#reach this moment

[attackfish]

@elf-kid2 in their last ask for the Reach this Moment AU asked for two things, each of which I decided needed its own post. The part I am answering here is What is Mai's relationship like with the Gaang.

Reach this Moment: [Link]. Universe tag: [Link].

Conveniently, there are, minus Zuko, five members of the Gaang.

1. The member of the Gaang (other than Zuko) that Mai sees most often is Suki. Suki, as head of the Kyoshi Warriors, spends most of her time in the Fire Nation palace. She's kind, she's sympathetic, and she's a natural born leader. Mai envies her, envies the ease she has with power, and with herself, and is so absolutely grateful for her presence that she could never express it. Not only does Suki admirably protect her new husband, toward whom she has many and complicated feelings, and gives Ty Lee the task to defend her, but she is also a fellow Earth Kingdom woman, an Earth Kingdom woman who is so far from what the Fire Nation expects of Earth Kingdom women, who comes with a band of Earth Kingdom women, who live well beyond the limits the Fire Nation expects. Mai is so grateful for all of them and their company. And she's grateful for Ty Lee too, not that she'll admit it.

2. Sokka shows up pretty regularly to visit his girlfriend. And the problem with Sokka is that he's just one more complication. He's a friend of her husband's, a husband for whom her feelings are anything but straightforward. And of course he helped end the war with said husband, and he pops in and out of the palace, making being a foreigner there look effortless. She hates him just a little for that. And she hates him just a little for being able to help end the war, when she spent every minute she knew there was a war, running around just fixing one problem after another and trying to keep her head above water as the Fire Nation appointed governor. And does she also have complicated feelings about that? Yeah. But he also goes out of the way to make her laugh. He doesn't treat her like a doll or a traitor for being Azula's appointed governor. And yeah, she kind of hates him sometimes, but she also kind of likes him a lot more often.

3. Toph is always an anomaly. She only rarely comes to the Fire Nation royal palace, and when she does, she doesn't stay long. She and Mai have become such different women, and yet they have so much in common, life experience, childhood, culture. Gaoling for all it is in the south, well south of the Si Wong desert, has tended to ape the cultural norms of Ba Sing Se as much as it was able. Supposedly the town was founded by the Bei Fongs, who were, and still are Ba Sing Se nobility and they still look to Ba Sing Se for spouses for their children. And like Mai, she grew up shut away, that restless despair and anger bubbling just under the surface. And like Mai Toph sees femininity as a prison. They each have their own relationship to that. Toph rejects it utterly, while Mai has learned to wield it. But neither likes it, neither is comfortable with it, any more than they are comfortable with their families, or their pasts. Mai doesn't always get along with Toph, or agree with her, but at least when she's around, Mai feels like their speaking the same language.

4. Katara and Aang came to the wedding. Sometimes, when she can't hold back the sense of shame and anger, Mai remembers Katara's look of pity. But they've met since then, talked, and Katara knows better now, knows that Mai has much sharper edges than she thought. Katara and Mai first really come to meet during the crisis over Yu Dao. It's hard, maybe impossible, to find one's way through a new role, one with no set parameters, that one is supposed to shape to suit one's self when one has no idea what one wants out of it or out of anything when one's whole life and purpose has fallen away twice in a year, and one hasn't an goals left. But Mai was governor of Ba Sing Se, and her sense of responsibility hasn't left her. And she knows intimately what it's like to be conquered by the Fire Nation. She knows the horrors and the cruelties of it, small and large, deliberate and incidental. Political boundaries between the Earth Kingdom and Fire Nation over former colonies makes Mai's nose twitch like a shirshu's smelling its quarry. And Katara spots her immediately as a natural ally. Aang, she knows, is more wary of her. He knows what she is, a woman with her own agenda.

5. He isn't wrong. For Mai, it's not as simple as Fire Nation verses Earth Kingdom, colony or province. For Katara, it's always simple. She's so good at getting to the straight forward clarity of a thing, when Mai feels like she's drowning in mud. But Mai has seen how little interest anyone in Ba Sing Se has beyond the walls, how it's a nation unto itself, and how benign the neglect has not been. These problems were exploited by the Fire Nation but they predate the conquest. And besides, who is it ruling Ba Sing Se, who wants the colonies back so badly? Why it's Long Feng. And Mai has found a goal, at least for now: making Long Feng's life as hard as possible. Later, this will evolve, into fighting for her brother's future independence as Earth King, but for now, she just wants to teach the man who used her and threw her out as soon as she was a threat, that he can't screw with her. Underneath her anger, she knows, is fear, but she has agreed with herself not to look at that too closely.

