#this is probably all incoherent ramblings but I needed to write it all out anyway

[dribs-and-drabbles]

More Thoughts about Kinnporsche ep 6

After episode six I wrote: “Kinn's love language is in his words but Porsche's love language is in his actions.” Some time after that I read a fabulous post by @iffervescent about how miscommunication is being handled in the show…which seemed to contradict the conclusion I had come to. It made me stop and think about whether I had interpreted things ‘wrong’…but once my Thoughts started forming I came to a slightly different inference. I’m going to attempt to spread out those thoughts here…and you might need to bear with me. (For the sake of this post I’m treating ‘communication’ and ‘love language’ as the same thing…which might not technically be correct but I'm doing it anyway.)

So @iffervescent’s take is that (pre ep 6) Kinn communicates through his actions whereas Porsche communicates through words and therefore neither were getting what they needed from the other. (Apologies if I've butchered your amazing analysis through my summary!)

However, after ep 6, I felt that Kinn was much more open to talking honestly…much more than Porsche, who seemed to shut down a little when Kinn tried to talk about that night and his wrongdoings and then Porsche defaulted to a jokiness soon after. And since Porsche found it hard to talk (I mean, he literally faked choking at one point, symbolising how he couldn’t get his words out), he instead did a lot for Kinn, using his actions to show his care towards Kinn.

And so I thought Kinn showed his affections through his words and Porsche showed his through his actions...And Kinn (pre ep 6) may not always have the right words or say them in the right way but that’s how he wants to communicate…and therefore it’s all the more tragic for him because his position and need to be distant makes him say the opposite to what he means to Porsche...and that’s probably why he ends up only being able to show Porsche that he cares in his actions. And similarly, Porsche wants to be there for Kinn, to show him he's there for him, to do things for him, but which is made hard because Kinn doesn't let him, by removing him as his bodyguard.

But in ep 6 we see a change in both of them. They’re removed from their real lives, alone in a place of limbo where they can be free to be themselves, and we see them gradually shift into their true nature – Kinn can speak freely and openly, without his father and the pressure of The Family and his obligations within it, and Porsche can act freely and openly, on equal ground since the boss/bodyguard hierarchy is rendered obsolete (as @jemmo wrote in a comment, "them being cuffed together is giving them something else...they’re two equals, tied together, both made to cooperate and listen and be on a level playing field.")

And I think this ties into the handcuff and lighter symbolism that I (in a post) and @jemmo (in her tags) have written a bit about already…

Ep 6 was an opportunity for Kinn and Porsche to both let their inner-child play and have fun (unlike how they were both prevented from doing as children for different reasons) as well as deal with their issues and get closer to one another. Porsche was able to lead on the former - since he enjoyed teasing and playing with Kinn, to draw out Kinn’s true nature, the lighter side of him – and Kinn led on the latter – keeping them handcuffed together unnecessarily because he needed this time with Porsche for them to connect, to understand one another, to form a stronger attachment. Here’s what @jemmo said on this:

#…the thing about the lighter and the handcuffs #Porsche wanting to see the light kinn has suppressed and buried deep inside him #and kinn wanting to desperately hold on to and build this bond between them through any way he can #…it’s such a perfect metaphor #for the things they hide and keep from each other #Porsche doesn’t let them bond bc he’s been hurt and it’s too difficult to let it happen #and kinn doesn’t let his lighter side show bc he can’t he cannot be that person the world won’t let him #but the irony is when they both give in they both get what they want #in showing his lighter side kinn gets to build a stronger bond with Porsche #and in letting them connect Porsche gets to see kinns lighter side

So in giving in to each other, they get closer and feel more comfortable in being themselves, and therefore are able to revert to their true nature – Kinn can talk openly and Porsche can act as he wants.

BUT this doesn’t quite solve the communication issue…because having thought about it I don’t think it’s as clear cut as one uses words whilst the other uses actions. I think it’s a four-way mesh…and I’ll try to explain succinctly.

I think both Kinn and Porsche show love and communication with their actions but they both also need to hear communication and love through words. Which makes it tricky because they’re both basically offering the same (or trying to and being blocked by different obstacles) and not receiving what they need (again for different reasons).

I think ep 6 opened the way for them to both realise this - in that isolated place, and helped by their growing closeness, Kinn was able to give Porsche the words he needed to hear and in turn this helped Porsche reciprocate…to some extent. Kinn, already in the habit of showing his care of Porsche through his actions, was still able to do things for Porsche (or at least tried with the fire and fishing!), and Porsche, free to be himself, was able to also finally do things for Kinn (like show him how to fish!).

Now, I said ‘to some extent’ there because I think it’s still harder for Porsche to speak honestly than it is for Kinn and I think this imbalance will be the cause of some continued miscommunication between them. The small exchange in ep 6 they have about 'doubts' has stuck with me… Kinn says to Porsche, “Then, from now on, there won’t be any doubts between us anymore,” after which Porsche agrees but looks nervous or uncomfortable about it. Kinn then frowns and I wonder if there’s a small part of him (his insecurities) that maybe doesn’t believe (i.e. trust) Porsche is being genuine in his agreement (and the thing is Porsche probably was but was just feeling increasingly awkward about having to speak honestly). And it makes me think of that scene we haven’t seen yet where Porsche slaps Kinn and tells him, “You never trust me,” and it just makes me wonder if this will be a miscommunication issue grown from this small exchange in ep 6 - Kinn needed to hear a stronger affirmation from Porsche which he didn't get and his insecurities will only grow until he gets it.

Anyway, I’m not sure if I’ve been clear with any of this…but if it sets off other Thoughts or interpretations in people then it’s been at least worth it. I think this is a fascinating dynamic, especially because there are so many external factors preventing Kinn and Porsche from being genuine and true to themselves and each other, and I can’t wait to see what will happen between them. How will they go back to the Family compound and act, knowing what they know about each other and their feelings?…even if they don’t actually see each other (because Porsche is with Vegas and Kinn is recovering) it's bound to affect how they interact with everyone.

[8aji]

im a lil embarrassed that most of the posts ive posted (duh) as of late were text posts abt me being sick LMFAO n it feels silly to write this but i think i may log out of this acc for a lil while at least on mobile <3

[34saveme34]

MOST INCOHERENT MARWARE RAMBLING INCOMING

I'm so obsessed and I must talk because I love the amount of potential here

like it's. villain x hero's silly sidekick. that's hilarious

like think about it. Puzzles didn't quite get to Mario like to the others

babe's collateral and did he make Puzzles regret that

their dynamic

just the silly in general. I love the early time ship art "what those antennas do" hell if I know but Mario is keen to find out.

it's silly fun! really cute and fun, especially when it stop Puzzles in his tracks. When he expects fear or devotion and instead he gets such a weird and unexpected and chaotic form of adoration with which his heart (if it is still there) cannot handle. it's beautiful. Mario in general just having feelings for him. It's so good

but also I wanna explore the like, specific eroticism that you can put into the Hunt. The way how Mario hunts Puzzles because he craves Entertainment and he'll have it No Matter What, it's so disgustingly amusing and something I could think about forever. I never really understood this before but these 2 REALLY made me understand. Mario smashing every single TV on his way until he finds His One and the Hunt is over? I'm so fucked up, I'M SO F U C K E D

ngl I realise a certain part of the fandom would probably call me a freak for this. I'm calling them catholic guilt ridden

anyways!

the emotional. oh the emotional. Mario already had a different thing going on when it came to villains

I think he is like, the best candidate in general to help Puzzles in redeeming himself. Mario can be SO caring and like like like

it's just ONE facet of this, this isn't how it starts but over time it would become such an important part of this because he grows like, genuine attachment

but the most important thing in the beginning would be is that he's casual. He also has like. a very specific type of emotional maturity, which some people like to call inconsistent writing, I like to call it a quirk and acknowedge it with my whole heart

but it would like, allow the 2 to speak on like, more casual terms

where Puzzles isn't a danger anymore and Mario just so happens to be there at the right time, say the right words

the rights words for Mario to just so obviously see that Puzzles needs a friend so so badly and letting him have it

this once, maybe he can prove to be a cool friend

and oh would he.... oh my goooood would he aaaughgh

because at his core, like, Puzzles isn't evil for the sake of evil, he's evil to obtain what he wants

so like, if he isn't obtaining anymore kdsldlsk I bet he could be fun. Mario would make him touch grass, they would go places together, have some silly adventures together, some more chaotic than the other

a dynamic that would form between the 2 where Puzzles becomes just a bit too soft that he lets Mario get away with things he shouldn't

maybe even helps him because he finds it fun anyways

considering what he was before..... finding solace in chaos and forgetting perfection for a second there...... he finds perfection right beside him....... maybe like, for example in the middle of a food fight Mario causes because they gave him shitty spaghetti or something and Puzzles just seeing the glee on Mario's face over the fun chaos and just. Feeling something in himself. And he wouldn't, for a long time, realise that it's love. He never felt it before

I can almost imagine him turning to romantic movies and such, trying to figure out if the feeling fits. Because it's so so intense in him, he never felt anything like this. He can't talk to anyone about this, he has no other friends in all this. And oooh dhslksdjsd ooOOhOohK?,s,,s,s dsooooooooohhh,,, dsdldk

guys I think he would create. Idk I just think. ijust think .

having experiences in life now, things that just keep replaying in his head, as he is starting to have a life. he would create something from his own head. And it would be like a love letter to Mario. And he would GET IT. And by it I mean. You know. 😲😳😳😳😳😳😳don't make me say it............

okay okay.......!!! He would get Puzzles's homosexual ass.

[silverwhittlingknife]

I noticed something in a lot of your Dick and Tim fics. It's probably so obvious, but you always write that Tim is watching Dick. In your newest one, Tim's watching Dick, in The Return Tim's watching Dick, and you even write that Tim is always watching him. Is Tim trying to read Dick? Trying to understand? Or does he understand him by watching? What is he trying to figure out by watching Dick? What does that say about Tim? I really hope this is intentional lmao because I would be embarrassed. Maybe this is just something so obvious that I'm just getting now.

YES IT’S ON PURPOSE <333 Anon. Anon. I'm so sorry this answer took forever, but listen, this was a really delightful ask <333 I think about this a lot.  I really love origin stories—I like stories that resonate through a character’s history. 

And for me, a whole lot of what interests me about Dick and Tim is that theme of watching and being watched. Seeing and being seen.

"Watch me on the trapeze, Tim. I'm going to do my act...'specially for you." | "Timmy, don't look." | "I turned away... I couldn't watch. Then I heard you crying and I turned back... I'm sorry, Dick. I didn't want to hurt you by telling you all this." Dick's watching me. Gauging my reactions. (Tim watching Dick watching Tim!) | "I'm taking off the blindfold." "No!" | "I can't see him. You can't see him. But I know Robin. And Robin's always there when you need him." | I love that kid. Too much to let him see me like this. (But Tim spots him anyway.)

Spotlights and lighthouses and cameras and photographs. Blindness and vision and masks and detective work and trust.

I'm going to try to be coherent about this but it's gonna be incoherent sdfsf BUT I'M GOING TO TRY so. Below the cut, a really long grab-bag of my rambling on vision and watchers and watching.

Tim + watching / Dick + being watched / different dynamics

Tim's origin story

Being watched goes with vulnerability/exposure

Incomplete list of moments with Dick and Tim and vision

Tim + watching

The first time we see Tim's face in LPoD: a close-up on his eyes looking for Dick, a close-up on his eyes at the moment that he sees Dick, a pullback to his face at the moment of recognition, a pullback to his face + his camera (you could maybe even argue that Tim comes into existence at the moment that he sees Dick, like, conceptually. the act of seeing is his defining characteristic. it is the thing that makes his character happen. he is the kid who's watching.)

