#this fixation is becoming detrimental to me because i have things i need to do but i'm just drawing their gay asses!

[koddlet]

you're the one holding the knife (cover for my shauna playlist)

[sunset-bridge]

gorbo thoughts part .. 3?

goro thoughts update. id like to ramble again

ok i think he might not have ocd actually! i mean he could but like...i dont think theres too many signs. so yes id like to. recall that. i think that was just me projecting LMAO.. its ok! i love learning more about my favorite guy. you know what he does have

i stand by the ocpd. (obsessive compulsive personality disorder, its a completely different thing from OCD. its a personality disorder) also Definetely ctpsd (complex ptsd)...... ! i was talking with someone and they brought it up and i was like. WOAG.. after reading about it

disclaimer: i only talk about these because i have them LOL.. im sure gorbo has a cute soup of Other problems but like. i cant really talk about those well... i find these two really interesting though.

see. ocpd, is like the perfectionist control freak disorder. its what people Think ocd is lol. BUT as a personality disorder, its so much more than that. people with ocpd also:

-you tend to have a black and white moral code

-your way is the only right way.

-you like to do things alone because no one else could do them right; this may cause relationship problems and you may come across as a fucking cunt ( i know this..)

difficulty compromising and accepting any critisicim of your actions or opinions.

excessive devotion to work and productivity

sosososo afraid of failure even if its kinda small. you feel it will ruin your image forever and ever. if i make a mistake put me to death please.

Frequently become overly fixated on a single idea, task or belief. even to detriment of . everything else in your life...

yeah...

me and some friends definetely see some of these in goro! ofc im so happy to hear what you guys think, i dont mind changing my views at all (like with the ocd thing i changed opinion about!)

like.. hes super fixated on his revenge plan, its the Only thing he cares about and everything is fair game if it allows him to advance that. leave him alone, its no one elses problem. he knows what hes doing. he has to be right about his values and beliefs. he has to. or else whats the point. dont tell him hes wrong. what do you mean? you dont know anything about him. he cant fail, he cant make mistakes, he has to work hard so everyone sees him exactly as he wants to and as someone valuable.

and. cptsd. as the name suggests its. a form of ptsd but..it has the Special Added features of:

-sometimes cant control emotions well

-you feel angry distrustful and resentful at the world in general

you feel worthless, empty or forever damaged by an event. like if you were stained with dirt forever.

you feel isolated. like no one could ever even understand what you went through (not in like an. edgy kid way. like fr. you feel even if you explained to people. they wouldnt understand you and your feelings. or theyd judge you and further hurt you...)

avoiding friendships and relationships, or finding them very difficult (!!)

escapism or depersonalisation...dissociative behaviors .

yeah.. ! yeah. i think these ring quite some bells huh..! its really shitty! you feel like no one would get it, like no one would like you, like you are ruined forever and theres not much to do about it.

makes sense that goro would absorb himself in his plan. after all. he felt he was some sort of curse upon his mom; as if he was the one responsible for ruining her life.. but hed like to "redeem" himself with the revenge plan. he has to, even if its difficult to go on. i wonder if he planned to do anything if he achieved his plan? i dont think so. its a bit sad but.. he didnt really seem to plan doing. or living much more after. its like his whole life he convinced himself his only use would be as the vehicle to enact a revenge years in the making, and thats it.

as if he wasnt a person. just a tool to revenge. i think this is why its so difficult, frustrating and downright distressing to him to accept he too, has feelings and wants and needs like any Normal Person on planet earth. no way. those just interfere with the plan. and he has no right anyways.

i thought how id feel, in his shoes and with all my cute soup of wrong stuff, if some guy showed up, hes the guy i gotta kill. ok. then hes nice with me, as if mocking me. hes better at me in most things. he has friends and family and everyone likes him and he barely moves a finger. while i had to work so damn hard to even get acknowledged?? what does he have that i do not. hes nothing special. so why? then this guy acts like a fool even when hes so extraordinary in every aspect... does he think its funny? for someone so special to pretend to be ordinary. when id kill to be just half as special as him. honestly.. id become super frustrated with this bastard too. his presence would infuriate me. and the most frustrating thing, would be that this guy seems to be the only guy that seems to like hanging out with me. what the hell. guess he enjoys trying to humor me..

man...

[atqh16]

Gonna preface this by saying I’m not autistic so if I’m wrong please feel free to correct me. With that said

I think there’s some legitimacy in the idea that Sai is possibly on the autism spectrum. He tends to take things very literally. Has trouble with interpreting human emotions to a point where he needs to actually study it. He also finds it difficult to emote himself. He can be very blunt with his words and comments and doesn’t seem to realize when he’s hurt other peoples feelings unless he’d done it with the aim to do so. But even then he consistently sticks to the same insults and teasings over and over (eg: him making fun of Naruto’s dick)

His jutsu style is very unique to his own compared to other Shinobis except for the ones born with a specific kekkei genkai. It could be interpreted as a fixation or special interest of his hence why he can implement it as part of his jutsu style so well

Of course you can say this was all caused by his time with root but compare him to someone like Yamato, who’d also been in root for far longer than sai, but doesn’t have issues with reading social cues or communicating himself the way Sai does.

I also like the idea because it adds some layers and complexities to his character. Especially since none of these things stop him from improving as a person and learning new things. Being who he is isn’t a detriment. It’s just a part of who he is. It doesn’t stop him from learning to become a good friend. To move away from the brainwashing he’d been subjected to under Danzo so he could develop his own identity and beliefs.

What I like about his friendship with Naruto is that Naruto never avoids him (except for their initial meeting which is fair since he saw Sai as trying to take Sasuke’s place). Naruto doesn’t shy away from him. When Sai admits to not understanding Narutos goals, he doesn’t brush the guy off. He takes time to explain. Like always, he allows himself to be vulnerable in a way Sai was taught not to be. In later chapters he’s also shown to trust Sai completely and is able to communicate with him in a fight without words (eg: in their fight against Karui and Omo). Naruto (similar to how he makes friends in general) does not shut Sai out and that’s significant. There’s a reason why Sai is protective and devoted to Naruto’s ideals the same way Gaara or Shikamaru is.

Which is why I hate it when I read fics where he’s depicted as just an apathetic, creep. Sai deserves so much better.

[peppertaemint]

I have a big Ask about becoming drained by the kpop life (Anon added a lol, btw). I thought I would put excerpts here and respond. The Anon is aiming this at all fandoms.

there seems to be this constant wave of complaints, entitlement and overreacting to every damn thing. Either it's a conspiracy and the company their fave group works at is trying to sabotage their faves or complaining that the company is over working their faves not taking into consideration what that artist is capable of being able to handle or discussions they may have had with their agency, overreacting that their fave isn't being treated equally, counting how many lines their fave gets, how much camera time, if their fave is sick or hurts their ankle, back, finger, leg, hand, arm, it's catastrophic and they act like it's RIP city and people are crying and talking about how scared they are, if two members get along and like to spend a lot of time together then that automatically means they're crushing on each other or in s secret relationship.

And:

The misogynists, the homophobics, the akgaes, the sexists, the ageists, the constant mobbing at the airports, the having fits about their faves dating or getting married and still plotting shit against those who dare live their lives just like everybody else on the planet deserves to do. All of it, I just don't want to see it. And as much as I have muted and unfollowed and blocked, the shit still gets through. I want to stay up to date on what my favorites are doing but I don't want to see the stupid shit. Those of you who have managed to not be exposed, mad props, but it hasn't worked for me. I need some advice because I am worn out by fans, not the kpop groups themselves

First, I don't believe the people who I see commenting and Ask-ing etc who say "wow I don't get how you see all this stuff wow I never see it." These people are either liars who want to make you feel crazy (gaslighters, lol) or they're only going on Tumblr and just got here so they haven't seen it yet. YET.

All fandom experiences have pieces of what you describe Anon, but it's Kpop fandoms that are the most extreme. And this is because it's driven by teens and mostly young girls. As much as people want to be the exception to the rule, the majority of people in these fandoms are still kids (up to 25 yrs old). Beyond kids, you have a lot of people of different ages with unhealthy fixations. I mean, how many "army" have you met who say their only happiness is BTS? I don't at all judge those people, but we have to be honest in saying that's not in the realm of healthy mindsets. When you put your happiness in people you don't know, that's a huge gamble.

A lot of people are fixated with online fandom community because they're filling in a void in their life; it can be a hobby (probably reasonably healthy) or it can be the person's reason to keep going. That's why you see such extreme reactions. When you're 12, everything is the end of the world. When your entire life is Baekhyun, his sore throat is gonna be the height of anxiety to you. Again, I'm not judging this; different strokes for different folks.

So what advice can I give you? Perhaps just to understand why it's happening and take breaks from it when it's not adding to your life. I mute people a lot. Basically, I put them in time-out. Even on DM too (oops secret's out!). If someone is crying about something I find infantalizing and a detriment to my life, I close it off and move on; I come back when/if I have time for that. I tend to unmute people when I can't remember what they did that was annoying. It works well. I can always re-mute. And this saves the block drama.

The easiest fix tho? Close Twitter, Tumblr, IG, etc and do something different. Watch a movie. Go out with friends. Or, watch a concert to remind you why you're really here. My "fangirling" is mostly in private, where I get to watch Taemin and SHINee concerts whenever I feel like it, by myself or with family and friends, and the only person whose opinion matters in mine.

