#the kid Prince watches

[celestialowlryx]

THE DRAGON PRINCE - BOOK 6: "STARS" ↳ We are, all of us, stardust. Held together by love for an instant.

[trashmancer]

Okay, I have to get it out of my system. The thoughts I had on what The Dragon Prince did and why, deep down, it repulses me on a profound level. (I’ve shared these thoughts elsewhere but here’s my analysis on Viren’s arc and ending in season 6.)

The season begins with Viren waking from what was teased to be death (and viewers were left thinking he died for a year). He feels free and unburdened and has hope. Maybe things can be better, maybe he can change, maybe he can fix what he has broken.

Spoiler alert: He doesn’t even get off the starting block. From there it is a descent towards despair and his self-inflicted death.

After he wakes, he encounters his bloodied daughter Claudia. This shock smacks back to reality and he sees what he has caused. He realizes the cold truth: his daughter is better off without him so he leaves her despite her cries for him to stay. It is worth noting as he leaves, he openly acknowledges it may kill him—and he doesn’t much care if it does.

He goes back home to Katolis searching for anyone to talk to. He begs to speak to King Ezran and is denied and told he deserves “no mercy.” He reaches out to his son Soren in an attempt to reconcile, to apologize, and Soren accuses Viren of trying to manipulate him. Viren realizes he will receive no help or solace here as he’d hoped, and despairs.

His feeling of hopelessness is symbolized by the show panning to a fly trapped in a spider’s web about to be consumed. The abject image of being trapped with nowhere to go except death.

Next we see him, he is alone in his cell, penning a letter of his regrets, which is not that dissimilar to one's final thoughts in a suicide note. But he reconsiders. After all, this is self-indulgent pain to burden the living, so he burns it. His last thoughts and words gone.

It isn’t much after this moment Soren tells Viren the only thing he has of value to offer is his ability to do Dark Magic—the thing Viren has been running from, the thing he now hates, the thing that ruined his life. Throughout the show, dark magic can be allegorically read as a form of self-harm, done out of fear and trauma while causing lasting scars to the user. And Viren succumbs to it. He agrees. With the biggest expression of it: offering his own body to feed the spell. He stabs a knife into his own chest (reminiscent of Shakespearean suicide). And he dies.

What happened here wasn’t just a blaring example of a heel-face door slam where a character vying to change their life around and be better is coldly denied. It was also a suicide—a glorified one at that.

For a show supposedly about hope and forgiveness and breaking cycles, having a character who for three seasons is striving to walk a different path take his own life in an act of despair when he has nowhere else to go is... well. Sure is something. Nothing good in my world.

[moonpascal]

i can’t watch movies/tv shows anymore. at least older ones, because then i develop a massive crush on them, and then there is nothing written for them or very few.

[eddiezpaghetti]

Okay, so my experience with Stranger Things is a weird one.

I didn't care when it first came out, started to watch it out of "might as well" in 2020, wasn't interested in it enough to make it past S2, forgot about it outside of going "oh, hey, cool, there's a lesbian in it now, I guess," in S3, got really annoyed when "Running Up That Hill" got popular from it because it was a song I listened to on fucking loop after one of my best friends died in high school and I fully expected its appearance in the show to ignore the whole survivor's guilt theme of the song (and was very happy to learn later that it did the exact opposite of ignoring the lyrics), saw people drawing Eddie, suddenly got a lot more interested, watched just the fourth season like a fucking psychopath because I was seriously only there for Eddie, then got interested enough to start the show over properly, having mostly forgotten what I did watch of the show before.

And let me tell you something from the perspective of someone who started with the complete fourth season, who wasn't there from the start, who wasn't tainted by ship goggles or this internal battle of hope and despair, who wasn't theorizing about what the painting could be or expecting Mike and Will to kiss when Volume 2 happened or rooting for Mike and Eleven's relationship to go down in flames or whatever the fuck. Just someone who went blind into Season 4.

It's really fucking obvious that Will and Mike are gonna be endgame.

Like holy fuck. It's so fucking blatant I don't even know why people are nervous.

No sane fucking person would shoot this scene this way if they wanted the audience to care about El and Mike as a couple. Despite being all blurry in the background, Will's reaction to what's happening here is smackdab in the fucking middle, clearly showing that the important part is what's going through his head here. What he's feeling. It's like the opposite of that scene from Kingdom Hearts II where Sora and Riku reunite and Kairi just fucking vanishes into the aether while it's happening because, despite the fact that she was standing between them when the scene began, she doesn't matter to the scene, so she's just kind of gone when the camera angle changes. Will could have been behind one of their heads, or so far in the distance he blends in with the background, but he's not. He's so obvious that despite being massively blurred out, he's still the first goddamn thing you look at. What, you think that's an accident? You think he's in the middle of this dramatic fucking scene because of a mistake? He basically has a big flashing neon arrow pointing at him with "THIS IS THE POINT" being screamed through a megaphone.

