#speculation and analysis

[warsamongthestars]

There's a nice lot of speculation and grumblings and gripping about clone accelerate aging. Like, because their years were cut in half, that must mean we're dealing with children.

... But mind something. Clones have gone through Puberty. Like, full puberty. As in by the time they're deployed, not only is puberty done with them, they're pretty done with it too.

They are full on adults. You don't get to adulthood without going through pains and terrors of puberty, and I imagine accelerate puberty is arguably far fucking worse than normal human puberty. They've probably experience a puberty that cannot be fathomed, with rapidly growing bones and muscles that make our growing pains feel like light discomfort, to the sheer agony they must've experienced. Eldritch body horror would probably be the aptest description of accelerated puberty. You wouldn't walk away from such a thing without be changed, and it ain't the new hair on your chest.

Now I grant you, there will be nativity. Being born and grown soldiers will certainly lack social graces and certain attitudes. There will be definitely information lost--but mind, being on a ocean planet on the ass end of the galaxy, with long neck frog people who don't know the first thing about how humans do their humaning, would make someone naive even if they grew up the old fashioned way. It'd be fish bowl naitivity.

But you don't reach adulthood without going through puberty. Every active duty clone we have ever met, has already gone through theirs and came out the other side--probably suffering the shell shock of it--but they have come out regardless.

And that writes them as Adults, if the soldiering didn't.

ADDENDUM

Nobody can tell me that Anakin Skywalker is more grown up than Captain Rex.

[patchwork-crow-writes]

As much as I'm not feeling particularly charitable towards the character of Carol Holiday, I think there are some interesting insights to glean into her character from before she got twisted up into... this.

I think she must have been quite charming, in her way, at one point. Rudy certainly saw something in her, after all, and their family was very close with the Dreemurrs. I wonder that December's rebelliousness was at least tolerated, if not wholly condoned, especially since her bedroom remains untouched since her disappearance.

And, perhaps it's strange to consider, but I think Carol and Kris must have been very close too, to the point where she'd be like an aunt to them. Why do I think this? Consider her fascination with blades - the katana she hangs over the kitchen stovetop, the bronze-cast snowflakes adorning the walls of her house. I think that she might have appreciated the craftsmanship and aesthetics of such things, saw a beauty in them, perhaps. And suddenly it doesn't become so hard to see where Kris might have gotten their fascination with knives from.

And, that's interesting, isn't it. The name "Kris". Short for Krismas, potentially, but also... the name of a ceremonial dagger from Indonesia. I wonder if Carol may have had a hand in naming them when the Dreemurs adopted them. I wonder if she saw potential in them, and wanted to nurture it, bring out the best in them.

Before all this... unpleasantness. Before it all got twisted out of control. Now Carol wields the blade with an iron grip... the formerly beloved Dreemur child reduced to their namesake, a knife with which she may perform an unholy ritual.

You don't consider a knife's feelings when using it for such a purpose. The knife cuts, the knife swings, as all good knives are supposed to. The Knife does what its wielder tells it to do. The Knife cannot refuse. The Knife cannot be anything other than what it is. The Knife will be wielded, and it will be used up, and it will be discarded.

I wonder if Carol Holiday can be pulled back from the brink before that happens.

[ambrosiagourmet]

I think one of the biggest tragedies of Laios & Falin and their relationship is how much his actions impact her life. But like. Specifically how much they WOULDN’T impact her life as much if they weren’t both stuck in such a shitty abusive situation.

This part of the Falin-tries-makeup daydream hour comic is what got me thinking about it again because truly it just... it seems like such a like an offhand comment that I'm sure Laios didn't mean to be cruel or anything. That's just like. A little kid not thinking about what they are saying. ESPECIALLY when the kid in question is Laios.

But man they depended on each other SO much as kids. Too much. It really feels like they didn't have any other source of positive reinforcement, or anyone else to share themselves with. So of course an offhand comment like that has a huge impact on Falin.

Or this little bit from one of the flashbacks:

This tears me apart. Do you think it tears him apart to think about? I think it does. I think Laios holds every small failure to care for Falin against himself.

And then there's the Bigger stuff. The way that him coping with his own trauma ended up impacting her.

Like his interest in monsters. Like him going to find a ghost, and accidentally revealing Falin's magic to the whole village in the process.

Like him needing to leave. And leaving her behind.

He shaped her life so much, and he carries so much guilt for it. And again, there should have been other people there to help. The same things that made Laios need to leave home are the things that made his leaving so hard on Falin. She ate alone after that. She shouldn't have had to eat alone just because Laios wasn't there.

She was 9 when he left for school, and he was 11.

Nine. And Laios feels like he failed her because he didn't stand by her through this better. As an eleven year old.

