#velveteen rabbit spoilers

[landwriter]

Dream as The Velveteen Rabbit, loved to life by Hob:

Dream is an Endless. Hob has loved him for a long, long time, but nonetheless they are parted, perhaps forever. On this dark night of the soul, he thinks of his life with Hob, what more he would have wished for it, and cries. One of his tears is a real mortal tear, and from that tear a magical flower blooms, and from that flower The Fates emerge, and they say, in their strange and three-voiced way, that he has become Real to the boy that truly loves him, and now they will turn him all the way Real, and he will have a different ending. And although he may no longer rule the Dreaming and it is no longer a part of him, he still visits it every night, when he falls asleep next to the mortal called Hob Gadling.

It is known that an Endless may never love a mortal, but there are no such rules about a mortal loving an Endless, and no one knew the consequences of being really loved by a human, not just played with and set aside, except perhaps The Fates themselves, who were watching it all, and smiling.

@give-to-oblivion <3

[utilitycaster]

I've mentioned I don't care for the implications of Reincarnate for FCG but to expand briefly, I think there's something that sits very ill with me about a character's final realization - that they are truly alive despite being a constructed entity and that they have agency - coming back as an arbitrary organic being with no input into who they are.

[magical-misfit]

I really hope that at some point Pinocchio meets the Velveteen Rabbit, just so he can learn the ideal of “to be real is to be loved” cause gdi my boy deserves so much better

[flowercoasts]

“this gets to be real now.” “are you sure?” “i’m sure.”

[a-mermaids-heart]

I know this isn’t really the same thing, but it’s been stuck in my head:

“‘Real isn't how you are made,’ said the Skin Horse. ‘It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.’”—The Velveteen Rabbit

“‘Camilla and Palamedes were loved by Nona,’ said Paul. ‘Pyrrha was loved by Nona. It’s finished, it’s done. You can’t take loved away. We loved you too. Palamedes and Camilla loved you.’”—Beloved Paul 🥲

[soyboysace]

i can't with this fucking ominous, creepy kid ! i hate ominous, creepy kids ! this isaac kid is scaring me more than gideon supposedly should hnggg i can't

[askamnesiamoonjumper]

ok so based on the results of this poll I’ll post my shapes design revamps yippee :3 (BUT I’ll put the spoiler one under read more so it’s a win win👍) (btw Applique is their homes name for context bc I don’t think I ever said that here before ?)

they didn’t change too much I just was wanting to mess with their colors a bit to feel more unified/overall more magenta leaning ?

SPOILERS YAYYYYYY it isn’t reflected in the art v well but they get a growth spurt in timeskip/are a bit taller than shown here :3€ Anyway ily velveteen rabbit symbolism,,,,,,,

[always-a-joyful-note]

As I have somehow become entangled in the Ensemble Stars fandom (I hate it here. Don't follow me to these waters, you guys) and am slowly reading the stories after the main one of music (and after watching the anime), I have come to the conclusion that Nito Nazuna is (probably unintentionally) Velveteen Rabbit coded.

If you don't know the story (spoilers for it ahead, you can read the short story here), it's basically about how a stuffed rabbit given to a boy as a Christmas present gets neglected in favour of newer mechanical toys. During his neglect, an older toy tells him a story about how the love of children to their toys can make them real, which the rabbit desperately wants but has little hope for. But by chance, a nanny gives the boy the rabbit to sleep with, cementing it as the boy's favourite toy. Sure, it gets more worn and other rabbits point out how it can't hop, but at least its loved...until the boy contracts scarlet fever and, for disinfecting reasons, the rabbit has to be taken out to be burned. Yeah, messed up...but as it waits for its fate, the stuffed rabbit sheds a tear where a flower with a fairy grows. The fairy proceeds to tell him that the boy's love made him real and takes him to the forest where he's able to finally hop away with the other rabbits.