Tim's a very vision-centric character: he's first introduced as a camera, then as a pair of binoculars, then as a pair of eyes. His whole backstory is about watching: watching Dick's parents die, watching Dick on TV, watching Batman and Robin. I've grabbed a few panels above with Tim watching Dick but there are so many more. His major deductions are all vision-based: he sees Dick-the-acrobat and later recognizes Dick-as-Robin; he sees Bruce-in-the-past and recognizes him as Bruce-of-our-time; the climactic moment in Red Robin is about going into a dark cave with a torch so he can see what's there.

And he's a detective. He pries into secrets. He analyzes people. He's a worrywart and a fusser who always wants to understand what's going on with other people. In a lot of those panels where Tim's watching Dick, his inner monologue is busy deducing Dick's emotions and trying to psychoanalyze him. Tim's caring and watchful and intuitive... but all those qualities also make him very very intrusive.

Dick + being watched

Dick performing acrobatics for Bruce, Donna, and Tim in Detective Comics 38 (his first appearance), New Teen Titans 16, Batman 441, and Nightwing 88 (where he reflects he's glad to be back in the hot glare of the spotlight)

Dick's a detective too, of course - Tim deliberately mirrors Dick, both in-universe and out-of-universe. But also Dick's a performer who loves being watched and also wants to control how he's seen. He gets a kick out of showing off, making puns, kicking ass, taking names, and he gets a kick out of having an appreciative audience. And he's got a kind of yearning for recognition - it hurts, when Bruce won't look at him, and in fights with Bruce, Babs, Roy, he'll often bring up the past, trying to get them to acknowledge a shared history.

At the same time, he's a very private person who withdraws and hides and pushes people away when he's upset. Right before Tim shows up, Dick's just ghosted the Titans because he's having emotional turmoil and doesn't want to have it in front of them, and they're trying to respect his wishes... but that solitude doesn't last long, because then Tim tracks him down. Tim will do this again when Dick's having an emotional crisis and trying to avoid everybody in Nightwing 110.

Possible dynamics

Tim watches Dick in Robin 11, while silently analyzing Dick's anxieties about Two-Face

"The watcher and the person being watched" is a dynamic that really interests me, partly because it can be so complicated?

You can see in Dick and Tim their very first roles: enthusiastic performer and the enthusiastic audience member. Dick likes to perform and show off and entertain; Tim likes to watch; those are roles they both easily slide into and they have a lot of fun together! But also you can look at the harsher side: the crime victim and the voyeur, the amateur photographer and the guy who hates being photographed. Dick's intensely private about his vulnerabilities; Tim's intrusive and watchful and constantly trying to figure out how other people tick. Sometimes Tim's the caring friend who watches Dick closely, reads him well, understands him; sometimes he's the nosy mini-detective who pries into Dick's secrets. And that's just two different ways of describing the same thing!

One of the things that kinda fascinates me about Dick and Tim's relationship is that in a lot of ways it's built on a bunch of low-key boundary violations. A lot of their early relationship is driven by Tim's desire to know more about Dick vs. Dick's reluctance to get close to anyone from Gotham; Tim's often out-of-line, but without his pushiness, it's hard to see how they would've developed a relationship at all. Later on, their friendlier relationship is marked by Dick teasing and low-key bullying Tim; it's pretty obvious that Tim isn't actually bothered by this, but it does involve Dick ignoring whatever Tim's claiming he doesn't like ("Quit it!" "Shh").

And one of the aspects of those boundary-violations is that Tim has a habit of witnessing things that Dick would prefer that nobody see. Tim's a witness to Dick's first and most miserable tragedy; he sees the aftermath of some of Dick's fights with Bruce; he's there when Donna dies. And he's sharp and observant and analytical, and I like to imagine this as being something Dick's not entirely comfortable with.

When Dick first meets Tim, it's before he's learned to wear a mask. And Tim spends a lot of time trying to see through Dick's masks, and he's pretty good at it, and a lot of that prying comes from love and care, because one of the ways that Tim shows love and respect and admiration is by trying to absorb absolutely everything about you, like a little sponge. But there's also something unsparing and even threatening about the search for the truth of someone else. It can be comforting or threatening, to know someone's watching you.

And I love how all that complexity is wrapped up in Tim's origin story? Both the giddy childish "Watch me on the trapeze" and then the awful grim reality of what Tim actually sees as a result and then the difficult connection when Dick and Alfred finally get Tim to explain how he knows their secret identities.

Tim's origin story

Tim (recounting his origin story in LPoD): My parents held me back as the thing moved to you. I cried out to warn you. (Two panels where we see just Tim's eyes, as he watches a crying Dick. He sees Batman approach and start trying to comfort Dick.)

I think fiction sometimes presents "being understood / seen / known" as an uncomplicatedly good thing, and there's nothing wrong with that! But I like complications, and I like the way Tim's origin story frames that moment of witnessing as difficult and fraught. Tim doesn't want to tell Dick how he knows their secret identities because he thinks it'll hurt Dick to know it: I don't want to hurt you, Dick, and I'm really afraid I might. And he's not wrong. It is painful; it does hurt; it's not something Dick's happy to know.

Dick's a very private person, and there's a painful intimacy to Tim's origin story - it's not Tim's fault he was there, but at the same time, it's not like Dick chose to have the most traumatic moment of his life on stage in front of an audience of strangers, you know? It's kind of a violation. In NTT/NT/Nightwing, Dick's pretty violently hostile to photographers, and he's intensely private about trauma in general, and I like to imagine this as partly a reaction to that foundational trauma of losing the most important people in his life and also doing it publicly.

And Tim's part of that audience. And he sees the worst part, the part that Dick can't talk about. He sees the bodies and the blood. He has nightmares about it for years. He hears Dick crying and sees him holding onto his parents' bodies. Not at all the kind of first impression Dick would want to make. Not at all the kind of person he wants to be seen as. And that understanding can be painful, because it's so close to the bone, and when Tim's just a stranger, it's upsetting, because Tim knows things that Dick would never have chosen for him to know. Their few conversations about it are awkward partly because Tim's thirteen and awkward... but at the same time, it's not Tim's fault so much as the situation! There's no way for Tim to talk about what he saw that wouldn't be uncomfortable for Dick.

... And yet, and yet. Tim's also one of the last people to see the Graysons alive. He sees Dick and his parents together; he even takes a picture with them. He remembers the whole thing so vividly he'll recognize Dick's somersault years later. He sees the grief. And so I think of that connection as kind of a metaphor for witnessing. Tim sees these things and they become real; Dick can't hide from them; in the act of being seen he's caught, he's in a spotlight, all the grief made real. You can't hide, that way. And Tim's got this unforgiving memory; he won't ever forget; he won't ever stop knowing.

But then, too: Dick's seen, he's known. Even at the very beginning, when Tim doesn't know enough to understand what he knows, he knows the important things.

So that shared memory is a barrier and a bond between them. It can be a source of discomfort or a source of comfort. And that's how I think about Tim watching Dick in general - it's complicated, and sometimes Dick's glad of it, and sometimes he resents it, and also it just is, it's a fact of Tim, that Tim watches. It's notable when he's not watching, when he's turned away.

Being watched goes with vulnerability/exposure

So I'm going to talk about the fraught feeling of being watched more in a little bit, but first: I think it's fascinating that Dick likes screwing around with games where Tim can't see!

Here's Nightwing 25 - Dick's come up with the idea of trainsurfing while blindfolded:

Tim: Are you sure this is such a good idea? Dick: Shh! Listen. Tune into the changing sounds and - Tim: I'm not so - Dick: JUMP!

Here's Robin 49 - clambering through a tunnel into No Man's Land:

Dick: Hard not to think about the river. All the water above us. And bugs. This tunnels' probably full of 'em. And rats. Big ones. Big blind rats with teeth as long as -

Here's Gotham Knights 9 - ambushing Tim in a sorta game of hide-and-seek:

Dick: Gotcha! Tim: Augh!

I feel like mmm I don't want to emphasize power dynamics too much because it's easy to overplay it BUT when I think about headcanons it's interesting to me to think about how maybe when Tim can't see, Dick's more in charge / in control, and so he feels more comfortable and less vulnerable, and that's often when he's most relaxed and playing around the most?

Whereas the moments when Tim's looking at him are often a bit more fraught, as here in Lonely Place of Dying:

Tim: I'm sorry, Dick. I really am. I didn't want to hurt you by telling you all this. Dick... Dick: It's all right, Tim. No matter how old you are, there are some things you never forget. Or get over. (Silent panel: Tim's watching Dick as Dick turns away and stares into the window.)

Or here in Nightwing 6, when Tim wakes him up from a nightmare:

Dick (internally, imagining a kid falling): He shouts to me. He always shouts to me. I never hear what he says. Tim: Nightwing! Wake up!

Or here in Gotham Knights 26, when Bruce is accused of murder:

(Silent panel where Tim's watching Dick.) Tim: I'm sorry. This must be hard for you. Dick: Me? Why? Tim: Well, I mean, it'd be one thing if we really knew he was innocent, but as it is - Dick: Wait, what? Stop right there. What are you saying, Tim?

Here's Tim spotting him before he can get away in Nightwing 110:

Dick (watching Tim from a distance, internally): Still, Timmy played it through nice and clean. Disarmed the perps, protected and avoided the cops. Kept any civilians from getting shot. God, I love that kid. Too much to let him see me like this. Tim: Hey! (appearing on the roof above him, fake-cheerful) You weren't gonna leave without saying hi, were you? Dick (looking away, very quietly): Hey, Timmy. Tim: Look at you, man! Back on both feet! Think you're done stopping bullets with your body for a while? Dick: Hope springs eternal. (Silent panel with Tim watching Dick, who's turned away.) Tim: You okay, Dick? Dick: I'm fine. Tim: Well, where're you staying these days? Dick: With some people.

Of course, sometimes Tim's watchfulness is frustrating but also a comfort, as in Detective Comics 874:

Tim (watching Dick, who's looking away): Are you listening to me, Batman? I'm saying the gas the Dealer used on you was powerful stuff. Dick: I'm fine, Red Robin. Besides...you're here now. Tim: You're not fine. And with or without me, you shouldn't be out on patrol ye - Dick: Sshhh. Here they come.

(Later in the comic, Dick mentally concedes that Tim's right that he hasn't really recovered from the gas, and Tim saves him from drowning when he's hallucinating. So Dick feels kind of exposed by the scrutiny, but also... he invited Tim along, so there's trust there, too - Tim's perceptiveness can be a good thing, too, when things are serious.)

Incomplete summary of moments with Dick and Tim and vision

I think I already mentioned a lot of these but here is my LIST

almost the first thing that Dick says to Tim is "watch me on the trapeze, Tim" and then Tim does and he basically never stops watching;

Tim watches Dick's parents die and watches Dick sobbing on-stage and watches him on TV and recognizes him by seeing a particular trick because he's dreamed about Dick doing the trick in his recurring nightmares about that night;

in New Titans 65 which is their very first team-up comic after Tim's origin, Dick's training pre-Robin Tim and gives him a test about watching for details and later Tim's takeaway is "I saw how [the Titans] listened to you";

there's a moment in Showcase '93 12 which is just Tim watching Dick and analyzing what's going on with him and there's another moment in Prodigal which is the same thing;

in Nightwing 6 Tim sneaks into Dick's apartment and hides in the dark and Dick spots him and tackles him; one of their most important bonding comics is Nightwing 25, where Dick insists on blindfolding him to get him to rely less on vision; when they sneak into No Man's Land they're in the dark and Tim can't see again and Dick's teasing him;

there are multiple moments when Tim can't see Dick for a bit and panics about his safety, in Nightwing 25, in No Man's Land, in Transference, in Bruce Wayne: Murderer;

Tim's there watching when Dick's wedding to Kory falls apart and he's there watching when Bruce and Dick fight and he's there watching when Donna dies and he's watching when Dick and Bruce swing together on the night before Infinite Crisis, and when Dick goes down and almost dies in Infinite Crisis we cut to Tim watching and seeing it happen and screaming;

there are multiple moments which are just silent panels of them staring at each other trying to figure out what's going on with each other or having a stand-off - in Bruce Wayne: Murderer, in Resurrection, in Red Robin;

in the aftermath of Donna's death there's a panel where Dick's watching Tim from a distance and not approaching;

in the aftermath of Blockbuster Dick spends half the comic just staring at Tim from a distance and hiding himself because "I love that kid - too much to let him see me like this," but Tim sees him anyway and chases him down and then they lie to each other and *ranting* LISTEN TO ME the whole comic is about Dick trying to AVOID being SEEN both literally but also METAPHORICALLY AND --!!!