Both of these kids deserved so much better from the world.

[teambyler]

My video "A LAWYER'S EVIDENCE that Mike and Will become a romantic pair in Stranger Things" is out!

Many of you have followed me ( @teambyler ) or read my essays analyzing Byler (I've linked some of the most-shared ones below). I am actually also a LAWYER who has a YouTube channel called RONALD OFF THE RECORD, and I just released my big video on Byler! (I also have another YouTube channel with 45K subscribers that I mention in the video)

I'm prepared to put my professional reputation as a lawyer on the line to comment on a piece of science fiction, because goddammit this is important to me! It is not "delusional" to think Will and Mike will become a couple, and there is nothing wrong with you if want it to happen! This is a video essay I've been planning for at least SIX MONTHS, and I put a lot of work into it. Please share, and please leave comments. Enjoy! =D

0:00 Why this video 1:38 Hate for Byler on the internet 10:16 Case for Mileven 15:21 Case for Byler: Starting premises 17:56 If Will were a girl… 25:30 The evidence! 29:05 EXHIBIT A: The Snow Ball 31:34 B: Mike's reactions to El and Will being upset 34:21 C: Season 3 ending montage 39:16 D: Airport reunion 47:51 E: Rink-O-Mania argument 51:28 F: Heteronormativity, audience expectations 58:25 G: Throwing away the letter 59:55 H: 2nd heart-to-heart scene 1:05:43 I: Mike can't say he loves El 1:13:27 J: Platonic reunion 1:15:12 K: Will's role convincing Mike to say "I love you" 1:20:08 L: Effect of the "love confession" on El 1:39:54 M: The Painting Lie 1:43:22 Honorable mentions 1:45:27 Non-diegetic evidence 2:01:23 Actor statements 2:07:01 Season 5 information 2:10:34 NOT how you write an unrequited love story 2:16:07 Why Byler SHOULD happen (queerbaiting, etc.) 2:28:21 A more powerful story 2:35:45 A personal note

I'm now making this my new pinned post, so I'll list a few of my posts here for people to check out.

ADDITIONS: -28:00 On "We should normalize same-sex friends being affectionate, they don't have to be gay," I should have been clearer. HOMOPHOBIA is the reason for that stigma. Straight friends feeling like they can be affectionate in our society HAS to include normalizing LGBT+ people. -1:16:55 I should've said this more clearly: Will reminded Mike that who HE is, HIS unique qualities, make him worthy of love and make El love him, not dumb luck. And Will of course could convey that because Will loves the actual nerd MIke and everything he is. -1:17:06 Mike making El "not feel like a mistake" doesn't fit El, because she says that Mike looks at her "like I'm a monster, too". Nor did she "push you away because she was afraid of losing you". That's Will, not El. Mike felt love because Will was describing himself. -1:52:36 I forgot to mention that, in the original Nina opera, Nina's lover is ALIVE and DOES return. The Duffers changed the story so that Nina's lover does NOT return, to further suggest Mike won't return! -2:35:22 I'm kicking myself for not being more specific about Mike and Will being heroes in more than one way: I think the theme of bullying from s1 will return, with Will (and also Mike) having to face bullying for being boyfriends in Hawkins.

Some other @teambyler posts:

Mike was saying "I love you" to Will

Questions to ask if ever you have Byler doubt

How the Duffers have set Will up to have a happy ending in Season 5

The most heartbreaking way Byler can culminate (and how I predict it will) (I know this is less likely than an "escape from Camazotz" possession scenario, but I still want this to happen =D )

How the Duffers likely will make the general audience AWARE of Byler and CHEER for Byler

-teambyler

[yujateaandpi]

Oughh it’s 2:00 AM and I’m having Thoughts and Emotions about Marceline the Vampire Queen. Like— she’s a punk bisexual and cool as heck but she’s also a terribly sad immortal with mom issues and double dad issues BUT BUT ALL of her parental figures gave her unconditional love so strong that it fundamentally saved the human race. Marceline saved the humans who hated her because her demon dad passed on the legacy that helped her grow powerful and her mom sang her lullabies and her adopted father clung to every shred of his breaking mind to protect her childhood. She was so loved! She was so loved! And that love never went away it stayed inside her even when all three of her parents hurt her so badly that the pain stuck for a thousand years. And all of the ways they hurt her were BECAUSE they loved her, so Marceline never learned to differentiate what it meant to love someone and hurt someone. So she hurts the people she wants to protect, she’s rough with the people she wants gentleness from, she abandons the people she wants by her side. And so much of the show is her collapsing and falling apart because she can’t figure out why why her relationships are all so broken. And then little by little she gets closure with each chapter of trauma— with her demon father, with her mother’s memory, with dear Simon— which then allows her to finally be at peace with herself and accept love— pure as it is— and give it back.