I know it's a stretch. But a former toy/doll, incredibly loved but not really seen as real and that destroying him even if he's fine with it...then neglected when his "owner" contracts a sickness...then finding a spark of life that frees him from his inability to move...a transformation from loved doll to a real something that learns to love himself. Tell me that isn't Nazuna, and the rabbit imagery even fits. He breaks free from his constraints not to be alone but to be with others of his kind, to move of his own will with others! It's just so...we are all human and our relationships are so complex and someone else's tragedy that also makes you hurt for them can also be the reason you find your own self -

Honestly, I'm not sure if this is actually Velveteen Rabbit coded since I've only seen that story in the anime, but like...if you squint, it fits?

[princess-of-the-corner]

I’ve always really disliked the idea of Adrien and Felix being Sentimonsters.

I mean, I don’t think the concept itself is inherently bad, but that clearly wasn’t something the writers had in mind before the introduction of the Peacock Miraculous. We only see hints of Adrien being a Sentimonster after the theory became popular in the ML fandom. There aren’t any moments in seasons 1 or 2 where we can go back and say “oh, now that we know he’s a Sentimonster, that makes a lot more sense.”

And it honestly makes the whole show and it’s world building all the more needlessly complicated and convoluted. Like, if Adrien was a Sentimonster the whole time, and Gabriel had his Amok, how the heck would it even be possible for Adrien to disobey his father and attend school in Origins?

YEAH NO LIKE

So!!

In /theory/, I don't mind the plot of 'they were Sentimonsters all along'. I don't mind the idea of other added in characters like Kagami or Zoé being Sentimonsters.

Honestly I kinda love the existential discussion that can come from such characters. At what point does programming become a person? Is artificial life truly real? So on and so forth. Anything from the Velveteen Rabbit to Chobits to I, Robot.

But yeah there are. There are so many plot holes.

Adrien is able to disobey Gabriel for the first two and a half seasons. Not even 'wiggle out with loopholes' but just straight up disobey.

Gabriel and Nathalie never sense that Chat Noir is a Sentimonster.

When Gabriel suspects Adrien of being Chat Noir, he doesn't use the Amok to force Adrien to tell the truth.

The Peacock Miraculous can casually create Sapient Life. This is not an issue for Ladybug killing them though.

So on and so forth.

Hell, Sentimonsters weren't even introduced until /the last five minutes of Season 2/.

Which brings me to another point re: the lack of setting this up: the actual lack of setup.

Let's compare this to two other recent series that did mystery/reveals WELL. Gravity Falls and Steven Universe. SPoilers for both of these ahead.

Gravity Falls had the reveal of Ford overall.

They set this up from episode one. The mystery of the Author of the Journals, Stan seeming to know more than he lets on, etc. Throughout the next season and a half, we got little hints to all of that. Some more subtle than others. But enough that the fandom caught on!

And it was a good mystery that even when we thought we were going to be proved wrong, thanks to Alex Hirsch trolling us with McGucket, there was still enough evidence to it.

Which made everyone scream when Ford actually showed up and confirmed that Stan had a secret twin who wrote the Journals.

Steven Universe had the reveal of Rose Quartz being Pink Diamond.

Throughout just Season 1, we are introduced to hints. Gems can shapeshift. Rose had secrets. There was a Gem Rebellion that Rose was the leader of. The Diamonds exist. Old ruins on Earth show an insignia with white, blue, yellow and pink diamonds, while modern ships show only white, blue and yellow. All sketches of Steven/Rose's Gem include it being diamond-shaped but just pointed inward.

And even when we get the reveal of Pink Diamond's existence, though thinking that Rose killed her, that's still a good reveal that made sense and builds up the next half of the mystery Rose being Pink.

These were great! They were good mysteries and had the fans going very early on!

And again, compare it to ML, who doesn't start this big mystery/reveal until half way into Season 3.

