#woobifying the worst person you know

[monmatch]

“Don't you know I would have loved you the way you were whole”

[navree]

I saw your post about the greens are tragedy characters and that you dislike Madeline Miller and I automatically followed you. I absolutely stand for gatekeeping ancient greek literature from the people who are like 'yeah, it isn't that deep' and then pull onto the worst takes on it (hiding behind 'yeah, I am studying it')

I'm legally allowed to gatekeep as much of Greek culture and Hellenistic classics/mythology as I want because I am Greek through my dad's side and have connected more strongly with that than any of the others in the hodgepodge that was my cultural upbringing (the perks of being American™). And if someone's going to say "I study Greek tragedies which is why I know you can only be considered tragic if you're a morally upstanding character" then I'm not only gonna gatekeep I'm gonna submit a request for you to undergo an IQ evaluation.

But welcome! Enjoy your stay, hope you're prepared for a lot of talking about historical figures no one cares about, various political takes and complaints, and a complete inability to be concise.

[lastflowerofyourhouse]

thinking about harrow and gideon as teeny little children.

like. the adults around them were never going to let them be friends, right? harrow's parents and crux were never going to put up with that. but i'll bet there was a moment, when they were small children, when they could've turned it around and just been friends. but of course they weren't allowed to.

like, here's the thing about toddlers: they kinda suck sometimes. all of them do, and it's usually not their fault. they don't have a developed sense of empathy or consequences yet, and they can't regulate their emotions very well. they're selfish and egocentric and short-sighted. they don't fully grasp concepts like sharing or delayed gratification. they have to be taught these things. it's the responsibility of the adults around them to help them practice and understand. and if they don't...well.

imagine you're tiny harrow. and you realize, one day, that if tiny gideon has something you want, then you're allowed to just take it and nobody cares. meanwhile, all of your things are sacred and protected by the adults around you. also, you're curious. you're learning about people and feelings and cause and effect. and so you start to pick on her, experimentally, as is natural for kids around that age. and you quickly come to understand that you can do whatever you want to her, and nobody will stop you. but if she retaliates, she gets in trouble. you would have to be one hell of an emotionally advanced toddler not to become a fucking terror to live with.

and that's not even mentioning how the adults around them treated gideon. harrow's primary caretaker and role model was fucking crux for jod's sake. and little kids love to copy behaviors and play and help even more than they love to steal. if the adults around you treat one particular person like shit, then you will inevitably learn to do the same.

also, gideon saying that baby harrow saw her as, quote, "an object of tormentable fascination" is weirdly heartbreaking to me? like yeah, harrow was probably The Worst as a little kid, for reasons already explored. but also, there was only one other child in her life. one other child, who was just close enough to her age to identify with, but also slightly older than her, by just enough months to be cool. i'll fucking bet harrow was obsessed with her. they were both lonely and bored and they had never been taught how to make friends or be nice to people. i'll bet they learned to fight like that. harrow following her around, just trying to get her attention, not knowing how else to do it.

the fact that griddle is very obviously babytalk too...it just fuckin gets me. harrow has been trying to say gideon's name since before she could properly form the syllables. she said gid-oh. what do you wanna bet it was one of the first words she tried to figure out how to say.

obviously, none of this justifies what came next. this isn't a harrowhark apologetics post. i'm not trying to like...woobify her or something. none of this emotional rambling about her toddlerhood absolves her of responsibility for shit she did as a teenager. but still. god i get emotional when i think about harrow and gideon as little kids. they were so lonely and they had no positive role models and they were completely fucked over by the adults around them and i am going to cry.

[flower-boi16]

Top 5 Best & Worst Characters in Hellaverse

So, for the most part, Hellaverse has pretty meh to bad characters. Buuuuut, there are a few decent/good ones, so, just for fun, let's go over the top 5 best AND worst characters in Hellaverse (in my opinion).

5. (Worst) Stella

So Stella. Stella, Stella, Stella...you had so much potential to be interesting...but you just...aren't. Just for the record I don't think making Stella abusive is a retcon since it doesn't contradict any of her past behavior in season 1 minus like...one background painting.

That's not really my problem with Stella being abusive. My problem is that it makes her boring and the show does that as a way to woobify Stolas. Really not much to say, she's just...boring.

5. (Best) Octavia

It's pretty funny how Octavia is pretty much the most beloved character in the critical community. She's both decently likable and is a bit interesting when you look at her, as she's a girl who was negatively affected by her fathers' actions and is dealing with the negative changes that have happened to her due to her parents always arguing...

...also her father is Stolas so she is therefore the most sympathetic character by default. Really, there aren't that many good characters in either Hazbin or Helluva, and Octavia isn't an amazing character, she only appears in like, two episodes, but she's still fine by herself and is one of Viv's better characters.

4. (Worst) Charlie

I already made a full post about the issues with my problems with Charlie as a character so I won't once again go very deeply here. You're probably wondering why Charlie is even here to begin with since I stated that I don't exactly hate her.

...well, just because I don't hate a character doesn't really mean I like that character. A majority of Hazbin's characters have similar problems of not being that developed at all and the development they do have often feels rushed. The reason why I put Charlie as the 4th worst character in Hellaverse is because, well, out of every character in Hazbin's main cast...Charlie is just kind of the one with the biggest issues.

Again, I already talked about my issues with Charlie in my post about her but just to recap; Charlie suffers from being heavily underdeveloped, she isn't a very compelling protagonist and has 0 growth throughout the show. She learns absolutely nothing. Her mentality is never once challenged by the narrative and she is always portrayed as right and anyone who disagrees with her is automatically wrong, and she also feels heavily overshadowed by the rest of the cast despite being the main character.

Charlie is also not the best person at times like some people have pointed out (she KNOWS THAT ANGEL IS BEING ABUSED and she chooses not to do anything about it. Wow, what a great friend), and overall she kinda sucks as a protagonist.

4. (Best) Lucifer

I've seen Lucifer gain a lot of flak from people with them calling him a bad person and it's not entirely unjustified. I can definitely understand why it may be hard to sympathize with the guy who literally greenlit annual genocides of his own people because he thought that they deserved death.

Not to mention him calling Charlie a "failure" in the pilot which is just...never addressed here. Also it's fairly weird that despite Lucifer being the sin of pride...he isn't really prideful of anything...? So ya, there a few issues with Lucifer as a character.

In spite of that though, I don't think that Lucifer is a particularly bad character. If anything, he's actually one of the more well-developed of the main cast and he has an arc that's decently compelling...?

He initially started out as a dreamer, someone with many creative and imaginative ideas for Heaven, but his ideas were always rejected and he was seen as a troublemaker by the elders of Heaven.

After he was cast down to Hell as punishment for accidentally letting evil seep into the world, he lost his will to dream and fell into depression, having a heavily cynical view of Heaven and Hell due to his past experiences. He closes himself off and doesn't stay in contact with his loved ones, mainly his daughter due to his depression. He tries convincing Charlie into his cynical views because he doesn't want his own daughter to face the same crushing rejection he faced.