[atomicrebelfire]

✍️Tommy Kinard: Speculating His Rank in the LAFD (Canon + Structural Analysis) 📊📋🧵

📍TL;DR: Based on canon clues and real-world LAFD structure, Tommy Kinard is most likely a 🎖️Fire Helicopter Pilot V—the highest pilot classification. His career path is unusual: he started in suppression at the 118 before transitioning into Air Ops using his Army flight experience.

-----------------At your own risk- Lets Spiral-----------------------------

While the show hasn’t explicitly stated his rank, there are enough visual, behavioral, and contextual clues/crumbs to build a solid case for where he fits within the LAFD—especially given the real-world structure of Air Operations.

Similar to Tommy’s military-to-LAFD career timeline, this is meant to be both canon-compliant and grounded in how the real LAFD operates, in order to build a plausible theory around Tommy’s role, rank, and seniority. It’s part character study, part structural breakdown.

🔍 Canon Facts/Clues (What We Know)

Tommy is introduced in S2 as a ground firefighter at the 118, and reintroduced in S7 as a helicopter pilot at Harbour Station.

In 7x04, he tells Buck that he used to be a pilot in the Army.

He has over 20 years of service in the LAFD (stated on-screen based of begins episodes).

He has taken helicopters out without formal clearance (7x03, 8x15). While reprimanded afterward, the fact that he has the access and autonomy to do so is notable.

He is seen launching without escort, clearly trusted to operate independently and justify his decisions after the fact.

He casually offers to teach Buck how to fly (7x04), suggesting he holds—or is qualified for—a trainer or flight instructor designation.

In 7x06, Tommy arrives at the hospital in turnout gear, soot-covered, after a fire at Angeles Crest. Raising questions about whether he was working suppression or Air Ops.

In 8x15, Tommy performs evasive maneuvers while being pursued by military helicopters—diving low, climbing high, and weaving between towers—as part of an aerial diversion to buy time and deflect pursuit.

In 7x03, Tommy helps Hen bypass red tape by taking a helicopter without official approval, offering only a vague line about Central Bureau and brushing off objections from Melton.

🚁 How Most LAFD Pilots Get There

In real life, becoming a helicopter pilot in the LAFD follows a specific and highly competitive path:

Most candidates begin with military flight experience or are already civilian-rated pilots (e.g., with commercial or instructor licenses).

However, even military pilots must first complete four years of full-time suppression duty within LAFD before becoming eligible for Air Ops roles—there are no direct-entry exceptions.

That said, their military flight hours and FAA qualifications do count toward pilot certification requirements, making them strong candidates once they transition.

They are hired into pilot trainee roles (Fire Helicopter Pilot I or II) and must pass rigorous evaluations.

Air Operations is a separate track—pilots do not typically come from suppression (ground firefighting) units.

As a result, most LAFD pilots have never served on engines or trucks.

Pilots usually work 12-hour shifts (day or night), typically on a 4-on, 4-off schedule, and remain on-call at the airport rather than responding on the ground.

🧩 Real-World LAFD Air Operations Structure

LAFD helicopter pilots are classified under the following civil service ranks:

Fire Helicopter Pilot I or II - Pilot Trainee Roles

Fire Helicopter Pilot III – Entry-level pilot

Fire Helicopter Pilot IV – Senior operational pilot

Fire Helicopter Pilot V – Training/lead pilot (sometimes informally called “chief pilot”)

These ranks are lateral to suppression-side ranks like Firefighter, Engineer, or Captain. While pilots typically don’t carry the "Captain" title unless cross-trained—but senior pilots often operate with comparable authority within their unit.

🧭 Why Tommy’s Path Is Unusual

Tommy’s trajectory breaks the mold in several important ways:

He began his LAFD career in suppression, working as a firefighter at the 118.

Only later did he transition to Air Ops, requalifying based on his Army flight experience.

This kind of cross-track shift is rare—most suppression-side firefighters never move into aviation roles, especially after years on the ground.

🔄 Update (Post-Publication): As clarified by a kind commenter, all LAFD helicopter pilots must begin in suppression roles. So Tommy’s path actually aligns with departmental requirements.

What still makes him stand out, though, is how long he remained in suppression—over a decade—before switching tracks. That kind of deep dual experience is rare.

He’s probably one of the few who might have earned credibility in both areas: the fireground and the flight deck.

This dual-track background probably makes him a unique versatile asset with extensive experience to the department.

🧵 What That Tells Us About Tommy

Tommy’s military aviation experience likely included high-risk flying, tactical decision-making, and possibly training roles—skills that directly translate to LAFD Air Ops.

