#ohhhh but actually hes not REALLY the same guy THIS TIME its ANOTHER guy who's just PRETENDING shut the fuck up

[bonetrousledbones]

girl help i was a fnaf fan for literally like a year max but ppl irl keep asking me if im gonna go see the movie and im just supposed to be polite about saying there’s no way in hell i’m spending movie theater money to see a movie about a franchise with some of the worst writing ive ever seen

[walrus150915]

Nimona headcanons part 3 bc I'm insane (out of order and disorganized so like- be ready) and bc it's my new year gift for y'all

• Nimona mostly talks like a normal teen but sometimes she'd use words that show her real age. "Sonorous", "vapidity" n stuff like that. Her vocabulary is INSANELY huge

• Ambrosius tries not to swear so he uses a lot of silly replacements instead. "HOLY S- golly!!", "You son of a b- bishop". Like I'm sorry but he's the type of guy to say fricking instead of, yknow, the intended word. Ballister finds it endearing; Nimona finds it stupid

• Yes yes he does replace sex with lovemaking. Yes he purely refers to him and Bal going at it as "making love". Yes he's a fellow like that

• Ballister doesn't drink alcohol. I know that's implied in the movie that he drinks (although I thought he drank, like, soda?? On the other hand he is a wholeass thirty years old man who's seen some shit so I wouldn't be surprised) but idk he strikes me as a type to refuse drinking out of moral code. He doesn't eat pork for the same reasons (pushing my cultural Muslim Ballister agenda)

• Ambrosius drinks only during celebrations or parties. Not much because he's a light drinker😭 one cup and he's already lying on the floor, crying and hyperanalyzing his life

• after Nimona came back Ambrosius was not safe from her jokes. Neither of them despised each other (not after Nimona saved the whole Kingdom and not after Ambrosius proved he really isn't a jerk) but boy does Nimona make fun of him on any given occasion. Ambrosius was taken aback by this at first but then he just got used to it

• Ambrosius is being kinda petty and jealous when Ballister spends more time with Nimona than him ("Although now apparently he's got a new best friend, what's that about?!"), not in a way that'd make it unhealthy ofc but still😭. Him and Ballister were tied to the hip for like the most of their lives and now there's someone ELSE Ballister likes to hang out with? Ugh🙄

• Ambrosius had a diary when he was a teen, he didn't write much there (one or two sentences a day). Once he became an adult he kind of forgot about it but after the whole... Hunting stuff started happening he found himself writing a ton of sentences there again

• when him and Bal started dating Ambrosius had a whole page in that diary filled with "Ambrosius Boldheart" HE'S A GUY LIKE THAT OKAY

• Ambrosius likes to attack Ballister's face with quick little kisses. If he pecked his forehead he must peck his cheeks and nose and eyelids and cheekbones etc etc

• Nimona sometimes speaks in rhymes. She doesn't know how she's doing it but her tongue just does it on its own. ("Let's go dunk on the punk in the trunk")

• Ballister has actually been a year older than everyone in his class, another reason why he was the black sheep™

• Ambrosius can play the flute and the piano due to his noble upbringing he HATES whenever someone brings it up tho

• Nimona and Ballister have those nights where they recall historical facts and situations and Nimona shows her perspective of the things. "The guy claimed to be a war criminal was the biggest sweetheart in the world what are you onnn". Ballister wrecks his brain trying to understand if she's serious or not

• Ballister doesn't get a lot of the jokes, they just fly over his head. Only after some time he starts getting them, like in the middle of the night randomly going "ohhhh that's what she meant"

• first time Ambrosius and Ballister made out Ambrosius threw his hands in the air and said "yayy :D"

• Ballister's haircare routine is better than you think it is he's just casual about it. Yes he uses coconut oil like his life depends on it

• Ambrosius's complexion is leaner but Bal's is broader. So when they exchange clothes it doesn't fit because Bal's shirts are too loose on Ambrosius but also kinda short and Ambrosius's are kinda long but too tight in the shoulders for Bal. They still think it's sweet to swap their clothes sometimes

[lemon-natalia]

Harrow the Ninth Reaction - Chapter 37

hmm yeah it is suspicious that the Emperor has to be locked away during the attacks. he gives an explanation, but we really only have his word for it

the Lyctors seem perfectly (and very convieniently) made to be able to enter the River while still defending themselves, which makes me wonder if that was the original purpose of creating Lyctorhood, and the Emperor maybe has some kind of plan revolving around it?

now this guy is quoting fucking Psalms 26 in Latin?? thats different to the quotes from before, the fact that its religious is interesting given this guy is apparently ‘God’ now, but he’s quoting a biblical text. also given Harrow can’t possibly know what he’s quoting 90% of the time, he’s awfully pretentious

Harrow’s eighteen, i’m pretty sure she knows how babies are made dude. at least she definitely knows after you guys nearly had a threesome in front of her on the dining room table

he’s been thinking Harrow and Ianthe are a thing omfg

the mysterious A.L.! somehow i was right that the Annabel Lee poem connected to her. and her having another name, and being dead for ten thousand years, i feel like thats a pretty good candidate for the good old Locked Tomb body. at least, thats my current theory.

‘She was my Adam’ again with the biblical stuff, this guy is seemingly religious, but also thinks he’s God??

and apparently the First House was destroyed via climate change and nuclear explosions. if i needed any other confirmation that its Earth (or some equivalent) then i’ve got it here i think

also he was just a normal person before the world ended, and he was the only one who survived and somehow became an incredibly powerful necromancer. i mentioned waaay back at the beginning of this liveblog that i knew there was a guy named John who had something to do with an apocalypse, but i didn't know if i was misremembering him being actually responsible for it, or if i was mixing it up with the Magnus Archives. and i, uh, still have no clue if that is the case or not from this convo, though i do feel like there's more he's not saying about this anyway (please no spoilers about this, i really appreciate everyone explaining things to me in the notes but i'd like to find out whats actually going on with this specifically while reading)

and A.L. was not a ‘normal human being’ whatever that means, and the Lyctors are ‘in a very real way’ A.L.’s children … what on earth does that mean? she discovered the secret of Lyctorhood maybe?

well that whole conversation both answered a whole bunch of questions and absolutely nothing at the same time 😂

well okay the dude’s gone past playing parent and just outright told Harrow he sometimes wishes she was his daughter. i really don’t know how much of that affection is genuine

imagine telling someone you view them as a surrogate daughter and they fucking. smash a glass table in response lol. and yeah if its been ten thousand years and you haven’t developed emotional intelligence yet, then i don’t think its happening mate

ohhhh shit she’s telling him about the Locked Tomb. and i suppose there are worse ways this could have ended than him not believing her at all, but i really don’t think she’s wrong, especially since Gideon said she saw her do so/saw the door open in the last book, i think she did get in there somehow

wait i was working under the assumption that it was the Emperor who’d messed up her memories, but its not! did she do it to herself then after writing the letters?

[mulders-too-large-shirt]

s1 episode 22 thoughts

i watched this episode in its intended setting: high on painkillers post surgery and holding an ice pack to my aching jaw. i think dana scully would be proud.

the first thing i thought was man, our duo has to deal with ANOTHER child. someone give them a raise.

the kid allegedly threw a cop out the window and killed him, to which scully says "you don't really think the kid had anything to do with it, do you?" which i think is a feasible conclusion to be drawn based on physical strength, but we also must remember that mere weeks? months? ago, 2 evil children tried to poison them so. never let ur guard down, agents.

mulder is trying to get a visual on the guy the little girl claims she saw and gives the guy a funny mustache to get her to laugh. to this i wrote "ohhhh fuck me" (stated as an expression of empathy, not literally. for now.)

he just wanted to make her smile and she did. and then she physically changed the screen to show the mystery man's actual mustache but come on. that was on the back of my mind here. mulder just wanted to make the little girl laugh.

(getting flashbacks to him letting the previous little girl hand the cashier the money for their soda. he is once again shifting into Protective Mode, this time trying to make a little kid caught in a tragedy feel normal. is it his psychological training or the innate big brother instincts? i will be analyzing this. he is the big brother in his family, right? that explains a lot)

scully was asking the girl's mom questions and the mom was like "she's scary and has no friends and we can't get her to go near water" but i was actually just admiring how beautiful scully was in this scene. sorry about ur daughter ma'am but have you seen the agent you're talking to? highly distracting

then mulder goes to leave but scully says "wait we have an autopsy at 7 :(" and i think this is sosososo funny because the last time "they" did an autopsy (scully doing the work, mulder trying not to gag) he looked like he was going to pass tf out. so him having a very convenient excuse to dip and visit the girl's psychologist must have felt amazing.

(but how sweet was it that she still wanted him there?)

((he tells her to look for electrocution from psychokinesis, though))

mulder asks the girl's psychologist, in all seriousness, if she's witnessed the little girl do any sort of psychic behavior and he has SUCH a straight face. she gets annoyed and leaves. mulder, the world isn't ready for your level of honesty, but i am and i appreciate it.

scully was then all scrubbed up, back in her autopsy era, talking to a recording machine and one of the cops burst in and asks "can i talk to you for a second?" scully is thrown off and says "i just started the autopsy" but the cop says "i don't think he's going anywhere" lmaoooo. i mean sure. guess that's true!

they think the guy the girl saw was another cop who died 9 years ago in a gang related bust... AND GET THIS! the little girl disfigures her dolls in the same way the dude died. fucked up tbh. weird seeing mulder with a doll on his desk but that's part of the job for a man like him.

new awful way to die just dropped: having ur scarf caught in the door of a moving bus. while a child stares at you. again, fucked up.

it seems that all the people who are dying were related to this drug bust a while ago... much to ponder...

they make a visit to the last living cop from the case's house and mulder stares at his fish tank for a while which i thought was lovely. i bet he does love tropical fish. this became relevant to the case later due to what tv writers refer to as "foreshadowing" but in the moment i really enjoyed his dedication to watching them swim about.

mulder immediately decides this girl is the cop that died 9 years ago reincarnated (which he seems to thinks occurs when a child is conceived the same time someone dies which. well. need to unpack that worldview at a later date)

"it's not so farfetched scully, reincarnation is a basic tenant of many religions!" <- said by a man who is a Nerd

(i say this lovingly as i also study belief systems. i'm expressing solidarity here. nerds need to have that in this world)

THE GIRLS ARE FIGHTING!!!!! scully's all, even if we DO get this child to go back into her past life with hypnosis, will the court take that as evidence? gagged him a little there tbh

(mulder's relationship to hypnosis is also fascinating. he seems to think that since it helped him find his missing memories with his sister, of course this little girl can go back into her past life using the same stuff! he doesn't seem very concerned about her screaming for her life, though, again complicating my view on if mulder is actually good with kids. because i would be like aww damn, she's screaming that she's dying, is that normal? he was just tuned in. it seems he is good at interacting with them, but unclear on if there's a level of real concern there or just a need to get to the bottom of the class. i will move forward in gathering evidence to support finding the Truth)

one of my favorite parts of this show is when scully recites some medical lore. like yeah he was drowned in sea water because of the stuff in his lungs or whatever. sooo cool babe how u just know that <3

turns out the cop that died 9 years ago was drowned in this other guy's fish tank!!! awful way to go. no need to get the fish involved.

the girl breaks into the only surviving cop from the incident's house and leaves threatening origami and starts blowing stuff up with her mind which is a standard evening around these parts

to get in the house mulder elbows through a window which OUCH! had to hurt. he then tries to talk some sense into a little girl who is about to kill her past life's murderer. she's 3 kills deep already idk what he thinks he's gonna do here.

BUT! she doesn't kill the guy! she just blows up his fish tank instead which was honestly sadder. rip those fish. and she walks away and then turns into a normal child and even starts swimming lessons!

mulder wraps up the case for the episode and it fades to black with a very confused expression on his face. i wrote "he's pondering at their splashing about".

a good episode! i like that scully got to see all the paranormal happenings going on, which usually she manages to miss. mulder is a believer in reincarnation, at least in some cases, so that information we can add to his psychological profile. need to know which course they took at the academy that was "dealing with very creepy children in stressful situations" because maybe we could all apply that into our life.

[popstart]

Am I the only one who feels like the way this fandom talks about female characters is always so like???? Omg girlboss but also a girlfailure I support women’s rights AND wrongs she was robbed!!!! Idk it’s always the same few phrases lol I don’t get it.

OHHHH I AGREE SO HARD💀 seeing the same 3 phrases used to describe the female characters bc they think its a diversity win. ok.

Female character is independent or strong etc -> omg shes suuuuch a girlboss teehee🙈 step on me. other weird and annoying sexual comments bc girlbossery is sexy (or something) and thats the only appeal female characters are allowed to have for a lot of people Female character is kinda cringe sometimes and doesnt succeed at everything -> omg my silly girlfaliure girlloser shes so sillystupid i love her Female character has dimension -> omg??? shes like a girlboss and a girlfaliure at the same time???

ignoring the fact i hate so many things about tacking on the prefix girl to random shit as something that feels like a negative connotation (or something degrading), there is 0 critical thinking people have for female characters and its like. ok man. people come up with 600 random headcanons and backstory elements for every single male character they like but designate the female characters they like to "oh ummm shes a girlboss so i like her😊" AWWEEESOMEEEEE. LOVE TO SEE IT🥴

and to people that dont see that or say that doesnt happen....... it does. i see it with my own eyeballs every damn day. eg; in fanon noah has 8 (or 9? i forget) girlboss sisters and is an expert hacker and speaks 300 languages and knows everything and makes 0 mistakes and is always calculated all the time and has 20 boyfriends while in canon he got kicked out of the opportunity of 100k dollars because he was reading and hates everyone and plays video games all day and is a massive schmuck for 1 single person that being emma. sorry noah fans thats just how it is. headcanons are fine but it gets to the point where its like hey guys what are we doing here.

and ok whatever. say we all stop talking about noah bc god knows he did nothing to deserve it. where do we go from there? the amount of people i see saying they wish there was more f/f in fandom they just dont wanna write it or people that say they wish they wrote f/f more its just too hard has me :I i think it really just proves how little fanon there is for female characters. since generally fanon is what fandom bases its fanfiction and general characterization on and f/f famously contains only women, it makes sense that if its "hard" to write for f/f pairings it means that people just dont care enough about the women to make wide spread fandom interpretations of them.

and it reaaaaaally sucks. total drama has what i consider a pretty good cast of diverse female characters. And sure, a lot of the time the show doesnt do them justice (they were robbed as many many MANY people say) but a lot of them have so much potential and all of them have at least SOME potential. but ofc, due to how theyre treated in the fandom, no one really cares about them outside of them being paired up with men. and even worse, people will just straight ignore them outright a lot of the time because they 'get in the way of their mlm ship' or some bs.

am i saying its inherently misogynistic to write mlm ships? HELLLLLL no. im just saying that the heavy apathy or visceral anger many many many female characters get unless theyre paired up with a man or because they 'get in the way of' a mans love for another man is quite frankly laughable when you consider what actually goes on in the show. this shit was made for kids, these people are kids. its just so weird just how obsessed people can be with a fictional character to the point of these overblown reactions to other characters of the same god damn show

[thatsuccessfulpokemontrainer]

uhuhuh how has sprites design changed and developed over the course of his story? same with beedrill and mari

Ohhhh thank you so much for this RAHH!!

