#ye this was long

[peculiarnation4u]

Why (i think) Huntlow confuses some people and myself (Very long post)

I don’t hate Huntlow, don’t even think it's bad. Felt the need to say that right off the bat for those of you who just saw the title and assumed the worst. So put your “Leave Huntlow alone!”, and “God I thought I was the only one who hated this ship” comments away, that’s not what this post is for. I made this to try to explain my complicated feelings towards this ship and how they came to be specifically why I feel the way I do. I also hope to shed some light as to why people may not be as fond of this ship as the other main two we have in the series. Now i only mean to give my thoughts, I can not speak for the bulk of the fandom and people who don’t like the ship, but maybe I can enlighten those who don't understand why the hate is here, and help the haters contain and focus the reasons they don’t like it outside of bias and petty ones. I'm also making this with the sole hope that'll i'll be proven wrong in For The Future and that my arguments will be invalidated (I don't believe you should ever hate a ship, just writing)

Huntlow, or Winter as some people call it which i refuse to do because like, winter is an already established word. Why would you name a ship after something that already exists and is used in daily conversation outside of the fandom? Isn't there a tumblr thread about why it’s a bad idea to name ships after already existing concepts.

Back to where I was, Huntlow is the ship between willow and hunter, established as canon in Labyrinth Runners. Despite that, the ship existed in the fandom prior to being confirmed and really started during the episode Any Sport In A Storm and fans of it only having to wait about a month till said confirmation. Unfortunately, it being confirmed somewhat divided a portion of the fandom with both sides being convinced they’re the minority. One of the main arguments against Huntlow was that it was rushed, which I don't actually agree with and will explain why later. Even so, it was still massively popular as Hunter’s only real understandable ship partner. With the four he had prior not really being well received by a majority of the fandom, Willow seemed like the best option handed to us on a silver platter and it wasn’t just a fanon ship either like most of them. That paired with the fandom eager to see Hunter get some sort of happiness and it not having any of the toxic tropes that usually come with teen mlw relationships in media it seemed like another hit from The Owl House relationship department and an obvious outcome. But was it?

Now like most of the fandom, I was right there watching all these episodes come out every week and the fan’s reactions to them as well as my own. I was personally really fond of Any Sport In A Storm as Willow, as well as Gus, was one of my favorite characters when the series started and I was happy that she finally got an episode or a moment to shine that didn’t feel overshadowed by Amity or Lumity. A little salty that it took being significant to Hunter for the fandom to finally give Gus and Willow the time of day but beggars can’t be choosers.

While watching the episode, one thing I and many others knew just from this episode alone was that the fandom was gonna start shipping Hunter and Willow, it was inevitable. However I wrote this off as the fandom just shipping as it does and didn’t pay it any mind, especially since I didn't see any of their interactions in the episode as romantic. So when Labyrinth Runners came out and confirmed that Hunter had a crush on Willow, my reaction was

“......what?”

No really, it was “what?”, I was confused. I mean I thought it was cute and was happy that Hunter had developed positive feelings for once, but seriously I didn’t see this coming at all, I was surprised, and that’s not a good thing. I wasn’t happy it was confirmed, I wasn’t even dreading it as either would imply I knew this was going to happen, but i didn’t, and i can explain why.

Now I will admit that I'm definitely biased. As you may have guessed, I'm not the fondest of Huntlow. But furthermore, I'm not the best at understanding what may lead two people to develop feelings for one in media and irl *cough*A-spec*cough*. So if Hunter or Willow had some sort of connection that I didn’t pick up on, that's on me. Though even with that drawback, I still think i’m not completely crazy when I squint at the writing

I mentioned before that Hunter's crush on Willow confused me, from a writing standpoint at least, so in order to understand it we have to look at what came before it, their meeting in Any Sport In A Storm. Call me crazy but this episode wasn’t enough to convince me Hunter would gain feelings, again from a writing perspective, not an emotional one. In terms of emotions I could completely get why he’d find her appealing, it was just poor at setting up that it was going to happen.