Recently I watched SHINee World IV with my mom. She adored Jonghyun. Just gotta say that. ;)

[tiodolma]

Do you think it'd be hilarious if season 3 Merlin and Morgana are cursed (you can imagine whatever)? And both are rude to the caster because they'll like to be back to normal like yesterday, so the caster lies and tells them they have to sleep together to break the curse? 🤣😂

That’s all I want. Trap those two powerful virgins in a situationship they can’t escape (and also resolve that S3 UST) lmaooo.

Also wasn’t S3 the season where they touched each other the most 😂😂

How abt this... like u know how kingdoms always arrange political marriages and stuff right to become stronger allies, right? What if the caster is also a magical radical who want the magic world "to be great again”? Smh somehow they have an idea of both mergana’s respective prophecies and also somehow they know each’s true identity. The caster’s agenda is to get those two bonded by whatever means necessary coz what better way to unite the magicfolk other than the two most powerful entities working together???

So they find a way to infilitrate castle camelot in s3. They befriend merlin (coz merlin is just that kinda guy) and also morgana (coz shes alone and needs allies). Then caster somehow actually really binds them together without both of them knowing 🤣. Basically the effect of the spell makes them drawn towards each other. S3 is a hella complicated time for both of them so their feelings are like amplified and their needs to get their hands on each other become more intense. Caster always scries on them from their water bowl and is like "yesss.... yesssss, just according to plan muahahahah soon the magic world will be great again!”

After a while Merlin suspects that love magic has been administered to him and he deduces it was done by morgana (see he’s obsessed with her and cant really be bothered to suspect anyone else lolol). So he asks Gaius for a solution. Gaius would be all scientific method about it. Kilgharrah gives even worse advice... the usual "that’s easy, just kill her and finish the job” which makes merlin roll his eyes.

Morgana and Morgause share a braincell so they dont consider Morgana’s increased fixation on Merlin as a detriment but a bonus. Her increased hyperawareness of Merlin makes her for a better spy. Morgause also wants her sister to start seductress training since yesterday and what better victim to practice on other than merlin?

Anyway caster is getting bored with their still UST so they send a mysterious message to Melrin that basically says "you have been cursed. you gotta have sex with the lady Morgana in order to fulfill your destiny.” Merlin interprets that as the solution to break the curse (and finally defeat the evil that is morgana lmao).

Merlin, honest powerful idiot that he is (and also hella embarrassed and dont wanna consult his bosses abt intimate matters) actually corners Morgana somewhere and is like "listen you and I have been cursed and the solution is to have sex with each other” and morgana is like "awe i didnt know u had the hots for me.” They’re gonna banter and be all sexy abt it because Morgana wont believe a word Merlin says and Merlin is serious and paranoid af and the spell just keeps getting stronger the nearer they are to each other lololol. (sparks fly, they cant stop touching each other, they smell really good wth?, isnt merlin's cheekbones prettier than usual?, morgana's so soff to touch dear lord... yknow things they already know and think abt each other but more.)

When everything gets too much (and morgana finally believes merlin’s statement that theyre cursed) they get one secret night together in the Isle of the Blessed asjjsgshsjskl (feelings, atrraction, desires of youth spring to life, morgs find out abt his magic coz the sex was magnificent/spiritual and hella magical) and when the deed is done the caster’s spell is complete and they’re basically married 😂

CASTER: FROM THIS POINT FORTH LORD EMRYS AND THE LADY MORGANA ARE JOINED TOGETHER AS ONE. MAGIC WILL BE GREAT AGAIN. THE BALANCE OF THE WORLD IS RESTORED.

Merlin and Morgana are like, "whut" (but tbf they seem to be more stronger together)

It all comes down to "we just both wanted the same thing gdi.”

Morgause still sees this as bonus bec ofc she does lmao

Cue kilgharrah sensing a disturbance in the force and be like "OH SHT. MY PLANS”

[selkiewife]

When Your Home Means Death

Show Theon Week || Prompt: Home

Home is such a loaded word for Theon, being a hostage of House Stark. Theon’s craving for home and belonging is an incredibly important aspect of his character. In Season 8 however, the narrative seems to equate his home with death. 

When Bran tells Theon he is “home,” it is before he gives his life to protect that home. When Sansa places the Stark pin on his destroyed Greyjoy armor, it is only after he has died. It is almost like he cannot truly be part of the family unless he is dead. He cannot be home unless he dies for it. 

(This gets personal under the cut. There is still meta but it’s mostly a personal post.) 

Theon’s death on the show is one that I have truly grappled with. It felt so incredibly wrong and yet, that very wrongness reflected a lot of my own fears and caused me to attach to him even more profoundly than before. Which... is hard to reconcile honestly.  I even ended up writing a 10,000 word “unfix it” fic where I leaned into the bleakness of his death to try to purge all my thoughts about it. Perhaps what bothered me the most was the idea that the show itself didn’t seem to mean for his death to be bleak. The show seemed to present it as something that was a good ending for Theon. One that “tied up his arc nicely.” And considering what they did with some of the other characters, I suppose I should feel “grateful” that he died the way he did. As Theon himself says in Season 5, “It can always be worse.”

To be honest, I have always been drawn to characters who die. I think it is because I have always had this obsessive fear of death (like the moment of death- not existing anymore.) So as a kid this fear made me become fixated on characters who died in books and media- like Beth in Little Women for example. And it was almost comforting in a way even though I found it really painful to read about. Like I would think “well, they went through this, so I can do it too.” 

Now as an adult, Theon's death taps into that need as well. The way he died- alone and feeling like he failed to protect Bran- feeling like the world was literally going to end because he failed... like that moves me tremendously. Because I'm so afraid of that (like- not that the world will end because I failed lol) but that feeling of dying so alone and desperate and feeling like a failure... This fear has only grown over the years and is very tied to my struggle with mental health. So the fact that Theon went through that- it moves me in the same way that watching him going through abuse moved me and made me feel less alone. Or the idea of him feeling such emotional anguish and guilt and still continuing to go on... that makes me feel less alone too. 

BUT AT THE SAME TIME when I see people saying it was a fitting end or an appropriate end I just.... RECOIL... because I do hate the way the show seemed to frame it. They seemed to framed it as this good thing. Like, “He’s dead but he’s home!” but then they perhaps inadvertently showed us that his home always meant his death. Yet that accidental theme still GETS to me and I'm obsessed with it.... 

And then I also feel sensitive about character deaths in general and the discourse surrounding them. It’s this idea that death is always seen as some sort of moral condemnation. I mean part of it is the fact that it IS framed that way often in media- like a narrative punishment. Either that or a “kindness” to those characters who are considered too emotionally broken, too physically disabled, too insane, too whatever- to the point that death is considered the better alternative. And that is so patronizing, ableist and detrimental really. It reminds me of Jaime and Tyrion’s exchange about Bran: 

"Even if the boy does live, he will be a cripple. Worse than a cripple. A grotesque. Give me a good clean death."

Tyrion replied with a shrug that accentuated the twist of his shoulders. "Speaking for the grotesques," he said, "I beg to differ. Death is so terribly final, while life is full of possibilities."

~A Game of Thrones, Tyrion I

And I hate that these framings of death have carried into our fandom discourse as well. You often see statements like, “My fave will survive until the end of the story and that’s why they are better than your fave.” But there was this truly excellent quote from The Sandman: The trouble with stories is, if you keep them going long enough they all end in death, don't they? And like yes. Yes. Death happens to all of us. It is intrinsically part of the human condition. So it’s kind of wild that something so universal and inescapable as death is often viewed as a character flaw. And most deaths on Game of Thrones actually weren’t framed like that in the beginning. Ned Stark or Catelyn definitely didn’t die because they were “the bad guy” or “too broken” or because they “needed redemption.”

Perhaps accidentally, Theon’s death is incredibly tragic in the way it illuminates the tragedy of his life. Home has always meant death or the threat of death from the beginning of his arc. His original home- the Iron Islands- was out of reach to him, unless he wanted to risk death to escape back there. And his “home” in Winterfell, where he grew up and grew attached, was technically a prison where he could be put to death if his father decided to rebel. In that sense, his ending on the show is a call back to the quote in the books: It was my home, though. Not a true home, but the best I ever knew. But in the show it becomes  “Death is the only home I can expect.” 

I want to just simply hate it. But... it brings up such powerful feelings and thoughts and questions that I can’t. Alas, nothing can ever be simple with Theon Greyjoy. And that is why I love him so much.

[maxwellchi]

Academic Obsession: Advantages and Disadvantages

April 27, 2023 | by: Argel Yuna C. Diaz

Our future is somewhat dependent on our grades. Grades are typically what they'll consider when obtaining a scholarship from a desired school or being accepted into their dream jobs. It goes without saying that they are quite helpful as a way of obtaining a desired goal, therefore getting a higher grade is very beneficial. Some students focus too much on this idea in order to achieve the grades they desire because they perceive that in order to receive high grades, they must do well or extremely well in their academic performance. I am the kind of student who strives to get the best grades possible.

I wasn't a student who often focused on schoolwork, but I want to do everything in my capacity to get a high mark for my beloved mother. Thomas (2011) noted that financial worry, the need for academic recognition, parental attention, and internal pressure were the predictor variables within the research on student grade obsession. When my mother is happy with my grades, I am thrilled, which motivated me to work hard to raise better. Growing up, I also realized how important getting extremely high grades was, so I kept working extra hard to get them. I became so preoccupied with wanting to get outstanding and better results that I was oblivious to my fixation with it.