So- sprite is actually two concepts (with two different designs) who got reversed mitosised into one guy, one was a self insert oc from my first full playthrough of pokemon crystal and one was a gym leader oc.

I'm not sharing old art of sprite because honestly looking at anything I've done more than a month ago makes me cringe however- I did an approxmation of "sprites" first design with some fun facts.

Also yes his '!' shirt used to look like that. I actually changed sprites colour scheme because I showed my friend some art and they were like "omg like mcdonalds sprite. is that why hes in the mcdonalds colours." . mortifying. changed immedaitly after.

I dont think I got it across in this version at all but gym leader sprite was supposed to be a punk and had a full patch jacket and stuff.

A lot of sprites design was really open to change when I first started the account, his hair would vary from being over one eye to being over both- his scars would move around since i forgot to make a ref. A lot of stuff just solidified over time the more I drew him the more I figured him out <3. The more I rp'ed as him, the more he became his own character and I got a sense for his likes and dislikes and it impacted his design.

Now drawing him is super duper ingrained into my head and whenever I open a new canvas there is always one of these guys

He also used to have upturned ears, not much to say on those, other than i liked the downturned look more, and changed it in november of last year.

He also kept the blue in his hair after him running away and attempting to dye his hair blue in an effort to disguse himself. He's kept it in the tips since for reasons that he can't explain .

Onto Beedrill! (did some doodles of his old design)

His design changes are really recent because at the start he just wasn't- interesting y'know. just some blonde dude.

But also BD was also first known for sending people meme shirts via pelipper mail so he didnt really need to be more than that. I think the googles and staff helped a little (speaking of which, looking at maybe giving him his staff back sometime)

As his storys become more relevant, I've needed to spice up his design, which I'm happy I did with the funky pokemon esque hair. The fox mask also helps him seem more interesting, but him wearing it isn't common enough to count.

I'm currently doing a redesign of his prosethic finger and another part of his design which i'm excited to share once i'm done.

Now mari!

Not much to say with her old design, her clothes and such were picked out my maris creator and cowriter, and she was supposed to look put together yet ready to fall apart at any moment. She was a real villian, but I've never been unhappy with her design and how it's reflected her personality.

I did like how in maris first apperance, lucians (her bayleefs) leaf was completely seared off along with having severe burns on its body, but by the time she got her blog it was full again as mari has saved up to get a coleus plant implant to regrow the leaf, along with the scars on him fading from her use of burn cream she was sent.

Thank you so much for asking, sorry for rambling haha !!

[storiesofsvu]

it's thursday bitches

spoilers under the cut

Okay, I was organizing fic and writing shit for the first two hours so I couldn’t live react BUT:

That ep of Mothership was phenomenal. Good job team.

Barely paid attention to Toronto, I can’t get on board yet.

Now it’s SVU time.

“happy hunting” ewww… puke in my mouth, that’s disgusting.

Girl WHAT THE FUCK. I don’t care if you JUST met someone at a hostel that night, you don’t fucking leave them alone in a bar when they’re visibly really drunk and with two guys all over her, come on.

Okay, I’m starting a Velasco line tally: 1

OOOO a full scene! Look at our boy go!

Okay yeah he is finally getting some screen time

These boy may not be the actual perps in this situation, but there is no doubting they’re pieces of shit.

This is gonna be one of those cases with the last minute twist that the other girl is the actual perp, right? That’s why there’s no dna?

I don’t like this squad. I understand rollins not coming back/kelli not wanting to come back (hello, she just had a baby, and would you want to go back to a workplace you were fired from full time?) but I will forever be salty about them getting rid of muncy and churlish, they FIT with the squad, they worked through their issues and worked well together. It was refreshing to have the younger generation coming in and being mentored by liv, fin and Bruno. I like the fbi girl, she’s a great actress, but the vibe isn’t the same.

Ohhhh I forgot about the other guy from the beginning lol

Okay but I DO love three powerful older women interrogating pathetic young twenty something boys

LOOOL and this dynamic of good cop bad cop between Bruno and joe?! LOVE IT.

Bruno is fucking killing me rn, this is hilarious. Prime television.

The fact that there is still another hour of television after this? I’m TIRED. And like..grey’s starts soon too so that’s gonna fuck me up.

This episode has fully sold me on wanting Bruno to destroy me. Sir. Pls.

Something that fell into your lap?! Liv…baby… you wanted to take in every abandoned kid at svu over the past 25 years. You were the mom calvin deserved, you wanted to adopt, you have ALWAYS wanted kids/to be a mother, its been part of her character arc literally the entire time the show was on air. Yes, technically noah kinda fell into her lap, but the way it was addressed here did not seem right lol.

Okay, that episode was actually super good compared to the last few weeks!

Don’t trust this captain at ALL. but like, I don’t think we’re supposed to LOL.

“I don’t know… im not his mother.. thank GOD” lol… we love Jet.

I miss bell…is she gonna pop up at some point? We need her sass/banter

The fact that she went out to do this super nice thing by replacing the flowers for jet cause she let her stay with her and THAT’S when she was attacked. Fuck this. Ugh.

The fact that they’re going through so much effort to block the face/voice of this killer means that we know who they are already, right?

BUT also… if the captain hadn’t called jet specifically to get Elliot to his fucking iab appointment she would have been home and able to protect the girl… so like… im still super sus of her

All of these crusty old white men all look alike and I cannot tell the difference between them. Is it the cap’s dad? Brother? Husband? Random poker night connection?

DIVORCE???!!!! I DID NOT SEE THAT COMING.

…okay but now they could be together somewhere down the road? Like.. they really did bomb us with that ship so I haven’t had time to decide if I like it or not but we’ll see how things go.

Okay so the brother AND the dad are both in on it? Maybe the cap isn’t actually sus and will be blindsided?

Meh, that ep wasn’t that good tonight tbh but two outta our aint bad!

[hailieshapedbox]

ohhhh i just realized why i have no desire to sleep even though i in fact am getting tired🤪 my cousin was in psychosis for two weeks on coke off meds and two days ago he took a turn and directed all of his pain and anger at me n was talking shit about me saying vile things (mostly about being lesbian) till 4 am two days ago and till 6am last night. walking in the living room where i was juggling a knife and scraping it on our roomates doors, throwing n stabbing oranges around the house till he got 5250’d in the morning. i hope hes having an alright time in there he really needs help and hopefully rehab and hopefully he finally wants the change that he might not know he needs and actually does want. ya had to vent it out guys thx for reading my run on sentence, im actually tryna lead into a better, personal topic and this plays a part on it so i started there. i uh started recovery in AA 3 days ago and im so fucking happy to finally want to take my life back fully into my own hands and have the drive and ambition that i got easily with alcohol (fucking cop out). ik how this sounds to some people, i went to AA and NA for fun when i was in a grouphome at 17 bc it was another way for us to get off the campus and hangout with the other houses (they called them cottages🏡🕯️🎍☺️). so im very comfortable in that environment, it wasn’t an entirely new concept or energy to me, its been about ten years, but this is my first time coming with a severe desire to change and take back my life into my own hands. ya i had drank in highschool (fuckinn middle school too) but i dont think i ever had to drink and drink and drink till i passout and not be able to stop until im blacked out. that didnt happen till i was 23 in such a chaotic livlihood i couldnt stand any part of my reality, work, home, abusive relationship, i couldnt breathe but i could drink. to the point i was delivering weed from the dispensary drunk. it happened again over the summer for all of the same reasons but this time i had come back to my cousins house to get on my feet and ultimately ended up helping everyone else and their businesses and livlihood more than my own and i was drained out, favor not returned gang. i thought i was gonna stop drinking at the end of summer and i did a few times, a week, two a month but the binges were bad and i was in a lot of dangerous situations recently. everytime i thought i was ready, someone would give me a reason to catch a nice break from the chaos circus life, n who would say no to what sounds like bliss? the last time i drank i didnt even want to, i didnt even wanna go out shit, friend called me crying for help, by the end of the night i needed a relief drink joined got physically hurt (7 minor injuries but some are mid😭), stranded they took off w my phone and wallet in my bag, no sweater at 4am upset in a parking lot not tryna take three hour walk home. a ride from a nice lady w a sketchy guy judging me. how the fuck did it happen again, how easy couldve i prevented this. i had already reached out to a well versed friend that i need to get sober, she said she’d be around in a couple days n we would go. i told her again the next day i needed it even more now and we went that night, which she was wanting to bc she liked that specific meeting. well gang that specific meeting is always gonna be the story to the start of my meeting. i immediately got picked to lead and read through out the meeting on a little stage in front of everyone with the key speaker. as i expected haha, never heard of a lottery meeting like that. i made a home that night, i kept eveyones lottery ticket from the raffle that i picked (and the three left over), i hadnt felt so much support in years, and all at once and a whole room full of people.

i know im only three days in but ive been waiting my whole life to be here.

[bishiglomper]

Pokemon thing went kinda well

They put on a 5 minute how to video an expected us to glean more from it than we did lol

Pretty much only other newbies were a dad and his little kid. Who set up ther shit and went to town.

I'm glad I attempted to put together decks and we've had a few practices... because we were expected to go to town too. It was gonna be me and nephew but I wasn't feeling it, I'd rather watch if someone was going to help guide. So bro played against him.

Someone did see us struggling and helped us set up. Then tried to coach nephew. Then nephew decided he was too adhd to sit and she took over. So it was her and bro. So bro learned how to play, he won, so he enjoyed it.

The nephews deck payout was abysmal. I suck at building them, I really do lmao

The lady said I should ask the guy coaching the other kid to help me make a deck. I know that guy from all over. Anime stores, the pokemon leagues. Cousins childhood BFF.

I asked for when he'd next be available (nephew was itching to flee) and I guess in a conversation RIGHT THERE, they were gonna try to do this again next weekend as a pokemon group. Like. Alright. Cool. Hopefully they'll get more kids.

In other news I spent the whole time next to this one chick, the one who coached and played for nephew. I kind of thought she was the lady i talked to last time? The wife other owner? Only that lady had a slightly intimidating aura whereas this one didn't make me nervous.

It was not the same woman. Though bro backed me up thinking they looked similar. Sigh. I don't know if its face blindness or the fact I just don't look at people's faces. 👉👈💦 oof. So I never got her name

What happened was "so pokemon next week, same time?"

It turned to the girl, "and crochet tomorrow?"

"Oh! Uh, yeah, just let me know when."

"Huh? I thought we set a time, noon? That's what the group thing said." She was confused and flustered

That's about when the owner as like "you probably talked to my wife"

Ohhhh probably. "So yeah, tomorrow at noon!" Aaaaaaaah should have asked her name lmao

Hopefully she'll go, I liked her pffft

If I weren't so pressured to leave i would have talked to her for another minute, maybe actually introduce ourselves, ughhh 🙈

Could have been better. Could have been a lot worse lol hopefully tomorrow is better. Sitting around crocheting is definitely a more conversationally active situation.

[llycaons]

ep43 (3/3): you already know who tf it is!!!! single surviving female character of cql 2019!!!

I can't believe that's their hiding place. I mean, it worked, but it seems kind of flimsy

wwx being sleepy is another piece of evidence people like to point to and while I don't think they slept together I can't think of a good reason for him to be so sleep either. maybe he was just making talismans or talking or something

I wonder if it galls wwx a little that nobody will ever suspect lwj the way they suspect wwx. nah, he loves it. no envies

so this is kind of foolish of jgy no? if he knows that wwx is hiding here, and he accuses wwx of doing something he couldn't do from CR, then obviously lxc will know it was jgy and not wwx who is a liar. then again I suppose it's not like jgy has much of a choice. if lxc is on wwx's side, he's on wwx's side

OMINOUS???

yeah lxc is a little disturbed by the time jgy leaves. hmm was that a threat, jgy?

the hanshi is so well decorated wow gorgeous

I sincerely hope he didn't keep her harnessed and saddled this entire time

lwj so gentle with the rabbits and wwx shoving his fingers in and making 5-year-old noises. sir

I never liked the readings that wwx is oblivious but it's like, really? you have NO idea why you're not afraid? well, I suppose he's not the most introspective guy

he does envy lwj one thing, it seems...

this is such a charming aspect of lwj's character. small animals love him and he is gentle with children

this is so classic for wangxian. ugh. donkey trip >>>>

ohhhh wwx getting closer!

lwj letting slip 1 (one) piece of information about The Song in 20 years: I've said too much

now THIS is cute. wwx suggesting silly romantic names after they get together was a thing in the book that I liked a lot. it could function the same way here, but I like it more as a confession mechanism, at least initially. that seems to be more of its role

anyway YOU KNOW WHO'S HERE!!!! MISS LUO QINGYANG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

aww baby mm is cute. actually I've never looked closely at mr. mm and he's kind of hot. good for her! I liked wq/mm in theory but I am fond of her normie husband

this might be a heavy-handed and clumsy plot point, but seeing wwx and lwj nod in approval of a five-year old is kind of funny

hiiii mianmian 😍

oh, you idiot

sheeeeee 🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰

in fairness he's only met her like once but this line is so funny. sir you threw yourself in front of a branding iron for her

personal highlights: where to start? this episode felt like a present just for me. I've been a little worried that my lack of interest in some of the recent episodes indicated I'm fully over it, but this one proved me wrong. it's powerful stuff, 43. and lbr some of the postres episodes ARE duds

lxc's description of jgy. he just sounds really great

the crickets around the jingshi

jgy's evil little over-the-shoulder jab at lwj. oohh that got me good

everything about the punishment scene 😍 peak romance

little lwj kneeling in the snow because he doesn't understand the only adult who ever gave him unconditional love is dead and he'll never see her again

'waiting for the one to open the door'

the entire domestic scene in the jingshi when lwj has his hair down and wwx is so reluctant to come inside and then talks through some things and then hears wuji and comes inside...the symbolism is so good

wwx suggesting he could name The Song

lxc's alarmed look after jgy's subtle threat

mm's hot husband

[miraculouscontent]

It’s heeeeere! Another summasalt, this time with nearly twice the length of the first one!