I think the main reason why is because there was no emphasis on their relationship specifically. Willow spoke to Hunter as she would any other member and as she did any other member. Gus got in a moment of speaking too. Hunter as well since he is shown interacting with and liking every member.

This downplays Willow and Hunter's presumed relationship and it raises the question of “why her?”, since Hunter showed that he liked everyone on the team equally, granted he put more focus on Willow but that was because she was the captain.

Hell, everything Hunter did with or to Willow, he did with or to Gus in the same episode, (meeting, complimenting their skills, a sad moment, a deep moment where they showcase their inner thoughts) he even goes on to have more moments and even an episode with gus.

Actually he had an episode with everyone except Willow , again I don’t count Any Sport In A Storm as it felt more like a group relationship episode than Willow and Hunter specifically, you wouldn’t consider Wing It Like Witches a Luz and Amity episode would you? (actually knowing this fandom, y'all probably would).

All this does is make Hunter and Willow’s chemistry look weaker by comparison, and only raises my questions. Hunter has more in common with everyone else on the team than Willow. The only thing they really had, that was stated and not assumed by the fandom, was that half a witch comment, which I want to talk about for a moment.

I remember hearing that line when I first watched the episode, back before the ship was really a thing, and even then I thought that they pulled this out of their ass the moment I heard it. Like it makes sense on a surface level but then you start thinking about it and it feels a little off.  Like Willow was called half a witch because she wasn’t good at magic, but Hunter can’t do magic at all, so would the term still apply. Where did he even hear it from, I find it hard to believe that a high up establishment like  the emperor’s coven would use playground insults, and Hunter couldn’t have just called himself it as we know this guy doesn’t know anything about slang. But all that is nitpicking, it just feels like it doesn’t hold as much weight for Hunter as it does Willow. We know Willow has been called it multiple times throughout the series and things adjacent to it, we see how she’s struggled with it and why she was called it. But Hunter doesn’t get any of that and I guess it lessens the impact, which is concerning since this is supposed to be their big connecting moment.

I feel like this could’ve been fixed if Hunter being called half a witch was brought up in an earlier episode, maybe when he was talking to Luz, that way the audience already knew this fact and didn’t learn at the same time Willow did.  Because at the moment, Hunter and Willow’s chemistry feels a little dry. There's a reason Gus is Hunter’s best friend and Hunter hasn’t spoken to Willow since the episode they met.

“But Hunter has a crush on her and he’s nervous so he’s not going to talk as much” . And that I understand, even noticing that it was a parallel to how Amity acted around Luz, and it was cute, but that’s the thing, cute, not efficient. It was sweet at first but then I started fearing that he actually wouldn’t talk to her ever again. It’s reminiscent of, and I don't want to compare the two because Huntlow is a thousand times better, Adrienette from MLB. In that show our mc Marinette has a crush on perfect model Adrien however is basically incapable of speaking to him without tripping over her words or backing out. At first it was cute how nervous she got but then it became detrimental to their relationship because she was unable to make a move and even the audience started to notice. How were we supposed to support this relationship or believe it’ll be ok if the mc had to get dragged to it by her friends or couldn’t do anything on her own, and Huntlow is giving me the same feelings. Nowhere near as bad as it just started and didn’t drag out but with only three (at the time) episodes left, i was paranoid.

Another way to explain my disposition is to simply look at the other two canon ships in the show, Lumity and Raeda and how they handled their ships. Earlier I stated that I didn't think Huntlow was rushed and I still stand by that. You can tell because it follows the same pattern as Raeda and Lumity, that the two characters become friends and almost immediately after, one of them catches feelings. Actually Eda got a crush on Raine faster than Hunter did Willow, both in story and irl. So it’s not rushed, however it does have an issue that led people to believe it was rushed, the aforementioned lack of chemistry and talking to one another before the crush came. Luz and Amity, and Raine and Eda were repeatedly shown talking to each other specifically and enjoying the other’s presence as well as getting to know them, Huntlow didn’t have that.

“But the show got shortened, they didn't have enough time to give Hunter and Willow their own episodes and moments”. And to that i say you’re right, but why even put in a ship if you know you won’t have the time to flesh it out. Also I can only agree with that statement so much when we’re constantly shown Hunter interacting with and having moments with Gus after their introduction.

