#so that’s sort of moot regardless lol

[wheeler-things]

Man, I’m never going to write it properly because I don’t have the patience or time, but one day I’m going to talk about my Crazier Things roleswap au.

Where—

Joyce kicked Lonnie out much earlier, and, instead of getting work at Melvald’s, decides to angle for a better paying job at the police station. Nobody believes she can handle being an officer because she’s Joyce Byers and she’s tiny and lbr a woman, but through her ferocious tenacity when the safety of her boys is on the line plus a pathetically slim pool of applicants (and the fact that I am the god if this au and I want her and Hop to swap roles because I’m swapping all the mains), eventually she’s brought on in a trial capacity. She ends up sticking around when her skills as a detective become apparent (yes, she still faces sexism in the workplace on the daily, but she is legitimately good at her job).

Meanwhile, Sara died when she was 2 or 3, so Hop’s divorce happened earlier. El wasn’t an experiment in this au (though she does have latent powers), but through some situation, Hopper ended up with El being shoved in his direction when she was a toddler. He wasn’t really in a fit place to care for her, but (for whatever reason that I have not and will not figure out) he ends up adopting her anyway. He moves the two of them back to Hawkins, and picks up a job at Melvald’s, because it’s what’s available at the time. Because all the stress doesn’t actually help his substance abuse issues (and because I need a reason for other people to doubt his sanity/perception a la s1 Joyce being doubled), he still drinks too much, and he’s not in a very mentally healthy place at all, but he’s trying his best.

Mike Wheeler might only be a little kid, but there’s already something weird about him. Even as a baby, he gets chronic nosebleeds. The lights flicker when he’s upset. Sometimes, the tape suddenly skips to or repeats a song that he loves, despite nobody touching the tape deck. Ted doesn’t notice any of this as more than a strange coincidence. Karen does her best not to think about it, but she can’t help but worry about her son.

Mike and Will still meet on the swings when they’re 5, and within the day, they’re best friends. Within the week, they also meet El, and the three of them become best friends.

The summer after Kindergarten, Karen takes Mike to see a doctor because she’s worried that his chronic nosebleeds haven’t stopped. That’s how he ends up on Brenner’s radar. And just before the start of first grade, Mike Wheeler disappears without a trace.

Max moves to Hawkins that October, and she becomes El and Will’s friend pretty quickly (she also gets a front row seat to the slow progression of the two of them losing more and more hope that their third best friend— who Max never met but knows everything about because both talk about him constantly— is ever coming home).

Karen obviously fights to look for her son, and the searches go on for months, but they find nothing. With her money and connections, Karen actually gets the current police chief kicked out of the position, because she doesn’t believe he’s doing everything he can to find her son. That’s how Joyce takes on the role of Police Chief because she might be the best detective the station has, but she’s also a woman so the thought is that Karen will probably get HER fired as well which for totally unknown reasons is the most palatable option to a bunch of people with power over the station (//sighs in sexism). Joyce actually listens to Karen, though, and is as transparent as possible about the search, even though it’s very cold at this point, so despite being dissatisfied and upset, Karen at least believes Joyce is doing her best. And that’s how Joyce ends up police chief.

Mike’s disappearance puts added pressure on the Wheeler house, so Nancy ends up acting out more for attention which is how we get Nancy in Steve’s canon s1 role as the popular party girl (though she’s still Nancy— smart as a whip and ambitious as hell, it’s just hidden better). Meanwhile, Jonathan ends up in her canon nerd role (he’s studying hard for a full ride to NYU!) with Barb as his best friend. And Steve… well, Billy showed up earlier with Max, so he got to work putting Steve down long before Steve’s rep was secure, and Steve is now something of a loner. He’s still a jock, but he does solo stuff like track instead of team sports. The upside is that this means he and Robin (who mayyyy or may not be the cool anti-establishment teen running this universe’s Hellfire Club, when the canon era starts) became friends earlier.

Steve and Jonathan know each other loosely, and are assigned to do a project together (Jonathan’s a nerd who’s taking a class above his grade level and Steve had no friends in the class so they got paired up by default), so Steve goes over to Jonathan’s house and sees Will, El, and Max huddled over their first dnd manual. Somehow (Steve doesn’t remember exactly how, but he’s pretty sure El and Will’s twin puppy dog eyes had something to do with it), a simple “oh, dnd, huh?” comment turns into thirteen year old Steve agreeing that the kids can use his place as a quiet place to play (his parents are never around anyway), and maybe he’ll get his cool friend who knows how to play to stop by and help out if they need it, and telling Joyce that it’s fine he wouldn’t mind babysitting because, really, he’s really bored a lot of the time in his big, empty house. And from then on, Steve’s place is this version of the Party’s Wheeler Basement.

Lucas shows up in fourth grade, and joins the Party. Obviously this changes his dynamic with Max— they get a slower burn in this one (and I’m still undecided whether it would ultimately end with El/Lucas/Max or Dustin/El), but he gets accepted really readily.

So… on November 6, 1983, the Party bikes home from Steve’s place after a session, and El vanishes (which is Will’s actual worst nightmare because now BOTH of his Kindergarten best friends have vanished without a trace). This leads, ultimately, to Will, Max, and Lucas going looking for El in the woods the next night. They don’t find her, but they do find a very bewildered boy with black, shaved hair and dark eyes, with the number 014 tattooed on his wrist.

[risingscorchingsuns]

Hi Leon!! It’s princeblue but my main acc!! Dropping into ask what you think Genya’s and kyojurous, and maybe even senjurou’s dynamic would be like? You said you interested in being moots sooo I’m taking an opportunity to have a convo hehe

omg hello!!!! thank u for sending this i literally have no idea how to start conversations lmaoo

i think it depends on how much they know about each other/where Genya is in his character development! there’s a LOT of factors here so im gonna try and turn it into a formula because that’s my favorite analysis format lol

i don’t know if this is going to make any sense because I don’t know how to do actual math but breaking things into variables makes it easier to sort them in my brain

let’s say K = kyojuro and G = genya. x = how much kyojuro knows about genya, and y = how much genya knows about kyo. a = pre-tanjiro genya and b = post-tanjiro genya. (i assume this would make a difference bc tanjiro makes him less aggressive lol.) Going to leave Senjuro out for now because that’s too many variables for a post that I don’t plan to cross-reference 💀

There’s also the fact that canonically, post-Tanjiro Genya would never meet Kyojuro, but I didn’t think about that until I was nearly done with this post so I’ll leave that variable in as a hypothetical. aG in this scenario can be a control group I guess lol

let’s take (K)x + (aG)y as a base formula, and solve for the dynamic there. assuming x is “Kyojuro knows nothing except Genya’s last name”, and y is “Genya knows Kyojuro as a Hashira and nothing else”, it’s safe to say their dynamic would be mostly professional. Kyojuro, knowing Genya’s last name, would no doubt link him to Sanemi. But Sanemi fervently denies having any siblings, so Kyojuro would likely try to probe Genya for info, due to his brotherly instinct. He’d want to know if something was wrong, so he could help if possible. Assuming we’re dealing with aG, Genya would shirk away the questions, and Kyojuro would back off out of respect. I don’t think Genya would be too rude about it due to Kyojuro being a Hashira, but definitely a bit more irritable and snarky than bG would be.

bG would feel hurt at the mention of Sanemi, but I believe he’d be more open to talking about it. If Genya opens up to Kyojuro, I think they have high potential to form a brotherly relationship given enough time. Kyojuro would feel protective of Genya, and, whether consciously or not, may link him to Senjuro and begin to act brotherly and/or protective of him as well. If Kyojuro knows that Genya eats demons to make himself stronger at the cost of his own health, he’d probably be horrified- food is very important to Kyojuro and he would be mortified at the idea of eating a demon to gain its powers, especially if it hurts the consumer. I’m not sure if he’d try to stop Genya or not, but he’d definitely be concerned about him.

Either way, I think the key variable here is whether or not Genya lets his guard down long enough for Kyojuro to learn his story- then I think their relationship would evolve from professional to a lot more brotherly. Kyojuro can’t entirely help it- it’s in his nature to protect, it’s literally been taught to him since he was old enough to understand. He would want to protect Genya regardless, but learning his story, his sacrifices, and his actions going forward, Kyojuro would almost certainly take him under his own wing if given the chance. I believe Genya would remind Kyojuro of Senjuro- someone who doesn’t fight traditionally, but is so so strong in their own regard. They aren’t exactly the same, but they have enough similarities that i believe Kyo would definitely associate the two.

how knowing Genya would change his perception of Sanemi is also an interesting concept but I’m going to save that for another post lol

anyway pls feel free to plug in different variables for me to analyze???? id like to do them all here but unfortunately i am writing this post so i can procrastinate on my schoolwork so im gonna call it here lol

[lupins-hehim-pussy]

Just speed consumed all of addison lee very much enjoyed I am waiting with my popcorn for next chapter! I did have a wonder while reading, what is Wriothesley's scope of vision? Is it like this needs to be 3 inches in front of his face? Can he see faces clearly if he's close enough? Loving the fic, keep writing!

The short answer is:

No matter how close he gets, it's still gonna be unclear. It's not quite like myopia/short-sightedness where the blurriness can change with glasses/distance. His vision is more like looking through foggy glass. If something is pressed right up to the glass, you can see it more clearly, but it will still be foggy. Additionally, the guy has always been red/green colour-blind, so that doesn't change even after his war injuries, but because his vision is worse in general, he can barely tell colours apart lol. Unless it's bright blue.

LONG ANSWER UNDER THE CUT.

HAHAHHAHAHAHAHHA HEHEHHHEHEHHE WHUAGHAHA sorry. I like to infodump about my fics.

Not kidding when say this: I have a document that have notes on every single year in the 10 years between the Celestia war and current INGITAL events.

Unfortunately this was all planned before Sigewinne release, so I didn't have her canon birthday (AND I DON'T CARE ABOUT CANON ANY MORE I'm burying my head in the sand.) but it accounts for every year that Sigewinne grew up and some other random lore bits. "What does this have to do with my question?" you ask. Well, I have the 10-years progression notes specifically to keep their life events in order and Wriothesley's and Neuvillette's healing progress consistent KJNDSKJNSANSKJHASDJNJSNDKJNASJNDSAJNKSAKJ.

SO. Detailed answer is this:

At this point in INGITAL, if you stand 1-2 meters away from him and wave, he's gonna notice if he's looking at you, paying attention, and you're both indoors, or he's wearing sunnies. He's not gonna be able to recognise anything, though, he can just tell something is moving. He can sort of read regular text on a computer screen at about 2-3 inches (on a good day) using his better eye (left, so he always sorta lean that way when he's trying to look at something), but it's a struggle and he'd rather not do it. His right is worse.

There's also his field of vision. So like, his peripherals are pretty much gone, and he has some dark patches/blind spots. He's also light-sensitive, so everything's kinda painfully bright sometimes, but his vision is also bad in the dark, so he needs a happy medium, but that can shift from day to day.

Very rough idea of what Neuvillette might look like to him on a sunny day. Veeery rough idea. I'm not blind I just researched a lot.

And then, regardless of what he can actually physically see, if his eyes hurt or feel too sensitive to keep open, it's all moot anyway. And once again, usually that depends on the day.

When Sigewinne was born, he had functionally decent vision in one eye (had a corneal transplant on his right). Legally can't get his driving licence, but y'know, he still felt confident enough to drive (Neuvillette did not let him, though.) The transplanted eye deteriorates over Sigewinne's first few months, and so did his better eye. He got another surgery for his left eye (the better one) when Sigewinne was about one, and that lasted for a bit, but by the time she's two, he's pretty much considered legally blind. By the time she's four, he does most things on his own and his other issues are managed as well, which is why they decided to have a second kid, and they had Carole when Sigewinne was 5. But Neuvillette struggled a bit with that second pregnancy. I mean, his first wasn't exactly rose and rainbows, but he his mental health nose-dived with the second one for a while. It's because he's been so focused on keeping it together while Wriothesley recovers that he hasn't fully dealt with his own trauma until his second pregnancy. Because yeah, thinking your husband died while you're carrying your first baby was traumatic. They've both got PTSD. By the time Sedene comes about though, they're all good. Sedene's pregnancy was a breeze, there was just Covid lockdowns HAHAHAHA. And then, if I go through with another pregnancy at the end of INGITAL, well... That's for me to know and for you to ponder.