He entered the LAFD through standard firefighter routes—like all Air Ops pilots must—but instead of transitioning to aviation early, he stayed in suppression for over a decade before requalifying as a pilot. (But why?! 💭🤔)

That makes his path both rare and earned.

His ability to take out helicopters independently, despite the fallout, signals a level of seniority and operational trust only afforded to top-tier personnel.

His offer to teach suggests a CFI (Certified Flight Instructor) license or LAFD-equivalent designation, reinforcing that he may also serve in a training or mentoring role.

Tommy might still be dual-certified (implied by full turnout gear after the Angeles Crest response. (Or the show forgot he’s a pilot?!)🫨🤐)

His evasive flying during the diversion mission —dodging military helicopters —points to tactical or combat-style flight training. Possibly special ops. (So sexy.😘)

He’s senior enough and holds enough field authority or just bold enough to fake it to casually override protocol with a “You didn’t get the call?” deflection.

🧠��� Conclusion: Most Likely Rank 🎖️

Tommy Kinard is almost certainly a Fire Helicopter Pilot V, or at the very least, a senior Pilot IV on the cusp of promotion. He’s not formally titled “Chief Pilot,” but functionally operates as one—with over two decades in LAFD, firsthand suppression experience, and the kind of authority and autonomy that reflects a deeply trusted position and seniority to push limits.

He may not wear Captain’s bars, but between his dual-track career, leadership instincts, and ability to push protocol when it counts, he clearly stands shoulder-to-shoulder with the station’s most senior personnel. 💬 If I missed something or misread a clue, feel free to correct me (kindly)—or share your own version. Always open to digging deeper. After all… the writers clearly aren't worried about consistency. 😌

📎PS: 🤷‍♂️ All of this is, of course, pure speculation—built off canon clues/crumbs, real-world LAFD structure, and my completely healthy, not-at-all obsessive need to spiral over every background detail the show refuses to explain. I know 9-1-1 isn’t always that deep (and sometimes barely tries). Don’t worry, I’m seeking a therapist. 🙃👩‍⚕️ learning to chill.😎🪭

if you read till the end 🫡 & don't ask why we needed to know all this!

✨ Update: Added more canon evidence from 8x15 and 7x03 that reinforce Tommy’s seniority + elite training 👀🚁 (That somehow got lost in my Excel-to-Tumblr exchange. Damn. I need to stop. I’m putting myself in a time-out. Bye.) ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- PS 2: Okay, so I did mess that up🤣—turns out all LAFD pilots need to start in suppression for 4 years, and someone kindly pointed that out (thank you!! 🙏). Just to clarify, this post isn’t absolute fact—I don’t have a firefighting background, just sharing what I could find. Also, I am not from USA. please take all of this with a grain of salt. this is just a fun exercise. I've now learned even more about fire department structures than I ever planned to.

Seriously guys, stop enabling me 😭 I should be updating my resume, not drafting municipal org charts for fictional men.

[rexomi]

Something something. Making Solas a liar in Veilguard actively brings back a problem they fixed working on Inquisition.

On December 20 2019 VGS posted an interview with Trick Weekes about their work on Solas. This whole sentence is a link so its large enough for mobile but also disclaimer this is before they changed their name so deadname warning.

Here's a transcription I found here which is where i took the screenshots above. Since I know not everyone has 40 minutes to listen to an online radio interview.

I however highlighted the main point since most of you are not reading the screenshots anyway but skimming through. Rant under Read-more. Also bc i try to not be too negative on people's dashs but also i wanna ramble some more.

"But he lied a lot more. And it really weakened his character."

You can tell this happened during the game. Solas lies only once within Inquisition. He says something he can't be vague about and you push him so he lies, badly. He usually tells the truth vaguely. Typically Solas lies no more than Blackwall.

I fully believe that if in Inquisition your inquisitor figured out that Solas was Fen’harel and asked him bluntly to his face he'd confess. He might even be impressed. But why would you ever start to think that. No one assumes that their coworker is actually Poseidon regardless of how much they love the beach and ocean.

He hides in your expectations.

You can't ask him about being an ancient elf or being Fen'harel of myth because those aren't very probable. They're astronomically low to be truth within that universe. And outside, no one finished DA2 and went i wonder if one of our next companions is the Dread Wolf. Sera said, impossible things can't be surprises. He doesn't have to lie so when the truth comes out it's becomes obvious on a second playthrough.

They then actively bring back a problem they fixed in Inquisitions development. That they were open about fixing. That having a character that outright lies to you makes you have no intention of even hearing out the character. It retroactively undercuts Inquisition bc i see people trying to find Solas' lies in it when they aren't going to find any beyond the court intrigue.

It undercuts any lore we do get from Solas bc people dismiss it outright as being a lie from Mr "I abhor blood magic". I feel like shaking people's shoulders like no, dont do it.