Obsessing over your studies may have benefits. You can receive good grades, which means you can pursue your chosen dream and spend your time and attention on it. However, these benefits may also be unhealthy. There have been times when I've gotten disappointed if I received a passing mark with a few minor errors because I want everything to be perfect. When I have nothing to do, there are times when I check my marks and feel dissatisfied. I additionally contemplate how poorly I performed in my previous academic endeavors. Being excessively focused on your studies has a lot of disadvantages as well.

It can be harmful to rely solely on students' grades as a measurement of success. I concentrated on this as a value rather than utilizing the advantages of getting good grades as motivation. I developed a strong fixation on my accomplishments and my comparisons to others, which made me feel less confident. If you focused solely on your grades, there are many more difficulties, but it largely harms your emotional and physical health. I became anxious and lost sight of why I was attending school, but thankfully I had my mother to talk to.

It took me some time to quit stressing over my academics; even now, I still struggle with it, but I just have to keep reminding myself that it's detrimental to my health. Stop and take a break if you feel anxious because you're excessively worrying about your grades. Be happy with your accomplishments of obtaining what you can and want. We should always keep in mind that we are more than simply our marks. If you ever feel stressed out over your grades, get in the habit of looking away from them and just unwind. Find an approach to improve it without spending too much time or jeopardizing your well-being rather than dwelling and hating what you've got instead.

An academic obsession develops when a student seeks attention, feels under pressure, or has any other personal motivations. It might be beneficial in certain ways, but it's really bad for one's health. It alters how pupils learn; they now more often memorize material than comprehend it. If you become aware of how critical of yourself is when it comes to your grades, try to communicate and be open with others. It might take some time since it's difficult to discuss this with other people and it's difficult to try to form a new habit, but the most crucial thing to you is the little steps and progress you make constantly.

References:

Thomas, J. (2011). Factors Relating to Student Grade Obsession: A Quantitative Correlational Study. Retrieved April 27, 2023, from https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED534698

[dangerouscommiesubversive]

Hello Commie, I’m wondering what you think about Hibiki (the show)? My friends can’t get through it and we’re curious

Hoo, boy. What do I think about Hibiki. That’s a big question, you got a few minutes?

On a basic level, my answer is, I think Hibiki’s kind of a bad show, and I can’t blame your friends for not being able to get through it.

On a more detailed level, I think it’s a show with some serious problems, a few of which are technical but most of which have to do with the writing and tone.

The technical issues are mainly the insistence in the first 29 episodes of the show on filming the majority of the fight scenes out in the woods in natural light. Personally I thought it made the action kind of hard to follow, and it often flattened out the gorgeous saturated metallic colors on the suits. There’s also the heavy overuse of giant CGI monsters. Like, I dig that they wanted Hibiki to fight a huge crab or whatever, but it looks very bad, just let him fight a guy in a suit.

My issues with the writing are a lot more extensive and serious. I think it’s a show with horrendous pacing issues, for example--on more than one occasion while watching I found myself actively bored. Sometimes it was because I wanted more action, sure, but just as frequently it was because the character arcs were moving at a crawl. Things pick up tempo when the show switches writers at episode 30, but with the sacrifice of the story becoming less coherent. Whatever the fuck is going on with the villains is never made clear by either Tsuyoshi (the first main writer) or Inoue (the second main writer), and I think that hampers a Kamen Rider show in particular kind of a lot, since the main Rider’s relationship to the villains is one of the core concepts in the whole franchise.

Kamen Rider Hibiki is also a show obsessed with masculinity in a way that I frankly found alienating and off-putting. It’s all about Men, and Boys Becoming Men, and Relationships Between Men. Like, Asumu’s immediate fixation on Hibiki, especially in the early show, is I feel often contrasted with his relationship with his mother, to his mother’s detriment--she’s super cool and working her ass off at a thankless job, but it’s still totally reasonable for Asumu to obsess over this man he’s just met because A Boy Needs A Father Male Role Models. Ibuki has a fatherly, or at least big-brotherly, relationship to Akira, Todoroki idolizes Zanki--it’s all about these Very Masculine Men as role models.

(Yes, Kamen Rider as a whole franchise is obsessed with men to the detriment of everyone else. But it’s not always obsessed with Manliness.)

(I have never forgiven the show for its treatment of Asumu’s mother. Whenever I start feeling kindly towards it, I just get a flash of her sitting sadly at a dinner table full of her son’s favorite foods while he runs off and gets lost in the woods looking for a man he just met.)

Anyway, switching to Inoue as head writer doesn’t fix this, it just makes the show a little bouncier.

I--look, I could go on, but this answer is already really long. Hibiki is not a well-written show and I do not like it. It is filled with wonderful characters, though--pretty much every individual character in the show is someone I love and cherish. (Yes, this includes Kyosuke, he’s precious to me.) The suits are also very very good, and the music theming is super cool.

However. Regardless of my feelings about the show, Kamen Rider Hibiki and the Seven War Oni is an incredibly good movie and you really don’t have to watch the show to enjoy it. Please watch the movie. It’s excellent. And it includes Kabuki, the best movie-exclusive Rider ever created.

[mc-critical]

I love to boring you but what do you think of Murad IV in MC:Kosem ? I really like him but he seriously need of a therapy with a psy *a great one !* and i don't think he treated Ayse (or Farya !) correctly ! He is trash (more trash than any others characters i think) but i also like her complexity. How do you find him ? Do you think he deserve more recognization like Selim or not at all ?

I don't like him one bit as a person. He's problematic, hypocritical and abusive and his actions go beyond every sort of justification, no matter how much he tries to justify them himself. However, he is interesting and complex as a character and you can still see where he comes from and how do his beliefs unfold. He clearly has a detailed arc; and that arc causes him to be way more paranoid, way more selfish, way more overindulgent, which was to his detriment.

Let's face it: the show portrayed him as a very bad ruler (I spoke about why here) and from what I've read, historically, he isn't any better, either. I don't know what does he deserve to be recognized for, aside from the conquering of Baghdad, which did nothing to absolve his crimes in the show, aside from how well-written he is. Any possible redeeming quality of his is destroyed by all his problematic actions piling in and all we've left is a nuanced exploration of his problematic traits. With MC Selim we have a much more understandable circumstance, the child neglect which explained his drinking and lay low tendencies and why it looked like he didn't care for what the other brothers did. Thing is, Selim arguably wasn't all that problematic at first (the provocations between him and Bayezid were more mutual than anything else) and what really pushed him to "villainy" was the death of Mustafa and Cihangir, the complete destruction of the concept of brotherly love in his head. His redeeming qualities were as balanced as his "villainy" and you see within how human he is and how everyone around him who wasn't Nurbanu did somewhat screw him over from the start. The nuance is on his entire persona, not on his problematic deeds. I do believe that MC Selim's writing should be way more respected, because of all the nuance. I don't think he's fit for a padişah in the show, but he isn't some cardboard cutout who only drinks and schemes. He has actual issues, desires, sensitivity, vulnerability and compassion. Murat is a different kind of a character. He's both a bad ruler and a horrible person, he doesn't really have a transitional point to begin his problematic deeds, since he's like this in the beggining. He has his reasons in his backstory, but they recontextualize his paranoia, not what comes out of this paranoia. His transitional point was more him getting even surer of his beliefs than beggining a path of ruthlessness. Worse, it strips him from any possible scruple he had deep inside and what we would see from this point on is his further moral descent and nothing else. He has two areas of justification: a fragment of his past and the "Shadow of God" mentality that only ring more shallow the further we go. (it's fascinating writing-wise, but that's about it.) With Selim at least we have his motives becoming stronger the more we go and watch him succeed. They're different thematic explorations altogether and one of them isn't much on the sympathetic or deserving of recognition spectrum by design.

What I like the most about Murat's writing is that no matter how strong and dangerous it is, his paranoia comes from a real place. While with Süleiman we only had hints of said paranoia in a few flashbacks, with Murat we had an actually devastating, shown on-screen event that had the harder job of making such sudden by the show change more believable. Murat, for whatever he is, is shown a tiny bit of understanding by the script when there actually are people actively working behind his back. Süleiman assumes he's been betrayed, but since the events that open his paranoia are mostly events molded or completely taken out of context and no one actively works behind his back until much after said paranoia was allowed to occur (even Mustafa's organization worked primarily against Hürrem, not SS, one attempt to kill SS aside, which the object of his paranoia saved him from!!!!) - we, as audience, have no reason to buy it whatsoever, which brought the understanding for SS soo down for me. But Murat's paranoia made him go way out of proportion to the point he went even further than SS by willing to end the whole state so he could be there and rule. And just like SS, his paranoia quickly became all selfish in nature to the point of alienating everyone around him who wants to give him decent advice and thinking himself as right all the time. He wanted to be a lone wolf, driven by toxic masculinity from the start. And him feeling overshadowed by Kösem... no matter how understandable it has the chance to be because of the time period, made him blind and instead of gaining experience in order to rule unscathed and firm, he decided to fixate himself on the past and on his role and possible deep-seated resentment of his mother, he made all the wrong decisions in every aspect of his life.

His anger issues are especially illuminating, since he tends to lash out on the slightest thing gone wrong, to the point of exercising physical violence. His anger probably stemmed from how he could only watch during Osman's death and the subconscious blaming of Kösem because of it, along with Musa's death and them not giving him time to shine, something he thought belonged to him and was his right, but by ruminating on all this, he, once again, focuses on his own feelings and own world, he, once again, reaches devastating extremes. Anyone who ever tries to defy him suffers from this. Anyone who tries to defy him is evaluated by how much he's fitting for his mold, for his world, something far beyond a wish for loyalty.

