#not the most traditional character and I treat her as something between an actual person and a concept invented by those

[hachinanakomatsu]

Personally Nana is a manga i feel you need an understanding of sapphic women's struggles to be able to read through the context and intention of the characters and their issues. Primarily the two Nana's.

Nana Osaki has a discomfort around the idea of traditional feminine roles and what's 'expected' from her as a woman. The main reason she feels her relationship with Ren doesn't and won't work long term is he's fixated on wanting to have children with her.

However for Nana this'd get in the way of her desired career as a singer and also her future. She deems becoming a housewife and having to provide only for a man as 'the worst fate imaginable'. This is the main reason for conflict with her relationship with Ren.

While Ren isn't abusive in the same way as Takumi he does force Nana into doing things she doesn't feel comfortable with nor want to do. It's because of this that her relationship with Ren is so toxic for the both of them.

On Hachi's side, most of her issues seem to revolve around a clear case of comphet and struggling with her feelings for the women in her life. Hachi desires what Nana least desires (becoming married, having kids etc.) however romance with men is painful and isolating for her.

Hachi's first relationship being with Asano, where she was groomed while she was still a minor ruined her perception of how relationships should be. She only started dating Shouji after he guilt trips her into a relationship (and sex).

Hachi constantly states wanting a friendship with Shouji and how much it means to her however she starts dating because everyone around her acts like she's leading him on. So she dates him, then Shouji gets mad she doesn't act how HE wants her to act.

Shouji literally cheats on Hachi with Sachiko because she wouldn't just sleep with him all the time whenever he wanted. Hachi wasn't 'submissive' enough, Sachiko was.

Then on Hachi's part her 'liking' of Takumi was only in a way of how girls idolise a celebrity. There's no genuineness behind this because there's a fictional distance between you and them. Once Hachi actually meets Takumi she notices there's something wrong.

Hachi only got with Takumi because she was feeling abandoned and left behind by Nana who started focusing more on her career. Her entire relationship with Takumi is a cycle of abuse on making her think she needs him while he's aware she doesn't actually love him.

Takumi doesn't love Hachi, he only loves the amount of control he has over her. He literally treats her like his dog and both Nana and Hachi are aware of this. However it's not easy to break out of an abusive relationship just because you're aware.

Especially since with Takumi Hachi is able to have a child, which is something she's wanted since she was young. Obviously she doesn't love Takumi but on her mind, someone who never had a clear idea or desire for the future. It's the only thing she can do.

Especially since from her pov 'Nana doesn't need me anymore'. I'm not saying everyone needs to read the characters in a sapphic pov but none of the relationships they end up in are healthy for either of them, they both have men forcing their desires onto them.

Nana and Hachi's love for one another is the focus of the series and if it ever continued they'd definitely develop their relationship further. There's a sense of freedom in their love for one another that they can't get with men.

To conclude, Hachi has clear symptoms of comphet and she is likely a lesbian but struggles with seeing her feelings as valid. Where on Nana's side she can't achieve what she wants to achieve in life if she's dating a man because they'll always have different life desires.

[loraluna]

Rating Rune Factory Children

(Because I play favorites)

Rune Factory (1)

1/10

Cute but not much else to say. You have to wait a ridiculous amount of in-game time to get one short cutscene meeting your genderless nameless child (Game doesn't even bother to give them pronouns) and then never get to interact with them again. Disappointing.

Rune Factory 2

8/10

A unique idea that the series has yet to implement again, this game let you play through the second half of the game AS your child from the first half, and honestly It was a cool concept even if the gameplay got a little wonky and unbalanced near the end. The game also introduced the first female protagonist to the series, Aria (left). She and her twin Aaron (right) actually had some personality of their own and even had unique interactions with the other villagers and children of the town. Cool concept and solid designs. I just wish you could interact with them a little more as a parent before the timeskip.

Rune Factory Frontier

7/10

I may be a little biased here, as this was my intro to Rune Factory, but I love these kids. Default names; Leif and Leona, are the first, and so far only, RF children you can interact with at multiple stages, these kids have several cutscenes documenting different milestones and are quite cute to watch. Once they reach the final stage, they don't do much besides toddle around the farm and look cute. You can gift them certain items but that's about it. Still, It's refreshing to watch your kid grow over time as apposed to the usual montage you get with RF kids.

Rune Factory 3/ Rune Factory 3 Special

3/10

They get bonus points for being the first in the series to let you have multiple kids (up to three) problem is, there's not much difference between em. The birth of each one plays about the same and while there's technically some different "personalities" it's more like each kid get a random lot of four or so unique lines of dialogue and that's it. There are also just the two sprites so if you have two or more of either gender they'll be identical, no matter the age difference. You can't gift them and they don't sleep, leave the house or even show up on the map. Honestly they're little more than cute house accessories.

Rune Factory Tides of Destiny/ Rune Factory Oceans

4/10

First off, please pardon the crappy quality. This game doesn't have traditional character portraits so it's hard to find decent quality pics. Tides of Destiny kiddos were the first in the series to inherit physical features from the player's spouse. (Pictured are Electra's daughter and Sonja's son) They appear to use the same child models as Frontier with some minor cosmetic changes but I liked Frontier's kids so no complaints there. I do wish they had real portraits and more dialogue but they're okay. At least they'll accept gifts and the events leading up to their births are quite wholesome.

Rune Factory 4/Rune Factory 4 Special

9/10

RF4's kids are darn near perfect. Luna and Noel have identical dialogue but they have more to say than any RF kids before or possibly since. There are TONS of unique exchanges and events with them, they participate in festivals, and most interesting of all, you can equip them with gear and take them adventuring! These babies are really something special. If I had to pick one complaint, I'd say I wish they looked liiiittle more like their concept art. They look like they both got aged up a little, which isn't bad but they do look barely younger than some of their possible parents...

Rune Factory 5

9.5/10

Rune Factory 5's children are right up there with Noel and Luna, but they get a slight advantage when it comes to customization. Like RF3 this game lets you have up to three kids, but unlike that game, these kiddos are treated like actual characters. Depending on your choice of spouse and your answers in a particular conversation, your kids can have a variety of looks and personalities, including the fan favorite feature of inheriting hair and eye colors from the spouse, and continuing along that customization train, these babies can once again go adventuring! My one, one small gripe...It'd be nice if your eldest could grow a little by the time their siblings are born. Heck, it'd be cool if the villagers kids could grow too. I'd love to see teenaged Julian and Hina~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So there's my thoughts on the Rune Factory children. I hope future installments continue the trend of more giving their kids more personality and better customization, maybe someday we'll even see kiddos inherit traits from non-human parents? How cool would that be if your kid could actually look half elf or mermaid or furry wereanimal? XD

If you agree with me (or strongly disagree) feel free to comment. Always up for discussing my favorite franchise~

[sombredancer]

Asian dramas and Love tropes

There are my favorite characters and their love stories as a list. Enemies to lovers

Drama: Her Royal Highness/长公主在上 Characters: Gu Xuanqing x Li Yunzhen Screentime: Main A boy is sent to be a servant in the unruly princess`s palace in order to find some dirt about her and to help his master to overthrown her, but something goes wrong... The HE is attached.

Drama: The Legends/招摇 Characters: Li Chenlan x Lu Zhaoyao Screentime: Main A leader of a demonic sect died trying to get demonic sword. Her soul returns to the world full of wish to get revenge on the current leader of her sect, who, as she thinks, killed her in the past. Found the way to be close to him, she learns that he wasn't the reason of her death and, moreover, desperately in love with her for many-many years. This is an adaptation of the novel "Ostentatious Zhaoyao", which I love more than a drama, but it's a good story in both variants. The HE is attached (although it`s a little bit obscure in the drama).

Drama: Till the End of the Moon/ 长月烬明 Characters: Tantai Jin x Li Susu Screentime: Main A boy who is destined to become a Demon God and to destroy the World tries to fight his doom. In a process, he falls in love with a transmigrator, who was sent 500 years back in the past to prevent his transformation into a Demon God. The irony is,making him falling in love is the only way to kill him for good... It`s an adaptation of the novel "Black Moonlight Holds the BE Script", which I like way-way-way more than the drama, not the least because the drama has BE and the novel has HE. I just watched it as a visually beautiful fanfic to the novel.

Drama: Love Between Fairy and Devil /苍兰诀 Characters: Dongfang Qingcang x Xiao Lanhua Screentime: Main My favorite drama of all times! Trying to save her love, a girl accidently falls into a secret prison for immortal criminals, revives the most fearsome demon of all times and heals his ability to feel. Later, forced to spend his time together with the girl from the enemy camp, the demon finds out that he actually likes her... The HE is attached. I wrote A LOT about them and made recap of the whole drama from the point of their relationship development in these posts: one, two, three, four, five and six.

Drama: My Journey to You /云之羽 Characters: Gong Shangjue x Shangguan Qian Screentime: Secondary In order to destroy the martial artist's clan, a female assassin was sent in there. While she is trying to seduce one of clan's young masters, he tries to expose her lies, but, eventually, falls in love with her. Unrequited. Maybe. This story has an open ending. My analysis of their relationship is here.

Drama: Butterflied lover /风月变 Characters: Ling Changjin x Bao Zhu Screentime: Secondary A wicked nobleman marries a princess because of her miraculous blood: it`s able to bring his zombie sister back to life. The princess allows him to treat her bad because she has been in love with him for a long time and believes he is a good person. Bit by bit he starts believe in it himself and begins to cherish his wife more... The ending is obscure (in a traditional Chinese way).

Drama: The Blue Whisper /与君初相识 Characters: Li Shu x Xue Sanyue Screentime: Minor A cat demon prince infiltrates the valley of demon hunters in order to set free the great demoness, but falls in love with one of demon hunters. Mutually. The ending is traditionally Chinese - they met again in another life. Т_Т

Drama: Immortal Samsara / 沉香如屑 Characters: Xuan Ye x Ran Qing Screentime: Minor An Asura king infiltrates the Heavenly Realm in order to steal the artifact that can help him conquering the world. The keeper of this artefact is a brave and honest goddess and he can't help but fall in love with her. After, he needs to choose: to be with his lover or to rule the world. He wants all at once, but there is no way to get it all. No HE for this pair. Pride and Prejudice

Drama: Lighter and Princess / 点燃我 Characters: Li Xun x Zhu Yun Screentime: Main A girl from a rich family with an anxious type of attachment falls in love with her classmate from a poor family with an avoidant type of attachment and tries to win his heart. It`s a problematic ship in a full meaning of these words and I like it this way. Yummy! The HE is attached.

Drama: Derailment /脱轨 Characters: Qi Lian x Jiang Xiaoyuan Screentime: Main A boy accidently meets his school sweetheart after many years of radio silence and understands that something is wrong with her. It turns out that her body is occupied by a transmigrator from a parallel world. At first he hates transmigrator for replacing his lover, but bit by bit he learns, that a transmigrator has not only the same appearance but the same habits and way of thinking, and falls in love with this new personality again... The story ends with HE but not in a way that you may think it would.

Drama: The Love by Hypnotic /明月照我心 Characters: Li Qian x Li Mingyue Screentime: Main In order to build relationship between two countries an emperor arranges marriage for his son. His fiancée is from a barbaric tribe: she is good at horse riding and archery, but knows nothing about palace etiquette and ladies stuff. It`s a light and sweet story about finding a path to each other's heart. The HE is attached.

Drama: The Long Ballad /长歌行 Characters: Hao Du x Li Leyan Screentime: Secondary A tsundere of a low background with a poker face does his ruthless job in a court, that's why a young princess thinks he is an awful man and is scared of him. But in reality he is a loyal servant and son and, moreover, secretly in love with the princess, who can't stand him... The HE is attached.