[By the way, Clorinde mentioned going over to their house for Wrio's birthday 8 years ago in Chapter 9, which is when Sigewinne was 3 and he was 28. His previous birthday (his 27th) was a disaster. Had a big fight with his husband. So that's another morsel of lore from the 10-years-of-plot document.]

There's a scene planned somewhere in all this, where Neuvillette shows him some of their photos on one of the days when his vision is better. Photos of eeeeveryone their kids and their friends and all. He printed them out and edited them to raise the contrast so Wriothesley can see it more easily. Wriothesley voice: Ajax is fucking ginger? [This is lore relevant. No spoilers though.]

[gumpistol]

:: SEMI-HIATUS NOTICE ::

as some may have already seen when i said something about it a few days back, due to some other health concerns, i am being taken off of my adhd medication for at least the next 1-2 months until i can get other health issues at a better place. i have no idea the full scope of how this will affect me, as this will be the first time in about five years that i'm not on any sort of medication. i.e. i could be in for a WILD ride folks.

i am certain of one thing though, writing, especially long-form, is going to be so much harder, and as a result slower, and possibly even non-existent. i struggled keeping up with rp writing A LOT prior to getting placed on meds, to the point of nearly giving up on it because i genuinely thought i could not do it.

that being said, until the end of June, my activity is going to be very low, and things i reply to are going to be purely based on where the dopamine wants to go. i don't want to try and force any writing, i don't want to fall back into the mindset of writing being something i dislike. i LOVE writing Luffy, i love writing my other OP muses, and i love that i've been able to feel excited about writing again for the first time in a long time. i really don't want to lose that, but i also understand that my health is struggling right now and it needs to be prioritized.

i have no doubt that my moots here will be understanding and patient with me, it's just a matter of me being patient with myself. but regardless, i just ask for some extra patience as more typos potentially happen, if my grammar gets a bit muddled, and if my writing is generally shorter since i won't be able to focus on the same threads for more than 15 minutes or so at a time. or i just have a sleep attack at my desk and pass out mid-writing. it's gonna be high school biology all over again lol.

on that note, any replies i do have written up to now will get typed up and added to the queue to trickle out over however long. i will still be present on the dash and engaging in shenanigans as much as possible, and i will also still be available in DMs for chatting and plotting, but i can't definitively say how well i will do with responding when my brain is being a spazz. who knows, maybe i'll actually do better at it! aha, no promises 

[laprimera]

ABOUT THE MUN - ooo I got tagged ooOooo

what made you pick up the current muse(s) you have?

fixation as soon as the second trailer with her reveal came? Like the little snippets that was known about the game already weaved a pretty intricate (and disproven lol) plot and personality.

Even after everything got debunked I still kept my original lore + now I live and love the idea her ideal, picturesque self is actually a front for how clutzy and forgetful she really is as a super busy champion who's passionate about her region.

is there anything you don’t like to write?

bad/sad unnecessary endings or forks in the road?? I know it's silly in context like "well stories arent all happy-" BUT THIS IS POKEMON AR PEE AND I PARTIALLY CONTROL THE NARATIVE AND I WANT MY PROTAGS TO GO THROUGH IT BUT COME OUT AT THE END GETTING EVERYTHING THEY WANT. IS IT SO BAD I DONT WANT TO PARTICIPATE IN BITTER SADNESS EVEN IN A FANTASY MADE-UP SCENARIO? REALITY IS HELL AS IS I DONT WANNA BE SAD ALL DAY OVER INTERNET BARBIES, I HAVE BILLS AND TAXES TO DO.

so I make sure to plot with long term plot partners so we all get that character growth and exciting story with something good they can all take away in the end. No, the character doesnt have to die to prove a macab point. No the loving couple doesnt have to break up for some story twist. And thats what AU's are for if we're looking to explore something else so it's easy to separate from 👍

is there anything you really enjoy writing?

plot novellas 👀 I see a partner reply instantly to a plot thread and I jive for days on end until the next reply for real-- each one is a really juicy cliffhanger and a lot of them still haunt the back of my mind.

how do you come up with headcanons? 

most come with interactions or thoughts stemming from the game or story itself. Eventually they branch out and more ideas happen and a lot comes from looking at dash and bringing up some really interesting points!

do you write in silence or do you play music? 

Ambiance and music helps esp when silence is actually really distracting (thoughts wandering and what not-adhd be like that). The mood even influences the reply.

do you plan your replies or wing them?

planned for plot driven replies but ic bouts and simple replies are winged!

do you enjoy shipping? 

YES YES YES YES, though recently I have to be a little more careful about saying Im completely open to shipping on whim. At some points the plot involves the other person too much and it gets hard to move a story along esp with the nature of the rpc and the lifespan of interest in the muse/rpc (which is natural ofc!).

You're okay to show and express interest in shipping so we can take a direction with our muses interaction wise but I say it's not for certain until they develop some more long term. Who knows, maybe it was just a crush or a fling sort of thought :' 0

what’s your alias/name? 

Leche leche leche leche leche milk

age?

30

birthday? 

may!

favorite color?

red and greens

favorite song? 

Sugar, You by the Oh Honey has taken a lot of real-estate in my head lately--

last movie you watched?

I,,,havent watched a movie in a really long time Ill be honest OTL,, I dont have the attention span to sit down for more then twenty minutes if that.

last show you watched?

Aggretsuko final season! That,,,was awhile ago. See above oop--

last song you listened to?

Dont know the last song that played on my car radio 🤔

favorite food? 

spaghetti and meatballs and cereal < 3

favorite season?

spring 🌼

do you have a tumblr best friend?

ooh I dont want to make anyone feel left behind. My moots have a special place regardless of hobby or not <3

tagging: uh...

[witheredoffherwitch]

hello there! just wanted to send an encouraging ask as I very rarely look at any hotd-related content on here (due to the lack of critical thinking that can be found and the pure vitriol spewed through anonymous messages - many lovely mutuals have also received horrendous anons telling them they should be physically harmed since they do not enjoy an incestuous crackship and that’s absolutely unhinged!) and you’ve handled these absurdly obnoxious, transparent anons in your inbox with grace and eloquence. it’s been a year and many moots on twitter have learned to keep to themselves regarding opinions related to alys/aemond and how it could possibly be interpreted as a gothic tale/romance (as they keep tabs over there too) but it’s truly pathetic and unsettling to see how a certain part of this fanbase CONTINUES to spew their hate and try to incite a reaction. rooting for a female character to be sexually assaulted simply because one is bitter over an incestuous crackship not happening is the definition of childish and frankly very odd. there’s already more than enough of that in this whole franchise and aemond taking a woman by force is simply not in-keeping with how they’ve characterized him in the show (as you’ve aptly acknowledged) and is very unlikely to happen (much to their displeasure). their relationship is not a fairytale but that doesn’t mean it has to include that at all.

anyhow this ended up being way too long but wanted to commend you for dealing with this pure nonsense from Those shippers! I’ve turned my anon option off to avoid this sort of behavior and moots who think alys has alot to offer as a character have received tons of hate while minding their own business. it’s been a year and they are STILL insufferable. seems they cannot cope with the fact that she will be in the show and that their ship is not happening. very sad. in any case, gayle seems like a very dedicated actress and she and ewan are surely to have an interesting screen presence together. can’t wait to see what they bring as a duo chemistry-wise and their performances! 🥰

Ahhh Cecilia!! I'm so sorry for getting around to your message so late, but I am all the more grateful to you for reaching out at the time. Aside from those two anons (to whom I so eloquently requested to throat my cock), I think I did a pretty good job at handling this ongoing dissent. Thank you so much once again!

I am so sorry that you guys had to deal with this kind of nonsense before, BUT I seriously hope that these anons have not deterred your enthusiasm for any Alysmond content. We barely make for a moderately-sized Kpop girl group -- and I hope the few remaining girlies are still active to keep this small hive humming and buzzing. Alysmond is a ship that will sustain irrespective of what the show follows - i mean, we have other crackships that are still going strong after all. We should grant ourselves a bit of freedom to express our creative interpretations of the narrative.

Coming to what you said about Aemond's depiction in the show, I 100% stand by that take. He's not shown to be an unreasonable brute who will take someone by force. Moreover from whatever leaks we've got till now (though I would take them with a grain of salt), Gayle's Alys is also made to come off as a very kooky character. Regardless of what they show on-screen, I am already drowning ten-feet deep into these headcanons -- IMAGINE the first interaction between Alys 'a barn owl cursed to live in human form' Rivers and Aemond 'tis I who studies philosophy' Targaryen. I don't care what anyone says because that's a recipe for deliciously dark and romantically gothic meet-cute. That's our quirky cursed witch and menacingly tortured kinslayer! If Condal messes it up, then we have enough material to draft multiple fucking AUs for ourselves. LOL I've even suggested earlier how we only need Gayle in Alys' costume -- because rest assured, we'll do the rest with moodboards and countless video edits.

I am extremely tight on schedule since I am doing my Masters while working a full-time job -- and because of that, I am short on producing the kind of content I'd like BUT hopefully, I can get something out by the end of this month. To be very honest, I actually don't really mind crackships (I read them all the time and have shared links to some of my favorites) but what really annoys me is this constant need to put down other ships to justify your own little delulu headcanons.

Anyway thanks for reaching out once again, and you are welcome to take a nice cushy spot in our coven.

Love, Kalki. 🤗

[psychewritesbs]

gege akutami is a menace to society actually

in case you haven't read, I'm talking about 215, so you can ignore me when you're ready

*

*

*

*

he saw us have a little hope last week and had to send us tumbling again 😢

it's going to be a tough ride for sure ~

I honestly don't know how they'll be able to handle sukuna at full form bc even with the limitations, he was still countering. It'd be even worse if he's willing to work with kenjaku too. For some reason (denial), I have a feeling megumi's going to overcome this. I won't comment more on that because i feel like i'll spiral (cannot believe maki said its weird seeing megumi's face on someone being strong 😭) On another note, sukuna and co's eventual defeat will be worthwhile for how much suffering they've caused and will cause. Sukuna's choice to leave yuji alive will definitely come back to bite him, but it's interesting that his joy comes from seeing yuji suffer and look pathetic than giving him death. He despises everything about yuji and I see him praising others and he calls yuji boring (he's not but I'll let you live today sukuna). I don't like theorizing too too much for fear of raising expectations, but I'm really curious about sukuna's life during the heian period.

When sukuna and uraume laughed at yuji, I felt like I was laughed at too. I guess we'll be seeing his bath scene next.

Anyway, thanks for reading !! Have a good day/night.

(Will I ever go off anon? We'll see one day !!)

HOLA! Happy JJK-Sunday!!!!

Ok. hang I'm just going to go ahead and...

gege akutami is a menace to society actually

There... I felt like it needed to be said louder for the people in the back who may still be on the fence about getting into JJK.

Ok brainrot about chapter 215 under the cut!

Ah yes, no worries about chapter leaks lol. My weekly routine involves checking leaks first thing Wednesday and Friday mornings and nerding out with the moots about it 😂.

Like I am for real worried about JJK ending because what am I going to obsess over when it ends?!!!!!

WHAT KIND OF NORMAL EXISTENCE WILL I BE FORCED TO ENDURE?!!!!!!

But anyways, I did hold off on posting my reply to you until today (Sunday) for those who follow this hellhole of a blog of mine and don't actually read leaks.

he saw us have a little hope last week and had to send us tumbling again 😢

it's going to be a tough ride for sure ~

Yesssss I was hoping we'd get to see Megumi inside the inner domain wrecking Sukuna or at least inflicting some sort of damage 🥲🤧. SOMETHING! ANYTHING!

Regardless, Megumi fighting Sukuna from within whenever his friends are in danger is so... this boy is so beautiful and he doesn't even get it.

To your point about this being a though ride, Frenchie is my voice of reason when it comes to my fatalist fear of Megumi's death. @justafrenchlondoner recently said some good stuff about how Gege is probably trying to get us to feel like all hope is lost before something good happens.

After all, it isn't uncommon to see events continue to escalate in a sort of "it's going to get much much worse before it gets better" kind of way.

For some reason (denial), I have a feeling megumi's going to overcome this. I won't comment more on that because i feel like i'll spiral

Riiiiight so I'm still rather unwilling to let myself hope Megumi is surviving for the mere fact that I don't want to be hurt. That's just my nature tho.