(the only thing i'm even as halfway obsessive about for them is the heights thing because also there are a bunch of moments involving falling or Tim being anxious about heights and worried that he'll fall or Dick will fall)

In conclusion

Consider the progression in all these moments where Tim's watching an upset Dick and worrying about him!! From reaching out instinctively-but-pointlessly when he's too far away in the LPoD flashback, to almost reaching out in LPoD but hesitating, to putting a hand on Dick's back to walk him back to the Cave in Gotham Knights 10, to physically dragging him clear of the water in Batman: Black Mirror!

In conclusion I don't have a conclusion but basically YES, "watching Dick" is a core Tim characteristic as far as I'm concerned, and Tim watches Dick a lot and that can mean all kinds of things from admiration to nosy intrusiveness to worry to care to gratitude to trying-to-figure-out-what's-going-on-with-him, and sometimes Dick's resentful and sometimes he's relieved and sometimes he's playful and sometimes it's a mix of all those feelings.

And at first it's always Tim watching Dick, but later you've got Dick watching Tim too, and there's that moment where Dick's secretly watching him fight but Tim spots him in Nightwing 110 and there's a silent panel where Dick's watching him in Resurrection and at the very end of Robin there's a scene where Dick's secretly watching him fight but Tim spots him and in the very last issue of Red Robin Dick's watching the end of the confrontation with Boomerang and in Prodigal Dick's the one who notices his face is bruised and aaaaaaah

Anyway I think they're neat <3

[nopeferatu]

Poll time!

I'd love to hear your reasonings for your responses! See below the cut for my own take, but only after you vote! :P

Putting this out there bc I've read a lot of BBM fic and I always thought it was pretty clear that the whole "Fellas like you and me, we march off to hell" "You may be a sinner, but I ain't yet had the opportunity" scene was Ennis slyly admitting to Jack that he was a virgin.

There are no lines that directly say this is the case, neither within the movie script (although there were rumors that an earlier draft had Ennis saying smth like "You may be a sinner, but Alma ain't yet given me the opportunity) nor the short story (unless you take "nothing he'd done before but no instruction manual needed" as the narrator saying Ennis had never penetrated anything before, which is how I have always understood it). I just always felt like Ennis assumes that Jack, the a swaggering, cocky rodeo dude, is more wordly than him and has been presented with a lot of different opportunities to indulge in what their conservative Christian society considers sin and vice... including premarital sex.

So imagine my surprise when I found that a surprising amount of people write Ennis as having had previous sexual experiences before ever meeting Jack. There's nothing wrong with it, of course, like you can interpret these characters however you want yanno? I just don't personally agree with that assessment.

Not to like... give any validity to the idea of virginity since at the end of the day it's just a social concept, lol, but I just think it's really important narratively that Ennis lose his virginity to a man. Like, he's been worried all his life about the consequences of queerness within men, and yet the seemingly first time he's ever presented with the opportunity to have sex is with another man, and he absolutely jumps at it. That point is in tandem with my belief that Ennis is the type who probably never pressured good lil Christian Alma for sex, which probably also leads him down a mental spiral after that first night with Jack. What does that say about him, that he was perfectly content with Alma not putting out, but that he did Jack with an angry enthusiasm the first chance he got? He might deny that it doesn't mean anything, but you know he lingers on it all the time.

Plus, I just think it's really cute that Jack is his first time. Jack, who he's been really drawn to since they first met. Jack, who probably became his first and only friend in life. Jack, who understood him in ways that Alma never could. I just really like the idea that Jack was the first person he ever had sex with, and the love that grew from there kept them coming back to each other over the next 20 years of their lives. How many people can say that they stayed loving the first person they ever had sex with that long? His relationship with Jack lasted longer than his own marriage, for Christ's sake.

Anyways... incoherent rambling over. I'm excited to see the results :3

[heraldofcrow]

10, 18, 23, 44, 49 forrr Sephiroth!

(Me and you share some love for white-haired main villain who has a very special circumstance of birth and is trying to stand up against his destiny, take control over the planet and end up fighting blonde protagonist who is their completely opposite but they are so similar… But mine is from FF9 xD)

FAREEHA YOU INDULGE ME TOO MUCH, THANK YOU!! You know I am holding back so much from writing essays on my beloved, loll. I need to stay CALMMM <3

Also, are you talking about Kuja?? Omg, I actually kinda know him! They did a FF9 crossover on the FF7 Ever Crisis game recently and they made a reference to him via Sephiroth actually. A very toned down reference though, haha. Sephiroth is still good and just a kid in Ever Crisis.

Anyway, if you want some of these asks on YOUR blorbo, just say the word!

Now for my incoherent ramblings!

~

10: Best moment on screen (or in the book)

This is so hard to say because he has so many. He can just show up and everybody gets awe-struck, but I suppose I would have to choose Nibelheim because it’s just the most iconic and establishes his villain role in the story going forward.

I mean, it’s THE scene…the scene where we see this famous war hero that everyone looked up to and loved completely lose his mind and set everything on fire lol.

I love it because I just get the ultimate “Fuck humanity” vibe from his downfall. It’s pure rage exploding from one person and the one person that really should NOT have snapped because of how dangerous he is. It’s terrifying and sad and perfect. I love this moment. I love villains that turn against mankind in general because of a horrific experience with humans. It’s very…human…hmmm…

This could only maybe be topped if the full remake version of him ascending into a seraphim-like, Biblically accurate angel looks as cool as I imagine it will. Can’t wait to see him wipe out the solar system in 4k <3

18: What they’d go to see a therapist about

EVERYTHING LMAO.

Ok, let’s just say somehow Seph didn’t snap in Nibelheim and lose his mind, instead being strangely calm and reasonable, thus deciding to go to fucking therapy. 💀

He’d have to go for his entire existence for one. His problems started from the moment he was conceived and even before, because um…his birth was an extremely twisted and violating experiment even as a concept. He’d have to come to terms with the fact that his own parents injected him with the cells of some fucking eldritch alien abomination while he was still in the womb so that he could serve some higher purpose after his birth. So yeah. He’d probably want to talk about that.

Then he’d have to deal with everything else like: serious mommy issues, Hojo, his mom, Hojo, Shinra in general, Jenova, Hojo, being raised as a child soldier, not knowing what it was like to have a hometown or normal life, not knowing what having fun was or how to socialize at all until he was like…14, Hojo’s A+ parenting, Shinra’s A+ childrearing, fucked up brainwashing and conditioning, war PTSD from when he was like…literally still a kid, Hojo being his dad, whatever happened with Gast, lifelong dehumanization via propaganda and military rearing, lifelong lack of autonomy, whatever terrible thing that is definitely going to happen in The First Solider, being sent to commit genocide as a kid, possible bloodguilt, severe psychological trauma, his only two friends bailing on him, Angeal’s death, his entire relationship with Genesis and what happened with them (I love my bois but their communication skills need some serious work xD), Hojo, human experimentation, the fact that he was the weaponized pawn of a cold, industrial, genocidal, tyrannical, warmongering organization his entire life without fully realizing it because they were really good at lying and manipulation, and finally….mommy issues and Hojo.

This is just all the canon stuff I can think of. If any more of the fan speculation gets proven right, it’s gonna get worse lmao.

23: If they were a scented candle, what would they smell like?

and also probably

sdfghjuikfghsj sorry lmao.

That would probably be post-insanity Sephiroth. Sane Sephiroth is just a melancholy sweetheart, so probably something like sage and vanilla because errrr…something-something sweet + slightly bitter + herbal symbolism my beloved + green and silver-white.

(CRIME BRULÈE LMAOOO I NEED THAT CANDLE)

44: Their happiest memory

Aww ;-;

I am trying to answer these all according to canon or at least what seems implied within canon, so I think it’s technically being with Angeal and Genesis.

This playful spar scene is very important, and it’s one of the only times Seph seems genuinely really happy pre-insanity. Later, when he and Zack are on a mission, he literally just stops randomly to talk about it all cheerfully. I mean, having fun with friends was a pretty foreign concept to him, it seems—so actually having the opportunity with his buddies looked like it meant a lot.

49: Favorite toy as a child

I’m sorry to say, but I remember seeing in one of the game guides that Sephiroth was in battle or at least training for it from before he was ten years old, and considering that he was raised to be a soldier, I don’t think he had any other toys besides weapons, hehe. I mean, in Ever Crisis, he is a young teen and has a scene where he experiences “having fun” for the first time. It’s a big moment for him, so I don’t think playing or toys were concepts he knew or understood as a kid. Maybe he had a few favorite swords though!

Had he been a normal kid….hmmm….well he is part alien and has a black wing…maybe he’d like a stuffed birb toy…ONE WITH BLACK WINGS. HA!

No, that’s just my crow propaganda smh, I’ll shush—

Ok, wow I really need to shut up dghsjk—THANK YOU FOR SPOILING ME FAREEHA! <3

[sjhhemmings]

“It was never you.”

brian zvonecek

a/n: this story went in a completely different direction than I intended and I am so sorry 😭, I might actually have to go back and try to write the prompt I wanted to because it’s too good and this story turned out so wrong. i’m sorry for breaking everyone’s hearts in advance. gah, anyway sorry for aggressively posting today, it’s my last day of freedom as everything starts for me again tomorrow. I hate Mondays.

warnings: alcohol, swearing, angst (no happy ending 🥴)

Walking into Molly’s at almost midnight, your sight as soon as you step into the bar makes you wish you never even showed up.

“Hey Y/N, over here!” Your best friend Gabby says waving you down to sit next to her at the bar.

“Late night?” She asks while handing you a drink and spinning in her chair to properly face you.

“Yeah, I didn’t get off until 11 on the dot. Traffic back home was a nightmare and changing into real clothes sucked because I haven’t done laundry and god, I wish I just stayed at home.” You exclaim since out of the corner of your eye you see Brian dancing with another girl. You also tried to take a sip of the drink Gabby gave you, but it turned out to just be water.

Working at Med is your dream job. You honestly wouldn’t trade it for the world, except when it comes down to the fact all of your friends are firefighters and you guys are almost always working opposite hours of each other. Then you would trade it. Trade it for a proper night out every once in awhile to be social and enjoy the company of others.

Gabby turns to look over her shoulder at the sight your repressing tears for and sighs.

“They’ve been all over each other all night, i’m sorry pumpkin.” Drunk Gabby says pulling your head into her chest to give her a hug.

Pumpkin. Pumpkin is Gabby’s drunken pet name for everyone. Once that girl has a few shots in her system everyone becomes pumpkin.

“I need a shot.” You announce looking at Herrmann who is stressed trying to get every person’s drink right.

“Oh my god! I am one person! If only my bartenders and co-owners weren’t drinking on the job maybe I wouldn’t be so swamped!” He muttered under his breath which kind of pissed you off.

“Okay Mr. Fireman who’s also Mr. Bartender, I get it your job sucks, you’re having a rough day, but so am i! I just got out of an 8 hour surgery that I basically performed by myself since my resident wouldn’t know his own head from his ass if someone didn’t tell him, and now I’m sitting here having to watch the guy i’m in love with basically get a lap dance over there stone cold sober, so please, get me a shot!” You half shout half beg at your longtime friend, who genuinely sympathizes with you and gets you your order.

6 shots later you’re drunk off your ass and rambling incoherently to Gabby who probably hasn’t understood a single word you’ve said in the last 15 minutes.

“You know I’ve given the last 2 years of my life to this guy, who barely recognizes I exist! I try to flirt, I try to make myself seen, but either the scheduling Gods won’t let me near him, or my consciousness who thinks everything I do is embarrassing won’t let me near him. I’m constantly losing!” You babble out to Gabby who is nodding along with her eyes shut so you know she’s probably asleep.