Drama: Miss the Dragon /遇龙 Characters: Xue Qianxun x Qingqing Screentime: Secondary A very naïve bird demon girl accidently meets a tsundere god of netherworld and turns his well ordered life into havoc. He starts liking it, though. The HE is attached. Forbidden love

Drama: A Frozen Flower /쌍화점 Characters: Hong Rim x No Guk Screentime: Main A gay king needs a heir, so he forces his lover to conceive a child with a queen. In a process, a boy, who was groomed as a king's lover from his childhood, finds out that he likes women much more than men. A traditional Korean tragedy. Very beautiful and full of feelings, though. (No GIFs because they all would be erotic ones).

Drama: 100 Days My Prince /백일의 낭군님 Characters: Moo-yeon x Kim So-hye Screentime: Secondary An assassin who is working for a wicked court official is secretly in love with a wife of a crown prince, who happens to be a daughter of the killer of his parents. Forbidden love doubles! But it's mutual, unfortunately for him. It's a very beautiful and full of desperation and feelings story. No HE, we die like Koreans. More detailed story of their relationship is available here, here and here.

Drama: The Yin-Yang Master: Dream of Eternity/晴雅集 Characters: He Shouye x Zhang Ping Screentime: Secondary A woman, who is destined to restrain the undying evil within her body for eternity in solitude, falls in love with Yin-Yang master. Her love is mutual, but her lover can't be with her forever, so he leaves with her his guardian demon to brighten her loneliness. Protecting her for ever starts being the only goal of demon's life... A tragedy, but a beautiful one.

Drama: The Legends/招摇 Characters: Gu Hanguang x Shen Qianjin Screentime: Minor "The Legends" once more! The main doctor of a demonic sect is in love with a leader of a righteous sect. A girl is not allowed to love anyone, otherwise she will suffer from the poison, so he anonymously sends her packages of medicinal herbs. She is curious about anonymous sender, too. But nothing can be kept in secret forever... Unfortunately, no HE for these two. In the novel he is safe and sound, but he has no love plotline at all. So is a price of love Т_Т.

I will talk about my other favorite characters and tropes in the next post.

[caligvlasaqvarivm]

i never noticed the hints towards pale Solfef! in light of that, i think it's interesting that Eridan pursued Feferi in the pale quadrant while desperately wanting her to end up in his flushed one, meanwhile Feferi pursues Sollux in the flushed quadrant, despite them seemingly destined to be pale lol guess seadwellers are used to swimming up current lmao

that said, what are your thoughts on Erifef? do you think Eridan actually wants her flushed? or is that another subconscious tactic of his to keep her(someone he deeply cares about) by his side?

personally, i'm of the opinion that though they do care about eachother, they could never work out flushed. i think Eridan -though very enthusiastic about her and thinks they share the same troubles that comes with being so high on the hemospectrum, as well as isolated via physical location and the requirements to meet seadweller expectations- doesn't actually want redrom with her, but he knows pale isn't 'good enough' plus prefers to go to Karkat for all the traditional pale stuff. dude doesn't realize they can just be friends and she won't abandon him(cue Feferi abandoning him the monent she leaves quadrants with him, further exacerbating that fear lol)

meanwhile, on Feferi's end, it's too much to go into here but i think she has struggles with being present with others. so though i think she also deeply cares about Eridan and was absolutely miffed he was going to Karkat for things that she(being his moirail at the time) should have been talked to about, i think she has a lot of character development to go through before she can really pursue quadrants as something she needs and wants and not something she thinks she should do. i think flipping pale with Sollux could have been that catalyst but alas :' ] it seems Hussie changed his mind

So, personally, I do actually think Eridan's flushed feelings for Feferi are real... kind of. The fact that he has 0 self-awareness really makes talking about his feelings difficult because everything needs to be qualified with "this would change if he were capable of taking a step back."

The "kind of" here is because I don't think it's necessarily Feferi, the PERSON, that Eridan's in love with, but rather, the Feferi that exists in his head. To Eridan, Feferi is a bubbly, adorable, cheerful girl who's nice to everybody and doesn't have a mean bone in her body. He literally says that he thinks she might be too nice to have a pitch relationship with somebody, which is definitely not true, as Feferi can be plenty mean, and there's plenty to find flawed about her.

The first reason for this mistaken belief is that that's definitely the way that Feferi believes herself to be, so it's how she presents herself, and Eridan believes people when they tell him stuff. The second is because, in Eridan's shitty, friendless life, Feferi has been his one constant - the person who's always been there for him, the only person who's consistently nice to him (until he meets Karkat, and even then, Karkat is master of the mixed signals, and Eridan implies that death threats and insults are regular banter between them), and oftentimes the one person who cheers him up when he's at his lowest.

I think a lot of people in the fandom are too hard on Feferi - she's genuinely well-meaning, and most of her bad points come from ignorance and privilege, not manipulativeness or spite. She doesn't consciously realize it when she's treating Eridan poorly, and she makes real efforts to be a good moirail to him, even though he doesn't usually reciprocate those efforts. I think she suffers from the Umbridge Effect, where Eridan's problems - being on such the extreme end of trauma and anxiety - almost feel alien and unreal, while everyone knows a Feferi, so Feferi draws in some undue vitriol.

She has a few outbursts at him when he's egregiously rude for no reason, but given she's been dealing with his severe mental illness for so long, and takes his threats and casteism at least semi-seriously, I don't blame her for being exhausted and snapping from time to time. She's genuinely just not equipped to help him with his problems - lest we forget, she's also 13. Otherwise, everything else she does to harm him is something she just genuinely doesn't consciously realize is a problem, because she's got a hard time seeing past her privilege.

For example, using Eridan for feeding Gl'bgolyb without gratitude - the thing is, societally, it's his job, and HAS always been a violet's job. Not only that, but given his... everything, if she asked him if he's okay with doing it, he'd definitely insist that he is, and in fact, that it's HIS duty and HIS privilege. He also started INCREDIBLY young, so it's genuinely just been like this for their entire lives. It's a bit shitheaded for Feferi to not realize how much she benefitted from this arrangement, but, again, it's a crime of ignorance, not malice.

In a similar vein, I think she stayed in her moirallegiance for as long as she did partially because she got an ego boost out of it. She commiscerates with Kanaya over how burdensome he is, and she gets to say things like "we are not better than anybody," which she absolutely doesn't actually feel, given how she won't shut up about being a royal when talking to Jade. She's elated to break up with him, her narration celebrating with a big "you're FREE!!!" and it's not a coincidence that said break-up happens after Eridan's no longer useful to her - she outright states that he can't threaten their species anymore now that they're in the game and everyone else is dead.

BUT, I think she ALSO means it when she says that she stayed in that moirallegiance because she was genuinely worried for him. Both this statement and the above paragraph can be simultaneously true. There's nothing about Eridan that's actually that offensive to Feferi, and I really do think she means it when she says she wants to stay friends. His constant emotional crises have just left her burnt out in terms of sympathy, and she never really knew how to handle him in the first place, but in their first conversation together, she's still genuinely making an effort to get him to open up about his feelings and to cheer him up about his failed kismesistude.

After the breakup and his failed confession, the thing is, he does accept that rejection! ... Kind of. (Again with the kind ofs.)

He outright tells her he accepts that she doesn't like him like that... BUUUT, is trying to get her to go ashen with him and Sollux, instead. THIS is the "trying to keep her with him" angle you're talking about, IMO; I think his flushed feelings are genuine, even if they're aimed at this idealized version of Feferi moreso than the real deal. Without Feferi in the picture, I think Eridan and Sollux would have a completely lukewarm mutual dislike. The sheer lukewarmness is probably why Erisolsprite is so stable - they're completely mid for each other.

The realness of his flushed feelings for Feferi is, incidentally, part of why I think him and Roxy would work so well together - if this idealized version of Feferi (bubbly, adorabloodthirsty, pink, cute, cheerful, and kind) is his Type... well.

I also think he and Feferi would work pretty well as just normal friends; they might have fallen into that dynamic on their own if they'd met later on in life. In a hypothetical golden ending, I think they do fall into it once EriKar happens, since moirallegiances are stated to have a stabilizing effect on a troll's other relationships.

[likealittleheartbeat]

hello !!

i was wondering, do you know any other characters like aang from other shows/movies/books? or maybe, just his theme of radical kindness appearing in other stories?

i've been missing aang, and it would be nice to find other representations of such a fun and warm personality like his.

ps.: your blog is like, fantastic. truly.

🥰🥰🥰🥰 This is the best ask I’ve ever received!!! Depictions of radical kindness in media is a special interest of mine—not exaggerating. So I’ve done my best to make a list of rec’s, just tv, from most formally similar to ATLA to least, with a short description for each.

1. Fruits Basket (2019)

"My mom told me, it's better to trust people than to doubt them. She said that people aren't born with kind hearts. When we're born, all we have are desires for food and material things. Selfish instincts, I guess. But she said that kindness is something that grows inside of each person's body, but it's up to us to nurture that kindness in our hearts. That's why kindness is different for every person."

An anime orphan whose established memory of the kindness by which her family raised her ends up transforming and liberating a whole clan from an intergenerational curse that enforced an abusive hierarchy all within a show that has a deeply queer subtext, beautifully complex plotting and character development that due to its zen influence refuses to demonize anyone or any perspective wholly, AND a straight romance you can actually root for!? Nothing comes closer to ATLA thematically than this show. While the lead Tohru Honda is the biggest representative of radical kindness, the character of Momiji Sohma with his complex purity, idealism, and gender performance is one of the closest you'll find to Aang in any media.

2. Mob Psycho 100 (2016-2023)

"The truth behind one's charm is kindness. Just be a good person, that's all."

Mob Psycho 100 explores a core tenant of ATLA's critique of imperialism and power: greatness and perfection are overrated. They both ask the question about what to do for the world with one's gifts if that's the case. How can one be both normal and prodigious at the same time? The satirical comedy and style of this anime, which deconstruct a lot of the shonen genre tropes, are pretty distinct from ATLA, but when ATLA arrived on the airwaves, it was a pretty massive break from tradition in Western animation, and for both of these series, that difference of style is tied to the message of the show about the experience and acceptance of difference.

3. Natsume's Book of Friends (2012-present)

"As I encountered kindness, I wanted to be kind myself."

The anime, Natsume's Book of Friends and ATLA both depict the challenge and necessity of facing abandonment, loss, and a deep-seated loneliness with kindness and gratitude despite the persistence of grief. Both take a deeply spiritual view--even a responsibility--of this experience that demands a compassion for all beings including those who intend to do harm. Natsume, an orphan shuffled between houses who is one of the few people who can see spirits called youkai, inherits his maligned grandmother's book of yokai names, becoming a target for them in the process. He hides all of this from everyone in his life, and even five season in, still has trouble admitting to the one person who understands him when he is struggling and needs help. The gentle and light tone papers over a profoundly honest representation of attachment trauma and the wisdom of compassion that develops as a tool to cope with it.

4. Hunter x Hunter (2011-2014)

"You can do whatever you want to hide your feeling. You still have a heart."

If you think that "Radical Kindness" is by definition non-violent, then this show is either not for you or going to change your mind. Gon, the protagonist of HxH, like Momiji mentioned in Fruits Basket, is another rare character whose naivete and optimism are treated with respect. He is allowed to suffer, to be wrong, to be stupid, and to inspire others away from their own cynicism with the persistence of his beliefs nevertheless. But HxH is a show that integrates the most violent aspects of the world (organized crime, capitalistic competition and privileging, state-sanctioned brutality, pure sadism) with its examination of human potential for goodness. And even within a list of shows deeply inspired by spirituality and religions, this show is abundant with religious references as it seeks out meaning, balance, and an ethic for modern experience. On top of that, it ranks with ATLA for the depth and relevance of its magic system to its themes, plus its got gay subtext out the wazoo!

