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saintsenara · 2 months

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Riddle’s extremely fearful and aggressive reaction to Dumbledore when he thinks he’s a doctor (and the fact that he assumes this at all and believes he is being lied to) has some pretty dark implications (which of course no one follows up on). Do you have thoughts?

thank you very much for the ask, anon!

and yes - this has occurred to me too... which means that my thoughts come with a trigger warning for the sexual abuse of a child, and are under the cut.

the relevant scene in canon is, of course, this:

“I am Professor Dumbledore.” “Professor?” repeated Riddle. He looked wary. “Is that like doctor? What are you here for? Did she get you in to have a look at me?” He was pointing at the door through which Mrs. Cole had just left. “No, no,” said Dumbledore, smiling. “I don’t believe you,” said Riddle. “She wants me looked at, doesn’t she? Tell the truth!” He spoke the last three words with a ringing force that was almost shocking. It was a command, and it sounded as though he had given it many times before. His eyes had widened and he was glaring at Dumbledore, who made no response except to continue smiling pleasantly. After a few seconds Riddle stopped glaring, though he looked, if anything, warier still. “Who are you?” “I have told you. My name is Professor Dumbledore and I work at a school called Hogwarts. I have come to offer you a place at my school - your new school, if you would like to come.” Riddle’s reaction to this was most surprising. He leapt from the bed and backed away from Dumbledore, looking furious. “You can’t kid me! The asylum, that’s where you’re from, isn’t it? ‘Professor,’ yes, of course - well, I’m not going, see? That old cat’s the one who should be in the asylum. I never did anything to little Amy Benson or Dennis Bishop, and you can ask them, they’ll tell you!”

the surface-level reading of this scene - which is clearly what the text wants us to go for - is that riddle thinks he's about to be institutionalised for being "mad" - and, specifically, that he thinks that what dumbledore has been told is his "madness" is actually his magic.

[he is also clearly meant to be read as panicking a little bit that he's fucked around torturing his fellow children and is now about to find out...]

that riddle accepts he's a wizard so easily - and that he is so reassured by dumbledore agreeing that he's not mad - is something the text wants us to read as sinister. him immediately describing himself as "special" is set up as a precursor to the adult voldemort's delusions of grandeur - which the entire arc of the series, ending in his death as an ordinary man, is designed to undermine.

but i've always disliked this reading. the eleven-year-old riddle - a magical child raised around non-magical people - is objectively correct to describe his powers as "special" [in that they make him identifiably different from the crowd] within the context in which he lives. the word choice is nowhere near as deep as dumbledore decides - he's clearly known since he was very young that he's a wizard, but he didn't have the precise language to describe this fundamental part of himself until dumbledore offered it; prior to that, "special" is a perfectly reasonable alternative term.

and, in always knowing that he's a wizard, he also knows that he doesn't have a mental illness - but he must also know that this is something it's near impossible for him to prove.

in the real world, if i spoke to a patient who told me:

“I can make things move without touching them. I can make animals do what I want them to do, without training them. I can make bad things happen to people who annoy me. I can make them hurt if I want to.”

then i would be correct to describe them as experiencing psychosis. and i might - depending on their other symptoms - have reasonable cause to admit them [voluntarily or not] for psychiatric treatment.

riddle is - of course - demonstrably not psychotic. but it's not unreasonable that mrs cole would assume he is - the world she lives in, as a muggle [even if she's a religious one], is one in which people do not possess the ability to move objects or control animals with their minds, and if one of her charges is convinced that he can, then she's justified in seeking medical intervention.

[that psychiatric treatment in the 1930s can be described without exaggeration as inhumane is another matter...]

which is to say, i think we can easily suppose that mrs cole has - prior to dumbledore's arrival - succeeded in having riddle "looked at", and that the idea that he's mentally ill and should be committed to an asylum has been mentioned before. i think most of us would be instinctively [and angrily] wary of doctors if this happened to us, regardless of how nice the doctors in question were.

and maybe that's all there is to it.

and maybe it isn't...

in the doylist text, the eleven-year-old riddle's personality is the way it is because he's the villain of the series. where harry is preternaturally capable, even as a child, of all the things the series defines as admirable - above all, enduring difficulty without complaint - riddle is preternaturally incapable of them. he's meant to come across as unambiguously sinister - and the fact that the text repeatedly emphasises that he has control over his unpleasant traits invites us to view him as someone who is acting with full agency. that he lives in an orphanage is a trope which the text uses, like a campy horror film might, predominately to underscore how creepy he is - and the text, in keeping with its general lack of interest in states and their institutions, never really prompts us to interrogate the impact of his childhood upon the course his life takes.