(Turns out that not having caffeine doesn’t help me talk any slower.)

Script below:

Anonymous asked:

Thoughts on Rocketear?

Can you Rocketear the newest episode apart with your salt, my beloved Salt Queen?

Penny for your thoughts on Rocketear?

Aw, anon! You can have that for free! I'm a generous goddess.

"Rocketear" begins with Chat Noir and Carapace - just Carapace, really - holding back a pack of what I presume to be the physical manifestation of the writing staff's age, or at least a representation of how behind the times the writing seems.

Just as the dinosaurs break through Shellter. Ladybug shows up with the scientist who revived the dinosaurs in the first place and said scientist uses a whistle to calm the dinosaurs down. There's also a line from Bob Roth about putting the dinosaurs in a theme park to make money and I know what it's referencing but it's so incredibly random that it doesn't really come off as a proper joke.

Carapace was notably sad right after battle, but insisted that he was fine when Ladybug asked. Rena, sporting a... - I would like to say "new design" but it's a recolor in every sense of the word - is hiding behind part of a building and smiles after the heroes before walking off. Ladybug takes Nino's miraculous back but sees that he's still upset and asks him again what's wrong. Nino asks where Alya was and Ladybug claims that she only needed Carapace for the job, which cheers him up but only until Ladybug is already gone.

Mm, I guess Nino and Adrien relate in heroism not being enough for them unless they have their respective love interest to flirt with.

Also, I know this is an obvious set-up, but the show can't tell me that Ladybug just always brought Nino and Alya whenever she needed one of them. Season 3 required her to go to Master Fu to get the miraculouses, and unless she already knew that Nino and Alya would be in the same location - which, okay, the show does basically shove the two of them together whenever Nino is onscreen, fair, if two characters are in a relationship in this show then it's weird for them to NOT be with that person - but it just seems like a gamble, not to mention proof to Shadow Moth that the two are close if Ladybug constantly brings both of them.

Anyway, Ladybug goes into the sewer and asks Rena if she's seen any sign of Shadow Moth or his traps. Rena didn't see anything and they de-transform. Marinette is about to leave when she thinks of something, but Alya assumes it's about her new look, which was apparently not voluntary on her part and the suit automatically adapted to Alya's new role as Rena Furtive, which she has now named it as.

Marinette reminds her that this is supposed to be a secret and that they agreed that the fox has no owner. When Alya is evasive about whether she told Nino that she won't be Rena anymore, Marinette stresses that everyone needs to believe that Alya won't be using a miraculous anymore so that she can remain an undercover spy.

What's the point in changing the look if you're not going to show yourself anyway? I mean, insurance, I guess, but still.

Alya, exasperated, parrots what Marinette has apparently told her before: that she helps Ladybug with Mirage in case Shadow Moth tries to follow her so Rena can follow him instead. Marinette stresses the situation again and Alya tries to get Marinette to agree on her telling Nino that she's Rena Furtive, but Marinette refuses.

At Marinette's house, Alya talks further and explains that she doesn't know if she can lie to Nino since they don't keep any secrets--Alya, babe, you kept Rena Rouge from him and didn't tell him that you knew he was Carapace until Ladybug was forced to give you your miraculouses at the same time. I don't wanna hear it.

Marinette states that it's too late for that and also not technically a lie, but Alya gets upset and says that Nino will never trust her again if he finds out that she kept something from him. Marinette brings up how she had to keep secrets from Alya too, but they're interrupted by Tom appearing and wanting to play games with them. Marinette makes an excuse about homework that she's repeated many times, as Tom comments that the teachers give her too much. After Tom is kicked out - hang on, lemme just... - Marinette uses the moment to show Alya that she's lied to her family a lot and hasn't played games with her father in months. She states that there's no other option as they have to protect their identities, and Alya agrees to talk to Nino.

In Alya's room - I just presume at this point that Nino's house doesn't exist and Chris is an illusion - Alya tells Nino that they need to talk, but stammers and states that it's hard to talk about. Nino thinks that she wants to break up with him, but Alya assures that she loves him. She finally gets to the cover story that Rena herself made up in "Sentibubbler" and Nino understands, sad that she won't be around anymore but agreeing if it's what Ladybug thinks is best.

Is it weird that Nino respects Ladybug's wishes more than Alya does?

Nino hugs her and is confused by why Alya was nervous to tell him, as she can tell him anything and nothing will change their relationship. Alya feels guilty and hugs back, murmuring about how they don't have any secrets; that's not what Nino said, but sure, push this plot to its already predictable conclusion. I mean, I thought it was vaguely sweet that Nino switched to seriousness immediately when Alya said that she wanted to talk, but how am I supposed to be invested in this couple when their dynamic boils down to "STRONG, INDEPENDANT WOMAN who wears the pants in the relationship because her boyfriend is portrayed as a wimpy coward"? Like, the show constantly dragged Nino down to make Alya look "powerful" by comparison, and then when it comes to characters like Marinette, we get a girl who works very well outside of her relationship with her endgame love interest.

It's the fakest form of "girl power," dragging guys down to raise girls up or actually making a strong girl character but having her love interest be a weakness that creates flaws in her that weren't there originally and having that love interest be who she's "destined for."

I'm rambling, sorry.

In class, Marinette assures Alya that she did the right thing and Alya agrees. As they're leaving school, Marinette talks about how their "night walks" start soon, and Alya non-subtly talks about how Rena Furtive will be on the lookout while Ladybug and Chat Noir patrol. She stops, however, as gets excited about some pictures she took of herself as Rena Furtive, which has a lot of details that Marinette hasn't seen. I don't know whether to groan at what I just heard or remind everyone that Rena Furtive is literally just a recolor and therefore this is the writers patting themselves on the back for this design, so let's just move on.

Alya then shows Marinette her phone--AUGH, MY EYES--and suggests making a poll on her Ladyblog so people can vote for their favorite Rena design. Marinette has to stress again that Rena Furtive is supposed to be a spy and thus invisible, which Alya admits that she forgot about.

Okay, I've been holding off on talking about this, but now seems like the best time to bring it up. Alya has been a trash friend as well as a trash confidant, and her role as Rena Rouge boiled down to, "it was convenient for her to be the fox at the time it was needed." She's not particularly stealthy like one would expect of a fox, and she was easily one of the worst candidates to be told Marinette's big secret. I'll get more into this later, but I have to stress that Alya has treated Marinette no differently since learning of Marinette's identity and has already gone against Marinette's orders once before at the time of this episode airing. Episodes are constantly torn between validating their decision to have Marinette tell Alya, having Marinette be worried about the decision while the show considers her to be ridiculous for it, and then having Alya either consider or make choices that clearly don't gel well with what's good for her role. Much like Marinette, she lacks a sense of self-control and--wow, a female character who's impulsive, never seen that stereotype before.

Point being, "Sentibubbler" stressed over and over that Alya was the right choice and deserved to be both the permanent fox and the understudy for guardian, but then we have "Rocketear" here where Alya is making basic emotionally-driven errors that I'm not even remotely sympathetic to when Marinette has gone through so much worse over the course of three+ seasons.

*sigh*

Alya laments that it's hard to find new content for the Ladyblog - ah, yes, tell me more about your struggles, Alya - but figures that at least she can post stuff about Chat Noir instead of--I don't know--making fake Ladybug theories to lead people off Marinette's trail. Marinette says that it's a great idea, though Alya still doesn't look too happy. The scene then rewinds to a little bit to show a different point of view, this time with Adrien and Nino. Wait, this feels familiar, wasn't there another episode that did something like--ohhhh no, this is going to hurt.

After saying good-bye to Adrien - something I wish I could do every time he's mentioned or on-screen - Nino catches the bit of conversation where Alya talks about the Ladyblog. Nino talks as if Marinette isn't there and asks Alya out to the movies because Marinette is chopped liver and this is about Alya and how sad she is, guys.

Wow, she's turning into Adrien faster and faster.

Alya hesitates, but Marinette assures her that there's still time. Alya excitedly runs off with Nino and they watch what I presume are previews given the narrator, featuring recycled footage from the Ladybug PV. Nino is upset because Rena is mentioned but not Carapace, and the preview features Rena telling Chat Noir to forget Ladybug because it's Chat and Rena herself who are trulu made for each other.

I don't know what's funnier; the complete lack of self-awareness or the suggestion that a biracial couple would exist in this show outside of a special that gives them maybe a minute of screentime and acts more like suggestive canon anyway. I think I might've been too generous with that line about dinosaurs.

Nino is offended by the preview and Alya brushes off his comments, stating that it's just a cartoon and it's made to entertain people, though Nino himself is certainly not entertained. Can't say I entirely blame him considering that Alya doesn't really try to say anything substantial or even agree with him. No cuddling or reassuring kisses, she just gets slightly sad and turns to her phone for a bit.

After the movie, Nino is cheered back up again until he catches Alya on her phone once more. He offers to take her home, but she's distracted, and he comments that what she showed to Marinette looked pretty nice; I don't know because they didn't show it. Nino asks what it was and Alya evades the question, stating that her battery is running out. Nino is suspicious, but spots Andre's ice cream cart and the two head over there. Andre calls them his favorite couple and asks what they want, but Alya sees Ladybug gesturing for her and has to run off, giving Nino a cheek kiss as she goes which feels like too little too late at this point.

Nino catches some conveniently-placed kids arguing over who Chat Noir loves, but they settle on the fact that girls in general love Chat Noir. Nino is then seen at the Seine watching the Ladyblog's latest video, where Alya is talking up how amazing Chat Noir is. I hate to stop every five seconds to complain - okay, actually I don't - but I presume this video must've been made after the movie since Nino seems like the type who would actively follow his girlfriend's blog, yet not only is this video perfectly set up to echo the kids and the movie preview, but Alya - despite apparently caring about her boyfriend soooo much that she kept trying to convince Marinette to bend the rules - didn't even try to warn Nino or text him so he doesn't take it too seriously. It's like "Sentibubbler" with the conflicting messages about identity rules; Alya cares about her boyfriend but both isn't thinking about how he'll take the things she says and apparently doesn't know him well enough to realize that he wouldn't be mad over her keeping a secret that she was told to keep. I already talked about how they play up Nino to be the emotionally weaker one of the relationship, but then they don't have Alya try to cover or make up for that. She's been acting very much not like Alya - you know, the one who in "Sapotis" practically bragged about how great she'd be at covering for Ladybug - with her stutters and weak excuses, so I can't completely blame Nino for being upset after everything that's happened when he sees the writers projecting onto Alya as she talks about how Chat Noir is brave and funny and cute and showing all these images of him as well. I don't agree with all of his actions, but--oh yeah, speaking of which--

Nino calls Adrien and is talking to him about how Alya must be in love with someone else. Adrien dismisses the idea, as Alya and Nino are together basically all the time, and asks who she could possibly be in love with. When Nino suggests that it's Chat Noir, Adrien laughs and jokes about it being Fang instead. Nino points out the video but Adrien did see it but is overall unphased and convinced that it means nothing. Nino says that he'll find proof and hangs up, but Adrien is certain he'll find nothing. Plagg comments that Nino will find someone because Plagg's charisma has definitely contaminated Adrien.

Ugh.

Adrien expresses concern that he put on the cat's charm too much and accidentally made Alya fall for him, and decides to visit Alya as Chat Noir to be sure.

Meanwhile, we get a reference to film noirs as Nino narrates. That's the second blatant reference this episode and now I feel like they wrote this script while doing a movie marathon.

Chat Noir arrives at Alya's house and Trixx hides before Alya opens the curtains to reveal her surprise guest. Nino is nearby watching the scene with his phone as Alya wonders aloud if something's wrong. Chat assures that everything's fine, but brings up the video she posted. He insists that it made him happy, but points out that she's been following him and Ladybug since the beginning and that they know each other much better due to everything that's happened. He has some conveniently-worded dialog as he starts to say that he hopes something's just an illusion and Alya gets worried that he's about to bring up Rena. Chat continues and clarifies that he wonders if she started to feel something for him, though adds that he understands because just look at him.

UGGGGH.

Chat clarifies by making a heart with his hands, which Nino sees. Alya laughs at this gesture and states that she has a boyfriend, doing the same heart gesture and suggesting that her love for Nino is even more than that. Chat Noir apologizes - hm, I didn't know he had the capacity to do that - and hugs Alya, saying that he was just confused.

An absolutely unnecessary hug for two people who, at least in terms of their current selves, have had very little screentime together, but this is also the show where making eye contact basically means your friends and it's all just to push the plot along so Nino inteprets that Alya is in love with Chat Noir, so whatever I guess.

Alya states that Nino is far more irresistable than Chat, then adds that she doesn't even know his secret identity, and she'd never fall in love with someone she doesn't know. Nino then runs away upset and the scene cuts away to the next day where--

Wait, wait, wait, hang on a second. Two things right off the bat there.

First off, we're just gonna sidle past that "wouldn't fall in love with someone you don't know the identity of" while ignoring the existence of the love square? Not even Chat thinking about how he doesn't know Ladybug's identity and trying to excuse that he doesn't have to? This guy is that certain of their relationship?

Secondly, Nino is practically sobbing and Shadow Moth doesn't take this as his opportunity? Same guy who akumatized Mr. Pigeon 72 times and has akumatized Gigantitan more than once? What is this pacing???

But--alright, so Adrien comes into school and sees Nino, still dressed up in his detective gear, which gets ignored completely as Adrien goes to tell him about Chat Noir and Alya. Because the show doesn't know how Adrien would convey this within reason, Nino interrupts him, taking him down into the lower part of the school where he has a desk and chairs set up. Adrien goes to ask when Nino had time to do this, but Nino slams his hand on the desk to cut him off. Nino presents the evidence he took and they go back and forth, likewise with Adrien turning off the background music while Nino turns it back on. Adrien insists that it's a misunderstanding, but pleads innocent when Nino asks how he knows. Adrien states that Alya is just a superhero fan and that she and Chat Noir have nothing in common.

Again, the complete lack of self-awareness is astonishing.

Adrien repeats what Alya said about secret identities and how she wouldn't fall for someone she doesn't know - they're really ignoring this, aren't they? - and continues hitting Nino's soft spots about how unlikely it is until Nino decides to tell Adrien something he's not supposed to.