Honestly I had a theory that Huntlow was always planned to happen back when they had more episodes, but then the show got shortened, however they still wanted to keep that so they left it in, which i'd be completely fine with.

It just feels off y'know, Raeda and Lumity were so good at avoiding tropes and doing something different. Amity could’ve just remained a stuck up bully or befriended Luz and become the angsty Lancer, but she didn’t. Their relationship could’ve been dragged out or Luz could’ve never shown signs of being interested until the show ended and they got together, but it didn’t. Luz and Amity could’ve gotten into stupid drama or jealousy after getting together, but they didn’t.

Raeda follows suit too. Raine could’ve just been the shitty ex who we forget about an episode later or they could’ve just been used for sexual tension instead of showing how they and Eda care for each other. Even more so, the reason why they broke up wasn’t left vague and it was actually worked on, instead of most exes tropes where the audience is never told why they broke up, or the two characters get back together without the initial reason they broke up being fixed. On top of that, all of their moments and episodes actually served the plot, world building or character development and it never felt like the plot stopped or like these moments could be taken out.

Raeda and Lumity did so many things differently, so it feels weird watching Huntlow come in and repeat so many tropes from media with teens as its main characters.The only thing I think Huntlow did differently was have a plus sized girl in the relationship, which I really like since plus sized girls usually aren't seen as desirable in media. Not that tropes are bad or that the ones Huntlow did were bad, it just makes me squint. Huntlow following so many tropes in comparison to Lumity and Raeda, plus flapjack (hunter’s closest friend for half a season) dying, plus Hunter being the character the writers like to torture, plus the weirdness of how it was written, makes me nervous because I really hope Huntlow isn’t going to be used just to hurt Hunter, mostly cause of fan backlash. Even I'd be a little upset if I got dragged along on this ride for nothing.

Now despite all of the things I've complained about, I still think Huntlow is fine, however I do think it could be better and fix the issues I mentioned earlier. Now the best fix would be to simply give them an episode, but we obviously don’t have time for that so the next would be to give them more moments together. Moments where Hunter is actually speaking and Willow isn’t doing all the work. Or give them more things in common, canonical things not stuff assumed by the fandom. Huntlow can definitely work, I even believe that that was the reason we were all able to overlook the negatives simply due to the ship having a lot of potential. (I really think that For the Future will give us this)

I have hope that my opinion will be swayed in these last two episodes and that my confusion will be put to rest. I feel like I'm missing something, like there was some sort of connection I didn't see, and if I didn't, then that's on me.

[inkskinned]

please i love you i'm begging you bring back suspension of disbelief bring back trusting the audience like. i cannot handle any more dialogue that sounds like a legal document. "hello, i am here to talk to you about the incident from a few minutes ago, because i feel you might be unwell, and i am invested in your personal wellbeing." "thank you, i am unwell because the incident was hurtful to me due to my childhood, which was bad." I CANT!!!!

do you know how many people are mad that authors use "growled" as a word for "said"? it's just poetics! they do not literally mean "growled," it's just a common replacement for "said with force but in a low tone." it's normal! do you hear me!! help me i love you please let me out of here!!!

[smokiedokie]

I opened my copy of The Tale of the Body Thief & immediately had to close it again because of this silly little annotation

[afniel]

This is the magic lucky word count. Reblog for creativity juice. It might even work, who knows.

[christadeguchi]

make men slutty again.

HEAT STROKE | GQ CHINA Photographer: Wintam; Editor & Image: Shawn Gao Ding; Makeup: Lucas; Hair: Tao Liu; Art: Grade 2 & Lei Min; Art Assistant: Jiang Mi; Models: Kim; Ye Hao, Yu Hang, Ho Jun; Fashion Assistant: Yiyi, Coco; Photography Assistant: Li Zhenxi; Song Luanyi

bonus as rightfully added by @polyabathtub:

[pigswithwings]

the angel staying over at my house asked for a nightlight in their room and i told them buddy, don't you produce your own light? what're you gonna do with more? and they said they wanted to see why people like it so much. and also that the nightlight i own is blue and they've been trying to understand color. anyways i think they've stared at it for an hour now

[tpwrtrmnky]

hindsight

[ID: A two-panel comic with crudely drawn stick figures.