[mokkkki]

SWTE A1 C12 - 1 Winner, 6 Losers, 1 It's Complicated 

Because Lucius Malfoy is in a fucking Hooters uniform.

Guess who wrote this on Monday but forgot to post it? Anyways, another amazing example of what happens when I try to make Regulus happy, this 2 POV Halloween-themed monster is the most chaotic of Act 1, so far (and I know I say that every week, but it's because the shit that happens each chapter keeps increasing!). I like to think it has all of the staples of a solid Sleeping With The Enemy chapter: an excruciatingly dramatic inner monologue, truly bizarre behavior from all of the characters, ruined plans, and so many emotions that writing it gave me whiplash. Here is the 1 winner and many losers from "Trick ± Treat", alongside their Halloween costumes! Spoilers below the cut. 

Winner: Bellatrix Black (Black Swan)

Yeah, our only winner in this chapter is Bellatrix. Who isn't even a PLAYER in Orion's fucked up mind games? As Regulus identifies, she's the only person who uses their money in a fun way. While her family was getting emotionally tortured by Orion Black, she was in France, hosting a bacchanal, and flew home to NYC to have the cutest matching costume with her sister. Unbothered queen.

Loser: Renée Vance-Black (The Velveteen Rabbit, a costume she changed out of as soon as a nanny snapped a picture)

The seven-year-old hugged her dad, and he had fallen on the floor, having a mental breakdown. Then, she sawhim throwing up. THEN, her parents ditched her for a Halloween party. She's a child I'm sobbing this isn't fair.

Loser: Petra Pettigrew (Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson In His Black Turtleneck)

Even though her costume was fire and her party seemed to be going great, I'm going for her as a loser since halfway through this great party, her old high school friend turned into a werewolf, and she had to scurry through the halls as a rat. Also, Regulus really kink-shames her after he gets locked in her love dungeon.

Loser that probably thinks he's a winner, the optimistic idiot: James Potter (Unknown)

James literally says three words in this chapter, but he's still oddly prevalent. He's a loser because Remus, who hasn't told James that he was attending, has transformed during a very public event, and if this gets out, MMG, alongside his reputation, is ruined. While he saved Regulus, this was not a victory; it was a necessity.

Loser: Remus Lupin (The Joker)

I don't want to hear ANY counterpoints on this one. I think a counterpoint would be impossible to form. The only reason he's a winner is because Sirius and Marlene had an argument; other than that, it's lose, lose, lose. He goes out and transforms in a public space full of friends and business partners. Sirius bites his shoulder. Marlene calls him a side chick. Literally the most ginormous loss.

Loser: Sirius Black (Conan The Barbarian)

He fights with his wife, then fights with his boyfriend, and said boyfriend turns into a monster and absolutely brutalizes the brother that he's arguing with. Like?? Do I need to elaborate??

Loser: Lucius Malfoy (Hooter's Girl)

His crush told him that she'd match costumes with him, but guess what! She didn't! Now, he's all alone in a tight nylon scoop top and booty shorts. Sirius found him hot for a millisecond, though?? But to Lucius, that probably makes for an even bigger loss. Either way, long live Himbo Lucius.

It's Complicated: Regulus Black (Hannibal Lecter)

Bro. I literally don't even know how to start. Regulus would be a loser, since his daughter catches him in the middle of a mental breakdown, he has a weird moment with Emmeline (tbh, all their moments are weird), and he hangs up because he literally can't handle the sound of James' voice. And that's just BEFORE the Halloween party, where he has a tense moment with his brother that he probably won't forgive anytime soon, a werewolf slams him against the wall and a red stag scoops him away and charges into safety, accidentally stabbing him with its antlers, and ending up in Petra's fucking love dungeon. That is a LOSS. But the very real, very large thing that makes me reject his status as a loser is that he's deprogramming himself from his father's bullshit. I don't know if this is because of James' influence or a part of his recovery from Slut in the Hut- but instead of having his Van Der Woodsen moment and throwing his phone out the window, he tracks down a homeless man and gives it to him, instead. Very rudely. But still. Regulus is undergoing a very subtle transformation (even a physical one, at the beginning on the chapter- go Animagus Reg!), and I just hope that he's able to complete it before his father finds out- and drags him straight back to where he came from.

read chapter 12 here!