He tells Adrien, not only that Alya is Rena Rouge, but that he's Carapace. Adrien goes through a range of emotions beyond sAD for once, shocked at the fact that they know each other's identities. Nino states that they don't keep secrets from each other, except now Alya is with Chat Noir. Adrien still doesn't understand and brings up how secret identities have to be protected, or else Nino wouldn't have told him because Ladybug wouldn't agree to it.

Oh, here we go. So that's why they waited.

Nino states that it was Ladybug herself who gave them their miraculouses at the same time; not giving the reason why, of course, nor pointing out that they're temporary heroes so there's understandably some leeway. Adrien is having a moment, but manages to bring the subject back to Alya and Chat Noir, who he still doesn't think are a thing. Nino argues that it's because Adrien doesn't know Chat Noir, but he does because he's Carapace and knows how Chat Noir acts. He says that it's all flowers and confessions when Ladybug appears, but he gets rejected because Ladybug thinks that he's annoying, and she's right. He adds that Chat flirts with Rena Rouge and that's all that needs to happen, with Chat stepping in on the first mission Carapace lost in. Nino laments the loss of the love of his life and wishes to shut Chat Noir up forever; we all do, Nino, we all do. Shadow Moth finally steps in with - oh, less than eight minutes left in the episode, yikes - and Nino is akumatized into Rocketear.

Rocketear rejects Adrien's pleas to stop, insisting that Chat Noir is who he's after, not Adrien, and Adrien transforms in sad fashion despite Plagg's reminder of who Rocketear is after. Alya, meanwhile, is in the art club with Marinette - wait, since when was Alya in the art club - telling Marinette about how Chat Noir thought she was into him due to the video, which Marinette groans at. There's an earthquake and they peek outside to see Rocketear firing his tears at Chat Noir, shouting that he stole Alya from him. Chat Noir tries to tell him otherwise, but Rocketear won't listen.

Alya groans at Nino doing this, then she and Marinette set off to find a place to transform. They conveniently go to the same place Adrien and Nino were, so they see the desk that Nino had set up.

Genuine question, how seriously does this episode want me to take itself, because now when I recount all the unnecessary love square drama in my head - because you know that's where this is going - I'm going to have to think, "Nino, dressed in a detective outfit, ripped off his fake mustache and told Adrien both his and Rena's identities, and also that Ladybug was totally cool with it and thinks that Chat Noir is annoying."

Gettin' two completely different vibes here. The episode clearly wants to be important but it doesn't take itself seriously either, which it totally could while including enough jokes to keep things light. Instead, I'm just left scratching my head and wondering what tone they're going for.

Marinette finds Nino's phone on the desk - I'm calling continuity error on that one because he at no point put it on the desk, at least not on-screen - and she questions Alya on the video she sees. Alya insists that nothing happened, apparently completely unphased by her boyfriend having spied on her, and says that he wouldn't have misunderstood if he'd heard the actual conversation.

The two transform and Ladybug immediately uses Lucky Charm, receiving a projector. Ladybug is clueless and Rena Furtive suggests creating an imaginary movie like Nino. Ladybug gets an idea, remembering Alya's earlier comments, and Rena confirms that she remembers every word of it.

Aaaaand, just like that, all of the tension has been completely sucked away. You know, "Backwarder" was a trash episode, but at least when Ladybug was showing every step of her plan, she didn't tell us what it was.

Meanwhile, Rocketear and Chat Noir are still arguing--I started zoning out at hearing the same thing over and over again at this point, so I just presume they were fighting over who does stuff behind their love interest's backs better; I don't think they came to an agreement but they're both losers anyway.

Chat Noir says that he'll prove his innocence, tossing his baton aside to show him giving up, but Rocketear points out that it proves nothing and strikes Chat Noir with his tears.

Our endgame love interest, everyone. Straight As yet about as smart as a sack of bricks, and that at least won't flirt with anyone non-consensually.

Chat Noir makes a point that he doesn't want to hurt Rocketear, and Shadow Moth tells Rocketear to take his miraculous before finishing him. Chat Noir can only weakly tell him not to before Ladybug snags Rocketear's wrist and diverts the shot. Ladybug explains to Rocketear about the projector and how it'll let him hear the audio of the recording he took. She adds that she doesn't know what Chat said, but she trusts him.

Marinette, I'm sorry, I feel so bad for you.

Ladybug turns on the projector and Rocketear relaxes at actually hearing what was going on. Rena then de-transforms and hurries out to meet with Rocketear, hugging him as Rocketear apologizes for doubting her. Alya also kinda sorta apologizes in a way I don't understand and Rocketear then breaks his akumatization, very casually, all on his own.

Yeah, just--casually, in a matter of seconds in fact. You know, it's really sad when people resisting akumatizations are more tense and emotionally compelling than them breaking them. This is twice in one season now and has zero impact considering that Nino's reason for being akumatized was already taken care of so he had no reason to stay akumatized anyway. Him breaking his own object to release the akuma would've at least been different, but instead it's just a repeat of what Alya went through with even less tension considering that Alya's wasn't even that good in the first place, relying on her relationship to Ladybug rather than who she knew to be her best friend.

Moving on, Ladybug captures the akuma and uses Miraculous Ladybug to bring everything back to normal. Shadow Moth monologues about how love and secrets don't go well together and he's sure that she has a lot and I'll talk about this later.

Ladybug hands over the magical charm, which Nino takes but insists that he won't need it, as he'll never let Shadow Moth use his love to manipulate him again. Plenty of other things to get akumatized over, but they gave the supposedly ace character a robot to help him stick out and also gave the supposedly aro character a miraculous back in season one to give her more importance. If characters aren't in love then they need something to ceompensate for it.

Nino apologizes to Chat Noir for being wrong and Chat Noir assures him that everyone has doubts, even him. He gets sad and Ladybug asks him what's wrong, but he insists that he's fine - officially throwing away his right to be upset at her later as far as I'm concerned - and they do their usual fist buuuuu--

...Really?

Everyone then splits up and Chat Noir sulks by himself instead of--you know, talking to Ladybug, or asking her anything, or making any sort of excuse for her because that would mean he actually has faith in her and understands that their partnership is different from temporary heroes, even if the excuse was as basic as her wanting to protect him more than the others because he would be that egotistical if they didn't want to stretch out this unnecessary drama.

Later on, Adrien is staring at a picture on the Ladyblog that might be a metaphor for the show considering how "in the foreground" Chat Noir and Rena are.

Adrien vents about Ladybug giving miraculouses to Alya and Nino, but Plagg states that she's the guardian. Adrien clarifies that he's referring to Alya and Nino knowing each other's identities, but Plagg doesn't see the issue. Adrien gets huffy and asks why the rule exists for LadyNoir but not Ninya, but Plagg again points out that she's the guardian, so she makes the rules, though obviously he uses cheese metaphors to convey it.

Okay, Plagg is only, like--half-right because he doesn't have all the information. If you don't mind me rambling for a bit, I'm on the fence here because, on one hand--yes, I agree that Marinette should be allowed to make her own rules, and I often do that in my writing because I think she should be permitted leeway in order to let herself be happy, but on the other hand, it's not technically her rule, as she had to let Alya and Nino in on their identities back in the Season 2 finale, so Fu was still around for a season. She wasn't even guardian yet!

Now, presumably so the fandom could blame Marinette if anything happened, Marinette never discussed this with Fu on-screen, so I can't say whether or not Fu knew, but I feel like he must've since Marinette had to have told him the heroes' identities off-screen, given "Party Crasher," and thus I imagine that Marinette would tell Fu everything that happened, which is consistent with what she does on-screen even if she'd keep things from him for a little while.

"Furious Fu" had also established that not even Master Fu followed rules completely, meaning that Marinette is in this awkward spot of mostly following what Fu taught her, which aren't all guardian rules anyway, and having to break the rules on occasion for various purposes. I can't say what Fu approved of and what he didn't, because episodes spend so much time on the love square that they forget about Marinette as a person and how she interacts with everyone else. From an emotional standpoint, I can't blame Marinette for not revoking the miraculouses of people whose identities get discovered because of her, as I imagine she feels guilty and it probably doesn't seem fair to force them into another miraculous or have them be entirely without one because of a mistake that she made, meaning that someone needs to be throwing a lot of red flags for Marinette to be through with them.

Though obviously, from the show's standpoint, it's just an excuse to not make new models, but I complained about that enough in "Sentibubbler" and this episode even went out of its way to design a detective model for Nino while spraypainting Alya's bodysuit in the same breath, so this is the world we live in.

Anyway, Marinette is essentially in this position where she still has Fu's rules hovering over her, but she's also trying to step out on her own and make her own decisions to varying degrees of success or failure depending on your point of view. Tikki--wait, no, bad idea--Su-Han then, could easily give input on these things, perhaps with Marinette discussing a modern day set of rules for someone her age and going back and forth with Su-Han on what the right choices to make are, finding something that's comfortable but within a realm of predictable control. Su-Han was okay with some rules being broken after seeing how Ladybug handled them and they could've easily made this episode about that instead, but instead, we get rules being set and then being broken on a writer's whim.

Which now brings us to the end of the episode, where Marinette is on the phone with Alya and apologizes for causing trouble between her and Nino. Alya tells her not to worry and she'll fix things - you know, those things that, to Marinette's knowledge, have already been fixed - and asks if Marinette trusts her. Marinette does, and Alya hangs up in order to face Nino.

Yeah, that feeling of dread in your stomach? That means you know how predictable the writing is and what's about to happen, good for you.

Alya explains that she has to tell Nino something and he's worried, this time trying to sheepishly break the tension. She explains that she's still Rena Rouge, much to Nino's shock, and adds that she's in hiding, which is why Ladybug didn't want her to tell anyone. Nino asks why she's telling him if she's not supposed to tell anyone - proving my point from a while back that he wouldn't have been upset had she kept it a secret - then asks if Ladybug agreed with it.

I want to give him a pat on the back for considering Ladybug, but he didn't even tell her when he had the chance that Adrien knows his identity now, so I'm just beaten down at this point.

Instead of answering the question directly, Alya says that she can't hide her identity from him because she loves him and they don't have secrets.

You know, like Nino telling Adrien about Rena's identity, or Alya saying specifically that she's a permanent holder, which I'm sure both of them will confess to since they said that they don't have--aaaaand the episode ends on happy triumphant music, okay.

I mean, I guess Alya at least didn't tell him that Marinette was Ladybug, but that is such a low bar and not even remotely worthy of congratulations when Alya told Nino the specific thing that Marinette told Alya not to tell; the thing that they had agreed on.

Nino wasn't upset anymore. He won't be getting akumatized either. Alya endured the supposed hardship of being a permanent fox holder for four episodes before breaking down and telling her boyfriend. Even her excuse doesn't hold any water because, again, they're both still technically keeping a secret, particularly Alya who knows Marinette's identity as Ladybug. The episode also apparently forgets that Alya and Marinette's friendship must not be as strong by her logic of telling Nino specifically everything, as Alya kept Rena Rouge a secret from Marinette for all of Season 3, but tells Nino about continuing to be Rena Rouge in Season 4. Boyfriends before BFFs without explicitly saying it, or to be more specific, whatever screws Marinette over the most, because that's what this comes down to, made worse by "Optigami" where Marinette told Alya that she'd tell her everything and I guess that doesn't go both ways.

"Sentibubbler" had Alya stress that no one would ever know. She promised Marinette and told Marinette to trust her, and the episode spent its entire running time talking her up and assuring Marinette that she was the right choice, even considering Marinette ridiculous for worrying when Alya had done something without Marinette's permission the episode right before it. Then, three episodes after "Sentibubbler," when Marinette is finally comfortable and trusts Alya completely, Alya betrays that trust. Nino betrayed that trust, knowing he wasn't supposed to do so but telling Adrien his and Rena's identity anyway, because he was losing an argument and needed to PROVE something.

Marinette gives them an inch and they take a mile. Marinette bent the rules so that they could continue to have the miraculous they'd started with and they disrespected her because it was hard for like a day.

And if this bites them back, it won't reflect poorly on them, it'll reflect poorly on Marinette.

It's not like Alya just overrode Marinette. She didn't go, "Hey, I'm telling Nino, I'm sorry," or tried her hardest to go back and forth with Marinette until they both agreed. No, she did what she told Marinette she wouldn't do without saying a word to her, because LOVE and SEEEECRETS.

And this only applies to her, of course, because don't think I didn't notice the parallels between this episode and "Truth," because WOW.

Episode begins with Marinette hoping for something and it blows up in her face? A date at the cinema that ends on a sour note? Plot-centric couple trying to get Andre's ice cream and the female with a secret needing to leave in a hurry? Boyfriend character getting akumatized over their girlfriend's secret? Boyfriend assumes/suggests that the girlfriend's secret involves Aaaaaadrien - or his alter-ego in "Rocketear"'s case - and the episode hints as much to him even though he's completely wrong? Akuma's colors are blue and black? THE BRIDGE?

But, ahhh, little difference, here and there, y'know, like how Marinette was forced to break up with her boyfriend while Alya got to keep hers, and Nino got to have long talks with Alya while Luka got little to nothing with Marinette.

Because do note that Alya, while trying to convince Marinette and talk to Nino about not keeping secrets, at no point suggests that Marinette deserves to be happy and deserves to have a boyfriend and that Marinette should be allowed to tell Luka her secret so they can get back together, so you have Alya here selfishly prioritizing her relationship with Nino while making no comment about Marinette's relationship, essentially asking Marinette to allow her what Marinette herself didn't have the luxury of, and Alya knows this because Marinette told her. It is both incredibly insensitive of Alya and incredibly insulting of the show to make so many parallels between this episode and "Truth" just to have everything crash down for Marinette because she's Marinette while everything goes well for Alya and Nino because they're not Marinette.

We've talked before about the formulas that are literally baked into the show, and one of those is how Marinette makes a mistake in every episode and has to learn from it. What that mistake is in this episode, I don't know, but considering that she apologizes for Alya and Nino's problems, I guess the show blames her for what they themselves had taught her.

Point being, there's a clear karma system in place, but it only applies to Marinette, and forcing her to mess up in every episode means that she is literally not allowed to be with Luka because had she been able to clear things up between them, he would've eagerly accepted her and they could've been happy. It'd be too difficult for her to mess up when Luka doesn't put mountains of pressure and expectations on her like everyone else. Factor that in with how she can be herself around him and it leads to situation that are too difficult for her to screw up in because her mistakes - more often than not - center around Adrien or her role as guardian.