[this is despite the fact that voldemort's reliving of the night he killed the potters in deathly hallows is an incredibly accurate depiction of ptsd...]

but it's also the case that the eleven-year-old riddle's behaviour and personality fits a pattern we might expect to see in a child who is being abused, sexually or otherwise:

he's aggressive, he has a hair-trigger temper, and he becomes distressed even by behaviour - such as dumbledore speaking mildly and calmly - which would not ordinarily be expected to provoke such a reaction.

his broader emotional state is fractious. his mood changes sharply, he seems to feel emotions very profoundly, he struggles to control his emotional response to things, he's extremely easily irritated, he's attention-seeking - and he particularly seeks negative attention, and he's very highly-strung. his admission in deathly hallows that he feels calm before he kills - or before he otherwise eradicates a threat or a problem - comes with the flip-side that he's someone who appears, when things aren't going well or he finds himself in a situation which he can't control, to become quite anxious. which is a trauma response.

he's extremely isolated. the text presents the fact that he has no friends as a deliberate choice - "lord voldemort has never had a friend, nor do i believe that he has ever wanted one" - and his relationship with everyone else he ever meets, including his fellow orphans, is defined by the text as exclusively involving him controlling, manipulating, and punishing them. or: he is always the more powerful person in the pairing. but this need for control can be read as self-protective just as easily as it can be read as sinister. there are hints in canon that riddle is not just some malevolent force in the orphanage preying on mild-mannered innocents. for example, billy stubbs, the owner of the rabbit he kills, is targeted by riddle as revenge: “Billy Stubbs’s rabbit... well, Tom said he didn’t do it and I don’t see how he could have done, but even so, it didn’t hang itself from the rafters, did it? [...] But I’m jiggered if I know how he got up there to do it. All I know is he and Billy had argued the day before." on the rare occasions billy turns up in fics, he's usually - i find - written very like neville - sweet and guileless and a bit pathetic. but the alternative reading - especially when we take into account that riddle attacks the rabbit rather than billy himself - is that billy is someone he would be afraid to physically confront. indeed, it's striking that voldemort - at all stages of his life - is described as being quite physically fragile. not only is he very thin, but he's always cold and his heartbeat is described several times in canon as irregular. i think this is supposed to be a comment on the physical changes he undergoes the more horcruxes he makes - although the idea that the soul would affect the heart doesn't actually align with how the series understands the soul to relate to the body - but it can also be interpreted perfectly legitimately as something he was experiencing prior to splitting his soul. i am committed to the headcanon that riddle was quite a sickly child - and that this is one of the things which drives his fear of death - and i'm also committed to the idea that his obsession with magic is because the enormity of his magical power makes up for his physical lack. he can defeat - and humiliate and frighten and remove the threat of - billy or dennis [or even an adult man?] with magic. without it, if they were to physically overpower him, then he wouldn't be able to throw them off.

he is extremely nervous about being alone in a room with dumbledore - someone he doesn't know, and who he assumes is connected to a profession [and, maybe, who knows any other doctors he's been previously made to see...] of which he is frightened.

he doesn't trust or confide in anyone - which, as a child, means particularly that he doesn't trust or confide in adults in positions of responsibility. he's clearly uneasy with the idea of finding himself in the subordinate position in an adult-child relationship when dumbledore offers to take him shopping for school supplies - potentially because he's worried that dumbledore will try and dictate or restrict what he's allowed to buy unless he behaves in a certain way... and i am always very struck that dumbledore says in half-blood prince: "He was very guarded with me; he felt, I am sure, that in the thrill of discovering his true identity he had told me a little too much. He was careful never to reveal as much again." this is presented in the text as evidence that dumbledore is the only person of whom voldemort is afraid - by which the text means that voldemort acknowledges that dumbledore knows that an ordinary man, mortal and unimpressive, lurks behind the mask of unassailable power he has created for himself; and which the text thinks is a good thing. but we can also read it as a self-protective act on riddle's part. in his excitement, he offers dumbledore information [that he is known to be a liar, that he is in trouble a lot, that mrs cole dislikes him and is disinclined to believe anything he says] which would give dumbledore - or anyone in a similar position of power and presumed respectability - cover to abuse him, safe in the knowledge that he would be unlikely to be believed if he reported it.