If I break my heart now then I won't be heartbroken later on if it turns out that Megumi is not surviving.

Sound logic as you can see lol. I have a tendency to come up with worst case scenarios.

Despite that, I think the idea of Megumi surviving this ordeal to carry on and change the Jujutsu scheme of things makes a lot of sense. Not to mention having to carry the burden of responsibility for the memory of the people he cared about but lost along the way, quite possibly because of his own miscalculations.

Ugh... depressing.

It's so "Watanabe-ending" in its execution but far, far more depressing, brutal and cruel.

gege akutami is a menace to society actually

On another note, sukuna and co's eventual defeat will be worthwhile for how much suffering they've caused and will cause. Sukuna's choice to leave yuji alive will definitely come back to bite him, but it's interesting that his joy comes from seeing yuji suffer and look pathetic than giving him death.

Yeeeeeeessss. I really like the idea that Sukuna's continued underestimating of Yuji will come back to bite him in the ass. I personally will not be surprised if Yuji takes Sukuna back into himself and then kills himself in a self-sacrificial fashion.

Very Pisces of him. Very dying on the cross for our sins symbolism.

I was also thinking about the idea that Sukuna feeds off of other's suffering too. This whole idea around him being a hedonist with no regards for others takes on a whole new dimension when you consider he might go out of his way to cause suffering because it brings him joy.

It feels like an exploration of a demonic being which made me realize that I think that I've taken for granted that JJK is a horror story and that Gege may be using horror tropes.

This only become clear to me as of late when Sukuna possessed Megumi's body. It was a total execution of demonic possession where the person who gets possessed has to be mentally weakened in order for the demon to take over.

Also, from my understanding of demonic entities, they are said to feed off of negative emotions and actually orchestrate situations that cause suffering precisely so that they can feed off of these emotions.

When sukuna and uraume laughed at yuji, I felt like I was laughed at too.

I couldn't have said it better...

I have to admit that this is one of my favorite panels ever because, as you say, it's SO DESPICABLE of them to laugh at Yuji when he's so utterly broken after having miserably failed at saving Megumi.

I have personally been fascinated with the reactions this panel has gotten because it speaks to something very real.

Whether it is the experience of being bullied or our unwillingness and complete rejection of the very same evil that exists within, I feel like Gege struck a deep cord with the execution.

gege akutami is a menace to society actually

And this is one of the things that have been on my mind about Gege lately--his execution of events as of late has been far more brutal and cruel than before.

Idk how to explain but the events in Shibuya were bad and shocking... but #things right now just feel hopeless and it feels like Gege is unleashing his self-loathing onto his characters--and his self-loathing is cruel and brutal.

With mangaka like him I always have to wonder about their psyche. i.e. CLAMP's Nanase Okawa has an uncanny ability to take you into deep pits of relatable grief and meaningless despair right along with her characters.

All of the above said, I also agree with Frenchie about how I both hate and love Gege for the execution of this moment.

The fact that Gege was able to depict a deep experience of despair through Yuji and then elicit hate from the audience, it speaks to his ability as a story-teller and how the story he's telling resonates deeply with the audience in a cathartic fashion.

Also, not sure if you've seen this post by littleholmes but it includes a photo of what might be the Harima statue in question.

And like... the despair this child statue seems to be experiencing and expressing is so palpable, and I love Gege for making a reference to it because it speaks to Yuji's inner child's grief and helplessness and suffering for not being able to impose his will upon his environment.

Not sure if Spooky will write about it in more detail but I also love what @linkspooky said about the idea that Yuji trying to "Shonen protagonist" his way through things usually doesn't work out.

It's a nice twist on how Shonen mcs just barrel their way through #things with their typical Shonen mc single-minded determination, and everything works out because of the power of friendship or something like that.

Not to sound like a broken record, but this is why I don't understand the idea that JJK is cliché Shonen. There's so much happening underneath the surface that is so rich in commentary on common shonen tropes.

Anyway, thanks for reading !! Have a good day/night.

(Will I ever go off anon? We'll see one day !!)

Thanks for stopping by and sharing all the #thoughts once again!

If you ever come off anon I am looking forward to it. If you don't... well, I'll be looking forward to hearing from you again regardless.

Have a happy JJK Sunday!

[symptoms-syndrome]

Personal, just under a readmore for privacy, no TWs apply other than mild sexual themes I guess???

Sooo my drag mom is getting me a job at a pretty big drag event (a competition that runs regularly) around here, not like as a performer per se but as part of the pit crew. And I'm having feelings about it?

Basically, the pit crew do stage setup, collect tips, and occasionally perform. And look pretty, ofc. Right now the two pit crew members (only one of whom I know personally) are a drag king and a cis guy (who might do drag IDK, probably does but doesn't like...there at that event usually.) And ofc it's a gay club so like the dude wears little briefs, the drag king usually wears trans tape and briefs and sometimes a harness or smth. And I have nooo issue w nudity for the record, I'd be fine w that, I'm mostly just hesitant abt that bc like. I don't wanna tape every time bc I'm lazy but throwing on a sports bra also feels lazy but I don't feel confident a regular bra is going to stay and not be fussy while I'm running around performing tasks. So I have the typical "what will I wear" dilemma LOL. I could just wear a binder tho TBH. Also I don't have issues w body image whatever bc A. I love my body and B. The event is already rly body diverse so like it's not like I'd stand out like I would being a lil thicker among a bunch of skinny twinks.

So I've covered what I'm NOT worried about. What I am worried about is like...do I deserve this, basically. I JUST started out in drag. It's been less than a year. It feels like cheating, to get a spot in this show even as just pit crew. Because they aren't just nameless stage hands, they get performance spots and promos on the socials and stuff. The one I know (the king) has been performing for like, years. Not to mention the connections, though I guess that's a little moot since I have a lot of the connections already thru my drag mom. She knows a lot of the big names around here and is friends with a lot of them. Like there are two hosts, one is friends with my drag mom and one I'm friends with thru a diff drag thing. But still, a lot of people who work there are like legendary.

And likeee I do also know that that's sort of the point of having a drag parent, they use their connections to get u things. But nepotism feels weird to me. I'm not used to being favored without a catch. And I'm worried my connections might make other people in the community think I like, cheated. What if they automatically think I'm used to just getting things? I feel like that might harbor resentment, but maybe I'm projecting.

I'm going to take the job regardless, mostly because I need the money. It's just wild, I feel like I've been thrown into the deep end with all of this. Like my drag mom has SO much faith in me and genuinely thinks I'll really be able to make it big and I don't? Know where that's coming from. Not that I think I'm not good or can't be good, but because I'm just a beginner. It's like declaring someone a prodigy a week into preschool. Let me prove myself first. But also don't look a gift horse in the mouth I guess.

[trippin-over-my-fandoms]

Someone help me; I’ve got too many WIPs

Tagged by @whateverthefuckyouwantiguess to share my WIPs. I too do not have a WIPs folder bc google docs won’t let me sort like I wanna so their meme in their post is relatable.

Rules: post the names of all the files in your wip folder regardless of how non-descriptive or ridiculous. let people send you an ask with the title that most intrigues them, and then post a little snippet of it or tell them something about it.

I’m so sorry if this is long I can’t access desktop to insert a read more line :”)

Resident Evil WIPs

Shadows Within

Over the Mountain

Discarded Experiments

To be a Heisenberg (Whumptober Collection)

By Your Side

When Home Finds you

A Good Son

Untitled Document

(The) Infidel Heart

Love is a Sickness

Mother’s Special Child Sequel

Supernatural WIPs

The Rising Son

Chapter ???: Sorry (Can’t Save Me Now)

Chapter 10: Moral of the Story

Chapter 12: When the World’s at Stake

Of Witches and Men

Capital Offense

Sunday at the Theater with Dean

This House Don’t Feel Like Home

Grounded

RDR WIPs

In the Dark of the Night

A decision Made in Blood

Think of Me (Once in a While)

Falling Up

Hnnng

Untitled

Blurbs

Arrowverse WIPs

Unknown Draft ooooohhh spooky

Chapter 2: Safehouse

Chapter 1: This isn’t a Vaction

The Divorce Child

Troubled Souls

Survive the Night

Idea

Hold On (Just a Little Longer)

This Year’s Love (It Better Last)

Date Night

Sad Short Story

Unbroken (I Came, I Saw, I Failed)

Hear Me Now

Story Idea- Natural

Happier

Untitled Work

Cop Oneshot

Parentage

Oliver Identity Crisis Thing

Fallout 4

Danse Hancock fic

Untitled

MISC WIPs

Heaven Won’t Miss the Devil

Sunday Fanfic Idea(s)

Italy ain’t big enough for the both of us part 4

First Flight

I even dug through my phone’s notes for this so :) some of these drafts date back to 2017 which is fun.

Tagging @politecorvus , @daily-escuella , @thetragicboysclub , @suncaptor , @splat-dragon , @sentanixiv , @aen-lu , @danger-r-98-5 , @12timetraveler , @fangirl-ramblings , and @godangrily - I think y’all are some of my writer people lol. If y’all wanna do this and anyone of my other writer moots consider yourself tagged!!

Thanks Mish for the tag!

[0rbularb0ys]

Life With Levael: Levael Meets Renyr

Man, I haven’t finished any stories in forever. Feels good to have something done! Of course, the fact that I always get carried away doesn’t help either lol.

This story is about several of my OC’s who live in a modern-ish fantasy setting. Think if there were elves and dwarves back during the 80s lol. I hope you enjoy!

Special thanks to @sacred-dragonair/@brushbrulee on twitter for being my beta reader!

It was a cold and gray afternoon, the sky blocked out by heavy clouds and a chill carried on the wind. The day’s weather was rain, though thankfully it was the sort that was so light, it wasn’t really even a drizzle, but more of a mist. Levael didn’t mind it one bit. It was the perfect weather for a mug of hot chocolate and a nice book. Even if the demon was presently doing neither of those things, instead taking a walk to the downtown art gallery, that was okay. He found a nice mist-rain to be refreshing, and he enjoyed how crisp and clean the air felt in his lungs. If it was a nice day to spend at home, then it was a nice day to spend looking at paintings and sculptures as well. And today, the gallery was promising something special.

It was Mother's Day weekend, and the Metropolitan Gallery of Contemporary Art was holding a special two-day exhibit to honor all parents who carried their children, regardless of gender. (Which was nice, considering the holiday’s antiquated name. Someone really needed to update that.) Today, the subject of the art on display was going to be pregnancy. Tomorrow, on mother’s day proper, the theme was parenthood. Levael was more interested in the former, which would be obvious to anyone who saw him as he walked down the street, cradling his large belly.

Of course, even without his pregnancy, Levael was a very difficult man not to notice. Even when disguised as a mortal, as he presently was, he stuck out like a sore thumb. His magic could hide his ebony horns and matching tail, his sharp teeth and claws. It could turn his inhumanly pink skin to a more natural looking fair color. It could give him normal mortal blue eyes instead of black sclera, white irises, and even whiter pupils. It could turn his long, flowing white locks of hair into black. But it couldn’t hide everything. Chief among the things he couldn’t hide was his height. At seven feet and three inches tall, the only chance he had of blending in was among larger races such as orcs. He couldn’t hide his enormous belly either. Which was a moot point since that was something he’d never do, he quite loved his tummy and would never want to hide it. But it was larger than pretty much any other race could manage. Combined with his pointed-but-less-than-an-elf’s ears, he looked like an unnaturally tall, enormously pregnant half-elf of some sort. 

Thankfully, the average person was too polite to say anything about how odd he looked.

The gallery was crowded today, with couples and families coming to see the pregnancy-themed art on display. Statues, paintings, lighting displays, art of all mediums brought together to create an exhibit honoring the beauty and importance of pregnancy. Smiling, Levael rubbed his belly, feeling the babies inside squirm and kick from all the outside noise, as well as the excitement of the man carrying them. The demon was delighted at all of the pregnant people who were attending the exhibit ─ and when the gallery was allowing all pregnant folks free admission for the day, why wouldn’t they be ─ as it meant a sea of round bellies just like his own. 