However, he reconnects with his daughter and brings back a spark in him that was lost long ago, and he promises to support Charlie and her dreams, despite his depression not immediately disappearing.

Admittedly that part is pretty rushed, like Charlie just says "but dad...mah people!!!!" and he's just like "ok". Again, it's not perfect and has some small issues, but compared to most of Hazbin and Helluva's other characters, Lucifer's arc is far more well-developed and is interesting in it's own right. If anything, Lucifer thinking that his people deserve death simply shows his cynical mindset that he's had for years, and Charlie's able to bring back that dreamer that was crushed long ago.

So ya. Lucifer is not amazing, but I like him. He's neat.

3. (Worst) Chaz

Chaz sucks. Chaz is a character that only exists just to make a bunch of unfunny sex jokes and nothing else. He is completely one-dimensional and is nothing more than a walking sex joke. And his "jokes" aren't even remotely funny.

I really don't have much to even say about Chaz. He's just THAT one-note.

3. (Best) Velvvette

I've talked about my thoughts on Velvvette before so I won't go too in depth here again. Buuut needless to say I think she's probably my favorite character in hellaverse. She's one of the few antagonists Viv's made that's actually entertaining and fun to watch, with a well-developed and charismatic personality that's not just "asshole who swears a lot". She isn't the best character in hellaverse though, but she has far more depth as a character compared to most of the other antagonists.

2. (Worst) Adam

I've spoken about my thoughts on Adam before multiple times so at this point I don't know if I have anything left to say about him. Adam is a boring, one-dimensional character with very little depth or personality as a character. He only exists just to be a pure straw character so he can be proven wrong by Charlie.

He can't have any real depth as a character because he only exists just to be torn down by the story. Again, already talked about that in a previous post so I won't go too in-depth here, but needless to say...ya, Adam still sucks.

2. (Best) Alastor

Like Lucifer, I've seen Alastor gain a heavy amount of criticism but personally, like Lucifer, I think Alastor is one of the better characters in the main cast. The has a sense of mystery and intrigue to him that makes him pretty interesting as a character. You're left wondering what his whole deal is & what he's planning.

That combined with Alastor's charisma makes him an entertaining antagonist for the show. He's one of the few characters that I'm interested in to see what they do with in the next season. So ya, I like Alastor...

Now time to get to a character that makes me want to punch myself in the face.

1. (Worst) Stolas

.....Honeslty what can even be said about Stolas that hasn't already been said? I've made so many posts complaining about this stupid owl and you already know my opinion of him at this point. If you really want to know every single critique of Stolas I have, read every post I've made that's tagged "anti stolas". But...I'll just say this.

Stolas could have been a good character. Hell, he could have been the show's BEST character. He had all the potential to be super interesting and compelling character with a great arc...but instead, Viv decided to completely retcon everything season 1 established in order to try and make Stolas an UwU soft boy the show REALLY wants us to sympathize for, in spite of Stolas being a bad person.

I'm sorry if I can't sympathize with the guy who SA's an lower class imp for his own pleasure and frequently neglects his own daughter and pays more attention to st. imp. And, as an artificial way to make Stolas sympathetic, the narrative has to wipe away any actual flaws he has and demonize any character that even remotely gets upset at his actions (which I talk about here), because god forbid we hold Stolas accountable for ANYTHING right? We have to coddle and absolve him of ALL his mistakes despite his flaws being what made him interesting in the first place.

Stolas NEVER grows or develops as a character because of this and so he has basically no character arc. Not only is he a poorly written mess of a character...he's also just BORING now. There's nothing interesting about him anymore, he's just an UwU sad sack. He had so much potential to be interesting but that potential was completely wasted in favor of this bullshit.

And THAT's what makes Stolas SO FRUSTRATING. Really, he pretty much represents HB, and, to an extent, all of Hellaverse as a whole; it started out good with a lot of interesting ideas and potential but through bad writing, all of that potential got squandered and now we're just left with a completely disappointing mess.

Stolas is the worst character in the show because he's the only one who legitimately FRUSTERATES me. He's my least favorite character in all of fiction and a complete mess.

1. (Best) Sera

I already talked about Sera before in a previous post so I won’t go too in depth here, but Sera is one of hellaverse’ better antagonists for having more depth and nuance as a character. She’s the head seraphim of Heaven and greenlit exterminations in order to protect Heaven….and Emily.

In spite of that though, she clearly doesn’t want to do this and is only doing it because she wanted to try and protect her people, and Emily, who she clearly cares deeply for as her older sister. She’s a lot more compelling as a character that most of hellaverse’ antagonists, not being good or evil but rather morally grey, having nuances to her as a character.

To me, Sera is the best character in all of Hellaverse because she's the one with the most nuance and depth compared to 90% of Viv's other characters, especially her antagonists. She actually has REAL DEPTH and complexities to her that make her a lot more interesting compared to most of Viv's characters. Hell, most of the characters in the best list are put there BECAUSE they are just more developed than most of the other characters (which just shows how bad Viv is at character writing)

Like Alastor, she's one of the few characters that I am interested in seeing what they do next with season 2, as she is likely going to get a redemption there. Well just have to see. But for now, Sera is the best character in all of Hellaverse.

So...ya...that was my top 5 best and worst characters in Hellaverse...

....bye.

[baiwu-jinji]

i apologize in advance if this ask sounds kinda weird, but i'm kinda curious to hear your thoughts on how the narrative treats qi rong, mostly because i think interacting only with the eng version/fandom might take some context from his character. i've seen people complaining that some fans woobify him too much, others complaining that some people treat him as a pure hate-sink when he's more than that. while i do think he's a multi-layered character, i do sometimes get the feeling that mxtx did not go easy on him, with the revised version being even crazier than before (some even say he was given a bit of onesided incestuous subtext with xl, but i wonder if that interpretation isn't just the result of weirdly translated lines in eng). i think this might be because he strikes me as a meta personification of sorts for toxic fans who place their identity and self-worth on just one person they completely idolize, and when that person is shown to be imperfect they immediately turn against them, and we know mxtx has had experience with those kinds of people.

i do think he's largely meant to be seen as unsympathetic overall, though i think there's strong nuances with his character as well. since his childhood he always lacked something and never really had a well formed identity, his prince name being symbolic of his life. he projected himself onto xl in life, and he kept on absorving the worst traits of the people around his life without really understanding them in order to feel powerful and important, from the xianle nobles to the signature traits of the other calamities. he also strikes me as very... "little brother"-coded, in the sense that he keeps looking for any sort of recognition and seems unable to mature. even when he hates xl i think he still somewhat craves his attention, and qr only developed a bit when he was forced to let go of this role by accidentally becoming a father instead. i think it's also interesting that he started out a lot like his father, but ended up sharing the fate of his mother.

i do wonder how the cn fandom views him and if he's nearly as divisive as he is here. i'd also be pretty interested in seeing some meta about him from cn fans. again, it feels like some context is missing by not speaking the language the book was originally written in...

