#or that he's bad at everything else ever

[calware]

imagine a world where jake wasn't characterized by fandom as "the stupid one"

[shanklin]

Stanford never became friends with Fiddleford.

Instead he got himself a different small friend group who cares a lot about him. At least about the Ford he pretended to be in college.

A kind, soft spoken formerly bullied genius who researches very dull stuff in Oregon and definitely not anything weird. Their Ford would never break any rules or ignore safety measures [unlike that other student they heard about during their college years.]

And then Ford stops answering their calls and loses his grant. 

It’s time for an intervention and they start pestering Ford with letters and calls until he finally agrees to meet them at a science convention, but he’ll take his brother with him.

They’re relieved! Ford is with Shermie! They like Shermie! It's a good thing that Ford still has one brother who isn't a good for nothing selfish criminal who destroyed his entire future!

If they ever get their hands on Ford’s evil twin they’ll make sure he’ll regret ever messing with their friend. Ford is too nice for revenge. They aren’t.

Meanwhile at the not-yet Mystery Shack, the Stans freshly survived their own angsty canon divergent tale of two stans AU and locked Bill out of Ford's mind like a week ago.

Stan: I don’t know how long Ford will keep me around but this will be good for him. He needs some friends to take care of him after I inevitably get kicked out again!

Ford: I only agreed to this because Stan insisted and I still haven’t found a way to thank him and apologize. I hope all my “friends” die in a fire.

[mollypaup]

i think a really great aspect of oofuri is how much it gets mihashi's ass for being overly timid and dependent. it would be really easy to write off the way he and abe interact as being abe's fault because he is overbearing, and a lot of people do, but it has some really great moments of going "hey, you cannot hide behind abe or depend on him to make every decision. it's not good for you, or him, or the team."

[rawliverandgoronspice]

Can you perhaps elaborate on the "Ganondorf should get to pummel Rauru"

As far as I'm recalling, we don't actually get that much of their issues in totk? We see leaders clashing, and then essentially Ganondorf kills Sonia and steals the secret stone, kicking off the imprisoning war. It's been a minute since I looked at the lore of totk (No Urbosa, so I'm nowhere near as invested as I am in botw) so I wouldn't be surprised if there's something big I missed, or even subtext I never picked up on

Sure! It's always very funny to me to receive the occasional ask like this, since I have been Renowned as a Rauru hater since release, but to briefly recap my perspective: I think Rauru was one self-conscious writing decision away from being the most compelling morally gray character in all of the Zelda canon, but unfortunately is heralded as being a near-perfect ruler (though even his imperfection is an extremely unclear and unexamined flaw that no character ever hold him accountable for --except for Ganondorf, and even what Ganondorf does call him out on is also unclear and also depends on translation because it wouldn't be a Zelda game otherwise) even though Rauru is mostly responsible, not only for his own problems, but also for everybody else's --including, crucially, Zelda's.

In a few words, he cannot be excused (like Zelda or Rhoam) by having to bear the weight of a kingdom for his poor decisions since, you know, he invented the damn thing (then of course maybe he would have to uphold the zonai legacy or something, and this is his motivation, but we don't know, since the game isn't interested in giving us this kind of information). His repeated invitations to the gerudos (and others but the gerudos are the only one not drinking the kool aid? which should be completely ok), being this new ruler of a brand new kingdom that didn't exist 5 minutes prior and yet feeling like he is somehow owed extreme levels of loyalty and devotion from everyone around him, being considered reasonable by the writing, is really baffling to me. Him dismissing Zelda's warnings (as tame as they are, which is just incomprehensible writing contrivences) even though he accepts that she does indeed come from the future, from a Hyrule ravaged by war, is crazy. Him running off to hunt and leave his priestess-wife in charge of the kingdom he founded on her lands while still speaking over her politically is.... sure a choice that was made in the writing. Him then choosing to warn Ganondorf that Link is a guy that exists and will kick his ass, is literally the reason why Link doesn't get the advantage and gets his arm destroyed. And then, in spite of all that, in spite of having the full picture, Rauru is vague and utterly unhelpful as a spirit while Link recovers, pondering that it's so sad that Constructs have to toil for all eternity for no purpose... :(

And like, yes Rauru, indeed Rauru, but maybe, just maybe, that should tell us something about how incredibly self-centered this goat-dragon-dude is --not realizing what he was imposing to his servants and people for his own leisure, in the name of his peace. I don't think he is evil, as in: he's not a cackling unsubtle and vapid caricature like Ganondorf is, but wow is this guy the most self-unaware and entitled character accidentally written in a game that fails to realize the absolute metric ton of red flags inserted in every single one of his scenes that I've... ever seen.

