#tbh i don't think about runaan and ethari like... ever

[kradogsrats]

Do you think Ghosting could be sort of like shunning in some religious communities…?

I think that's almost definitely what inspired it! Which kind of says a lot about Moonshadow society since groups that practice shunning tend to hit a lot of the markers for what defines a cult. :|

One possible difference that would be really significant is how compulsory everyone in a community participating in the Ghosting is—shunning doesn't work if only some people do it, the point is that the target loses their entire community. Generally AFAIK anyone who doesn't participate in the shunning winds up shunned, themselves. That's one of the more cult-like aspects of it.

Rayla initially believes that surely Ethari wouldn't have gone through with Ghosting her, which could go either way: it may be just be wishful thinking that he would defy the entire community for her, or he and Runaan may have refused to participate in Ghosting Tiadrin and Lain (see below) so she believes he will do so again. Tylluan's community also uniformly ghosted them—the person who replaced them as a leader was a close friend of theirs, and while she's generally sympathetic to them, she also refuses to discuss them in public or otherwise indicate that she supports their plan to save the town. So there is at least a little bit of that aspect to it, with social pressure to not speak about people who were Ghosted, but maybe that also means that the actual magical part is voluntary? I don't know. It's kind of unclear.

But with regard to that... by how we've seen Ghosting applied, it would be logical that Tiadrin and Lain were almost definitely Ghosted. Which means that if participating in the Ghosting is compulsory, Rayla has almost definitely Ghosted her own parents, which will cause a very fun(tm) moment when they are released from the coins. If it's not compulsory (like maybe you can get a "conscientious objector" exception if you're otherwise a sufficiently established community member) I think it's likely that Ethari, at least, did not participate. Runaan's a bit of an open question on that for me, and it probably would come down to either whether or not he actually believes Tiadrin and Lain would be even capable of abandoning their posts or Ethari demanding he not do it. And then if either of them refused, I very much doubt they would have allowed Rayla to do it. (Assuming they could prevent her, which... I was going to say obviously the guardian of a minor would have be involved in that decision, BUT Rayla is apparently culturally considered old enough to die on a mission into enemy territory to assassinate a heavily-guarded major political figure, SO YEAH.) But I think the question of whether or not she would have voluntarily is an interesting one—was Ghosting her parents an effect of her destructive attitude toward them (and herself), or was NOT Ghosting them part of its cause?

[raayllum]

Hi Rayllum. Noni again

Hope all is well.

One criticism that I constantly see over and over again is how S4 completely destroyed Rayla's character. Saying that the writers did completely ruin and destroyed Rayla's character for no reason at all. That they did such a disservice to her, why didn't they not give her any growth at all in S4. I've been seeing it on both reddit and YouTube. Why did the writers make her unlikable, how TTM was completely unnecessary. How Runaan and Ethari don't seem to love Rayla at all in seasons 1-3, among others things. Like such unnecessary harsh and cruel criticism towards the writers about how they ruined Rayla's character.

Which I don't agree with to an extent. Even though I had my issues with how they handled Rayla in S4, I feel that the writers foreshadowed things in S4 that might have happened to her, what she possibly went through during those two years as well as having some strong levels of importance and growth for her character development going forward. I know you've mentioned this before about those who don't pay attention or see what's going on with Rayla. It just bothers and upsets me that some people really don't truly understand Rayla's character at all or don't even see some of her changes in S4.

Hope you don't mind this. I just want to see S5 so badly because I have a feeling this is where Rayla's character arc is going to really shine and prosper going forward and in the seasons to come. I can't wait to see it. S5 is about to unleash the tides, and I'm so here for it.

Much love, fam. Keep being awesome ❤️

Thank you for sharing your thoughts! I've said before I definitely would've appreciated more insight into Rayla's time away in S4, but that's more of a "I hope the show addresses this eventually" thing than "this is a fault of this specific season" tbh.

To me, the biggest thing that's indicative of 1) how well people are grasping her characterization and 2) how well people are able to predict her plot arcs comes down to one thing, which is really whether TTM surprised them or not.

Because like, did I see Rayla walking away coming? No, I didn't. But did I know this specific issue of "Rayla is too self sacrificial and prone to trying to do things alone" was going to be the biggest relationship hurdle her and Callum will have to jump? Yeah, I did, ever since 2x07 happened, and then I just waited for her tendencies to be brought up again in a negative light for like, 3+ years afterwards. Because you don't have a character say shit like "Don't you worry about my hand, the egg is all that matters now" and "It doesn't matter what happens to me" and especially "But if I die, I'll just be paying the price they should have paid a long time ago" and have it go nowhere. Previously, I thought Rayllum would have a smaller arc and a big blow out fight, but in retrospect a more dramatic route like this makes sense

A lot of meta and predictions is a guessing game, for sure, but while we might not always (or even often) assemble the puzzle pieces in the right manner, I think being able to identify the puzzle pieces at all is 1) a skill and 2) kinda important. Reviews aren't necessarily 'analysis' per se, and people are allowed to have opinions / feel however they want of course, but like - idk, not all critique is either made in good faith and/or grounded in canon nevermind analysis, y'know?