Hi! I think the narrative basically takes the same stance as Xie Lian in its attitude towards Qi Rong, which is the sort of "I can't love you but I don't want to hate you, the best I could give you is indifference". I agree that Qi Rong isn't meant to be lovable, but MXTX isn't dismissive of him as a character either - she devoted almost an entire chapter to Qi Rong's death, let him speak his mind, and gave him some form of closure.

Qi Rong having onesided incestuous subtext with XL (!!) in the revised version is...very interesting haha, I haven't read the revised version so I can't know (someone please tell me where to get the revised version ><). Although I want to speculate that even if there is some incestuous vibes, it's not truly sexual - it's probably libido directed the wrong way when you're lusting over someone else's identity, but not over that person per se. Qi Rong lusts over XL's identity in the sense that he wants to be XL - or rather he wants to be perfect, worshipped, all-powerful etc. (bit of digression, there's an underrated psychological thriller called Cracks starring Eva Green, if you watch it you'll know what I mean)

I don't have the impression that he's truly divisive in the Chinese fandom, but then I don't engage with the Chinese fandom that much so I could totally be wrong. And I don't think any context is missing for English readers either (except maybe the humour of QR's obscene language might be lost in translation?) because human nature is the same everywhere, and Qi Rong's distorted psyche is more a matter of human nature than cultural context.

As for Chinese fandom's view of QR, there's this great meta I translated and posted a few days ago, and I found some other opinion pieces about Qi Rong on Zhihu (Chinese equivalent of Reddit), as you'll see they're quite diverse.

A lot of Chinese readers say that what stands out most about Qi Rong is his comedic role in the story because his cursing and name-calling are really funny; a lot of people also mention being really touched by his self-sacrifice to save Guzi. I found this one post that has a similar view to yours, which is QR represents MXTX's toxic fans:

"I always felt it's the author admonishing her fans in an implicit way not to be as crazy as Qi Rong [...] My guess is that the author can't ask her fans outright not to act in this way because that would hurt people who support her but are immature, however she can't turn a blind eye to these people going around provoking more resentment, so she creates QR to remind her fans not to be like QR, or they'd appear as unlikable as QR to the public. But the author still feels symathy for thse fans, so she didn't depict their representation in the novel as totally incorrigible - QR retains some humanity and is a little adorable when he starts to care about people."

I also saw opinions about the narrative (or rather Xie Lian) not going easy on Qi Rong, like this one:

"Xie Lian is clearly a very good person but why is he so heartless to QR? He eventually treated QR as a joke and a burden, but QR was once a true follower of his. At first I thought XL was perfect and cares about everyone, but he never really cared for his cousin. When I read that XL felt neither joy nor sorrow when QR died saving Guzi, my heart chilled. If XL could forgive the masses who betrayed and reviled him, why can't he forgive his cousin who once followed him whole-heartedly?"

There're also people saying that Qi Rong's potential divisiveness is what makes him a great villain, like this post:

"What MXTX's well-received villains have in common is a tragic childhood and not being loved growing up, and they only have a soft spot for one person. Although these villains did horrible deeds and are unrepentant, they all reserve some kindness in their heart for the only person who's good to them. This contrast is striking and touching, yet most likely to cause controversy. Therefore, MXTX knows very clearly how to create a memorable villain, and I admire that."

Someone else says when they read about Qi Rong they "don't know whether to laugh or cry" (XL's signature emotion hehe). They add that "this is where MXTX is successful in writing a villain - you both hate and pity him; he's infuriating, but you don't really want to see him die either."

Another view is that since Qi Rong has no filter, he sometimes serves as the truth-telling voice. For example, when XL wanted to keep Lang Qianqiu in the dark about the truth of the Gilded Banquet Massacre, Qi Rong blurted out the truth.

There's also a question posted on Zhihu that asks why people like Qi Rong, and there're some interesting answers. There's one post that says "I find him attractive because he's depicted as alluringly ghostly in a lot of fan art like vampires in Twilight" haha

Another post says they like Qi Rong "because he's guilelessly wicked, while XL and Hua Cheng are hypocrites" emmmmm

Another one says they like Qi Rong because "being Xie Lian is exhausting, he's so wronged but he just endures it all, while Qi Rong just launches verbal assults whenever someone rubs him the wrong way, it's so cathartic. The most difficult thing in the world is to be a good person, because as soon as you do one thing wrong, everyone criticises you; but if you're a bad person, even if you did just one good thing, everyone praises you for it and shows you pity".

[yall-hate-kids-tourney]

Loser Round 3: Monaca Towa (Danganronpa Ultra Despair Girls) vs. Damian Wayne (DC)

Propaganda below the cut

Monaca Towa (10-12):

her existence makes the game and its world more interesting, when you think about it she is the one who manufactured and designed the evil robots. Basically funding the destruction of the world for the only person she thought understood her. And she knows she was being manipulated and just is ok with that because everyone in her life is manipulative. Reading her diary one of her last pages is about how much she wants to die.And for a game about how adults should protect children, she is the only child to not get saved. I’m not saying she should’ve been redeemed she’s a manipulative liar, abuser, and murderer but her existence shows the corruption of this world.

I understand most people don’t like her. That’s understandable she’s completely and purposefully designed to be hate able but I love her. And the game is more interesting with her than without

Damian Wayne (9-14):

Damian is a kid who was raised as an assassin and because of that when he first appears he has some really messed up ideas of how to prove himself to his father by being aggressive with the criminals they capture and attacking his brother. Because of this people act like he is the most evil character ever and refuse to give him any grace. They make him out to be this awful irredeemable monster who just wants to kill his brother and hurt people. If the fandom isn’t making his out to be The Worst(tm) then they are ignoring his existence all-together. He is a really interesting character who has done some not so great things but he’s grown and learned a lot through various character arcs (as much of an arc as a comic book character can have) and he deserves to be acknowledged for himself and not just as a villain so that people can woobify his brother.

——

HES JUST A LITTLE BABY GUY!!!!! Little baby man raised as an assassin and learning how to be a real person <3. But because he was kind of a dick and also a little stabby early-on, especially to the fandom's main "so sad uwu depressed baby" blorbo (and also he's not white), people treat him like he's satan incarnate

[dross-the-fish]

I can't find it now but I saw a post where you said Erik's mask isn't a comfort item. Why do you think it isn't? Why would he get so angry at Christine if it wasn't?

Ok, I'm about to get ranty and it's not directed at you specifically so don't take it personally.

I hate the take that Erik's mask is his "security blanket" or his "comfort device" because it's incredibly LAZY.

It's fucking lazy. It's a lazy and reductive take and it almost always comes with the intent of woobifying Erik and villainizing Christine.