he doesn't appear to feel safe in the orphanage and he's frequently absent from it - by his own admission, he spends a huge amount of time wandering around london on his own, which may even involve him staying away for several days at a time. nobody appears to notice or care about this.

he's very independent - which the text again presents as evidence of his deliberate self-isolation and rejection of the bonds of love and friendship - and his independence is unusual for a child his age [i.e. that he is capable of doing all his own shopping for school].

his knowledge of violence - i.e. how he designs the trip to the cave to be maximally psychologically devastating for dennis and amy and devoid of repercussions for himself - is also more advanced and methodical than would be expected in a child of his age. again, the text uses this to emphasise how inextricable the child-voldemort is from his adult self - and also, to some extent, to underscore the intellectual brilliance [his magic is also more advanced than is normal for a child] which his narrative archetype [the exceptional villain who is defeated by the everyman hero] requires. but we can also read it as evidence of his own victimisation. a common sign that a child is being sexually abused is that they display a knowledge of sexual behaviour which is more advanced than is reasonable for a child of their age - for example, knowing in detail how a sex act is performed, or fluently using sexual slang which they have no chance of knowing either from age-appropriate settings like school-based sex education or conversations with a parent or trusted adult, or from the sort of enthusiastic hoarding of rude words and phrases all children enjoy as they grow up. riddle's precise, clinical knowledge of how to manipulate, frighten, torture, and control can be seen as something similar. if he can - at eleven or younger - methodically break down another child until they're "never quite right" again, then this is because he's learned how to from someone.

he keeps secrets. and he also goes out of his way to extract them. his grooming of ginny in chamber of secrets - he manipulates her into confiding things she wants to keep to herself, promises he won't tell anyone, and then uses the threat that he will to get her to do his bidding - is an absolutely textbook example of how abusers use the idea of secrecy to control their victims. it doesn't make his abuse of ginny any less inexcusable if we assume he learns this from being on the other side of things.

dumbledore understands his little cache of objects as trophies he's taken from victims - and the text takes the view that dumbledore is correct in this assessment. that hoarding trophies is something widely associated with serial killers means that this is yet another thing which underlines how creepy - and how like his adult self - the child-voldemort is. but it's also the case that the adult - and teenage - voldemort places a lot of emphasis on gift-giving as part of his control over other people. the two most obvious examples in canon are wormtail being given his shiny hand as a reward for helping voldemort get his body back, and slughorn being buttered up with crystallised pineapple before voldemort asks him about horcruxes. the text thinks this is sinister - and one of the reasons it does this is because gift-giving is a grooming tactic. the text also clearly thinks this isn't behaviour voldemort has learned from the other side. and yet a common sign that a child is being abused is if they have possessions it doesn't make sense for them to own [i.e. a child from a low-income background who is suddenly decked in designer clothes] and which they can't or won't explain how they came by. riddle's cache isn't luxurious - although he's so poor that a yoyo or a mouth organ probably is a luxury to him - but there's also nothing in canon which precludes the objects being presents, rather than stolen goods. if the spell dumbledore uses to make the box rattle is caused by a statement which is both relatively ambiguous and dependent on dumbledore's subjective personal morality - is there anything in this room he's acquired through nefarious means? - then the spell would still work as it does in canon if riddle was an abuse victim given the objects as "rewards". dumbledore's tendency to locate right and wrong in the individual and dumbledore's belief that good people should steadfastly endure misery means he can be written entirely canon-coherently as someone who would think a victim who appeared to collude in their own abuse - such as a victim who "offered" a sexual act because their abuser promised them something if they did - was behaving consensually, manipulatively, and nefariously. and it's worth noting that when riddle doesn't know what dumbledore has done to make the box rattle, he is "unnerved". when he realises dumbledore thinks he's stolen the objects - and that he has no interest in forcing him to admit this aloud - he is "unabashed". perhaps because he's just received proof that an experience he doesn't want to talk about is still secret...

on the other hand, the objects could indeed be stolen - because petty criminality and anti-social behaviour, especially in pre-teen children, is also a sign of abuse.

