#no this boy is not 'edgy'

[russenoire]

on first watch as an anime-only, i remember feeling like ritsu kageyama's descent into evil in episode seven needed a little more air, more space to breathe. i... no longer do. if that slide down the slippery slope feels a bit sudden, there is a reason; and if you know what to look for, it's not actually all that sudden. bear with me here.

from the first episode, the anime sets ritsu up as shigeo's kind, solicitous younger brother. we don't see much of him for the first three episodes, but when we do, he's making bids for shigeo’s attention: helpfully straightening his spoon when it bends and deposits a bite of his dinner on the dining table; noting that he seems out of it and offering himself up as a confidant at least twice; checking in on him in the morning so they can both leave on time. (i actually love the anime for doing this. ritsu doesn't even show up as a character until maybe the middle of the manga's second volume?) except for the spoon, shigeo gently turns him down every time.

and yet. the interview ichi mezato snags with ritsu in episode four confirms a distance between the kageyama boys. you are not seeing things here. he initially refuses her desire for detailed information about shigeo’s powers, only indulging her to find out what shigeo’s been up to. ritsu holds those powers in such awe that he uses a rather hyperbolic phrase to describe shigeo for her: '世界の基本', or sekai no kihon, literally the standard for [his] world.

after he coldly walks out on her, she reviews what little she’s gleaned from their chilly meeting: he's hawt, at the top of his class, athletic, very popular... all things his older brother decidedly is not. the story establishes a duality here between ritsu’s image—indirectly revealed through mezato’s notes—and the reality of ritsu, sat hunched across from her, sullen, barely tolerating her until she coughed up the information she promised him. later on that evening, we see just how deep ritsu's awe goes... or rather, how snared up it is in resentment and envy as he attempts in vain to bend a spoon, just like shigeo did when they were younger. all the trophies of others’ esteem already gathering dust on his shelves don’t mean shit if he can’t have this.

ritsu intercepts shigeo as he leaves for class the next morning: no student council meeting, so an opportunity to actually talk to him. this is rare, his brother notes. and of course dimple is haunting shigeo. when the specter comments on their apparent closeness, the boy side-eyes him hard. this can easily be read two ways: ‘why the hell are you talking to me when no one else can see you?’ and ‘man, fuck you for sticking the knife in deeper.’ ritsu doesn’t ask about the cult meeting here or ever in the entire series. was he really all that interested in mezato’s news? no, he only wants to know why his brother doesn’t use his powers anymore. and this is the first time they’ve talked about this.

it’s such a neat little mystery, these breadcrumbs the story leaves for us until ritsu’s formal introduction in episode six. even though they share the same home and appear to be on friendly terms, the kageyama brothers may as well live on opposite sides of the planet. we don’t even get a sense of why this state of affairs exists until episode five, where teru chokes the breath out of shigeo and his pissed-off soul levels teru’s school before catapulting him into the stratosphere to reflect on his sins: several years prior, shigeo nearly killed ritsu (and possibly ended three much older boys) in an accident neither boy understands; fragments of memory flash before his eyes as his consciousness shorts out.

‘brother, you’re home late, sopping wet. here’s a towel. are you hungry? you seem down; is everything OK? if you need to talk, i’m here for you.’

instead of turning down this bid for connection like all the rest and turning inward again, shigeo actually opens up. he apologizes for the accident—for the first time—then asks for some clarity, since his memories of it are broken. and ritsu clenches the knob to his brother’s bedroom door tighter. he lies to his face, tells him to ‘get over it already.’ this after asking shigeo to confide in him again, no less: too terrified to be honest with him, too used to being shot down. this boy is soaking in fear he has no context for, and he heads downstairs to soak in it alone. shigeo at least has reigen to process his own fears with, though he never trusts the man enough to take full advantage.

ritsu has no one.

he’s already keeping up appearances at home and has been for years; over the course of the spring cleaning big cleanup arc, we learn the extent to which he’s been doing so at school.

(all those expectations of him weighing him down for so long… he can’t hold out forever.)

student council vice president tokugawa calls him out on trying to melt into the scenery like his brother; his considerable gifts make that impossible. said gifts, however, are so ego-dystonic for him that they’re yet another part of Ritsu Kageyama’s Big Lie. the academically-gifted, popular sprinter so many of his fellow students swoon over isn’t real: why does everyone praise him for things anyone could do? he doesn’t actually have friends, just associates. who cares about charisma? why does everyone think he’s perfect when the only thing he truly wants will never be his? and why does his locker leak chocolate every valentine’s day?

gentle reader. are you still wondering why he snaps when he finally gets his wish? and why it looks the way it does?

[elvyn]

This dramatic bald guy again (I'm impatiently waiting for news from da4)

[kritzenkriegen]

ah dammit lads I'm sucked back in

[wintys]

𝗌𝗎𝗆𝗆𝖾𝗋.

[egophiliac]

swipes everything else off of the table to yell about diasomnia flower bookmarks

(I gave Silver one too :D)

[wieqo]

﹙ 🕯️兀🛟 أتى ✧ SEC(2)ND TRACK ✱⣔

[crabsnpersimmons]

(slowly cleaning out all the art i drafted but never posted)

sometimes the only way to recharge after a long day

is drawing your current blue trauma boi* in the outfit of your previous blue trauma boi**

*Moon, from my hairdresser AU "New 'Do, Same You" AU

**Red Clad Dewey from Another Eden

[tygrlsblog]

⓵⃜⡷⃨Got Yo͟u͟r͟ 𝓗eart in a HeadL͟o͟c͟k͟ ੋ࿔🌳

[cott3ge]

ׁ ⠀ 🪴 ⠀ 𓈒⠀ 𝖠𝗅𝗅 𝖨 𝗐𝖺𝗇𝗍 𝗂𝗌 𝗒𝗈𝗎 𝗍𝗈 𝖺𝗇𝗌𝗐𝖾𝗋 𝗆𝖾 𝗋𝗂𝗀𝗁𝗍 𝗇𝗈𝗐, 𝗃𝗎𝗌𝗍 𝖽𝖺𝗇𝖼𝖾 𝗐𝗂𝗍𝗁 𝗆𝖾 𝗋𝗂𝗀𝗁𝗍 𝗇𝗈𝗐 .

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ ㅤ ㅤㅤ ㅤ𝗂 𝗆𝗂𝗌𝗌 𝗒𝗈𝗎

[dollange]

⠀ ⠀𓏵⠀⠀⠀⠀　 ׅ　 ㅤㅤ 20 ⠀ㅤ۫ㅤ　 ㅤㅤ𓈒　

.ㅤ ⠀ ꫶ — 👓

[avadorie]

I changed jobs and cities, I hated holidays, babies, history, newspapers, museums, grandmothers, marriage, movies, spiders, garbagemen, english accents, spain, france, italy, walnuts and the color orange. Algebra angred me, opera sickened me, charlie chaplin was a fake and flowers were for pansies.

[goucore]

(＞＜*)ノ ͟𝅘𝅥𝅮 Tava muito louco, passei vidro abaixado

Faltando tão pouco pra pensar logicamente, ce me apareceu com um maio rosado

Não sei se foi sonho ou ilusão da minha mente

[also-web]

⠀⠀⠀YOU⠀⠀⠀☁️᤻⠀⠀⠀⠀:⠀⠀⠀⠀(⠀파란색 & 회색⠀)⠀⠀⠀⠀✧

[notdysfunk]

More to add to the wing series

Someone asked me to draw /Moon/ with broken wings. He just wants to fly :((

[galentir]

Rough sketches my beloved

[cupcek]