Erik does not find his mask comforting, he feels he has to wear it to conceal himself and if anything he gives the sense that he would much rather be able to live without it. He's angry at Christine for a few reasons and I speculate some of them are not even about Christine.

The most obvious and superficial reason is that his carefully laid plan has gone to shit

Erik believed whole heartedly that if Christine didn't know what he looked like that she might be compelled to return to him if he let her go. My guess is that he had planned to try and win her over and wait to tell her the truth after they re-built some of the lost trust...trust lost because he lied to her...and kidnapped her.

Erik is a wee bit unhinged.

But I also think there's more to his freak out. This may be headcanon on my part but I always interpreted this

As being something of a traumatized response. Not because the mask gives him comfort or something like that, but because when someone is deformed, especially back in that time period, people often stared or treated them like a horror novelty. Erik has no doubt endured a life time of people trying to look at his face as some kind of morbid curiosity to be gawked at and Christine snatching it may have put him back in that mindset and he is PISSED.

His bit about "Women being inquisitive" also strikes me as him referencing things that happened before. I almost wonder if Christine wasn't the first person to catch his interest and if he's tried this before with....horrible results.

It reads less like "Oh no! You took my safety blanket! Now I'm exposed and vulnerable!" and more akin to

This specifically is why I hate the whole "mask is his comfort item" take because it makes Erik sound like a toddler throwing a tantrum because someone took his binky and paints Christine as being somehow in the wrong for wanting to see her kidnapper's face.

A thing she had already demanded of him previously which he denied without giving any explanation whatsoever. I cannot stress enough that Erik is the one with the power in this scenario. They are in his house, he has her trapped and he has been the older mentor/protector figure in her life for some time. The scale is tipped in HIS favor, not hers. I've always felt that at this point in their relationship her taking off the mask is, in a way, her trying to level the field because he's had her at such a disadvantage this whole time.

And that's not to say that Christine doesn't have feelings of some kind for Erik. Christine's feelings for Erik are messy and complicated but there is an undeniable fear and discomfort that she expresses over her captivity. She does pity him enough to come back, I think she also feels a lingering attachment to him, despite everything, but Erik keeps making. The. Worst. Possible. Choices.

To be clear, Christine is not in any way to blame for "provoking" Erik. He is a victim of the the time period and the society he lives in but he is not in any way shape or form CHRISTINE'S victim.

Erik isn't to blame for how he's been treated by the world at large and he's clearly been through some shit, he deserves sympathy but that doesn't make his treatment of Christine ok or make it Christine's job to give him affection and companionship.

[ungodly-amounts-of-godly-trauma]

wotw round 1

propaganda under the cut!

zhang chengling:

ok this is complicated because he IS an angel and the sweetest and whatever. but people tend to focus so much on that to the point where they forget the rest of him as well. like he's a 14 year old boy who had his entire family massacred in one night. he had jagged piece of glass (I think it was glass, they never specified the material) stuffed into gash on his side and he had to walk around with that and then had to be the one to reopen the wound and dig it out of himself. he went through being tortured and was even waterboarded but only spit in the face of his torturers. like that side of him gets lost so much in favor of he's the world's sweetest boy who is so innocent and naive

espresso cookie:

okay. heres the thing. espresso cookie is a badass mage who scraped his way out of poverty and literally invented his own form of magic from scratch. he is world renowned as an extremely powerful and reliable scientist. he literally created one of the greatest inventions of all time in-universe and helped strengthen cookies all across the world in battle.

he's also really mean. there are multiple stories about him not getting along with this one dude (who's basically his worst enemy) and generally just being really mean to everyone. he can be normal (because he feels emotions like everyone else?) but generally he's just really sick of everyone's shit.

you know what the fandom did with him? they took his character anD FUCKING RUINED IT. HE WAS REDUCED FROM A BADASS MAGE WHOS SICK OF EVERYONES BULLSHIT TO A SOFTIE TSUNDERE BOY WHO GETS SHIPPED WITH HIS WORST ENEMY. ITS SO ANNOYING. IT IS THE WORST CHARACTERIZATION. ESPRESSO HAS NEVER BEEN SHOWN TO HAVE A "SOFT SPOT" FOR HIS ENEMY. IT IS LITERALLY THE EXACT OPPOSITE. IF I SEE ONE MORE PERSON BABYIFY ESPRESSO AND REMOVE PARTS OF HIS CHARACTER FOR THE SAKE OF THEIR SHIP I WILL GET VIOLENT. I'M SORRY YOU CAN'T HANDLE MEAN CHARACTERS. BUT IF I SEE ONE MORE PIECE OF MEDIA REDUCING HIM TO A LITTLE SOFTIE INSECURE CATBOY I SWEAR TO FUCKING GOD. IT'S SO BAD I'VE HAD TO STOP INTERACTING WITH THE FANDOM JUST TO ESCAPE IT.

[misrepresentedmorallygrey]

PROPAGANDA

Jason Todd

Jason is as someone else put it succinctly "a mass-murdering terrorist and tax-evader". He does evil, the story constantly condemns him as evil and sinful and thuggish and stupid and uneducated and overemotional. He does have a lower and more selective kill count than Luke Skywalker, John Wick, Disney Mulan, etc. So you got part of the fandom writing an annoying flood of fan fiction about him being a warm soft nice guy skipping through the daisies with his fam (hey have fun, guys). Then you got another side picking out the worst ex-canon comics for him (while they ignore the worst ex-canon comics for their own fave characters i.e. "my fave only did evil because of a mind-control potion, but Jason always chooses to be evil even though the story and the writer himself said he was crazy and broken and suffering from magic insanity")... and accuse him of being a cop (he is a cop-hating cop-killing terrorist murderer criminal thuggy thug thug constantly being hunted by law enforcement in a world bursting to the brim with actual copaganda while the heroes regularly cooperate with police—so many anti-fans are misusing the term copaganda because they hate this fictional character to the point they want to train people to be blind to actual copaganda). Jason is absolutely a villain—and he returned to his hometown when it was a battlefield with hundreds killed in the latest conflict, ruled over by a child-killing torture-enthusiast. War is always wrong and evil, and Jason was raised to be a soldier in that war—and when the promises of justice and safety never came true, he decided to seize power through murder. Jason is evil. He is inarguably a lesser evil than what usually plagues the town. Innocent people are alive because he got his hands dirty. He is such an asshole. People like him should not exist. He shot a 10-year-old in the chest, and nobody not even the 10-year-old cared the next day because it really wasn't a big deal. He was kidnapped by a billionaire with a taste for young boys, and it's literally not a big deal. His crimesagainst fashion are unforgivable tho.

Batman's adopted son and second Robin that got killed by the Joker and came bag to enact a revenge plan by becoming a Gotham drug lord. He had a duffel bag of 8 decapitated heads at some point and planted a bomb on the Batmobile and then got his throat slit by Batman to save the Joker. He stole his older adoptive brother's (first Robin) identity and blew up a high school but he forbade Gotham's drug rings from selling to children and actually became an anti-hero in Gotham and killed the people Batman wouldn't (rapists, drug lords, etc.). He attacked his little adoptive brother (third Robin) and beat him to a bloody pulp. He also slept with Batman's baby mama. He raised a fucked up Superman clone with kindness. He has lead teams of Outlaws on multiple occasions that love him. He's on good terms with many (not all) of Gotham's vigilantes.