And because another rule in the show is to bring up Adrien so they don't "lose him for too long," she can't avoid bringing him up either. If he's not in the plot, he has to be mentioned, leaving Marinette in a lose-lose situation that she'll never be free from.

So, let me just get this straight then:

The guy who spied on his girlfriend instead of talking to her about his assumptions gets to keep his girlfriend, not because he realized it was wrong regardless of whether he was correct or not, but because the situation had been cleared up for him, yet the guy who actively resisted his akumatization, saddened by his girlfriend's secrets but wanting her to share them when she was ready, gets broken up with and tossed to the wayside because he's not a rich blond boy who got a miraculous because he happened to be within the twenty meters of space where Fu was searching for new holders?

Meanwhile, the girlfriend who has gone against the wishes and insistence of her best friend - guardian of the miraculouses, by the way, so she calls the shots, something that Alya herself said in "Optigami" BEFORE GOING ON TO DO HER OWN THING IN THE SAME EPISODE AND BEING REWARDED FOR IT - is allowed to go against the wishes and insistence of her best friend again for the sake of "all love, no secrets" with her boyfriend and so she can have the happy ending she wants, yet the girl who was chosen for a miraculous without her consent, forced to screw up and talk about a random boy who doesn't even go out of his way to spend time with her, treated like absolute trash by writers who find humor in her misery, and is the only one to receive overly harsh and long-lasting consequences for her actions while also covering up and forgiving the actions of others within the episode where they do it...

doesn't get her happy ending, and won't ever get her happy ending. That thing Shadow Moth said about love and secrets not going well together? Yeah, only goes as far as the writers want it to, because both Nino and Alya still have secrets, and some of the ones they did tell each other were forced by someone else and kept until that very moment. This idea that people in love have to tell each other everything and that it makes a relationship stronger makes me immensely uncomfortable, and that lesson is also in "Guiltrip."

People should be allowed their secrets, and obviously there are exceptions for things that are being hidden with malicious intent, but being essentially forced to share everything or risk not having a "full and complete" relationship is stifling and sounds like it'd only cause stress.

This episode sucks. It furthers and confirms everything I've already thought about the show, Nino's screentime continues to be dependent on Adrien, Alya, or both, there are pointless references that completely take me out of the experience, and the utter betrayal from Alya and supposed message of the episode just reminds me that Marinette is inevitably going to be stuck with a guy who didn't even DO anything in this episode and is going to let himself stew instead of asking for any sort of clarifications from someone he apparently trusts so much.

So the takeaway is that Marinette's life is awful, she'll be forced to apologize for rules that she didn't even come up with herself, her best friend will walk all over her for the sake of her relationship with a guy - not even for the sake, really, they were going to be fine, it was more for HER personal comfort if anything - and the guy who actually makes Marinette happy and could've known her identity instead BECAUSE HE AT LEAST DIDN'T HAVE A TRACK RECORD OF SPILLING HER SECRETS gets treated in the exact same way that she does; like nothing, just something to abuse unfairly.

What a waste of an episode.

[strawberryspence]

fifth time's a charm

Fluff | Spencer Reid x FEM! Reader

Summary: Penelope just wants Spencer to be happy. So, she sets him up on various of dates, each one ending in a disaster.

Word Count: 2,38k

Warnings: mention of bi!spencer, s12-s15 arcs, some sexual innuendos, mention of threesome, kinks, and sex, just overall bad dates, pregnancy, a few swear words.

Writer’s Note: Hello! I wrote this one for @spencers-dria and @reidsbookclub! Thank you for liking my idea! I really just went crazy with this one. It's just a cute meet cute, so I hope you guys find this funny and fluffy! <3

Gif of is mine! Look at that glorious hair 😆 Tumblr stop ruining the quality!

Penelope basically grew up with Spencer. They were both young when they first met and watching Spencer grow and go through all the shit and trauma he has gone through is chipping away at Penelope.

After the whole Cat Adams fiasco, Spencer’s relationship with Max ends a week after that, Spencer understands that not everyone can handle a relationship with someone like him, especially the fact that her family was put into danger because of him.

A month after the break up, Penelope finally decided that enough is enough and that she’s going to set Spencer up with as many people as possible until he meets someone who will fit him.

Spencer, on the other hand, can’t say no to the ever positive and cheery Penelope Garcia. In his heart he knows that Penelope just wants him to be happy, so if its setting him with a dozen of people, then okay.

Spencer won't admit it but he was also jealous of her and Luke's growing relationship and he just wants something like that for him.

At the same time he was happy that she was happy. More than anyone in this world, he believes Penelope Garcia was the most deserving of true love.

But after 3 dates, god almighty, Spencer wants to end it all.

The first date was with a woman named Shelly. She was cute and all, Spencer even thought that it could lead to a second date, but then she started babbling about how her ex just broke up with her and she’s just looking for a “fun” (code for I want a one night stand) time.

Penelope bailed him out by calling with a fake emergency.

The second date was with another woman named Tiffany. Its was going okay and Spencer was staring to really like her until Spencer tells her that he had an IQ of 187 and Tiffany said, “Oh! You’re a nerd!”

This time Penelope bailed him out by literally getting his car towed.

The third date was the weirdest one. Spencer finally agreed on a date with a man, and its not that he has a problem with it, it’s just he has never tried dating another gender. It was with a man named Travis and the date was going pretty good until the very end where Travis finally told him his true agenda: He was looking for someone for a threesome.

This time Luke bailed him out by having Roxy literally chase him down the street.

Tonight was the fourth date. Penelope says its with a woman named Erica and all Spencer can think about is that he needs to learn how to say no to Penelope Garcia.

Spencer gets ready for the date with Erica. They were going to eat at an Italian Restaurant that he choose.

He just hopes this night would be the night that it works out for him. If it doesn’t maybe he needs to go to a shaman or something to fight away the bad spirts and the bad luck.

“Hi! I am Erica!” Spencer stands up from his sit on the restaurant to shake her hand, “Hello. I am Spencer.” Careful to not say Doctor, in case its another “nerd” situation.

“How do you know Penelope?” Spencer asks as both of them settle down and after ordering wine.

“Oh! I don’t know her actually.” Spencer can’t help but make a face, “Excuse me?”

“I don’t know her actually. We’re actually water aerobics classmates but that's it!” Spencer nods and makes an audible OHhHH before looking down at the menu.

“How about you? How do you know her?” Erica asks, “Oh! I work with her in the FBI.”

“FBI?!” Erica almost chokes with her wine and sits up straight. Spencer can’t help but squint his eyes, she suddenly looked nervous. He can’t help but think that maybe Penelope set her up with a criminal? Which is impossible because he’s pretty sure Penelope does background check for everyone around them.

“Yes... FBI. Is there a problem?” Erica immediately shakes her head, “Uh.... I am going to the bathroom.” She says in a hurry and runs to the bathroom.

Oh dear, his bad luck is endless. Spencer immediately takes out his phone to call Penelope.

“S-spencer!? What’s up!?” Penelope’s voice comes in as a yelp, making him pull the phone away from his ear.

“Penelope! Did you set me up with a criminal!?” Penelope yelps again, “No! Erica has a clean background! She’s not a criminal. How could you say th-ugh... at!”

Spencer sighs, “Penelope Garcia, are you talking to me while having sex with Luke Alvez!?”

“N-no, I am not!” Her voice is more breathy now and Spencer is even more disgusted, “Oh god! Bail me out of here you two!” He says.

“Yes! YES! I’ll bail you out!” Spencer immediately turns off the call as he hears Luke’s grunts. Ugh, those two.

Erica comes back 10 minutes later, looking flushed and nervous, she's also out of breathe and her dress is crumpled.

“Are you okay?” Spencer asks, looking more scared than worried, Erica laughs, “Yeah, I am good. FBI agents is... my kink.”

This time its Spencer’s turn to choke on his wine. He was unlucky. He was the unluckiest man alive right now.

“It is...?” Spencer asks, unsure on what to say.

“Yeah! Do you... do you have the kevlar vest? You know with the FBI logo?” Oh god. What is this? Why was he here?

A bulb lights up on his head and finally everything makes sense.

“I am sorry. But did you...,” He lowers his voice, “masturbate in the bathroom?” Erica smiles at him and nods, enthusiastically.

“Do you want to get out of here?” Ohhhhhkay. Maybe asking her that was the wrong decision because she was now thinks that he is interested. He starts shaking his head to say no when he feels a hand on his shoulder.

“Honey!?” Spencer turns his head to a very pregnant woman, who was about his age, now looking at him with eyebrows raised.

“Honey?” He repeats, “What? Did you forget your married? Now galavanting around and dating some...” You look Erica head to toe, “chick?”

“I— I...” Spencer can’t form any word. What the hell is happening? You widen your eyes on him, before leaning down and pretending to pull on his ears, making him yelp.

“Pretend. I am Penelope’s bestfriend.” You whisper to him and Spencer’s eyes finally widen at agreement and nods.

“You’re married!?” Erica shrieks at them.

“Yes, sweetie. This guy you’re dating is married and is about to have his fifth child! So we’re leaving now! Before I go into labor here! With mucus and stuff!” You act distress while holding your womb and still holding unto Spencer’s ear while pulling him out the restaurant.

When they’re finally out of sight, you let him go.

“I am sorry for hurting you. Damn, how bad is that date that Penelope had to call me while having,” You pause to give the word more emphasis, “sex!?”

“It was so bad! She started acting weird when I said I worked with the FBI and then she rushed to the bathroom to masturbate!” You can’t help but laugh holding unto your stomach.

“I am so sorry you had to do that while pregnant.” Spencer says, now finally having the chance to look at you properly.

For a pregnant lady, you looked as beautiful as ever, giving the famous “pregnant glow” a whole new level.

“Oh please! This!” You look around before taking his hand and crossing the street to a park.

Spencer guides you to a sit, because he felt bad that he made the pregnant, beautiful, lady stress out over his bad date.

Weirdly, you started pushing your stomach down the skirt of your dress making him look away immediately.

“Ta-da!” Spencer looks back at you and the pregnant stomach is now gone. You were now holding a hollow styrofoam belly with snacks in it.

Spencer raises an eyebrow and gives her a look. But truth to be told he's kind of happy that the woman who he's finding extremely attractive is not really impregnated by someone else.

"Oh! Don’t look at me like that! I was going to watch a Star Trek rerun in the movies down the block and the snacks are always too pricey!” You wag your finger in front of him as he sits beside you.

"Where did you even buy that?" Spencer asks laughing as you started opening a bar of twix, "Oh. Michael's." He nods at your answer.

“That’s why I was able to run so quickly to the restaurant.” Spencer cringes at this statement, “I am sorry if I ruined your evening.”

“No, you didn’t! It was fun to play a pregnant lady with a cheating husband. Plus I get to meet the famous Doctor Spencer Reid, with 10 PhDs, IQ of 200 and can read 100,000 words per second.” Spencer laughs and almost chokes on air, “It’s 3 PhDs, IQ of 187 and 20,000 words per minute.”

“Well, you know Penelope and her hyperbole. That’s how her stories go.” You laugh and Spencer finally realizes that he doesn't even know your name.

“Oh! I am an idiot! I am sorry, what’s your name?” You laugh as you bite down on the twix, "And why have I never seen you before?"

“I am Y/N Y/L/N. I am Penelope’s childhood best friend, I just moved here like 6 months ago.” You offer him another bar and Spender happily accepts it.

"Why'd you move here?" He asks, happily munching on the chocolate bar, finally realizing that he never got the chance to eat.

"I got an offer to teach in Georgetown and Penelope was also here, so I said you know what? Why not? Its always an adventure with her and with what she made me do tonight, I am so happy with my decision." You wink at him and his nose scrunches up as he laughs with you.

You were sure Penelope was overselling this great Doctor Reid but, oh man, why did she never mention that he looked this good?

"What do you teach?" Spencer asks, "Astronomy."

His eyes widen at this, "Really? I didn't expect that." You laugh at his statement. "Yeah, a lot of people say that. I have a Bachelor's Degree in Astronomy."

"That sounds awesome! Maybe I should get mine too..."

You gape at him. You're so dead. Tall, good looking, fbi agent and always wiling to learn? Its like your dream man came out of the movie screen and was presented to you, which was hard to believe because your dream man is Matthew Gray Gubler and that man just raised your standards through the roof.

"Another one?!" Spencer laughs at you before he protests, "Hey! You can never have too much!"

"You're not wrong with that." You agree with him and you both sit in silence eating chocolates.

"Too bad we met late, we could have went together to watch Star Trek. The ticket selling has been sold out since last week." Your face scrunches up into a sad smile, and Spencer has never felt so bad.

"Hey, we can watch it at my place?" Oh god, that sounded to forward and its evident when your eyes widen, "I mean! If its okay with you! We can watch it at my place and I have popcorn. For free." Spencer rambles on as he mentally face palm himself, his bad luck streak continues.

You laugh because he looks so nervous, "Its fine, Spencer. I should call Penelope first tho." You pull out your phone but then make a face when you remember the last time she called you.

"You know what, I'll call her later. I don't need to hear her and Luke's grunting. Ugh, they're disgustingly sweet and gross at the same time." Spencer laughs as they both start standing up, "You're right. But you know what I've never seen Penelope that happy with anyone."

You happily agree, "Yeah, it's been a while. She deserves it. You know I always told her that I've met so many people in my life, but she's the most deserving of true happiness." His smile grows bigger at what you say, being the same exact thing he said.

"You're right." You both start walking quietly, Spencer helping you with the hollow belly.

"So... Star Trek..." Spencer starts and you immediately yelp, feeling defensive over a movie series, "Hey! Its a good movie!"

Spencer immediately panics, "I didn't mean anything bad! Its actually a good series! There aren't many scientific errors in it especially considering how long ago it was made!"

You can't help but smile, you already knew this but you still nod as if you didn't know this because... well... how can you correct this cute man?

"Okay. Good. I don't want to watch a Star Trek movie with someone who doesn't respect it." You say sternly and it makes Spencer laugh, "Relax, Y/N, I also love it."

The walk to his apartment was quick, it turns out you both live near each other. The walk was full of many random talks and just wonderful topics.

"Penelope tells me this is your fourth blind date?" You tease him and the pink that colors his cheeks is the prettiest shade you've ever seen.

"Yeah... Its all been bad, or weird, or just out of this world." Spencer can't help but scratch his head. You chew on your lips, trying to gather your courage.

"So... Do you consider this your fifth date....?" You look up at him with wide eyes. He looks at you, a smile slowly growing on his face. "If you want it to be." He supplies and you immediately nod with a smile.