Again, if all of this was intentional, he would have been a masterful character. Maybe my favorite guy.

But the game destroying all other characters' interiority (and botw's worlbduilding) to tell this incredibly uncompelling tragedy about this super-cool perfect king and his series of completely avoidable failures... yeah, that really did not sit well with me at all.

Other posts about the topic that I've written previously:

A post about imperialism themes and aesthetics in TotK (I think it probably deserves an update with more specific historical examples)

A post about intent VS execution (especially re: good rulers and good kingdoms, and why this trope needs to be earned --contrasting TotK and EoW)

So yeah! Rauru. Weirdo guy. Compelling weirdo guy I think, but in a way the fandom really uhh disagrees with overall haha

[chibishortdeath]

Ya know, Castlevania tackled the concept that life after defeating Dracula could be difficult for a Belmont with Richter feeling like he’d lost all purpose and reason to go on living if not for saving others and fighting against something—

But, do you think any of them before him felt that way too?

I mean it sounds kind of miserable, being raised your whole life to be solely relied on for one moment… and then what? How do you handle the sudden shift to ‘not being needed anymore’? Evidently, most of them didn’t have very much happen to them after the events of their games since we don’t get to know—

But, do you think any of them ever got better? Do you think anyone before Richter ever learned how to live for themselves? Did Richter?

Anyway it’s 8 PM and I’m sitting around wondering if any of the Belmonts were still happy after their happy endings (debatable if certain ones got happy endings tbh but anyway), Konami can u check on them, I’m worried—

[moeblob]

Haha, it's so funny how I am so indecisive that I go "I wanna draw my son" and then have too many ideas as to how. So here!

Take Ferdinands (and a Felix, I suppose, bc they are boyfrinds in my heart and soul).

[princeof-flowers]

UGHHHHHHHH

Currently writing a fic that's basically just- "Emmrich has reached a level of besotted fool that even he can't handle because Rook gives him a hug and kiss every morning and night, and often gives him flowers and just thinking about that gets him hard and makes him pre because he's imagining married life already Send Help".

Like??? There's not even any dialog really it's just Emmrich being like- "he gives me kisses and hugs every day and gifts me flowers and alchemical ingredients 🥺🥺🥺" and fantasizing about being married to him and waking up next to him every morning like DAMN. Emmrich you got it bad. You're down horrendous.

[technicalknockout]

thinking about how cut off tko is from forming even a vaguely normal relationship with people

[sagrandr]

you know what? travis deserves to crash out. as a treat.

[saturdaymorningcartoonz]

Btw im like full on blocking people who defend the live action Lilo and stitch lol

[pseudophan]

my aunt's being a cunt so now my mum's sobbing in the living room everything is so awesome all of the time

[thesmokinpossum]

Bohdi Sanders, Modern Bushido: Living a Life of Excellence | William Shakespeare & John Fletcher, Henry VIII | The Godfather, Mario Puzo | Andrea Dworkin, P*rn*graphy: Men Possessing Women | The Godfather II, deleted scene | The Godfather II | Mallory Ortberg, Children's Sories Made Horrific: Curious George | The Godfather II, deleted scene | Brenna Twohy, Swallowtail

[machiavelli]

people need to understand that a buzzcut is only fitting to a very small demographic of this planet.

[unopenablebox]

what do we think is the most low effort "observance" of "passover" i could do

[girderednerve]

having a moment remembering the time i went to a river cleanup in high school & told one of the sophomores that i was dumping catfish out of beer cans with, in the course of conversation, that my dad was an alcoholic, & he looked at me, awkward as anything, & asked if my father beat me. incredible opportunity to think about cultural scripts. anyway i said no