5. Mushishi (2005-2014)

“Make sure to remember, every person and place has a right to exist. It is true for you too, the entire world, as a whole, is your home."

Elegaic, episodic, compassionate, and strange, with some of the best short story-telling of all time, Mushishi is the story of a medicine-man who travels the Japanese countryside helping people deal with the spirits that accompany the little trials and tragedies of life that cling to our minds long after they're passed. The protagonist, Gingko, and the show itself takes the approach of restraint to observe these problems fully and come to a conclusion that's taoist in its balance and acceptance of reality--"Eyes unclouded by hate" as Miyazaki/Gaiman would have it. Each episode is like a therapy session arguing for you to choose to live even as the heaviest burdens sit on your chest.

6. Reservation Dogs (2021-2023)

"See...love doesn't have to be received, it can just be."

We're finally out of the animes, and moving away from the zen and shinto approach into some other options. Reservation Dogs' indigenous humanism was groundbreaking, bringing in distinctly modern American realities (with the kind of true-to-life details only a an on-location shoot could offer) with Native beliefs about ancestry, community, and connection to the land, while rarely feeling preachy. Instead, it's just fucking hilarious and casually heartbreaking. Four friends on the edge of graduating high school on a reservation in Oklahoma try to figure out what to do with their lives after their plans to go to California get abruptly messed up. Radical kindness as a concept often gets focused on accepting the enemy but what about accepting the weird stoner uncle who farts all the time and won't talk about his years in the army. I think that might be a more important goal of radical kindness, in truth, if we are being asked to look and accept reality for what it is, because growing comfortable with disappointment and the mundane let's us live without the relentless striving that drives perfectionism.

7. Skam (2015-2017)

"The second you start looking for hate, you find it. And when you find hate, you start hating."

A Norwegian teen drama that understood internet culture better than any show before or since, four season-long romance plots better than any romance film from that decade, and a masterfully constructed exhortation about leaning into failures of connection to build deeper compassion rather than demonize another person or group. Each season focused on a specific character within a high-school friend group, emphasizing the limited scope of subjective experience, and had them confront the challenges of opening up to others fully. And even when they return into the scenes with new protagonists, their lives weren't sorted perfectly, reflecting how resolving a single romantic plot point would not resolve life. The impact of this low-budget public-television web series (!!!) will be felt for years (it's already been referenced by Netflix juggernauts like Sex Education and Young Royals), but we're not likely to see something that juggles political themes, heartfelt characterization, realistic dialogue, and meta-commentary (it flashed its own hater and fan comments across the screen in the last episode!!) in such a obsession-inducing package anytime soon.

7. Boys Like Boys (2023)

"Because I have always been someone who hates myself, I don't have the courage to face it. Running away is my only option...What if I give myself one more chance to be brave?"

So how can a reality show make it onto a list of radically kind tv series, especially a dating show!? Well, when that reality dating show casts people who radiate warmth, vulnerability, and respect and seem to have the kind of chemistry that most scripted shows can't even manage, it's a good start. But then, when they elevate that cast with a format that addresses the cruelty of dating, elimination formats, and broader societal exclusion (an important consideration for a gay dating show), it offers a new model for future shows. Boys Like Boys did this when mid-season (spoiler alert) they had contestants vote out a contestant, only to provide the contestants with a vote in which they could retain a contestant who they didn't want to leave. In fact, many of the contestants asked if they could abstain from making a vote that would eliminate a constestant and were allowed to. The final result left one contestant, Jia-Hang, up for elimination--he had voted for himself to be eliminated, and many contestants, recognizing his reticence to continue on the program, didn't want to force him against his will to stay. Then, looking around at nearly the whole cast sobbing, even apologizing to him for not providing him enough support, Jia-Hang chooses to stay on. This is just one of many heart-warming authentic moments in the show that illustrate the vital influence of kindness to impact the trajectory of our hearts.

8. Joe Pera Talks With You (2018-2021)

"I can help you reach things. I can tend the garden. The different hours we keep are a good thing. And when they overlap, I can offer companionship and entertainment."

So much has been written about this show's groundbreaking kind approach, I'm going to quote instead: "It can be difficult to convey how a TV show airing on Cartoon Network’s provocative nighttime programming block Adult Swim can evoke almost nostalgic feelings of kind-heartedness. The premise of Joe Pera Talks With You is so simple as to almost be beside the point: Comedian Joe Pera plays a lightly fictionalized version of himself as a sweet Michigander, a middle-school chorus teacher with small and specific passions. Joe likes breakfast food, obscure trivia, beans, trips to the grocery store, and his grandma. He greets every day with a contented smile, stands beneath a pale blue sky, packs a balanced lunch that contains no surprises. (A turkey sandwich with cheese and a tomato, a banana, some trail mix, and as a treat, some cookies.) Joe, more than anything, is satisfied. His greatest joy is sharing these small pleasures with you, the viewer who exists on the other side of the fourth wall he has cleanly dismantled, often speaking quietly to the camera like he’s sharing a secret, just between you two. That he’s talking “with” and not “to” you is a crucial distinction in the show’s title: Joe never lectures nor rhapsodizes. Instead, he waxes poetic about what he loves and who he cares for and how he leads his life, telling his stories from a vulnerable position of welcoming you into his daily existence.” --“A Great Comedy About Being Good,” Allegra Frank for Vox

9. Anne with an E (2017-2019)

"Her life was not short on challenges, and still she held no grudges, believing instead that grace is perennial like the green, green grass."

While maligned for not being the 1980s version, this Netflix adaptation of Anne of Green Gables takes what many have read as an autistic subtext and made it text, giving Anne a performative quality that pushes a lot of the audience into the same irritation that the characters of Avonlea feel for Anne at first, and, thus, requires its audience to persevere toward the same kindness that Anne inspires in her adoptive mother figure, Marilla, among others, which is much more rewarding than simply identifying with Anne right away. In so doing, it enhances the development of its broader approach to acceptance--an approach in its insistence on the requirement of a community of kindredness (see Sebastian's excitement at finding out about the black community in "The Bog") that is much more rigorous than many other shows will cop to. Expanding far beyond literal adaptation into queer, black, and indigenous characters, without disguising history or disparaging the thematic seed of grace at the heart of the novels, Anne with an E imagines what it meant and what it might still mean to build real joyful community with others through kindness.

10. Little Bear (1995-2003)

"Interesting."

A childhood favorite that disguised in its simplicity a wide-openness to the world and an acceptance of different natures. While most child shows emphasize kindness, few do so with as much patience, wonder, and generosity extended to its viewers. Little Bear is a curious kid who goes on adventures in the woods around his house that can turn into games or small imagined experiences. He is sometimes with his friends Cat, Duck, Hen, Owl, and Emily, whose personalities, along with Little Bear's, bring about small tensions in their games that ultimately resolve, if not independently, then with the help of Mother Bear or Father Bear, who give each other knowing glances about the expected childhood behaviors. This is the first show that initially taught me to observe things while withholding my judgment, that first step of radical kindness.

12. The Andy Griffith Show (1960-1968)

"The key to happiness is finding joy in the simple things."

One really old and somewhat controversial throwback for my last entry. If you have concerns about a sheriff character representing radical kindness, I would encourage you to start with the third episode of season 3 where Andy, the sheriff in question, has to explain to the new mayor why he doesn't carry a gun and lets prisoners go to gather their crops. There have been some fantastic pieces written about the complexities of this show's bucolic fantasy and Southerners (of all races) attachment to it, but they all acknowledge a type of humanistic and deceptively simple virtue found in Mayberry that audiences long to witness, if not emulate themselves. It's a morality that resists the "hyperactive zealotry" and bureaucracy that the show satirizes through Barney Fife (along with guest characters like the new mayor) and instead emphasizes the understanding that one can have for each individual and the trickstery middle paths that one can find to address conflict.

[felixravinstills]

How I Personally Read/Characterize Festus Creed

Because not everything can be about Felix Ravinstill. (Also yes, I'm using my own gif for visual interest.)

@persephoneprice, since you asked so nicely, I finally finished this post. This will probably feel familiar to you/anyone else who's read my oc fics.

Most people I've seen portray Festus as either a golden retriever type character (with a side of himbo at times?) or someone on the meaner side of Capitol students, and I suppose that I land somewhere in the middle.

Personally, I see him less as a traditional himbo (he's in the top 24 students at the Academy that's got to count for something in terms of booksmarts) and more of just someone who lacks polish in his interactions and social graces. We see him suggest very blunt force/violent approaches as solutions to get people to watch the Games in the book (Ch.6), and he seems to have less control over his emotions (crying about Arachne, obviously Clemensia admits to crying about the death of their friend too, but she and Coriolanus seem to quickly leave Festus at his apartment when he starts maybe implying it's not normally socially acceptable to be so emotional in public?) (Ch. 7).

In my mind, I think this lack of social grace makes some of the other Capitolites occasionally look down on him. Everyone has their slips once in awhile, but Festus has them more frequently.

Also I think the briefly mentioned dare that Festus put Coriolanus up to about making out with (hooking up with?) a girl in an alleyway (Ch. 13) speaks to Festus having a tendency to get himself and other people into some sort of mischief/potentially goofing off. I can't remember any other specific examples, but just his general vibe tells me he likes to goof off.)

Festus definitely has a cruel streak, just based on the casual way that he talks about his animal cruelty side hobby (dogfighting), and the aforementioned very blunt force solutions of getting people to watch the Games (Ch. 6). I don't think he's cruel in a malicious way (which is in a way perhaps more frightening but also more interesting to me). He's just not reflecting on his actions and realizing that he's cruel or mean. He takes things at a surface-level most of the time and won't delve into any moral quandaries without severe prompting.

Connecting to his movie portrayal, I don't actually think that there is much of a gap to bridge between my read of his book personality and his movie personality (This might be an unpopular opinion, idk.). Like ignoring the fact that a lot of the mentor's more sympathetic moments were cut from the movie, the film is consistent with the crueler aspects of Festus' personality that the book kind of hints at to me.

It might be hard for most people to imagine Coriolanus inviting Movie! Festus to Sejanus' memorial dinner at the end of tbosas if Festus interacts with Sejanus like this, but if you follow my headcanon that Festus is constantly putting his foot in his mouth in conversations and taking the occasional verbal spar a bit too far, then, while he still obviously looks down on Sejanus, there is a possibility that he doesn't actually treat Sejanus that differently from how he treats other people (see him teasing Felix). Thus, to Coriolanus, he would actually seem like a viable person to bring to that dinner.

While I'm disappointed that Festus organizing people to carry Coriolanus around on a chair after Lucy Gray wins was cut from the movie (Ch. 20), I do think Movie! Festus' more hostile reaction to Coriolanus' tribute winning isn't that out of character from Book! Festus if we consider that Coral was the runner up, and as the Games end with the release of the snakes in the movie, Festus probably felt that Coral really was about to win before that happened.

I also personally headcanon that Festus was at least a little upset that Coral died, because he had gotten used to the idea of her winning. Obviously, that isn't exactly on par with thinking of her as a equal and fellow human being, but there's a seed here for him to start thinking critically and sympathetically and realize that the tributes are people like him. Unfortunately, like with most of the mentors, I think it would take a lot to force him to reflect in that way, and in most universes probably isn't in the cards for him.

Overall, however, I do think that he is a great friend to those close to him just based on how he acts with Coriolanus throughout the the book, and he does seem to want to do what he considers the right thing, like when Reaper's starving and he tries to convince Clemensia to feed him (Ch. 18, although he does retract this statement in the next chapter). Unfortunately, the right thing for someone raised in the Capitol is very skewed.