He didn't love any of his women, IMO. His physical violence and abuse was highlighted by his dynamics with them the most and he always decided on the harshest punishments when it came to them. One might argue that his relationship with Farya played its part in somewhat humanizing Murat and disguising this overally questionable at its impossibly best love story for ratings and stuff, but the more we went, the more abusive it got and Farya could never get over his unpredictable and turbulent nature that strived to strictly control every single thing that was close to him to toxic levels. I won't even begin with how he treated Ayşe, because that was such a trainwreck and she deserved much better than to constantly fear for her life, because this guy could go immediately crazy and kill her and her kids. With Sanavber it was only slight infatuation and that's all for me, because in that point, I doubt this guy was capable of love. One Murat went and there came the other before Sanavber arrived and Murat was on the path to become his cruelest self.

All in all, I don't mind anyone going out there and trying to explore him ( in fact, I would actually love such discussions!), but he's hot trash, he should die in fire along with Süleiman and I'm struggling everyday to declare which one is worse in my book, because they suck the same for me, but in different ways. I appreciate their narrative roles, but otherwise... screw them both.

[cardentist]

I’m relatively new to the marble hornets fandom, but one thing I’ve noticed is that people don’t seem to realize just How affected jay was (by the operator and by the investigation in general) and how early on it started. which I really think is relevant when people point out some of jay’s apparent Poor Decision Making. this is Definitely because of how deemphasized it is in the show itself (Especially season 1) but you really can get a feel for it when you go digging.

I’ve talked before about how it’s Very Likely that jay already had some form of ptsd by the start of the series (Link) but what gives us the clearest picture of jay’s health is actually his twitter account. (Link)  If you’ve never taken the time to read it before then I Highly suggest scrolling down to the bottom and working your way through, it’s a surprisingly fast read! but for the purposes of this post I made a Highlight Reel of really anything I saw that was relevant to either jay’s mental health, his physical health, or his obsession with the case that you can see in full here: (Link)

I’ll be using the most Pressing screenshots from that post to make my point here, but you really do get the full Effect scrolling through.

putting a readmore down to hopefully not spam people with screenshots ljksfad Warning for spoilers, talk of chronic illness, eating issues, difficulty with unreality, and other various mental and physical health issues

just as a note: this is going to have a Lot of focus on season 1 because this is where a lot of jay’s issues are established. I definitely have a Lot to say about the other two seasons but I won’t report on every instance where he’s paranoid or sick, I’ll be focusing more on the extremes!

looking through the whole series, videos tweets and all, it becomes Very apparent that jay has a Consistent pattern of behavior where he fixates on the investigation (and the people affected by it) to the detriment of his own health and safety. from the more mundane (digging through hundreds of hours worth of footage to exhaustion) to the more Extreme (following alex into the abandoned building Knowing he’s dangerous and that he’s probably going to hurt him because he Might find some answers).

(which on that note, while it’s definitely due in no small part to the influence of the operator and the extreme stress of the situation, you could pretty easily interpret jay with adhd, hyperfixating on research and video making.)

while I knew I’d find that going in, but I wasn’t expecting it to be hammered in so Quickly. this was posted the Second Day after his twitter had gone up

this continues, with jay occasionally mentioning how tired he is from compiling entries, feeling disorganized, and not being able to sleep in between him actively posting about sifting through tapes on a near daily basis. Then in july he starts actively getting Sick

104 fever, not well enough to work for Three Days. and there’s no telling how long it’d been building up without him noticing until then. he mentions being sick throughout august for long stretches of time (at least a solid week once), and it only gets worse from there

And something of note here, while he Does mention when he’s feeling particularly awful sometimes, for the most part he mentions his health when it affects his ability to go through and post about the tapes. there’s no telling just how frequently he was sick or exhausted when it Wasn’t worth mentioning. He only mentioned the results of the doctor’s visit a week later after he was specifically asked about it

and it’s Very apparent that whatever’s going on is Pretty Severe 

it’s after this point that he largely stops giving us specific updates on how sick he feels, but it’s also still very clear that he is sick. he mentions how out of it he is or how Bad a week’s been after he goes long stretches without updates. and he’s still going to the doctors in November

that leaves me with the impression that things haven’t improved, he’s just stopped mentioning it. he tried getting help for it with no luck, the sickness didn’t stop so there wasn’t much more he could do about it besides adapt. while I’m certain that his health would fluctuate over the course of the show, I don’t believe he stopped getting sick. tim’s sickness never really went away, and jay was bad enough by the end of the series that he was having seizures like he was (there’s really no telling if that was his first or if it was just the first time it’d been Caught).

so from here on out it’s a safe guess that everything jay does is with backdrop of sickness and exhaustion.

then, of course, this is where jay starts being more open about his paranoia (which has certainly been an undercurrent for a while now)

also of note: this isn’t the first time he’s mentioned having a difficult time trying to keep things straight in his head and it won’t be the last. he was already starting to doubt his memories and his senses back in 2009.

moreover, paranoia and fear (and possibly fixation) about the situation has him holling up in his house, to the point that he’s running out of food. how long has this been an issue? and if it’s an issue in 2009, then just how bad is it going to be when he’s running himself in and out of hotels too afraid to stay in one location? how often has he been forgetting to eat while burying himself in tapes and fear?

whether it’s from the operator, his slipping memory, the results of fixating on his work for as long as he has, his frequent sickness, the paranoia, or any combination therein, we can add brain fog to the list

and again, a case for jay’s fixation on finding answer. he wakes up in his house with no memory of how he got there, confused and in pain, digs through the footage on his camera, and has the entry up the same day. this was the point where he’d visited brian’s house again, only to be teleported around and meet the operator face to face. he says in the entry that he’s never going back to the house again, that he’s done with the case, but well.

much further down the timeline jay would say that he had no idea what he was doing with his life before he started down this rabbit hole, that he was miserable and directionless and alone. He didn’t know what he would do with himself when all of this was over, he just knew that while he was taking the case on he was at least doing Something. I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that this was always true, that part of his obsession with it was tied to feeling absolutely nothing for his life without it.

and sure enough, a week later and we get the idea that his paranoia is only getting worse, followed by him breaking and going back to search through the footage.

He posts more about his paranoia in february, but it’s in march that he’s scared out of his house by totheark only to have his apartment burned down. he only seems to learn about this march 24th, and he uploads the entry with the news footage on the 25th

while it’s true that he seemed to have taken a break after that upload, he’s back again on 4th with the cryptic text message. It’s between then and the 18th that he’d start his Long tradition of hotel hopping.

the final entry for season 1 is up the next day. We can’t know for sure exactly how truthful jay was when he said he was feeling better in entry 26, operator sickness tends to fluctuate with exposure just like any other mental illness. what we Can say is that jay got exactly 10 days of quiet between his apartment burning down and alex contacting him again, and after he was contacted he was afraid enough to start hotel hopping.

if 10 days is what jay merrick describes as a break, then my god. the implication that in an entire year jay merrick hadn't gone a 10 day stretch without looking at the tapes is, Something.  

this is where things take a real shift, both in the narrative and in jay’s tweeting patterns! this is the period where jay went radio silent working with alex for 7 months, only to forget everything. the only insight we have on how he was doing at this point is what came before, and the tapes he’d uncover in season 2. my best educated guess is to say that he is doing Not Great.

it’s of course after the operator wiped his and jessica’s memories that he starts up tweeting again, he doesn’t remember why he stopped at this point after all. but he’s also far less talkative between entries. in the beginning especially we’d Hear when he was sick, when he wasn’t sleeping, because he’d update frequently enough that he felt the need to explain when he wasn’t able to. this change is most likely due both in part to not feeling safe enough to be as talkative publically anymore, and on his focus on figuring out what’s going on.

that’s not to say that we don’t get Anything from this time period however.

we get quite a lot of talk about lack of sleep, exhaustion, etc throughout the beginning of the year. insomnia and jay staying up late to work on entries is to be expected, but this is the first time that we hear about jay Oversleeping. I’d say he’s long overdue for it considering how much he’s gone through at this point (and for how long), though it’s Also notable as possibly being a symptom of either illness or depression that we Aren’t hearing about.

this one just makes me sad

it’s Relatively quiet after this, with jay making light commentary here and there. the general vibe is that he’s hard at work when, of course, entry 32 comes along.

jay just Stops after jessica is taken. he doesn’t say anything, he doesn’t even start looking through the tapes for over three weeks. he couldn’t keep himself away from the tapes for that long after he was face to face with the monster or after his house was burned down. that says more about his state of mind than anything else could have.

there’s some mentions of possible sleep issues and jay feeling paranoid (more specifically, not feeling safe anywhere at all), but things don’t Really pick up until march

jay tries to upload entry 37 throughout the day, but no matter what he does he can’t remember the password for the account. this continues on into the 22 Until

“enttry #37“ is uploaded the next day, the footage of alex’s birthday, it’s linked on his twitter, and then six days later

He posts about how the footage he’d found earlier was deleted on his laptop and how he needs to get back Fast. he takes a rest stop on the 30th to charge his laptop and look through the red tower one more time to make sure he didn’t miss anything. and then Nothing until

he doesn’t get back for nearly an entire Week. now, it’s important to mention that there’s been speculation that this was going to be where the original skully reveal would take place, which is believable enough. but whether or not that’s what it was Going to be, the implications with what we have Now are, troubling to say the least. we’ll probably never know exactly what happened here but It’s Not Good. what did he eat? what did he drink? how did he sleep? Poorly, I’d Imagine.

