of defence, and much of her skills, are as much oriented around storytelling as they are charm and seduction (moreso the former than the latter, albeit), because her defence mechanism was that as much as it was storytelling, to keep her abuser happy. This is a part of why Agartha is the way it is -- to keep such men away from her. Hell, there's not a single King in sight, save technically Fergus, and Chaldea's d'Eon and Astolfo. Fergus knows this. Hell, he heard this being called out. He's well aware how terrified she is. So, what does he do?

SEXUALLY HARASS HER. He claims she has to live to have kids. That men and women have to live to have kids. He claims that she should live, because he'd smash her. ...Now, that's insulting enough -- moreso, that it's played dead serious. Nobody even as much as calls him on such a shitty persuasion tactic, and nobody even mentions how awful it is to sexually harass a woman who'd been sexually assaulted at best for the better part of almost three straight years. AND IT. FUCKING. WORKS.

SCHEHERAZADE. IS IMPLIED. TO BE INTO IT.

And because of this, she's swayed to join the heroes and seal Phenex away for good -- giggling about how Fergus' worldview was partially correct even as she fades away. The epilogue features Fergus, sexually harassing Scheherazade ON SIGHT -- calling out 'tits on my 12:00' or whatever, as Scheherazade darts off. However, Schez isn't avoiding him due to trauma. She's avoiding it because, while she's into it, she doesn't want to 'die' so fast. This fucking ending highlights among the biggest issues with this damned Singularity. Even Blavatsky coming out of fucking nowhere to Deus Ex Machina a grail and help into Guda's hands -- despite seemingly being slaughtered by Columbus in a (admittedly a bit funny) way to get the base of the Resistance -- means nothing to me compared to the blatant slaughter of two characters at once. Fergus is a total horndog even outside of Agartha's reach, but he even notes he respects his partners' consent, and doesn't overstep his bounds if he makes them uncomfortable. Scheherazade isn't exactly trusting in the slightest, least of all in Agartha - she barely even begins trusting Guda due to Guda treating her with actual respect. Even then, she isn't actively prostrating herself for Guda in that sense, very likely due to the fact that's more of a defence mechanism to her rather than something she'd enjoy, due to extreme trauma. Albeit, Fate writing does leave the possibility in the air for Guda specifically, but that's very likely just due to Guda being Guda and being careful to treat her properly and help her than anything else (and also the whole 'self insert harem' thing, I guess, but that's a hell of a lot easier to ignore esp in contrast to Agartha) And yet, we see that epilogue, that butchers both of them in one fell swoop so badly that I almost ended up hating both of them. Agartha's biggest problem is that it tried to be deep and intriguing, while having the writing quality of the goddamned Valentine's events. It picked all the right characters to have an incredibly intriguing storyline, and fell flat because the author decided that playing sexual harassment, d'Eon's everything, and even the most serious scenes for comedy was more important than telling a story even half as meaningful as the chapters before it. Lo and behold -- to my knowledge, Minase wrote it. Of course he did. He chose the best, the most interesting characters he could find, and made them so fucking one-note that the story lost all its charm in moments. He chose to emulate Nasu without understanding what made Nasu's writing so good. He chose to make Agartha a laugh fest despite simultaneously trying to make it 'deep.' He chose to fall head-over-ass over a possibly interesting allegory into misogyny and fall right into sexualizing it to the point of feeling like a femdom BDSM fic. And go figure the only character he did decently was Christopher fucking Columbus. I have a hatred for Agartha I can't reasonably place anywhere else. Prillya was just as shitty, but I ignored it, because Prillya itself wasn't great, so of course the crossover sucks too. Valentine's events written by him weren't great, but whatever, it's a Valentine's event. Septem, written by someone else, was similarly not great. But it wasn't insulting. It simply wasn't great, and had a lot of wasted potential. But its ending wasn't out of character to the point of being insulting. Its story didn't make incredible mythological and historical figures too infuriating to like anymore. It didn't almost ruin entire Fate characters for me. Not the way Agartha did. I should probably contextualize that Scheherazade is among my favourite mythological figures. I introduced myself to her through Magi (lmao) due to further research into the base stories -- as well as a favourite Magic: The Gathering card, Shahrazad, which forced you to play a game within your game, like how Arabian Nights featured stories within stories.