Panel 1: The lime green person is talking to the leaf green person and the moss green person.

Lime: "I... have a confession to make."

Leaf: "Go ahead."

Lime: "I want to rewatch the Wizard Child movies."

Leaf: "Didn't the wizard author get incredibly chromophobic?"

Lime: "Yeah I just... It's nostalgia you know? They meant a lot to me when I was a kid."

Panel 2: The three are on the couch.

Lime: "All right, let's go."

Leaf: "It's so weird how the wizard author just turned chromophobic though. Like I remember this series being pretty good for its time. It'll be weird seeing their work contrasting with their views now."

Moss: "I'm just glad we got the movies for free through normal and legal means. Heh."

End ID.]

[ID 2: Scenes from three Wizard Child movies.

Wizard Child and the Simplistic Morality: A slightly round child with a propeller hat is talking to a child with no hat.

Round child: "I am so fucking fat and greedy I am textually shown to be fat because I am greedy and also evil."

Hatless child: "You are to infer my moral purity from juxtaposition with this fat child. Woe is me for our shared parent has deprived me of a propeller hat."

Wizard Child and the Goodness of Wealth: An adult wizard is talking to the child, who now has a wizard hat.

Wizard Adult: "Wizard child you are secretly extremely rich."

Wizard Child: "I will form biases regarding the bankers all being triangular for some reason!"

Wizard Adult: "Your wealth is deserved because your true parent was Good and therefore you are also Good."

Wizard Child: "Now we should acquire consumer goods. Buy consumer goods!"

Wizard Child and the Dark Family History: A blue-grey horse person is talking to the wizard child.

Blue-grey: "No, wizard child. You don't understand. I am one of the good ones, because unlike the bad ones I don't try to spread my curse that makes you a blue-grey horselike creature to others!"

Wizard child: "Wow uncle blue-grey you are one of the good ones! I forgive you for being a horse because I am so good I would even forgive horses. I sure hope you don't conspicuously get killed off later in this movie!"

End ID 2.]

[ID 3: Oh hell no there are even more of these.

Wizard Youth and the Tokenistic Relationship Dynamics: A square headed wizard youth is talking to the former wizard child, now a wizard youth.

Square Wizard Youth: "Wizard child, as the only person with a square head in this entire series it is my duty to inform you that you are the savior of all people with square heads, too. Let us build a one-sided relationship that only furthers your character development, after which I will immediately lose all plot relevance."

Wizard Youth: "I will do this because I am a maturing wizard youth and need disposable relationships that don't threaten the endgame!"

Wizard Youth and the Escalation of Stakes: The Dark Wizard, a sort of grey-green person with a cloak, is pointing at Wizard Youth.

Dark Wizard: "Wizard Youth, I have returned!"

Wizard Youth: "Dark Wizard! Why are you green now?"

Dark Wizard: "Evil magic made me green! I am green with envy towards all who are good!"

Wizard Youth: "I will not engage with how you are clearly based on fascist ideologies and yet this narrative plays into fascist aesthetic sensibilities!"

Wizard Youth and the Post-Hoc Revelations: The Wizard Youth is leaning over their Wizard Mentor, who is laying in a pool of blood.

Wizard Youth: "Wizard Mentor no! You can't die!"

Wizard Mentor: "It is fine, wizard youth. My death will further your character development into a wizard adult. Also, I was secretly a very very dark purple this entire time. I never brought it up so I could retain narrative approval.

End ID 3.]

[ID 4: Wizard Adult and the Overdue Conclusion. Three panels. I am sorry.

Panel 1: The dark wizard is dueling the Wizard Adult with magic beams.

Dark Wizard: "Evil green beam!"

Wizard Adult: "Good red beam! Despite the enormous variety of magic in this series this is what our final battle looks like!"