Listen. I love the guy, I love him dearly, but I feel like people these days are trying to make him like completely justified in everything he did?? And like you can see where he’s coming from, sure, but my man did absolutely beat Tim Drake, a teen, half to death for the crime of being Robin. He’s morally gray! He had decapitated heads in duffle bags! Let my guy be morally gray please stop woobifying him

Jason Todd is regularly stripped of his autonomy in fandom to make him more palatable and “redeemable”. They attribute his legitimate trauma, annger, and pain driven actions to “pit madness” a side effect of the way he was resurrected. Not only that but so many people don’t even know what he actually does when he comes back, it’s like a shitty game of telephone where each person tells the next a slightly altered version of his return and at the end everyone thinks that Jason hates the kid who took up the Robin mantle after him and wants to kill him and that he is mad at Bruce for no reason and all Bruce needs to do is tell Jason that he is loved (despite Jason having a lot of evidence to the contrary) and everything will be all better. His values and beliefs and convictions are treated as invalid and his trauma is something he needs to just get over because it’s inconvenient and harmful to everyone else and doesn’t he know that everyone else was also traumatized by his death?

vigilante who kills people • traumatized as hell • has trouble differentiating between good deeds and selfishness • shot his little brother on the spine • tried to kill his other two brothers • operates under the belief that controlling evil is the only way to help innocents • has an immesurable love for the people of Gotham and really wants them to be happy and safe!! • please for the love of god fandom stop talking about him as if the bad things hes done are forgiveable AND as if the good things he's done don't matter

Gonna be honest even canon misinterprets him. There's no winning. All you need to know about DC universe is that multiple different writers have had a go at writing him and every time he is wildly different which is maybe why people interpret him very differently?? Canon interprets him in a he did everything wrong way a lot of times and fanon interprets him in a he did nothing wrong way because he is blorbo to many, when he is very much someone who did a lot of shit wrong but also had a lot going on, while thats still not an excuse for like, a lot of maiming and murder, and (usually) later in the timeline he is less trigger happy and has evened out from villain to morally grey, his whole "redemption" to being morally grey is usually up to fan interpretation whether or not they're chill with letting him keep murdering bad people or they say no murder in general, and whether or not bats is chill with the whole he keeps murdering people thing since he has a staunch no murder stance. Also!! a lot of people in fanon write in the whole pit insanity thing as a way to excuse a lot of the things he did while in his full on villain era, and like,,, i don't think that was canon??? like i straight up think the whole pit madness thing was made up but a lot of DC canon is wibbly wobbly already so its hard to say. hope this wasn't too word salady but i hope you understand that whenever you are consuming any piece of media, canon or fanon, with this man in it you have literally no idea what you are stumbling into you, you are playing fucking spin the wheel, which flavour of Jason Todd are we reading about today. I will say though, canon does objectively treat him like dogshit and only really brings him back every now and then as a punching bag for Batsy whenever they want to have edgy emo abusive dad bruce wayne because comic writers think found family is for chumps and so is being a good parent and actively resist it with every ounce of their soul :/ so I understand why fanon strays so far away, it's just that fanon also can't seem to agree on the degree of morally grey he is?? idk someone save Jason it's the worst custody battle of the century between canon and fanon.

Miguel O'Hara

he is dj internalized homophobia. he is so so sick in the head

[nobodyfamousposts]

I love the newest part of chloe's lament!!!

As always, the problem with all of chloe's plans Are that she doesn't think them though, because she doesn't think she needs too. She has it in her head that she has future knowledge, and so operates solely on that.

I am very curious as to which student overhead Chloe and Bustier. Sabrina or Adrien who already knows of Chloe's wish? A classmate with no idea of theyre even being a wish? Maybe marinette herself?

Thank you for writing and Sharin chloe's lament btw it's one of my favorit miraculous aus and I just reread it all when i saw the newest post <33

To be fair, it's not just her future knowledge.

The thing about Chloe (or at least the way I'm doing her), is that she has this perception of how the world works and how it SHOULD work based on the many years where the world DID work that way. For years, Chloe could essentially do whatever she wanted and not only were there no consequences, she was never even suggested that she was wrong or anything she did was wrong.

Look at canon: even in the few instances where Chloe "lost", she didn't really lose anything. At most, someone else "won" and she just didn't get something she wanted. And even when she was revealed to have been cheating or acting dishonestly, nobody really calls her out on it. She still at most doesn't get something she wanted. That the adults seem to ignore her behavior and even the narrative made more of an effort to woobify her didn't help matters.

Chloe in this setup is the prime example of someone who thinks she's the main character and the world is just supposed to make things work out for her. This is combined with her future knowledge to make her think that this is an advantage she can use to benefit herself...not realizing that the entire setup has changed and whatever benefits she had before that protected her from consequences are no longer there.

In her limited defense, at this point her future knowledge is really her only advantage. Through it, she knows things that most other people don't. But not only is she trying to use it for selfish reasons, she's trying to apply it in ways where it simply can't be applicable due to the changes already made by the setup of the world.

Half of the akumas Chloe knows about were created because of her. But Chloe isn't in a position anymore do to as many of them this time around.

Do you really think Princess Fragrance is going to happen? It'd be Marinette whom Rose would ask instead of Chloe, and while Marinette may not be able to personally introduce Rose to Prince Ali, she could still take Rose's letter to him. At the very least, she certainly wouldn't just rip it apart in front of her.

Vanisher? Sabrina and Chloe aren't friends.

Rogercop? Haha no. Chloe doesn't have a golden bracelet.

So yes, while she is acting on future knowledge that may not apply, the bigger problem is this "protagonist centered morality" Chloe has where she is operating under the belief that SHE is the protagonist and that things are just supposed to work out in her favor because she is herself. Because that's how they always did before.

But as a result of the Wish, Chloe gave that up. Not just the money and social status, but also the protection and ambivalence she received not just from the adults around her regarding her behavior. Chloe is getting first hand experience of what Marinette and others had to go through when it came to her, and she hates it. But what Chloe especially hates is that unlike her, people don't resent Marinette for being better off and she fails to see it's because of her actions.

It's easier to just act as if Marinette's manipulating everyone or that they're brainwashed than admit that Chloe caused her own issues.

The worst part is that Chloe could have turned her situation around at any point. Her future knowledge would have helped her do that. But that would require her to accept her position for what it is and more importantly, stop repeating her previous behaviors. And given it's Chloe, that's going to be the hardest thing for her.

As far as your question, I'm not going to reveal just yet which student it is. Though I will go ahead and say it isn't Marinette. She's still at the contest, marveling over the other entries and maybe even giving feedback to some of the contestants if they want it.