Spencer's smile grows bigger at how excited you look. Maybe he's bad luck streak was ending with you by his side.

Spencer's fifth date was a success. It ends with both of you fast asleep on his couch after eating all the popcorn and candies your bodies can take as Star Trek plays on the background.

Penelope finally stops setting him up on dates when he comes to work the next day with a smile so big, its competing with the huge bouquet of tulips he bought for Penelope as a thank you.

-

taglist (if you want to be added, please message me 🥰): @all-tings-diego @shemarmooresfedora

[nightingaelic]

could you do Fallout New Vegas companion’s reactions to a Courier Six who is also the Lone Wanderer telling their stories from their time in DC? (bonus points for Arcade’s reaction to them hating the enclave, and if that would make him decide to keep his past hidden even longer, or if he would still tell them?)

The logistics and implications of this make my head spin. This is also super long, honestly I should just quit writing reacts and start writing fics OH WAIT

Getting the courier talking was a tough thing to do, but on nights where the moon was full and the coyotes' howls were miles away or at least behind some stout walls, on nights where they were a few beers in and they hadn't seen another living soul in a few days, that Mojave Express deliverer started to reminisce. That wasn't really the surprising part, though. No, the surprising part was what they would remember, fondly or not-so-fondly: A world apart from the desert, a continent away on another coast, and stories of life in a vault, a missing father, pure water and a Brotherhood divided.

Arcade Gannon: Arcade didn't mind these moods, at least when they first cropped up. He nodded along as the courier talked about living in their father's shadow, about feeling cornered by their own family's legacy. He hung on their words about living in the cradle of America's history, about Project Purity, all of the gritty details of modifying a GECK to bring water to a devastated wasteland.

Eventually though, the courier's memories soured, with the arrival of Enclave remnants in their life. Arcade folded into himself with every harsh word, every jolt of plasma that had disrupted his friend's world relived in horrific detail. They gestured angrily as they described their newfound purpose, their battle for power with the fractured Brotherhood of Steel at their back, and their smug satisfaction at the moments they were able to crack open Raven Rock and the Enclave's mobile base crawler and lay waste to their tormentors.

It took a few rounds of these stories before the courier noticed he shrank and grew quiet whenever they neared the end of their story about breaking into another vault to find the GECK. They stopped abruptly one night. "What's up with you?"

"Um..." Arcade scratched the back of his neck and looked away. "Nothing. Nothing, I just... have some personal experience with the Enclave, myself."

The courier sighed. "Yeah, there's a few people walking around the West Coast that have similar stories to mine. Arroyo's full of them, for one. Is it something like that?"

Arcade took a deep breath. "I feel... well, it's a lot closer to home, for me. Close enough to raise questions, so I don't talk about it much."

"Close enough to..." The courier twisted their face up in confusion for a moment, before realization set in and their eyes grew large. "You were... your... oh."

"Mmm-hm."

"Well, fuck me." The courier smiled and popped a cap off of another beer. "I've been doing all the talking, haven't I? Let's hear your story about working with the guys in power armor who ruined my life, right after dad did."

Craig Boone: Whenever the courier started up like this, Boone couldn't help but notice a familiar twinge of regret and self-doubt in their voice. It shone through most clearly when they spoke about their time with the Brotherhood of Steel, the men and women they'd fought alongside and lost during their struggle against the remnants of the Enclave. It was there, too, in their story about returning to the vault they grew up in, setting the chaos that had arisen in their wake to rest, but not being able to go back to the way things were.

Boone didn't pry. He knew that feeling well. Instead, he cracked open bottles of beer, liquor, soda, whatever they had on hand during their nights in the desert, and just listened. He'd done the same for Carla, when they were younger and new to each other and he couldn't get enough of her voice and how it flowed endlessly, easily, the way his never could. He absorbed it all now as he did then: The joy, the pain, the loss, the fear, the triumphs and falls and abandoned dreams that filled the courier up and drove them to travel west, beyond anything they had ever known.

That last part stumped Boone a bit, though. "Why didn't you stay?" he finally asked one night.

They looked surprised. "Stay? Stay where? I didn't have a home anymore."

Boone shook his head. "With the Brotherhood. Or some other settlement."

"Like Megaton?" The courier sighed. "I thought about it. Close to the vault, friendly people, easy work... I guess I just didn't want to wind up... stuck."

They flushed red and looked away from him. Boone knew why they were embarrassed, but he also knew the truth in their words.

Sometimes the courier cried after they had finished, though they did their best to hide it. Boone pretended not to notice. He was pretty sure they knew he was pretending, but he was also pretty sure that pointing it out would be worse than just letting it be an open secret between them. The silence between them endured, but something grew inside it and flourished. Some kind of deeper understanding.

Lily Bowen: The more the courier spoke, the more Lily made connections in her muddled mind. Of course they knew the basic layout of most vaults, they had grown up in one. Of course they were extra-sensitive to the Mojave heat, they had come to the desert from the cooler of the two coasts. Of course they'd been extra-wary around the super mutants or nightkin of Jacobstown, they had only known angry super mutants looking to grow their own numbers through any means necessary.

Their shared experience of growing up inside a vault reminded Lily of happier days, and she often asked questions about Vault 101 during the courier's stories. "Were you sweet on anyone inside your old home?" she asked, with a big smile befitting a proud grandma.

The courier blushed. "That's not very polite, Lily."

"Oh, I'm sorry, dearie."

"No, no it's okay." The courier smiled. "There was a boy who picked on me a lot, but I never figured out whether he did it because he hated me or liked me. His name was Butch. And there was Amata, my childhood friend. She was the daughter of the Overseer."

"Daughter of the Overseer?" Lily grinned. "I'm sure she was a lovely young woman."

The courier looked a little misty. "Yeah. She was. Probably still is."

Lily pulled a handkerchief that used to be a small tablecloth from inside her overalls and handed it over. "Maybe we can go back there together, pumpkin," she offered. "I always wanted to travel to the capital. We can visit your friends, see the sights."

"Yeah, maybe someday." The courier accepted the gift and blew their nose. "I've got some things I need to finish up here before I even think about wandering back east, though."

"Then let's make a list and do our chores," Lily said happily. "Number one?"

"Ohhhh, man." The courier smiled up at her. "I wouldn't even know where to start."

Raul Alfonso Tejada: Raul got a faint smile on his face whenever the courier started up like this, as if their memories reminded him of another place he had come from, another time. While they couldn't have more different backgrounds, pasts- hell, he had several hundred years on the courier, even if they shared the same road today- there was something in the description of the other roads they had walked that made him feel warm on a cold night.

"What's on your mind?" The courier asked him one night, when Raul's smile grew larger than usual.

"Nada, boss," he reassured them. "You're just a good reminder that I can change my mind about the future anytime I'd like. Tell me the one about that radio DJ again."

"Again?" The courier rolled their eyes. "Why? I could tell you a million stories about Underworld and all the ghouls that lived there, but all you want to hear about is Three Dog. You'd probably have more in common with the Underworld folks, honestly."

Raul nodded noncommittally. "Sí, but my favorite stories are about people who had to rise above bad situations and become someone uncommon. Anyone who's able to do that is either fighting for something great or running from something terrible. Sometimes both."

The courier shot him a skeptical look. "Three Dog's holed up in his radio station 24/7, he's not running from anything or out fighting for anything. All that stuff about 'the good fight' is a load of bull."

"Now, now, Six," Raul chastised. "Just because he looks like your average pendejo doesn't mean he isn't doing his part. You even told me his radio show is inspirational for the Capital Wasteland folks."

The courier held their hands up in the air and bobbled them, as if balancing an invisible scale. "The duality of man. Being an average pendejo, or convincing everyone around you that you aren't actually an average pendejo and can pull off miracles."

Raul laughed. "And which one are you, boss?"

"Eh, I'm still figuring it out."

Rose of Sharon Cassidy: Cass was never one for fixating on her own past, but she couldn't help but sympathize with the courier whenever they deigned to add onto their unbelievable story. It was hard enough for her to navigate her own damn life: She couldn't imagine being called upon to steer an entire area's destiny.

After another night of recalling their life inside a vault with their dad, then their unexpected loss of him right after being reunited on the surface, the courier stopped suddenly. "I'm sorry," they said.

Cass paused her swig of precious whiskey. "What?"

"I keep going on and on about my dad, and here you are not knowing what happened to yours."

"Eh." Cass took her drink and waved her hand around until the burning swallow made its way down. "S'loads of people in the wasteland without a clue what happened to their pops. I'm not special. In fact, I'd say it probably hurts a bit more, what happened with yours."

"Well, all the same." The courier sank deeper into their seat and examined their own bottle of spirits. "I feel like an open book, tonight. Anything you want to know about where I came from that I haven't already spilled?"

Cass thought for a moment. "Tribals."

"What about them?"

"Does the East Coast have them? You're not the first traveler I've met from there, but none of you have so much as mentioned any tribals out east."

"Mmm." The courier looked thoughtful. "I guess we do have them, though maybe not in the traditional sense. There's a mess of them in Point Lookout for sure, and at least one tribal group in the Capital Wasteland outright, but beyond that things are more... loose. Fewer intact families, fewer intact homes."

"Huh." Cass took another drink. "Maybe that's where my dad went."

She let the courier stew in the awkward silence for a bit before she grinned and reached out to smack them. "Just kidding. Keep going. I want to hear about that giant robot again."

Veronica Santangelo: Veronica usually sat and listened, spellbound, picturing a chapter of her order that had realized the very thing she kept trying to tell the Elders and made the ultimate sacrifice to follow their hearts anyway.

Well, maybe Elder Owyn Lyons hadn't come to the same realization as her, but he had had a change of heart that split his company and cut them off from almost everyone they had ever known. It had been five years since the High Elders had instituted radio silence toward their East Coast chapter, and so far there had been no attempts to re-establish contact.

Veronica prodded the courier for any info she could get about the Capital Wasteland Brotherhood of Steel. The courier let slip pretty early in their friendship that Elder Owyn Lyons had passed away, which wasn't unexpected. The man was 76 years old, after all. She learned on one particularly emotional night that his daughter, Elder Sarah Lyons, was also dead, something she wasn't sure even the Western Elders were aware of. That memory was clearly painful for the courier though, so Veronica didn't press for details.

"And the Enclave?" the Scribe asked one night, arms wrapped around her knees. "Are they completely gone?"

The courier grew cold. "Yes. I made sure of it."

"Right." Veronica nodded. "So the Brotherhood took over the air force base they were at. It must have been chock-full of tech and resources, if it was the Enclave's last stand."

"It was." The courier sighed and shifted in their seat. "And it woke up some of our brothers and sisters to their original mission in the Capital Wasteland. I thought maybe that selfishness had died with Liberty Prime, but... well, I didn't like it, so I left."

"Mmm, yeah." Veronica nodded again, sympathetically this time. "I know how you feel. Felt."

"Feel," the courier agreed. "I just wish there was more I could've done. Maybe there wasn't anything else, short of seizing power."

"You'd definitely get pushback for that in the Brotherhood," Veronica agreed. "But you might get that chance out here in the broader Mojave."

ED-E: At first, ED-E enjoyed the stories, trumpeting and cooing various beeps at the appropriate moments for emphasis. The one time the courier began badmouthing the Enclave, however, the eyebot waited until they had finished before playing back the first tape that Dr. Whitley had recorded before its trip.

The courier listened to the scientist's words from years ago, deflating slightly as it played out. When the tape had finished, they stood up and checked the eyebot over. "He sent you toward Navarro, huh?"

ED-E beeped affirmation, and the courier sighed. "But Navarro was already gone. I'm sorry. I guess I'm... well, me and the Brotherhood of Steel back east are responsible for your previous master's decision to send you away. Might be responsible for more, too."

ED-E beeped sadly. The courier pressed their forehead against the eyebot's metal dome in apology.

Rex: Well, surprising for most. Rex was not most. As soon as the courier got really into their recollections, Rex usually yawned and went to sleep. He stirred when he felt their hand reach down to scratch the ruff of his neck, or pat the glass dome that held his brain.

"Good dog," the courier said, through the veil of sleep. "You remind me of another pup that used to follow me around."

[skzfairies]

sooyoung’s relationship with nct dream!

✿ mark

he was actually the first one to introduce himself to her in the dreamies

he was really sweet towards her but wasn’t like, over the top, he was kinda chill yk

and that just made her feel so comfortable because she had so many worries about joining nct dream as a girl, she knew monique would also be there, but they weren’t in the same unit so it was very nerve racking for sooyoung

and this girl was like, 15 and she was being thrown into debut suddenly with a bunch of boys, and it was very overwhelming

but mark assured her that it was all okay, and that everyone wanted her there, and that she deserved to be here

if she was ever having any problems with anything, he would always try his best to help her out, or direct her to someone he knew would help her

and now they are the bestest friends, sooyoung admitted that out of the members he feels like an older brother the most to her :D

their always goofing off or messing around, but not like bouncing off the walls together, they just make jokes to each other and burst out laughing

they have so so many inside jokes omg

and whenever they randomly make eye contact, they would always burst out laughing, they literally can NOT be serious around each other ....

mark is basically the reason she knows so much english 😭 she literally just repeats whatever he says and then studies it later....that’s basically how she learned lmaooooo

✿ renjun

renjun ALWAYS clowns her, like she could just be breathing and he would make fun of her (all jokes ok he loves her)

and she’s just like .... did i ask

but she always gets him back :D

she doesn’t roast him, but rather she EMBARRASSES him

if renjun teased her a lot in a video that was uploaded fhat day, she would go on vlive and tell a VERY embarrassing story of renjun and go in COMPLETE detail and then she’s done she’s like “how are you guyssss?”

once renjun saw that she was doing that and he went to where ever she was and complained about it and she just laughed at him while he was begging her to stop 😭

they love each other i promise

they also play fight a lot, like they could just randomly be hanging out in the living room and they would just randomly start fighting each other until they called a truce

sooyoung always wins ☺️, you gotta learn a few tricks if you spend the majority of your time with seven boys

also, when sooyoung got confindent and comfortable with speaking some mandarin, she randomly started speaking it renjun

and he was SO touched like 🤞 he was in shock he was like “when did you- how- what?” and she was just like “ i wanted to learn some so i can talk to you and chenle, i don’t know much but it’s a start!”