Bonus: the reason I think that Felix and Festus might be drawn romantically but also in the platonic sense is actually Festus' constant putting his foot in his mouth/lack of social graces. It would appeal to Felix, because he can always count of Festus to be at least somewhat genuine in a world where so many people might be trying to use Felix's connection to the president for personal gain. On Festus' end, I imagine that having someone so accepting of his social foibles would be very comforting. So, yeah, I think they would get along even if I didn't ship them!

Anyway, I hope this makes sense! Surprisingly, I do have thoughts about characters other than Felix!

[imhereforonespecificpost]

7 Things I liked about “Carry On” By Rainbow Rowell

Trying to get myself to write something, anything, to get out of a creative slump, so I wrote a review of “Carry On” by Rainbow Rowell! If there is a fandom I'm sure I'm late to it haha. Spoilers below the cut 

In no particular order, things I liked about the book: 

I felt like I got to experience a whole series condensed into one book. Before I discuss this one, yes, I know there are more books in the series. But I thought it was really cool how this book could stand on its own! It tells a complete story from beginning to an end I was satisfied with. And I thought it was cool how Rowell uses flashbacks or character conversations to cover the important events from “earlier in the series.” I felt like I got a series-worth of build up to both the main relationship and to the defeat of the main villain, without having to actually live through a slow-burn. 

Agatha escapes the narrative. Again, maybe this changes in later books. But I had so much respect for Agatha leaving campus (and then the country!) as soon as she escaped the Mage and his threats to suck away her magic. For most of the novel she only sees her expected role as “girlfriend of the chosen one” and feels dutifully resigned to the accompanying dangers. I loved seeing her choose her own happiness and safety (in the non magical world, which she prefers!) after successfully escaping with her life. Very inspiring personally as I work on leaving a high demand religion. It wouldn’t necessarily work for all characters to do that, but I love that for her. 

The existence and power of the Insidious Humdrum directly results from Simon's use of magic. This one is a twofer. A -  I really like when an antagonist exists in opposition to the protagonist’s goals without any malice of their own, and the protagonist overcomes them in a way that feels more like a release than a defeat. No Face from Spirited Away serves as a good example of this kind of antagonist. After being corrupted by the bathhouse he causes a lot of destruction and hurt, but to solve the issue Sen/Chihiro didn’t fight him, but just got him away from the bathhouse and he was able to return to a calmer state. And for the Insidious Humdrum, he accepts and welcomes Simon un-creating him by pouring back all the magic. It felt very complete and satisfying, and a good ending for all parties. B - I love when the end of the story reveals new information that will change my perspective on certain scenes during a reread. I think this would be more prevalent if it were going on for a whole series, but even as is I think knowing the connection between Simon and the Insidious Humdrum makes a reread worthwhile. 

The Mage, the real antagonist, is a tragic character. In the traditional sense of the word I mean, where he brings about his own destruction through a character flaw. He does some good things too, like opening the school to a more diverse group (countering both ableism and racism to some extent). But his hubris in thinking he can prevent the downfall of the mages through creating a savior (Simon) leads him to also create a force that destroys magic (the Insidious Humdrum). He has good intentions, but ultimately he frightens me just like a villain should, especially at his most desperate. In the ending scene on Christmas day he disregards both Ebb’s and then Agatha’s humanity, seeing only their power that he could use to save everyone (from a problem he caused). He also does not treat Lucy as a full person, sacrificing her health and eventually her life to achieve his goals. And even knowing Simon is his son he does not demonstrate any love toward him, only thinking of how to train him to defeat the Insidious Humdrum. He creates his own problems and hurts the people closest to him because of his determination to control the big picture. 

Perspective jumping reveals the backstory to the audience but not the main characters. Because Lucy tells about her life with The Mage and giving birth to Simon, we as the audience know the full story, but the book ends with Simon and his peers not knowing the identity of his parents, nor that they intended him to be the mages’ savior. It feels more true to real life. We often don’t get to know all the answers. 

Powerful Ebb chooses to live a simple life. She serves as a foil to the Mage. Powerful, but unassuming, she values people and relationships (like that with her brother or with Simon) more highly than anything else. Very cool character, especially at the end when she comes back to save Agatha. A classic, but you got me with the self sacrifice. I love her. 

Penelope’s dad teaches Simon about damaged ecosystems recovering over time. Very sweet. <3 And such a cool way for the Insidious Humdrum to have had real damage and yet we end on a hopeful note. 

I stayed up late to make myself finish this. Finally something I not only started but finished! Thank you for reading, if you made it this far. Hopefully I will create more in the future, either art or writing. 

Love, 

OOTS

[glambots]

By the way, happy Holidays in advance!

Do the animatronics have their own festive celebrations once the pizzaplex is closed? Do they receive gifts or make gifts? You can choose the 4 characters you prefer for this. Thanks for all your hard work, I love what you do and I wish you everything you love for next year!

I'll do the Glams/band for this one!

🎩Glamrock Freddy + Holiday HCs:🎩

⭐Freddy is definitely the kind of guy to put gifts together by-hand--and they're usually filled with merchandise and vouchers of some kind. He'd love to give more "personal" gifts, but still, it's more about the sentiment behind the gift, rather than what's given...right? (He still really hopes you like it, though.)

⭐Almost everyone on the staff gets a "gift" from Freddy Fazbear for..."Fazmas." Though it's mostly a corporate issued gift card or voucher for the Plex itself. Gotta get that money cycling back into the arcade-economy! Freddy is aware of this tradition, though he feels a little awkward knowing the gifts didn't actually come from him.

⭐Aside from putting together gifts, Freddy spends most of his holidays responding to fanmail. When I say the man gets just about as many letters as Santa, I mean it. Not that he doesn't appreciate the cards and letters he gets! It can just be a bit...much. He only has so many shelves to display things on!

🍕Glamrock Chica + Holiday HCs:🍕

⭐Chica loves decorating. She absolutely lives for helping string up Fazmas lights all around the 'Plex. She'll even try to sneak up some mistletoe here and there if she can get away with it! (Which she can, usually until someone gets caught under it and then it gets taken away--killjoys!)

⭐Her gifts tend to be little bundles of candy, vouchers, and hand-made Fazmas cards. They're very basic, but she puts a lot of love and genuine care into each package. There are ribbons everywhere. Stickers. Glitter. Bows. She even swaps out her regular candy selection for more "holiday-themed" treats to give out.

⭐Honestly, out of the group, Chica is the most holiday-crazy. She'll spend hours looping holiday songs on repeat until either Roxy or Monty threaten to break her stereo if she doesn't play something else for the love of god please if they have to listen to "Jinglebell Rock" one more Got Dam time--

🐺Roxanne Wolf + Holiday HCs:🐺

⭐Being your resident "tsundere," it is up to Roxy to be the "Bah! Humbug" of the group. She's too cool for all this sappy Fazmas junk. Why get all excited over nothing? It's just another day. (She says, spending countless hours poring over what gifts to get her bandmates.) They better appreciate all she does for them!

⭐Still, that "Grinch-like" mentality is never shown around the fans. No need to ruin it for the little rockstars. Besides, she has to admit--she looks pretty good in-costume. But, like, when doesn't she? Not to mention, she gives Mariah Carey a run for her money when it comes to performing "All I Want For (Faz)mas!"

⭐Really, though, as much as she puts on an act in the face of "holiday spirit," Roxy is such a sucker for getting holidays cards. She might not get nearly as many as Freddy, obviously, but the ones she does get, she displays with complete and utter pride. And if anyone (Monty) makes a snide comment on it, she'll kick their ass!

🐊Montgomery Gator + Holiday HCs:🐊

⭐Compared to Roxy, Monty kind of flip-flops between trying to act too "cool" for the holiday hype, and being completely obvious about his love for the holidays. Because, who wouldn't be hype?! It's Fazmas, baby! Time to crack open some (non-alcoholic) eggnog and Jinglebell Rock-n-Roll!

⭐When it comes to character costumes, he's almost always cast as a reindeer of some sort. Mostly because the elf costumes won't fit on him, and corporate just has to have Freddy play Santa. Every. Year. No, he's not salty about it, not at all! Why would you think that? He says, drawing a mustache and horns on the nearest "Santa Paws" poster. Stupid, lucky bigshot bear...

⭐Monty's gifts are very...self-promotional. Usually vouchers to his own attractions, something with his autograph on it, and a Fazmas-themed "limited edition" Monty plush. And he fully expects you to love it, because why wouldn't you? Look at how cool his plush looks! Check out that autograph! And you get a chance to hang out with him even more! What's not to love?!

[your--isgayrights]

You're like one of the only ones that I feel like can answer my question. But anyways, do you think there is a connection between Bathes framework(death of the author ig) being so prominent in HSY's arc and how it relates to JHY's, YSA's, JHW's arcs and their experiences as a woman. Like ik there was some gender stuff goin on with HSY when she was a guy apostle. But I feel like womanhood isn't as explored in her arcs like it is with the three other characters but I feel like you can somehow make a connection 😭 sorry if this is a tall order.

Anon babe I'm very flattered and I'll try to make some connections here, but if someone who is actually woman has something to say about this please come on in and feel free to tell me to stfu 😭😭. Like obv just from living in Society I have concepts of womanhood/gender dynamics/lived experiences of misogyny but also I need you to understand that identification with and appreciation of a personal identity of womanhood is something that I as a person have consistently been repulsed by my entire life. Like the act of wanting/choosing to be a woman is something I will never be able to fully understand or experience.

THAT BEING SAID I HAVE WRITTEN A FEW PARAGRAPHS HERE IN RESPONSE TO YOUR ASK.

TLDR;

authorship is creation outside of motherhood and therefore queer.

narrative control is queer, and therefore disassociation from traditional gender roles comes with increased narrative control.

the narrative of ORV equates Barthes' framework with the "reality" of a reader that has to be challenged by the compassion and love of another person experiencing their own "reality" and authorship of a story is an attempt of that act of impossible communication.

Like ugh ok wanna be clear that I'm not like shim saimdong on the 50,000 won style trying to equate womanhood to this role via like bioessentialist weirdness, but I think that the most obvious connection with authorship and the female characters in orv is the idea of creation that like is sort of tied with motherhood via a character like LSK. Bc yeah if you look at the two big authors writing Kim Dokja's life, it's literally his mom with her prison book and then also Han Sooyoung later on, right?

This is kind of fun to me bc I have a friend whose like actually a lit/film major type person and writing an essay about queer tragedy in film and we were talking about queer narratives and ideas of artificial conception/creation ala Frankenstein, the "unnatural birth." In Western lit tradition this kind of thing has obvi been like connected to horror more modernly, but I think in like early Korean lit (me saying this as a guy who has like only read the Samguk Yusa so 🌾 of 🧂) the connection between unnatural birth and the divine is less complicated and not treated as the same kind of perversion that subversions of nuclear family models have been by narratives in lit largely influenced by a majority religion that values that structure of subservience in the West.

(example of unnatural birth that is fun fine and normal in Samguk Yusa: the first king of Silla is born from an egg and so is his wife and like she even has a beak until it falls off and like Kylie Jenner lip cup style gives her bbl lips /hj.)

The act of authorship can then be seen in/equated with this unnatural birth, or maybe a better term is divine birth. Authorship/narrative control in orv is also shown to be something inherently queer bc like again if you think about LSK and HSY, there is, like you mention Anon, a conflict between the societal role of Woman and becoming an author. Like if you've read feminist lit you are probably already been knew about this but to put it in terms of a referenced text from ORV, there are foundations of an equation of womanhood with motherhood from those very beginnings of Korean lit. The bear mother is a story literally about becoming a woman and that good old neoconfucian influence can be seen in how the path to womanhood for the bear is to completely obey the instructions of a male deity without questioning or straying. She is then "rewarded" by said make deity when they wed and she becomes the mother of Dangun, the deity founder of Korea. This neoconfucian framework of 'womanhood' places emphasis on subservience to higher power and motherhood.