Taking a deep breath in, you look over to see Otis and his girl of the night and pout. That should be you. Sitting in his lap, nibbling on his earlobe in a sexy way, purring- okay purring what the fuck is up with this chick? What does he see in her besides a short skirt and a quick fuck? Oh that was rude…but you’re drunk so who cares.

The bell at the front door dings and the last person you would ever want to show up, shows up. Kelly Severide. What the hell is he doing here?

“Okay, time to go home,” He tells you basically announcing your departure to the remaining 8 people in the bar catching the attention of Otis.

“But I don’t want to!” you say back with your voice laced in attitude as if you were a middle school girl who didn’t get her way.

“Nope, I wasn’t asking, let’s go.” He demands trying to stand you up.

After a few seconds of the both of you arguing, Otis’ one night stand to be comes and starts talking to Kelly.

“Hey baby, what if we get outta here, she obviously doesn’t see a good thing in front of her when she has it so someone worth your while might as well take your offer.” She says biting her lower lip and trailing her finger up his bicep.

Kelly looks at her with complete disgust about to turn her down but you butt in before he gets the chance.

“That is my brother you stupid bitch.” You mutter not talking directly to her but you said it with enough emphasis she got the gist.

“Excuse me!?” the random girl yelps out like she’s a puppy I just kicked. This causes Otis to get up from his seat and see what’s going on.

“Is everything all right here?” He asks Kelly who seems to be the only adult in this situation. But again before he can respond you butt in.

“No, get this thing on a leash.” You say which causes the girl to yelp out again.

“Y/N stop, Otis everything is fine.” Kelly says trying to grab your arm and leave but you wiggle yourself free.

“No everything is not fine Kelly!” You say but before you can explain the walking mini skirt speaks up.

“Are you really going to let her talk to me that way Oti-bear?” She says with puppy dog eyes attached to his arm now. Seriously what is this chick’s deal?

“Y/N what is your problem?” Otis ends up asking,

“Otis, she’s drunk, i’m taking her home now.” Kelly says grabbing ahold of your arm again.

“Of course, always having your big brother fight your battles.” Otis says rolling his eyes to turn away but you’ve had enough.

“I was in love with you at one point you know that?” You say stopping Otis dead in his tracks with whatever the fuck anyone wants to call her now still on his arm.

“What?” is all he mutters still not turning around.

“You know the least you could do is face me as I say this?” You say absolutely not caring anymore.

Finally turning around to face you Otis sees the tears about to spill over your eyes and doesn’t know how to feel.

“I was so in love with you. For the last 2 years you spent almost every waking moment on my mind. I would go to events because I knew you’d be there, I would always be watching you from afar afraid to ever approach you and mess anything up between us..if we ever had anything. I don’t even know if you would be able to call us friends. But I loved you. I just know that I was so in love with you. You were the man of my dreams. The guy I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. But you’ve never looked at me twice, it’s always the other girl if there is one. Everyone has tried to tell me you don’t hate me, and that you’ll come around, but in the end it was never going to be me. Even this thing was going to choose Kelly over you but the second she got shot down and ran back to you, you took her in with open arms. Why? What about me Brian? What about what we could’ve had? Why can’t I ever be enough for you?

“It was never you.” Is all he says in response.

“What?” you’re the one at a loss for words now.

“You never could pick up on the hints could you? I’ve seen your longing stares from across the room, and the flirting, I’ve seen all of it. But It was never you. It’s not that you’re not enough for me, it’s that you were never an option Y/N. I don’t want to be with you. Is that clear? Can you understand that yet? It’s nothing personal it’s just it was never you.” Brian explains with absolutely no remorse.

“Go to Hell, Brian.” You say as your turn around and cry into your brother’s arms. The only thing you could ever want now is to just die.

“Jesus Otis.” Is all Kelly says as he rolls his eyes at the other man and walks you out of the bar.

“That was harsh.” Gabby says getting her stuff and following the two of you out of the bar.

“Hope you’re happy.” Herrmann then says walking out and leaving just Otis and the mini skirt alone in the bar.

[not-souleaterpost]

SOUL EATER ICEBERG LAYER 1 INTRO

Well it's not much but it's honest work:

I had to use that bitchute shit cause youtube fucked me over with copyright - and I ain't putting no stock music or video game ost - cause I might not have a lot of self-respect, but just enough to not be some "proffesional youtuber" - fuck that shit. But yeah, in the end, this is more of an experiment figuring out stuff - I now know that, no, mumbling my thoughts of the dome without many retakes is not the best, and that yeah splitting things into smaller parts is better - anyways as proof that this is just an intro, I'll just show how many entries the next few layers have:

So yeah, I get it's disapointing to deliver this little after all the time, but atleast know I got a better look at what is needed to get this job done - the plan is to go layer by layer till the work is done as they say.

At first planed to do two layers for this cause they are so short, but with all the holiday stress sadly I'm to busy to deliver in time without just crashing and burning - that's why I'm also posting this now - cause this is not good enough for a Christmas present lol - but maybe atleast as the pre-festivities gift you get from your coworker when the office HR staff makes you swap gifts.

Anyways, for those who don't get anything to the rambling, mumbling and general incoherence of the video and audio - yeah...sorry

(Also will probably not be active on tumblr still, maybe just reply to some messages, but if need me write me an email at souleaterpostanime@gmail.com)

[empressofedge]

This is going to sound so fucking cliché and sappy and probably not make a lot of sense, but I’m going to say it all anyway. I owe so much to not only this show, but to bumbleby in particular. I hopped on the RWBY wagon back in the Vol 2 – 3 hiatus and instantly fell in love with it. And my brother made a comment about Blake/Yang being a ship and at the time I was like JUST out and I instantly was like “I love them, wish they’d be together” (ahahahahahahahah) but resigned myself to being okay with just shipping them happily in my little corner. (19-20 year old me had no faith, idiot.)

ANYWAY. At the end of Vol 3 when ALL THAT HAPPENED I saw this amazing potential at an epic romance, and thought MAYBE???? And damn did I ship hard from there. Flash forward a few seasons… vol 6 started and we all lost our minds at every interaction. I’d been wanting to be involved with the community for so long and wasn’t sure HOW. I started writing, and that helped some. But there was this little discord server dedicated to bumbleby that I heard about and got the courage to ask to join. And so I did.

That… legitimately changed my life forever. Like not just my fandom life. My real, every day, life. I’ve made friends that will last a lifetime. Started playing dnd. Traveled internationally for the first time. I fell in love. Like damn, I owe the bees my damn girlfriend. Lol It says a lot though, about what good writing and good characters can do. These things can bring people together. And while it sounds dramatic – I know, I really do – that’s what RWBY and the bees did for my life.

I’m not entirely sure what my point is, if I’m honest. Maybe a love letter and a thank you? A celebration for seeing something so important to me come to fruition? But I felt the need to say… something. Anything. ‘Cause it’s not every day that a show makes me nearly cry from joy. Lol So thank you bees, thank you CRWBY, and thank you RWBY.

PS Sorry for the mostly incoherent rambling. This is mostly just me feeling like I needed to say something for me

[sophieinwonderland]

hi o/ jus wana start by saying dis is jus semi incoherent rambling of a sleeby oupy who didnt get to eat 5 borgars for dinner.

i find the anti endo point of “just doing it for attention” so weird

for one its really disconected from real life, like, attention is a basic need fir our body, its why solutary confinment is such good tourture. its like saying “theyre just doing it to get food” :l dumb argument, evyone needs and withholding food because someones starving is an evil thing to do, an so is ignoring someone who’s in need of social interaction.

and two, its blatantly wrong. like, we’ve told 0 people irl about being a system, we’ve only told like, 3 online friends, and we never talk about system stuff with them still cuz we’re scared of loosing those friends for being too weird. we pretty much never post about it on our blog an besides the blog description no one wud probably ever know. the one time someone guessed we’re a system in a discord servr i had a full anxiety attack an avoided any interaction for 2 weeks even tho they were accepting, an then when we finaly went back to talking there i made sure we had any trace of system stuff wiped from the servr profile an deleted the messages that made them ask and only just showed that all again after 2 months of keeping everything hidden. we’re terrified of people we know knowing we’re a system or getting attention cuz of tgat.

tho we’re definitly on the extreme end for that (mostly me tbh… the social isolation and abandonment issues exo-memories and the body’s trauma from similar irl stuff deff made me super scared about this) but its a pretty similar experience for a lot of systems from wut ive seen where telling ppl is pretty much an act of compleat trust an usualy very anxiety inducing.

besides, if someone really wus just after attention, they could just post a incorrect fact online or a really dumb take. thats much easier an will get a lot more attention than faking being a system ever could. like, saying something like “reading is bourgeoisie” on a semi popular post will be a thousand times better at getting u attention than being a system ever could.

theres so much more i wana say about this, like the ableism inherent to that argument point, or the way its linked to child abuse, but phone keyboard is stupid and terrible and im too hungy to think well enough to write out those points properly an do them justice.

anyways, i hope u have a great day/night depending on when u read this.

Right! And if they're claiming people are wanting positive attention, I don't see that as being that hard either.

Like, if someone wants to talk to people on the internet about stuff, there are spaces out there for literally anything and anyone. You're not going to get more attention for being a system than you would for being outspoken in a fandom or a religion or any other social group you're a part of.

People who want attention... don't need to pretend to have people in their head to get it. And the attention you would get for that is often going to be negative because a lot of people are sanist and pluralphobic. But as you mention, it's not even the best way to get negative attention when there are so many actual troll-y things you can do.

You can find hundreds of communities online with people who will support you and give you attention for your takes on various topics! Or you can find hundreds more who will hate you if you push the right buttons!

There's just... no logical reason to fake being plural for attention.

And isn't this, again, the very same claims that have always been made against the LGBTQ community?

It's actually kind of funny how that happens, isn't it?

The people who are getting attention are generally the ones who most conform to society. It's not plural or trans people. It's the ones who do their best to fit in and be like everyone else in their group. Meanwhile, people who have identities that diverge from the norm are often left outcasts and shunned by peers.

And yet it's the latter group that's accused of attention seeking?

It makes no sense. 🤷‍♀️

[will-o-wips]

It is 4 am. I'm staring at the ceiling of my bedroom, coincidentally having my phone right in my line of sight, and write this with the exasperation and intense focus that I probably won't ever have again. I'm about to attempt to make any sort of sense of the latest Hayao Miyazaki movie, The Boy and the Heron (or rather, How do you live? in Japanese), that I watched for the first time in theatres a day ago.

I cannot claim to be right, or to know everything about this movie. Actually acclaimed critics and people with obviously more braincells than me have probably better takes than I do. But I must speak, lest the insanity truly take over my brain, lest I really end up combusting because of how much I want to talk about this.

Prepare yourselves for the most incoherent train of thought and line of consciousness you will ever experience.

FILLED WITH SPOILERS READ AT YOUR OWN RISK. YOU WILL NOT UNDERSTAND UNLESS YOU HAVE SEEN THE MOVIE.

Before I start with my actual thoughts, however, I'll state my personal feelings about the movie, because I feel that matters too, and this is my post anyway so! But I personally left the cinema feeling somewhat mellow. I was not insane about it yet. It was,,, "meh". The impression of the ride was great; I was giggling along with the funny and even sometimes not purposefully funny moments, I enjoyed the animation to the point I would genuinely flap my hands in excitement at how good it was, I understood the story in great lines by noticing small details and going "oh so does this mean x?". But I did not cry. Not a single tear during or after or before the movie. I did not waver with my opinion on it as I rambled about it to my friends online and irl, much to their annoyance. I did not hesitate when I put it in my silly little Studio Ghibli movie tierlist maker that I update whenever I watch another one of these films together with my friends, categorized (in)discreetly under "all vibes no plot but there's a witch/wizard". I still don't, in fact.