6. Long Feng is not eager for a war he can't win, and he's fully confident he can run rings around the child Avatar and teenage Firelord. So he readily agrees to negotiate. But it's neither Aang nor Zuko he meets on arrival in the Fire Nation capital. It's Mai. Her husband leaves the negotiations to her, a gesture of profound trust, and one she does not forget.

[tom-bakers-scarf]

Spotted this in a second hand bookshop and the whiplash I felt was so strong that I think I’ve discovered another 12 stages of grief

[tennant-davids]

SUCCESSION 2018 - 2023

Is that why you're paying a billion dollars for a gay little website?

[beaulesbian]

Enough to make you believe in true love.

[avisisisis]

Most straight relationships in media: “Even though there's no development and no chemistry and we don't look like we love each other that much we'll date because we're straight and that's what we're supposed to do. Right??”

Most queer relationships in media: “If saving you is a sin, I'll gladly become a sinner.” — “Dying together also included a ‘together’.” — “You changed my destiny from the moment we touched.” — “I would know him in death, at the end of the world.” — “The hero and the warrior were like the sun and the moon...”

[querro]

my favourite part of the decked out guests stream was the two-way "thats what she said" bit. and i havent seen anyone talking about it

[z-tomaz]

it also caught me so off guard in episode 1 in particular that the crew clearly knew how much izzy was doing to protect them from ed?? no one's saying it out loud because it won't help but the hug, and the whole scene surrounding it, says they've all quietly been paying attention and worrying about him behind his back and it was a culmination of weeks and months of living like they were while knowing that izzy was bending over backwards to absorb as much of ed's rage and heartbreak and anger as possible in order to shield the rest of them??? help??

[scintillatingshortgirl19]

their face journeys mean so much to me

[ef-1]

[Seb was trying to shake Daniel's hand, and Daniel tried to fist bump him]

Daniel: I was trynna give Seb knuckles, he wants to shake my hand so- the formalities were getting confused these days, people just hug.

Int: Hug it out!

Daniel: Yeah, hug it out.

[...]

[Seb fixes Daniel's sleeve while he's talking, unrolling it from where it's ridden up]

Daniel: he's even fixing my shirt! He's got good etiquette, he's a very responsible man.

[lostonmyroad]

the orv dokja moment where he’s like “i see i’m so galaxy brain yjh is acting devastated over my death is to get coins from the constellations and not because he actually cares for me i’m so genius” is the most iconic moment in literature ever to me

dokja thinks he’s being so fucking smart he’s overanalzyed this to the point of looping back to being a fucking dumbass

im pretty sure it has legendary status in the fandom

[mayasaura]

one problem with a theatrical adaption of tlt is htn, where the reveal that Gideon lives on works because of the change of second person to first.

the only way i can think of it working is that the actor playing gideon works backstage, like the lights system (but is hidden from the audience aside from subtle hints)

the biggest hint is when when wake breaches pal's river bubble she 'breaks' the lighting system and the stage goes dark. harrow is ushered into the wings by pal so she doesn't see anything, but the lights flick back on just before the curtains drop for a scene change, and pal looks directly up at the light box in surprise and smiles. if the audience is quick to turn around they can see a flash of a black robe.

Oh boy my friend, have you come to the right place!!

So, fun fact about ninja. Bear with me, I am going somewhere with this. The image of a ninja covered head to toe in black, with a hood and mask, comes from Kabuki theatre. It was originally a stagehand uniform. Like stagehands in modern theatre, stagehands in Kabuki would wear all black to signify that they were not really there, and whatever effect they were causing (carrying a prop, creating a breeze, ect.) was to be taken as happening on its own. Basic stagehand stuff, a lot of productions in many styles around the world do it, especially if they don't have fancy rigging systems.

Someone (I don't remember who now, or in what play) had the idea to dress the ninja in a production up as a stagehand. In the convention of the theatre, this made them invisible. The audience was already so used to ignoring stagehands, they didn't know any more than the characters that the ninja was present, despite the actor being clearly visible on stage. Which meant when the ninja struck, it was as if out of nowhere. I can only imagine the uproar in the theatre the first time it happened. It worked so well as to become commonplace, and the rest is history. The popular image of a ninja is still a kabuki stagehand.