Of course, as much as he loved and appreciated pregnant bellies, it wasn’t what Levael was there for. No, today he was here for the art, and the art would be his focus. The first piece he came across was a pregnant female mannequin. Her hands rested on her belly, and the left and right sides of her bump were removed. The vertical center of her belly, where her belly button sat and her linea nigra ran, was the only remaining part of her motherly swell. Internally, this remaining patch separated the left and right parts of her womb. In the right hemisphere of her belly, the part most easily seen to anyone passing by, was half of a model fetus. Walking around to the other side, the left half of her belly contained half of a model of the earth. Looking at the plaque before the sculpture, it read:

“They who carry new life, carry the world within them.”

Standing beside the display was an orcish gentleman, looking rather proud of himself as he spoke with what looked to be a reporter from the city’s newspaper. He must be the artist behind the piece. It was nice to know that local artists were being given a chance to show their skill, and this sculpture certainly deserved to be there, at least in this demon’s opinion. After taking another moment to take in and appreciate the piece, Levael moved on.

As he walked through the exhibit, admiring everything on display, Levael saw a painting which had him enraptured. It was a man, heavily pregnant, laying in bed and giving birth, with his baby beginning to crown. He gripped the sheets of his bed with one hand and his belly with the other, while his mouth hung open, crying out. 

The disguised demon was in awe. He could so easily see himself in it. He’d given birth before. Hundreds of times, in fact. As a high demon, such was his job to ensure the demon population remained healthy. And while demon pregnancies and births were different from those of mortals, he knew what it was like all the same. He had been in that same situation many times before, and would be again soon, as the little ones currently within his womb reminded him with their kicks. 

To look upon a piece of art honoring the creation of life while feeling life growing within his own body was intoxicating. He was lost in the sensations given to him by both the painting and the unborn in his womb.

“Excuse me,” said a voice.

Levael blinked as he was broken from his trance, startling slightly from both the stranger speaking to him and a sudden sharp kick. As he soothingly rubbed the spot where he’d been attacked, he turned to see just who was addressing him. A man was standing beside him, looking up at the demon. A dark elf, no less. The average elf was hardly rare; they were as common as any other race, but dark elves? Most weren’t quite used to the wider world and generally preferred to stay within their home, the Undercity. Or at least the elven kingdom of Aerendyl, or so Levael understood. 

Like most dark elves, his skin was gray, and his hair was a stark black. He spoke with a noticeable elven accent, though clearly different from the sort most people were familiar with. He also spoke a certain way which suggested he was trying to hide it. His eyes were blood red and he was, naturally, short. He was just about the perfect height to rest his chin on Levael’s belly while standing perfectly straight. If Levael had to guess, he was about five feet and four inches tall. Hanging off of his shoulder was one of those tubes people would store rolled up papers in, looking awkward as it bumped against a messenger bag he was also carrying.

“Sorry to bother you, it’s just that I noticed you really seemed to like this piece.” Said the stranger.

“Yes, well… Wait, have you been watching me?” Levael asked, narrowing his eyes.

“No, more people-watching in general,” The stranger reassured him, “And I hope you won’t take this the wrong way, but you sort of stand out. It was impossible not to notice that you were standing here for ten minutes staring at the same piece.”

Level felt his face heat up as he cleared his throat. “I uh, hadn’t noticed I’d been appreciating it for so long.”

“You don’t need to be embarrassed. The painting resonated with you, and that’s something special, isn’t it?”

The disguised demon glanced back at the painting. “Yes. Yes it is.”

“Would you mind if I asked you what it is you like about this piece, and the exhibit as a whole? I’m trying to get an idea of what makes the art here today connect with people. But only if it’s no trouble. I don’t want to tag along if it’d be a bother.” 

“Alright. I suppose it would be nice to have someone to discuss the pieces here with. I haven’t had anyone to do that with for a long time.” 

The elf smiled, clearly happy that someone was willing to talk shop with him. “Awesome! So, tell me something about it that spoke to you.”

“Well,” Levael and the elf turned and looked at the painting in question, “I suppose the first thing that caught my attention was that the painting was of a man. I’ll admit I haven’t seen everything in the exhibit yet, but from what I’ve seen so far most of the depictions of pregnancy here either show a woman or someone gender-ambiguous. This one is clearly a man. Like me.”

“And not just that,” Levael continued, “but look what he’s doing. He’s laying in bed, giving birth. I know what that’s like. I’ve been where he is.” He said, absent-mindedly rubbing his belly.

“It’s special to find something that you can see yourself in.” The stranger nodded.

“What about you? Is there anything you like about it?”

“Oh yeah. Look at what he’s doing with his hands. One of them is gripping at his sheets, and you can see his knuckles are turning white. He’s in so much pain. But his other hand is cradling his belly. The artist did a fantastic job; you can really see how gentle he’s being toward his child while still being in so much pain.”

“Yes, I definitely see it.”

“It’s the duality that comes with parenthood; that you have this little thing that makes your life so much harder, yet it means the world to you, and you cherish it to no end. Or maybe duality isn’t the right word, but you know what I mean right?”

“No, I get it completely. Except, birth doesn’t always mean pain. Look at his face here. I can definitely see how someone would see it and say he’s in pain, but look at it differently. He looks as though he’s feeling pleasure. Look again at how he’s gripping his sheets, the way his toes are curled. Doesn’t he look like he could be experiencing rapture?”

The dark elf looked at Levael as he spoke, then looked back at the painting, searching for what he was talking about. “Oohh, I see it. You’re right, he may well be orgasming.” He looked back to the disguised demon, slightly confused. “But birth is painful, isn’t it? Does that really happen during labor?”

Levael felt his face heating up as he realized what had been asked. “Y-Yes, actually,” He said, clearing his throat, “There’s, ah, a lot going on down there. During birth, that is.” He said the last part quickly.

Pregnancy and birth were perfectly normal and routine to Levael, and demons in general. Talking about this normally wouldn’t have him hesitating so, but he wasn’t just talking about a natural fact of the birth process, he was indirectly admitting to having derived pleasure from it. Especially since demon physiology made pregnancy and labor much easier than it was for mortals, reducing the experience from excruciating pain to merely great discomfort and blending it with toe-curling pleasure. Sure, some were more uncomfortable or pleasurable ─ after all every birth is different for demons and mortals both ─ but regardless, for any demon like Levael to deny receiving sexual pleasure from birth would be a bold-faced lie.

“Huh. I never knew that.” The stranger said, rubbing his chin. “Ya learn something new every day, I guess. Makes sense now that I think about it.” 

Levael turned his attention back to the painting. “It’s a beautiful piece. It’s almost a shame there’s so much left of the exhibit to see. I could stand here and get lost in this one forever.” He sighed.

“They’re selling replicas of some of today’s paintings in the gift shop.” The elf said.

“Really?”

“Yeah. I mean, like I said it’s some of them, but if the artist gave permission for them to make copies then you can buy one on your way out.”

“Good to know. I’ll have to see what’s for sale before I leave.” Level looked around. “Should we move onto the next piece?”

“If you’d like to. I’m tagging along after you today, so you can set the pace.” The elf said. As the pair walked toward the next piece of the exhibit, he cleared his throat. “I just realized, I never told you my name. You must think I’m some weirdo to ask to follow you around without even giving you my name, huh?”

Levael shook his head. “No, I don’t. You were excited to speak with someone about the art and it slipped your mind. It happens.” 

“I’m glad you understand. Still, it’s pretty rude.” He stopped walking and turned to the pregnant man, extending his hand for a shake. “I’m Renyr.”

“Levi.” Levael said as he shook the offered hand.

The next piece the pair stopped to view was a mannequin of a pregnant female body. A soft light was shining inside the chest, illuminating a heart inside and synced with a light inside the belly, revealing the silhouette of a fetus as the two glows pulsed in time with the beating of a heart.

After that was a marble hewn-statue of a pregnant woman, surrounded with real flowers which grew around her feet and covered her body. Water was also trickling gently from her nipples, nourishing the flowers.

As the two men walked through the gallery, they stopped to discuss the pieces which most caught their attention. Levael never had anyone to discuss his thoughts on art with, not since leaving the underworld. Plus, going through the gallery with someone like this, talking about points of view and sharing the occasional laugh, it kind of felt like a date. The very thought had Levael feeling slightly flustered, the babies inside of him kicking and squirming in response to his racing heart.

“Your lil’ guys are going nuts in there, aren’t they?” Renyr grinned, watching the movements unfolding beneath the fabric of the demon’s shirt. “You and your partner must be excited.”

Levael gulped and rubbed his belly in an attempt to calm the babies inside of him, though his heart rate was keeping them riled up, and it wasn’t exactly slowing. “Ah, I, uh, I don’t have… a partner,” He said, clearing his throat, “I just do surrogate work.” It wasn’t a total lie. The babies didn’t belong to Levael and he wasn’t going to be the one raising them; he was going to be sending them off to a public nursery in the underworld after their birth. He just wasn’t being paid for it, since he wasn’t living in demon society anymore.

“Oh, I see.” Renyr nodded. “That’s kind of you, helping others build families. I’ve always had a lot of respect for folks who do that.” He looked up at Levael with a smile. “Knowledgeable about art and a nice guy to boot. Hard to believe no one’s come along and snatched you up.”

Levael wasn’t sure if it was Renyr’s words or a particularly strong kick to one of his ribs, but either way he felt that he might swoon right where he stood. He tried desperately to spit out some sort of response, but coherent words were beyond his reach. The best he could muster was to keep silent and avoid sputtering out random syllables like a toddler.

Renyr didn’t seem to mind Levael’s sudden silence. Judging by the tiny smirk on his face when his eyes fell on the disguised demon, he was aware of how flustered he’d made him.

“So,” Level said, clearing his throat once he’d calmed down a bit, “This one is rather eye-catching.” He motioned to a painting that the pair were passing. An oil painting of a woman in the middle of giving birth, surrounded by other people tending to her. Wiping her brow of sweat, holding her hand, preparing to handle the baby as it slid out of her, all kinds of little things to offer her support and make birth a little easier. The plaque read It Takes A Village.

As soon as he saw the painting, the elven man was no longer smiling. “Hm. I saw this one while they were setting up the exhibit.”

“You don’t seem to particularly care for it.”

Renyr didn’t deny the statement, merely pursed his lips as he thought. After a moment he opened up his tube and pulled out a rolled-up painting, carefully straightening it out before showing it to Levael. It was a watercolor painting of dark elves crowding around a heavily pregnant man, casting off a divine light and warding off the darkness of their cave. The elves of the crowd were reaching out toward him and trying to feel his belly in the same way that poor, put-upon masses would grasp for salvation.

“Oh my…” Levael breathed. “That’s beautiful.”

“Glad you think so,” Renyr said with a dry and humorless chuckle, the corner of his mouth tilting upward ever so slightly, “I submitted it for the exhibit, but I guess the curators didn’t share your opinion.” Taking a deep breath, he let out a long sigh as he looked back and forth between his own painting and the one on the wall. “These two have the same subject, but they still rejected me.” He looked over to Levael, “That’s why I’ve been asking folks about their thoughts on the art on display today.” He turned his attention back to his painting. “I’m trying to see what mine’s missing.”

“I see.” 

Renyr took a seat on a nearby bench and motioned for Levael to join him. “What do you think?” He asked as the pregnant demon took a seat.

“I’m sure it’s not that your painting is missing anything. The exhibit could only show so many pieces, so there were always going to be artists that had to be turned away, even if their work is as good as yours.” Level suggested.

“So someone was going to get cut either way, and I just happened to draw the short straw, huh?”

“Exactly.”

Renyr grimaced. “I think I like that possibility even less.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, if the problem is that my painting is missing something or my technique isn’t good enough, then I can address that. I can practice and improve my skill. That’s on me. I can fix the problem. But if it’s just dumb luck, what can I do about that? I’ve got no control and I’m stuck at someone else’s mercy.”

“I can see how that would be frustrating,” Levael nodded sympathetically, “Let me take another look. Maybe I can find something.” 

Eyes looking hopeful, Renyr nodded and showed his painting to Levael once more. He didn’t say anything, just allowed him to analyze the two pieces. Minutes ticked by, but the elf was patient. If it meant he would get the feedback he was searching for, then he seemed prepared to wait as long as it took.

“I think I see it,” Level said after a pause as pregnant as he was, “Your painting and that one have the same general subject, but the way you approach it is different.”

“Go on.”

“Look at the way the other painting frames the pregnant woman it has as its subject.” The demon said, pointing to the piece on display. “She’s in the center, the main subject, and she’s surrounded by other people, just like yours. Look at the way she’s depicted, and look how the people around her are acting toward her compared to yours. Everyone’s coming together around her to help deliver the baby. Mother and child are pulling the community together.”