They retconned him guys i have proof from 2019.

And its like if you hate Solas is this even satisfying? Like that's not Solas. His motivations are gone (that's a whole other post) and so is his core personality trait. It's like they went here's the Dreadwolf but during the ten years they replaced the smug asshole who was insufferably right with a 20 yo senior chihuahua that doesnt have any teeth.

My favorite villains are those that tell the truth. Because nothing hurts more than the truth. Can you imagine if he told you the truth. If he told you horrible things that you dismissed as lies to only be true. Wouldn't Varric’s death have more weight if he told you Varric was dead only for you - for everyone - to see him in the Lighthouse. If it was a spirit who took his shape to help you or even because it saw something worth reflecting in your memories.

So you dismiss him until it's revealed near the end oh he was telling the truth and you have an oh shit maybe he was right about other things but its too late to try and stop any of the truths he told you which could be from allies/companions betraying to stuff about Ghilan'nain and Elgarnan.

Like the only way to redeem Solas was to listen to him and by going out of your way to address problems he sees and you can find the alternative to tearing down the Veil by a series a little puzzle pieces throughout the game.

Have it be he will only listen to you if you listen to him. That he'll reject your other solution bc why the hell would he trust you if you couldnt extend the same.

Like Solas couldve been a great villian and he should've been great for both the haters and those that liked him. Not only the romance but for those who became his friend. Like i keep coming back to if i hated Solas would i be satisfied with Veilguard.

And the answer is no because that isnt Solas.

Tricking him has no weight bc he's an idiot in Veilguard like not even in the ending bc doesn't notice you switch the dagger around like right in front of him but none of his actions make sense. Ppl have mentioned the regret prison makes no sense for Elgarnan and Ghilan'nain bc they don't have regrets.

Attacking Solas has no weight because he literally needs the shit kicked out of him by a dragon for it to even begin to work. They literally need him to be at deaths door before its realistic that Rook could take him in a fight.

Redeem has no weight bc of the massive retcons to his motivations. They had to retcon the post credits scene bc even if Flemythal went hey i don't want you to do this Dai Solas wouldve went okay but that doesnt solve my other problems with the veil including the corruption of spirits and the fact its in literal shambles so i guess is still coming down.

I'm just disappointed. By the end of Trespasser they had a great villian and they just tossed it to the side and reverted him and people are arguing about a character who's sole defining trait in Veilguard is a problem they solved before Inquisition launched.

Basically we can sum it up with a screenshot.

[cirrus-grey]

ALICE: So each of the cases is categorized on four metrics with a standard integer scale, that’s your DPHW.

GWEN: Okay. Now I’m pretty sure I need to try and keep them as even as possible.

ALICE: Ok, so, it makes sense that if you’re low on “W” that means we should probably prioritize processing cases with a higher rank on that metric to bring the average up, right? … So, it’s just a hunch but I bet if we have a look at old cases and then try and sort by “W” we can find out which cases got the biggest scores in that metric and reverse engineer what you need … Now, unless I’m wrong, which, let’s be honest, is pretty damn likely, when we cross reference this shortlist for common terms we’ll find out what Freddy thinks you need and that... is... more... Bonzo?

Loving finally getting a breakdown for why DPHW is important, here.

Now I, like the utter nerd I am, have been tracking the DPHW of each case on a spreadsheet, and therefore was able to do some quick sorting just like Alice. Bonzo is definitely our highest W scorer of the lot – he’s got 2 of the 5 cases ranked as “8” on that metric, though he tends to score pretty high on P and H as well.

However.

We are not low on W. When you add up the total DPWHs of every case we’ve gotten so far, you get:

D – 136 (average score 3.2)

P – 148 (average score 3.5)

H – 210 (average score 5.0)

W – 218 (average score 5.2)

W is the highest metric. So either it needs to be the highest, and the balance only works if it’s at the top...

…Or Freddie is lying about what’s needed, and intentionally trying to send things haywire.

Not too much mercury or the world ends, not too much sulfur or we all go mad…

[thanergetic-hyperlinks]

What does Alecto want?

This is something I thought about while I wrote that post about Gideon's immortality.

When people speak about Alecto the book and Alecto the character, there is often an assumption that Alecto wants revenge for John turning her into a Barbie, and that our main characters want to kill God.

I'm not going to get too much into what I think the endgame might be for Jod (I'll leave it for another day) but I have some observations about Alecto!

First, people think Alecto wants revenge for the initial act of ripping her soul out and stuffing it in a Barbie body. I'm honestly not so sure that's her main concern!

Initially, Alecto's main fear is dying:

This is presumably what frightened her when in pain as Gaia, and what frightened her here, starting her life with John at the end of the world.