So, back to the stage play of Harrow the Ninth. I think you've hit almost exactly on how to incorporate the Gideon twist into a theatrical production. But not as a lighting tech. Gideon is a stage hand. Maybe there would be more than one stagehand, maybe she would be the only one, but she would operate in full view of the audience, literally setting the scenes. I think it works best if she's the only one, but if the production needs more, she should subtly stand out in some way. As the play went on, we would notice that this one stage hand... increasingly interacts with Harrow, though Harrow never acknowledges it. At first it might look like she's playing Harrow's necromancy, because that would be the main special effect she would need to help with. When Harrow is unconscious at the end of a scene, it's always the same stagehand carrying her out. But we all know she's not really there. Until Palamedes acknowledges her. Turns to look right at her, and speaks to her. I can see the scene clearly. He would look at her, stunned, until Gideon finally took off her mask. The line "Kill us twice, shame on God," would be addressed to Gideon, and then he would turn back to Harrow, kiss her on the forehead, and tell her to go. Gideon, always out of Harrow's line of sight, would guide Harrow away while Harrow looked back at Palamedes.

[ruporas]

all I wanted was to save them... (ID in alt)

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

I started reading Dungeon Meshi last week, became instantly charmed and captivated, and blitzed through the entire manga in 4 days (and changed my profile picture about it). With that in mind, I would just like to say...

I love your dungeon meshi art so so much

CHILCHUCK!!!!!!!!

Thank you kindly! I love Dungeon Meshi a lot, so I'm happy to see so many people get into it for the first time.

CHILCHUCK!!!

[justaz]

merlin’s secret being a visual thing. when he is around arthur or gwen or leon or morgana or [insert whatever character here] merlin seems pale and thin, almost like a ghost or an apparition. when the sun lands on him he reflects it like a corpse, he eyes seem dark and dull. he has this ethereal beauty to him, this otherworldly visage that leads many to believe he is of fae blood. he just doesn’t seem to be 100% human. but when he is ONLY with lancelot or gaius (cough or gwaine bc gwaine DEFINITELY knew) merlin is heartachingly human. merlin shines in the sunlight, colors are brighter and more vibrant around him, and his smiles are wide and his laughs are boisterous. he takes on color and leaves everyone wanting to know him. but when other join in or interact with the two, merlin shifts before their eyes so quickly and suddenly that they aren’t sure whether or not what they saw was a trick of the light. the idea still leaves them wanting more and wanting to see the merlin who is just so full of life but that merlin only appears for a small select group of people. merlin who has a guard so high that it has an effect of other’s perception of him.

[those-badass-reeds]

I'm begging people to please just learn to enjoy things, genuinely. Like yes, think critically while consuming media and stay alert, but also remember to allow yourself downtime.

I'm tired right now and probably won't be able to articulate this properly, but I just saw someone on Twitter complain that movies like The Menu and Glass Onion are shallow half-critiques that don't actually say anything radical about the rich/class systems, and I mean... Yeah? That's actually ok? They're entertainment products designed for mass appeal. And I'm not saying that something can't be entertaining as well as taking a clear, defined position, but I'm saying that not every piece of media has to be an in-depth takedown of social/political systems.

Both films had something to say, and do a good job of getting people thinking about our current society and it's issues. They aren't documentaries created for a niche group who have thoroughly studied these ideals, nor do they claim to be. Not everyone watching these movies will have the same knowledge of social systems, and most people certainly don't want to be flat out lectured by fictional characters.

Learn to enjoy things for what they are sometimes, without feeling the need to condemn them for every way they didn't live up to your personal standard

[cinnachaos]

hi sorry i dont want this to seem like rb bait but i thought itd be fun to see if it works please do not send me to note bait jail

if this gets 1k notes ill buy a keyboard and learn how to play calamari inkantation over the summer. ill post a video too if anyone wants proof :-)

ill also draw the squid sisters at 500 notes if u guys want

SORRY I FORGOT TO ADD IT ORIGINALLY BUT THIS LASTS UNTIL JUNE 20TH 2024. ill still draw the squisters whether this works or not, but this is to avoid impulse buying so i dont want it to last forever!!! fate of my money is in your hands tumblr. choose wisely