#my sleep deprived thoughts

[escapismkidnappedme]

genuinely cannot stop thinking about sister Daniel. There's no part of my lesbian brain that looks at sister Daniel and registers that it's a man in drag.

[fjordline]

[frownyalfred]

one of the Batfamily's protocols for someone going suddenly evil actually is what they jokingly call a percussive reset (slamming the evil person's head into the wall just hard enough to scramble any potential mind control but not enough to cause serious brain damage) and Bruce absolutely hates that they call it that. does that stop him from doing it? absolutely not, but he tends to default to throwing an explosive device close to the evil person's head instead (make that brain jiggle like Jell-o) and plays it off as a "distraction." this is step 6 on his potential mind control protocol/checklist, immediately preceding step 7 (calling Diana) and step 8 ("this isn't you, don't do this").

[thelosers-club]

is this funny

[luck-of-the-drawings]

[OLD ART ALERT] A COLLECTION OF SCENES FROM THE GILLIONS CATSCRATCH ARC THAT BROUGHT ME GREAT JOY. i love fishy chips especially when its just gillion being delirious and violent and hostile

[vladimpale]

"overworkers don't get cuddles" the overworkers say

day 1 of zukki week 2023: domestic

@zukki-week

[violent138]

It must've been so weird for Jason to get used to Bruce and Alfred taking an interest in his wellbeing, spending money, time, and effort to give him more than the bare minimum, after he was used to taking care of himself, especially in those early days when they hadn't yet changed in his mind from fickle, possibly well-meaning strangers and pushed all his trust issues.

And I bet the noise and clamour and raw affection from his siblings was off-putting initially to Tim, who grew up without any of that. At first with just Bruce and Alfred it was probably okay, a gradual step up from the weird isolation of his house, but then with all the siblings and the teams and his deepening relationships it probably took him a while to open up or get over the novelty of family dynamics.

[mushroomsie224]

Hi! I’ve got a drawing request! You don’t have to do it if you don’t want to. If you want, I’d like you to draw Cedric inspired by a fairytale princess of your choice. I’m in a fairytale mood right now and my birthday is on Monday.

Happy Birthday! I decided to draw him as Rapunzel!

Cedric lives in his tower, longing to go out and go on adventures and do important things, but is stuck inside doing mundane tasks instead.

[yakultstan]

[cherrywhite]

I know Faulkner's ever increasing body count is a running joke as if it's something he's purposefully racking up but Rane's murder is such a stark contrast compared to every other one that's come before. And that difference marks such a monumental shift in Faulkner's character.

Like, he runs from the hotelier immediately after sainting him (I know his whole I'm going to make you a saint mirrors what he tells Rane this episode, but he still ultimately runs), he can't bring himself to use the Withermark at Marcel's Crossing, and Mason and Thurrocks' deaths were done in a fit of rage, the horror evident by the time he comes to his senses. Even Daggler's was caused by the Angel Faulkner summoned, not something Faulkner committed to up close. And I imagine however Charlie drowned, well. There's a lot of ambiguity in how it could have gone down, something we'll never really know the scope of, purely because Faulkner is such an unreliable narrator.

Then there's this.

I would argue that Rane's death is much more violent than the ones that came before purely for the fact that Faulkner seems to revel in their suffering as he does it. He needlessly pulls them back up to get a breath of air before plunging them back in the water. He strikes them with his staff so hard that it breaks. And he does this all while laughing and mocking at them. He's needlessly cruel to the point of terrifying. This part was so well done and it really shows just how far Faulkner has gone.

I'm so hesitant to say there's no way back from this simply because of how TSV writes its characters but my knee-jerk reaction as I was listening to this the first time is that there isn't. This was him, fully aware, crossing over the threshold.

[justarandombrit]

Guys I think Zazzalil was right

[escapismkidnappedme]

Things I've learned about the phandom post-hiatus :

1) Most of us watched them growing up and have since discovered our own queerness

2) Anything they do nowadays would've put teen!us in a coma

3) No one can cope with that one photo of blonde Phil

4) No one can cope with Sister Daniel

[sualne]

my voice has started to drop and ive been in a near constant state of gender euphoria this week :DD

[mayrine]

wha- WHAT

imagine this: ranboo dies lovejoy starts playing

[socialiseisnotinmyname]

feather boi

[fancygremlin]

A breakdown of Arthur’s breakdown.