he can be extremely obsequious - when dumbledore tells him to watch how he speaks he becomes "unrecognisably polite", he ruthlessly flatters slughorn, and he is cringingly deferential to hepzibah smith. the text understands this as evidence that his apparent charm is only superficial - another trait associated in the popular imagination with serial killers [and it's striking that so much about the young voldemort - handsome, charming, seemingly quiet and polite, true evil lurking underneath the mask - is exactly like the pop-culture persona which has been created for ted bundy...]. voldemort himself agrees that his charm is performative in chamber of secrets: “If I say it myself, Harry, I’ve always been able to charm the people I needed. So Ginny poured out her soul to me, and her soul happened to be exactly what I wanted." but his obsequiousness is also a fawn response - a way of minimising a threat by attempting to please the person issuing it. he becomes "unrecognisably polite" - after all - in response to this: Dumbledore raised his eyebrows. “If, as I take it, you are accepting your place at Hogwarts - ” “Of course I am!” “Then you will address me as ‘Professor’ or ‘sir.’ ” Riddle’s expression hardened for the most fleeting moment before he said, in an unrecognisably polite voice, “I’m sorry, sir. I meant - please, Professor, could you show me - ?” riddle could reasonably interpret what dumbledore says here as a threat to prevent him attending hogwarts - even though dumbledore evidently doesn't mean it in this way - and he switches to being fawning because this is something he really doesn't want to happen...

do i think that any of this is what the text was actually going for? no. and nor do i think that reading riddle as a victim of abuse excuses the violence which the adult voldemort goes on to perpetuate.

but i think it is a reading of his characterisation which is both canon-plausible and interesting - a strange, sickly child with a reputation for cruelty and dishonesty being abused by the respectable doctor who is constantly called in to treat his coughs and wheezes, who buys him little presents and charms him into telling him secrets, who then [to paraphrase the teenage voldemort] feeds him a few secrets of his own, safe in the knowledge that nobody will ever believe him if he tries to get help.

and i also think this a reading which is sincerely important.

a significant contributor to the prevalence of child abuse - no matter what exact form this abuse takes - is that we are culturally conditioned to imagine that both the abuser and the victim will look and behave in a certain way if the abuse is "real".

and this means, all too often, that we take child abuse more seriously when the victim is "sympathetic" - when they're from a stable home, and their family are respectable, and they do well in school, and they're polite and sweet, and they look innocent, and they behave perfectly appropriately for their age, and nobody would ever dare to say that they come across as older than they are, and they're white, and they don't have a history of lying, and they don't have a history of attention-seeking, and they don't have a criminal record, and they're not abusive themselves, and there's absolutely no way of suggesting that they colluded in their abuse, and the perpetrator was someone who looks like a child abuser.

someone who is creepy, low-status, ugly, unpopular. someone who everyone can tell is socially abnormal, someone who nobody would ever intentionally permit to be around their children. not someone who is charming, well-respected, attractive, rich, popular, trustworthy. not someone who has a loving family and a happy home. not someone we might be friends with.

but many perpetrators of child abuse are these second group of people. and many victims of child abuse are "unsympathetic", when their social positions and reputations are compared to their abusers' own.

they lie. they steal. they're attention-seeking. they're vindictive. they have trouble distinguishing between imagination and reality. they're violent. they're bullies. they hurt animals. they abuse other children. they take drugs. they're mentally-ill. they come from broken homes. they're in the care of the state. they're dirty. they're poor. they're odd. they're behind at school and badly-behaved in the classroom. they do things which allow their abuse to be dismissed as something they brought upon themselves - they speak or dress in certain ways, they pose provocatively in pictures and post them on the internet, they are known to be sexually active outside of the context of their abuse, they lie about being over the age of consent, they engage in sexual behaviour with an adult abuser in a way which appears [even though it isn't, and there's never a circumstance in which it will be] to be consensual or for their own personal gain, they are flattered by the attention they receive from someone who is important or attractive grooming them, they have complicated - and not always wholly negative - feelings towards their abusers.

and they are still - unequivocally - victims, and what happens to them is still - unequivocally - abuse.

tom riddle is an unsympathetic victim - not only of any potential abuse, but also of the horrors of his life which are explicit on the canon page: that he is raised in an orphanage; that he is grieving; that he knows nothing about his family; that he is thought to be mad.

the absence of any institutional response to his childhood experiences - dumbledore, by his own admission, discloses nothing about riddle to his fellow teachers - is a flaw repeated again and again in the worldbuilding of the harry potter series.

