#they didn't disappoint AT ALL

[liminal-roses]

Is it weird to cry? Because I am

[mimimar]

finally completed my comic based on the song ivy by taylor swift!✿ please zoom in to read the text and see the details~

✿.✿.✿

you can get the digital zine pdf here! it includes extras like character profiles, costume design, more art of willow and ivy, zine-exclusive sketches and an illustrated guide to the symbolism of all the flowers in this comic.

you can also get prints of individual pages here!

✿.✿.✿

[batty4steddie]

JOE KEERY Behind the scenes of Finalmente L'alba

[rawliverandgoronspice]

Always a bit puzzled by people saying that anyone who wanted long-term consequences for TotK Zelda's sacrifice are "edgy".

I'm not even particularly in the camp that she should have remained a dragon forever (I think this should have been Ganondorf's fate, it would have been sooo much more impactful than to explode him and move on but anyway). To be honest, I wish the rules for turning back would have been 1) clear 2) active gameplay on the player so that it feels like it's something we have earned, and 3) not make her have amnesia about it and/or at least having her gain some crucial insight because of the experience.

(also: doesn't she crave knowledge? isn't that insanely mean to have her watch over every civilization and every bit of history ever and then take it away from her? kind of dislike how totk privileges the comfort of the player's feelings over what the characters would actually want or need tbh)

To be perfectly honest, I fully expected us needing to turn her back before engaging Ganondorf so we would fight him together, especially since Zelda as a compagnon exists in the game code already (though in a very subdued state). It feels very very strange to me that all of this mechanic of Sages following us existing and yet we never have the very climactic cool Zelda-staple moment of facing Ganondorf or Ganon together (OoT, WW, TP, ST and probably more that I'm forgetting all did this in some way --even BotW had Zelda more involved than in TotK). I'm not sure Mineru was a compagnon that was needed over Zelda honestly, especially given the kind of non-insight she gives us on the zonai (even if the idea of the mecha is cool, it really could have been Zelda using her zonai + sheikah knowledge to pilot one for us or something).

But anyway: yeah, even if this isn't what I would have wanted personally, I think wanting Zelda to remain a dragon is kind of arguably more respectful of her relationship to Link, in a way, that what the game ended up doing. When she enacted this sacrifice, Zelda decided to trust him to such a extent that she lost herself, reciprocated his trust in her and his devotion to her, and now the future of Hyrule exists beyond her and beyond what Hyrule once was, but she trusts them to follow through and be happy and she will watch over them from the stars moving on. It's fine if we manage to save her from that fate, but even if we don't, honestly this sounds like a beautiful story/tragic romance to me, if you want to read it that way. Tragedy doesn't necesserily involve edginess. Fictional pain isn't always mean, or out to get you.

[atdawn]

MERLIN | 4.05 His Father’s Son

[alexandriaellisart]

team meeting

[scintillatingshortgirl19]

the fact that they gave house this line at the tail end of the s6 domestic hilson era is. hmm. something

[chaoticallyfluffy]

Ok consider:

A new hero emerges and the Justice League watches him for a while who make sure he’s not a threat. They see this giant clumsy man who moves like he’s not used to his body, smiles goofily every time he saves someone, and is clearly inexperienced with his powers and they’re all just like. Ah. This is a child.

Except they don’t think he’s a ten year old or however old Billy is at the time, no no. Clearly this hero came into existence shortly before his first appearance, just a few months ago. They don’t know how or why but It’s not the weirdest thing they’ve seen so it’s pretty easy to believe.

But they can’t just leave this toddler with the powers of a god to stumble around and potentially hurt someone by accident, nor go down the wrong path and become a villain. So of course they decide to ‘subtly’ guide him without alerting him to the fact they’re onto him.

They introduce themselves but instead of inviting him to the league they pop by every once in a while to ‘subtly’ teach him about responsibility and power, but also about love and humanity. They try to teach him to enjoy life and that he doesn’t have to act like an adult around them, instead encouraging him to enjoy his childhood even if it’s not an ordinary one.

(Too bad the Justice League suck at subtlety.)

Billy is certain they somehow found out he’s a kid before they even met him, probably because of Batman’s freaky know-it-all powers, but he isn’t very worried as they seem nice and don’t treat him like he’s dumb or fragile. They respect him as a hero despite his age so he lets himself act like a kid around them after a while.