Part 26 is stuck in my head, so I am going to talk about it.

Arthur’s breakdown of course starts off with the reveal that Larson sacrificed his daughter for power and money.

However, what really reinforces Arthur’s self-loathing are Yellow’s words;

Yellow has no qualms in throwing cruel accusations at Arthur. His intentions were clear and simple: to hurt him in the most devastating ways and where it hurts the most. However, Yellow does all that in a voice that Arthur recognises as John’s.

Ultimately, Arthur is forced to hear the voice of his only friend confirming all his worst fears and convictions. That’s what gets to him: his best friend seeing him as Arthur truly sees himself (irredeemable, rotten, a poor excuse of a human who should have died a long time ago. Someone who is trapping John, and who is forcing John to stay and put up with him).

Arthur is ao distraught that he is almost catatonic as he is carried to the mines. He is unresponsive to Yellow's insults, he has no strength to bite back to Larson's taunts. He just lets himself be dragged by Uncle.

When John finally, miraculously comes back, Arthur is quick to latch onto him. His attempts at interacting with John are however awkward and clumsy. I think that this inability to reconnect with John is because he still cannot distinguish John’s words from Yellow.

After all, if Yellow is John without his memories and without their shared experiences… doesn’t that just mean that deep down Yellow’s opinions reflect John’s in some way? Does John really think of Arthur as a self-centred person, a selfish man, a careless and cruel monster who hides behind fake acts of kindness?

To put these doubts to rest, Arthur decides to project onto John his issues. If he can prove that John is not like Yellow, he can prove to himself that he is not like Larson.

He therefore wastes no time in praising how John has improved… by cruelly comparing him to Yellow and demonising everything about Yellow… which is not right. The things he shows reluctance over were still part of who John was, those were still parts that John had to build upon to become who he is currently.

Ultimately, Arthur is involuntarily preventing John from further forming his own identity by explicitly telling him what he should and shouldn’t do, what he should and shouldn’t be. He is suddenly removing the safety and freedom that he granted John this far to figure his own identity out and is instead setting up arbitrary expectations and rules.

He is just doing to John what he did to Yellow.

These strong attempts in differentiating John and Yellow held a lot more weight, when we consider that he was projecting his own problems onto his friend. That's why he is so explosive and irritated whenever John doesn't agree with him.

He was just trying to grapple for any excuse, any proof that there is something concrete that he can use to define what makes a person good or bad. Because otherwise, there really is no difference between himself and Larson and he cannot bear to see himself in that light. He can’t accept that despite everything he did and tried to improve, deep down he’s still a cruel, heartless monster who killed his own child and went on to live.

When John didn’t give him what he wanted (instead going as far as agreeing with Yellow at one point), Arthur grew more and more anxious and restless. So, the only thing that he had left was to carve out and purge the rotten parts of himself. In any way he could.

Only then will he be a good person. Only then will the scales even. Only then he will stop seeing himself as a murderer and a poor excuse of a human.

He resolves that the only option for him is to kill the parts of himself that he doesn’t want. He decides to kill himself Uncle and make Larson pay.

Clearly these suicidal tendencies have been accompanying with him for a long time, as shown in his emotional reactions when his parents died, when Bella died and when Faroe died. His regret is also shown when he confesses he felt extreme guilt in enjoying the life he managed to build back for himself in Arkham as he was working as a PI with Parker.

Arthur just truly cannot forgive himself and his self-loathing runs so deep it’s almost a part of himself he cannot leave behind.

I like how the doubt Arthur feelings of inaptitude, guilt and self-loathing still linger even after being comforted by John at the end of Season 3:

He is unable to truly move on from his mistakes, he still feels the need to find a piece of irrefutable evidence proving he is a good person and that he can be forgiven. He needs his worries and anxieties to be put to rest.

John's forgiveness isn't enough to move on. Daniel's forgiveness was just enough to convince him he might be a good person who is truly trying to do good.

However, in Part 36, we can see that Arthur has not abandoned his self-loathing, as he still sees no wrong in wanting to kill himself killing Uncle. After Oscar reveals what happened at the orphanage he grew up in, Arthur and John have this exchange:

Arthur is tragically forever stuck waiting for Faroe's forgiveness, which he can never really obtain. She’s dead and there is nothing he can do to get her back…