Even in Fate outside of Agartha, I liked her. Her design didn't make much sense to me considering her character, but whatever, I didn't need to think too hard of it. It's just a design, and despite my hatred of Penth's design, I still love Penth as a character, so I can handle Schez. But Agartha painted her in such a way that all the subtlety and interesting parts of Schez went completely out the window. No longer was there any hidden references to the aftereffects of her life beyond 'i dun wan die,' and there was hardly an ounce of sympathy or kindness in her bones at all. While her being an anti-hero made some sense, especially as she was only a normal person with far above-average storytelling prowess, there was a point when she stopped being a 'good, but terrified person' and started being a complete asshole. And Agartha was that time. If it weren't for her Interlude, which redeemed her considerably, and Ooku, which did wonders for her character despite being written by Minase (as I believe Nasu was overseeing him at that point), I very likely would've never gone for her at all, despite my love of the myth. In Conclusion This rant is just to say that Agartha is bad. Horrific. Insulting, even. At every step where it could've been good, it tumbled head-over-ass into the most insulting, uncomfortable shit you could imagine. It failed to take itself seriously, and paced itself like a comedy event, but simultaneously acted as if it expected its audience to take it seriously. Like a clown brigade deciding to take on Les Mis, it loses all of its punch when every few lines is interrupted by a jab at Fergus, sexual harassment, or something that comes close to being cool before suddenly turning into a badly-timed joke, or suddenly becoming laden with dialogue so sexual it feels straight out of a porno. It's aggravating, awful, and with only brief reprieves of bareable comedy in between long, long lengths of hellish text and awful characterization. The only good part was the gameplay -- which, laden with interesting mechanics not seen elsewhere, was legitimately fun. My take? Avoid all Agartha cutscenes and plot, and just play the gameplay. The gameplay's fun, and if enjoyed on its own, would probably make for a far better experience than observing the story surrounding it. But good gameplay doesn't make up for a horrible story, especially in a game where plot is as important as it is in F/GO. Agartha's a pile of shit in my eyes, but that's ultimately only my opinion, and nothing more. If others have an opinion counter to mine, that's completely fine -- and don't let this analysis ruin your fun with Agartha if you enjoyed its plot. To be frank, I'd be happy if you enjoyed it where I could not. And if you think my takes are misinformed, or if I missed a spot (or overreacted to a spot), that's what the reblogs and comments are for! I'm definitely not the kind of dude who has the final say in matters like this -- this is only what I picked up. Thank you for reading!

[posthumus]

hullo boys, today i’m writing about my thoughts on the Dickie incident in Maurice. (potential content warning for sexual assault and pedophilia — if you’ve read the book, though, it won’t get more graphic than that)

i’ve actually always appreciated the Dickie scene, controversial though it is. i first read the book when i was fifteen — the same age as Dickie himself, iirc (EDIT: I did not, in fact, recall correctly; see here) — and i feel like i got it instantly: to me, it serves to highlight the extremely fucked-up attitudes towards sex society helps to internalize. that said, your mileage may vary on how much discomfort you’re able to withstand, and i think it’s completely fair to feel that the incident makes Maurice — the character and/or the book — irredeemable. i’m able to forgive a lot of the more problematic elements of Maurice because i think they’re adequately criticized in the text (at one point Forster literally calls Clive and Maurice misogynists). however, i don’t blame anyone for feeling uncomfortable with them. mostly, i’m trying to explain why i personally like the function of Dickie within the story, and why i think the whole episode requires a nuanced approach. 

first up: i’ve seen the whole Dickie thing’s presentation interpreted as completely uncritical, which i think is pretty misinformed. i’ll certainly admit that at the start of the chapter, it’s quite ambiguous as to which way the novel will frame Maurice’s feelings. it’s extremely uncomfortable to read, especially in a modern context: there’s an element of suspense as you try to guess whether or not an author of this time period would have endorsed sexual assault. but the catharsis comes at the end of the next chapter, when the horror of the whole situation snaps into sharp focus: “was it conceivable that on sunday last he had nearly assaulted a boy?” for the previous chapter, Maurice had been kidding himself about the whole thing, and it doesn’t seem quite as rapey as it actually is; but then we’re thrown the word assault, and it becomes clear that we are, in fact, meant to understand that this was a horrible thing to even think of doing. 