[chiefyakousdilftits]

Fanfic / OC Talk Under The Cut !! Vague Spoilers For Chapter Four Of Rain Code ( And Velveteen Rabbit ) !! ✨

Yui and Yakou basically all of Chapter Four. 🤠✨🥂

[angie-j-kay]

Okay, here are my takes from Barbenheimer, and the messages the movies seem to be pushing:

Spoilers under the cut.

Oppenheimer:

If you're autistic, have anxiety, or are generally sensitive to loud scary noises, be warned that this might set you off. This was very much a horror movie, disguised as a historical thing. Also, Christopher Nolan music is Christopher Nolany. YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN.

The great horror wasn't that the people involved were monsters, it was that they were just people. ANYONE handed enough fear and desperation risks becoming this. Yes, even you.

If the monster feels really, really bad about it after, is he still a monster? (Answer: YES, but you still paid to see this movie so now you're culpable too.)

A discussion of how responsible scientists are for what the powerful and cruel do with their inventions.

Ian Malcolm in the first Jurassic Park movie was right. "You were so preoccupied with whether or not you could, you didn't stop and think if you should!"

Hey, it's that actor I had such a crush on when I was 14 and wow, he got old, and OH SHIT I'M OLD TOO... It doesn't matter which actor I'm talking about, MOST of them were that actor to someone or other.

Florence Pugh has nice tits, and Robert Downey Jr. should play more villains. Also, David Krumholz is slowly turning into Alfred Molina.

Spoiler alert: BOOM.

Men suck.

Barbie: This one's gonna get me SO MUCH HATE, because y'all love Barbie, but I'm gonna do it anyway.

They told me it was an empowering movie for women and girls to watch. I went through the whole thing, and was rather insulted by this claim. Yeah, the idea of "women can be whatever we want" was repeated over and over, but the actual movie showed very little of that. Only the DOLLS got to be what they wanted, not the "Real Women."

Barbie not having a vagina is played for laughs, and the first thing that happens when she becomes a Real Woman (Yes, this is a plot point.) is... going to the gynecologist, with her new vagina and uterus. The Mattel board meeting actually had a man ask "I'm a man with no power, does that make me a woman?" How Tumblr hasn't caught the transphobia there is beyond me.

Ha ha, pregnant Midge! Loved that!

Feminism is important, because the patriarchy hurts... Ken. And the other Kens. Look, I get that this plot point was aimed SOLELY at the men who were watching this movie, trying to force them to imagine the role reversal and see how awful it is, but it doesn't change the fact that the main plot point of a supposedly feminist movie was clearly targeted at men. Like... come on.

Why is Will Ferrel here? You could have replaced him with a broken lamp in the corner and the movie would have been just fine.

I can't think of a single time that Barbie invited Ken's company. He pursued her, and she tolerated him because that was just sort of her role and she felt she had to. He respected none of her boundaries, just constantly tried to push past them. Then when he went full incel to the point of violence (Yes, I count brainwashing and enslavement as violence and you should too.) and she defeated him, he threw a screaming, public, self-hatred tantrum until SHE was apologising to HIM and consoling HIM, just a few minutes of screen time after a rant about how unfair it is that women are held responsible for men's bad behavior.

Ruth - "I can't let you become a real woman without you understanding what that means." Ruth - shows a montage of babies and motherhood, with some random crap tacked on the end in hopes that we won't notice that.

Being vocally angry about the patriarchy, racism, and enforced femininity is for dumb, angry teenagers with daddy issues who don't know anything about anything, and growing up into REAL feminism involves pink dresses.