So, given all of this, you'd probably say that I disliked the movie. That I would not have so much to say about it, after doing my mandatory ramble and update. Wrong. I still have more to say, somehow.

Despite that, I didn't rewatch the movie itself. I read an entirety of one (1) review of it, together with one (1) random video essay of 8 or so minutes, covering the basics of it. I reblogged one (1) post about its protagonist on tumblr and otherwise kinda read through the rest of the posts on here. I did not re-experience or re-examine this movie again. I cannot (again) accurately reference anything besides that what I vaguely remember from watching it a day or two ago. It's not playing anywhere near me anymore/not out anywhere else yet, so really, I don't even know what possessed me to write about this, or even say anything. The most fascinating thing (to probably all of us here) is; what made me change my mind about it?

It might've been the review on IndieWire. David Ehrlich and his well-written review, bringing things into much needed context as to why this movie was created. It could've been the fact that I've actively processed the movie better, now a little bit of time has passed. [Honestly it deserves a second watch/view for something more concrete, but I'm repeating myself with this, you get it.]

But I don't even really understand it myself. I felt and still feel so detached from this movie in a sense. I appreciate the artistry that went into it, and I adore the way it simply tells the story and leaves it up to interpretation. It references every single film Hayao Miyazaki has ever made before, and elements of other Ghibli films can probably be found in there too, if you looked hard enough. The vibes were similar to those of Spirited Away, and Howl's Moving Castle, given how inexplicably fantastical the world was. It just existed and breathed, and we as the audience jumped straight into it. We never got more exposition than what was needed; honestly I have a feeling that the second half of the movie was the vaguest piece of media I have ever consumed in my life. But it also had this perfect balance of the more drama-focused Ghibli films. The Boy and the Heron, in my opinion, is like the golden middle between reality and fantasy, both in terms of its narrative as well as comparison between other Ghibli movies.

This might also be the reason why I felt confused. The lines between reality and fantasy were so effortlessly blurred, that you could only process a singular picture. And when things are vague to me, I constantly need to pick them apart and analyse them, simply to satisfy my own curiosity.

The moment before I stepped into the movie theatre, my friend who watched along with me told me they heard it was a film about grief. I nodded along and said "yeah, okay, that just means it's another one of many Hayao Miyazaki and Ghibli films. Most of them are about some kind of loss, and dealing with it, either way." I sat down together with them; row 9, chairs 17 and 18, with my two bottles of water (one carbonated, one stilled) and the bag of terribly sour packaged chocolate pretzels I bought at the theatre itself. Horribly overpriced for the quality, I must say. My friend held onto the popcorn, and we sat through the ads, talking and laughing, anticipating something that was supposed to blow us away.

I cannot speak for my friend, but I think they really liked the movie regardless. They didn't cry at it either, even though we both know of each other that we always cry at such things. Somehow this movie evoked a certain stillness in us both; a stalemate between emotions and confusion. Maybe delayed processing. Maybe something else entirely. We both, or at least I, hid it until later.

It was midnight, and right before we stepped on our train home, I was excitedly going on about the references and animation, the things I did appreciate. I bragged a bit about how I recognized Kenshi Yonezu's voice in the final credit song that we didn't get to listen to entirely, because it was so late and we had to rush to get home. They laughed at me and told me to take some time to actively formulate any coherent thoughts on it. I disagreed (lovingly and jokingly of course), and we left it at that.

In the train itself, the same high dimmed into a simmer, the excitement replaced with contemplation, and I kept talking.

I told them: "I believe that this truly is his last film. This felt like a goodbye." And in return, they replied: "It's crazy how this is the last time we'll ever get to live in such a moment. The release of the final Ghibli movie in theatres.

"I'm glad we got to go."

I was too.

I got home, rambled about the intrinsic way The Boy and the Heron referenced other Ghibli movies to my online friends who had yet to see it. Followed by a heated tangent about how When Marnie Was There truly could have had better direction in regards to the narrative, as well as how Only Yesterday was the most boring out of all Ghibli movies. It was a nice night. I didn't think about the movie again.

The following morning, I contacted other friends, who told me about how Robert Pattison voiced the Heron in the English dub, which I hadn't seen or heard at all. He did a great job, judging by the trailer. This led me to another opinion, namely the video essay (I will try to find it and put it in the notes later if you are curious), which claimed something similar to this (of course, paraphrased):

"This is a farewell. The one true movie to tie such an expansive career. It is another movie where you are allowed to explore the magical together with the main character, while sticking close to the processing of it all."

The review I read said it was a swan-song, that it was the question and title of the movie in Japanese, posed at us, after The Wind Rises left it open to interpretation at the end of its run. That this was a story about the legacy that Miyazaki is leaving behind, how reality and fantasy coexist together, possibly influencing each other (not explicitly said but what I interpreted that review saying, so no this is also not completely like this).

Other tumblr posts I've seen on here say it was a film most likely dedicated to his son, Goro Miyazaki. That it was a gentle "I'm sorry, the shadow I leave behind is huge. I know that you will try and fail to fill it. It's okay; you don't have to. You can leave it behind. It's alright if this legacy dies with me."

Some other sources I've seen compare the main protagonist to Miyazaki himself, trying to grapple with the ending.

Yet somehow, all of these interpretations seem to fail to explain the entirety of this movie. The bigger picture if you will. These themes and moments and interpretations are not wrong, but to me, they're not satisfying enough.

Because maybe I am the only one who actually was insane about this moment, but I will never forget the delivery room scene between Mahito and Natsuko. How Himi addresses the magic stone, pleading to let the two go, saying "Natsuko and the boy who is to be her son". (Again, paraphrased, I cannot remember the exact line.) Maybe I am the only one who witnessed the whimsical fire witch and the going back in time plots and the fact that a younger Kiriko and Himi were there, already part of an ecosystem. How we already know from the other grannies in the house that Mahito's mother disappeared once for a whole year into the tower, and then came back the same as before. How the pelicans were BROUGHT there, that they did not belong there, and yet were forgetting how to fly. How they ate the Warawara, these creatures that were rising above to be born in the upper world. How the Heron's weakness was his 7th tail feather (or something along those lines), and how the fish and the frogs chanted for Mahito to join them in the tower. That the great-great-uncle was hoping for Mahito to succeed him and build a new tower, yet the king of the parakeets butted in and haphazardly did the job, resulting in it immediately toppling over, as well as the stones getting cut.

I think about the final scene where the Heron says "It's best to forget. Do you have any keepsakes?" And Mahito shows not only older Kiriko's figure, but also a piece of the stone paths they walked upon in order to get to the centre, the beating heart, the magic stone and his great-great-uncle.

How this is taking place during a war, that the timeline goes from his mothers death that Mahito cannot get over, to the welcoming of his stepmother and his new younger sibling. Them moving back to Tokyo. The way the tower completely collapsed. Completely and utterly collapsed and perished; not even a trace of it left behind. The way that older Kiriko keeps yelling it is a trap to Mahito in the beginning, but that both he and the Heron know. That it is inevitable to tread this specific path. That he must see for himself, whether his mother is truly alive. The way she both was and wasn't; first a mirage of her older self disappearing into a puddle of water, and second a firey spirit of her younger self coming to help Mahito. The way that he reads and cries at the book she left him, the way he hits himself with a rock after his big fight with his classmates; the way Mahito in general drowns consistently in the beginning of the film. He drowns in the fire that he lost his mother in. He drowns in the mud and the dust when he tries to enter the tower at first. He drowns in his dreams, in his tears, drowns right into his quest to find Natsuko (straight through the floor, by behest of his great-great-uncle), drowns in pelicans trying to eat him, nearly drowns in the actual sea until younger Kiriko fishes him out.

Now these things may seem like me just randomly naming shit that happens in the movie. Hopefully in a slightly poetic way, possibly. I could go on and on about the imagery, truly. But my point is, this movie may have been Miyazaki's last movie, his way of closure, his way of speaking to his son about his legacy, his way of describing the grief of losing his mother (idk if this is autobiographical or not. It very well may have been), yet...

Even so, it doesn't really fit the entire picture. It feels incomplete. The analyses always focus on the true meaning behind this movie, what happens behind the scenes, this one key climactic moment between Mahito and his great-great-uncle. But that's as if you would ignore the rest of the movie in general. As if the fantastical aspects weren't there to abstractly tell a story besides just being a symbol of closure for the person that directed it.

Personally, this is a tale of rebirth. Of losing yourself, and then rediscovering yourself in a way. I associate it with my own personal loss of my grandfather; the family member I felt closest to out of everyone.

The way you look back at such a traumatic stage in your life, something that irrevocably changed you for good, something that you probably don't ever want to relive again, but also mustn't forget. The way you instinctively are afraid to learn about who the person you love and grieve was, before you were in their life.

To this day, I still cannot speak to my mother about whether my grandfather had a favourite song before me forcing him to sing along with my favourites. A favourite book before he read out bedtime stories to me tirelessly. Who the boy in him was, and what wisdom and life lessons he carried on, into his grave, into the hearts of his children.

This movie depicts so much more than just grief, it's so much more than just legacy, even. It directly reflects the way I know I would have felt had I dared to actually see things for myself. If I actually dared to go through my grandfather's old things; the books he wrote and dedicated to me, the books he read when he was young. This movie depicts not how to live, but how to live on.

And the only way to live on is to move forward. To look at the foundations upon which it was built, to evaluate whether you truly want to have this be your burden to carry for the rest of your life. Mahito's abstract grief in regards to his mother, and the solace he finds in the fact that he at least knew who she was; that he at least had her in his life as both his mother and the girl that his stepmother knew, that at the very least he knows his mother would do it all over again, if she could. That despite everything, she did not regret a thing, and that she was not afraid. That somewhere, in the past, she lives on, happily marching toward this fate, because she knows that Mahito will be there to meet her again in the future.

And Natsuko, god, she worries relentlessly about whether Mahito will accept her. She worries to the point she yells at him, telling him that she hates him and his existence, because he rejects her so coldly and yet still bothers to show up in front of her during her most vulnerable moments. That he only takes and takes and takes; he steals her cigarettes in order to learn how to sharpen a knife from one of the servants. He uses those techniques to create a bow and arrow, a weapon. He gets into fights at school, he gets gravely injured on the side of his head, leaving a lasting scar.

If I were in her shoes, I would be furious at him too. Especially if he walked straight into the delivery room, trying to drag me out of bed while I was doing my damn best to keep the other child in my belly alive.

That scene, that sheer rage, and the way it ALL FUCKING SUBSIDES the MOMENT Mahito accepts her and calls her mother. The moment Mahito understands that through the literal whirlwind of plasters, things used to tend to wounds, none of those pleasantries/guards will truly allow him to reach her. The way he tries to nurse his own wounds, as well as try to nurse hers, over the loss of their shared connection (Natsuko's older sister, Mahito's biological mother), will NEVER allow him to make a connection with her. By being careful, by being polite, he will never get to be her son.

And he realizes, in that moment, that he wants to.

The magic stone tries to stop this. The magic stone dislikes disruption; dislikes things changing, dislikes breaking traditions (the taboo of entering the delivery room). The parakeets in the tower flourish because they follow the magic stone's whims more or less. They agree to follow its rules, even if it means they are prone to its abuse, because it gives them an advantage, a place to stay. The pelicans have to eat the Warawara, because there is no other food available to them.

The way younger Kiriko says "you reek of death", and how they establish this place is mostly made up of death and dead people. Dead people, or dying people, creatures that are begging to survive another day. Creatures that are begging to be reborn. That want to change, that wish to fly once more.

My mother once gave me a poem dearest to her heart. We have always been a family filled with literature and stories, but my mother was always the best at both writing them and reciting them. She used to read them out to me, back when I was in a particularly bad spot mentally, to the point I could not get out of bed for weeks on end, to try and reach me. She read with the sincerest passion in her voice, a small plea to get me back to the girl I was before.

I cannot explain or remember the poem by heart, but once I was at my true rock bottom, she told me to look it up. A Serbian poem, written by Miroslav Antić (I will add the name of it later), that was about growing up and growing into your own person. It made me weep, for it had a phrase I think I can only translate to this:

"Run and don't look back."