this may also be what his earlier brain fog was leading into. losing track of the days of the week turning into losing track of the days entirely. but we’ll never know for sure

after this we actually get quite a lot about jay’s general discomfort, paranoia, memory loss, and regret scattered over the months. none of it is specific but a lot of it is tied directly to his discomfort with the tapes, which has turned into a constant with every upload. we can certainly tell that he isn’t doing well, but this message is particularly notable because it mentions a specific symptom that we haven’t seen before.

at this point jay’s paranoia and anxiety is bad enough that he can’t sit in silence anymore, and if he’s mentioning it so casually now it’s likely been an issue for a while. jay doesn’t tell us everything, and there’s almost certainly worse that hasn’t been said.

jay has Significant problems with sleeping throughout august that seep into september, to the point that he calls it “worse than usual.” but this is overtaken by his horror at entry 49. jay censored alex beating a man’s head in, but he had to watch it unedited, and it clearly took his toll. he didn’t even want to share it but ultimately decided that the world needed to have it if anything happened to him. but that wasn’t the end of it.

he spends nearly the entire month trying to find Any sign of who this man was. this is a specific aspect of jay’s personality that I think gets overshadowed by the perception of him as stupid. what he is is overworked, over his head, and impulsive, but he’s not stupid. but this is an Excellent example of jay’s dedication (bleeding into obsession).

this is obviously speculation on my part, but I think you can read this two ways (or a mix of them both): either jay is worried that something about the operator wiped away the man’s existence (like being taken made people forget about him somehow). Or he’s motivated by guilt, feeling responsible for having been there the day the man got crunched only to run away, desperately looking for any sign that Somebody had bothered to care about him.

things are relatively quiet after this until just after entry 50

something jay’s mental health really doesn’t need: more evidence of people breaking and entering while he’s asleep. what’s interesting here is that he went much quieter after this, just a handful of tweets relating directly to the next entry. I think you could either read jay being less open about how he’s doing on twitter as him being Well Aware that the people who want to hurt him (or who he Thinks want to hurt him in the case of hoodie and masky) have access to it, and in part because he’s doing so much Worse now.

the end of season two that the start of season three, of course, brings tim back into jay’s life and with it a Much needed distraction from his fear and paranoia. we’ll never know how jay reacted to the news that alex had tried to kill him in the moment, but we do know that it shifted his mindset from passively digging through the old tapes to actively trying to hunt alex down. tim was a Living Breathing lead, something he could actually Grasp Onto. and in light of what was likely something Very horrific that became a new fixation for jay.

he’d live blog about looking for tim from november 28th to march 8th, this was the most active he’d ever been on twitter and I think it absolutely speaks to how desperate he was for this to go somewhere. he even got to do some breaking and entering ! that said, having a distraction didn’t mean that there weren't a few noteworthy.

jay’s Current lack of trust is what’s going to lead to his and tim’s blowout later on. we can’t know how tim would’ve reacted if jay had been honest from the beginning (and it honestly would’ve gone poorly anyways), but tim’s confrontation with jay was honestly using his anger at being lied to as an outlet for the horror he felt at learning the truth of what’d been going on. he definitely would’ve still been angry and hurt, but he wouldn’t have had a direction for that anger. they might’ve started working together sooner.

however at this point jay doesn’t know who wants to hurt him and who doesn’t, he doesn’t feel safe talking to strangers on the street, let alone someone he already knew stalked him for two years. both of their reactions are understandable, and you can see the collision course coming when you step back far enough.

jay is Very quiet about what’s going on with him at this point. there are a few updates about his general paranoia and fear as well as him live tweeting about things relevant to the plot (thinking about coming clean to tim, posting tweets and pictures of trying to find tim after hoodie stole his medication, solving the totheark code that troy forgot to post a key for), but there’s only a handful of standout tweets that give us something new about his mental health scattered throughout the series.

this absolutely does not mean that he’s in a better place of mind, but what it does mean is that he’s being less open about it. tim didn’t know just how bad jay was and he’d been living with him. the fact that we have less to work with at this point is more an indication that he doesn’t feel safe sharing anymore (he hasn’t for a while) and a possible sign that he’s already gone into denial about his health (not wanting to connect it to the operator because of what that’d mean for him).

that said, we can take a look at what’s left for us.

this is from after jay had tim take him to the abandoned hospital for the first time and before the entry of it went up. this is notable because it’s one of if not the first time that it’s been directly stated that buildings associated with the operator can cause sickness. that or we can infer that the operator was actively strengthening its influence on them at the time (which might’ve also contributed to both of their irritability in the entry itself).

I don’t think this is notable because this is jay’s First nightmare, but rather I think it’s notable for him because his memory of it is totally gone. it’d make sense why this’d scare him at this point considering well, the entire series of marble hornets. but it does raise the question of how many more nightmares Weren’t worth sharing to him and how often they contributed to his sleeping problems.

next it’s worth noting that entry 67 messed jay up a lot. likely because it was solid evidence that alex was out there actively hunting them down (and just how close tim had gotten to being taken after he’d been throttled by the operator). He ends up posting about it Twice, as opposed to his previous strategy of not at all.

now finally, Finally. I’d like to talk about jay’s state of mind leading into his death. lets start with the timeline

jay doesn’t say anything at all between entry 74 and entry 75. tim had been running the account while jay was out of it, but jay had come to at least by august first, entry 75 was posted august 23rd. this is jay, and he has absolutely nothing to say.

he’s only just come out of his zombie state, he’s stolen the tape from tim (after trying to give him the chance to come clean), and he’s run off. we don’t get anything else out of him until september 3rd.

jay’s waited almost 2 weeks not only to watch the tape, but to even say anything at all. in my opinion? I think he’s afraid to not have anyone left to trust, let alone tim. he wouldn’t have given tim so much time to come clean himself otherwise, he wouldn’t be afraid of even looking at the tape otherwise. part of it is the sting of having his trust betrayed before, of closing himself off, and then trying to trust again. part of it is that he genuinely cared about tim. he wants to believe in tim, and he’s making it absolutely clear here.

it took him another 9 days to work up the courage to watch the tape, a full 20 days since the entry showing he got the tape was posted (and possibly longer, since we don’t know how long the video took to make). he was That afraid of not being able to trust tim anymore. of course, we know now that what’d actually get to him was realizing that jessica was gone. he’s mentioned before that he blamed himself for jessica being taken. that was what’d kept him going for years at this point and now she’s just, Gone. Gone For Good Gone.

the specific timeline here is a little harder to sus out. the gaps between some entries are too long to really make sense and what we’re getting on twitter aren’t as overt as they have been before. but here’s my best attempt to straighten it out.

jay sits on this for roughly a month, likely trying to process something that he’d used as a crutch to help him keep going bursting into smoke and grieving for someone he doesn’t really know but that he’d cared deeply for anyways. it eventually reached the point where the events of entry 82. he desperately goes back to the tunnel, the last place he saw jessica go in the video, for any last trace of her, any sign that she could still be alive, and doesn’t find any. he tries to reach out to tim, he tells him that he’s seeing things, that the world is shifting around him, that he’s sorry and that he understands why tim did what he did.

we don’t get an insight in what this month was like for jay, but it’s clear that he had a steady decline. he’s scared, he’s alone, he knows he needs help. and then the operator takes him. we never see exactly what happens to him after the seizure, and with the montages we’ve seen from tim’s titty cam it really could’ve been anything. but whatever it was it was enough to change jay’s entire attitude.

this is the last thing that jay posts before entry 77 goes up. it’s hard to say when this was posted for sure, because 77 was up 3 days later on the 16th, but I think it has to take place after jay was assaulted by the operator. jay thought he could call tim beforehand, we saw him try on video, and there’d be no reason to try to contact him through twitter if he knew he had an easier way. what this tells us is that jay woke up after the operator attack, tried to call him an unknown number of times, failed to reach him because the operator was still blocking his calls on tim’s end, tried to reach tim through twitter, and Then went out to try to confront tim likely believing that tim was intentionally trying to avoid him.

that mental image alone hurts me, but this means that even after everything jay was still trying to reach out to him.

at this point jay was in, some kind of denial just like everyone else. it hurt to feel like he was responsible for jessica’s death so he had to believe that she was still out there, he had to believe that it was someone else’s fault. he didn’t want to hurt tim like alex did, he didn’t want to push tim away like brian did, he wanted tim to laugh and pull jessica out of his closet where she’s been hiding this whole time. he wanted to believe the truth wasn’t real because it hurt.

the desperateness that he begs tim to leave his camera Also gets to me. jay’s mentioned for years that the point of recording and uploading footage was to make sure someone would know what happened if “something happened to him.” he pointed the camera away from jessica for 30 minutes and something Did happen to her. that's been weighing on him for years but never more than it has been for the past month.

then when hoodie comes for him, lets him free himself, and runs off one of the first things jay did was go to tim’s medicine cabinet and make a noise of frustration at finding all of the bottles empty. he knew that something was wrong, he knew that he wasn’t thinking straight anymore, and on some level he still believed tim. but there wasn’t anything there, everyone was gone, and he was running out of time.

now, I wanna paint another picture here. according to tim, the footage he found on jay’s laptop was dated the day before jay came to confront him. jay tried to reach tim through twitter at 8pm so it’s safe to assume that it was posted the day before he decided to meet him in person. jay spent october 13th getting his shit kicked in, he was hogtied on october 14th, and the entry showing their confrontation was up on october 16th.