in my opinion, the book in no way endorses Maurice's thoughts — i actually think that, for his time, Forster was taking a pretty noble stance. the introduction to my copy of Maurice, by David Leavitt, includes a quote from Lytton Strachey, who wrote to Forster, “you apparently regard the Dickie incident with grave disapproval. why?” like, pederasty was still celebrated amongst a lot of gay men at the time. the fact that the Dickie thing reads so uncomfortably at all is a testament to Forster's (correct) stance on the issue; i think you're meant to be grossed the fuck out by Maurice's thoughts. (also, not that this exempts him from criticism, but Forster himself was assaulted as a child; i think he very much understood the gravity of what he was suggesting.)

secondly, Maurice is an EXTREMELY flawed character, and it seems ludicrous to suggest that we're expected to sympathize with all of his thoughts and actions. he's an asshole for most of the book. much emphasis is placed on the fact that Maurice is an entirely average man within his time, location, and class; his opinions and actions fall in line with that, which is why i’m personally okay with his misogyny (even though i’d throw hands with him in real life). 

the big misunderstanding with a lot of Maurice’s flaws, i think, is that he isn’t a self-insert character, either for the reader or the author (consider the terminal note: “in Maurice i wanted to create a character who was completely unlike myself”). none of Forster’s characters are blank slates, to my mind — they all have extremely specific personalities; we’re not meant to be following them wholeheartedly the way we would with, say, Harry Potter. i worry some people read the book expecting to be able to back him 100%, but i think we're supposed to be observing Maurice, not putting ourselves in his shoes. (the omniscient narration helps with that, as we're told about elements of his psyche that Maurice himself isn't aware of. also, i’m no expert, so don't quote me here, but i think the concept of a self-insert protagonist is a sort of newer one? i feel like most books pre-mid-twentieth century have characters you're supposed to observe and criticize, and not wholly empathize with — Nick Carraway comes to mind.) 

lastly on his flaws, i think the genre you place the book in influences how angry you are at Maurice. if you see it as a romance novel, which is certainly a fair reading, his sudden moments of insane fucked-up-ness make it much harder to root for him. i’ve come to see it as more of a bildungsroman, so i think the point is Maurice's mistakes; he has to reckon with a lot of his actions, including the Dickie incident. 

the part of the whole Dickie debacle that’s the most fascinating to me is its context within Maurice’s discussion of sexuality. i think the Dickie incident showcases how sexual repression and internalized homophobia can pervert your perspective on all sexual relationships. within the novel, sex in general feels like something criminal (certainly in Maurice’s case this is true for sex between men; however, there are also the diagrams on the beach at the start of the book, and Anne’s complete lack of knowledge about sex when she marries Clive). if you view all sexual relationships as immoral, though, pedophilia and sexual assault become no more unethical than consensual sex. it’s interesting in that light, then, to compare the Dickie incident to the moment with the man on the train two chapters later: one absolutely should be illegal, but they are both interpreted by Maurice as obscene, and both (if acted upon) would have been criminal offenses. i also think it’s interesting that the man on the train is perhaps the closest comparison to Forster himself within the novel, as Forster, in middle age, cruised London’s public spaces in the hopes of finding someone to hook up with. while Maurice loathes the man on the train (David Leavitt’s introduction, again, discusses how Forster wrote a love story that deliberately excludes himself), i don’t think the reader is meant to. 

personally, the Dickie scene resonates with me as someone attracted to women. being told that your own desires are inherently predatory doesn’t dispel those desires, but only makes you ashamed of them, and warps your perception of healthy sexuality. i tend to interpret Maurice’s feelings about Dickie more as intrusive thoughts than actual, tangible want — this kind of obscenity, to his mind, is inevitable for him. i don’t think Maurice would have actually assaulted Dickie. i think he was cracking under the pressures of an openly hostile society, while grappling with his own repression and unmet needs. 

TL;DR — Maurice is a flawed character and Forster is critical of his actions. further, the Dickie incident gives us a striking picture of Edwardian society’s attitude towards all sexual relationships, which still has applications today; the episode also gives us insight into Maurice’s mental state. it’s uncomfortable, but in my opinion necessary to the core message of the book.