hogwarts - and the wizarding [and muggle] state more broadly - doesn't intervene in any case of neglect or abuse, from harry to snape to voldemort's own parents. the series' individualistic morality means that we aren't supposed to interrogate these collective failings. and the series' black-and-white view of good and evil - and its general belief that violence is fine if the person it happens to "deserves" it - means that it has no interest in examining the ways that poverty, isolation, and neglect are risk factors; that straightforwardly unpleasant people can still be victims; that victims can go on to become perpetrators without their victimhood ceasing to matter; and that the abuse of children usually takes place not in silence and secrecy, concealed in ways which make it fine for adults not to notice it and not to intervene, but in plain sight.

this is knowledge it never hurts to refresh. thinking about lord voldemort's childhood might be an usual way of doing so... but it is an effective one nonetheless...

#asks answered #asenora meta #tom riddle #lord voldemort #if wizards had the concept of safeguarding it would be a game changer...

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lhuxlux · 9 months

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Meeting the right people in the wrong time, unfortunately. It happens a lot, that's just how life is. They were happy together as a couple, but they had flaws and they couldn't learn from them and grow as people. Things could have been better, according to Betty. But there are no regrets.

I think it was a beautiful moment because it's true things can always be better once you realize your mistakes and have a happier outcome for the two of them, but that doesn't mean they were miserable. That's just how we learn things. And they learned they had different points of view and their own flaws, which made the relationship not as equal as they thought.

In Adventure Time, we see Betty finally realizing her own mistake, all the things she has done for Simon, she had to neglect her own needs. No one forced her to do that, it was her own decision. Simon was repeating Betty's mistakes in Fionna and Cake, he became obsessed with the idea of having her back. And I think Betty making Simon realize his flaw was cute.

She didn't hate him, she never blamed him, because she understood it was just an honest mistake and he didn't realize until he had to choose between two options in the book he was reading with Beth.

The book itself is a nice metaphor about life choices, there are no do-overs, choices aren't inherently good or bad, but you have to face the consequences later on, maybe you dislike the lack of options to choose from if you aren't careful. Beth said it clear, maybe if Simon paid attention to Nova (Betty's representation) and not only Casper (Simon's representation), things would have been different and he could have had more choices.

But now he cannot hold onto the past. He needs to live, and not for Betty's sake. She didn't want that when she finally managed to undo the crown's wish. Betty wanted to do that because she felt like it wasn't ok leaving Simon cursed.

The bus scene is so powerful, because it shows you the better outcome for the two of them (but maybe not for characters Simon finds later on like Marceline), but he knows it didn't happen like that and there are no do-overs. That's when Betty says her last words, showing no regret and gratitude to Simon for being in her life. Simon doesn't get on the bus, they don't share the same objectives anymore, and they have to take different paths. It was a beautiful goodbye. Some people make us happy when they appear in our lives, but they aren't meant to be in our lives forever.

#simon petrikov #betty grof #adventure time #fionna and cake #golbetty #betty golb #petrigrof

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onyxs-personal-account · 2 months

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OBEY ME REDESIGN/AU? KINDA?Just read pls😭

Art -> Part 1 -SATAN- (art at the end)

Hey! My name's Onyx and I'm a artist, which gives me incredible powers of creation that I use to make or redesign silly characters instead of focusing on my already existing art projects or simply my overall future : what a life.

So as the title says, I'm redesigning some of the om! characters as well as changing up the world they live in. As for the first redesign I chose (very self indulged choice ) to start with Satan :)

This isn't really an AU but just me ''fixing'' (changing) things that I (emphasis on the I, this is MY opinion, you don't have to agree with me) dislike about the game's world and/or characters. I also added things that were, yes, absolutely unnecessary, but so fucking cool 😎

Btw english isn't my first language so if something doesn't make sense just pretend it does, thanks :)

START OF MY RAMBLING

So, in my vision of obey me, all demons have access to magic (curses, hexes, potions...) but some demons also have a connection with one to two elemental powers (water, fire, wind...)