jay follows tim, he searches through the school, and then chooses to keep watch in the building overnight.

jay’s had issues with food since the first day of marble hornets, Literally. it’s possible he snacked before he came to confront tim, or on the way to the school. it’s possible the upload dates are one off (the timeline certainly gets wonky going off of upload dates after this). but even still, at the time he was getting shot he was on at least day two without food (and likely much much longer), and at least 48 hours without sleep (again, almost certainly longer). On Top Of Everything.

jay merrick didn’t stand a chance

there’s so So much more I could get into, especially if I started poking more at the entries themselves or the Implications of some of the things I’ve talked about here. but that’ll have to come another time, I’m very tired jfklsd

[eijispumpkin]

some musings about yut-lung, inspired by a post i saw on the dash earlier today:

if the story of banana fish were to be reframed with yut-lung as the protagonist, ash would not actually be the primary antagonist of the final arc. eiji would.

why? because yut-lung’s issue was never really with ash. it was with his own lack of happiness after he got his revenge on his brothers. we can see this in episode 24 when he tells sing that his entire life’s purpose was to hate his brothers, and now that they’re gone, he’s empty.

now, obviously, during the beginning of this retelling, none of the characters we really care about from canon would matter. the primary antagonists would be the lee siblings, particularly wang-lung as head of the family. most of yut-lung’s actions in canon are behind the scenes, but in this retelling they would be front-and-center. i’m not gonna linger on that point because i think it’s fairly self-explanatory, but ash and eiji would not really be relevant to yut-lung’s story until after yut-lung’s plans are well underway (i.e. until hua-lung is drugged and has already become his puppet).

so, what is yut-lung’s relationship to ash?

i would posit that he latched onto ash as someone he saw himself in. someone that had been through similar trauma, someone who should have been as broken, unlovable, and unable to heal as himself. (or at least, as he saw himself.) that was the root of his fixation on ash: the belief that if yut-lung himself couldn’t heal and be happy, even after getting his revenge, why should someone else?

and, when we analyze why ash was more capable of healing in the timeframe he did than yut-lung, obviously there’s eiji, but eiji is not the only person to care for ash. there’s shorter, nadia, max, ibe, alex and the other gang members, etc; while ash has had an undeniably hard time, he has also found a support network.

yut-lung has not.

in fact, the whole thing is so foreign to him that he completely discounts the entire network, and decides that ash’s sole support is eiji. now, ash and eiji are definitely important to each other, but it would be remiss to say that eiji is the only person important to ash or the only person to care for him. this is a misinterpretation of ash, caused by yut-lung placing him on a pedestal as “the only one who understands”, so to speak, and it’s why yut-lung fixated so hard on eiji as the obstacle to remove in order to bring ash to his level.

ash’s actions towards yut-lung are not actually antagonistic. ash tells him he’ll kill him one day, but he never tries to actually act on it, or do anything else to hinder yut-lung’s plans in general. frankly, ash doesn’t really give two shits what yut-lung is doing, until ep 20 when yut-lung has eiji, alex, bones, and kong. that is (iirc) the second time ash and yut-lung even see each other after shorter’s death.

now let’s contrast that with eiji.

in episode 9, yut-lung says that eiji really annoys him, because he’s too innocent. he echoes that in episode 14, when he says that people either want to protect eiji, like ash, or they want to “tear him up and destroy him”, and that yut-lung himself is one of the latter. putting his idealization of ash aside for a moment, it’s pretty evident that this hatred is motivated by jealousy (a common theme in yut-lung’s story): why should eiji have had a happy childhood, when yut-lung didn’t? 

in fact, that whole conversation in episode 14 is pretty telling. yut-lung tells eiji that he’s stupid for thinking he’s ash’s friend, because “ash has no need for friends [...] all he needs are those who idolize him, and those, like arthur, who defy him. he doesn’t need anyone else. especially not you, who is only a burden to him.”

yut-lung isn’t talking about ash. he thinks he is, but really? he’s talking about himself. or, rather, what he wants himself to be.

in ep24, we see him breaking down because he doesn’t know what his life purpose is without having an enemy. that combined with how he thinks that someone like ash (i.e., someone like himself) “doesn’t need friends”, the fact that the heart of his quest for vengeance is his mother, and his jealousy regarding eiji’s happier childhood, all comes together to suggest to me, at least, that at his core, yut-lung craves companionship, and at the same time desperately wants to deny that he wants it.

this conflict is the crux of his character. yut-lung’s story is ultimately a man-vs-self battle; he has an image of himself that he wants to be (cold, calculating, alone, satisfied), and he’s trying desperately to force himself to fit into that box, but he can’t actually do it. he’s hurting, he’s lonely, and he’s scared, and he lashes out and gets petty, bitter, and vicious.

so how does eiji come in?

eiji is the antithesis of everything yut-lung wants. he’s evidence that ash (i.e. yut-lung’s mirror) can heal and be loved, and yut-lung doesn’t want to see that, because it shatters his worldview that he’s on a path no one else except ash and those like him can walk. he doesn’t want to accept that people like ash (i.e. himself) can need love and support and friendship. eiji threatens to undermine his entire outlook on life.

and how does eiji respond to that? 

eiji responds by loving ash harder. by insisting that yut-lung won’t ever understand, but that he will stay by ash’s side. that they understand that they both care for each other. yut-lung kidnaps him after ash is stabbed and reported dead, and eiji refuses to stay put. tries to escape many times, until he finally does. 

and when he does, yut-lung says that he’s just decided that he will be ash’s enemy, for as long as eiji is his only weak point. this is just a thinly-veiled attempt to make eiji leave ash, because eiji’s presence threatens yut-lung’s entire delicately-balanced view of himself. 

so yut-lung’s plan to get blanca to blackmail ash via eiji? meant to prove that eiji is nothing more than a weakness. really, he has no need to force ash back to golzine--he’s gotten his revenge, he could have done it without golzine’s involvement, he didn’t have to do this--but to him, it’s necessary to prove that he was right all along, that eiji is ash’s weakness and not an asset, that having eiji around was a detriment and he was right.

because if he’s wrong, it means he could have been healing, could have been loved, could have been less alone... and he wasn’t.

so yut-lung decides that ash has to fall back into hell in order to make himself feel secure in his own previously-established patterns of thought. unfortunately for him, eiji brings people together--as eiji is wont to do, like yut-lung said in ep14--to rescue ash, and turns everything on its head again.

this is why he goes to the museum to attempt to dupe golzine. it’s not really about ash. it’s about his view of himself, and the threat to that that eiji poses.

eiji is the real antagonist to yut-lung’s protagonist. ash is someone he puts on a pedestal and sees as a mirror of himself, and while ash is important to his story, eiji is the one who primarily acts in contention to yut-lung. he’s the one who thwarts so many of yut-lung’s plans, who tells him he’s wrong, who tries to stand in his way. 

overall, the main villain in yut-lung’s story is his own trauma. he developed many irrational thought patterns as ways to cope with what happened to him while he dealt with it alone, and wound up projecting them onto ash and eiji’s relationship (honestly, in a way blanca did as well, but that’s an essay for another day). however, within the bounds of that projection, eiji shows much more active opposition to him than ash.

[not-xpr-art]

Art Advice #6 - Ways to combat social media fatigue as a creative person

Hi guys!

This week’s topic is something I think any artist who’s predominantly active on social media will relate to; that feeling of utter helplessness at trying to live up to social media algorithms, which can really impact your mental and physical health...  

I want to just offer some advice on how to feel less burnt out from art social media (advice I need to take myself sometimes)...

Ways to combat social media fatigue as a creative person (& how you can make social media overall a better place to be).

As I’ve already said, social media can take a big toll on your mental and physical health, particularly if you’re relying on it for your career (as a lot of artists and other creatives do). 

This blog post aims to offer some small pieces of advice to help make your life a little easier when navigating the world of art social media!

1) Algorithms are built to destroy creativity.

I think we’ve all had that phase where we try and keep up with the fast paced algorithms of social media that demand we produce new content day after day, as well as constantly interacting with other people’s posts and spending a minimum amount of time on the app. And all of this leads to feeling fed up and tired when you’re using that particular social media. 

For me, Instagram used to be such a wonderful place for sharing art. I met many amazing fellow artists, and the community that was formed their was genuinely lovely. Unfortunately, everything changed when the fire nation (Facebook) bought out the company & the whole site became so less friendly to smaller creatives. 

I’ve heard a similar story from a lot of artists, who find Instagram’s focus on excessive posting and engagement, which mainly rewards big influencers or celebrities and not smaller accounts of creative people, incredibly disheartening. The algorithms don’t allow artists to naturally explore their creativity, and it leads to more and more artists getting just completely creatively burnt out.

Of course, this all sounds really pessimistic, but it doesn’t have to be. For me, places like Tumblr and the newly created Artfolapp, which (although not perfect) offer a great alternative to the algorithm heavy apps like Instagram, Facebook or Twitter. As with all socials, there’s a huge element of luck that comes with posting art (timezones, audience, etc can all play major parts in how well your art does), but I always find places where posting doesn’t feel like a chore are a lot more enjoyable.

Alternatively, as simple as it sounds I think a great way to start approaching all social media is to not focus on numbers. Instagram actually recently gave the option of being able to hide likes on others and your own posts, which I actually think is a great idea! Once you become less focused on numbers I think you can breathe a little easier!

2) Numbers =/= Your worth as a creative person.