and renjun just hugged her, he didn’t know what to say and he was like I LOVE THIS GIRL SO MUCH

no bcuz sooyoung literally deserves the world okay shes so sweet

and renjun would teach her and help her practice when he saw her studying and they just have little conversations with each other in mandarin, and it’s so cute hehe

oh yeah stargazing is a thing for them heeh, when neither of them can sleep because their stressed or it’s just not happening, they both go outside and attempt to watch the stars, even if you can barely see them since their in the city :/

✿ jeno

GAMING BESTIES

they stay up so late playing games whenever they are off and always regret it in the mornings 😭

when she first started playing games w him she was rlly bad and jeno would always beat her and he was SO SMUG ABOUT IT and he was like “haha loser💪”

and sooyoung being the hard worker she is, she practiced her gaming skills for a few months and watched a ton of vids and jeno would ask her to game and she was like “no, not yet.” “i’m kidding your not a loser!” “i’m not playing w u until i can beat ur ass!”

and then a few months later she finally asked him to play

and jeno was like YAY ☺️☺️

and he kept on hyping himself up,,, and then sooyoung beat him

she ended up beating him 4/6 times they played 🤞

JENO WAS SO SHOCKED

HE WAS SO HEARTBROKEN

and sooyoung was just like :))) it’s okay jeno, maybe next time!” and she skipped out of his room happily while jeno was still like :0

he sat there in shock for awhile...

song writing besties 🤞

he actually helped her a lot when she was first learning, and when she completed her lyrics she had him check them over

same for him, she would always read over his lyrics he written, and sometimes she recorded a guide for him !

they always bounce ideas off of each other whenever their stuck, and then their like “damn we rlly are big brain 🤞”

OHHHH SHE MET HIS CATS ONCE

she fell in love with them, and his cats were instantly drawn to her

jeno has like 100 pictures of her w his cats he’s like :)) my childern

after meeting them sooyoung wont stop asking for asking for pictures of them or asking if their okay 😭

jenos like “do you love my cats more than me?“ and shes like “YUP:D”

✿ haechan

oh my gosh someone seperate them

these two are so chaotic omg

they are always coming at everyone’s throats omg

they roast the shit out of everyone 😭😭

whenever they are together there’s always loud laughing, BECAUSE HAECHAN IS JUST SO FUNNY OK

completly random but they look so cute and pretty sitting next to each other :D

haechan does tease her, but it’s not as much as the other members and she’s like :) “i’m special”

he’s always hugging on her and she either has two reactions:

if she’s sleepy and haechan throws himself on her she’s like ??? who tf is on me ??? and she looks so confused while haechan is moving around on her to get comfy and hes lowkey screaming and shes like 😳 i just woke up, and then she just goes back to sleep

if she’s wide awake she will scream and laugh and jokingly push haechan off of her until she gives up and just hugs back onto him, and she pats his head and goes “haechannie, your so cute :) i love you!“

its kinda a suprise that he’s older than her because he acts SO CUTE AROUND HER

and normally sooyoung would judge tf iut of u if you acted cute around her but wirh haechan she gets SO SOFT

like internally screams with haechan looks at her with a soft expression on his face because HE IS JUST SO CUTE AWH

another gaming duo <3

although it’s harder to beat haechan for her 😭😭

she’s only beat him like 5 times of the 6 years she’s known him 🤞

they also stay up late together, like they’ll be facetiming and they will litwrally just talk about ANYTHING and laugh their asses off

he lets her ramble about the random facts that she knows or the show she has been watching and jes just like :D your so cute, even if she repeated the same thing 2828 times or is not making any sense at all

haechan and sooyoung are so soft for each other 🤞

but they also arent afraid to roast tf out of each other 💪

✿ jaemin

these two are the sweetest omg

like they are SO CLOSE

and they are always together omg

like they always hang out in either one of their rooms and chill, it’s mostly her room tho because she complains about jaemins bed 😳

jisung feels like jaemin is his roomie too because he’s in there so much :0

dw sooyoung and jaemin are considerate 🤞

if jisung is sleeping and they wanna have a deep ass talk then jaemin will drags her to his room, because lets say jeno is a heavy sleeper (idk if he is but lets just say he is ☺️)

they are ALWAYS cuddling, like whenever she walked infront of his and he is sitting down, he’ll pull her to either sit next to him or his lap, it depends if cameras are around 🤞 and then once she’s sitting he’ll wrap his arms around her and just cuddle until they get uncomfortable lmao 😭

sooyoung will not fall asleep on any other member but jaemin, it’s just a thing idk, not that she’s not comfortable with the other members she just prefers to cuddle w jaemin since they cuddle so much hehehehe

whenever they are out walking in the streets and she’s tired she’ll grab onto jaemin’s shirt and he just down at her like :0 oh my god your so cute i just wanna protect ☺️, and he just puts his arm around her shoulder while she holds onto him :( i love them their relationship is so soft

ohhhhh jaemin made her go bike riding w him one day and she felt like she was going to DIE, her legs were so sore afterwards but jaemin was semi fine, and she was just like 😡i hate you.

she always asks jaemin to edit her photos for her, cuz she doesn’t know how hmph, and jaemin offered to teach her so she was like ☺️ okay so she sat in a chair next to him, and she ended up falling asleep.... whoops

jaemin was like “so you just do this to remove any- sooyoung?” and he looked down and sooyoung had her head against her knees, and she was OUT, like jaemin tried everything to wake her, so he ended up having to pick her up and put her on his bed while he finished editing her pictures 🤞

best boy jaemin YUP

i could write for AGES about them because i just love their relationship so so so much but all you guys need to know in summary is that they are such a soft friendship, they can always be seen cuddling together, they talk about almost everything, and their just besties :D

✿ chenle

01 liner babe’s yup !

they were close before debuting because they were close in age, and when they found out they were debuting they were like YESSS I KNOW YOU 😟😟

they call themselves twins hehe, even if they aren’t even born in the same month 😭

if they say they are twins, they are twins.

HIGH PITCHED LAUGH DUO YUP

sooyoung also has a higher pitched laughed, so whenever they laugh, it’s VERY high pitched

also they love to randomly harmonize?

like they could just be sitting in the waiting room and then they would just sing in harmony and then go back to whatever they were doing :0

ohhhh and they LOVE doing tik toks together

they will do covers of dances together or those silly duo ones and it’s so FUNNY because they are both so chaotic and it’s so cute

they really killing everyone w their cuteness 😭😭😭

he was also so shocked when she spoke mandarin to him, even if it was just a little bit and kinda awkward because she had just been studying to for a few months (she started studying it in january 2021!) and he was like 😟😄😄

he also gave her a big hug but he was way more entergetic than renjun, he shook her back and forth and yelled in her ear, NOT ON OURPOSE

he was just excited 🤞🤞

ohhhh they also post lil duets together :D and it’s so CUTE

like their both bare faced in a dim lit vocal room and one of them is playing the piano, and they just sing, and it’s so raw and beautiful, OH MY GOD I LOVE THEM

vocal icons

✿ jisung

at first he was kinda shy around her, since hes normally shy around new people

and sooyoung was like, i understand, but shes an extrovert so she tried her hardest to be friends with everyone and talk to everyone, and jisung was like ???? how are you so talkative ???

the first thing he ever said to her was “your shirt’s cool, i like shinee subaenim too!” and it was really quiet and sooyoung was like “thanks ☺️”.

she was wearing a shinee tshirt btw, she’s a big shawol 🤭

they eventually got close though, i mean your bound to be when your with them all day yk

but sooyoung was so soft and gentle w him and reassuring him that it’s okay that hes a lil shy and he just felt comfortable around her, even if it was kinda hard to have conversations

now their inseparable!

she always laughs whenever he breaks something, but she always grabs it and sees if she can fix it for him, while laughing

for the first few years of their debut jisung was like her lil bro, she would always tease him or fool around him

and now its the reverse 😭

jisung always roast her or teases her, and it’s so subtle she would just laugh whenever he said something and then after awhile she realizes what he just said so she’s like ... ☺️😟😳😕

shes like wHAT HAPPENED TO MY LIL BRO

jisung always pats her head when she has her mouth open after he teases her, and is like “hehe, love u”

“sure you do jisung, sure you do.”

she gets him back by blasting twice or shinee and dancing on her bed until jisung gets out of bed and turns it off 😭

she never does that when he’s sleeping because she doesn’t actually wanna make him mad 😭

they have never fought and she’s not willing to loose that streak

jisung compared their hand size once and it litteraly made sooyoungs hands look like a baby hand and she was like ... i hate it here

now he always asks for a high five and then he laughs because of the size difference

and she gets SO MAD

“STOP DOING THATTTTT, ITS NOT FUNNY”

“stop falling for it 🤷‍♂️”

“hOLD ME BACK.”

jaemin actually had to hold her back from running after him after he teased her

not that she would hurt jisung....she would just hit him a few times

jaemin scolds her for fighting the members he’s like “we do not condone violence in this household!”

then she goes “condone violence my ass! just let me flick him.”

jaemin doesn’t let her flick him 😭😭

she does it before jisung goes to sleep tho 💪

[itsclydebitches]

The thing that feels disingenuous about Miles answer about Ironwood is that he was part of the writing staff that framed the general as a cool character to start with. I do think that the signs about Ironwood's evil were clear since V2 and in V7 he was an outright dictator from episode 1. Nonetheless, he was still consistently framed as a cool character, someone you can trust and rely. You don't get to blame the fans for liking a genocide if you was the one framed him as cool in the first place.

I actually don’t think being cool is the problem. If we’re satirizing and/or making a  statement about the toxic masculinity that leads to something like a dictatorship, then being “cool” is a crucial part of that. People don’t leverage the power they have by looking lame, they do so by appearing desirable, enviable, awesome. Being in the military is supposedly “cool.” Being a white guy with a giant gun is supposedly “cool.” Having power over an entire nation is supposedly “cool,” etc. If you only make such characters look revolting  — even when they are  — then you miss one of the main recruitment tools for this kind of rhetoric. Any version of Ironwood that’s meant to make a point about the dangers of following someone like him needs to make him look “cool” and then deconstruct that, pointing out the ways in which this cool veneer is a lie meant to pull you in. To do otherwise is to claim that evil people are always easy to spot. Making your villains “uncool” implies that the people who do appear cool in real life must be fine then. That good looking, charismatic leader is great. Why would I look critically at his actions? He’s too cool to be evil. 

My personal problem is not that “They made the dictator look cool and we can’t possibly expect the audience to tell the difference between someone who is truly good and someone who is just using various Cool Points to skate by” because that would be the point of such a character  — the work the show needs to do. My problem is that RWBY didn’t do that work. At least, not to the extent they needed to. Rather than making Ironwood a truly heinous character (prior to Volume 7 ‘s shooting, I mean) and allowing the audience to learn how appearing cool can’t hide that, they just made him good person. Straight up. Flawed, absolutely, but no worse than any of the other character on screen, particularly post Volume 6 when our heroes are frequently putting people in danger, seizing power, telling lies, keeping secrets, and generally acting in the ways we’re supposedly meant to condemn Ironwood for. Since talk of Miles’ vid last night I’ve seen three separate “Ironwood was always bad, idk how people can miss the signs” posts and those people are half right. There 100% were signs we were meant to pick up on. The problem is RWBY then went and deconstructed those signs. Ironwood didn’t just bring an army to a peace festival, he brought an army to an event he had good reason to believe wasn’t peaceful  — and he was right. Ironwood didn’t wrest control from Ozpin (using a series of checks and balances that exist for this very purpose...) because he has an obsession with being in control, he did so because he honestly believed Ozpin was putting people in danger  — and he was right. Ironwood didn’t step up post-Fall because he arrogantly believes he’s the only one capable of saving Remnant, he did so because he’s actually the most qualified: a fully trained huntsmen leading an Academy (like Ozpin) with an army and knowledge of this secret war. What, was Ironwood supposed to read the script and wait for the group of dropout teenagers to arrive and save the world instead? To say nothing of how his power and responsibility are framed as sacrifices, not something he sought out. Ironwood doesn’t want to be the sole ruler here. His desperate relief at having allies again proves it. Good setup for the rise of a dictator would have been Ironwood being cagey with his information and exerting control over the group... not telling them everything, not giving them more power, not letting them keep the Lamp, not taking arrest off the table so as to keep them in line, and generally doing the opposite of everything he did do to share that responsibility and power. RWBY got very good at giving us the first half of these red flags  — he has an army, he’s stubborn, he’s hurting Mantle, etc.  — but then time and time again introduced a context that changed that flag dramatically: they are fighting literal monsters, he’s no more stubborn than our title character, hurting Mantle is a consequence of a plan he thinks will help the whole world and our heroes back this. Those who insist that Ironwood was 100% a villain in the making (or a villain already) prior to shooting Oscar are working from their assumption of what his archetype represents, not what RT actually put on screen. Because RT is just really bad at writing a dictator character. They didn’t have the skill to manage someone who only appeared good on the surface, let alone a character with the complex nuance of wielding “coolness” to their advantage, which is why in Volume 8 they had to resort to cartoon villainy with literal, evil spotlights. It’s not that the audience is too dumb to pick up on those red flags, it’s that RT couldn’t manage to plant them without continually introducing valid justifications. You can’t say, “Bringing an army is a bad thing. Look at this dictator coding!” without me going, “Yeah, except in the fictional world you created an army does not represent the problems it does in our real life societies. This isn’t a guy amassing soldiers to go after oil, he’s trying to protect people from monsters. Not even metaphoric monsters acting as stand-ins for a minority group. Literal, evil monsters!” RWBY ignores its own context and a good chunk of the fandom ignored it too. 

The problem with that (besides the general frustration of someone ignoring parts of canon to forward a particular reading) is that the fandom’s go-to claim is that everything is meaningful  — and it’s a reading the writers very much support. Fans do not, as the above attests, push for a simple reading of, “Don’t think too hard about it. Just take the surface reading and run with it” which, while still frustrating, would have at least been a valid stance. Rather, they insist very strongly that nuance and depth are what drive the show. From the song lyrics to a tiny detail in the opening, everything is important and if you don’t accept that then you can’t appreciate RWBY’s complexity. 

“Okay,” I said. “Then in that case Ironwood coming around to Ozpin’s position is meaningful too? Glynda  — one of our best and most faultless characters  — supporting him is meaningful? Flipping his gun, defending Weiss, Qrow writing to him, the group working with him for months on end... all of it is meaningful to his characterization? You said so yourself.” 

“No, no, no,” comes the reply. “He’s just bad. But he’s also nuanced. He’s tricked you into thinking he’s a good person by acting kind sometimes, by getting support sometimes, but none of that is true. His actions are what matter and his actions are simplistically bad.” 