The ''regular'' magic as well as basic knowledge of the devildom fonctionnement and history is taught to young demons (just born/reborn demons and fallen angels *wink wonk) at RAD (which explain why the heck some litteral ADULTS that could easily have a balanced working life are still in an HIGH SCHOOL environment.) (I know that adults can go to school, no problem with that lmao, but lucifer or satan in the og! game for example have nothing to learn there anymore and could be having a ''regular'' active life like-)

But yes, the academy's objective isn't really to ''tame'' demons, because they can't change their very nature and the idea that a demon (Diavolo) is working on turning other demons into more ''human'' beings seems really fucking off to me

And the human exchange program was supposed to be more of a ''exchange of culture'' kind of things where humans would learn about demon's ways and vice versa, it wasn't as diplomatic as it was in the game. See it as these ''special week'' thingy in school we're you'd learn about other cultures and try different country's dishes everyday. Exept it's for a full year. And in hell.

ALRIGHT THANKS FOR TAKING THE TIME TO READ YOU'RE SO SWEET ILYSM :))))

here's the part that you probably wanted the most : THE DRAWINGS x) (hope it not too pixelated 🗿)

ABOUT THIS REDESIGN

Soooo my Satan is connected to earth and shadows and is an expert in curses and potions as well as devildom's history which is one of his favorite subjects along with the optional Art and litterature classes. (there's multiple optional classes that are supposed to help students that can't keep up or have bad grades to balance their grades by just showing up and listening, for exemple, mammon sometimes goes to the optional business and trading classes. )

In the og! game, satan is supposed to be lucifer's opposite, but I felt like it was mostly showed with his design and wanted to make it go a little further by making them dress in a more androgynous way and changing a bit his personality, making him a bit more carefree. (he's still super self conscious about his dangerous changes of temper which makes him a very closed and silent person, he's also still introverted, but when I say carefree I mean that he often skips classes to go check on cats or go read, and that they don't feel obligated to fulfill a role of exemple as a head student or avatar of wrath like lucifer does) I honestly just wanted the opposition between these two to be more marked but not necessarily have this ''competition'' between them because it felt very childish.

As for the elephant in the room, yes, he has hooves, no, there's no other reason than the fact that he doesn't have an animal theme like all of the others have. Yes, I only chose it because I find it cute. No, you may not pet them. Oh and as for the ''but why do they show up, aren't they supposed to have a human form'' I just decided that being gifted at everything is unrealistic, so I officially declare that Satan SUCKS AHH at maintaining his human form. He's not helped by the fact that he's constantly concentrating on staying calm and having a neutral facade and would saturate if they also had to concentrate on his physical form. But yeah he's still bad at it.

Alrighty thats it for today :)

Much love !

#obey me #obey me drabble #obey me fanart #obey me au #obey me satan #art #fictional world #rewrite #obey me fanfic #obey me headcanons #obey me fandom

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gabichanwrites · 8 months

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As someone who has no strong feelings toward Izzy, I still didn't want him to die and was certain Izzy wasn't going to die because despite all the things I disliked about what they did to certain characters and plots in the second season, I thought it didn't fit the show to have a central character (or basically anyone who isn't a minor character) die. It didn't fit anything it had set for itself in the previous season to kill off one of their main characters even if it WAS for a meaningful reason (which it wasn't). And yet they did it anyway, and like I thought, it was an awful decision.

Yeah, man, exactly that!

I may be quite biased because I literally loved Izzy since I first saw and heard him, all the quips, all the potential of redemption... And, you know, I've got a spot for "pathetic, wet cat" characters. As in I want to give him a towel, feed him something nice and treasure each moment he stops hissing at me.

And even with all the love I hold for Izzy, I don't think I'm not objective when I say it's a shit narrative choice and it's a death that doesn't do anything. It wouldn't serve well any of the characters in the show in fact.

Especially with the way the show handled 1 season, with the softness and historical inaccuracies in how open everyone is to the new stuff - man, people loved it. I loved it. I trusted the writers so fully that not for a moment did I think they would actually kill off anyone, not even for a moment did I believe that Lucius would die. And this was this kind of show about pirates, this was why people liked it so much, at least partially.

And now this finale... Even if we ignore how much Izzy doesn't deserve it, it's just a bad way to go. It's a generic shot in a generic setting, with the character doing absolutely nothing special, not protecting anyone, not running away, just standing there. It's like killing Pete so Lucius will realize that pirating is dangerous and bad and he should stay on land. It's like killing Jim to make Oluwande realize that this isn't safe and... I don't know, go to Zheng. Honestly, I have a hard time coming up with similar nonsense because it just... Doesn't make sense. The writer in me recoils at the sound of so much unnecessary death and cut potential for the sake of... What exactly?