You're welcome! I'm glad you're enjoying it so far!

[etoilesbienne]

Nice to see that apparently we’ve all read it runs in the family. It was my guilty pleasure fic and i didn’t expect to see other people talking about it. I started reading it like a month after i got into bad and dsmp and i was /obsessed/. It’s one of those fics that changes your brain chemistry and makes you stare at a wall after reading it. To this day im still subbed to it on the off chance that it gets another chapter.

like genuinely its an enamoring fic it has an odd premise but like the author has so much potential in, like, being able to write genuinely engaging narratives. i'm shocked at how much setup is put into the work and you can tell where the narrative is going in a way that's like watching a trainwreck. You know exactly where it is going but the journey of getting there is so fascinating to watch.

anyway i want to ramble about what i liked and what i didn't like in the fic. so. huge reader discretion advised, go look at the other warnings i posted about this fic before reading this (also spoilers for the fic ahead)

like part of its most interesting facets is it is one of the few fics that tackles this sort of heavy subject matter of assault and kidnapping and doesn't really shy away from how genuinely negative it is and can be. like don't get me wrong ive enjoyed other psychological horror before, but it was, like, nice? to see the "pets" all be like genuinely upset and respond realistically to the situation they're in. no "they really like it secretly" undertone.

not a criticism but my favorite part of this story is the random ass normal human names they try to give everyone. they made skeppy have a white ass last name. bbh's name is Bad Halo. purpled doesn't even show up but his name is mentioned to be, like, "nolan purpled but he goes by purpled because his cheating whore of a mom named him nolan and he hates her" genuinely funniest line of the whole fic one of my favorites i can never ever forget it. i need to find all the human names in this theyre so fucking funny.

also badboyhalo? while he IS woobified and made much more demure and defanged, he's still like... that IS badboyhalo. his moments of complete suspicion at every encounter. his doubting. refusal to break the mould and rock the boat out if fear something bad would happen. VERY badboyhalo sentiments. also the fact the writer knew about skephalo divorce. going to be honest, looking at how their other work contains a6d, i think the writer was/is a bbh watcher. and then the schlatthalo. the fact they made schlatt ask to curse? and then bbh laughed when he did? this person understood both of these guys. they did their homework. schlatt isn't a megalomaniac evil villain one note. i don't know if i'd call both of them "in character" per say, but i can definitely say they had consistent characterization and i could understand how their characters got to these versions.

also the technohalo multifaceted concept? techno seeing bbh as too innocent? putting bbh on a pedestal and denying his humanity in that way? WILD. the setup and writing was all there for, like, bbh using his body and manipulating techno to turn against phil.

like the good parts of this fic are such crazy highs and peaks it makes the lows look so much worse.

speaking of which: wilbur soot.

by god is wilbur soot not a character, he is a force of nature and just continuous digging deeper on trying to fix a problem the writer accidentally started. none of sbi really are fleshed out or rounded characters, but wilbur soot is like by far getting the worst treatment. im not even a wilbur fan LOL.

he's supposed to be a schizophrenic serial killer which already isn't a great start, and then you watch the writer realize the issue and try to fix what they've started. this is when schizophrenic medicated slimecicle comes in. followed by badboyhalo looking at the camera and going Not All Mentally Ill People Are Bad. which was just really funny in such a morbid way. but then the writer DOES go in an interesting direction with phil denying his condition and refusing to help him get medicated. however with the slimecicle medicated moment it comes off as a medication = The Good Mentally Ill Person narrative. genuinely i dont know how id solve the wilbur issue without extensive rewriting. he's just a mess.

phil i think is one of the most interesting of sbi, being made into a central antagonist and a genuinely good villain. his scenes have well made tension and poses actual threat and stakes to the narrative. he's a good villain! techno has an interesting arc with bbh but just isn't given enough screentime and doesn't have much beyond "brute to be manipulated" which sucks a little. tommy is tommy. only one of sbi i could see not dying in a fire at the end. wilbur, despite his other issues is a narrative driver with his capriciousness, but the schizophrenia plotline is such a mess that he just is not a person here, he's a plot device more than anything.

more abstractly i do wish they committed and, like, had sex scenes or were blatant about sex happening. like they keep dancing around it but so much of the fic does not make sense if sex isn't what's occurring here. like i get subtlety if the avoidance of sex is what they're aiming for! but its okay to, like, maybe make it more clear whatever techno and bbh have going on is obviously sexual, because that can be used to advance the narrative and make it more clear bbh is using his body to manipulate here, because that'd be a good plot point to continue the themes and motifs of the story. i also just do not know how else to interpret the relationship lol.

my other biggest criticism is make it less misogynistic. the only three named women are the dead samsung smart fridge (who is now a dead mom named samantha), minx the alcoholic witness, and puffy, who is somehow ranboo's mom. like the ableism is horrific here but its so over the top stupid in the ableism, while the misogyny is subtle and just reeks. genuinely why is puffy ranboo's mom that sucks so fucking bad. make her be his aunt or guardian or something. but mom? c'mon.

i rambled way too long lol there's more i can say but this fic is my roman empire. the writer has so much potential but just needs more life experience to understand mental illness and misogyny. also a beta reader to fix their formatting. and maybe make their dialogue more human. shoutout to ranboo giving his name and phone number to tommy after tommy literally fucking tells him he'd "make a beautiful corpse" CRAZY exchange. no human would do that.

[trust-and-jump]

FANON batfam things to (dis)like

To like:

Tim Drake taking photos at night - you know what I'm talking about.

Lazarus Pit's influence as some intrusive thoughts.

Jason Todd being literature nerd.

Not mentioning Cassandra Cain's second "adventure" with Lady Shiva, because I love Cass and I'm happy for all the stories it didn't happen.

Not destroying Clocktower.

White streak in Jason Todd's hair (I know, I know, it was in some comics too, but I consider it as fanon thing because— the ones who read comics would probably understand (I hope) what I mean).

Cassandra getting her name even without Barbara Gordon naming her.

Bruce accepting Tim Drake as a son almost immediately.

To dislike:

Bruce accepting Tim Drake as a son almost immediately.

Cassandra Cain having no personality outside of her weird body-reading thing/outside of her being Batfam therapist (which is— just WHY???? She's the worst option for this! I love her but she can't be perfect and she has SO. MANY. PROBLEMS. She deserves better than being that!) Guys she will beat all the criminals up if it means she doesn't have to talk about feelings and all that. Besides, knowing the person's intentions or guessing emotions doesn't mean knowing how to talk through it or how to handle these emotions or how relationships between people 'should' or 'should not' work.

Assuming that she understands everything people say before she learns how to speak.

Not mentioning her problems with reading&writing and thinking she would learn ASL immediately (and MAYBE she would, in some stories, IDK, but I saw only one fic that actually discussed why ASL would be as difficult for her as other languages)

Fucking... autopsy scar. it should not exist.