Somehow, whenever I look at all of these birds and creatures in this fantasy world, trying to fly desperately, trying to get to the skies, trying to get to even live, and think about the fact that the only way they can is by leaving this place. That the only way they can fly and survive as themselves is by leaving this tower, this stone, this foundation. By leaving and being born, by leaving and being reborn.

And, after all of this. Somehow I'm not even done yet. I haven't talked about the great-great-uncle in depth, nor the king of the parakeets, nor the heron whatsoever. I have not yet even touched upon what I might think the magic stone is, and the sheer amount of like symbolism I picked apart in my brain because of my insanity.

I'm probably not the only one who noticed these things. But so far I haven't seen anyone actively share these things, so, I will do my best to continue and genuinely wrap it up as best as I can. So that this can also bring the same amount of closure as the movie does.

The magic stone is like a shooting star that came onto the earth. It realizes dreams and worlds of whoever dares to walk into it and claim to own it; like how Mahito's great-great-uncle got obsessed and built a tower around it, caging it, taming it. And yet he still had to play to its whims, consistently making sure his own tower of blocks did not fall, that all of his work did not amount to nothing. Personally, I do believe the great-great-uncle could represent Miyazaki himself. That Miyazaki is trying to express how he built Ghibli and that now it has been going on for so long, and it has become unmanageable to continue upholding it. That it is time to retire.

A thing I find interesting and remember pretty well is the conversation between the parakeet king and the great-great-uncle. How they talked about Mahito's transgression, breaking into the delivery room (side note: he broke in and broke through to Natsuko with his mother's spirit. Mahito became Natsuko's son with the blessing of his mother; with the sheer love she had for him being carried on and through), and how the great-great-uncle says something akin to this:

"It is why I wish for him [Mahito] to succeed me."

"I cannot overlook such a transgression."

I feel this is important. It is key to how the great-great-uncle views Mahito in this. Because Mahito was not sent out on this quest to find Natsuko out of pure selfishness. Sure, his uncle would have wanted him to succeed him, but the entire reason WHY he believed in Mahito to begin with, is the fact that this boy was able to break the foundation and the traditions in the first place. Mahito inherently disobeys from the chosen path. Mahito inherently does not believe the Heron when he says that all herons lie. Mahito doesn't waver when the heron flies straight at him, he doesn't sway when the frogs or the pelicans overwhelm him. Mahito stands firm in who he is, even if he is trying to deal with new circumstances. Mahito inherently goes to places he should not be in (his curiosity for the tower). Mahito has enough power on his own to create a new tower, but only by rebuilding it from scratch.

This ready acceptance that the great-great-uncle has towards Mahito's decision NOT to inherit his legacy, is what makes me believe this is what this movie is supposed to represent. Break away from the old, off into the new. Closure. Moving on.

This is also reflected in the sentiment that Mahito truly DOES move on. He goes back to his family, his father, school, he goes back with Natsuko as his mother and a new younger sibling to Tokyo. He returns there where he came from, but he is not the same anymore. He is reborn into a new Mahito.

And god I feel like I'm repeating myself to death here; I really should have thought about the structure of this, but give me some slack okay. It's like 6:30 am already and I'm still not done, despite continuously writing and labouring at this.

So, the tower that immediately falls apart by someone who always follows the whims of a dream (the parakeet king and the stone respectively). God it is just such a momentTM. Because in the end even this shows that the parakeets, too, even though they by far had it the best in that goddamn tower, had to leave. For they could not build something on their own without learning who they were outside of the already established. Outside of just following the rules and all.

They had to leave, my GODDDDD.

As I'm getting progressively more unhinged, we shall move onto the most unhinged character in this entire fucking movie. The Heron himself. God there's too much to unpack here, really, but the truth is, the Heron was supposed to be the guide to Mahito. The Heron was supposed to be Mahito's biggest, most aggressive enemy, the direct antagonist to Mahito's protagonist. The Heron doesn't want change. The Heron tries to bribe Mahito with the fact that his mother is still alive, that he need only enter the tower, and lose himself to illusions and dreams. That fantasizing about his mother being alive won't only drown him more, that it won't just let Mahito sink into the deepest pits of his despair and anguish about such a death, that losing yourself to the belief that something is there when it is not wouldn't only be counterproductive. The Heron masks himself consistently; he says that all herons lie. He says that he only has one weakness, his own feather, that allows the arrow to automatically target him. In essence, the Heron shot himself in the foot beak. He himself slipped up in his mirage world, and came out to be who he truly was, this weird little man with a huge nose and a conniving demeanour. He adamantly cannot disobey the dream, for then his true nature comes peaking out (a small detail I absolutely love is the fact that the Heron's feathers also disappear out of Mahito's hands when Mahito is called back to reality by the grannies. The grannies protect him in the dream world too, by being his tether and support system while he gets over himself and starts trusting Natsuko). The Heron doesn't WANT to be a guide, for in order to be a guide, you must tell the truth. You'd need to know some facts about the world around you and share this information with the ones seeking guidance. This is how I believe Mahito understood the Heron before we did.

It's not that all herons lie; it's just that this particular one does not want to face the truth/reality.

Another interesting detail: the whole reason why only Mahito was able to cover up the hole in the Heron's beak was reminiscent about how only those that called you out can really patch up your old image. Only those that have poked holes in your false narrative are able to fill them back up again, and even then it is not the same, and even then it will not always be comfortable/reliable.

Either way, the Heron, after this wings partially turn into hands, his true nature, is unable to fly all that well for a while. He relies on Mahito's corkscrew thing in order to relish in his comfort zone of lies again. But throughout the movie, the Heron slowly starts to ignore the corkscrew completely; simply opting to stay in his (frankly, freakish) half gremlin man half heron costume form. The Heron changes because Mahito inspired him to change. Even though his image used to be spotless before, and he tried to deceive Mahito, after a while, he stopped doing that. The mutual trust both Mahito and the Heron had grew. The Heron became a person, although his heron-ness would never go away.

The Heron thus warns Mahito that he should want to forget. That he will forget, either way. That this struggle of his to grapple with the reality of his situation, and the fantasy that he was delving into, will become a far-off memory that Mahito should not revisit. The Heron, I believe, is genuinely trying to look out for Mahito.

"Don't dwell in what you have already overcome. Don't revisit the things you have already outgrown."

And this is where the movie more or less ends. Mahito still keeps that stone, and his mother's book, and he goes back to Tokyo; the only crucial difference is that he has overcome his own grief.

Now, I've said this like a billion times now, but this is the rebirth. This is what I think this movie stands for. What it means, at its core. This is what it means to live; to move on and to cut ties with that what has no place in your life anymore. Miyazaki, I think, is trying to give us closure, a final farewell to Ghibli altogether.

Now I don't know about any speculation that he might come back again, and personally, I don't think it really matters. If he does come back, good for him. I just don't know enough to say anything for sure, so I'll just say I cannot say.

Either way, I think, even though Miyazaki conveyed the need for a new start/a rebirth, he didn't really end on the complete abolishment of all that used to be. You are allowed to keep mementos of it; even though the Heron advises not to. Mahito is allowed to reflect upon this experience, to see it as another stone in his foundation/formation, to say that, yes, the spirit of this change will always stay with me, although it has passed.

Just like how Mahito's mom was someone who returned to the past without regrets. She never came back. She was a spirit that pushed Mahito forward, and he will always remember her, but it's better that she stay a memory than become a fantasy.

This is why I'm so impressed by this movie in general. I'm so thankful that I was able to witness this with a friend of mine. I'm glad that I was able to see this, even though my insanity knows no bounds, and the fact that I didn't even think about any of this until I really sat down to look through the options of interpretations.

I'm so glad I got to go. Now it's time to run towards the future, and never look back.

[autumnslance]

Writing To Yourself

(Mileage may vary, I'm not your mom nor your teacher--unless you're working for a specific state healthcare service, anyway.)

That's how you garden. Tend the plot. Plant a million seeds, reap a thousand blooms. The rest? Compost for the next crop. -@biot08 / @driftward

During a Discord convo, I thought about why so many fandom writers catch “writer’s block”, and some of it goes back to self-care and taking in new media, getting inspiration and knowledge, covered in this post. But much of it?

People think everything they create has to be publishable for others’ consumption. That is Not True. Too often we don't want to write things just for the sake of writing them, falling into the trap of thinking it needs to be perfectly polished and shared, but No It Really Doesn't.

Folks talk about “writing for oneself” but in terms of posting finished pieces of the kinds they want to see. If everything feels like it “has to be” publishable, it can start to put too much pressure on oneself. And then there’s your block, especially if the type to worry about how others Perceive you and your art.

Try simply writing anything and deciding later if it's something you want to share. I have pieces I wrote cuz my brain suddenly said it wanted to, but that writing isn't posted anywhere. Usually it’s random lines; out of context sentences, scenes, or bits of dialogue. Sometimes just incoherent character rambling. Ideas for situations and what ifs. Misspelled, typos, not grammatical, redundant wording, passive voice, bad POV, too many adverbs, not enough active verbs, not enough description, too much description, etc. All in notebooks or doc files. I’ve shared the (now out-dated) deep nests of my WIPs folders and the multiple, unfinished, unpolished pieces within them. Most will never be completed nor seen by the public. 

For instance, I've a random smut fic of a Highlander Warrior of Light and the popular antagonist of Shadowbringers. I'm not usually a villain liker, but one day it hit my brain, so I wrote it. I have notes and outlines for the rest of their story and how it plays out, though I'll probably never write more. I scratched the writing itch, stretched some skills, considered things from a different angle, and now it sits in drafts (I did post a couple decent-ish smut lines to my private Twitter once).

Mostly, it's practice. Even if it's junk and janky.

“But I have (professionally) published X or Y…”

Still gotta exercise the writing muscles! Still gotta scrawl off something utterly unusable now and again for the heck of it!

All those random lines, descriptions, scenes, rambles? Maybe I'll use them someday. I wrote them down to feel the pen in my hand or keys clacking under my fingers, to see the words pop onto the page or screen, to play with word choice, sentence structures, and “how would they say that?” For my own satisfaction, no one else’s.

When I get bored or stuck, or need a screenshot or writing prompt response, I might poke at those lines, pages, rambles, and see if they hit now or spin off to something else. They often don’t. But sometimes they help inform other things I do post to the public later. Even if that’s just a Question of the Day prompt response on Twitter.

(That also counts as writing and creating btw; you’re still coming up with something to share about your characters and I think that’s very creative of you.)

If the mood strikes, write. Even if it's just a vague idea--especially if it's any bits of dialogue or description, if it's something you think that you actually do want to write when off work or out of bed or whatever.

Even if you never post it anywhere public. Even if it never gets out of crummy first draft, unfinished pages form. It might feel like pulling teeth and look rough, especially if it’s been awhile.

But still write it. No one else has to know or see. Not until you want them to.

Maybe parts of it will inform something you do finish later. Maybe two years from now another prompt will hit just right and you’ll dig out that draft and finish it for posting. Maybe you’ll cannibalize aspects of it for an entirely different piece. Maybe you’ll even use it in a few more years to see how far you’ve come as a writer.

In many cases? That's how you actually keep writer's block away. Keeping ideas around to steal from yourself, letting yourself write nonsense, unpublishable bits and pieces, maybe even whole pages, just for the heck of it, if writing is something one enjoys and wants to stick with as a hobby (or professionally). If you don’t enjoy writing for fun? Don’t force it; do little character prompts and blurbs as they feel right, and find the ways to share creativity that work for you.

And seriously, don’t forget to take in new media, experiences, and information. This is How You Lose the Time War got me writing on an original story I shelved last autumn. The stories aren't at all alike! But seeing new words in new ways helped shake something loose in my brain. So try to make some time for that, too.