And then this?

They're paired up like they're taking fucking prom pictures. Each one of these pairs is so fucking close to one another and so fucking far from everyone else. It's not, "Oh, they're standing vaguely near each other in a group shot," it's fucking Noah's Ark out here. Again, there's no way to take this as an accident. It's not just a framing issue. If they wanted to make the shot look balanced while still not hiding anyone else behind El, they would have scattered people around much more naturally. Even if they wanted to keep Nancy with Jonathan and Hopper with Joyce, there's so much room on that hill for three people to stand on El's left and three on her right. But they didn't do that. They put Mike and Will together on purpose in the most obvious way possible.

Like I get that coming up with crackpot theories is fun in and of itself and I'm not blaming anyone for having fun. I totally get the appeal of arguing a point and reaching for every stupid little thing to pull into it because it's like a game, okay? I've done that. But if you're trying to actually convince someone (whether it's someone who wants to believe or someone who's pissed at the very idea that Mike and Will could be in love), stay away from blue and yellow lights, stay away from costume design, stay away from the existence of closets in backgrounds. And don't worry about whether Mike's gay or bi when he's in love with Will either way. I'll give you a little tip about persuasion: You're only as strong as your weakest argument. Even if you've got strong stuff in there, too, the person you're trying to convince is going to dismiss anything you say as complete insanity the second you start going on an entire tangent about the shape of a character's fucking pocket.

Sometimes, clothes are just clothes. Sometimes, there's a closet in the background because it helps establish that a character is in a bedroom. Sometimes, blue and yellow are just a couple of colors that look nice together. And sure, it might be set designers and costume designers and cinematographers smirking and winking at the audience from behind the camera. But if the show was just those things, instead of those things in the context of everything else, they wouldn't be saying anything of note.

But this?

This tells a story all on its own. Someone with no context can look at this and automatically assume that each paired person is standing with someone they care about deeply, seeking comfort as they watch some sort of disaster unfold. And yeah, romantic couples usually come in twos, and we live in an amatonormative society, so that's going to be the first association anyone makes seeing a bunch of people paired off.

It's the same reason you look at this

And go, "Oh..."

"Those two are probably a couple."

And I genuinely don't understand how people could have watched S4 Vol. 2 and gotten scared. Because as someone who went in with no investment whatsoever, I just looked at these two--

--and went, "Oh, those two are a couple. Good for them." And I moved on. Shut up about the trees for five seconds and just see the forest for what it is.

Oh, and if you're still nervous? Little thing from a storyteller here: You don't leave a hanging thread like "Will confessed his romantic feelings for Mike by projecting them onto El, but Mike either didn't understand or at least didn't say he understood," without coming back to that later. That's Chekov's gun hanging on the wall, babes. It's gonna fire at some point. If Mike was going to reject Will's feelings, if they weren't relevant, they would have had that discussion in Argyle's van. There'd be no reason to leave you in suspense.

[imjustavenuxwithaboomerang]

i'd let bearded and fanged ben ruin my life

[timetravel-might-just-happen]

lotus boy! 🪷

kid needs a nap asap

[bird-inacage]

Love Sea Trailer | A Selection of Tongrak's Outfits

Peat, you are looking so goddamn fine. The styling for Tongrak in this series is absolutely stunning.

[its-leethee]

I am so accustomed to seeing the adults in children's media portrayed as antagonistic obstacles for the child protagonists to outwit and overcome. So, I really appreciate how in The Dragon Prince, Callum, Ezran, and Rayla are able to approach and rely upon the adults, strangers even, that they meet during their journey. The specific examples I want to talk about are both from 1x07: the doctor and the mercenary.

When Ezran and Callum meet the doctor, he is genuinely concerned for the boys, even though he can tell that they're not being completely upfront with him. He gives them his hospitality and listens without judgement or reproach while they tell him about the accident with the egg. When he realizes his expertise is inadequate, he keeps his promise not to tell on them, and points them towards hope.

Rayla's meeting with the mercenary is more tense; he is understandably skeptical of her intentions after she chases and corners him in an alley. But when he realizes her sincerity, he heeds her plea for help. His words ("but it'll burn you") and his body language (his hesitation, his worried facial expression) belie his empathy - at least, until he sees that she's an elf, and his prejudice overcomes him.