When he gets comfortable enough to detransform Billy thinks that’s his identity reveal. The league thinks that he magicked himself a body that’s more of a representation of his true self and fits his developmental age better, possibly as a way to blend in with humans and experience what it’s like to be a normal child. Good for him!

Basically Billy gets a bunch of super powered parents and the Justice League get a newborn man that they think they’re raising from scratch lol

[demigods-posts]

I've seen a lot of discourse about Virginia Kull's portrayal of Sally Jackson in the Percy Jackson and the Olympians TV series, and I'd like to say that I loved her. Don't get me wrong. I love Sally from the original book series, and I, too, would fight the God of War on her behalf. But something that I enjoyed about Virginia's portrayal of Sally that we don't get in the books is the character depth. We don't hear much of Sally's backstory in the TV series, apart from a couple of flashbacks with younger Percy and that scene with Poseidon (Toby Stephens). However, those scenes do an excellent job of showing us that alongside being Percy's mother, Sally is also a young woman who fell in love with a man she could not be with and is enduring the natural consequences of having Percy. She struggles to communicate with him when she's frustrated, gets teary-eyed when she lies to him to prolong the inevitable, and actively sacrifices her happiness to ensure his safety. Virginia Kull's portrayal of Sally Jackson reinforces the character's humanity, imperfections, and determination, and it's everything to me.

[imminent-danger-came]

I am seeing some of the WORST takes about tdp season 4. Sweet, sweet tumblr users. This season was a lot of set up, not everything was supposed to be explained or resolved, or even "should" have been. Season 4 had to do the heavy leg work of re-establishing characters and arcs and the plot moving foreword. It just needs a little time to be able to act on everything it's now established. It did a good job building off of arc 1, and now we are fully indoctrinated into arc 2!

[sprout-fics]

Some thoughts about MW3 and then I'm logging off for a few days I think. Honestly the amount of brutality in this game touched a raw nerve considering recent events and I need a reset

The game was rushed. There's no denying that. It is extremely clear which levels were carefully designed and which ones were just recycles of gameplay in warzone.

I found the 'weapons free' levels to be extremely disappointing. What I loved previously about MW2019 and M2022 was the very meticulous paced gameplay that was realistic and believable. Instead we had Soap on his own gallivanting around an armed island fortress with zero stealth and zero planning. Alone stealth mission who? It was clearly just code from warzone and I really really disliked it

The plot was disjointed and hard to keep track of. Makarov is here, now he's there. Here's Yuri for a split second, bye! Plane crash, and for what? There was a distinct lack of cohesiveness that came with the previous two games

Part of this lack of cohesiveness is that we play as everyone except Alex and Ghost. That's a total of 6 or so roles, when the previous campaigns had 3 max (Alex, Farah, Gaz for MW2019, and Gaz/Soap for MW2022) This is particularly disappointing because I felt the limited number of roles was a major advantage over the originals, which also felt disjointed at times with the sudden transitions of POVs

Most of this gameplay was Price, which I heavily disliked. I appreciate Price best in his role as a supervisor, as overwatch guiding the younger sergeants through missions. It suits his character, as opposed to him getting shot at and barking about his need for cover. it erases a lot of his character to find himself in a vulnerable position like that. We should have focused this campaign to Soap, Gaz, Farah, and maybe Laswell

A lot of the missions could have been shortened to cutscenes, which would have made them more comprehensive and would have allowed for better flow of the storyline. Instead we have Farah and Price...wirelessly hacking things? if we're going for realism that's just not it.

The game relies too heavily on Warzone cutscenes, which I felt the other two games did less of, which was a good strength as it attracted a different and more diverse audience

I hated the Graves Shepherd subplot. I'm glad Shepherd got his comeuppance, but other than that I hate that Farah just 'Oh he attacked my allies? Oh well.' Because frankly I feel like it goes against her character. Feel free to disagree with me on that, but I really just didn't like that aspect of the game

The amount of civilian brutality was really hard to stomach. I understand its just poor timing on the game's part due to recent events, but even the airplane level and comments made by Makarov's men just...had me walk away from the playthrough for a bit because it disgusted me so much. I get that such scenes were needed to drive home Makarov's villainy, and maybe it's just current events, but it really did feel like overkill

We barely got to see the team, I feel like. One thing I loved about the previous two games were the small asides of banter and interaction we got. We got absolutely none of that in this game, and it speaks to the rushed quality and really subpar production. The banter and interaction in the 'Alone' mission in MW2 was what made it popular. In this game, Soap and Ghost barely say five words to each other. I really miss the team dynamics we saw

No Roach. Enough said.