[praisetheaxolotl]

I’d like to get your thoughts on this, hope this is okay!

Look at this quote from this article:

“It’s easy to pick on the “this wouldn’t be happening if these characters were coded as male,” but it’s nonetheless true—as a fan of the unrepentantly (gloriously) awful Bill Cipher, among others, I can promise you I see it regularly.”

I immediately thought of this blog when I read this. 

Not saying you’re misogynist, of course. This blog is just so fascinating, and for someone to dismiss it all like that is frustrating. 

I mean, of course they weren’t referring to you directly, but still. 

For someone to brush off people’s interesting, thought-provoking theories as nothing but misogyny is kind of close-minded, in my opinion. 

But this makes me curious. Do you think you’d still feel the same way about Bill if he was more feminine-coded? Would it matter?

And what do you think about that statement? Are you as annoyed by it as I am?

It’s always alright to get my thoughts on certain subjects, Anon! And lucky for you, I have lots of thoughts on this.

First of all, thank you for liking my blog! I put a lot of work into it, and I still look back on everything I’ve done here fondly. This blog is my only fandom-specific blog that’s still semi-active even after I’ve left the fandom. 

And, about what you said about misogyny... I don’t actually think that’s what the article is talking about. It’s not misogyny for someone to pick apart Bill Cipher, but it’s misogyny if someone offers that level of potential depth to a male character while instantly condemning a female character. 

But... honestly, from my experience? These two groups of people are different groups. 

I used to run in those “anti” circles, back in 2015? 2016? Before the whole “SU criti/cal” thing started to become popular. But I could still kinda see hints of it? It was back when SU was hailed as THE perfect show, before people knocked it off the pedestal they put it on. 

Anyway. These people hated redemption arcs. They saw Bill as this irredeemable monolith of a character, and any alternate interpretations were met with outright malice. I got called out once for, and I am not joking, headcanoning Bill as an abuse victim. They claimed I was “excusing his actions,” but when I asked to please show a screenshot of where I said that this excused him, they couldn’t. Because I never said that. 

(I ended up publishing the whole headcanon on my main blog, and people loved it. That reception is what pushed me to create this blog.)

I don’t doubt at least some of those people became the type to nitpick SU. So I feel that the same people that nitpick male characters are also the type to nitpick female ones. They’re just nitpickers with a black-and-white sense of morality.

But there are always exceptions to the rule- people who love morally gray male characters but hate morally grey female characters. Yes, some of these motivations may be spurred on by misogyny. But what frustrates me is the initial assumption of malice. I’m not saying the article itself is guilty of this, as it seems to be speaking to a general problem, but more those tumblr posts or tweets trying to “call people out” if they gravitate towards more morally gray male characters than female ones.

Which brings me to my answer to your question: No, I don’t think I would like Bill as much, had he been a woman.

But please let me explain first. 

First, you need to know some facts about me:

I am transmasculine. (Not a trans man- I’m nonbinary.)

I have a personality disorder. I’m not comfortable disclosing which one, but it’s one of the cluster B ones.

I was abused, and my reaction to the abuse was extreme anger and irritability. (Hence the PD.)

Another important fact is that my abuser was a woman. She’s my mother. I had to live with constant emotional abuse, gaslighting, neglect and other forms of malice for my whole life. I’m still not free yet, and I’m turning 20 in a month. (No, literally, exactly one month to the day.)

I was abused my whole life by a vindictive, manipulative shit of a woman, and it made me into a vindictive, manipulative shit of a person. The key difference is that I am actively trying not to be a vindictive, manipulative shit.

When I pick apart asshole male characters, I see myself in them. I do a deep dive into the whys, the hows the whos of why they ended up the way that they did, because it makes me feel liberated. It’s personally liberating to see someone like me, whom everyone sees as a monster, have a backstory that shows that monsters aren’t born, they’re made. It’s liberating to see them try and change, it’s liberating to give them someone to help them change no matter what, it’s liberating to look harder. Because that’s what I wanted. I wanted someone to look at me and see past the violent, angry 15 year old that I was, and actually help me. I wanted someone to see I was a victim, that I didn’t like being the way that I was. I wanted someone to help me and be there for me, even though I was messed up and awful.

