#you cannot blame her for this!!!

[velvetbunniie-archive]

i would’ve killed him, actually.

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Council of lovefools.

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[bananafire11]

Doodle before im off to sleep

Jax, please don't eat the newcomer

[jazzyjazzin]

over on what used to be the bird app i am noticing that everyone seems to think creloise angst will be cressida being upset with eloise for their friend breakup but look me deep in my eyes without blinking and you tell me right now that cressida is capable of holding a grudge against eloise of any kind, because idk about you but that stage 5 clinger would last five second at most being mad at her, all eloise has to do is bat her big blue eyes and she’s putty

[miraculouslbcnreactions]

It's weird to expect lb to be able to read cn mind and called her a bad partner for it. But it's even weirder for lb to ignore cn WHEN HES OBVIOUSLY IN DISTRESS and not called her a bad partner for it because I think called her a bad partner for ignoring it is understandable and justified especially since she consider herself as his boss.

Every time I bring up this conflict, I try to make it clear that I don't think Ladybug was blameless, I just think Chat Noir's writing was worse. Let's walk through the problem to show what I mean.

Season four stars with Marinette extremely stressed by her new Guardian status. In Truth and Lies, the first episodes of the season, we get this:

Ladybug: Will you cut it out with the practical jokes? I could have really hurt you! Cat Noir:(answering while hanging by the yo-yo) M'lady, the only thing that really hurts me is when you make me go on patrol by myself. (sighs, relaxing his posture) I even missed your little angry pout. Ladybug: Sorry, Kitty Cat, I'm a bit over my head at the moment. (pulling him up) Cat Noir: I bet! "Guardian of the Miraculous", big name, big responsibility!

This is also the start to Chat Noir communicating poorly. In this episode, he's straight up told that Ladybug is in over her head and he never once asks how he can help. In fact, we even get him saying this when asked how he feels about the change:

Truth: Cat Noir, tell me what- (interupted by Ladybug throwing a present at Truth) Ladybug: (covering her parasol with foil) ...do you think about my new role as guardian! Cat Noir: If it doesn't change things between us, then I'm good with it!

So not a great start to the season. I know people focused on Adrien's terrible treatment of Kagami in these episodes, but this Ladynoir dynamic was actually what rang alarm bells for me. I kept waiting for Chat Noir to offer his support since it was really, really obvious that Ladybug was in over her head since she was late to patrols, the last season literally ended with her losing her mentor figure, and, you know, she straight up told him that was what was going on?

The next episode is Gang of Secrets in which we see Marinette out her identity to Alya. I get why she did this, she needed support and her partner doesn't seem interested in giving it, but she can't say that for certain because she never asked him directly and she should have. Trusting Chat Noir over Alya would have allowed Ladynette to maintain the security of her secret identity - a thing she claimed was more important than ever - and to honor their partnership. At the very least, she should have told Chat Noir that Rena Rouge was now a full time holder so that he could account for that in battle and to minimize the fallout by owning up to her mistake asap. The longer a lie goes on, the worse the truth will hurt.

To Ladybug's credit, she does eventually acknowledge her mistake after the Scarabella incident:

Ladybug: You... must've been pretty surprised to discover there was another holder! (Silence. She sits beside Cat Noir.) Ladybug: I'm really sorry, Cat Noir. I should've told you. I mean, if I found out that you told someone about your secret identity, I'd... probably be upset, too. I'm really sorry I hurt your feelings.

This is a decent apology. She doesn't try to absolve herself of wrong doing. Instead, she acknowledges that what she did would hurt her, too, if the shoe were on the other foot. The only thing she loses points on is the fact that she doesn't tell him about Rena Furtive.

However, instead of agreeing with her and telling her that she has hurt him, Chat Noir says that she did nothing wrong and never once brings up how their weakened partnership is bothering him:

Cat Noir: You didn't hurt my feelings. You did everything right. Paris will always need a Ladybug superhero to watch over her. It's just... I realized that if one day that hero wasn't you, m'lady, since we don't know each other's identities, that means... I'd never see you again. Ever. And now, I just don't know if I can bear it.

This is the thing that I hate about this arc. The reason why I say Ladybug is blamed for not reading his mind. Especially because, three episodes later, we get Rocketear, which gives us this:

Cat Noir: Everyone has doubts now and then, (looks down) even me... Ladybug: Is everything okay, Cat Noir? Cat Noir: Yeah, yeah. (prepare his fist) Pound it! Ladybug: (fistbumps) Pound it!

Rocketear is the episode where Nino outs that he and Alya know each other's identities while acting like Ladybug said identities weren't a big deal even though that is very much not what happened. You'd think that Chat Noir would want to know the full story, but instead he just lies and says that everything is fine.