The Velveteen Rabbit walked so that Weird Barbie could somersault while doing the splits.

I did cry when Barbie saw the old woman for the first time and called her beautiful. That was nice.

The boy bands of the early 2000s are finally explained.

The only way out of the patriarchy is by women talking to each other and working together, then... men saying they're sorry and totally promising never to do that again. Because that always works.

I mean, the movie wasn't terrible. It just wasn't made for feminists. It was made to get men angry enough to go see the movie so they'd have something to make angry podcasts about, in hopes that a few of them would start to think about what garbage they're spewing. Also, to sell toys, Hummers and Birkenstocks.

Also, I'm not sure this was Greta Gerwig's fault. This whole thing reeks of studio meddling.

OH, and men suck.

[magical-misfit]

Some quotes from the Velveteen Rabbit I thought fit this last episode of Neverafter

“real isn’t how you are made, it’s a thing that happens to you”

“[The mechanical toys] were full of modern ideas and pretended they were real”

“It takes a long time. That’s why it doesn’t happen to people who break easily or have sharp edges or have to be carefully kept”

“But those things don’t matter at all because once you are real you cannot be ugly, except to people who don’t understand”

[thewebcomicsreview]

So, Skin Horse is over. What are your thoughts?

I really enjoyed the comic as a whole, but I have to admit that I feel like the final arc... um, wasn’t the end of Narbonic as far as feeling like the perfect inevitable conclusion of the story is concerned. I kinda kept waiting to see the other shoe drop?

Narbonic is a very simple story

Dave meets Helen. They slowly hit it off and start dating. It gets out that Helen was keeping a Horrible Secret from Dave, they break up and have a huge fight but ultimately Dave forgives her and they get back together. Spoilers. That's the "steak" of the story. All the cyber gods and moon bases and the like are "sizzle". They heighten the emotional stakes of the story and add some spectacle, but they ultimately don't "matter". The story could have dropped all of that and been a realistic indie movie where the big secret was Helen cheating on Dave or investing all their money in crypto or something, and everything would still work.

What's the steak of Skin Horse. What's the emotional core?

The comic opens with a quote from The Velveteen Rabbit from the character of the Skin Horse, whom the comic is named after. The quote says that a toy can be brought to life and become Real if a child loves it enough.

The plot of this final arc is that nonhumans are no longer visible to humans, they're not Real to humans anymore. So there's some connective tissue there, and the finale does end with everyone getting paired off (Unity/Sweetheat, Nick/Victoria, Tip/Tigerlily, Annie/Lovelace), and much like the Velveteen Rabbit they leave the human world behind, even if (unlike the rabbit) they come back later to try to fix it. So the comic is sort of resolving its theme here: The velveteen rabbits aren't Real to humans, who will never accept them, but they are saved by their love in each other.

And then, after learning that Lovetron destroyed its version of humanity, they all decide to work out their own shit and come back to try to make the earth a better place instead of just fleeing to Space Canada. This is Tigerlily's idea and in part motivated by her love for Tip so love saves the human race as well.

And I think the reason Skin Horse's ending feels a little flat to a lot of people is that the thematic elements take a back seat to a big infinity war fight that's sort of at odds with it, such that the nonhumans win the big war and then flee the planet. The themes of "The world may never accept us, but we can accept each other and try to change the world" doesn't really jive with the "We defeated the bad guys easily hooray! But also not really!" battle. There was a lot going on in Skin Horse and it made the core message messy and confusing at times.

But thematically, it makes sense that Mr. Green is revealed to still be out there, working his way back up. They didn't solve discrimination. They likely never will. There's no satisfying solution to the problem of society hating you, no satisfying ending. You just find people who love you and do what you can for them and try to make things better, one day at a time.

[cakerecipe]

[Image ID:

The first image is a cropped screenshot of a quote on goodreads.com from the book The Language of Thorns by Leigh Bardugo. The quote says:

Are you my soldier? Are you my prince? Are you my darling? Are you mine?