(But don’t feel too bad for me- A few years ago I met someone wonderful through this very fandom who was exactly the kind of person I needed. And last November I proposed to him and he said yes!)

When I see a morally grey female character... all I can see is my abuser. I see in them the person that hurt me. I don’t want to look deeper, just as I don’t care about my mother’s long rambles about how shitty her childhood was. Was she also abused? Yes. Do I care? Nope! I don’t feel that same drive to pick apart female characters that act like the male ones I like, because of my trauma.

 And honestly? Just because I gravitate towards male characters more doesn’t make me a misogynist. How I treat actual real life women does. I do examine my behavior to make sure I’m not being misogynistic- in fact, it was worry that I was being misogynistic in my dislike of these characters that made me think hard enough to have such a long answer to your question. 

Maybe someone liking only male characters is an indicator of misogyny. Maybe it isn’t. I’m not shy about talking about what happened to me but people should not have to disclose their traumas in order to be “allowed” to consume fiction in a way some stranger doesn’t like. 

And there actually is a specific subset of morally grey female characters I like: my own OCs. 

I guess it’s the fact that I created them and thus can control how they act? They’re all assholes and I love them so much, but I don’t feel that same aversion as I do with characters that aren’t mine. Because the lack of control I had over my own abusive situation is what fucked me up so hard, but now I do have the control. If I watch a TV show, I don’t have any control over what the characters do, they’re not mine. But I do have control over my OCs.

(Psst- if you wanna see those OCs, I’ve since moved to the Invader Zim fandom, and am working on a HUGE fic series for it. (It’s not published yet- I’m working on it behind the scenes.) Those OCs I’m talking about star heavily. Here’s my blog, if you’re interested. I kinda wanna do some metaposting for that fandom, too, but I’ve no idea where to start. I love the Irkens, though, haha. Anyway if any of you happen to like IZ and have a meta-question for me... the askbox IS open!)

Anyway. This got really long. But misogyny in fandom is a thing, and the article does call it out well. I just get frustrated that people immediately assume malice. The statement does annoy me, but because it does happen if the characters are coded as male, too. I see it all the time. People just tend to either be fans of the morally grey, or... not.

[janiedean]

I was just wondering what do you think about posts that excuse Cersei's behaviour because she's mentally ill, or that if you critique its because your ableist and hate mentally ill people? Or some variation/combination of the two? Like it just bugs me in general when people automatically excuse and even justify horrible, violent and abusive behaviour just because someone's mentally ill, particularly as someone whose been on the receiving end of that behaviour from mentally ill people.

... I think I’ve made my opinion clear, but very briefly and hoping that I don’t unleash the kraken:

c.’s issues could have been solved if someone had sent her to a child psychologist before the age of then in modern au. period. because someone who grows up not having a shred of regret over having thrown a supposed friend in a well when they were twelve over a menial thing either should have had a completely different upbringing or should have gotten therapy. which doesn’t exist in westeros, but anyway, when discussing c’s issues that’s the crux of the matter;

c’s issues also hurt other people and I’m not talking about j., I’m talking about everyone around her or mostly, and the point is that the moment someone’s issues also mean hurting others... your freedom ends where others’s starts. assuming that her MH issues mean that she’s justified in behaving the way she does means that having MH issues is a free out of jail card for hurting others, which... it’s not;

spoilers: all three lannister siblings have mental health issues. same as like, 90% of the characters in these books. I’m 99% sure that the only two POV characters who doesn’t have issues that would require immediate therapy are davos (and he’s lost four kids, he has his problems) and asha, probably, and asha is just... very functional but it’s a miracle she came out like that considering her background. everyone else has issues over issues to different degrees, so... at this point disliking anyone in these books with this reasoning would mean hating mentally illy people while at the same time 85% of the characters you like most likely also have mental health issues and I’m talking just that, because I mean... if someone likes bran and not doran or viceversa I’m not going to assume that they’re ableist since both characters are disabled and both can’t walk, but most likely it’s just a personality preference, so saying that if you don’t like c. it’s because you hate mentally ill people or are ableist to me is ridiculous because like... I don’t like c. and my top five has three pov characters who have obviously mental health issues up the wazoo and one who most likely had plenty (and two out of those five also have become physically disabled as well during the series), I have gone to therapy for a damned long time myself and I hate mentally ill people now just because I don’t like a character who has MH issues? sorry but that’s like... ridiculous. you’re allowed to not like some characters because their personality is not your thing regardless of the issues they have;