Finally- Soap's death. This may be an unpopular opinion. It was completely meaningless. Makarov got away. He didn't get any last words. Even in the originals Soap was able to say something to Price. It was pure shock value, plain and simple. It added nothing to the plot that hadn't already been done, and I fully believe the devs shot themselves in the fucking face by taking away arguably the most beloved character in the fandom. That was the final straw for me.

I was considering maybe purchasing the games, but at this point I'm not even going to rewatch this campaign, let alone play it. In fact, I won't be watching future games either. I'm fully done. I'll be writing according to the MW2019 and MW2022 timelines, but this game does not exist to me. I'm disappointed and upset by the quality of this compared to the previous two games, and the way they tried to make up for it with pure shock value.

That is all. Goodnight.

[flimsy-spine]

anon requested ⇢ Maddie & Buck in Fight or Flight, 2.13

[enchanted-day-dreams]

I find it ironic that people love to talk about Billy Hargrove having internalized homophobia despite the fact that homophobic Billy is only a fanon trait, meanwhile Steve Harrington used queer as an insult against Jonathan Byers and yet folks wanna act like he's the most ally to ever ally (or even pretend he was never homophobic to begin with) just because he wasn't still a dick to Robin when she came out to him.

Y'all can have whatever headcanons you want, but the canon truth is that between Billy and Steve, only one of them got a homophobic insult slung at them but never slung it back, and it wasn't Steve.

[khaopybara]

Boston's a Bitch and he owns that Shit! Pt. 1

There's a reason why Neo worked out his ass off to play Boston and it's because he would have just as many "outfit" changes as Ray if I put every time he was shirtless in a scene.

NEO TRAI as BOSTON ( ONLY FRIENDS EP. 1-6 )

[melisusthewee]

"The Andes are huge. They'd have to organize the search in some way - like in zones. They were here yesterday. We saw them fly overhead. Today we heard them but didn't see them. I bet they're searching a different area." "That means they didn't see us." - La Sociedad de la Nieve/Society of the Snow (2023)

[general-cyno]

wano has become a favorite arc of mine for different reasons and it also gave me a lot of zolu brainworms to mull over, so here I go (again). spoilers for some of the big reveals in the arc so beware

despite getting separated shortly after reuniting, yasuie's execution once again highlighted how similarly minded zoro and luffy are - like zoro, luffy gets pissed at the sight of ppl laughing at yasuie after he's killed, though they both learn it's due to the effects of the smile fruits. and despite the fact that doing so could put their plan in jeopardy (hence why sanji yells at zoro to cool his head), luffy actively cheers zoro on (from the distance) when he goes after orochi in retaliation

a nice tiny moment is also back when they're together. luffy was worried since big mom appeared in wano yet jimbei (who had stayed in whole cake island to fend her off along his former crew so the straw hats could escape) hadn't arrived. albeit zoro wasn't even part of the WCI arc events, he's quick to reassure luffy:

although I'm not certain whether law was referring to them specifically or not, there's a part during the discussion of the raid where he says there's two idiots who, no matter how much planning goes into it, are likely to charge straight in regardless. then, of course, this happens:

(so yeah. I think they're probably the idiots)

and funnily enough, zoro doesn't get lost for once. not only does he find luffy, any intention zoro had of (ironically, considering he was causing a ruckus himself) chastising luffy for messing up the infiltration goes out the window when he tells zoro about the spilled oshiruko

this is a direct callback to their interactions with tama when they first reunited in wano. it's cute how attached they got to her and yeah, they're both stupidly reckless at times but this is one occasion in which it isn't just for the sake of chaotic shenanigans - it's them getting angry at how these ppl are disrespecting what tama and the oshiruko stand for. to those present, it seems foolish/weird since they don't understand the context behind it, but it's the kind of understanding that goes on between luffy and zoro precisely bc of the moments they share together.

there's some good panels of both worrying about each other after getting hurt and zoro carrying an injured luffy to safety. they're soooo.

this was pretty good too:

their plan to jump to the roof to face kaido ultimately fails here but it's still cute that zoro's so willing now to just cling to and let luffy carry him around like this (arlong park zoro has come a long way lol). it also says a lot abt luffy's trust in both the crew and zoro that he was fine letting them in charge below while he and zoro went to face kaido together.