Write to yourself, not for others’ consumption. Public posting is great for validation and encouragement, for when we feel the urge to share due to pride or just wanting to gush about our faves. But also let yourself remember why you liked creating worlds, making up stuff about your characters, and writing at all to begin with, without the pressure of public posting. Give yourself some grace, and let it all be messy, unhinged, misspelled, ungrammatical, incomplete, and make no narrative sense.

Write to yourself, for yourself. Then let the rest follow.

[cvrc11]

AN INCOHERENT RAMBLING ANALYSIS OF A VERY SMALL PORTION OF NIER AUTOMATA (2017)'S THEMES

Okay so it has been 6 years of me basically thinking about Nier Automata at least once a day and planning to eventually write something coherent about it, and I still plan to do that because lord knows this will NOT be coherent, but @flemmboyant accidentally prompted me a few days ago to spew a bunch of analysis of this game she has never played at her and she told me it would be a good tumblr post so. This is my extremely rambling and incoherent response (slightly edited for clarity where her responses to my messages were relevant for context) to the prompt "Tell me about Nier Automata's themes", because I just needed to get this OUT OF MY SYSTEM apparently jesus christ it's been SIX YEARS it feels so much longer how did i ever live before Nier Automata. anyway.

This contains full spoilers for the game's themes and narrative, and also a single pretty major spoiler for the original Nier, and probably will only make sense if you're familiar with the game, so, readmore time!

[okay so this all began with me saying that 2B's highly sexualized design, and to a lesser extent 9S's kinda creepy schoolboy design, actually serve important thematic functions despite Yoko Taro's insistence that he just "likes pretty girls". So that is the theme I am explaining here at the start] Basically I think what Automata is going for with the fact that all the normal, "civilian" androids who are fighting in the war as a ragtag resistance are wearing sensible clothes and look like adult humans with fairly photorealistic deisgns, but the military androids who are created by and fight for YoRHA are either anime waifus in sexy maid costumes or pedobait pubescent boys in schoolboy outfits (a thing which is definitely more widely sexualized in Japan than in the west) is that the military propaganda machine of YoRHA is invested in the spectacle over the reality of war and purposefully attempts to distance their aesthetics from the harsh realities of war and make them all sexy and shiny and cute. And ALSO the game has this thing about how the androids have maybe been programmed to experience the equivalent of human sexual pleasure when engaging in violence and murder so anything that aesthetically brings sex and violence close together is in service of that, such as the fact that 2B's and 9S's clothes get blown off when they use their BUILT IN SELF-DESTRUCT OPTION because they're SENTIENT BOMBS BUILT FOR A FOREVER WAR WITH NO PURPOSE BUT THE PERPETUATION OF A CYCLE OF DEATH AND VIOLENCE but they've been made SEXY and CUTE to MAKE EVERYONE, INCLUDING THEMSELVES, FORGET ABOUT THAT FACT AND -------------------------

also the YoRHA androids are all made to be sexy and aesthetically perfect but they are not expected to experience love or desire or appreciate beauty, aesthetic or otherwise, while the normal androids who look like normal people DO experience all these things and act on them and fall in love and fuck and love flowers and landscapes but the YoRHA androids don't even KNOW that they ARE sexy and aesthetically perfect because it means nothing to them, it's just what they look like, and being half naked is meaningless to them but they always have BLINDFOLDS on because yoko taro is SUBTLE AS A BRICK and the scenes of the greatest intimacy and sensuality and love are those in which they TAKE OFF THEIR BLINDFOLDS and see each other's EYES

and even the machine lifeforms, who look alien and have nothing of the human form about them, understand desire and love and beauty more than these perfect beautiful sexy porcelain dolls who mimic the most exaggerated fantasies of their ancient human creators who are no longer even alive to appreciate them

anyway now you have the requisite knowledge to understand why i am insane about the one moment in nier automata that i am the most insane about, which is when, in a conversation that isn't voiced and plays out in text on a screen between 9S and one of the game's antagonists, the antagonist in question suddenly, in an attempt to throw 9S off, asks "You want to **** 2B, don't you?" and it's this big shock moment because OBVIOUSLY you ASSUME that says FUCK and this comes out of NOWHERE and it DOES throw 9S off HARD and then later in the game 9S's mental state deteriorates very significantly and he fights a bunch of 2B clones and during the fight he starts to be creepier and more manic and obsessive in the violence he inflicts on her and in the end he chokes the last one of them to death while laughing maniacally and also crying and you think the plot twist is that the censored word was maybe KILL and he's secretly been trying to kill her all along but then you remember that their sex and violence responses have been programmed to be the same and you realize the word isn't censored for THE PLAYER because PEOPLE SWEAR IN THIS GAME ALL THE TIME, the word is censored FOR 9S because HE DOESN'T KNOW THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE TWO, THEY ARE THE SAME TO HIM and AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

he's a GUN in LOVE who thinks the only feeling is BULLET

anyway this is only one layer of the like 5000 thematic angles this game is juggling. the first boss you fight is named Marx and Engels. Fucking. YOKO TARO, MAN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

there's a part where a bunch of children commit suicide and depending on how you interpret certain stuff the game MIGHT be saying to you, in that very moment, that they were never real people and didn't actually feel anything and were just machines doing a fake-out chinese room thing to mimic genuine human interiority, and grabbing you by the throat and going "so you SHOULDN'T CARE, RIGHT??? so WHY DO YOU STILL CARE, BITCH" and this moment rewrote my personal understanding of what it means to have empathy and what the moral value of empathy is, but it could ALSO NOT BE SAYING THAT AT ALL and their feelings COULD have been real in which case it is instead asking you if you feel good about yourself because you WANTED their feelings to be real, you TAUGHT THEM to feel like real humans, you ENCOURAGED them to embrace their humanity and be humans and not machines and now they're DEAD BECAUSE OF IT so WAS IT ACTUALLY BETTER FOR THEM TO FEEL THINGS, YOU MONSTER

none of this is even TOUCHING on all the INSANE shit this game does with GENDER there is SO MUCH GENDER EVERYWHERE the gender is LEAKING THROUGH THE SEAMS the YoRHA soldiers have comical over the top sexual dimorphism and absolutely NO interest in gender or traditional gender roles while the robots that have no sex of any kind or any reason to even associate with any gender whatsoever are OBSESSED with human gender and WANT TO HAVE IT SO BAD and they DON'T UNDERSTAND IT but they WANT IT SO MUCH and they KEEP TRYING TO INVENT GENDER but they DON'T KNOW WHAT ITS FOR they just THINK IT MUST BE IMPORTANT BECAUSE IT WAS IMPORTANT FOR HUMANS and in their attempts to enshrine it REVEAL ITS ABSURDITY AND POINTLESSNESS

this is the Little Sister machine. By putting that pink bow on her head of her own volition because of her naive and foolish but authentic desire to be a woman she is more of a woman than 2B, who was designed by generations of scientists to be the Most Woman Ever but who has never had a single thought in her life about the concept of gender or womanhood, could ever be. This is the game's implicit message all the time and it rules

i didn't even get into the themes about the unnecessary overvaluing of "authenticity" or "natural" things that are manifested by the fact that not only are there no humans in the game, humans died out a long time ago and the "regular people" you interact with are all other androids like yourself who either were never programmed to be insane killing machines like you or simply broke their programming at some point so now you ostensibly fight your forever war to "protect humanity" but are in fact protecting your fellow androids but ALSO THOSE "HUMANS" WHO MADE YOU AND THEN DIED OUT CENTURIES AGO WERE THEMSELVES NOT ACTUALLY HUMANS BECAUSE IN THE ORIGINAL NIER IT'S REVEALED HUMANS DIED OUT THOUSANDS OF YEARS BEFORE /THAT/ GAME AND THE "HUMANS" WHO MADE THE ANDROIDS IN NIER AUTOMATA WERE THEMSELVES ARTIFICIAL CREATIONS DESIGNED TO PREVENT HUMANITY'S EXTINCTION THAT FAILED AND INSTEAD JUST BECAME THE NEW HUMANS SO YOU ARE LIKE. SO MANY LAYERS DEEP INTO NOT BEING "NATURAL" OR "AUTHENTIC" HUMANITY BECAUSE IN FACT THE LAST BIOLOGICAL HUMAN DIED OVER ELEVEN THOUSAND YEARS AGO

So ALL that stuff I talked about the authenticity of "real" gender AND the authenticity of the "humanity" of the robot children has to be taken in the additional context of MULTIPLE MATRYOSHKA DOLL LAYERS OF FAKE HUMANS

[at this point she asked me WHO ARE YOU FIGHTING IN THE GAME because as you can see I kept referring to a war without explaining bc i was too busy being insane about THE THEMES]

YOU, or "androids", are fighting "machine lifeforms", which, you see, are TOTALLY DIFFERENT, and unlike YOU, an android who definitely has normal human emotions, are OBVIOUSLY just mindless drones with NO semblance of humanity to them, because THEY were designed by an ALIEN RACE to INVADE EARTH and then it's revealed the aliens actually died out on their own like IMMEDIATELY after invading and the machines have just been self-replicating all along lmao

honestly the FUNNIEST part of Nier Automata is that THE ALIENS ARE REAL and are UTTERLY IRRELEVANT

like. it seems so OBVIOUS from the START that the big reveal is gonna be "oh the machines are ALSO man made this is some wild misunderstanding and the war is pointless" and then you FIND THE ALIENS and they're DEAD IN A SPACESHIP and the FACT THAT THERE'S ALIENS THAT INVADED EARTH IS NEVER EXPANDED UPON they are never given A NAME OR ANY DEPTH OR ANYTHING IT'S JUST AN ACCEPTED FACT OF THIS SETTING THAT "THE ALIENS" INVADED AT SOME POINT AND NOW THEY'RE DEAD, LET'S MOVE ON

and they are NEVER BROUGHT UP AGAIN because that's the POINT, the point is that both the humans and the aliens are an EXCUSE, even if the androids didn't KNOW both species were extinct (which, the android LEADERS did know about the humans at least), it wouldn't MATTER if they DID know because the war is no longer ABOUT humans OR aliens even though that's what ALL the propaganda is about and the motto of YoRHA is PROTECT MANKIND and you hear that phrase EVERY FIVE SECONDS and then it's revealed they're dead and NOTHING CHANGES and the androids STILL shout PROTECT MANKIND as they go to kill and die in an endless war over nothing with a group that by and large isn't even hostile, they're just sitting around trying to figure out if putting on a pink bow bestows GENDER for fuck's sake they have no interest in conquering the earth for aliens that THEY don't even KNOW about because they don't even HAVE the mythologized notion of their own creators that the androids have, the machines that ARE fighting are only fighting because THEY'VE ALWAYS BEEN FIGHTING and that's just WHAT LIFE IS and AAAAAAAAAAAAA

you built a world wide death machine army and told them they were fighting for peace but they can never make peace because they're a DEATH MACHINE and all they know is DEATH and THEY'RE GUNS IN LOVE WHO THINK THE ONLY FEELING IS BULLET and that REMAINS TRUE ON THE LEVEL OF THE PERSONAL DRAMA BETWEEN 9S AND 2B JUST AS MUCH AS ON THE GRAND SCALE OF THE GLOBAL EXTINCTION GENOCIDE WAR BECAUSE THEY'RE THE SAME THING DRIVEN BY THE SAME FUNDAMENTAL PROBLEM AND THAT PROBLEM IS THE FASCIST DRIVE TO BUILD A GUN TO SOLVE EVERY PROBLEM

as you can see even when i start by saying "the FUNNIEST thing about the game" it ends up being NOT FUNNY AT ALL because it's ALL ABOUT THE THEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEMEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEES [tears off my own head and kicks it out the window, still screaming about themes]

[tiredassmage]

I am now over here reading all of Dash and Leo’s fics 😭

RATTLES THE BARS OF MY LITTLE ABODE! Leo is CATNIP to me in!!!! I think a slightly different flavor or variety than some of my other blorbos, but breaking down his behavior is just!!!! OOUUU I've been in my feelings about it all day.