. This kind of death breaks the theme we got used to seeing and it takes away our belief that we can freely enjoy the shenanigans without worrying. A feeling I just got familiar with when the curse and Calypso's birthday happened. This kind of death takes away character in a cruel, pointless way and reduces them back to side characters, there to make way for the main couple. And I like Ed and Stede well enough but COME ON.

So yeah, in short, I fully agree anon. But you probably knew that if you took a look at my Tumblr in the last few hours. I'm gonna stop here though because it's very late for me and I am several hours behind on getting some sleep. Thank you for the ask though, I feel like this finale deeply affected even those who aren't that obssesed with Izzy and, to be honest, it's our first warning sign - writers don't mind pointless killing anymore.

Or maybe it's the saving grace - the bad reception will make them unlikely to do anything equally rush and stupid in the future.

#izzy hands #ofmd #ask

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illegiblewords · 6 months

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Serious talk about meta under the cut.

I don't know who might need to hear it, but fwiw mental flexibility is a huge part of analysis (and interacting with other humans lol). You need to be able to account for multiple possibilities when examining a work, or understanding a social exchange. You need to be able to separate what is objective fact from your own subjective interpretation and judgment. The most negative interpretation is not automatically the most worthwhile or true. Someone throwing accusations around in-line with their own worst interpretations does not guarantee those accusations are warranted. You are not a bad or stupid person for disagreeing. Shit needs to withstand scrutiny. I don't always strike the right balance myself. I do the best I can but I'm definitely not perfect. Tbh I'm not beyond pettiness either--although I try to keep that out of actual analysis lol. There have been times I've griped to friends privately or blogged about how I felt (sans tags, with spoiler blocks so people can opt out). I've griped recently. I'm bound to gripe again in the future. Some level of griping is inevitable imo and I figure no one is 100% immune.

All that said, even if someone’s take isn't canon AND even if it's something I really dislike--I'd personally rather people follow their passions anyway. Hands down. I could be in the middle of a rant and my answer would still be that the subject of my frustration gets to exist. I'm not the boss and odds are we're going with different versions in our own heads. Discouraging another fan from creating due to my preferences or narrative approach would horrify me. I've seen fandoms where gatekeeping like that killed the creative community and it was fucking awful.

Not everyone is confident in their own judgment. Not everyone faced with a pissed off person trying to use lore and accusations like clubs will feel okay continuing with their own vision. Elitism and manipulation (especially through rhetoric) can be present within analysis. People are not being taught how to recognize those things properly. Analysts aren't always aware or invested enough to even be careful. It’s legit easy to get caught up in ideas or feelings to the point of forgetting about other people’s, and adjusting to account for alternate approaches takes some work. For me at least, I think having a 'no insults' policy and being super careful when it comes to absolute claims (assertions not qualified by 'I think' or 'it could be argued') helps.

Anyway. Just because a person calls something ‘meaningless’ doesn't make it meaningless. Someone pooh-poohing an observation you made doesn't make your observation less true or important. Employing a literary term doesn't mean that individual actually understands the term, how it works, or how to apply it. Which is to say nothing of romantic chemistry or whatever. I encourage readers to extrapolate on this. ‘Shallow’ could apply as much as ‘meaningless’. Denying parallels exist by itself doesn’t actually negate those parallels. Your version of a character may not be the same as the fan next to you’s and that difference doesn't have to detract. There's more I could say on the subject (I've edited out a lot) but basically--just because another fan isn't into what you're doing doesn't automatically make what you're doing wrong, immoral, shoddy, or otherwise less.

Seriously, vet shit. Question the entire premise an analyst tries to establish then decide for yourself if it holds water. Turn over word choices and assertions in your head before deciding if they're appropriate. Do it to me too. I don't care if someone is the holy goddamn emperor of analysts. Just because a person says something is good or bad, true or false, whatever the hell doesn't make it so. Just because a person uses a technical term doesn't mean they're discussing it effectively. Quality of argument matters beyond the packaging it’s wrapped in. It's important to protect yourself from people whose priority is enforcing their own preferences, including dismissing things they aren't partial to.

I just don't want anyone shamed silent man. Not even people whose takes drive me up the fucking wall. Neither I nor any other analyst is an authority here. And there are people who are absolutely ready to take advantage of other people’s insecurities to assert themselves. Might not even be malicious, just indifferent.