I also want to give a mention to Villads and Lujanne, who stepped up as mentors/guides for the trio, and offered their assistance, advice, and kindness without expectations of recompense.

In reality, most people are good and want to do right by others(1). The vast majority of the strangers and people you meet are not scheming, nefarious opportunists-in-waiting. If you approach with vulnerability and ask someone for help, they will honestly try to assist you.

I just find it such a refreshing, appropriately wholesome take. Grownups aren't out to get you, kids. As someone who was raised in the "stranger danger" era, I am glad to have tdp's more nuanced and honest version of reality to show and discuss with my own children.

[zuppizup]

So, does Villads know Rayla’s an elf? He’s clearly chill with elves, so I don’t think he’d care, but does he know?

Did he suspect all along and just sort of shrug when it was confirmed?

[aterfish]

So i just binge watched all of the dragon prince and i have one thing to say:

What the fuck

[tomurakii]

God Liam Wilhelmina my beloved. Losing his best and only friend because he dared to try and save the man who stood between him and a crazed paladin. Kneeling in the tiny crawlspace of a rope trick and failing to treat the poison that killed the crown princess, the first person to ever include him in anything. Hiding there with her corpse until the assassins left, stowing her away in a cupboard to try and preserve what little sanctity was left. Her skin cool to the touch like Preston's but offering none of the comfort. A sweet kid who liked seeds becoming a war guy because it was either that or losing his mind and his life along with it.

At every step of the way, failing to protect those who cared for him. Choosing vengeance because it was already too late to choose to save

[saturnniidae]

The dragon prince is soo real for having their human royal family be entirely made up of people of color

[ghostbird-7]

MI brainrot

Ethan comes out of the therapist office looking effortlessly cool. This is not a good sign. He’s got his mission face on, wearing something that could be conceived as a smile if you haven’t seen his proper one, which is crooked and a bit too wide, unleashed when he’s being brutally mocked by a dear friend or has one of his signature puns turned around on him. When mission face is off he’s intense, makes an amount of eye contact that on paper is around average, but feels interrogative when you’re under it. He’s moving smoothly, too. Benji knows for a fact that with his ribs and knee he should be walking in his usual lope, but he’s walking like he’s in a poker game at gun point. Benji takes him home. In the kitchen, after small talk and tea, Ethan’s still got his game face on but he’s icing his leg and Benji’s given him a pamphlet so they don’t have to look at each other. Ethan tells him after 10 minutes, on the dot. “I’ve been jittery after missions where I didn’t use to be. The shrink says it’s because I’m not passively suicidal anymore,. Says I probably have been for a while, didn’t know.” He’s talking like he’s conserving money on a telegram. He hasn’t looked up from the pamphlet. Benji makes him another cup of tea, and after the next mission holds him by his uninjured body part (right shoulder seems okay) with enough pressure for him to feel it until he settles a little. Ethan thanks him with a foot rub the next week, long enough later that most people wouldn’t have connected it. Benji loves him, chooses to. It’s always been a choice for him, when he’s not in physical danger he can stack feelings around the corners of the problem till he’s looking straight through it. It’s what made him such a good technician, and it’s one of the things that made him decide to love Ethan at first. He can’t. He’ll buckle down and work through it, but always as a person. Benji will stay while Ethan works out how to feel like a person again.

[ratatatastic]

"So, tell me with the Stanley Cup—that was with the whole team. But, you're gonna get a day with it...What are your plans?" "I have a lot of plans, obviously, we'll see what—one of them will work. I'm gonna try and bring it to Finland, to my hometown. Obviously, show it to my family, to the people who help me to achieve this goal, show it to the kids—young hockey players—all that kind-of stuff. We'll see what happens from there." "I mean, such a history for hockey, and Finland. Matthew Tkachuk jumped into the ocean with the Stanley Cup. Any plans of doing that in the North Sea?" "Maybe. Maybe, in the lake. I know it's not healthy for the Cup to go in saltwater." "That's what I was thinking when I saw that! Like 'Oh, they better clean that up fast!'" "Yeah, but lake should be fine."

nothing geeks me out more than the way sasha enthusiastically nods more when martina mentioned matthew jumping into the atlantic with the tincan like yep yep 🙂‍↕️ thats him 🙂‍↕️ he did do that 🙂‍↕️🙂‍↕️

Wimbledon Championships 2024 | 7.4.24 (x)

[coochie-sniffer3000]