Renyr nodded, eagerly awaiting for him to continue.

“Now take a look at yours. Everyone’s coming together because of the pregnant man, but the tone of it is different. He’s portrayed not quite as a part of a community or a family, but as some kind of divine being. He’s above them, and they’re reaching out to him like religious disciples. I can see that your intent was to depict the beauty of pregnancy just like all the other artists here, the problem is you did so in a way that might be missing the point of the exhibit.”

Renyr said nothing, merely studying the painting on the wall before looking back to his own painting. After several minutes of thought, he spoke again. “...son of a bitch, I think you’re right.” He said with a deep sigh. He rolled up his painting and placed it back in the tube before looking up at Levael with a smile. “Thanks, Levi. I don’t think I would have put that together without some outside perspective.” 

“It’s easy to have a bit of tunnel vision when it comes to your own work, isn’t it?” Levael said with a small laugh. 

“You’re preaching to the choir.” The elven man looked around before turning back to Levael. “We’ve pretty much reached the end of the exhibit. There’s a small cafe right by the gift shop, near the exit. Let me treat you to a drink.”

“Oh no, I couldn’t,” Level began to say.

“I insist,” Renyr’s tone of voice was cool, firm yet friendly, “You let me pester you all afternoon and you gave me some really important feedback on my work. Buying you a drink is the absolute least I can do.”

Levael gulped and cradled his belly. Suddenly the kicking inside his womb felt like the babies were trying to push him to accept Renyr’s offer. Was this a date now? Was he trying to turn it into one? “Well, if you’re going to insist…” He quickly checked his watch, hoping that he might have time to enjoy some tea with Renyr. Unfortunately, time was against him, and Levael frowned.

“I’m so sorry. I’d take you up on your offer, but I work nights and I need to be getting ready for my shift.” He sighed.

Renyr didn’t do a very good job of hiding his disappointment, though he was clearly trying to play it cool. “That’s fine, I totally understand. How about tomorrow? I know this nice little place not far from the gallery.”

Levael smiled and blushed slightly, nodding. “I have time tomorrow, yes. Somewhere around the early afternoon works perfectly.”

“Sounds like a plan to me.” The elven man said with a nod. He began rifling through his messenger bag, pulling out a pen and a scrap of paper. He wrote out his note and handed it to the pregnant demon. On it was the name and address of the cafe, as well as the time to meet. “Maybe it’s for the best that we put it off for a day. After all,” He said, a smile crossing his face, “A guy needs time to get ready for a proper date.”

Immediately, without fail, Levael’s face went red as he felt his heart trying to beat its way outside of his chest. Holy crap, this was a date! What should he wear? Should he go casual, or with a little more flair? Would this lead to another date? Did Renyr give good belly rubs? Did he like pregnant tummies as much as Levael? What did Renyr kiss like? 

Could Renyr be “the one”? 

“Um, Levi?” Renyr said, reaching up and waving his hand in front of his face. “Are you okay?”

Hundreds of scenarios were running through Levael’s head all at once, branching out into all of the possibilities this date could possibly lead to. When the shorter man’s hand waved in front of his eyes, he snapped out of his daze, then began desperately trying to save face, lest his handsome man rescind his offer. “I’m fine!” He blurted out, unable to stop himself. Renyr flinched at the sudden outburst, and a few heads turned in his direction. 

“You sure? Your face is looking pretty red, and your babies…” He pointed to Levael’s belly, visibly shifting and bulging with the movements of the unborn within. “I mean, that’s gotta hurt. Or at least be uncomfortable.”

“Oh nonono, don’t worry, i-it’s no bother, not at all! I’m used to it! Doesn’t phase me in the slightest!” The pregnant demon said with an awkward laugh. A tiny voice in the back of Levael’s head told him that it was time to leave before he made himself look like an even bigger idiot. “I’ll see you tomorrow, then?”

Renyr smiled. “Looking forward to it.”

Levael nodded and hurried off before he could make himself look like an even bigger fool. Though in his hurry, and as flustered and distracted as he was, he wound up bumping his poor belly into several people, at one point knocking over some poor dwarf and nearly falling over himself.

As he waited at the bus stop, giggling and rubbing his belly with the giddy excitement of a teenage girl, Levael took the note out of his pocket and read it over and over again, taking in the curves of Renyr’s handwriting. It would be hard to wait until tomorrow, but hey, good things come to those who wait.

[starsarefire824]

Heeey moot! Just woke up! Even though I'm late, I just wanted to say that you deserve to write whatever tf you want and I'm sorry some peeps were harassing you about The Pact. I don't think folks know how hard it is to not only write, but then to post it for others to see. So, for them to criticize you when it's just a fun fic that they can ignore or filter out (tags on ao3 are meant to be used geez) its wild to me. You're doing something very unique with the characters and including a lot of different subgroups of the queer community splendidly while keeping them flawed like real teens - all in 1 fic. As a demi ace myself, I was so happy to see you incorporate that in your fic respectively and a lot of my queer Sex Ed came from detailed, researched fics bc even though my parents and school system talked to me about sex, there was nothing for the queer kids, let alone ace kids to get guidance on. So, for fic readers/writers like me, using fics to explore sexuality was a godsend.

Can't help but also think it's the biphobia kicking in again, specifically for characters like Mike. No one has a problem hc Max as bi even though it seems like lumax is clearly endgame over elmax or elumax, but when it comes to Mike being bi it's like the world is ending despite it clearly being byler endgame. I personally ship all hcs of Mike's sexuality cuz only Robin and Will have been confirmed queer. Everyone else in ST to me is undisclosed until stated straight or queer. But again that's me.

Also love your poly rep cuz my sib is poly and so were some of my grandma's cousins from 1950s-now. So, again, all or most sexualities explored in fics is a must, regardless if you ship it. I've always been a polypartycule shipper and enjoy how you include all party members and mention Duzie sometimes cuz too many times I found fics/hcs excluding the fact Dustin has a stable relationship with Suzie in favor of just highlighting byler and elumax as the romantic ones of the party.

Sorry for the rant but I had to let it out. I hated scrolling through my feed and seeing that post you made of folks getting heated over fiction like you're gonna convince the Duffers to change the whole script. Anyways I hope my support is felt. This is still me typing in a sleep daze and yeah. I'll continue reading your work cuz I enjoy good writers first and foremost and omg lol you made it having some harrassers cuz the greatest books were on the banned book list. Not saying you deserve the irrational hate, but that's how I'm framing it - this is giving "banned book energy" just cuz The Pact is exploring romantic madwheeler when no one cares about byclair or henderhop or henclair (despite folks labeling El as a lesbian). Anyways, you do you moot be blessed out here

Hello deer moot!!!! <33

Thanks so much for the positive vibes!!! I truly appreciate it. I guess I was just feeling a little let down that a select few people made it so far into a fic and then were angry about the way things were going and/or felt the need for me to tell them the ending. At first it didn't bother me, but after answering the same questions 1,000 times and trying to sort of reassure everyone it got to a point of being exhausting! I want to talk about the fic, but I don't really want to have to defend my writing/story/ship choices every chapter. It's kind of exhausting and was bringing me down a little bit. But anyway, enough about that.

I am SO GLAD that you are like...really vibing with some of the choices in that story? Especially with your unique pov being demi ace and having poly family. I think that fanfiction can be a very important tool for a lot of teen when it comes to exploring sex, especially if it's not a cis het-normative type or even just....dealing with sex from a young person's pov and all of the obstacles that everyone faces in that regard. Also, I think it can just open up a conversation or make a person think about things that maybe they might not of before etc etc. Or! They can just enjoy those scenes for the writing/good time. I'm here for all of it.

I'm not sure if it's a biphobia thing? It honestly hadn't occurred to me, but you may possibly be right. I know a lot of people headcanon Mike as gay, which I fully support. I wouldn't be surprised if that is the case. I think if Byler happens in canon, he'll be unlabeled. BUT I do like to write Mike as bi, I personally think that there were feelings for El at some point. I personally headcanon him as a bi-romantic, and sexually leaning towards men. But that's just me....

But anyway, as that pertains to madwheeler, I also really enjoy the bi for bi Max and Mike dynamic, specifically because it's fun to write, and secondly it's another thing to add to their already similar personalities. And yea. I agree... unless a character's sexuality is specifically stated like El and Will's, there is room for exploration for most characters and that's what fanfic and art is for.

I do think there is this strange thought process regarding bi characters, that if they have a relationship with a person of the opposite sex it's like they're not "queer enough" for other people. Like it's somehow lesser than if Mike has a relationship with a woman, even though he already, in canon, is well, with a woman. And that people tend to forget that people are still bi, still queer, even if they are in the most outwardly straight presenting relationship, cause let's face it....you can't really help who you're attracted to and who you fall in love with. it just is.

And when it comes to the madwheeler in this fic, I am fully aware it is one of the least popular ships out there, but again, that is one of the reasons I wanted to explore it. And a a bi, poly person my self it was really interesting putting these characters in a dynamic where they were both involved with people of differing genders and orientations. It gives you a lot to work with when it comes to having things to write about! シ

And as you said, it also allows for some messy, realistic teenage angst! Which I am always a fan of! ;)

Anyway, thank you for the rant. I appreciate it so much, and am honestly still blown away by the positive responses to this story. Even if it's not everyone's cup of tea!

[theangryjikooker]

Can I say something controversial? Lol. Either way that tattoo convo is tricky imo. I’ve always said I believe what the members say and I think I’m more or less neutral regarding Jikook. By that I mean I can see them being a thing, but I also see a lot of conflicting stuff that can deny it. So sometimes I am more on the side 'hmmm something’s going on here' and sometimes I’m more ‘nah this kinda disapprove it’. Ngl the Army/Jm tattoo was something I was side eyeing a lot (let’s be honest most of fandom was, and not just Jikook shippers, or it wouldn’t be such a hot topic). But now I have to take Jungkook for his own words. And I’m sorry to say this, right now I feel like either that guy is a bit dumb because it has been quite obvious for everyone and their mothers that that J on top of the M on his ring finger was a suspicious placement as it could clearly be read as JM which, again, basically most of the fandom has been doing since he got it hence why that whole ridiculous theory about all of the members initials being part of it etc. So either he’s naive and a bit of a dummy, which I never thought of JK before, quite the contrary, or it means he’s a liar… Either way, the conclusion isn’t exactly one I like… I’m aware that I’m also being judgmental here but f*ck, sorry but if it does stand for his name, with this placement and all, it’s just a weird and dumb idea and does not make any sense to me, I don’t understand the logic, the symmetry and all? Like, what? On the other hand I surely don’t want to indulge in the idea that he lied and didn’t tell the whole truth because after all he could have just avoided the topic altogether and it sounds a bit too conspiracy-ish for me. Sorry for the rant, and for legal reasons I just want to emphasize: those are only my own personal thoughts on the issue. I know damn well it’s not my business after all.

Fair enough, and I can see why the debate continues on the issue. And as you so astutely pointed out, the conclusions don’t reflect well on him (one more than the other).

But I think I would trust his explanations by default, regardless of how it sounds because at least he’s addressing the topic. While JM has become naturally associated with Jimin, I think it’s just as plausible that he really wasn’t thinking about it too hard.

Although, in fairness, if we’re talking symmetry, it would’ve made sense for him to add the J on the pinky. Be that as it may, people with any sort of vision—and especially when it comes to permanent body art—can be a little quirky with their choices.

His tattoos don’t have any influence on my feelings towards Jikook, so it’s a moot point for me and not one I prioritize. At this point, I do feel more comfortable believing what he has to say. If his future actions/words create a dissonance with what he’s just said, it would be something to earmark, but it’s definitely not worth my energy when talking about Jikook.

[winter-spark]

Reposting a Reblog as a Separate Post #2

[I might be less lazy with editing this one or I won't. If I was lazy but edited it I'll just cross off things lol, If I wasn't lazy and added edits it'll be in brackets, if I don't edit something that should be edited 🤷🏾‍♀️ have fun. Also this is still a copy and paste just so you know.]

[Related posts for 'context': initial thought, sketches I did]

So you're probably thinking "Gee Spark you're gonna talk to yourseldf some more about some no one asked about" to which I say:

I will answer your inqury on what I was going for for their clothes! At least as to what I was trying to inspire their outfits off of.