So we have two situations where the show allowed Ladybug to give Chat Noir a chance for clear and open communication and both times he turns her down.

What's worse is that he clearly starts making up stories in his head, leading to Kuro Neko, which starts with Adrien avoiding a fight on purpose as some sort of shit test. He then gets upset when Ladybug... doesn't lament his absence on national TV?

Clara: (from TV) By the way, where's Cat Noir? You've saved Paris without him quite a few times recently. Are you two at odds with each other? Carapace, Pegasus, Vesperia and Pigella: (from TV) Pound it! Ladybug: (from TV) Of course not, it's just that... umm, he's a partner like any other! The most important is to pick the best superheroes for each mission, with or without Cat Noir. No matter what, we've got a great team and we'll always be here to save Paris. (Adrien is shocked.) Adrien: (turns off the TV and sighs) "A partner like any other..."

Dude, what did you want her to do here? Complain that you flaked on her? Make Paris feel less safe by saying she doesn't know where you are? Imply that the fight was barely won without you? What are you doing? Plagg, you are completely failing as a mentor right now.

The shit test continues as Chat Noir goes to meet up with Ladybug now that the battle is over, arriving just as Ladybug has finished instructing the team on what to do:

Ladybug: Come on, guys! Hurry up before you all detransform. I'll meet you at rendezvous points. (The heroes jump away in different directions, and Ladybug starts typing something on her Yo-yo.) Cat Noir: Hey! Meow are you, m'lady? Ladybug: Great, thanks, but I gotta go retrieve all these Miraculous. Cat Noir: I could lend you a paw to help save time. Ladybug: Thanks, kitty cat, but it's a guardian's job to do it. Cat Noir: I know who some of them are, remember? I was there when you first gave them their Miraculous! Ladybug: You don't even know where their rendezvous points are, I don't have time to— Cat Noir: Playing cat and mouse is my forte, you know— Ladybug: (yelling) If you wanna save me time, stop wasting it in the first place! (Cat Noir gasps. As Ladybug swings away, Cat Noir clenches his fist.) Cat Noir: And take my Miraculous back when you're done!

So Ladybug doesn't publicly chastise Chat Noir for missing the battle and rejects an offer to help because of very legitimate timing concerns, leading to Chat Noir quitting because she failed his stupid, petty, childish tests. Realistic writing? Yes. Writing that paints Ladybug as the one in the wrong? No.

Going into this episode, Ladybug has no idea that things are messed up between them even though she has actually kept communication lines open. She asks him if things are okay, but he lies. And when he's ready to quit? He plays stupid games and wins a stupid prize. It's really not shocking that the next scene sees Ladybug totally baffled by what just happened:

Plagg: For a while now, you've been neglecting this camembert— I mean Cat Noir, and going on adventures with the all other cheeses! Ladybug: But he should be happy about it, it gives him more time off. Plagg: Cat Noir doesn't wanna have time off, Ladybug! He is in love with you! And your persistent calling on all the other heroes has broken his heart.

And how is she supposed to know that, Plagg? Was she supposed to assume that her partner was lying when he said he was fine? Because she did ask and he said that nothing was wrong. But something was wrong and it lead him to build up a story in his head, reading nonexistent intent into her actions, all of which is toxic and unhealthy communication.

I cannot stress how common this shit is. I've seen it so many times and I will own that I've done it in the past and wound up getting no support when I needed it because I'd directly told people I didn't and they committed the heinous crime of... believing me.

Here's the other thing, there are times when I'm in distress and legitimately don't want or need help. Times when I just need to be alone for a bit. So if someone asks me if I'm okay during those times, I'm probably just going to say, "Yeah, I just need a people break" or something like that. That's why the Scarabella scene is so bad. Ladybug can see that Chat Noir is in distress and he gives her a fully plausible answer: I'm not upset with you, I'm just saddened by the idea of losing you. And she believes him because why wouldn't she?

Same goes for Rocketear. It's reasonable for Ladybug to assume that Chat Noir is just shaken by the fight. She has no idea about the bombshell that Nino dropped right before the fight. She doesn't even know that Nino and Chat Noir are actually close friends, making this fight a lot more devastating than it looks at face value. Her actions here are not objectively wrong. They're only wrong if you know the whole story, including Adrien's needs. Things that she cannot know unless Chat Noir uses his words to tell her things.

I cannot over stress how much season four is a textbook example of denying yourself support because you cannot communicate your own needs. Is it an understandable character flaw for a character with Adrien's background to have? Yes. Absolutely. 100%. But it's still a character flaw. This season desperately needed an arc about Adrien learning to tell people what's wrong. Not because he's the only one in the wrong here, but because things cannot get better when Ladybug has no idea that she's hurting him. (Nino has no idea either, but let's keep our focus on Ladybug.)