Of course, in the middle, there's her actual murder, and how she felt about it:

This fragment is so interesting. Most of this chapter the dialogue is in quotation marks, indicating it's not the memory of John and Alecto but current dialogue between John and Harrowhark.

John tells Harrow what happened. He is the one who asks her if she remembers what Alecto said. She (Harrowhark) said “What else did I say?”. And when Harrow says “I still love you”, Jod remembers that Alecto was also willing to love him despite what he'd done.

But Harrow is left without the answer to one question. “Where did you put the people? Where did they go?”

After this paragraph, she will say there are things she doesn't understand:

Apparently Alecto's memory isn't fully accessible, or she can't know Alecto's thought process, or there's bits of her memory gone for other reasons, whether it's John's intervention (unlikely, given how much incriminating stuff Alecto does remember) or because that's what was most traumatic to her and—unlike John's tale of apocalypse—nobody later reminded her. (Diegetically, of course, Tamsyn is simply saving that reveal for Harrow's arc in Hell.)

In any case: after being told the entire story about being killed and turned into a Barbie, Harrowhark still says “I want to understand why she was angry”. And that's seemingly tied to why John was terrified.

And the text directly relates that to the missing population of the Earth.

There are three things that very nearly make Nona fully recover the memory of who she was. One is when Pyrrha very nearly says her name, and Nona doesn't want to hear it. Later she doesn't seem to be lucid enough to react to Ianthe saying it, but she does react to this final line: Ianthe yelling “John loves Alecto!”. In the meantime, however, there's one more thing that shakes Nona deeply enough she has an actual heart attack:

And it's the sight of the Tower that makes Nona lose the will to live:

She also gets a couple passages where the sight of devils touches some deep, frightening memory. And we are given one last clue:

The River is dead.

We knew as early as HtN that the River is broken in some way. Its waters are described as brackish, salty, dirty, full of ghosts represented as rotting corpses. It doesn't seem to flow anywhere as rivers should. House religion says the dead wait as mad ghosts until John conducts his Second Resurrection. John of course has planted House theology with his idea to conduct “a flood” at some point and start over (“empty is just another word for clean”, etc.), once his revenge is done. He needs souls to not move on, in order to do that. We know through Abigail and Dulcinea that there is another shore, a Beyond that they've managed to exceptionally reach.

Alecto seems upset, above all, by what happened to the River, and that it remains unfixed.

Alecto states that she no longer fears death. She has experienced it (“I died once… no, twice”, and that's before her brief tenure as Nona).

She might be ready to leave John behind and move on, but.

What if she can't move on?

By which I mean: what if she—a Resurrection Beast, intimately acquainted with the spiritual dimension that is the River—what if she knows that she could never cross it as it is now, if she were to die? What if she knows that she would be absorbed by the stoma in the River's current condition, or float around insane forever? What if the sum of all necromantic transgression is that Jod committed ecocide on the afterlife and true death is no longer possible?

What if she needs the River to be healed in order to die?

To conclude, two other tidbits:

1. When Nona, trying not to engage with her Alecto consciousness, briefly considers just giving up and dying, she says:

2. Palamedes speaks of the Beyond (after briefly witnessing Dulcinea as she is there in TUG) right before he describes Paul as an end and a beginning. I don't think this is accidental?

[drew-the-pic]

[sepublic]

Yesterday, Glitch released this in teaser for today’s Knights of Guinevere announcement.

Right off the bat, it seems that our Princess is meant to be some sort of amusement park attraction; Given her dreams, is she a biomechanical animatronic programmed to believe she’s real? Or did they actually bring back the dead as an attraction, because it’s that kind of futuristic dystopia in space, if Park Planet is any indication? Perhaps the title alludes to some sort of stage play gone horrifically real.

It also makes me think of Disneyland animatronics and given Dana’s past with the company and her issues and past artwork it sure is. Indicative, perhaps.

There’s a mention of ‘Blue Lung’ which is probably a fictional disease, but a quick search brings up Cyanosis, in which your skin turns blue due to inadequate oxygen. The Princess is probably supposed to be blue based on her dreams and the posters but hmm. Again given the potential amusement park setting I wonder if it’s a commentary on Disneyland’s handling of COVID.

There’s also this poster for Star Snuff which could be a band? Or some fungal infection and it’s the same disease as these Blue Lung Blues.

All of this is to say, the first project Dana made after cutting ties with Disney following the cancellation of her first passion project was about how Disney fucking sucks.

[beepingmemesauce2727]

lol

[patchwork-crow-writes]

Deltarune's central conflict seems to be coalescing around the tension between being trapped in the amber of the past versus embracing the liquid uncertainty of the future - and how the fear that keeps us trapped in said past can rob us of the potential joys of said future.