So first up the Orange's outfit 'moodboard':

There's one more outfit I want in consideration for this but I'll explain in it a second. So! I really think Orange might like to wear the sort of jacket thing Yuki's got on there, and while I opted out of the choker for him I do think he'd wear multiple necklaces. As for Citron's outfit there, I like the belt.

Also, those large gold bracelets seem to be mandatory and possibly a while jumpsuit of sorts. The owl earrings I legit just found right now(or well last night because I did fall asleep writing lol) to give an idea of what his earring might look like when I finalize it and pick out an Owl for it. I'm not sure if he always had an Owl earring or not but if he didn't that's fine because then it could be his little piece of abroad that he keeps with him, but if he did that's also fine because it's a sliver of his interests and personality shining through.

There was one more outfit I wanted here but oh well you don't need an image. It was the one with flowers on it. I think if Orange is allowed to wear some with more designs than what we've seen Citron and Tangerine in, it'd have flowers on it. Why? Well after all he's a nature boy. I know because they[/the company] telepathically told me when I was trying to draw him.

[Editing in this new version of the post here, too lazy to cross out and adjust last paragraph but I did think I should update this part: I didn't want to include the picture initially because I'm not tagging these character and I know one of my moots doesn't vibe with the character in this outfit so I hope croping his face out helps in case they see this. Here's the picture.

I don't think either sketch includes the scarf but I think I did consider it a lot when I was initially sketching them]

Okay so next up Navel's outfit "moodboard":

So here we go. I like the collar on Sakyo's outfit. Then I think Navel would have a visible choker like Citron does(tho tbh in my head it looks more like Yuki's but to avoid confusion I didn't put Yuki in this set.) There's the flowy part of the outfit & I'm leaning towards how Sakuya's is but Idk for sure, I kinda also really like the whole shoulder section of Sakyo's outfit so Idunno. He probably definitely has the stars though like Sakuya does. (As you can see I'm less sure on this outfit lol.)

[edit/Update: If you saw the other pictures I had here no you didn't:

THIS. Like like when I had the pic with Tangerine's outfit from this event I was confused why I picked it but I liked the energy like the soft poofiness of it and I sorta want a similar vibe, this sorta has that same vibe. BUT also like the collar!!! I want Navel to have a collar somewhat like this so that his choker that he definitely has is visible!]

Anyway, longer hair seems to be a trend for the royal family and Citron only sometimes wears a ponytail. SO why not let Navel have a ponytail? I think that Navel would try to differentiate himself from Orange in some ways since they're always together and so close in age(confirmed in my heart) and so a ponytail is a good start and easy to do.

I know that these ponytail cuff things exist. While looking up pictures for these, I learned that a lot of them have elastics in them? I didn't know they did? But regardless, I think that Navel should have one. Maybe without the elastic like the rhinestone one, but be bigger and more solid like the second one. It for suresies should have a star design on it. He loves the stars, fact.

So yea that's what I have. Just struggling to articulate it. Thanks for reading this.

Anyway. Yea. I know I'm kinda like the only one here but like if anyone wants to help with these outfits or has any additions or anything feel free to add on.

[kickassfu]

Regarding Eddywow. Bc I just really need to get it off my chest and it's been bothering me all day. So firstly I cannot find a single primary source about this infamous fic posted on 8/30 aka a copy of the fic or even a screenshot of the tags so everything I can find in response to or accusing the fic of is a gd moot point. However, what I can see from previously posted fics are pretty fucking tame kink wise frankly and very clearly tagged not only in tags but in beforehand notes. Thusly I'm led to believe from what small evidence that I can uncover that what occured in the last 24hrs was a witch hunt against this author, who even at this point if they did something wrong, has been harmed completely out of proportion to their supposed crime. It's absurd this is still something that happens in 2022 and greatly distressing how many people are willing to just jump onto the bandwagon of destroying someone without a scrap of first hand evidence. From what I can find the person on Twitter who initially brought up disliking this fic has even backed down from their opinions and stated they harbor no ill will against eddywow (for all the good that does now). On the one hand I hope this doesn't destroy Eddywow's enjoyment of this fandom, but on the other hand if they never step foot in the fandom again I can understand. Verbally berating and threatening someone will never teach anyone anything but fear and contempt and does nothing to address or help real issues.

So I only noticed this when i went to bed at like midnight and didn't reply 'cause i had to wake up at 6am for work and had no brain power to actually write words lol anyway sorry for being late

Feel free to get it off your chest, you're not the only one upset and if it helps it helps! And well I don't need to find any screenshots because I did read the fic, and I did see the tags and the warnings she wrote, so it might be a he said, she said sort of thing but I still know it was there and so do a lot of people (and tbh even if there were no warnings, for the situation to escalate the way it did is fucking stupid and ppl need to quit the internet if they can't behave). But ok that's fair, it's a moot point 'cause you can neither confirm or deny with your own eyes.

But as you point out she has a history of tagging things properly and even giving warnings in the notes, so it'd be fairly strange if she just decided not to do it this time. And *ding ding ding* you said it exactly right, it was a witch hunt taken to the extreme over something fictional. I'll tell you something, I think it got to that point because her writing is popular and maybe some ppl were jealous. Yes there's still the anti mentality and the purity bullshit thrown in there, but it wouldn't have blown up if people didn't love her writing as much as they do.

Either way it's fucking weird how everything went down tbh.

Oh yeah that this shit still happens is mind boggling. But I think it's only gonna get worse not better, because the anti and purity mentality is growing more with time not going down. And people don't seem to realize that harrassing a real person will always be worse than reading or writing something fictional that's fucked up.

Yeah it seems they've talked it out and they're cool with each other now, but it still blew up regardless and reached shitty ppl that blew it out of proportion.

I agree, it sucks that they took something they love from her and pushed her to a point where she needed to step away but it's completely understandable and she deserves all the time in the world to feel better. And if she never feels ready to come back, it'll hurt because i love her and her writing, but again it'll also be understandable. It still sucks that they ruined something good and i honestly hate them for it.

Well they don't wanna teach or be taught. They just think they're right and that all of us are evil, disgusting ppl that deserve to rot in hell and to that I say I'd rather go to hell than be in heaven with you fuckers <3 godspeed motherfuckers.

i'm sorry for the long reply i still have so much to say about this. I'm still so fucking angry. Thanks for the message love <3 hope you're feeling better after saying this!

[maariarogers]

season 2? or nah?

@julliette17 replied:

Are we sure that they're not doing a season 2? If not then I do think we're being cheated. But if there is a season 2... the possibilities... Oh well, if I hate the drama ending I'll just reread the webtoon.

Of course these thoughts ran in my head as well!

Although again, I might be biased since I truly don’t want the series to end lol but yes, if you’re analysing the series carefully, in my personal opinion, there are still a few of unresolved plotlines that you can sort of see, which I’m not quite sure how they will be placing what’s to come to reach its conclusion by 16?

For example, I’m not quite sure if their running sub-plot regarding Columbus Park is actually solved. I’d like to lean on the fact that it hasn’t, but the way Jugyeong’s mother accepted their fate when it was made known to us that Columbus Park himself lost the money that was stolen, and it was a good thing anyway that they moved so Jugyeong is able to move away from her bullies, seemed like it has? But I still feel like it’s moot — because then, why have we been following Jugyeong’s father journey to earn the money so desperately? 

There’s also a sub-plot with Sujin herself. Obviously, Jugyeong tries to reach a resolution with her, but she rejected it and ultimately, I assume, moved away or erased herself from the rest of her former friends’ narratives. I’m not sure if Episode 14 considered that sub-plot solved — it seemed like it might have, with just us, as an audience, getting to see that Sujin has officially elected to be on the opposing side, but still. The resolution seems quite stumped, if that makes sense?

Like, where is Sujin now? How could she have such a tremendous effect on the plot, and then not being written till the end?

Not to mention the ordeal that is Seojun’s feelings towards Jugyeong. I think this is one of my biggest concern, and while they lay the foundation of Seojun’s feelings so well that we, as audience, could see how far he went for her — I would feel like it’s such a waste if he had held back what he held back for so long, confessed, only to be rejected post-time skip? Just because Suho came back? No... I’m team Suho all the way, but that’s not how you treat a character.

So far from what I’ve seen of the writers though, as much as the characters are faulty at certain times, they do make the characters make up for it. Or, at the very least, these characters don’t get away from what they’ve done wrong scot-free. You can see this when Seojun regretted over the weight of saying “You don’t deserve to be happy” at Suho earlier in the series; and Suho learning again and again to be a respectful partner in his relationship; and Jugyeong bettering herself with each faults that were pointed out to her as well.

So, despite some rough beginnings, I’d like to say that the writers are very careful with how they write these characters. And to see them potentially putting Seojun in such a heartbreaking role till the end seems lacklustre. Like, something I don’t think they’ll do — they could, of course, but they shouldn’t. Not after putting so much care into sculpting his role and how he contributed to the plot beforehand.

Which brings us to the next major point, Suho leaving and then returning and? Obviously we see Jugyeong held so much anger over it. And she’s right to do so! Yes, I understand Suho’s affected by his environment (his dad sick, he’s all alone) and the physical distant, and maybe the emotional weight of all the guilt from what he could never forgive his father for, and leaving Jugyeong with barely a proper goodbye — but he still hurts her. He still, to an extent, gave up - regardless if he thinks he did it for her own good etc.

And in my head, the constant thing that kept going over and over is: how could they possibly redeem Suho after committing such an awful damage to his first love in just two episodes? How?

Which was why I’m so mad because I think they could’ve easily done this at episode eight, or episode 10 even. 12, if they’re so desperate to make it that late into the series. But making it at the end of 15, and then minimising the romantic effort and feelings of Seojun as well as potentially rushing Suho’s redemption for a two-year lost, like... that made me think they could be planning something more for the future?

But realistically, I feel like they will somehow conclude it within the sixteen-episode mark. K-drama have surprised me once, they will surely surprise me again. Or — they will leave it at an open-ending and therefore audiences should refer to the webtoon thereafter.

Personally, I don’t hope so much for Season 2 — like yes, I would kill for it lmao only because of Selena and Aiden though — because Jugyeong’s storyline, which is supposed to be the main storyline, is quite resolved? The only thing that hasn’t are the ones I mentioned above, and whether or not, like the webtoon, she achieved her dream to be a professional make-up artist like Selena or otherwise. There’s also the issue of Suho and Seojun each finding their own life direction, but that’s a whole entire thing altogether.

More than a Season 2, I’d wager more on a movie possibly? But again. Probably unlikely! But yes! This is my opinion! I know you probably didn’t think I would take this as seriously as I have but skdhskjdfh I do.

[psyga315]

Prelude

With Volume 7 just beyond the horizon, I figured to look back at my thoughts for Volume 5 and, through more cooled down eyes, boil down why I consider it to be the worst volume of RWBY. When I wrote my review of Volume 5, it was literally the night the episode premiered, so I was boiling. But now? I’m going to look through the review with fresher eyes and clarify what sort of problems I had with RWBY.

First, a bit of backstory. There was an interview made during the summer in between Volumes 4 & 5 that had the cast say what sort of themes one could expect for Volume 5. Among these were stuff like “building yourself back up again”, “shouting ‘we’re not done here!’”, “solving problems on your own”, and lastly, from Barbara herself, “Strength” and “Growth”. For someone who was just starting to realize why people were turned off by the darkness of Volume 3, this was uplifting to say the least…

Shorts

The Character Shorts kinda hyped the Volume, though they sunk in their own way. Weiss’s Character Short effectively foreshadowed her loss to Vernal. This tough and talented girl gets her ass stomped rather quickly and needed to be bailed out. Winter’s line about how she “won’t be around to save her” was foreshadowing to her not actually being in the season, but when I first heard it, I thought she meant “Hey, I’m going to die this volume, lol!” and that’s without bringing up how the trailer fails to hype Weiss up like the other trailers did.

Blake’s Trailer was alright, especially in taking steps to address a problem regarding Menagerie, but it felt more like Ilia given the backstory dump we got that feels all the more like mandatory reading. The problem is that, and it’s perhaps the very first problem I’ve heard about RWBY, is that the trailers (and by extension, anything that’s a spin off of RWBY like World of Remnant) feel more like you need to watch this rather than you can watch this. It’s confusing, but let’s use Blake’s Short as an example.