"Replacement". It's a good thing, actually, I just don't like it.

Shiny Dick. (KDJDISKSOXBXJSKOSSLSS I LAUGHED AFTER I WROTE IT I WON'T CHANGE IT)

Jason slitting Tim's throat at the Titans Tower. I know it would be kinda poetic after THE BATARANG ™ but - no. I remember Jason/Clayface thing with Hush and I accept this canon but all I see at the Titans Tower fight is beating. I'm not even sure Jason wrote the note in blood, because guys, have you ever tried to write big letters with BLOOD? I DID. It's so fcking inconvenient. and takes too much time! and oh my god, even if Jason DID write it in Tim's blood, why slitting his throat? do you have any idea how ridiculously difficult the whole thing is? I think people just kinda confuse Tim-Jason situation at the Titans Tower and Tim-Jason situation with Hush. Because. Slitting throat thing. And they often forget about that Jason/Clayface thing with Hush. I forget it too, sometimes.

Lazarus Pit Madness as a form of mind control or something that excuses everything Jason did. And turning him to a different character.

Impulsive Jason Todd who has no control at all. like with the white streak - I mark it as a Fanon thing despite it being in comics. not because previous reasons but because. because retcon. fuck off. I mean, as Robin he could be, sometimes. But all Robins were like that sometimes. And they all still were professionals. Well. Can vigilantes be professional????? I don't think so but who knows.

Shiny Dick [2]. I won't apologise. (wow I just found out that apologise and apologize are both correct, just British and American variants. Cool!!)

Duke Thomas having half-existence. - would it hurt to actually choose if Duke exists in your story or not? he's an amazing character and it's better not to write him at all if he's a ghost here, my guy.

Weird Tim who worships Jason while getting beat up by him. Did you see how Tim's all sassy while fighting? NOT a deer with big eyes at all. ROBIN. He's Robin!

Not acknowledging what Damian al Ghul or Damian Wayne has been through. I get it, you like Tim and Damian's acting hostile makes you hostile towards him but— seriously?

Woobifying any character while completely changing personality. Dick, Tim and Jason are suffering the most from it. Damian is there sometimes too.

"Jason doesn't try to kill Bruce anymore". He never tried to kill Bruce except this one time in Lost Days where he decided not to do it after all.

Not acknowledging Jason Todd being a hypocrite.

guys do you remember Jason's dead eyes in Lost Days. literally the last glimpse of life in him was when he found out that Joker was alive. It's sad.

___

okay there's a lot more than that but I just can't remember anything else right now. And I'm not going to touch all the fandom's opinions on Bruce Wayne as a parent because it's even more meaningless.

___

sorry for bad English.

[deusvervewrites]

It gets even worst when you mix in Dadzawa into the stories, which you know full too well by the tag that the author intentional will make OCs out of Inko and All Might and not use them correctly unless they have actual long term validation, good build up and good writing onto why they’re the way they are. It’s to the point that I won’t read Izuku(angst, feel-good or otherwise) with Dadzawa stories, even if they lack abusive/dead Inko and All Might bashing, simply because they woobify and regress Izuku. Not to mention how the rest of 1-A can also be negatively affected by adding Dadzawa without cause.

Dadzawa, even if they is no bashing of the other characters, is frequently overused and improperly used to the point that the intended individuals for a Dadzawa to exist suffer. I understand why the authors want to have a feel-good and father like teacher for 1-A, especially for Izuku since in all scenes, Hisashi is still a deadbeat unless you subscribe to DFO, but don’t believe that All Might can change simply because of his first scene telling Izuku can’t be a hero(All Might had a bad day, it happens to everyone). A randomly inserted Dadzawa with or without the common OCs committing identity theft, has a chance to influence and develop the story and characters in the wrong way.

The impression that canon Aizawa gives off, especially if you know what it’s like to have a great father and good teacher, is that Aizawa would not be a great person to emulate due to his hygiene issues and what he does in the daily basis, which is what we see in canon. There’s a number of Dadzawa fans who haven’t even read the manga nor watched the anime, thus they believe that Dadzawa exists in canon, it’s an entirely fanon creation, especially after Eri joins the story. I know that some of them may have father issues themselves but we already have a greater father figure in All Might. I guess they are more horny and attractive to the slim figure(who doesn’t do Batman right at all) that is Aizawa and implants all of Inkos, All Mights and everyone else’s good traits onto Aizawa.

Aizawa does seem to do a good job with Eri, but for his class? I think it's telling that when Bakugou was kidnapped, several members of 1-A decided that saving him themselves was the best course of action.

But it's infuriating that so many characters have to be turned into flat OCs so they can be assholes solely to make Aizawa look better.

(That being said, the Prince of Heroes series setting up All-Might-Bashind-But-Dadzawa only for Aizawa to drop the ball so hard the kids think he hates them for several months was absolutely hilarious)

[sarka-stically]

im mad enough to make 2nd post and I barely post ever. this show was never high tv but this ep rly spat in the face of everything i liked about it. usually i try to be positive but here you got random list of all things terrible in no particular order (vaguelly chronologic who knows)

ALSO I dont take them probably assuming they would have more eps and then scrambling to fit the story in one episode as decent excuse... the stakes they set up in ep7 werent impossible to fix with one ep, they just wrote terrible episode

ed's entire character arc of 2 seasons being rolled into tiny ball and thrown in the trash. and no he isnt slipping or spiralling again, it isnt him being hot protective husband, this is him, character who spent 2 seasons trying and failing to be better and finally decided that the healthiest thing to do is to just drop the lifestyle that brings out the worst in him and pursue simple life THROWING IT OUT after finding out its not as easy as he assumed and he would have to work for it??? incredible fucking message david jenkins, if being better version of yourself is just lil bit inconvenient its not worth it go back to your crappy ways.

and NO its not him slipping, the tone of this whole thing is very distinctly victorious. and also NO the path he took now is not in any way different or better than the one he left. there is even fun triumphant vibe to him KILLING PEOPLE which was always treated as sth BAD for him??? literally absolute nonsense

what the fuck was that plot?? why are all pirates arrested?? when all they did was sink those ships?? i know this show tends to be cooky and silly and cartoony, but this was just absolutely random unexplained jump of stakes.