It is notable, then, that the act of becoming an author in Lee Sookyung's case is literally the very action that abandons her child. The act of authorship is juxtaposed from reality, as Kim Dokja's lived experience is retold transformatively and then believed to be true by others and by himself to some degree. Authorship is something that alters the 'natural' and 'real' and divests the author of their subservient societal role. (Abandoning your child #justqueergirlybossthings /j)

So then, let's look at female characters in ORV and their relative relationships to narrative control and femininity. YSA is a good contrast to HSY here, because as you note Anon, reading ORV HSY seems more divorced from womanhood than YSA, but why is that? In all likelihood, it's because YSA takes the place of a certain type of female character that often exists in the stories of this genre, a female colleague who performs her role much better in the original society than the male lead before an entry into the world of the story. Something to also note is, how, despite not being a "character" of the original WoS, YSA is particularly tasked with a role of passivity/narrative inactivity that commonly befalls female characters in the modern day but most notably is exemplified in East Asian lit by the monk Tang Sanzang in Journey to the west. A character who motivates the actions of the main character but is often thwarted in attempts to directly change the narrative and put into inert states (TSZ is told to go somewhere by bodhisattvas and follows their instructions and always gets kidnapped by demons who want to eat his hot cicada body or w/e, YSA studies languages, has her contract renewed, takes the subway when her bike is stolen, gets yanked around by Greek gods and prophetizes herself into a backroom library she can use to peer into the mind of God, etc.) In some ways, bc YSA tends to follow 'the rules,' because she appears to have less awareness and control of the narrative, she also seems to fall more easily into the societal category of "woman." Put directly in contrast with Han Sooyoung, whose perspective on the narrative as a creator leads her to show less care for the lives of those in the story and who actively kills many of said characters without remorse, perhaps contrary to the role of complete creation an comparison of motherhood and authorship might imply, narrative control is power both to create and destroy. If you're in a daoist mood, you could draw a taegeuk and equate this balance of divine birth and unnatural death with the balance of androgyny between feminine and masculine, the balanced whole then being considered a cosmic whole/the absolute/something powerful/ the author, etc. (Singshong being a couple who wrote the book together kind of also adds another layer of context to this in that like in the daoist/Confucian tradition of heteronormativity man and woman together are a complete form, if all cosmos can be divided to binary then the collaboration across that binary recreates the whole, an androgenous true state of creation)

Again, in this way, narrative control/authorship is something that inherently breaks reality and in a heteronormative world this force can be coloured as inherently queer. Thats probably why are transgender girlies JHY and YJH are so significant in that their experiences of womanhood are ones that directly defy the predestination of narrative. There is no direct reveal of YJH having been the Punisher, because it is something beyond narrative understanding, beyond the rules of the universe that Kim Dokja defines as the Reader. JHY's identity directly contradicts the design of the author/creator and reader alike, her choice in her personal gender identity directly defies narrative and in that way gives her agency outside of the realm of "character," her queerness being something that gives her transformative power and control over her reality.

In the matter of Barthes, I would say I'm a bit biased, because I find reading less interesting when the context and the intent of the author are not considered. In fact, I kind of resent that death of the author is sort of a literary standard in that a lot of modern English courses will discourage essays that use terminology like "what the author is trying to say could be" and instead encourage only the use of text, because on the whole I find it less interesting to look at words and not imagine the soul behind them. In some ways, I view death of the author as a selfish framework that emphasizes only the reinforcement of a reader's worldview and desire for escapism in text that doesn't have to be connected to the real world, a delusion. Not to say enjoying a book means one must love the author, but I feel that every reader will naturally have their own (mostly one sided, I suppose) relationship to the author within and without the text, and denying that fact denies personhood to the art form in some ways. In this view, I think one of the reasons I love ORV so much is probably that some of its themes seem to very much agree to this sentiment. Authorship and readership are often equated to this act of "impossible communication" between people. ORV views authorship, the sharing of stories, as this way to impossibly try to understand the life of another person. Part of what gives the text of WoS and then ORV itself so much meaning in the end is the fact that we know who wrote them in the fiction and for what reason. Knowing the author is actually phrased within the text as pivotal, foundationally important, the only understanding that can lead to the salvation of the reader in the end, his knowledge of the person he can recognize in the author's words being himself and the fact that the author's understanding means that he is in some way loved and and known by others who love the same story. When the HSY who wrote WoS is shown to literally cease to be, trying to reach the reader and failing to be seen, it's a scene that makes one cry, a tragedy, a loss. Death of the author is not a preferable frame of analysis in ORV, only connected by a morose sense of inevitability defined by a consumerist literary world that holds said framework as truth.

But again, if death of the author is "reality, " then the ending of ORV is one where radical joy can be found in the breaking of said reality. It's pretty notable from a queer framework that the "happy endings" in ORV all occur in non-nuclear family structures, the 999th turn adopting the OD, KdjCo wanting to live in a house together, etc. Also notable that, because that is a dream that KDJ cannot see as "real," the absolute power the reader is given to determine the world keeps it from happening. In this way, death of the author and absolute power of the reader is the final boss of ORV as HSY and the characters batten down the hatches and scream into the void "YOU ARE NOT ALONE, YOUR REALITY IS NOT THE ONLY ONE, LOVE THAT EXISTS FOR NO PREDETERMINED PURPOSE CAN BE YOUR SALVATION."

It's also kind of important to me outside of the text in the understanding that this story, though obviously formulated in the context of trying to appeal to a wide audience for commercial success, is also one that comes from people who experience our reality trying to tell us that love is the answer to it all. Young people today in SK are very likely to at least know someone who has attempted in the past and you know there are some pretty similar statistics if you happen to have friends involved in queer communities here in the US. Because of my own experiences, I've always felt that distinct lack of recovery narratives in fiction, as past generations tend to see it as either so outside the norm or so clearly regulated to certain situations that it's portrayed as obviously wrong choice by a weak person or the obvious right choice by a brave person and ORV is one of very few stories I've seen not try to make a value judgement on it, but rather illustrate exactly the reasons why KDJ wants to die, why he doesn't value himself, and saying please, please stay. There is so much love for you here even though I know you haven't seen it yet. And an understanding that these ideas of love and happiness are something some people in certain situations can only be shown proof of in the stories of others. And I feel like understanding of that context is what makes ORV so important to me as a Reader, even if I know very little about SS aside from that, the fact that they exist as people living in this same world is still important to my enjoyment of the story as a reader.

Ok, sorry, this became more about narrative queerness than death of the author/womanhood but again a lot of my views of womanhood exist in like, opposing it? Lol. Tho my experience of manhood also exists in opposing a lot of it, I just personally enjoy tussling with it much more than I ever would have with womanhood I think lol.

[be-the-glenn-to-my-maggie]

The time thing is actually something I'm glad you mentioned in your response because I've been puzzling over it myself. I can see this happening one of three ways so far: 1) the RDA have been there for longer than in canon and Grace and them ended up arriving at a later time. 2) the meshing is less organic and more purposeful. After gaining their independence they still want to keep parts of their culture but want to sort of move away from the more traditional stories told by their creators/captors, so they mesh the stories and songs on purpose to make something uniquely theirs.

Or 3) since they are just experimental versions of the recoms, it makes sense that the RDA scientists might have needed time to perfect the memory transfer, especially since around two-thirds of their test subjects are from the people who volunteered their memories way back when the science of memory transfer was just becoming a thing as to not waste more valuable memories. Therefore a lot of their memories are often muddled, and those who can remember fully are few and far between. I imagine that if this was the reason I chose it would also give me a reason as to why Paz went up so high in the rankings: she's one of the last to be made, therefor all of her memories are intact. With the knowledge she knows, it's no wonder she became the Priestess of Songs. Plus, she knows far more about the RDA than the others because of how long she was with them, which could be another part of that.

Hmm, very interesting!! I think any version could be very cool. I think it seems like you have the most fleshed out about the last one. I kind of like the idea of them all being somewhat defective memory-wise.

My best friend suffered a brain injury while we were growing up, we were about sixteen, and sometimes talking to her is just having the same few conversations over and over with slight variations. She is the same person with the same personality, she just doesn't remember that she told me this story last week, you know? It really isn't that big a deal, because she lived and she is much better than she used to be. Often with fictional memory issues or brain injuries, I feel like a repeated story or a forgotten detail is treated as a sign of the character still being broken, not quite healed. Sometimes it's every day life. I like the idea of a whole clan of characters who are... I don't know, damaged mentally, for lack of a better word, but it's just their way of life. I've read a few stories where Spider has mental trauma from the RDA mind reading machine, and the memory thing being such a major deal always makes me vaguely sad. I'd love one where he'd adjust to his new normal.

When my best friend is tired she CANNOT balance, she will fall trying to walk over something even if it's the only thing on the floor. It's just her now so it's the funniest shit in the world, we just make fun of her. Idk. That idea makes me feel warm and happy. My apologies for going off topic, you made me think about something that's really only been a half formed thought.

[evelhak]

Hey! For the character ask thing. Kuroko with 6, 8, 20 ;)

Hi! Thank you for your curiosity.

6. Least favourite ship

This was a short fight between Nash Gold Jr. and Momoi. Momoi won quickly. And the reason is because shipping Kuroko with Nash is so out there that I can't take it very seriously even though the thought is disgusting to me. Momoi actually has a personal relationship with Kuroko, so that's why it bugs me more. Momoi's behaviour towards Kuroko is not cool. I know this story has more blatant harrasment in it, but Momoi really gets to me because it's repeated frequently and they are actually supposed to be friends and it's spefically Kuroko she treats this way and no one else that we know, so it makes it more personal. And I don't think Kuroko is too dense to get it, I mean she's going around calling herself his girlfriend. I think he's simply disinterested, and avoids the conflict. (It would make a lot of sense he would think Momoi wouldn't want to be his friend anymore if he spoke up about it considering everything.) I think this is a terrible basis for a ship. I think they have a lot of things to solve before they can even be uncomplicated friends. (Which I took upon myself to write ofc.)

(Since fandom is what it is, I feel like I still need to repeat to anyone who reads this that I am not coming at you if you ship these people. You have your right to do that and I have my right to dislike the ships. No justification or explanation needed on either part. It's a matter of taste.)

8. Favourite outfit

Never crossed my mind. Went through my pinterest board and found this. I think it's really cute.

20. Weird headcanon

Okay, I have so many headcanons that utilize full artistic freedom, but when I think about it, any of my queer headcanons or even my decisions to "diagnose" this character are not that weird, because they are still based on canon. The interpretation or how I chose to draw a cohesive picture of those canon things is evidently not the most popular but I don't think it's truly weird, because it's definitely not baseless.

There's one thing though that is full fancy and not at all canon based: Kuroko's grandmother. She's basically an OC in my fics because we know so little about her but I wanted her to be a big influence in Kuroko's life. I think she's weird, and I meant for her to be so anyway. She's an eccentric, young grandmother who's ahead of her time and knows and understands a lot of issues people younger than her don't. Basically Kuroko's parents are more traditional than she is. She definitely has an echo of a fairytale witch, and shares traits with a lot of women who I admire. Not that she's without faults. She's rather overconfident in her assessment of situations and concepts, and she can be a bit detached from humanity outside of her family and friends in a way, like the world is a fun show for her rather than something she's a part of. I didn't give her a name though, she's just Granny. I'm well aware that she's unlikely, but I'm not here for the likely, I'm here for the outcomes that are the most interesting and impactful to me. 🤷 I know this is not directly a Kuroko headcanon but in a way it is because his relationship with Granny is so important in my fics, she basically taught him everything he knows apart from school and basketball.