“Ohhhh. So then does that mean this story is really about the creation of a villain?” 

“Huh?” 

“Well, Ruby. She’s ‘nuanced’ in the same way. She acts kind sometimes and gets support, but her actions are terrible. She endangered an entire city because she couldn’t wait to see if Ironwood got his letter. She condemned Ozpin for keeping secrets about Salem and then kept those same secrets just two days later. When the kingdom was under attack she sat around drinking tea, crying on a staircase, just hoping someone would come fix things for her  — all while actively sabotaging the one person who was trying to save people, even if that action seems silly to us (let’s fly really high). So if we’re looking at the impact of someone’s actions outside of their intent, as we just did with Ironwood, then she’s a bad guy too, yeah?” 

“No! She’s the hero!” 

“... these characters don’t know she’s the hero from a meta perspective. If we’re supposed to judge the meaning of RWBY based on these details — ” 

“But it’s not just the details. It’s also the allusions. Everyone in RWBY is based on another person or character. It’s very complex and that inspiration drives their story, so if you don’t have that information it’s no surprise you’re confused. For example, this is why Penny had to get a human body. That’s what happened to Pinocchio!” 

“Oh! So then Ironwood is destined to be a good guy!” 

“What?” 

“Well, you just said the allusions drive their stories, right? The whole point of the Tin Man is that he always had a heart and just needed to realize that. So clearly — “ 

“No! He’s supposed to be a classic dictator, he’s only bad!” 

And ‘round and ‘round we go. RWBY’s writing is atrocious yet the fandom pushes this narrative that it’s all a complex, multi-layered story that requires taking every part into account to understand the “real” message... but when you try to do that with certain characters like Ozpin and Ironwood it’s, “No, actually, they’re just simple archetypes of Bad Men.” Nuance exists for the bees, but not other ships. It exists for the characters fans like, but not the ones they don’t. And RWBY’s inspirations have to predict the ending for this character... but not that other character. It’s a nonsense grab bag! 

Fans are right that Ironwood had a lot of red flags to set up this downfall. Fans are also right that those red flags were severely undercut, thus reversing their impact. Fans are right that Ironwood becomes a 100% bad guy who kills because he can and threatens to bomb a city. Fans are also right that this characterization feels absurd for Ironwood, both in terms of his morality and his intelligence (how does bombing Mantle help you now??) Ironwood is badly written. He was badly written in 7 and 8, if he was always meant to be a dictator in the making then he was badly written in 2-6, and he’s conclusively badly written when it comes to lacking a backstory and a canonical semblance  — two things are are supposedly driving all of this characterization. That’s the answer: not that he’s good, or bad, but that RWBY can’t write a consistent character, let alone a nuanced one, so it’s no surprise the fandom can’t decide on anything. What’s there to decide on? It’s that nonsense grab bag. In a different show I think making the dictator appear cool would be a crucial bit of commentary, but RWBY doesn’t have the skill to pull that off. 

[makeste]

BnHA Chapter 288: ZOOM AND ENHANCE

Previously on BnHA: Tomura, AFO, Deku, and Nana all met up inside of OFA and were all, “wow this is awkward.” AFO talked a whole bunch about vestiges before realizing that nobody cared (EXCEPT FOR ME. I CARED!!), and was then all “anyway so just to get everyone up to speed here, Tomura is Nana’s grandson.” OFA appeared and was all “what up bro I see you’re still a dick”, and then everyone stood around for a bit waging psychokinetic war on each other and blowing up on the ground and shit. This didn’t really accomplish anything, so AFO shifted gears and started trash talking Deku instead, because he’s a whiny little punkass loser who can’t admit when his brother has gotten the best of him yet again! OFA was all “anyways Deku rules and haters gonna hate, peace”, and then everyone wooshed back out of OFA and back into the real world, Deku with his quirk still intact. Meanwhile Gigantomachia and the LoV stampeded ever closer to the city, and Toga started monologuing in preparation for a seemingly inevitable battle with Ochako! And then the chapter basically just ended there lol.

Today on BnHA: Imagine you are Uraraka Ochako. And you’re out here doing what you do best, saving bitches and being a badass, when all of a sudden some old lady runs up to you and is all “PLEASE HELP ME, MY HUSBAND IS ASLEEP OR SOME SHIT, YOU KNOW US OLD PEOPLE, WE’RE SO FUCKING FEEBLE AND HAPLESS.” And so you’re all “OF COURSE” because you’re a good fucking person, and then she speeds off like she’s got fucking wheels and it’s like damn, grandma, were you in varsity track or what, and then OUT OF NOWHERE she just spontaneously turns into HIMIKO FUCKING TOGA. And she’s all naked and shit, and it’s like damn, Toga, where are your clothes, and she just giggles and ducks into a nearby building. And so you follow her for god knows what reason, and she fucking pounces on you and starts interrogating you in like the most seductive way possible, and you’re all wtf is this. Like, can you even imagine. Anyway so Ochako is having quite a day.

okay lol so I’ve gotta kind of rush through this since I’ve got other stuff I need to wrap up today as well, so! fingers crossed that we get a nice, simple chapter with no controversies or elaborate revelations or anything like that! just give me lots of stuff to mindlessly keysmash about, Horikoshi. I’m counting on you bro

lol what

an actual fucking plane?? is that allowed?? how bizarrely normal. are we sure this plane does not shoot lasers or something or is powered by someone with like a fusion reactor quirk idk

and who tf is Takeo-san. some random guy Horikoshi is suddenly introducing after 300 chapters to come save everyone at the last minute? pretty sus. Horikoshi is this your self insert

GASP

NO WAY THIS IS ALL MIGHT, RIGHT?? holy shit I swear to god if it’s All Might this lady needs to TURN THE FUCK AROUND RIGHT NOW. stop at McDonalds, order a black coffee for herself and only herself, and drive the rest of the way back home without so much as a bathroom break. there are certain prophecies which we don’t need to be tempting right now, okay people?? holy shit

(ETA: OR, here’s a thought, WHAT IF IT’S BEST JEANIST. hope springs eternal lmao. anyways though surely it’s not actually All Might. he can’t die yet, he’s got like 5 million secret things he needs to explain to Deku, and also Kacchan is unconscious and he can’t just SLEEP RIGHT THROUGH ALL MIGHT’S DEATH like come on.)

oh look more heroes all lining up to be slaughtered by Machia

real talk, at this point their priority should just be evacuating any citizens in Machia’s path, and then getting the fuck out of his way. none of them stand a chance in hell at stopping him and they know it. the body count is already high enough as it is. regroup and live to fight another day, people

anyway, so Machia is apparently plowing through cities at 100km per hour. that... actually might not be fast enough. Gunga and Jakku were 80km apart, so at that rate it would take him nearly an hour to reach Tomura. that fight’s gonna be long done by the time they get there. huh

okay these guys are saying he’s going to reach them in about 8 minutes. ?? so are you telling me Tomura and Deku and the rest have been fighting for like 40 minutes already?? lmao Gran probably bled to death half an hour ago at this rate. Horikoshi please explain yourself. some of us spent our entire childhoods doodling comics instead of paying attention in math and science AND IT SHOWS

anyway so this is all very bad and this guy is really rubbing it in just how bad it is

I mean... yeah. obviously the villains are still to blame at the core of it all, but yeah. feels like you all could have planned a hell of a lot better for this. you knew there was the risk of Tomura waking up, and you knew there was also the risk of Gigantomachia waking up as well. and you pretty much had no contingency plan at all huh. society is really gonna be in shambles after this

lmao look at this shit. Machia is so big at this point that it looks like they’re having a picnic in the middle of some desert somewhere. at what point does it cease being a guy’s back and start being its own zip code

even has its own wifi. amazing

oh shit Compress apparently spotted someone and he’s asking Skeptic to “zoom and enhance” like it’s CS fucking I. that’s not how it works Compress you fucking boomer

anyway so OF COURSE,

was there a reason you needed to zoom in on them, other than to trigger Toga?? some people just want to watch the world burn

so Toga is now GEARIN’ UP!!

that honestly is so fucking handy. over at U.A. they have to carry their gear in briefcases like scrubs. does Compress actually have the best quirk in the world?? it flies under the radar so well that I always forget about it, but like WHAT CAN’T IT DO though, y’know??

WELL WHAT DID YOU THINK WAS GONNA HAPPEN MY DUDE

“oh hey is that the U.A. kids? Skeptic could you please zoom in on them for absolutely no reason? OH MY GOD TOGA IS RUNNING OFF TO FIGHT THEM, OH MY GOD WHO COULD HAVE FORESEEN, OH MY GOD”

now he’s all “DABI PLEASE DO SOMETHING” but Dabi is all “DABI DON’T CARE”

Dabi don’t care about NOTHING OR NO ONE!! Dabi don’t got time for this

lmao I literally forgot that Spinner was even there, shit

so are you gonna go with her then or not? because I got news for you dude, it doesn’t matter how heartwarming your speech is, nothing can stop this girl now that she’s gone full distracted boyfriend meme

AW BUT IT REALLY IS HEARTWARMING THOUGH

Spinner is the glue keeping this dysfunctional Addams family together honestly. too bad he couldn’t stop Compress from OPENING HIS BIG DUMB MOUTH ah well

lmao but he’s letting her go anyway though

Spinner for new LoV President. all in favor??

ANYWAYS LOL THIS IS BAD

“ACCELERATE EVACUATIONS” LOL WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO OCHAKO HE’S MOVING AT 100KM AN HOUR AND HE’S LIKE FUCKING GODZILLA SIZED FKJLK

“PLEASE RUN OUTSIDE OF THE VILLAIN’S PERIPHERY” well thank fucking god the people have you guys to guide them what would they even do without you lklkhlkds

NO HORIKOSHI DON’T YOU DARE

IF YOU HURT MY GIRL FROPPY I SWEAR TO GOD!! LEAVE HER ALONE YOU BRIGAND

OH THANK GOD

“sorry for SAVING YOUR LIFE” smh. anyway so how fucking badass is Ochako though?? can we just talk about this. THE GIRL POWER ARC STRIKES AGAIN hot damn

(ETA: and btw, seeing as Iida is nowhere to be found, I’d say odds are pretty good that they did in fact send him to go warn the Endeavorsquad of Gigantomachia’s imminent arrival. godspeed Iida! they need all the help they can get right now honestly.)

EXCUSE ME BUT ARE YOU TOGA

IS THIS TOGA. THIS IS DEFINITELY TOGA OMG

“I IMMEDIATELY TRUST YOU AND I WILL FOLLOW YOU TO THE ENDS OF THE EARTH” noooo Ochako nooooo

damn Toga you really drained some poor old lady’s blood just so you could pull this kind of sneaky shit. I forgot how much I loved you

ohhhh lol so it’s her “husband” that is Takeo-san lol

THE BETTER TO LURE YOU INTO A TRAP MY DEAR

lmao Ochako you rube

now you’ve done it Toga. there is nothing Ochako loves more than a good old fashioned Old People Romance. DID YOU KNOW SHE HAS SEEN THE NOTEBOOK LIKE FIFTY TIMES. AND NO MATTER WHAT, IT ALWAYS GETS HER AT THE END. meanwhile I just want to watch a movie where James Marsden actually gets the girl for once but we all know that will never happen

OH MY

ngl this page would be like a thousand times better if Ochako was still blushing omg. did I ship this before?? I honestly can’t remember but I sure as fuck ship it now goddammit

(ETA: pretty sure I shipped it back during the Forest arc too but I don’t have time to check right now lol. but Toga is just so horny on main for everyone, all the time, and so like, it’s hard not to ship it.)

so now Toga is running off all flirtatiously and Ochako is barreling after her lol

plot twist, Takeo-san is actually in there. and he has NO IDEA what’s going on. WHAT HAPPENED TO MY WIFE. WHY IS THERE A GIANT MOLE MAN BURROWING THROUGH THE CITY

Ochako why on earth would you follow Toga into this dark creepy house where she could spring at you from any angle out of nowhere. just go back outside and float up over it until you have a high enough vantage point to see all the exits and just wait for her to come out

Toga says she wanted to talk to Tsuyu-chan as well, but let’s be real, you and her don’t have the same kind of electrically charged kismesis energy that you’ve got going on with Ochako though

LMAO DEKU NOWHERE IS SAFE

getting dragged like a fucking wedding train and he’s not even there to defend himself, shit

blah blah blah just ask her your question already Toga

MY WORD

would someone please inform Toga that this manga is only rated PG-13

so now Ochako is all “seriously Toga wtf”

you see that’s what I wanted to know too, lol. I really like that the characters actually think about these things and ask these kind of questions. that’s exactly the contrast between the heroes and the villains right there. the villains care about each other, they’ll give each other heartwarming speeches to please come back alive, and yet they’re utterly indifferent to the thousands of people being killed as they demolish their way through city after city. meanwhile by contrast Ochako’s first thought upon being erotically waylaid by her sexy knife-wielding archnemesis is “but what about that poor old lady is she all right.” just completely opposite energies, almost to a hilarious degree. like maybe Ochako actually should worry about herself just a little bit more lol but heroes gonna hero

and so now what, Toga!! you’re gonna pout about it?? like she’s betrayed you somehow?

anyway so that’s the end of the chapter! and I’ll just come right out and say that I’m hoping that this fight ends up being something where Toga maybe starts to see things just a little bit more from Ochako’s point of view, and not the other way around, because otherwise I’ll be a little frustrated, ngl. the manga has done an excellent job of making the villains likeable and relatable and getting us to sympathize with them up till this point, but at some point it’s got to start refuting some of these arguments and making it clear that the villains do not actually have any kind of moral high ground here

and also! I really like Toga and would like her to have some kind of redemption arc! but as of now that’s looking to be really difficult if not impossible to pull off, because Toga hasn’t exactly shown a whole lot of remorse for anything she’s done so far, you know? because she doesn’t see it as bad in any way; to her it’s just her way of expressing love, and being true to who she is. but being true to yourself really should NOT involve, you know, MURDER, and so yeah. it’s a problem lmao

but who knows! maybe this battle with Ochako will be the start of something which eventually leads to some sort of change within her! I have absolutely no idea how that could play out tbh, but even so I can hope! either that or she will double down on the whole “villains are victims and heroes are apathetic cruel hypocrites” ideology and decide she wants to kill Ochako and Izuku for breaking her heart, in which case I will be very sad, but I guess if that’s the way Horikoshi’s gonna play it it is what it is!

and lastly, so is this going to be like the final battle between them or something?? surely not, right? like this is just round 2 of 3. well at any rate, it’s sure going to be interesting