WHERE THE FUCK are all the other husbands of jackie. this is barely valid complaint but this stupid ep rly makes it look like swede is her only husband and I dont appreciate it

why the unholly hell did they spend entire season actually setting up crew as important, give them their own opinions and relationships to their captains, have izzy even mention that THE CREW is what its all about.... and then have them barely have any speaking roles in this episode and 0 plot relevance

that fucking PLAN??? WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT??? im sorry why the fuck did their plan include walking through the biggest swarm of brits while having mr noseless richie UNSECURED amongst them??? why even BRING HIM other than to have him there specifically so he can be the one to shoot izzy for future drama???

izzy. death.

i genuinely could be FINE with izzy dying if they wrote it decently. and id even be fine with it in this episode. if they made it fucking meaningful... but they had my man, mr famously skilled pirate catch random bullet because he is incompetent actually... bullet into the side of the body that ofmd physics say is survivable easily??? and then give 0 attention to it??

ed being there while he dies??? this truly makes me just feel like they killed him only so in hypoteticky s3 they can woobify poor ed some more... or even give him excuse to be narrativelly clean of any atrocities he does in name of revenge

but it makes no. fucking. sense. ed shluldnt be there saying ur my only family, ed has not treated izzy as family ONCE in this entire show, ed barely talked to izzy after first 3 episodes, he is NOT the person on that ship who cares about izzy the most of all. if anyone should be there while he fucking DIES its the crew. who has shown constantly through this season that they care about him, who he made whole speech about in THIS SAME EPISODE. im sorry frenchie did NOT carry izzy back on the ship to drop him on the floor and have ed who I REPEAT HAS NOT SHOWN HE CARES ABOUT HIM AS MORE THAN AQUITANCE SINCE LIKE EARLY S1 be the one to be there in his last moment.

I get izzy wanting to make amends but BOTH OF THEM SHOULD BE APOLOGISING, HE SHOULDNT VE BEGGING FOR FORGIVENESS and ed shouldnt be framed as blameless in their relationship in izzy's last moment.

and what made me genuinely laugh was izzy saying that the crew is ed's family. they are literally NOT. everyone who was aboard the revenge either hates him or is scared of him, and I dont think they had enough reason to change their minds as ed hasnt rly spent any time with the crew and shown only care for stede. they are NOT ed's found family and this payoff and this found family line is so ridiculously not set up and not narrativelly deserved it makes me laugh.

overall absolutely ridiculizs episode it made me laugh and it made me angry and it also made me angry how quickly we move past that

[arthurtaylorlester]

whispers into your inbox "jmart was the worst thing that could have happened in tma; it wrecked Jon's character and is the most transparent 'how do we not have our mc become suicidal?' I have ever seen. TMA then falls into the hole of the only important or good enough relationships being romantic, discarding previous character development to throw everything into romance solves all ~ ♡ I hate it and I hate how much Jon is woobified and infantilized in the fandom to drool over Martin and I hate how everyone acts like their relationship is good, when I think either of them with 5 years of a normal life would realize how awful the relationship was for both of them." Anyway lol I expect no response or post of this I am just being spicey on anon

oh anon you thought i was gonna see a take like this and not post it?

i need you to out yourself to me because goddamn this is an interesting take!

look, i love jmart, but even with 5 seasons of development they still somehow managed to feel rushed?

i disagree in that their relationship being unhealthy is a bad thing for them, because like the appeal of podcasts for me is the fucked up relationships. fucked up characters = fucked up relationships, yknow? like john and arthur from malevolent, normally, they'd hate each other without much of a second thought, but that's not the point, they love each other despite that, and that kind of extends to jmart for me.

i also totally agree with the fandom criticism, woobifying jon is like the only tma content i see on twt and it is soooooo annoying.

my personal qualms with tma however is in part the lore decisions and how the fandom treats the lore (and also the whole podcast).

s1 is easily the best season, mostly because you have no fucking idea what's going on, but after s2 things really start feeling like they're being drawn out, at least to me? like i think season 3-4 couldve been one thing, and um. season 5 is fun if you like jmart and the eye ig. i know most of this is a gross oversimplification (not forgetting yall basira&daisy fans) but after the core cast of season 1-2 i could not really get the other characters being fundamental in the story (not georgie. i love georgie)

don't get me wrong, the not-sasha arc was amazing! but after tim died, and martin fucked off for most of a season being sad, i was a bit bored. the buried isnt interesting to me sorry.

and also they under-utilize basically every fear, including the eye, and the one that upsets me the most is the stranger. oh what is it? circus and clowns ig. LIKE OPEN UP YOUR EYES THE WORLD IS OPEN TO YOU THE UNCANNY VALLEY AS SO MANY NICHES PLEASE

and by the end of the show, it just feels like they keep rotating the same 3 fears, and the others just kind fade into the bg

and then there's the fandom. i'm sorry but some of you guys act like tma is the end-all-be-all of fiction horror podcasts. when it's just not. sorry, but the magnus archives, after s1, just isnt scary. you know what's going on, the fears! which are neatly tied into these categories of oddities!

and the show explicitly states that the 14 fears categorization is arbitrary and that they all bleed into one another, but the fandom just. ignores that? like i've heard so many people go to other podcasts and say ''oh x is so eye avatar-coded!!'' and then x just has some vague eye symbolism that isnt even the point (this is about arthur lester)

and like i don't understand how tma manages to be the most mainstream fiction podcast nowadays, when welcome to night vale is right there ! and yes, i am implying that wtnv is objectively better than tma, because wtnv despite running for 12 goddamn years has never bored me with an episode, and it has roughly the same amounts of episodes! they both have similar formats that could repetitive quick (radio show vs statements) and even though i'd say statements have more creative freedom, wtnv still manages to not be boring. this might also just be a fact of better and more varied authors but hey, this is just my opinion

i want it to be clear that i'm not trying to start discourse, i still like tma! the fanartists are some of the most talented artists i've seen, and the fics are just aughhhhhhhhhhhh /pos

[oreganosbaby]

it’s funny for people to really want people to formally label roman a “fascist.” functionally and in certain parts of his genuine beliefs, he is and that’s like, just part of being a roy. you really have to ask “why is it important that we call roman a ‘fascist’?” i assume that on a conscious level, most want this because they don’t like the so-called “woobifying” of roman that could slip into (fictional?) fascist apologia occasionally; however, i think that it’s pretty stupid to make this a roman-exclusive quality when they’re all fascistic and i think that sometimes, labelling them as such creates this kind of distancing from the characters for the audience to reassure themselves that they’re comparatively “good people.” i mean, the characters literally do that in canon. they just look stupider because they’re actually in positions to benefit from fascism (owning/executives at the racism factory) and also they have like, fascistic tendencies. i mean, there’s kendall calling shiv and roman “nazi-lovers” and himself a “defender of liberal democracy,”as if that means shit. like, come on.

like, fascism is an extremely morally loaded word and when it becomes synonymous with “bad person” and loses all other meaning, it goes back around to just saying that a character is “evil” or “the worst” so they don’t have to actually understand what fascism is and how it works. fascism isn’t just when people do racism or whatever. that’s such a ridiculously narrow view of things. what makes succession’s writing about fascism interesting is that it shows fascism as a spectacle, an attractive one, that capitalism uses. they’re fascists because they’re capitalists and specifically, ones that have been benefiting from decades of fascist spectacle. so, if they’re fascists because they’re capitalists, why are they capitalists? and it’s because that’s all they know and they’re born into that position. why did logan become a capitalist? why does anyone become one? if you can’t figure it out then, i don’t know how you’re watching this.