Following on from my last point, it can often feel like if you’re posts aren’t getting as much attention as you used to then there’s something wrong with the work your doing. 

Of course, this isn’t true at all, and most of us know this. Unfortunately if your posts are a part of your work, and the engagement they have is directly linked to how successful in your job you are (and how much money you make that week), then numbers are a lot harder to ignore. 

My biggest piece of advice for this is to visualise the numbers as what they are; people actually interacting with your work! So even if it’s only 1 person, that’s still 1 entire person who enjoyed what you posted! 

3) Luck be a b*tch, honestly ...

As previously mentioned, there is a lot of luck that comes with being successful on social media. Luck of posting in the right place at the right time, having one person with a bigger platform share your art, etc. 

So there isn’t a lot of advice I can give in this section. One thing I’d recommend is involving yourself in a particular community or fandom. Even if you don’t do fancontent, finding a community where you can meet like-minded people and support each other’s work is a really useful thing!! 

For fancontent (like fan art, edits, cosplay, covers, etc) you can just check out the tags of those fandoms! Even if it’s a small fandom, there is usually some content that already exists for it. Often by following a range of people in the various fandoms you enjoy can also lead to fun opportunities, like fan-zines or collaborations! 

For non-fancontent it can feel like it’s a lot harder to find people to relate to. One thing I’d recommend is to find independent magazines online which specialise in sharing creative works! This can offer great chances to get your work featured, as well as meeting some fellow creatives!

Basically, curating your social media experience to feature people that inspire you & support you not only makes for a more enjoyable time being on social media, but it also means there’s more potential your work will be seen!

4) Passion Pays.

Audiences often know when you’re producing something because you feel like you have to (perhaps it’s fancontent for something you gained a lot of followers from, or a particular style that you’ve done for a long time) rather than from genuine passion, and that can be to your detriment.

My advice is to do what you’re actually passionate about, even if that means that some people may not be as interested. For example, I gained a significant portion of my followers on other social medias from posting Kpop fanart. And although I still do this occasionally, I only ever really do it when it’s something I really want to draw. Even though I know I could churn out a lot of Kpop content that those people who followed me for it would really like, I also like drawing other things & going out of my comfort zone in art. 

And I know that the people who still follow and support me now understand this, and often appreciate that I draw things I’m unabashedly passionate about! It has also made me a lot happier overall with my own work, since I feel like I’m constantly pushing myself to do new and interesting things for me, and not to fulfil the interests of others! 

This can also include a complete turn around of the kinds of things you create, by the way! If you’ve been a 2D artist for ages, but suddenly develop a passion for 3D sculpture, then go for it! Those who are still interested in your work will stick around. As well as this, you’ll grow an entirely new audience with the new creative outlet you start sharing! It’s honestly a win-win situation, and don’t let the fear of people not accepting the change hold you back!

5) TAKE BREAKS!

Possibly the most important piece of advice in this post is to remember to take a break from social media! Even if it’s something you rely on for your job, and the algorithms demand you spend time on them, try to take periods of time during your day to switch off from it. 

Another thing I would also suggest is taking breaks from posting things. I did this in January because I wanted a break from forcing myself to live up to the hell of a posting schedule. I still did art, but without the pressure of having to post things I was able to take time and have a little more fun with it! 

A final thing in this part that I’d suggest is taking breaks from doing creative stuff occasionally. If you’re anything like me, you probably spend nearly every day doing or at least thinking about creative things. And that can become very tiring! Whether it’s taking a week, a few days, or entire months, remember that your creativity and skill aren’t just going to disappear if you take a break from it for a bit! 

I think creative people tell themselves that if they don’t keep posting, then people are going to stop supporting their work. But in my experience, people stick around even if you haven’t posted something in years! Because if someone enjoys your work, then they’re going to stick around regardless! 

TL/DR

Basically to sum up, social media can be hell to navigate with it’s obsessive algorithms and posting schedules. But if you allow yourself to adapt to other sites/apps that don’t rely on those things, don’t fixate on numbers, curate your experience to both be inspiring and supportive, let your passion shine through, and remember to take breaks, then social media can become a lot more enjoyable! 

I hope this post was somewhat helpful to anyone who struggles with this... I have to admit that I often don’t take my own advice in regard to social media, but I thought me posting this could help both of us out lol!

Check out my other Art Advice posts here if you’re interested!

[saijspellhart]

Do you have any headcannons for Radicalshipping?

Oh gosh, you put me on the spot. Uhhh. Kinda? I spose headcanons differ depending on the AU really. But for the sake of simplicity I speak in reference to Radicalshipping if it occurred somehow in the canon Yugioh timeline.

First off, YBakura is stingy with the praise and kind words. He’s like a grumpy cat that doesn’t want to be touched unless it’s on his terms. But when he does say something nice he really means it.

YMarik, is the opposite. He lathes on the flattering words and praise, but it’s always laced with ulterior motives and oozes danger.

They both call Yugi “Babysitter,” an endearment that is equal parts affectionate and derogatory.

They are actually incredibly grateful to Yugi, and regard him with a lot of respect, in both his skills at gaming, as well as his depths of compassion and forgiveness. But they will die before admitting this to him.

They like to pick Yugi up from University, and take pleasure in intimidating the heck out of everyone while they do it.

YMarik struggles with his own identity. Being given a separate body he knows he was Malik Ishtar, but now he is a separate entity and strives to be his own person. To the point that he attempts to eat meat, and consume dairy out of spite, to the detriment of his own body. And gets sick afterward. Yugi is always there with a wet towel, and patience when YMarik inevitably gets sick and throws it all up.

YBakura knows YMarik wants to eat meat, and at first YBakura eats big ass steaks in front of him just to be an ass. But the more they become friends, the more Bakura excuses himself to the bedroom to eat meat. He refuses to eat the vegetarian meals, and Yugi always cooks something for both of them if Yugi cooks.

YMarik actually likes cooking, but will make faces at the food the entire time. And taste everything.

YBakura will not cook. He will buy takeout before he cooks.

Yugi likes them both, and sees the potential for good in the both of them. He tries very hard to help both of them turn over a new leaf. But unbeknownst to him, but knownst to us, their darkness is actually rubbing off on Yugi.

Yugi will become a feisty little protector if anyone messes with, or badmouths the yamis. He’s fiercely protective of them, despite them not needing his protection.

They are extremely flattered by this. And will sometimes put themselves into positions where people speak badly of them, just to watch Yugi go off on people.

YBakura struggles with unresolved complicated feelings for Malik. And deals with them by being incredibly hostile and antagonizing whenever Malik is concerned.

YMarik is still angry about being banished by Malik, and because of this he struggles with a temper, so he avoids Malik and conversations about Malik on principle.

YMarik became less interested in Duel Monsters, and found his calling with online gaming, and computer games. (He still has a deck though and will play with the others.)

YBakura still likes Duel Monsters well enough and frequently challenges Yugi, they keep each other on their toes.

YBakura wants to play Monster World, but no one will play with him except Yugi. Because of his past penchant for trapping everyone’s souls. Not even Ryou will play with him.

Ryou still comes over to hang out, but he rooms with Malik, and neither of them want YBakura or YMarik to stay with them. For various reasons.

Yugi was the first one to start crushing on the yamis, but kept his mouth shut about his feels because he felt it was inappropriate since he was responsible for them.

YMarik and YBakura are both jealous and possessive of Yugi, and constantly compete with each other. Despite their possessiveness, they are fine with Yugi spending time with his friends and family. YBakura has a soft spot for family.

YMarik has an oral fixation. Needs to put his mouth on things. Bites pens, nails, erasers, hair, Yugi’s fingers, etc etc.

Both yamis are incredibly smug about the fact that they “got” Yugi, and would jump at the chance to rub this in Atem’s nose if Atem were not already in the afterlife. They are just that petty. But they did sincerely develop feelings for Yugi.

That’s all I got right now. I hope those are headcanon-y enough for you. Thanks for the ask.

[keyofjetwolf]

I hate how the manga sucks mamoru's dick but i can't blame takeuchi for writing this self indulgent fantasy about her perfect husband because her actual husband is apparently a dick.

I know somewhere between fuck and all about Takeuchi’s personal life. I know she HAS a husband, and that husband is also a manga writer/artist, but there’s where my knowledge ends and ignorance begins. So while I’m using this as a springboard, nothing in the following is specific commentary or authority about Naoko Takeuchi’s life and experiences, about which, as just stated, I know nothing.

It’s interesting to me, in that way we can become interested in things that we can’t understand, how, in a sea of fascinating and diverse female characters, some women still have a particular (often repeated) tendency to single out and focus on a man. It makes no sense to me, just none at all. I’m not saying male characters can’t be awesome, or there’s some inherent flaw in ever enjoying a male character above a female character. But you hang around people as they drift through enough fandom circles, you begin to notice patterns. This is something I’ve seen pop up again and again and again. Why they keep going there is a question I’ve wondered, and come back to now and again when my mind is wandering, or happens to be sparked in that particular direction.

You writing this, Anon, did that for me. I’ve mulled over this Ask since you sent it, thinking about it, wondering whether it was worth even bringing up. AND MAYBE IT’S NOT I DUNNO. But apparently it’s a conversation starter I feel like finally tossing into the world.

Specifically, you got me there with this Ask, because I wondered at the correlation you were suggesting. That because Takeuchi’s husband “is a dick”, her fixation on Mamoru made sense. Not that she left her husband, or found someone less dickish, or decided marriage wasn’t for her. But that she became fixated on a fictional character of her own creation, to the detriment of every other character and the story itself (IN THE OPINION OF THIS JET WOLF), because an actual man in her actual life was disappointing.