One of the most important things you can do for your own mental well being is to dismiss the idea that your needs are the same as everyone else's. Everyone needs different amounts of attention and values different behavior based on things like their upbringing and life events.

I get the feeling that I'm wired pretty similar to Marinette. At least, it influences how I write her because I can go months without talking to my best friends and still call them my best friends, a trait we all share because two of use are artsy introverts and two of us are moms to young kids, which allows for very little free time. Meanwhile, my SO and his best friend spend hours on the phone almost every week. I swear that those two go into withdrawal if they don't talk at least once every seven days. If months went by without them talking? Something would be very wrong, but the exact same time gap isn't even remotely concerning when it comes to my friends. It's something my SO and I had to figure out when we got together because I need a lot less attention than he does. But we communicated and found a balance that we continue to work to communicate about so that he doesn't feel neglected and I don't feel overwhelmed by too little me time.

What I'm trying to say is Marinette wasn't horribly wrong for assuming that Chat Noir was telling her the truth or that he liked having a larger team so he had less responsibility. Those are reasonable assumptions. Especially since he never actually indicated that he wanted more responsibility until he was ready to quit and decided to shit test her by pushing for more to do when she was stressed and on a timer.

I do think that she should have offered it to him before that or - at the very least - the show should have clearly stated why she didn't do that since it apparently had nothing to do with Chat Blanc trauma like we all thought it did. I'm not saying that she's blameless or perfect or that there weren't things she could have done better. It's just really hard for me to look at Chat Noir's behavior in season four and go, "Oh yeah, he's the injured party here. Ladybug holds all the blame and did everything wrong." She did many things wrong, but generally speaking, she owned her faults and tried to keep communication channels open. Chat Noir chose to ignore those chances to talk or otherwise try to express his needs in a clear and understandable manner.

We'll end with one final point to drive this home: You said that she's his boss. Well, if my boss asked me, "is everything okay with the project?" and I said, "yes" while freaking out about the upcoming deadline that I'm probably going to miss because he's given me too much work, the issue is not all on my boss. It's on both of us. Him for overloading me and me for not telling him I'm overloaded. You could even argue that it's mostly on me because I'm the only one who can properly gauge my own ability to do a given workload. As soon as it was too much, I should have said something. And if I don't feel like my boss is approachable? Then I should quit. But that isn't the situation I'm in and it doesn't appear to be the one that Chat Noir was in, either. He wanted to stay part of the team, he just totally failed to tell Ladybug how being on the team was making him feel.

People magically knowing what you need and how you feel is a myth. I promise you, most people in this world do not want to cause you pain, but if you cannot clearly express when someone is causing you pain, then you will continue to get hurt by people who would be very happy to not hurt you if they actually knew that their actions were causing you pain.

[itsjustj8]

Never Love an Anchor by the Crane Wives is so Isla Morningstar coded. In this essay I will-

[mercy-is-alive]

Nothing would give me more pleasure that to have hyunwoo's family make haein's grovel, especially the mom

[requiemforthestars]

I'm a NATLA defender now, tbh. I think more people will grow to appreciate its good parts more as time goes on. I'm of course waiting to see how they wrap everything up and I'm not immune to its flaws, but I think people are so blinded by everything not being The Exact Same as the original cartoon than they're not appreciating its good parts. It's an adaptation, a companion, it's not a replacement to the original.

[incorrect-supercorp]

kara: this is my girlfriend lena and this is lena's girlfriend, andrea

[an indefinite period of time later]

kara: these are my girlfriends, lena and andrea

[autism-alley]

y’all headcanoning poseidon as purposefully sending medusa’s head back to sender knowing gabe would open it is like. entirely missing the point of sally jackson’s character and also SO fucked up if it was poseidon?? who used medusa’s head to kill an asshole man?? like!! what the fuck! not to mention sally jackson?? ms. sally jackson? who kills her abusive husband? who on multiple occasions rejected the help of the man who is both a god and her former lover bc she wants to build her life herself—? and who does it? “if my life is to mean anything, i have to live it myself.” those are sally jackson’s words. the abuse itself was already incredibly watered down in the show and that is upsetting. to have gabe accidentally kill himself because he’s a bumbling idiot waters down her agency against her abuse and is even more so upsetting. to have not just a man but a literal god kill her husband for her is so. do you not see how that’s even worse. and then add in that god being poseidon and the method of murder is medusa’s head? i don’t even have words to articulate it, just—

no matter how you cut it, narratively you only disrespect and degrade sally when gabe’s life is taken by any hand that isn’t hers, and having that hand be poseidon’s is just wild.