also: again, c.’s issues hurt other people. those other people have no obligation to stick by if they feel like it’s detrimental to their health, same as no one has an obligation to stick by someone who is detrimental to their MH or well-being and also has no intention of changing/is aware of that. like, I can get behind wanting to support someone you love whose behavior hurts you who has realized it and is getting help/is actively trying to get better, but if that person doesn’t care or isn’t aware then no one has an obligation to stick by if it hurts them, so assuming that people who don’t like c. or whoever else or that characters in the books should stick by c. because of her issues if it hurts them is imvho not a thing people should even bring up because it implies that people have an obligation to excuse actions that are hurtful when the person who commits them has no interest in getting better, so... nah;

also there’s critique and critique and disliking a disabled character doesn’t automatically make you ableist same as disliking a woman doesn’t make you a misogynist, but like, going outside cersei: people can dislike tyrion just because they don’t gaf about him or because they don’t like the character or because they don’t find his personality that charming, but the moment the criticism turns into calling him a monster or joking about his height or basically sounding like tywin when he talks about tyrion then it’s definitely ableism and to be quite honest when it comes to tumblr there’s a lot more ableist critique thrown at tyrion than at cersei, because the ten of us who dislike her openly do it because she’s terrible while recognizing that she has issues which explain why she’s like that but don’t justify what she does at pretty much almost any point ever, the army of people who meta about tyrion as if he’s these books’s ultimate villain when 90% it’s because he could be in the way of their ship or say that he has male privilege over c. who therefore couldn’t have abused him (YES I had to read that with mine own eyes) and the likes most likely should check their priorities because that’s not hating him bc he’s a character you don’t like, that reeks of ableism 101 and of having skimmed his chapters (also tyrion has MH issues up the wazoo too but I don’t see people on here mentioning it). same way, one thing is disliking cat because she’s not your type of character, another is the fact that this entire fandom seems to have decided that blaming catelyn for every horrid thing that happened in these books that would not have happened had she just stayed home with the kids which imvho shows exactly the level of not-so-hidden misogyny rampant around here/directed at her specifically. but I don’t think that everyone who hates cat is misogynist or does it because of misogyny, I just think that a lot of fandom bias against her is... very misogynistic;

to sum up the above thing, considering that c. is also straight up written as a negative character and grrm has said time and time again that it’s her point in the narrative, assuming that someone would dislike her just because she’s MH is pretty much fried air as we say here because given what she’s pulled up until now, I think that she has enough of a CV that people have more than enough reasons to dislike her without bringing her mental health into account. because her issues might explain why she’s like that, but they don’t justify for shit anything she does, and if that’s valid for knowing why theon was the way he was in wf but doesn’t justify him killing the miller’s kids, knowing why jaime pushed bran but doesn’t justify it, knowing why sandor doesn’t disobey ethically horrid orders but doesn’t mean he hasn’t done pretty fucked up shit etc., then it’s also valid for c. and I really would like for characters to be judged evenly, thanks.

also: everyone has their limits when it comes to understanding/explaining where a person committing wrong actions comes from. if people can relate to c. and/or see themselves in her issues and have compassion for her, that’s their prerogative and I won’t go bitch at them for it same as I appreciate if people don’t bitch at me for having compassion for theon or sandor or jaime or whoever else. but at the same time assuming that everyone has your standards is ridiculous. for me c. was irredeemable after she basically went and laughed about the red wedding/thought she was so much better than cat because cat went insane after seeing robb die because to me people finding the red wedding funny or hilarious or well-deserved is the ultimate thing that will make me stop caring about them. if for someone jaime having pushed bran out of the window is irredeemable as long as they don’t come to me complaining about why I don’t think it is, it’s their prerogative.