Panel 2: Wizard Adult stands victorious over the dark wizard, who is dying on the ground.

Wizard Adult: "In the end, dark wizard, you were defeated because I am morally superior to you."

Dark Wizard: "I was a product of systemic failures. There will be someone like me again someday!"

Panel 3: Zoom in on wizard adult, who says:

"Not if I can help it. Because I am going to be a wizard cop now. The moral of this story is that all systemic issues can be solved by finding a bad guy to beat."

End ID 4.]

[ID 5: Four panels.

Panel 1: Return to the green trio on their couch, watching the TV say "The End." All are are silent.

Panel 2: They are sitting on the couch. Moss is looking at their phone.

Lime: "Yeah so there were maybe a few signs we missed because we were children."

Leaf: "Yeah. A few. Some."

Panel 3: Continue conversation.

Lime: "So what did you think, Moss?"

Panel 4: Zoom in on Moss, who says: "I've been zoned out on my phone since the second movie. They lost me at the magic stuff. Wizards aren't real."

End ID 5.]

Start - Previous - Next

[buzzrds]

here's my wonderful isopod child, handcrafted in leather

[toshootforthestars]

(source)

[ashoss]

patrol is fun :DD

[myiliterallyhavenolifegoals]

I love the dramatic, triumphant reveal that wolverine and deadpool survived the time ripper, mainly because i'm 1000% sure wade heard paradox monologuing™️ and was like "nonono hold on we have to wait for the Right Moment" and logan, who is 7 different kinds of exhausted at this point, was like "....yeah ok lol"

which leads to 2 grown ass men hiding behind a corner just waiting to ruin this british man's afternoon? logan really went from “i'll kill u with my teeth” to “yea sure i'll commit to your stupid bit” in like 2 days, honestly what a lad

[bowl-o-nudel]

Man can't enjoy nothing without that damn nosey jealous bitch ruining it 🙄

[endusviolence]

Rowling isn't denying holocaust. She just pointed out that burning of transgender health books is a lie as that form of cosmetic surgery didn't exist. But of course you knew that already, didn't you?

I was thinking I'd probably see one of you! You're wrong :) Let's review the history a bit, shall we?

In this case, what we're talking about is the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft, or in English, The Institute of Sexology. This Institute was founded and headed by a gay Jewish sexologist named Magnus Hirschfeld. It was founded in July of 1919 as the first sexology research clinic in the world, and was run as a private, non-profit clinic. Hirschfeld and the researchers who worked there would give out consultations, medical advice, and even treatments for free to their poorer clientele, as well as give thousands of lectures and build a unique library full of books on gender, sexuality, and eroticism. Of course, being a gay man, Hirschfeld focused a lot on the gay community and proving that homosexuality was natural and could not be "cured".

Hirschfeld was unique in his time because he believed that nobody's gender was either one or the other. Rather, he contended that everyone is a mixture of both male and female, with every individual having their own unique mix of traits.

This leads into the Institute's work with transgender patients. Hirschfeld was actually the one to coin the term "transsexual" in 1923, though this word didn't become popular phrasing until 30 years later when Harry Benjamin began expanding his research (I'll just be shortening it to trans for this brief overview.) For the Institute, their revolutionary work with gay men eventually began to attract other members of the LGBTA+, including of course trans people.

Contrary to what Anon says, sex reassignment surgery was first tested in 1912. It'd already being used on humans throughout Europe during the 1920's by the time a doctor at the Institute named Ludwig Levy-Lenz began performing it on patients in 1931. Hirschfeld was at first opposed, but he came around quickly because it lowered the rate of suicide among their trans patients. Not only was reassignment performed at the Institute, but both facial feminization and facial masculization surgery were also done.

The Institute employed some of these patients, gave them therapy to help with other issues, even gave some of the mentioned surgeries for free to this who could not afford it! They spoke out on their behalf to the public, even getting Berlin police to help them create "transvestite passes" to allow people to dress however they wanted without the threat of being arrested. They worked together to fight the law, including trying to strike down Paragraph 175, which made it illegal to be homosexual. The picture below is from their holiday party, Magnus Hirschfeld being the gentleman on the right with the fabulous mustache. Many of the other people in this photo are transgender.