[mysticdragon3md3]

Just noticed Rhea's archbishop headdress has hearts all over it. Plus, she has a little heart right on her chest.

A while ago, I wrote an analysis of all the hearts on El's costume, when I first noticed them all over her post timeskip outfit. She literally has her hearts in all the wrong places. Her hips, her back,…There's also a tiny heart on her forehead, but it is UPSIDE-DOWN. It's like the character designer went out of their way to symbolize that "her heart is in the wrong place". Though that is an English idiom, a "heart in the wrong place" (not in the chest) could still be universal enough to symbolize misguided intentions or misguided emotions. Kind of like the cliche of edgey anime antiheroes/villains with one monstrous eye, reflecting their warped perspectives. (I'll gladly accept that as true, even for characters I love, like Lelouch vi Britannia.) Even just being upside-down could still be universal enough to symbolize an inverted, "incorrect" state of emotions.

So now that I've just now noticed all these hearts all over Rhea's headdress, plus her chest, I'm inclined to wonder if that was a big hint that she wasn't a villain. I'll be the first to admit that Rhea gets too blindly zealous whenever anything involves her mother, and maybe she shouldn't be the sole leader of any standing army in that state. But for the rest of the time, first-hand observations of her, show what appears to be a fairly good person.

FE3H seems to have a lot of discord between people's reports/claims of how something is, versus observable facts: Fodlan's history, Claude's good nature vs his self-proclaimed suspiciousness, the Agarthan's claims about Rhea vs first-hand observations of her character/actions, etc. There's even a lot of misleading in characters' names, like "Claude" being a reference to a nefarious character in a Shakespeare play, versus Claude's actual good nature and benign intentions, as well as "Edelgard" literally meaning "noble guard", in contrast to her actually functioning as the villain or villain-protagonist. But despite all the misdirections, FE3H does ask the audience to judge their own direct observations of a character…in addition to using a lot of blatant direct symbolism in their character designs. For example, after the post timeskip, both El and Dimitri have multiple cliche antagonist elements to their character design: El's horns and almost fully red attire evoke the imagery of a traditional devil; Dimitri wears all black armor, an eyepatch, and has allowed his hair to grow wild and shaggy, like cliche villain/antagonist/anti-hero costume elements. It seems that FE3H not only wants the audience to judge a character "with their own eyes" but to also signal hints for a character's true function, through their visual costume.

So why does Rhea have hearts all over her head? Right-side-up hearts, at that. Given that Rhea appears to be a good person, willing to defend Garreg Mach, saying she didn't want a repeat of the Red Canyon tragedy, contrasting against the Agarthans who do not see humans as valid sentient beings… Given that Rhea seems benign in most White Clouds interactions… Given that Cyril feels so indebted and grateful to her, strongly implying that she helped him greatly… Given that Rhea seemed to treat her human experimental subjects well, by treating Sitri as family, even after she proved to be another "failed experiment" to resurrect Sothis… Rhea is probably a good person, and that will likely be reflected in the hearts on her costume. Unlike El's post timeskip hearts in "all the wrong places", Rhea does have her hearts in the "right places". Rhea has a heart in her center chest, where the Heart Chakra is. Then she has multiple hearts on her Archbishop headdress: 3 in her crown; 1 at her center forehead. Though, a heart is typically thought of in the (leftish) chest, since people consider the mind and head to be centers of the self, it feels like a good reflection on Rhea's character, for her to have multiple hearts around/on her head. It could imply that she is "thinking with empathy", and thus, kindness.

In contrast, we have character designs like El, who has one of her misplaced hearts on her forehead, in the same place as Rhea, but El's heart is upside-down and partially overlapped by a sharp 4-pointed star, which I discussed in another post, might symbolize a character's past trauma "scars". Though I find it curious that Rhea wouldn't have a similar "scar" symbol overlapping one of her costume's hearts, since she has similar trouble moving on from her past trauma, just like El.

Though, now looking closer at Rhea's Archbishop costume, she actually as a LOT of these 4-pointed "star"/scar symbols, many of them seeming to emanate from or surrounding her costume's hearts. Rhea has 3 pointed "scars" above her center-chest heart, gold pointed "scars" above each of her headdress's hearts, perhaps even more pointed "scars" if you also count the white stars above the sides of each heart on her headdress too, pointed "scars" in her flared collar, one pointed "scar" on each side of her mini cape's/cowl's front. Looking at the back of her costume, she has another pointed "scar" on her back---as well as another heart at the back of her headdress! The back of her headdress has even more pointed "scars". I know Sothis, and thus Nabateans are associated with stars, since Sothis came from space, but with these pointed "scars" also being on the costumes of the House Lords' after the timeskip, and coincidentally symbolically reflective of how they handle their past traumas, I am inclined to think the pointed "scars" on Rhea's costume are also more than just a reference to stars. I only just now noticed the additional hearts on the fronts of her mini cape/cowl, but these are also beside pointed "scars", which seem to emanate from the hearts. It's almost like a direct symbol of how past pain/trauma has emanated from Rhea's emotional centers. Her emotions of caring and kindness are the bases from which these pointed "scars" spring from. Maybe she was too sensitive, too intense in her emotions, which is why she went to such extreme reactions after Nemesis killed her mother and the other Nabateans. It would be normal to seek revenge, to get sad, or angry. But Seiros's reaction to Nemesis killing Sothis, was to build an Empire, so she could build an army to take him on. Even during FE3H's very first cutscene, Seiros is shown to be so focused on her revenge, that she doesn't even spare a look for the comrades fighting and dying for her. Similarly, when on the battlefield in 3Hopes, Rhea has no response to Cyril's death, even after his final words are only about her. Whatever kindness/compassion that Rhea has, it can also convert into just pure expressions of pain, trauma, and anger, once she is triggered. Maybe that's why the pointed "scars" emanate from her costume's hearts.

One curious thing about the hearts on Rhea's costume is that she does have ONE upside-down heart, dangling on the front of her dress, between her hips and thighs. Now, because Rhea only has one upside-down heart, as opposed to El's multiple misplaced/misaligned hearts, even one misaligned heart on Rhea's costume seems less ominous. It doesn't seem to mark her as an antagonist/villain, like El, but it does seem to hint that there is something wrong with Rhea. Fittingly, this upside-down heart is covered by another element of her costume: a decorative panel of fabric, connecting the mini cape/cowl at its front. Rhea is literally covering up the warped, misaligned parts of her symbolic emotions. Instead of coming to terms with her mother's death, she misguidedly, repeatedly tries to resurrect Sothis…which is not a healthy coping mechanism! She keeps such experiments in secret, and thus, it seems fitting that the warped results of her emotionally warped aspects are also hidden on her costume.

I will admit, that hearing the full Silver Snow explanation for what happened during Byleth's birth, does make me inclined to read Rhea with more leeway towards benevolence. She wasn't just kidnapping people to torture with human experiments, like what the Agarthans did with Lysithea and El. I don't recall if it was ever confirmed that Rhea was creating these human experiments from scratch or not. But the important fact is that she treated these experimental beings as family, with kindness, as valid individuals, even AFTER they proved to be failures towards her goals. And number one rule of mad sciencing: if you're treating your experiments with compassion, then you can't be that bad of a mad scientist.

So yeah, just like El, Rhea has a LOT of hearts hidden on her costume design. (And I haven't seen this many symbolic "scars" since Claude's post timeskip costume design.)

One final bit of speculation about heart shapes on costume designs, is that today I also began to wonder if the brooches pinning the House Leaders' Academy uniform capes might also count as symbolic hearts? And what would that mean? I've always drawn that brooch, as a heart, with a diamond on top. A much more blunted diamond shape, than the 4-pointed "scar"/stars, so I'll focus more on the heart (for today). It's interesting to note that the heart shaped portion of these brooches are much more obscured than the clearer heart shapes on Rhea's and El's costumes. But maybe that's fitting for the House Leaders during White Clouds. Before the war, Byleth still has no idea of the true nature of these characters. Byleth is still trying to get to know them. But El is hiding her true heart, by hiding her true intentions, plans for war, etc. Claude is hiding his true self so thoroughly, he offers multiple misdirects, including a few honest statements, mixed in with the misdirects, that it's often difficult to tell when he's being absolutely sincere or just joking. Dimitri is also hiding his true heart, by putting on the "perfect prince" facade, while actually fixated on avenging everyone killed/hurt by the Tragedy of Duscur, as well as fixated on his suppressed, unresolved Boar rage about it. None of the House Leaders are being fully honest about showing their hearts to Byleth during the Academy phase. It's no wonder that the heart-shaped symbols on their uniforms are obscured by lots of filigree.

[deathbysatellite]

Grunt Household: Week 1

Much like with the Pleasant household, we start off the Grunt household with one sibling repeatedly antagonizing the other.

Quit being mean, Ripp.

Intercept ended up being the correct choice, and General Buzz earned $20,000 doing so!

Interesting bug that happened: the school bus drove off after dropping off Tank, then a second school bus came by to drop off Ripp. Sitting on the opposite end of the bus isn’t enough to Ripp to avoid his brother. No, he needs to take a whole other bus home.

Both of them wanted to get some gadgets, then Tank decided he wanted to buy some jewelry. I bought a necklace for Ripp and a watch for Tank, but I forgot to put the watch on Tank before he aged up, so it ended up going to Ripp.

Ripp becomes fast friends with Tycho Curious, while Tank introduces himself to Puck Summerdream.

No offense, Tank, but you literally don’t have any friends to invite to a sports party (yet).

General Buzz brought Tristen Nott home with him from work.

And while Tristen busies herself with the fish, we end up with a rare sweet moment between Buzz and Ripp, as Buzz autonomously decides to push his son on the swing set.

Buck wanted some help with his homework, so I had the person with the highest relationship score do that. In this case, it was Ripp.

The tree out front briefly caught fire during a lightning storm.

Once again managed to pick the right choice, and Ripp won $500 in a sweepstake prize.

While hanging out with another coworker, this time Kimberly Cordial, Buzz found his passion for Sports.

Ew, Kimberly, that’s literally rotten.

Poor Buck ended up so tired, he passed out where he was standing in the dirty bathroom.

Ripp snuck out late at night with Ophelia Nigmos.

Somebody left a pile of trash in front of the house, and somebody else had the bright idea to try to squash the resulting roaches, so now Buzz has the flu.

Tank discovered his love of science via the telescope.

Buzz decided to introduce himself to Ophelia in an interesting fashion. Come on, what did Ophelia ever do to you??

Oh, look! Ripp and Tank are getting along for o-

Well, that didn’t last long.

I honestly don’t remember which brother brought home Nawwaf Jordan.

Come one, Tank! Puck gave you a sincere compliment and you rejected it? And now you’ve briefly lost your first friend!

Buzz seems to be getting popular, as he’s now brought home Matthew Picaso home with him. This is getting dangerously close to a party.

And just in time for Tank and Buck’s joint birthday, too!

Tank’s Lifetime Want is to have 20 pet best friends. His first attempt at befriending a pet didn’t go so well, as Scout rejected any interaction from Tank other than being fed a treat.

Buzz has much better luck making friends, as he pretty quickly ended up networking with Marylena Hamilton. I told you he was getting popular!

Well, damn! I did not expect that!

How come Scout is nice to you??

Randy London became another victim of Unsavory Charlaton.

Buzz decided to congratulate Tank for...not going to college. Y’know, that actually seems in-character for him.

Tank decided to break from the family’s long military tradition, and join the Athletic career instead.

Buck’s been wanting to get a kitten for a while, so I finally got him one as a birthday present. Meet Bonkers!

Meanwhile, Ripp brought Meadow Thayer home with him from work.

The weekend finally came, so I sent the family on a trip to Bluewater Village.