the x drake ordeal was kind of funny but it served to show exactly why zoro complements luffy so well. luffy tends to be very trusting toward others, even those who might've started out as enemies which usually works out fine but still. zoro's quick to remind luffy that the guy's a traitor and unreliable, and (along with some of the other straw hats) refuses to blindly accept the impromptu alliance. it's interesting though, that zoro doesn't entirely disregard luffy's opinion nor x drake's help per se - he's just understandably wary of drake's true intentions (pointing out that he's still hiding where he stands in the whole conflict) and eventually agrees to team up. love the balance of it ngl.

that said, the actual fight on the roof has to be one of my favorite parts! it's probably one of the most obvious occasions in which zoro's role as luffy's first mate/right hand man and how much luffy relies on him too shines through. there's zoro slashing big mom and kaido's fire attacks so they wouldn't hurt luffy, taking the lead in attempting to stave off kaido and big mom's joint attack (and succeeding for a bit) despite the fact that he's got three powerful captains beside him, and several panels of him protecting luffy. this one was particularly crazy

this is pretty much zoro's equivalent to "if you wanna kill him you'll have to kill ME first". insane. I love them so much. zoro may be the one to have more instances in which he gets to demonstrate his loyalty and protectiveness towards luffy rather than the opposite - but knowing luffy's the one who usually risks himself for others in grandiose ways, I find it very compelling that zoro gets to be the one to protect him in these important moments, that luffy trusts him to do it and even thanks him for it here in this arc. to me, there's a reason why, out of the whole crew, zoro was the only one to take part in this particular confrontation. mutual trust/understanding/respect etc are at the core of their relationship. it's a two way thing.

fast forward to zoro vs king and OF COURSE this mf thought of luffy when facing the guy.

I posted about this the other day, but something similar happened during zoro's duel against mihawk. when the latter asks what drives zoro to fight despite being so weak, it's this exact part of his meeting with luffy at the marine base that he recalls. zoro has certainly driven himself to get stronger for the crew's sake and for his dream, but it's clear that luffy (and his own promise to kuina) is one of zoro's biggest motivators. he's also the one person zoro has cast aside that very dream of his for so... (thriller bark zoro you live in my heart always).

when zoro wins against king, too, it's his promise to never lose that he recalls. the promise he made to luffy. regardless of how you interpret their relationship, it's obvious luffy means a lot to zoro and moments like these don't let the readers forget it.

that said, this was perhaps the most insane part to me:

just when you think zolu can't get more trope-y than it already is, the manga says: wait a fucking second. canon sun/moon, heaven/hell, god/demon zolu.

I was already spoiled about these bits, though they were exciting to read through anyway. I think it's very curious that both zoro's ancestry and his conqueror's haki reveal happened during the arc where the true nature of luffy's devil fruit comes to light and his awakening into joyboy/nika takes place. can't say for sure what oda's planning for them in the future, but wano is probably the biggest glimpse so far as to the kind of figures luffy and zoro are bound to become (or are already becoming) in one piece's universe.

joyboy luffy being considered a hero to wano only rivaled by shimotsuki ryuma is also so... oof, knowing that ryuma (also called god of the blade) is zoro's ancestor, whose zombie he faced back in thriller bark and whose sword shusui he wielded for a while after that, and that he resembles physically too (both being one-eyed samurai/swordsmen). there's a lot more parallels to be drawn between them, and zoro's conqueror's haki adds a whole new layer to their relationship, but a detail that's fascinating to me is that both zoro's presence and joyboy's awakening in wano are hailed as the work of fate at different points, by kawamatsu and zunesha respectively.

overall there seems to be a thread of "fate" that's tying the story together from the void century to roger's era to the present but choice is also an important aspect imo. zoro and luffy are an example, bc in spite of how their stories have turned out to be somewhat intertwined... it was luffy's choice to seek out the demon pirate hunter and rope him into his crew. it was zoro's choice to join him, to make a promise that'd tie his own dream to luffy's. there's a potential that neither of them could've reached if they hadn't come together to sail in that dinghy and formed an entire crew (a family!) that have all of them journeying towards their dreams, always relying on and striving to become better for one another. all of these little choices for luffy and zoro led them up to this point and onwards, which tbh is just really fucking good.