but assuming that all of us need to find c. redeemable or understandable or relatable because people who like her do is ridiculous because you can’t expect anyone to relate to your favorites just because you do, and calling out the social justice card is ridiculous because fictional preferences are what they are and you can’t force yourself to like someone you despise just because they belong to X category - I wouldn’t tell people they have to like jaime because he has ptsd nor I’d expect them to be automatically ableist if they don’t gaf about jaime either way and don’t make jokes about him losing his guts with his hand or about how he’s the stupidest lannister, I’d expect people wouldn’t tell me I have to like c. because she has MH issues or whatnot. because there’s plenty of reasons to dislike c. and none of them have to do with her MH and most of her have to do with her abusive behavior.

also, last thing: the one time I actually met someone who was a self-proclaimed ‘I empathize with cersei on a personal level’ person, after three days in which they were an asshole to everyone in the group we were, the moment I called her out on it after she had been even more of an asshole when someone else tried to discuss it reasonably, I got backhanded in the face twice for it. now, I handled it and tbqh I didn’t mind it half as much as I could have because I didn’t gaf about this person and barely knew them. I also know that this person had issues (and later went to therapy so good for them), but as much as I could sympathize with her issues, forgive me if I don’t really think I want to see again someone who barely knew me and saw fit to hit me in the face twice. now, am I ableist for that? I really don’t think so. it’s the exact same principle. someone else might have had another reaction to it, but I’m not obliged to give them a second chance since they hurt me first and no one would say I’m ableist for it. it’s the exact same argument just brought to fictional level. one thing is disliking a character because of their issues only (ie theon and the castration jokes), another is disliking them because you think they’re boring and/or they’re not your kind of character.

and people need to realize that their favorite character can’t be everyone’s favorite character statistically. like. none of our faves are automatically everyone’s faves and that’s fine because that’s how the world works. *shrug*

[utopianparadoxist]

I'm gonna have to dissagree with you on the whole "Eridan is irredeemable" thing. Simply because he did have his reasons for doing things(they were just bad/misinformed reasons), and wasn't as much of a Nice Guy(TM) as everyone says. Here's what happened, according to what I remember: Eridan tries to convince everyone(or at least Feferi) that there's no hope if they don't join with Jack(not realizing that there's no hope with Jack either). 1/4

Feferi's like "Ew, you're just doing this cause you like me." Eridan goes "Ew bitch, no. I am so far over you, I literally don't care about you except you're also technically the Empress now." Sollux challenges Eridan to their Hate Duel and Eridan goes "Ugh fine". Sollux gets Rekt, and Feferi gets pissed that her new "pet"(because that's what Sollux seemed to be to her) didn't win and tries to kill Eridan. 2/4Eridan kills her first, destroys the Matriorb to distract Kanaya when she looks like she might go for him next(arguably the only uncalled for action, as I don't think she'd actually attacked him yet), kills Kanaya, and then leaves poor Karkat alone and goes to find somebody to go with him to join Jack. 3/4So he didn't just go on a murder spree, he was either winning a duel(Sollux), or defending himself against (percieved) threats(Feferi and Kanaya). If he was really gonna go on a murder spree, he would've killed Karkat, too. Also all of this probably wouldn't have happened if A: Feferi had done her job as his Moiral; or B: Present!Karkat hadn't called it off with Past!Eridan. (Sorry if this all sounds rude, I just really hate when people don't actually pay attention to Eridan's character) 4/4

You have some serious issues with women, anon. From the top:

A) Eridan was cruel, ungrateful, judgmental and unpleasant to everyone who had the misfortune of talking to him from his first appearance. Also, he’s a fucking Nazi. Feferi was forced into a position of trying to cool the temperament of a literal genocidal nazi asshole. Nobody owed Eridan further emotional labor once he was no longer a threat.

B) Your view that Feferi viewed Sollux as a ‘pet’ is as uncharitable as it is based on absolutely nothing. If you’re going to make statements that dramatic at me, be prepared to back them up with the text and have your reading put under scrutiny. I’m not here to indulge the validity of everyone’s pet headcanons. I’m here to talk about Homestuck. 

C) You’re forgetting the part where Eridan tried to get Feferi SPECIFICALLY to join Jack with him. The offer was not open to Sollux and was not made to anybody else. Eridan considered her worthy because she’s ruling class, because oh have I mentioned, Eridan is a fucking nazi.