Long post under the read more - you've been warned :P

Hometown has been frozen in time for a long time. Its residents cling to the illusion of a glorified past with such vigour that it has completely arrested the town's development. We see it in stages - first, with Asriel's departure to college and everyone waiting for their "golden boy" to come back home so they can bask in his immaculate aura once more. Next, we see Asgore's seeming inability to let go of his former relationship with Toriel, pouring so much of his time and energy into trying to make her return to that idealised family unit with him. Then there is Father Alvin, whose perceived inadequacy compared to his father Gerson literally manifests in him keeping his funerary object in his church desk drawer.

Struggling against that prevailing wind are the young and the restless. Undyne bristles against the stagnation of her surroundings, fuming as she directs traffic and files paperwork with an energy more appropriate for foiling a bank robbery. Rudy Holiday lies dying in hospital yet still wishes for his surviving daughter to be able to live her life to the fullest. Catti wishes to escape the yoke of her family's cloying earnestness and explore her identity through the medium of goth and incantations. And returning to Asriel, you expect that he might have seen in going away to collage a chance to escape the tar pit of his surroundings, to make something of himself other than how his family and peers saw him - an unchanging, static image of a past that no longer exists.

Of course, some people are trapped by a past they would rather eschew but do not know how to. Berdly is forever running from his own perceived inadequacy but can never quite escape it. Susie's experiences growing up cemented a conviction in her that she was fundamentally "bad", a concept that she still struggles with despite her and her newfound friends' efforts to defy it. And Noelle finds herself trapped between the desire to move forward into the future and a reverence to a past that once seemed so sweet.

The dark worlds also exhibit this struggle. The darkners eagerly await the return of their lightner "gods", the beings which gave them a purpose to live by. Queen's stated goal is to trap all lightners in her candied games and glowing screens, an endless present containing only superficial distractions and little in the way of meaning. Tenna recognises himself a relic of a bygone past, but is seduced into believing that he can turn back the clock and make the Dreemurrs adore him like they used to.

The purposes they were imbued with gave their lives direction, but that same purpose threatens to crystalise and ossify the very notion of their future, turning it into something more akin to glass or stone. The prophecy is the ultimate manifestation of this idea - a perfect, immutable record of the future that cannot be averted or defaced. Etched in glass, the future it predicts seems so fragile, but break it and a perfect replica will take its place a little further along. You can defer and delay, but you can never escape its crystalline prison. You are just as trapped by the future as you are by the past.

And so, we come to Carol and December Holiday, and Kris Dreemurr - representative of the past, the future, and the present, respectively.

There was always a sense that December felt constrained by Hometown - her mother's town - and her family - her mother's family. That she was rebellious and impulsive and wanted to make something of herself, be her own person instead of what was expected of her as the elder sister of the Holiday children and daughter to the mayor. She promised Noelle (Elly) that one day she'd take her to the city with its brilliant lights and the promise of a brighter future... or at least, a more interesting one. She wrote her own songs that preached about her desire for freedom and her drive to attain it by any means necessary. December was a shooting star tearing through the world, racing towards uncertainty with a hand eagerly reached out to grasp it.

And then, she disappeared, and that bright future was snatched from her in one fell swoop. Now, she is only the Lost Girl - her bedroom untouched as an eternal shrine which must never be desecrated, her rebelliousness canonised and lionised as an artefact of the past, reduced to a passive rendition of the lost Lenore, frozen in amber as a caricature of who and what she once was, and not who she might yet have become.

However bad Dess's disappearance might have hurt Noelle, it seems to have completely broken Carol. The character we meet in Chapter 4 is cold, rigid, inflexible. Her will in her household, and across hometown itself, is absolute, unflinching, irrefutable. She is compelled to control everything within her considerable dominion, right down to the minutiae. While she is not singlehandedly responsbile for Hometown's paralysis, she is its prime architect. And she is also apparently willing to risk wiping it all off the map for a chance - a chance - to bring December back from wherever she's gone. To this end Carol is ruthless, merciless, will do anything up to and including coercing a vulnerable teenager to assist her in her plans. The future and the present both are irrelevant - all that matters is getting her daughter back.

For the sake of the past where she had both of her daughters, Carol froze the clock and arrested Hometown in an eternal present. Now she seeks to turn that same clock back, to forsake the prospect of the future's myriad possibilities for the cast-iron solidity of what she once had. Everything she does is for the sake of her family, her daughter, her perfect life. And she's willing to do it regardless of what the family in question might actually want or need.