The second image is a photo of the bottom of page 365 of Siege and Storm by Leigh Bardugo. Mal is speaking with Alina. The dialogue reads:

“I'm not a soldier anymore,” he said. “I'm not a prince, and I'm sure as hell not a Saint. So what am I, Alina?”

“I—”

The third image is a photo of the top of page 366 of Siege and Storm by Leigh Bardugo. Mal and Alina continue their conversation. The dialogue reads:

“What am I?” he whispered.

He was close to me now. The scent I knew so well, that dark green scent of the meadow, was lost beneath the smell of sweat and blood.

“Am I your guardian?” he asked.

He ran his hand slowly down my arm, from shoulder to fingertips.

“Your friend?” His left hand skimmed down my other arm.

“Your servant?”

I could feel his breath on my lips. My heart thundered in my ears.

“Tell me what I am.”

He pulled me against his body, his hand circling my wrist.

End Image ID]

The Language of Thorns // Siege and Storm

[existential-fox]

Random Pandora Hearts Thoughts

What is actually wrong with Jack? Like I get the Lacie thing but even before that they said he was like ‘water’ as if there was no one there. Is it because he was never living for himself?

I really like that while Vincent is pretty much an irredeemable bastard throughout the story, he still shows respect to Elliot and lets his anger out on their father due to his cause of death. It makes him a lot more multi-faceted. 

Oswald (Glen) is ironically one of the most sympathetic characters in the manga. You wouldn’t think that at the beginning lol. 

The twists still fucking blow me away. Like Volumes 17 and 18 are a rollercoaster of wth moments. 

Every character is based loosely on an Alice in Wonderland character. Except it becomes interesting when you realise the Alice/rabbit connection. The setting outside of the abyss is actually Wonderland as Alice followed a ‘rabbit’ from the world she was born in.

I still love the themes of not living for someone else but finding your own purpose and meaning in life. It’s peppered throughout the series with Jack/Lacie, Gilbert/Vincent, Oz/Gilbert, Cheshire/Alice, Noise/Echo, Oz being a puppet, Elliot’s ‘the reason you suck’ speech about how not caring about your own life isn’t noble etc. etc. 

The Abyss is such a cool concept and I love that it became corrupted by its Core being given the ability to feel loneliness and pain. Like before that it felt lonely but didn’t understand it....kind of like Oz. It sort of puts the themes of being conscious of yourself into perspective. The Core never experienced anything but negative emotions, but Oz, who was able to live a life away from the Abyss had positive experiences and people who cared about him as well which is what saved him in the end. This is why Oz is the number one character imo. He portrays humanity so perfectly. The dark moments but the good as well. The doubt and the resolve. The ability to change and the ability to get stuck. The ability to be influenced by others and the ability to find your own way. Unfortunately the Core and Alyss never had that chance as they were left all alone in a hole of despair (especially after the Tragedy). It was only when Oz reached out to her like the MVP of humanity that he is that she could finally be saved. 

I’ve never been as big a fan of Break as it feels everyone else is but any moment with him and Sharon warms my heart. I love their sibling relationship and how much they care for each other.

I love how Gilbert can do something courageous or be breaking down in the manga due to a heart breaking discovery, and then you’ll go to the jokey pages at the end and the manga artist is calling him useless and bullying him relentlessly. Poor Gilbert.

Where is the anime remake of this?

I love Oz. He develops consistently throughout the manga and it never gets stale. He’s literally the story of The Velveteen Rabbit as well which I’ve always adored the symbolism of in regards to humanity. I’m just going to leave this here as I feel it sums up what Pandora Hearts is about beautifully:

"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real."

"Does it hurt?" asked the Rabbit.

"Sometimes," said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. "When you are Real you don't mind being hurt."

"Does it happen all at once, like being wound up," he asked, "or bit by bit?"

"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."