This is mostly for the purpose of getting them some clothes, now that Tank and Buck have aged up. If clothes shopping didn’t take so long, I would have had them do something afterwards.

Ripp met Ivy Copur, and most of his Wants rolled to be about her. Unfortunately, she didn’t seem very interested in him.

Tank took quite a liking to little Bonkers, quickly developing a friendship. Something I’ve noticed with Tank, is that he builds relationship score with other Sims very quickly. They’re often at about a 75-85 with him, before he’s even at a 50 with them.

Being the only person he has chemistry with, Ripp asked Meadow out on a date.

It went well enough for him to score his first kiss!

Uh-oh! Mrs. Crumplebottom’s here, which means things could go hilariously wrong, very quickly.

Luckily for the two of them, Mrs. C was too busy lecturing people for wearing their swimwear in public (at a public pool), so Ripp ended up having a dream date.

Tank managed to get promoted pretty quickly.

Rare Want? I’ve never seen it at least.

Ripp and Meadow hung out again the next day (along with Catherine Viejo, who tagged along with Meadow).

Despite having just bought clothes the day before, Buck decided he wanted to go clothes shopping again.

I gave Buck Popularity as his primary Aspiration, but Grilled Cheese as his secondary. He rolls Grilled Cheese Wants far more than Popularity Wants, and the constantly rerolling want to gain a cooking skill point has earned him enough enthusiasm in Cuisine to get a magazine subscription.

Tank, on the other hand, has Fortune as a secondary Aspiration, and he’s one of those shopaholic Fortune Sims. He’s constantly rolling Wants to buy really expensive stuff, like this $500 statue, or what I’m pretty sure is the most expensive stereo in the game. Well, something for him to hold onto for when he gets his own place.

Tank rolled Wants to invite someone over, become best friends with Puck, and play catch (another rare Want?), so I’m hitting three birds with one stone.

Thanks to Meadow, Ripp got promoted to the top of the Slacker Career, and became an overachiever!

Having neglected his homework all weekend, Ripp spent Monday morning rushing to get it done before school. I try to do Wants based gameplay, but since teens don’t typically roll Wants to do their homework unlike children and young adults (I actually have yet to see that Want appear for teens), I have them do their homework if they roll a Want that requires having good grades, like getting into private school, or getting a part-time job, or going to college. Ripp had been rolling the “Go to College” Want quite a bit.

This creates another similarity to my playthrough of the Pleasant household. In both cases, the teen that’s supoosed to be lazier ends up doing really well in school due to an abundance of “Go to College” Wants.

And we end the week with Tank leaving the nest to find his own place.

Bonus: Tank’s new home.

[artharakka]

Kehrä is a god or goddess of strategy, plots, and magic. A character for a project “Butcherbirds”.

She appears sometimes as a human, sometimes as a lynx, and sometimes as a mixture of both. Her symbol is two squares connected by their corners to form a figure eight or a symbol of infinity. Her realm is a deep purple night sky filled with stars and magic.

Her aid is often sought by desperate political and military leaders, ambitious scholars — and even by some who call themselves mages or witches. But if one manages to get her attention, they must be careful that they are dealing with the right god. For there is another god who uses the face of a lynx: Surma, the trickster god of chaos and storm.

Kehrä prizes knowledge and wisdom, but her favours to the mortals are often unnoticeable. She thinks her gifts must be earned through hard work, experience, and research. She has learned that divine knowledge should not be used by humans in their personal pursuits and wars, and those who ask her aid are often ignored as undeserving. Those who ask too much, are cursed to be sirens, mythical creatures who know everyone’s desires and, with promises of their fulfillment, lure the other greedy mortals to their demise in the rocky islands and shoals.

She has a more personal reason to keep the divine knowledge sealed away as well. Long ago, she aided mortals more readily and took a smart and ambitious boy as her apprentice. He studied and he learned and finally, he found a path to the realms of the gods. He tricked his way past the island of the dead, beyond the fiery and barren realm of Tuulikki and Marshes of Valkea. Through the Woods of Korpi and the Sea of Salvia. And as he made his way through those realms, he collected all the secrets of the gods into a single book.

When he arrived at the doors of Kehrä, she realized her mistake and closed her gates from the boy who usurped her place. But the mistake had already been made and the young man became a god. The new god, Surma, carved his realm of chaos and storm at the threshold of Kehrä’s realm where he still resides among the other gods.

[phoenixyfriend]

OKAY so on the topic of Star Wars takes wrt “character ends up in an A/B/O universe where they’re an omega, but they were previously a cis male in their canon”

@atagotiak and I had some Thoughts on discord

So, obviously, Anakin would make a good omega and he’s also incredibly murdery. Foregone conclusion that we're using him for this.

There is no preexisting Anakin in the Omegaverse. He shows up JUST as the war is starting. Canon timeline is in the third year of the war (he’s 22), but whatever dumped him into omegaverse also tossed him back a few years. No de-aging, just a bit of mismatched timeline stuff.

He's... really good at war, and clearly a Jedi, so the Temple just kind of goes "WELL OKAY THEN, SURE, YOU'RE IN, EVERYONE PRETEND HE'S BEEN HERE THE WHOLE TIME." The Jedi, by and large, don't care about omegaverse dynamics beyond 'what do you need, medically, to be happy and healthy' and 'what do you need to be aware of so you can be prepared for biases you encounter in the field?’

None of the civilian natborns (mainly politicians) want to put him on the field because of those biases. Anakin, being Anakin, is VERY blatantly an omega in scent, has never been on suppressants (because it wasn't a thing he fucking NEEDED), is incredibly emotional as a person, loves kids, etc.

Like, nobody wants an omega fighting a war anyway, but THIS one is like PINNACLE omega, and those awful Jedi are making him FIGHT just because he's good at stab!

The Jedi: Actually, it's because he's got several years of war experience that we don't, and he's a good tactician that works well with the clones-- Coruscant: You MONSTERS The Jedi: Look, we gave him the option to not stab and he looked absolutely devastated. Anakin, several days earlier: You don’t want me? I’m not good enough??? Jedi: Also he can beat up at least half the temple.

He doesn't know a damn thing about dynamics, but he DOES know that sometimes he's so horny he wants to stab HARDER. The clones are largely disinterested in their generals' dynamics because between mostly-Mando* trainers and no-dynamic Kaminoans, they only really care if a person can shoot.

* Mandalore approves of Fighty Omegas. As far as (traditional) Mandalore is concerned, you want an omega that will kill the threats to your children as well as you do.

Anakin: You know more about being an omega than I do. Rex: ...I'm an alpha. Anakin: Yeah. Let that one sink in a bit.

We have two options for Obi-Wan!

Omegaverse local Obi-Wan (beta) has never met this man before, and is very unnerved that the immediate default reaction Anakin has to his presence is releasing Family pheromones as if Obi-Wan is his DAD and like. This strange, too-tall man from another dimension has got absolutely NO control over what he projects in the Force OR in his dynamic.

Obi-Wan was ALSO transplanted from canon to omegaverse, and is also an omega, for contrast reasons. He is nice and friendly and and likes poetry and that sort of thing... but also he has the highest dismemberment count in the movies. Also he doesn’t prioritize romance.

We went with the second one because it's hilarious.

Someone watching them spar: Wow, omegas from that universe are terrifying.

As previously mentioned, now with some tweaking to account for both: Obi-Wan and Anakin just straight up don't exist until they drop headfirst into the council room, already covered in blood. (It's mostly not theirs.)

Nobody realizes either one is an omega until they "naturalize" to this dimension and Anakin goes into heat... and doesn't realize it, actually, because his primary symptom is heightened protectiveness and aggression. Everyone else with the right nose realizes, because the man has no control over his pheromone production, but Anakin? No. He just stabs. He’s angry and horny and he will cut someone.

Ahsoka has no reaction to human pheromones but basically everyone smells Anakin's "my child!" reaction to her, so... Cool. Have a padawan, we guess.

Anakin ends up sparring a lot with Aayla and Ahsoka, because only humans and near humans have dynamics, so these two don't REACT to the pheromones situation.

(Palpatine is a Kindly Old Beta who tries to treat Anakin the way he EXPECTS Anakin wants to be treated, which is. Not. Accurate.)

(Anakin hates it.)

I'm just so in love with "An omega can't fight." "You wanna fuckin' bet?"

There are plenty of omega Jedi, by the way, it's just... most of them can keep it relatively low-key instead of Anakin's jet-engine broadcast. Some, if they're known to be omega, probably take advantage of being underestimated, like Obi-Wan probably (and especially a version of Obi-Wan that was always an omega, unlike this version). They have a very different way of presenting themselves than Anakin, who's not subtle about being an omega and also not subtle about being all aggressive and stabby.

At one point, Anakin has to protect some Very Traditional Individuals who get all "Stay back, Omega, it's not safe!" and he's just... so tired of this shit. “You are squishy civilians and I'm a trained Jedi Knight and accomplished GAR General who's killed more people in one sitting than there are in this entire palace. Sit the fuck down and let me do my job.”

It starts making the rounds that Anakin insisted on fighting in person, and the rumors shift from "how dare the Jedi force an omega to fight" and over into things that are deeply hurtful in-universe in the vein of "broken omega" and some people try to say it to his face but like...

He didn't grow up here.

He doesn't care.

Say that to one of his friends and he's going to rip out your spleen, probably, but say it to him and he's just staring at you flatly and asking if that's a negative on getting away from the encroaching battle droids, sir?

"You're rather unpleasant for an omega, aren't you?" [deeply offensive] "I literally could not give less of a fuck about your opinion. Move."

It's not that there aren't omegas that act like Anakin, either, it's just that most of them aren't, you know, Jedi who regularly interact with the upper crust, or capable of his level of destruction. Unbeknownst to Anakin, everyone clocks him as Outer Rim based on his behavior, well before his accent gives him away, and certainly before he mentions he's from Tatooine, because Core Omegas Don't Act Like That.

Someone they meet in a more diplomatic setting says something decently passive-aggressive about how at least Obi-Wan acts more like how an Omega should. Then a battle breaks out for some reason, and... well. Anakin and Obi-Wan cause such a scandal by keeping score of kills in a battle, don’t you know?

Turns out sending Anakin to fight Ventress is great because she keeps expecting him to react a certain way but NO he's here to STAB.

I like the idea that Obi-Wan's favorite opponent these days is Grievous because the cyborg doesn't have a nose, and thus gives zero fucks about dynamics or heats. Dooku is a rich old man who has opinions heavily influenced by Sith Juice Making Him More of a Dick, and the Dathomiri can smell dynamics even if they don't have them, and so they have biases about those things. Meanwhile, Grievous is just there to Kill, and Obi-Wan genuinely appreciates the lack of commentary on his dynamic.

Dooku’s probably an alpha, or a beta who's used the whole "we are more level-headed" thing as one of several angles to keep himself the public face and supreme commander of the CIS.

On to more fluffy things that have less to do with political biases.

There's a lot of "I'm upset that my loved ones don't know me," but also please understand the appeal of Obi-Wan marching up to Quinlan like "Yes, hello, I understand you've been read in on the full situation behind myself and my former padawan. I was close friends with your alternate universe self, which I feel is necessary disclosure before I propose the following: Would you like to join me for my upcoming heat, as I have minimal experience with the dynamics situation and even fewer people I actually trust, and I believe I can put my faith in you to treat it as casually as necessary while still having control and respect for my person."

(The Team is in a fairly safe place to process stuff, but having sudden unexpected changes to your biology has gotta be a little traumatizing, on top of ending up in a universe where none of your friends know you and people have a whole host of unfamiliar forms of sexism to point at you.)