[Image ID: A black and white photo of a group of people. Some are smiling at the camera, others have serious expressions. Either way, they all seem to be happy. On the right side, an older gentleman in glasses- Magnus Hirschfeld- is sitting. He has short hair and a bushy mustache. He is resting one hand on the shoulder of the person in front of him. His other hand is being held by a person to his left. Another person to his right is holding his shoulder.]

There was always push back against the Institute, especially from conservatives who saw all of this as a bad thing. But conservatism can't stop progress without destroying it. They weren't willing to go that far for a good while. It all ended in March of 1933, when a new Chancellor was elected. The Nazis did not like homosexuals for several reasons. Chief among them, we break the boundaries of "normal" society. Shortly after the election, on May 6th, the book burnings began. The Jewish, gay, and obviously liberal Magnus Hirschfeld and his library of boundary-breaking literature was one of the very first targets. Thankfully, Hirschfeld was spared by virtue of being in Paris at the time (he would die in 1935, before the Nazis were able to invade France). His library wasn't so lucky.

This famous picture of the book burnings was taken after the Institute of Sexology had been raided. That's their books. Literature on so much about sexuality, eroticism, and gender, yes including their new work on trans people. This is the trans community's Alexandria. We're incredibly lucky that enough of it survived for Harry Benjamin and everyone who came after him was able to build on the Institute's work.

[Image ID: A black and white photo of the May Nazi book burning of the Institute of Sexology's library. A soldier, back facing the camera, is throwing a stack of books into the fire. In the background of the right side, a crowd is watching.]

As the Holocaust went on, the homosexuals of Germany became a targeted group. This did include transgender people, no matter what you say. To deny this reality is Holocaust denial. JK Rowling and everyone else who tries to pretend like this isn't reality is participating in that evil. You're agreeing with the Nazis.

But of course, you knew that already, didn't you?

Edit: Added image IDs. I apologize to those using screen readers for forgetting them. Please reblog this version instead.

[squadron-of-damned]

[christadeguchi]

"i would know her by reformed body alone... i would know her in death"

also... there's official art

[basshole-astard]

PSA: i keep seeing posts about staying cool in extreme heat that include advice like "gatorade is bad actually!" and "don't drink fruit juice it'll just dehydrate you!" and neither of these are true!

regarding fruit juice: there's apparently a misconception that Any Sugar At All will dehydrate you, and that's simply not true. yes, sugar will make you pee more when consumed in large amounts, but 1) the natural sugar in fruits won't do this to you 2) great news! a lot of fruit juices exist without any added sugar in them! 3) honestly even having a glass of the fruit juice with added sugar won't completely dehydrate you as long as you're also drinking water throughout the day. if its hot you deserve a cold treat of a drink!!! can't go wrong with fruit juice!!!

regarding gatorade: maybe this isn't an every day drink, but guess what: if it's 110F/40C or hotter outside, and you don't have AC, or you're moving around a lot outside of the AC, and you're sweating buckets: that's when you drink a gatorade.

gatorade exists to replenish all the electrolytes (salt) and glucose (sugar) that you sweat out. YES it is meant for athletes to drink during intensive work outs and not necessarily for people who aren't doing that kind of exercise. BUT GUESS WHAT! when you're sweating buckets because you had to walk to the bus in extreme heat, that's intensive exercise. please feel free to drink a gatorade after that! that's its intended use case!!!!

no: neither of these drinks should be a total replacement for water. but drinking a lot of water and then treating yourself to a fruit juice with lunch is a good idea!!! drinking a gatorade becuase you just had to walk for 20 minutes in the heat is a good idea!!!

Please Stop Spreading Misinformation About Drinks!!! It's fine if you drink things that aren't water!!!! Yes you should probably always be drinking water but drinking something else As Well isn't going to hurt you!!!! okay!!!! its fine!!!!!!

honestly so long as you are consistently getting Any (non-alcoholic) fluids in you, you're doing great!!!!!! okay!!!! i love you stay safe <3