Ilia talks about her backstory as it is contrasted with a chase between Blake and a random dude we never see again. Assuming you’ve never watched the trailer, you’d just get the truncated version of “MUH PARENTS ARE DEEEAAAD!” and not the bits where she was forced to resent her own race because it was easier to blend in to her surroundings, like a chameleon. It’s ironic, since RWBY would do the reverse problem with Adam, where his trailer isn’t mandatory but we barely get a backstory for him beyond “I got branded, but everyone will speculate that it’s because I did something bad and not that it drove me to do bad things”.

Lastly, there’s Yang’s short, which had the minor hiccup of contrasting what an interview said about running out of Aura means you can’t use your Semblance. The Aura thing is something that can be discussed for another day, but the basics you should take away from this is that, for some time, people didn’t know how running out of Aura is symbolized. Most people take the flickering as the signal as the next hit on those guys are usually the one that does them in. As such, you had this huge debate on what kind of flickering means Aura broken and what just meant Aura is low, which, personally, could have been avoided if the writers and/or animators just utilized that Aura dust thing (seen prominently in the Bumblebee vs Adam fight) as their definitive “aura broken” animation instead of just using it some of the time.

First Episode

The first episode proper promised a lot. In fact, a good chunk of the first half promised a lot. However, it became much clear in a second viewing that a lot of it was just padding at worst and showing us where the characters are at best. But what I think was done dirty the most in this episode was introducing Mistral. We were hyped in Volume 4 (thanks to World of Remnant) that Mistral was this dichotomy of rich, cultural people and the seedy underbelly of criminals and that, at least one of the elements would be utilized in Volume 5. Unfortunately, all we got were a few mat paintings that contrast what Lionheart was saying in regards to Mistral being in chaos.

And so, the most we get out of Mistral are those mat paintings and a perpetually raining downtown that we don’t see much of, even when it gets briefly revisited in Volume 6. We’re supposed to be invested in the city and yet all we get are empty rooms and 2D art. They took great steps to improve this in Volume 6 with Argus, though, so if there’s any consolation, it’s that they learned from their mistakes here.

But we now get into the biggest problem of why Volume 5 is disliked. Because of the situation, the group are left to basically wait until Lionheart convinces the council to get them some Huntsmen. The heroes. Wait. In a volume where the writers were talking about the themes of improving yourself and pulling through with your own strength.

Do you guys see the problem here? I know people have bitched about Volume 5 to hell and back and you’ve probably heard the complaints to high noon, but this entire issue is what rots Volume 5 to the core the most. Not the piss poor fight scenes, not the inconsistent characterizations, it’s that the plotting decides to take a back seat when the volume was meant to be about taking action.

As the episode goes on, you see the problem unfold. Ruby and friends hit a dead end until Oscar appears and has Ozpin exposit things to them, Weiss is denied a chance to save people and fight the Grimm until the Grimm come to her, Blake is hit with the dead end of the Albains deflecting blame, and Yang had the chance encounter with Bakugou where he knows the hideout of her mom.

The closest person who is taking action here is Yang, who established that she is actively looking for Ruby (technically Raven, but as we see later on, moot point). Blake’s situation is being handled by her dad, Weiss is sitting in the plane until the Grimm come for her, and Ruby is sitting on the couch that I’m pretty sure has her grooves molded into the cushion with how many times she’s sat there.

Episode 2

A minor complaint before we go to Episode 2, we had the Stinger repeat itself because the crew thought that people wouldn’t see the stingers. This is the show, mind you, that makes a point to include scenes at the end of every volume, regardless of how long they are or what point they serve in hyping the next Volume. Hell, one of the major complaints about Volume 2 was about the stinger not mattering. So why did they suddenly decide that the viewers might not see the stinger in a culture where the MCU exists?

Alright, cooling things down, we have three major scenes in Episode 2. Salem’s chat with Lionheart was meh at best and wtf at worst. I get the idea of Salem using different approaches to get people to do what she wants, but the cool aspect of Salem was that her approach was not what a villain would normally be. Instead of berating or choking her minions should they fail or talk back, Salem instead talks people down like she’s a mother to them. Even when Tyrian fails, she doesn’t hurt him, but rather tell him that he disappointed her. So, having her choke Lionheart, even when in hindsight it made some sense, is kinda an odd thing to do.

But not as odd as Salem’s whole “Not you, Arthur” bit. A lot of people drew points to that and the best I can explain is that it’s either a typo (she’s meant to say not yet or not now) or Arthur and Watts are some sort of Jekyll & Hyde thing. Unfortunately, it seems Watts is more a parallel to Watson rather than Jekyll, so that brings me to believe that it’s a typo and so, rather than have an easy explanation for a problem, we just have a compounded problem. One of many.

And there’s something funny to be said about Salem warning Cinder about Silver Eyes when Ruby barely learns about it this Volume. And also that she wants to speak with Tyrian but we never see what comes of it. At all.

I only have one new thing about Weiss vs. the Bees. Originally, the pilot was supposed to be gay, but held off on it because they’d be killing off their first revealed gay character, something that wouldn’t look good to the fanbase. Now, while I understand the reason behind it, I have to question the logic behind why they think it isn’t okay for their first LGBT character to be offed, but instead be someone who seemed okay with murdering her crush’s parents while sending said crush to her abuser.

But more on that later, we have Sienna to discuss. Now, there’s a lot to dissect. For one, RT has obviously realized that they’ve messed up and brought Sienna back for a bit (while taking the heat for “if she’s so badass, why did she go out like a chump”). However, in hindsight, what purpose did she actually serve outside of some cute nod to Shere Khan?

All she did was tell Adam that he’s going too far and that’s it. And really, it just seems hypocritical for the leader of the White Fang to effectively restructure the organization into a terrorist group, murder tons of people, and then suddenly back away and say “woah, too much” when Adam proceeded to help torch Beacon. It’s to the point where one question most people want to ask at cons is “did Sienna order the hit out on the SDC”, since we don’t actually know and that it could be a radical leader of that quadrant like Adam.

It felt more like Sienna should have been just the leader of Mistral’s White Fang faction instead of ruling over all the White Fang, which would make more sense as Adam would need permission to attack a kingdom that isn’t his stomping ground. Then there’s the introduction of Hazel, who at first is presented to be a pretty decent character, not wanting to kill people if he had no choice, but as time goes on, is basically your stock “big soft guy with a secret hulk side” character.

Unfortunately, this episode didn’t help enforce the theme of taking action when it’s the villains who are doing it and seeming to be two if not twenty steps ahead of the heroes.

Episode 3

Episode 3 has that whole speech thing I overlooked. Barring Ghira’s speech that the crew said is based off Obama’s “we killed Osama” speech (which, if it is, paints the whole situation of Sienna’s death in a rather dark light) before Ilia interferes. Now, I actually liked that Menagerie is hesitant to stand up for Haven. After all, humans hated their guts so much that the island was originally planned to be a place where people could dump Faunus on. There were lynchings and enslavements that are still going on to this day, just in subtler forms, Of course the Faunus wouldn’t want to fight.

Then Ilia swoops in and robs Blake of any agency she has with the scene. If RT wanted to not let Blake convince the people until three quarters to the end, they should have cut the subtlety and have some annoying kid go “IT’S TOO EARLY IN THE PLOT TO DO YOUR SPEECH!”. Hell, let Blake tell her story about her team, but the audience balks at the fact that she’s not only friends with a Schnee, but also a human who crippled a guy on live television. Remember that plot point?

We then cut to Oscar and this is perhaps the reason I decided to do this revisit of Volume 5. The way Ozpin talks of action and resolve, it felt like we’re going to the root of the themes of taking action. No more being subject to the events of the plot like in previous Volumes. Now? Now is the time to fight back! And that built up to… what? One training scene and Ruby learning headbutt?

Granted, we see later on that there was a bit more to the plan, but for the most part, it seemed like an excuse for “character growth” as opposed to actual character growth. A training arc isn’t just some short scenes of a person lifting weights and jogging up stairs. Its meant to be a sort of means of growth for the character. There’s a reason most training montages have the character suck at first, but then get better by the time the montage ends. It’s because it’s the quickest way to show growth. But even without that, you could get some serious mileage for a pulled off training arc.

Rocky IV and Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back have some good examples of it. Rocky IV had the titular hero train and work out in the middle of a cold, mountainous range, while his opponent is simply given steroids. It shows the dichotomy between the two and how they view their eventual fight. Empire, on the other hand, had that masterful scene with Luke in the cave, where he has a huge moment of both foreshadowing and character growth.

Here? We just have Ruby learn headbutt like she’s nothing more than a Pokemon. There could have been a lot more done with it, like having Ruby put a lot more force in her punches, causing others to realize she’s extremely angry about what happened to Pyrrha and Penny, or, if the need to exposit about Semblances is needed, bring something new to the table that isn’t going to confuse the fuck out of people… Something like:

“Your Semblance might not reveal itself until you need it most” or something like that. Not “A semblance is someone’s personality, but not. Wow! Exposition!” or “Hey, remember how we said Aura was passive? Welp, not anymore!”

Not to mention that Jaune is seemingly cool with Ozpin suddenly coming back from the dead. Here’s the thing, last Volume had him upset with Ozpin about what happened to Pyrrha, something that didn’t seemed to resolve itself. Keep in mind that, for all rights and merits, Jaune believed Ozpin to have died. In fact, it was that confirmation that Ozpin had lost against Cinder that convinced Pyrrha to kill herself. Now here he is, seemingly stuck in the body of another kid and he just outright said this is a normal thing for him.

You’d expect him to have something more than “golly!”. The fact that he didn’t seem to have any aggression towards Ozpin until after he ran to his hidey hole in Volume 6 seems rather odd given that his entire character is that he’s angsting about Pyrrha and angry at Cinder for what she did. The group seem rather content to just sit back and let the plot happen, which is the opposite of what the crew was trying to convey with their themes.

Episode 4 and Episode 5

I still stand by what I said regarding how Episode 4 was a good episode, finally having a reunion between two members of Team RWBY, but it’s perhaps one of the last good things about RWBY we’ll ever see in Volume 5. Because Raven’s promise to tell Yang “the whole truth” turns out to just be regurgitated exposition at worst.

But first, we need to have Blake, the woman who doesn’t want her race to be labeled, turn out to have labels for her friends. Okay, granted, it’s not that dumb but it is kinda patronizing that we need to have a character tell us what another character is. While the rest of her speech is pretty effective in defining Blake’s character, making her perhaps the only character these themes of growth and strength actually apply to, it still is annoying that the most we take away out of this is her boiling down every character to a single word, then bringing up how Adam is going to ruin everything for the Faunus. You’ll see why this is a problem later. I liked the setting of Menagerie’s Shallow Sea marketplace thing and felt like Menagerie is wasted potential.

Ruby’s whole speech still feels like damage control, but with the added complaint of Ruby deciding to blame Salem for something Cinder did. Now, I heard the common excuse a lot: “Salem told Cinder to do it so it’s all her fault”, but that problem with that? Cinder told Emerald to kill Penny. So… Yeah. It is her fault. Hell, I wouldn’t have minded this if Ruby didn’t word it like Salem personally killed Penny and Pyrrha. Like as in, she just up and appeared out of nowhere and shot both Penny and Pyrrha in the head.

It still doesn’t fix the fact that Ruby is basically “hey, remember how I’m supposed to be upset?”

Lastly for Episode 5, we have the White Fang do the brilliant plant of murdering the chieftain who just spoke out against them. It’s dumb. Extremely dumb. What the hell do they think will happen after they murder the chieftain in cold blood? Menagerie is just gonna magically bend over and obey the White Fang? But perhaps the biggest waste is the White Fang in general.

You have these two sneaky fox brothers who seemingly oversee everything and even state that they’re only letting Adam do what he wants until he’s no longer of use to them, a buff bat dude, and a spider-lady… And they’re never seen again after this Volume. I get the idea, because RT is trying to wrap up the Faunus subplot as quickly as possible, but the problem that you can’t exactly introduce new characters or hidden depths if you’re just gonna throw them out with the bath water.

If they wanted to end the subplot, why did they put all the effort in some random characters that are just gonna be defeated off screen with a tea tray? Then again, this is a problem endemic to RWBY. Introduce this character, then quickly shoo them away before you’re committed to writing a plot for them. If you know you were going to half-ass the White Fang conclusion, why bother with stuff like more White Fang members or the SDC brand? In fact, why bother with the White Fang to begin with if you’re going to do so little with them?