And trapped perfectly between these two forces, like a fly caught in a web who sees the spider approaching them, is Kris. We can infer that they looked up to Dess growing up, and the way she was completely unfettered by the stagnation of her surroundings, didn't care what other people thought of her. She would likely have represented hope for Kris that they, too, could be anything they wanted to be... until suddenly, she was gone. And perhaps that might have been okay, given enough time - perhaps they might have mourned, but kept her example alive in their mind and tried to move forward.

But Carol stopped them. Like she stopped everything else. Saw how much they cared for her. Fed them tales about bringing her back. Made them promise. And held that promise over their head like a sword of Damocles. In this way, she molded them into yet another extension of her will with a control far more adroit and complete than anything the player could possibly muster.

Find her.

You promised.

Don't forget.

But another force exerts its will upon Kris - the Player. When Kris is crushed by the weight of their perceived responsibilities, when they are rendered catatonic by the sheer impossibility of their situation... we are the ones who march them forward. We are the ones who bring them to Ralsei and Susie, new friends who represent hope for a brighter future despite the darkness. We are the ones who FORCE them to make choices again, FORCE them to assume the mantle of a hero, in defiance of the villain they may well believe themself to be. We show them another way, however forceful and inelegant our methods, however much they may fight us along that way.

Are we any better than Carol in this regard? No, I wouldn't presume that we are - our intrusion into their life is every bit a violation as her transgressions. Unlike Carol, however, we are broadly invested in Deltarune's future, rather than its past. There may only be one path, one ending... and yet still we are invested in seeing that future take shape, whatever it may be. We reflect on a past that isn't ours, but unlike Carol we take that past and use it to inform what happens in the future, instead of trying to control it. For us, the future is not set in stone, or written in glass... the future teems with uncertainty, and we cannot help but reach for it, enthralled by the possibilities it contains.

It's possible that December Holiday may yet be saved from whatever fate might have befallen her... but the damage done to Kris, and the danger to the world that has resulted from that desire begs the question: even if we COULD save December... should we? More poignantly - if December could see the chaos and the hurt that was wrought in the service of bringing her back... would she want to be brought back in the first place?

At this juncture we cannot say, we cannot know. All we can do now is wait for the promised new future.

[the-irreverend]

I find this moment where Rudy interrupts Toriel because it really adds an interesting layer to his relationship with Mayor Holiday, because it kinda communicates to us that Rudy is second-guessing his relationship with her to the point where he's not comfortable having her addressed as his spouse

When he speaks her name, his expression makes it as if he's saying it with a grudging and frustrated tone. And the fact that Rudy sharply interrupts her IMMEDIATELY after Toriel addresses Carol as that, and instead opts to call her by her first name indicates to me that Carol's neglect and toxic parenting are starting to test his patience, especially in the wake of Dess's disappearance.

Remember how when Kris asks them about Carol and Noelle when visiting the hospital in Chapter 1 he said "love her but... she's tough on her"? That could very well be a euphemism for how not-so-good things really are, and that Rudy's trying to quell Kris's worries by pretending that by pretending he loves her more than he actually does.

Either way, it'll be interesting to see what becomes of Rudy and Carol's marriage in the following chapters, especially as we learn about her role in the Dark World.

[pocketdeadlock]

yes yes yes yes!! ive been thinking about this so hard. i love that they're a bit Not Okay. they escaped from an assassination attempt, it's no wonder they're paranoid as hell.

and i do think the spirits are corrupting them, or at least making them sick in some way (affliction reference.) it's no coincidence that the arm they hold the briefcase with is the one that's fucked up and rotten. there's also them starting the game with -15% spirit resist. its like having to wield the spirits for so long has eaten away at their defenses to them.

i'm gonna take a sec to ramble about pocket since i've officially played 75 games as them and i have thoughts i need to get out, lest i explode.

first, i find it interesting how varied their dialogue is in regards to the spirits. pocket goes from apprehensive ("good god, what am i about to do?") to pessimistic ("i'm becoming more and more like my father") to objective ("sometimes violence is necessary").

then they just... do a complete 180°? they absolve themself of responsibility ("it's the spirits killing them, not me") and flat out deny that they are enabling violence ("my father chose violence, not me").

though it's done subtly, everything seems to suggest pocket isn't exactly doing well mentally despite their mostly optimistic nature. i mean duh. but this raises another question: is pocket going bonkers from living in paranoia for years, or are the spirits actually starting to corrupt them?

at this point, we just don't know. it is suggested they are being physically affected by the briefcase considering hands normally don't look like that. so, there is possibly some merit to their claim that the spirits are the ones doing the killing.

everything about their situation is ominous. it isn't even clear if they're talking about the enemy or the spirits when they go in the case and say "they're trying to kill me."

personally, i think it's neat! i love complex characters. all nonbinary people should have a free pass to go a little crazy and freak out sometimes, even if they are a nepo baby.

[reizkai]

js getting that out there