And I think... part of the catnip of Dash & Leo is... is I Think... there was a level to them where they both identified the Other as Better and man I just. Bowl of soup, I want to drink it directly from the bowl. I'm probably incoherent right now because it is bedtime but OUUU. YOUR HONOR.

Funnily enough what started all this was chatting with another friend on Discord [so like whole bonus ramble I guess for this] about blorbos and that sent me on a Leo spiral that had me, in short, pondering the what if, or if he does, actually, end up twisting around his whole deal of getting into smuggling from... well, a predicament he got into and doesn't have a clear out of to... something he might be able to favorably manipulate if only so he finally has some room to pay back caring for the few people he is close to and I think... with Dash in his life and Liv still genuinely usually across the galaxy from him, he's... just trying to make a version of this bad scenario in which he might be a bit more genuinely able to look after himself so he's not worrying them all the damn time and I cannot emphasize enough how much I want to shake him like an ill-advised move against a vending machine about it. [He still thinks Dash deserves better but he is so, so, so Dash's sad little wet stray feral cat about it, he will Not Leave unless he is booted back on the street. Might still shake about it in the meantime though.]

I do also still have the handful of kiss prompts I got sitting in my inbox, one for the boys among them, I have kept them. This semester has been... That's a whole 'nother post in and of itself, but it's been a Time, so I haven't been rotating them to actually write much of them yet but they're in there. My little dragon horde of blorbo thought kickstarters when I need a pickup. And ofc the BG3 takeover happened, too. >.> [Inhales] But ouuuu Dash and Leo cuddles... I could return to those thoughts... They're so good. So Good.

Man who is giving me SO MANY MORE COMPLEXES IN THOUGHTS doing that to him too OUUU why I do that to me, right?

So I unfortunately don't have more words to offer yet. Spare camp edition Leo for the road instead perhaps?

smth smth baby you're my angel you're my darling annngeeellll--

Anyway blows a kiss to the sky. For Dash, our beloved. <3

[uranium-city]

@june-doe-event’s June Doe is finally here & with that I made my first entry to the with the pride prompt!! Here are a bunch of ramblings about my headcanons for the choir!! Maybe I’ll do little icons or something in the future but for now I just wanted to write my thoughts in the incoherent mess that is these few paragraphs 😭

Ocean is an asexual lesbian! As someone who only likes women she just radiates those vibes, it takes one to know one, y’know? Anyways with Ocean’s strong need to conform to societal standards I can very much see her as someone who suppresses their sexuality to feel more desirable by society. Girlypop’s got a lot of internalized homophobia she’s working through & is the last member of the choir to come out. The rest of the choir lowkey realizes she’s queer before she does 😭. She’s very “[Woman] is so pretty… but I’m NOT gay guys I’m NOT GAY!!” 

The ace part is pretty self explanatory. Throughout the whole musical Ocean is repeatedly disgusted by anything & everything sexual. While it could be argued she does this to keep up her goody-two-shoes, moral persona, the fact that her acting like this only serves to antagonize her from the rest of the choir leads me to believe it’s less of a “Look at how moral I am!! You should vote for me!!” thing & instead a bit more personal. Her putting down Noel, Constance, & Ricky for expressing sexuality most certainly will not get them to vote for her I feel like she’s saying these thing just because that's genuinely how she feels about sex. 

I posted this the other day but I’ll add it again here since I wanna make this point “I always found it odd how in Every Story’s Got a Lesson straight A student, miss smarty pants Ocean O’Connell Rosenberg interprets the lesson behind Romeo & Juliet to be “teen sex kills” & not that baseless hatred leads to unnecessary bloodshed. I’m sure it’s just a throwaway joke & doesn’t matter at all.. HOWEVER I will be using this to spread my ace Ocean agenda. No one that smart misinterprets such a simple message like that unless they already view sexual relationships in an inherently negative light.” Big sex-repulsed ace vibes to me.

Noel is canonically a gay man so there’s that. In my mind he’s a cis man but enjoys presenting himself in a fem-leaning lense. Like he definitely would’ve gotten into drag if he had lived & doesn’t mind she/her pronouns despite identifying as a dude. He’d probably get all giddy if you referred to him as Monique. Overall just very comfortable in his identity.

Mischa is THE bicon of all time. I feel like it took him a while to realize that as well but not because of internalized homophobia like Ocean but instead because he just?? never really thought of it as an option?? Mischa’s not homophobic in the slightest but grew up in a country where queerness is typically regarded in a negative light & because of that the thought of him being queer never really crossed his mind. It wasn’t until he met Noel that he was like “Wait… man can actually like man?? Like romantically?? …like actually??! Woah... that’s awesome..”. I also like the idea of Mischa being polyam because he has two hands Goddammit & one’s for Talia & the other is for Noel. 

I feel like the entire RtC community collectively agreed on Ricky being trans which is really funny to me /pos. In my mind he’s gender-fluid & uses any pronouns & is usually referred to with he/him due to being masc presenting. I don’t really have any strong opinions on whether he’s transfem or transmasc I just know that he hasn’t got a cis bone in his body lmao. I feel like I tend to gravitate towards transfem since that seems to be the most common headcanon in the fandom but transmasc Ricky has really been starting to grow on me. I like the idea that despite the language barrier he faced & more traditional urban-ness of Uranium City he was able to express himself through transitioning & presenting more masculine. He’s not a trans man but he’s typically more comfortable settling with a masculine identity so it’s the best way he can express himself to a town that’s not understanding of his identity as a genderqueer person. + he was actually played by a transmasc actor once & that’s really cool!! Either way, trans Ricky is so real & I love how creative the fandom is when applying that headcanon to aspects of the musical like with the many interpretations of what Savannah meant to Ricky. Sexuality wise?? He definitely likes women & is either flat out only attracted to women or bi with a heavy female lean. 

Jane Doe doesn’t even know her own name let alone her sexuality. But that can’t stop me from giving Penny Lamb headcanons >:]

Despite the fact that I think about Penny the most out of the choir I never really could settle into a set lgbt headcanon for her?? I would love to say that Penny’s a lesbian but Legoland is very complicated with how it portrays her sexuality. Like it comes across that Penny does like men with her remarks on Johnny Moon & is only bullied for being a “lesbian” since this is the 2000s & being homophobic to the weird kids was the norm back then. But also?? Penny is pretty much implied to not even know what a lesbian is?? With her sheltered upbringing in Elysium it’s possible she didn’t even know what the concept of being queer was until she started being bullied at St. Cassian. Like if she didn’t even know being queer was a thing until she was like 15 then I highly doubt she has any sort of grasp on her identity. Like this isn’t your everyday normal comphet, this is… ADVANCED comphet.. + with all the Ride the Cyclone productions that have so many different futures for Penny (or whoever Jane is brought back as) including ones where she takes a husband, outside Legoland sources saying Penny’s not gay, but also the knowledge that Legoland is admittedly dated & if it were to be revised in modern day it would likely make Penny queer or at least leave it ambiguous since it’s more appropriate, I am so endlessly confused. I like lesbian Penny a lot !! I would like for it to be semi-canon but I definitely wouldn’t die on the hill that it is because of the way Legoland is written. Anyways those are my thoughts.

On a more brief note I feel like Penny’s agender but in a really apathetic way. By that I mean she just does not care at all. She doesn’t mind being referred to as a girl, she just doesn’t feel very connected to it. She doesn’t feel really connected to any other identity either, like in regards to gender she feels like she could just take it or leave it lol. She was born female & has such been referred to with feminine terms her whole life so that’s she’s become used to it, but if one day everyone around her inexplicably started referring to her with masculine terms she’d just continue her day like “oh okay that works too I guess.” 

Additionally Ezra shares the same feelings surround gender except that he’s accustomed to masculine terms instead. The main difference is that if you asked Penny her pronouns she’d probably be like “Oh I don’t really have a strong preference, thank you!” while Ezra would be like “Gender is a socially constructed scam created by the U.S. government to sell more toys at the McDonald’s. I am above that meandering capitalist propaganda. Do not refer to me.”

& finally Constance I go back & forth from her being the STRONGEST straight ally known to man & her being pansexual. (She does claim to see the gold, the pink, & the blue… coincidence?? I think not… /j.) Either way she definitely threw everyone little parties when they came out with cupcakes decorated as pride flags. She very supportive regardless of if she herself is queer or not. & while I hadn’t thought about this before, my one ace friend brought up that the way she regards sex as just something she needs to get out of the way comes across as ace reminiscent & I’ve been thinking about that a lot. I can def see her as being on the ace spectrum!! To me she doesn’t experience a complete lack of sexual attraction & definitely isn’t sex repulsed like Ocean but falls in the middle of ace & allo. Gray asexual Constance is very real to me. 

[grishaverse-chaos]

as promised, here is:

grishaverse ships as taylor swift songs!!

malina - im only me when im with you

THE childhood friends to lovers song!!

just a small town boy and girl! living in a crazy world! trying to figure out what is and isn't true!!

and I'm only me when I'm with you!!!

don't wanna fly if you're still on the ground!!

it's SO malina

darkl!na - dear john (censoring the ship name so it doesn't show up in tags!)

sksadgshdh I had to

on a serious note it does fit very very well

don't you think I was too young to be played by your dark twisted games!! regret how I ignored when they said run as fast as you can!!

you'll add my name to your long list of traitors!!!! the darkl!ng literally DID add her name to a list of traitors sjdhshdgjdhd

genyadavid - paper rings <3

it's just..... so cute and soft, I love it sm

and you know something? david DOES like shiny things and he WOULD marry her with paper rings!!

nikolina - getaway car

taylor literally wrote this song for nikolina, I take no criticism

you were driving the getaway car!! we were flying but we'd never get far!! should've known I'd be the first to leave!!

no but they LITERALLY met in a getaway car. they were LITERALLY flying. but they didn't get far.

I'm sorry I will never shut up about this ever

ANYWAY!!

kanej - renegade

that one scene in soc where inej goes "I will have you without armour or I will not have you at all"

it's literally just GET YOUR SHIT TOGETHER SO I CAN LOVE YOU!

there was nowhere for me to stay but I stayed anyway!! you wouldn't be the first renegade to need somebody!!!

GOD the accuracy of this is killing me.

I can't lie I could write a whole essay on every line of this song and how perfectly it fits kanej.....

you fire off missiles cause you hate yourself but don't you know you're demolishing me!! let all your damage damage me!!

wesper - enchanted

idk how to explain this one it's just the Vibes

walls of insincerity.... playful conversation starts, counter all your quick remarks

just the whole thing where they first meet reminds me SO MUCH of enchanted I can't even

helnik - miss americana and the heartbreak prince

.....yet another that I could write a whole fucking essay on

nina IS miss americana!!

my team is losing! battered and bruising!

boys will be boys then, where are the wise men!

IT'S YOU AND ME THAT'S MY WHOLE WORLD, THEY WHISPER IN THE HALLWAY SHE'S A BAD BAD GIRL

and I'll never let you go!! cause I know this is a fight! that someday were gonna win!!!

zoyalai - peace

tbh I considered ciwyw as well but in the end I think this is ALSO such a zoyalai song I couldn't not pick it

honestly I can see this being from either perspective.... neither of them can give the other peace! and that's what they love about each other!!

I can't even choose any lyrics to highlight, just the whole song

actually wait that was a lie.

okay so think about zoya believing nikolai is too good for her. now think about "your integrity makes me seem small, you paint dreamscapes on the wall... it's like I'm wasting your honour....."

SIT WITH YOU IN THE TRENCHES!!!

the chorus.... I can't imagine it any other way than nikolai singing it to zoya tbh. I'll keep your brittle heart warm?? I would die for you in secret??

but you got a friend in me = as my general. as my friend. as my bride.

this is probably incoherent but OH WELL

tamadia - invisible string

again I cannot explain it's just the Vibes

isn't it just so pretty to think all along there was some invisible string tying you to me?

it's so CUTE and I love it

also "cold was the steel of my axe"

because tamar and axes.

anyway! that's it!! this definitely got super incoherent and rambling towards the end but I hope y'all enjoyed it :D