Whether any of that is true of her husband, I neither know nor, honestly, care. Far more interesting to me is this core idea, that women do perhaps focus on these male characters, because on some level there’s this NEED to believe a man like them is possible, that he could exist.

Historically, men are -- and I don’t think I’m being particularly controversial when I say this -- really fucking shitty to women. You name it, they’ve done it. I’m personally to the point where there’s nothing I could learn about any man who has ever lived that would genuinely surprise me. Of all men throughout my life, my grandfather was the best man I’ve ever known. I love him like I have few people. And if someone told me tomorrow that he’d sexually assaulted their grandmother, I wouldn’t necessarily accept it unquestioned as stone cold truth, but I WOULD be like, “Fuck, I dunno, maybe?”

That’s just the reality of our experiences, and our mother’s experiences, and her mother’s experiences,and so on down through our collective history. Which isn’t to say it’s just the way it is and men are incapable as a sex of better, just that we’re sure as hell not there yet, and none of us are completely free from the times in which we live.

So -- she asks herself hypothetically and also apparently out loud today -- is that maybe why this focus? A focus which, in the personal opinion of this Jet Wolf, is completely illogical? This drive to center our fictional worlds around the men we don’t see anywhere near enough in the real one?

NO FUCKING IDEA. Intended or otherwise, however, thank you for giving me another thing to chew over on this, Anon.

[corruptedbonecharm]

hello yes hi. you are the hypatia expert. what exactly is it about her personality or situation or, yknow, just generally her, that draws you to her, and what's your favorite moment of hers in game?

hello yes it is i, the local hypatia expert apparently -

i am... really not sure what made me like her so much or what even drew me to this particular character in the first place. her being a fellow Science Woman™ like myself, perhaps? maybe i felt bad for her? maybe i simply liked how kind she is or her general gentle demeanor? i have no idea, it just kinda happened on its own and snowballed from there, as many of my previous character fixations have done.

all i can really say here is summed up with

now, though, i love her for a number of reasons i'm not sure i can even list with any amount of comprehensibility... she's a hardworking but exceedingly gentle and altruistic doctor who seems to care about those who need her more than she cares about herself, often to her own detriment. it's through her sheer determination to help people and her insistence on harming no one in the experimentation process that she ends up becoming a murderous monster, which is really a sad bit of irony isn't it? now she's tearing apart the very same people she dedicated her life's work to helping.

i love that she's a woman of science in a time period where they were rare and often looked down upon, love that she looks her age and doesn't suffer from same-face syndrome and that her outfit's fitting and sensible and -

gah i dunno man i just Love Her

as for the favorite moment thing it's hard to say, but if grim alex counts for this question as well then i think her intro cutscene is probably my favorite moment because goddamn. and i've said it before perhaps too much, even but i really like hypatia's idle dialogue as well! it goes from making you feel bad for her with her not-quite-mentally-present meandering muttering to "you're planning to do what with huh??" and that gradual transition gets me every time

.....also i know this ain’t about her but alex is cool and i love her too for some reason, but she’s a whole other can of worms

[solarflareanon]

I have... Thoughts i wish to pour from my head

I fucking love digimon adventures. the first two seasons of digimon. I was reminded of this fact when I heard a snippet of “kids of america” or whatever that song is called and was catapulted back in time to when my siblings and I recorded the dubbed digimon movie on VHS when it aired during the saturday morning time slot reserved for such shows as Pokemon, Cardcaptor, and other anime deemed appropriate for children.

Now. My hyperfixations come and go with the seasons of my life and sometimes the conditions are right that I revisit an old fixation. 

Such has happened in the past with digimon.

Numerous times in the past I have watched specifically the dub of the digimon movie because that brings me a reliable dose of joy to my life. An unspecified long ago I rewatched just the first season of digimon adventures, that being the one i remembered the best and have the most fondness for. Not terribly long ago, although longer than it likely feels, I rewatched the entirety of the first and second seasons of Digimon Adventures and Digimon Tamers for good measure because that season is several flavors of fucked up.

At this point ya’ll are probably going, “wtf do we care about your enduring love of the show digimon?” to which I say this: I have been granted many hours of the day to think about Things and in those hours after reliving my favorite memories of digimon I have formed Some Opinions on how the second season of Adventures could have been better.

Lemme say one last thing before going further, I love the second season of digimon adventures and it has some of my favorite episodes and characters and did a really good time skip, which is why it haunts me so. Also I’ll be using the dub names of the characters because i always watched the dub and that’s what i’m used to. Also Also, it’s been a hot second since I’ve watched the show so this is all based on my memories of what stood out to me from the show.

SO

Biggest thing i wish were different is Who Got Which Egg.

First off the Love Egg? Give that thing to Cody not Yolei! Cody didn’t get as much development as the other characters in my opinion. It seemed like the show was trying to make him a more sensitive Izzy clone, which in my opinion didn’t really work out. A much stronger part of his character was his connection to his family! Multiple times he was shown going to his grandpa for advice and he was shown really cherish that bond. It would have been a great to see that explored more and have that facet of his character shine through in his interactions with the other digidestined as he begins to consider them his family too. They could have had conflict where he realizes that with how tanky his partner digimon is, he might have a responsibility to protect his new family but at the same time doesn’t want his partner to keep getting hurt! I dunno man, but this child is full of love and kindness and I wish the anime had given him the corresponding eggs.

Meanwhile Yolei? Ya’ll guessed it! I’ve been saying it since i first rewatched the show! Give Yolei The Knowledge Egg! She is Brash. She is Curious. She is full of Fire not Love! If the anime had gone down the route of “Oh, she needs to learn to be more Loving(????)” I might have let it slide but No! She mentions having a crush on Popular Kid Ken a few times early on, then it’s dropped! Ya’ll remember that one time Kari was having a panic attack about the dark ocean or whatevs? Yolei slapped the shit outta her to get her to snap out of it! Again, if it was made more clear that came from a place of love and concern and not a “pull yourself together” moment, I’d let it pass. But the Knowledge Egg? That shit’s obvious. She’s literally the techie of the group, connects with Izzy, sticks her nose in everything and the Wings of Knowledge sounds cooler than the drill of knowledge. Sincerity egg is great tho, eggcellent choice.

BiG change comin through! Defo give the Courage egg to Davis, he’s got hot-blooded protagonist juice comin’ out of his ears. But also, give him the Hope egg instead of the Loyalty egg. 

Now Hear Me Out! Think of the character possibilities! Despite his annoyingness, Davis has been shown again and again uplifting other’s spirits, from his friends, to freshly-humbled Ken, to a literal army of digidestined in the finale. A big part of why they won in the finale is because he literally had hope for the future! It could have been a great way to develop him as the leader of the group since that seems to be the role the show was pushing for him anyways.

And tying closely to the above are the egg choices i’d make for my two favorite characters. Kari still should get the Light Egg, but I think it’d be so juicy if TK got the Loyalty egg.

My thoughts on this are that we’ve seen that these two clearly have some baggage from the first time they were in the digital world. TK straight up has ptsd over the time patamon was Murdered In Front Of Him As a Child and Kari’s got some shit goin on with the dark Ocean that is Never Resolved. Wouldn’t it be just so fuckin’ crazy if the show was just like, yeah TK’s having a hard time mustering up any hope for the future right now and just, gave him an arc that was him working through his mental illnesses. There could be these scene’s where Kari’s like “you alright?” and he’s like “apparently not?” and then it’d be so emotional when he gets patamon to digivolve to ultimate using the crest of hope! There’s so much potiential!

But then Kari still gets the Light egg because that’s less a virtue and more just a characteristic that she emits. And because she still get’s her expected egg it takes longer for people to see that oh yeah, Kari’s got lingering trauma too. Then that could be tied into and represented by the dark ocean subplot as it eventually becomes too big of a problem to ignore anymore. Which would be a running theme with Kari from way back in the first season where she keeps putting other’s before herself to the detriment of her own health. Tying in with TK getting the Loyal egg, there’s an episode where he’s the only one who notices Kari’s literally glitching out of reality and is the one who follows her to the dark ocean to try and get her back. It’s already choice, but what if more of that? What if better Yolei and Kari bonding too? (I’m not gonna lie ya’ll it’s getting late and i’m wrapping it up) Like, Yolei is shown to not bottle things up and I feel like being the smartest in the group she could help understand wtf the dark ocean is and would be the most likely to go “bitch! let’s get you some therapy!” and just not give her the chance to keep saying “Im fine.” And that’s a dynamic i wish had been explored more rather than just slapping the two girls together.

That all might be a bit much to ask of a children’s anime. But what’s not too much is how giving him the Loyalty egg would contrast and parallel him to his own brother Matt! Think about it! Later in the season when they get the ability to dna digivolve he and Cody are paired up mostly because they’re the spares; but by by drawing these parallels between Matt and TK across the seasons, it would give him a reason to bond with Cody who is only a little bit older than TK was when he first went to the digimon world. There could be this element of big brother protectiveness and mentorship that would lead him to understanding what his own brother went through mixed with memories of what it was like from the other side and I just think it would make their dynamic more interesting.

*deep inhale*

That’s it for now, my head it 39% emptier and I am tired.

tl:dr I think Digimon Adventure 02 could have had more interesting character arcs and dynamics if they had shuffled who had which digi eggs.