Episode 6

Moving on before I lose my cool, we have Qrow aimlessly walking around downtown Mistral. Now, the crew said that Maria was supposed to be here… But… Why? What purpose would she serve? If she’s just gonna be a “hey, look, cameo to foreshadow Volume 6”, then that’s a horrible purpose. You know how most Cinematic Universes tanked because they spent more time hyping the next twenty movies when they should focus on their pilot? That’s what she would have been like.

Not to mention that she would have been caught in the crossfire of why Volume 5 was bad. “So here we have this random old lady who doesn’t matter at all to the plot so why is she even there” and then “Oh wow, she’s a SEW. They’re doing damage control to justify her unneeded presence in Volume 5”. And, don’t get me wrong, Maria is a fun lady and all that, but there needs to be a reason she was there beyond “hype for next Volume”.

What makes the problem worse was that they’re planning to include Maria so as to have a sort of Yoda to teach Ruby. This makes the complaint of “why didn’t Ruby ask about the Silver Eyes” even more of a complaint because now it seems like they decided “hey, we’re going to address it next volume, so let’s not bother bringing it up here”. Which is even worse than “hey, people noticed we didn’t address this so let’s completely invent this character for the sole purpose of addressing it!”

And then there’s Raven who is all “lol, I know more than you realize but I’m not actually gonna answer anything trolololololol” AARHG!

Okay. Okay. Before I completely lose my marbles, there’s one thing about the scene with Raven that’s stupid.

It’s the “there’s no such thing as magic” thing.

Okay. I get it. Turning into a bird is something that, in the world of RWBY, seems impossible. But there’s a ton of problems with this:

What makes summoning dead Grimm to fight for you so much more different than magic?

You’re willing to believe in magic rocks that augment your fighting style and are in fact part of a company that profits off magic rocks, yet turning into a bird is the messed up thing?

The guy who gave her this ability is currently inhabiting the body of a young boy and has said to basically devour his soul in due time, as well as create the magic that’s responsible for torching your school and your friend… And the BIRD is the most messed up thing!?

“But Raven made it sound like she was forced into it”. She didn’t seem to have any fucking problem with it though. Not only that, but it didn’t seem like a big dark secret that Ozpin wouldn’t want uncovered. In fact, he even said he gave Qrow and Raven the ability to turn into birds in an amused way.

Even more so when everyone but Yang seemed to respond to it with disbelief rather than outright anger. There’s a reason this whole bird issue was made fun of in Jello’s “So This is Basically RWBY” video.

Also, before we move onto Episode 7, I wanna bring up that the scene where Qrow visits the Shields is perhaps the reason why I hold Ozpin’s censorship of Lionheart’s role in the Battle of Haven to be one of the most scumbag moves he could have made. “Your mom’s dead, but don’t worry, the guy who sold her out is a hero!”

Episodes 7-10

Right, back to Episode 7. Okay, I’ll admit, it was a nice reunion scene all things considered, albeit with some rather unnerving things like Yang asking Weiss if she let the Boarbatusk skewer the trophy wife or even the dumb, patronizing “we haven’t made character arcs for us to go through so I’ll just say we had some”, since they had the great idea to use Ren, who is voiced by Monty’s brother, as the mouthpiece for that.

Unfortunately, this is the episode I always think back to when I think of Volume 5. The perfect epitome of a slow, monotonous Volume. The problem I have is that, yeah, it’s meant to be this breather episode, a calm before the storm, but this just feels like a long lull that’s made even more insulting with the cliffhanger. All it has is people dumping exposition that viewers have either figured out or weren’t even burning questions and I think the awkward silence that followed Ozpin saying how he was the wizard that gave the Maidens his power is the perfect epitome for just how boring the volume is. The dude just revealed a massive plot twist and it’s treated as nothing more than a “did you know” factoid.

While I liked how they addressed that Blake leaving Yang would have had some serious negative emotions in Yang, it felt rather half-assed that they basically resolved it with “hey, my mom’s drunk, so shut up and accept Blake the moment she comes back”, especially since it comes from Weiss, who told Blake at the end of Volume 1 that if she ever runs away again, she best let RWBY know. If they wanted to ship Bumblebee so badly, this would have been a great hurdle for them to come across instead of just “hey, let me resolve this plot for you”.

Now, the whole thing with Ilia… Let’s get the elephant out of the way. The way they revealed her sexuality, I feel, could have been done better. “You wanna know why I’m gonna kill your parents and bring you to your abuser? Because I wanted you to look at me like a lover!” There’s a reason why some fans label her as a “psycho lesbian”.

However, I want to bring up that Rooster Teeth did an excellent job at building tension during the climax of the Menagerie Arc. Sure, the cliffhangers were tiresome, but you couldn’t help but admit you were at the edge of your seat and it even did a good job at subversion. Even if they allegedly didn’t even intend for it to happen.

The constant dryness of exposition and dialogue exchanges is what made Episode 10 so much better than the other episodes. Not just because it’s action-orientated, but because it finally tries to get back to the themes that it was originally supposed to tell. Throughout the entirety of the middle portion of Volume 5, the group basically took a backseat and allowed characters and plots to happen to them rather than advocate for themselves. The closest thing we got to the theme of “building yourself back up” is Weiss talking to Yang about Blake.

In fact, the only actual characters taking action are the villains. Constantly roadblocking the cast, setting them in for a trap, and even aiming to screw each other over. These guys have more advocacy and agency than the main characters. The most any of them did was…

Burn down their own house and blamed everyone else for it, all while saying that the house is the message Adam wants to send.

Use a girl’s unrequited feelings towards them to their advantage, straddle them, and guilt tripped her enough for her to consider switching sides.

Cry about how things are not going their way until their hands start magically glowing.

Yelling at someone until they cry bitch tears and then have them run away without even bothering to close the door leading to the dangerous artifact everyone had been working so hard to keep out of enemy hands.

In the volume where the theme is “solving problems on our own”. Just because Yang drops the word strength a few times when bitching out at Raven doesn’t mean that the theme had been accomplished. In fact, they do nothing of their own accord and just follow a script. Even Ozpin, the supposed smartest guy in all of Remnant, doesn’t even bother to figure out a way to counter the trap. Just instead walk in. Hell, if Yang didn’t spot Raven, they’d be mulched.

But, back on track. Episode 9 was an entire waste that failed to pay off the expectations of what we had with the cliffhanger set up in Episode 7. “But it subverted your ex-” NO. There’s a good way to subvert expectations and being promised a fight after episodes of bland exposition only to have it be “lol, no, it’s just gonna be more talking” is not a good subversion.

No. Here’s a better way. Set up the cliffhanger like normal, but don’t show Cinder’s dragged out negotiation with Raven. Instead, have her “allying” with Cinder be a twist. That way, people’s expectations for what happened are actually, you know, subverted?

The Battle of Haven

But, you know where this is leading to… The Battle of Haven. Really, I don’t think I can say anything that hasn’t been covered by someone else. We all know it makes all the Vytal fights look like masterpieces by comparison, we all know the jokes about useless Weiss or Lionheart hogging the staircase, or even the plot holes of Raven knowing Cinder’s arm being Grimm but doing nothing about it or Blake, despite spending the past volume saying how Adam must be stopped, suddenly doesn’t care about him…

So let me cut it simply:

The reason this battle sucks might have to do with the crunch.

We don’t know how long this issue with Rooster Teeth had been going on for, but if it is indeed what people say it is and that animators don’t get paid for the last quarter or third of their work, then that might explain all the cut corners animators and writers made. Why the fights are broken up into one on ones or why fights are cut out entirely. Maybe they weren’t getting paid enough and thus, the quality of RWBY suffered as a result of it.

And that’s perhaps the shittiest thing about the Battle of Haven. It could have been this epic fight that would have made up for all the boring, drawn out scenes of exposition and chatting, but because Rooster Teeth got too greedy or even because of our own impatience (which, again, isn’t helped by the aforementioned long, drawn out scenes), we are treated to a final battle so broken and tiresome that the Battle of Winterfell manages to be a better final battle, with the only thing holding it back being that Haven had a better identity twist.

And if, for whatever reason, it isn’t due to crunch issues, then we have another problem. This was meant to be this hyped up rematch between the heroes and villains, who haven’t seen each other since the latter ruined the lives of the former. This would have been excellent to see how the killers of Jaune and Ruby’s friends would interact with them, how Yang would react to the person who framed her, even how the group had grown since their last battle…

But… if crunch wasn’t to blame for the quality dip and the writers intended for the fight to go the way it went… I have to say… What the fuck were they thinking!? So many moments could have been brought up here and yet they decided that they weren’t important enough to focus on! And now, with this battle over and done with, those moments lost their luster. If they decide to bring them up, it’d be too little, too late at best and “why the fuck are you bringing this up now” at worst.

I’ll deal with one commonly used example to get what I mean. Adam was established in Volume 3 to be a threat only made strong because he uses Blake’s emotions against her and has a Semblance that lets him dish out aura-breaking damage. Blake easily defeats Adam and has him on the ropes, only to let him run with a few excuses that some people have debated to death and back, when it would have been much easier for Blake to have to choose between apprehending Adam and helping Yang. Then, when he inevitably returns to haunt Blake next volume, suddenly he’s a threat that Blake is afraid of again despite Blake having “grown” to oppose him.

They wanted that “triumph” over him, but realize that by doing so, they’ve burned that opportunity to have the triumph be meaningful. Same goes with Emerald and Mercury. They had a good opportunity for Ruby to effectively call them out for their crimes like how Jaune did to Cinder, but instead she just headbutts Mercury. Yang had at least some closure on her arc with Mercury, but it was meh.

The Point in All of This

Hell, speaking of wasted opportunities, the reunion of Team RWBY, something that the opening had hyped and one that the fans had been waiting for since Volume 3 ended, is nothing more than an afterthought. They couldn’t even be assed to show Blake’s first fight back with Ruby and Weiss. That’s how little they cared. It’s like everyone was just wanting to get that paycheck but they needed to rush that final episode out the door and also need to make room for Gen:Lock and Nomad trailers. They didn’t even care about the stinger, as they basically ignored any sort of information relating to the stinger.

Perhaps the biggest reason why Volume 5 sucked so hard was that it was running off the heels of Volume 3. Everyone basically accepted that Volume 4 was meant to be a breather Volume, with lower stakes and lower drama (with the exception of possible death flags for Ren and Nora), but the moment they made Volume 5 the grudge match everyone wanted, then the stakes got raised back to the heights of the third Volume, only for it to fail to live up to the expectations. Sorry, I think I mean to say “subvert the expectations” in this day and age.

Though, I think the huge problem with all of this, and perhaps the biggest bottom line I can say, is that it might be due to Volume 3 going too over the edge. By killing important characters and even dividing the team, the villains had raised stakes up so high, that people began to take the show more seriously. When characters were vaguely hinted to die, be it through threats from the villains or even flashbacks, people fretted that they would die. When the villains go back to striking distance with the heroes, people desired a grand battle. When the show tried to deal with the ramifications that happened with RWBY separating, people wanted to know what was going through the characters’ heads.

And when Volume 5 failed to deliver/“subverted their expectations”, people considered it a bad volume.

But worst of all, it failed to live up to its own themes. Jaune was the only person to build himself back up again through deus ex hands, and we saw next Volume that it needed a statue for him to feel better. No one was in a position of giving up only to be defiant and shout “we’re not done here”, but instead cry “it wasn’t supposed to be like this!”. The big problem of Volume 5, make sure the relic is secure, is only solved because two characters had a catfight in the basement and the survivor didn’t bother to lock up because their daughter was too busy bitching at her. No one really grew or strengthened their resolve. The triumph… wasn’t theirs to have.

Although, it seems Rooster Teeth had learned from their mistakes, with Volume 6 being leaps and bounds better than Volume 5, regardless of what you thought of the latter half. Best of all, the themes promised in Volume 5 were shown prominently in Volume 6, albeit some of the scenes capitalizing on those themes feeling more like a child is having a tantrum because they couldn’t have the airplane.

To close out this rather long winded discussion, and to give people a tl;dr on the whole matter, Volume 5 failed to address the themes it had presented and instead just padded itself out, expecting people to accept it because it’s RWBY.