D) I literally do not care to what extent Eridan was personally out to go on a murder spree. He’s still a gutless coward who abandoned all his friends and took dim views of even the ones who went out of their way to show him kindness, like Karkat, on account of his ***LITERAL SPACE NAZI IDEOLOGY***

E) Andrew Hussie himself talked about him in the dimmest of terms, calling him the worst kind of bastard Homestuck has to offer in the context of Act 5--harsher words than I’d use, considering LE and Gamzee exist. But like. You’re gonna have a hard time finding evidence for your pet reading, bud. 

F) Maybe when you’re expressing virulent misogyny at a female character don’t LITERALLY call her slurs? It’s kind of on the nose. You might have noticed part of my aesthetic is valuing the effort it takes to read between the lines, so like give me a little room for doubt here as to where you’re coming from ok thanks.

G) I didn’t even call Eridan completely irredeemable in the grand scheme of things, for fuck’s sake. My point was that actually just the opposite: That no matter how bad Eridan was, you still have to read him while weighing the agency of a child trapped in an exploitative system with the literal quasi-Adult GOD that set up that system in the first place. 

Eridan is shit, but there’s potential for him to be not shit somewhere in his character. The two statements are not contradictory. 

[yelloskello]

so I generally avoid Tumblr Prose, but i’ve had this one chillin in my likes for a long time now because the premise seemed interesting to me. About five minutes ago I was like, y’know, i’m takin A Small Rest, i’m about to get up but not quite yet, let’s actually read it.

And mostly it left me disappointed. I got about halfway through, got bored, lightly skimmed the rest, unliked, and moved on.

Whhhyyy?

1) because i’m tired of Stories Where the Real Villain is Misogyny. Like. I’m so tired. I’m tired of ‘spooky men who go bump in the night’, i’m tired of ‘you can Only Trust Your Fellow Woman #radfemvibes’, i’m tired of ‘look at all this exhausting misogyny she has to deal with’. 

I’d rather just have stories with men who aren’t toxic in the first place, and women who don’t have to deal with misogyny at all. 

2) the prospect of this story was in essence ‘ruler chooses to marry the big bad evil guy in order to keep her throne’, aaaand they pretty much instantly established that he was barely evil at all and any concept of him being evil was, like, just a big misunderstanding and/or Assumptions. He’s good, actually!

Yawn.

A while back someone on tumbo was saying that the real underlying Best Ship Dynamic was seeing two flawed people find each other and, through their interactions with each other, becoming better people, and now I think all the fucking time about how true that is. Y’know why Zuko/Katara was so Good in Avatar: the Last Airbender? Because they were both flawed in their own way and their interactions made them better. They both were dealing with unchecked pain and trauma, and when forced together, they both managed to quell each others’ inner fires and help each other find peace. Zuko and Katara hunting down the man who killed her mom was basically an entire episode about just that. Their brief interaction in that jail cell in the earth kingdom? Probably more meaningful than almost any interaction she really had with Aang. They had common ground, and they grew from each other.

Aang was just like, pretty gorl tho, and katara wasn’t even really feeling it like almost the entire show.

This is why enemies to lovers is So Fucking Spicy. Because when they start out constantly at each others’ throats, they PROBABLY got some shit to work through and there’s room for growth.

BUT ANYWAYS

That’s what this story lacked. It sounded promising from the premise because, marrying big bad? Why, that’s like, the most perfect chance for him to grow to learn to not be so fucking evil! And maybe she’s flawed, too! Has her walls too high up! Learns to be more vulnerable! Learns to trust! Maybe learns to be, like, a LITTLE naughty or some shit!

And instead he was just Good Anyways and was basically kinda this bland Anti-Misogyny doll to call out the Other Sexist Men and make her feel more confident in her role as queen. Technically, she grew some - but it felt less engaging as a romance story because it wasn’t mutual. It was just basically him taking care of her.

Yaaaaawn.

I know we’re all fucking terrified of writing actual flawed characters because of the weird purity culture that permeates some circles of social media, but like. It’s so much more interesting to read. Find the middle ground between ‘fucking irredeemable, yikes’ and ‘kind of an asshole’. take consideration of the shit that a fictional story being fictional and kind of operating on a different level of morality, makes more palatable. Look at bad characters who WORK, study how they grow, and gimme THAT.