[thefairfolk]

it's funny because women in the middle east will be beaten and/or killed for letting their hair show, are constantly shown propaganda from first grade about how they need to cover themselves and be modest and docile if they don't want to end up in hell with other scum, expelled from high school/college or forced to abstain from participating in important exams if they speak out against the government, have poisonous gas cans tossed into their schools as an intimidation tactic, are made to feel bad for having working mothers, and generally live in a country where not only they but also people of other genders are, majority-wise, in a state of poverty in comparison to the western world, yet still continue to be calm and powerful.

and first world women (whether white or black) will weep at seeing the stupid barbie movie and think that THAT'S the pinnacle of women's rights. like, that is PEAK self-centred ignorance.

i don't think that the western world is some kind of perfect utopia for women. i understand it has its own flaws. but you can't possibly expect me to believe that people there understand just how bad things are here. in fact, considering the fact that growing up here has taught me a lot of important facts, i'd say it was a vital experience.

heed the tags.

[a0random0gal]

Guuys i'm back! And with the finest team black arguments in town! Today our contestant is:

"Alicent is an evil bitch for trying to expose Rhaenyra's sons as bastards, she could have gotten them killed!"

This one is surprisingly popular amongst the blacks, but unsurprisingly dumb. And I'll say why:

First things first, can someone explain to me the reason behind everyone's belief that the strong boys would be killed for this? They are just kids, who took no part in Rhaenyra's lies regarding their legitimacy. The poor children actually believed they were Laenor's sons! (Well except Jace but whatever.)

The real culprits in this mess are their parents, who willingly had them while being fully aware that if exposed on their bs they would be punished. The boys wouldn't be harmed at all, the worst thing that would happen to them would be losing the Velaryon family name, becoming Waters, and getting kicked off the line of succession.

Sucks for them but definitely better that a sword in the neck.

Speaking of their parents. Nyra would have to be disinherited for attempting to put her baseborns on the throne, cheating on her spouse and generally bringing so much shame to the royal family.

Sucks for her too, but you know, reap what you sow girl. You knew the risks.

The one who would actually face serious consequences would be Harwin, for sleeping with the princess and all. Normally he would probably have to be executed, but not before being given the chance to take the black, which he would definitely pick.

So yeah, sucks for you sure, but you keep your head, your dick, and only lose your inheritance. Lmao on second thought this would be a better alternative for him, Larys wouldn't have to kill him to inherit, and he'd be freezing his ass on the wall instead of burning it in Harrenhall.

Happy ending for Lord Strong.

And with that said Alicent would not be causing the deaths of innocent kids and would be able to secure the future reign of her son, so why exactly would that make her an evil selfish bitch? When has trying to avoid your children's inevitable execution at the hands of their half sister been a bad thing?

Team black only really wants Ali to bend over and die, just so that their feminist queen can take over lol. They unironically demand a woman to give up all her agency for someone else, how progressive of them.

Funny how I made this long ass post explaining how Nyra would have to face the consequences of her actions for once in her life but obviously this would only happen in an au where Vizzy was an actual competent king who didn't just live to give his "only child" all that she asks him to.

In our timeline he would just keep denying their bastardry and cutting tongues of all who disagree. And if it became impossible for him to deny reality anymore, he would immediately pardon Nyra and Harwin and legitimize the Strongs, then promptly pretend that nothing happened. It would be infuriating, but also hilariously bad ngl.

[sunnybearvampire]

You've been filled with anger ever since you can remember. The world is unfair and everyone has an advantage over you. You have to succeed, have to come out on top. Whatever it takes.

You have a party, one you've named yourself, but you're not really friends. Except for one person, your only true friend, none of them would stand by you through thick and thin. But it doesn't matter, they're just means to an end.

You are presented with an opportunity. A way to channel your rage and to make everyone who's ever wronged you regret it. You take it eagerly.

Your party will come with you. They'll have to, anyway. They're presented with a choice. They all choose correctly, like you knew they would.

Now is the time for your one true friend. You've even prepared all the paperwork for her already, to make it easier. It's just the one last step to take before you come out on top, glorious. You can't wait.

You kill your only true friend.

She is presented with a choice.

She doesn't come back.

[alphaketoglutaricacid]

probs another reason the rift formed between hien and toshiro is bc hiens like that hag curse, izutsumis and tades situation, maizuru being the mistress ✅ all normal while shuros havin a several year realization of like hey. Whats going on here

[webbytbh]

Mrs. Beakley's concept design!! She's getting ready for her interview, I don't know if the concept follows the storyline of the 1987 ducktales but that doesn't matter

[purpldawne]

that one arashi post about presenting her as overtly feminine in fan media but not in a "trans women are only valid if they conform to traditional femininity" kinda way and more in a "happyele are a bunch of pussies for having a trans woman imply/state she wants to be more feminine in every sense of the word and then never letting her do so beyond socially" kinda way