Obi-Wan, who wasn't quite touch-averse but was much more easily overwhelmed by physical contact than Anakin (who craved it), suddenly finds his body switching gears and insisting on cuddles with Trusted Loved Ones, which is.... mostly Anakin, on account of nobody else really knowing him yet. Also Ahsoka, who is aware that she's something of a replacement for her alt-universe self, but Anakin explained it as "I love you so much no matter which dimension I'm in or what you're like, and I'd like to get to know you the way I got know her."

(It's rather eloquent for Anakin. He got Obi-Wan to help him draft up the script for when he pitched taking on omegaverse Ahsoka as a padawan.)

Anakin gets a more intensely sexual heat than 'usual' at one point for Reasons (IDK it could be as innocuous as 'we got better food than the usual rations and my body is reacting to the higher fat content with the belief that it's safer to have a baby now'), which nobody takes a whole lot of notice of because they're in a WAR, and also this is only his fourth one so it's not like he's got a lot to compare it to... except then the predominantly alpha clones can't stop themselves from reacting to the pheromones, mostly by wandering past his door and asking if he needs anything, offering up alpha-scented blankets and stuff for the nest to soothe the hormones, bringing snacks and electrolyte drinks, and like, Anakin is flattered, really, but fuck off please.

(He got a warning from medical a few hours before it hit that it would be different, so he actually does have alpha-scented fabrics to help him out. Apparently that's a thing you can just ask friends for, so he asked Rex if he had anything on hand that he could spare. He now has one of Rex’s recently-used sheets and a bodyglove in the nest.)

(Anakin has no idea how to feel about the nesting instinct, but at least it’s warm.)

Tia asked "Oh hey, who has the scared and horny reaction to his carnage?" and like.

Listen. I'm not saying I've been low-key imagining this as Rex being a very subby alpha who's really into Anakin's whole Thing but...

At one point Anakin gets injured in a way that requires painkillers and he ends up whining to the point of almost crying about the fact that nobody is cuddling him right now in medbay and Kix just gives up and comms Ahsoka to come hug her weird older brother.

And Then There Is Purring.

That’s a Thing Now.

Rex ends up in the pile somehow. He came over to check on Things and ended up yanked in by half-asleep, half-high Anakin, who has a grip like an octopus and no impulse control and is purring like a pod motor while NUZZLING HIM.

There’s a lot of blackmail photos featuring Rex’s very intense blush as he’s cuddled by his commander (giggling at him) and general (clinging like a tooka and rubbing himself all over).

Anakin is deeply offended that ANYONE thinks he'd want to get pregnant by just any old person, NO he needs to fall in LOVE there needs to be EMOTIONAL DRAMA and if Padme won't have him (apparently she's in a relationship and no he's not BITTER) then he'll find someone else to have a whirlwind romance with!

People think Anakin's a slut because he can't control his pheromone production (he has NO practice and for health reasons he can't go on suppressants) so he always smells open and ready for flirtations, which Obi-Wan also has to a somewhat lesser degree (he's older so his body just naturally produces less), and then someone tries to cross a boundary and grabs his ass and ANYWAY Anakin has to now fill out an incident report for breaking a civilian's arm.

Again.

[writingwithcolor]

Gingerbread man as golem

@yaronata asked:

I would like to write a character who is Jewish and uses a Golem. She's based on the D&D class of the artificer which looks magic but isn't, because they produce all their effects with inventions, like the "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic" quote. Her story is that her very Jewish town was under attack from a terrible monster when she was little. Her Rabbis made a Golem to protect the town, and it succeeded but was torn to pieces in the process. She was fascinated by the Golem and as a kid didn't see a big difference between it's sentience and person's so was really thankful for its sacrifice like you would a person's sacrificing their life for you. They thought all the pieces had been devoured by the monster before it died, but she went looking and found the piece used to animate the Golem, which she, kinda misunderstanding called its "heart". She kept the piece and grew up to be an incredibly skilled cook, specialising as a baker in the town. I imagine she would make a lot of really good food for the Jewish holidays, or to break fasts on ones like Yom Kippur or Tish'abav. But she also made a town specific holiday to honour the Golem's sacrifice and the town still being alive, because I feel "we are not dead woo" is a big theme for Jewish holidays from my research, so it could fit, for which she invented ginger bread men to be the golem, and gave them little "hearts" of fruit or honey, and you're meant to eat them limb by limb like the beast did before eating the heart. This would be the inspiration for using the "heart" piece later to make her own giant gingerbread Golem to help her save the world.

These are my questions 1) would it be considered bad or disrespectful for someone who isn't a Rabbi to make a Golem, or is this method of taking an animating piece someone else made disrespectful? 2) Her journey will take her far from her town and her Jewish family and friends and she will likely travel with gentiles. Would it be disrespectful for a Golem to be used to protect a lot of gentiles and one Jew in the course of saving the world? I don't want to fall into the stereotype of someone putting all their effort into valuing and protecting very specifically the group that in real life is oppressive to them. 3) While she is not using magic and is actually mimicking its effects with technology she invents, is this drawing too close to the line of "magical Jew"? 4) I like to "play test" my characters in ttrpgs to really get a feel for them before I write. Would it be disrespectful to play a Jewish character when I am a gentile, and would it be disrespectful to play a Jewish character in a setting where there are demonstrably real gods other than the one of Judaism?

I really like this character idea and I think it's cute and fun and rooted in Jewish culture but I really want to make sure it's respectful and as good as I, a gentile researching on the internet, thinks it is. Thanks so much! Have a nice day!

My answer to this is very complicated because there are things I both like and do not like about this premise. First of all, I love the idea of a cookie golem, and I'm even imagining the magic word that brings him to life (EMET/truth) would be written in icing. And I'm okay with the part about how she found a piece of the old golem and used it to build a new golem, because that makes sense for a golem made from a baked good when you think about how people use sourdough starter to make a new batch of sourdough.

However, here are the thing that make me cock my head to the side like my little sister's German shepherd:

1. re: "magical Jew" - that's not a trope I've ever heard of. Remember, marginalized groups don't receive identical disrespect across the board. It is indeed a trope to use Black people or disabled people as supernatural plot devices who exist only to further the stories of white main characters or able-bodied main characters. But I can't say as I've ever seen anyone using Jewishness that way. Usually if we are someone's one-dimensional plot device it's as someone's lawyer, fixer, "money guy", etc, not a supernatural force. So this isn't something you have to worry about.

2. I have a certain level of discomfort with you playing as a Jewish character just because playacting as a marginalized culture you're not part of strikes me as off, but I understand that that's how you gain insight into a character you're about to write so it's more of a writing exercise than anything else. (I wonder if D&D regulars from marginalized groups have written about this -- I've only played a few times casually with family so if I did run into this type of discussion in my social justice reading I wouldn't have absorbed it. If anyone is curious I played first as Captain Werewolf, and then switched to playing as Cinnamon Blade because lawful good was too hard. :P )

3. I would prefer you omit the detail about eating the cookies piece by piece symbolically, for two reasons: a. it unintentionally evokes Communion by having appreciative people consume a baked good symbolic of an entity who sacrificed his life for theirs, and b. focusing on the details of flesh consumption reminds me too much of Blood Libel (yes, a gingerbread man is in the shape of a person but how many of us actually think about it literally, the way this act would cause?)

As to your first question: I'm fine with her making a golem even though she's just a rando. Second question: I see what you're saying and maybe it could be more okay if it's really clear how well these gentile folks are treating her? And questions three and four are answered above.

I really do love the idea of a giant gingerbread man golem. Cookie golem T_T <3

--Shira

I would like to second Shira’s point about not ripping apart the gingerbread cookies. I honestly would prefer they were used as decoration, and other cookies eaten instead, since that part just feels so not-Jewish to me, but I don’t have golem-specific issues other than that. It seems like you have already been doing a lot of research, which is appreciated.

As far as the ttrpg/DnD aspect… I bounce back and forth on the topic of playing characters that are so very different from our experiences, other than in fantasy-related ways. However, I am aware that a lot of people will play with, and experiment with gender in game, and learn something about themselves in the process (the number of trans players of ttrpgs who tried out their gender in game before they were out is high). It’s different with Judaism, and even more significantly different when it comes to things you can’t convert into, like various actual, real-world races. But because people do sometimes experience growth from experiences like this, I’m hesitant to dissuade players completely. I do urge you to, at a minimum, bring the same care, research, and willingness to learn, that you brought to this question.

--Dierdra

This sounds like a creative storyline that you could have lots of fun with 😊

At first I was confused by this part:

She also made a town specific holiday to honour the Golem's sacrifice

But then you really got me thinking about different types of Jewish holidays and how they come about, so thank you for that!

Because it’s often the little details that either make a story super powerful or kind of nonsensical, I think it would be a good idea to decide what type of holiday is being created here:

A full-blown chag with restrictions on labour and halachic obligations? These are commanded in Torah and new ones can’t be added.

A minor yom tov with halachic obligations but no restrictions? These were instituted by the rabbis prior to the destruction of the Temple, so again new ones can’t be added.

A public holiday or equivalent? This would usually be declared by the Knesset in Israel, and filter to the rest of the Jewish world from there.

A community-based yom tov with specific customs only for people in the know, such as certain Chasidic groups celebrating the birthdays of their deceased leaders? I asked around, but no one can really tell me how these holidays get started, which is probably a good indication that they arise quite organically from a group of people who all just feel that it should be celebrated. Probably not created by a single person, as such.

Something she runs from her bakery, not religion-based, but more like a day of doing special products and deals the way many small businesses do on their anniversary?

Now, if the people of a modern-day town were actually saved by a real live Golem, that would arguably be the most overt miracle for many generations, so there would be a decent chance of options 3 and/or 4 happening. It’s entirely plausible that there could be special foods for this day that become a tradition, including Golem cookies. People who directly benefited might also return to the site where the Golem fought the monster and recite the prayer, ‘Blessed is Hashem, Master of the Universe, Who performed a miracle for me in this place.’

Alternatively, if it’s important that your MC created the holiday, something like option 5 might be the best. Hopefully this will still fulfil what you need: you describe her as incredibly skilled, so I can imagine the day when she goes all out on the Golem cookies being one of the most exciting events of the year for the townspeople, just because her baking is that good. Plus, they already have a personal stake in the Golem’s sacrifice, so I definitely think it could be a thing without being an official holiday. Also, if she is outside of an all-Jewish environment, don’t forget that she would have to decide whether to commemorate the anniversary in the Hebrew calendar or the local one.

Coming back to the cookies, sorry if we’re getting a little repetitive on this point! But I don’t see the cookies being torn limb from limb as part of a celebration. First of all, this doesn’t sound like a very celebratory thing to do, to say the least. Can you imagine explaining that to a three-year-old on their first Yom HaGolem? They would be terrified! (I don’t read this suggestion as accidental anti-Semitism so much as getting carried away with a metaphor, which I’m sure as writers we have all done!)

But also, it’s worth pointing out that our commemorative foods aren’t usually that literal. If you think about hamantaschen, maror, or apple in honey, they’re all symbols. That’s not to say that having Golem-shaped cookies is a problem, as this sounds like just a bit of fun that the MC is having and not something that is directly at odds with Judaism or Jewish culture. But it’s worth bearing in mind that the more literal you go from there in terms of tying the cookies to the event they commemorate, the less culturally aligned your holiday food becomes.

Finally, about the Golem protecting non-Jewish people: I like this idea! There’s a stereotype that we only use whatever is at our disposal to help ourselves and other Jewish people, so a Golem being created by Jews but helping others as well is a big plus for me. Of course, as has already been pointed out, this would be an odd choice if her Saving The World team were anti-Semitic or otherwise disrespectful to her/her community, but I don’t think you were headed that way!

-Shoshi

I have to come back in here just to squee over the phrase “Yom HaGolem.” Well done :D

--Shira