For me, analysis feels kind of like uncovering a dinosaur skeleton. I want to share the cool and exciting things I find with other people. Sometimes I might be sorting out what my own thoughts and feelings are. It's also possible to examine why you're uncomfortable with something, or why you love something another person hates, while making very clear what is YOUR READING and not THE READING. Offering a variety of possibilities is very different from presenting yourself as the only correct one. One note at the end when everything else was insulting and intolerant is like a band-aid over a wound.

EDIT: As a last point, that I'm throwing in just-in-case. If anyone reading this thinks they may have overreached and done stuff I've mentioned + feels shitty about it… that's still not the end of the world. It’s okay. This is hard stuff to learn and I really don't think anyone's perfect at it. Worth the effort though. Just gotta take a deep breath, acknowledge you're a fallible human same as everyone else, and do the best you can going forward. Life goes on.

#saw one that horrified me a bit recently #involved a combination of overreaching + insults + purity culture #I can totally imagine buying in and being seriously fucked up by it when I was younger #I don’t want that happening to anyone else #it's okay to talk about NOTPs man but there are more and less responsible ways to do that

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buckybarnesss · 6 months

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Adding to the episodes of bad Mako social media takes, here one from the "offical" youtube channel. They did a 'who's on the naughty list' poll and the choices were Zaheer, The Earth Queen, and of frickin course Mako (and Tahno for some reason).

That actually made me a little angry. I really hate how their channels go to appeals to the worst parts of the fandom.

Sorry to dump here, but I needed to vent this out.

hey no problem.

the fandom's hatred towards mako has always been objectively odd to me.

like there isn't anything wrong with disliking a character and i know a lot of people find mako boring.

couldn't be me but whatever.

what bothers me is that the purposeful, willful misunderstanding of a character where it's twisted to justify character bashing. it often comes across as "hey this character isn't expressing their trauma the way i want them to so they suck."

mako is repressed.

part of the love triangle problem is that mako doesn't know what he wants. mako's emotional needs became superfluous when his parents died. they no longer mattered in the face of survival for himself and bolin. when confronted with something outside of this he completely flounders because he's not only never examined what his wants even are and has disregarded them so much he has no idea that obtaining something he wants for himself is like, you know, allowed. also, tu clocked his ass by saying that him wanting to people please ended up pleasing no one including him.

is mako the mom from reba mcentire's is there life out there? yes. yes he is.

i have seen sooooo many bad takes on legend of korra characters. from korra herself to a child character like meelo. mako is not the only victim but he is the most visable i think outside of korra.

i've also expressed sooooo many times that i loathe what i consider a bad stale joke that is frequently regurgitated that mako somehow "turned" asami and korra gay makes me want to brain myself. i expect that shit from reddit and youtube but when i see it on tumblr it's disappointing because it's usually people who claim to want representation yet they disregard korra and asmai's bisexuality to make mako the butt of a shitty joke.

also asami and korra didn't get together until three full ass years after either of them were involved with mako.

all three of them get over their cringe love triangle too and become even better friends by the end. none of them hold onto any resentment. mere weeks after korra and mako's break up korra and asami are laughing about their mistakes and korra wants mako to come with her to find airbenders. there weren't any hard feelings.

people will bend over backwards to justify kuvira and rationalize amon or defend zaheer when mako's worse crime is being a dumbass teenager who made mistakes but more than apologized and made up for them.

#my blog #mako #lok #legend of korra

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mbti-notes · 1 month

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Anon wrote: Hi mbti notes, I’m an entj that wrote to you a long while ago about feeling trapped with intimacy. I’ve done a lot of work on myself since then partly with the help of your reflective questions in your answer. I’ve run into another issue I’d like to ask about.

In an attempt to learn more about myself I’ve been trying to identify traits in people I really enjoy being around and that are important to me in friendships and relationship but am finding my responses confusing.

An example being a friend I met recently who is very honest and straightforward with their thoughts and feelings, no games, which is something I know I don’t like. I really liked their energy so I followed that interest and got to know them but started seeing those same traits I initially liked as childish the more I learned. They would take unexamined contradictory moral stances or just in general not want to explore their thoughts. While they were honest they also seemed to have no room for self doubt.

I don’t understand how I could both really like and then be so turned off by the same things as I got more exposure to it. Perhaps I’m making the problem too broad and it just was a bad match, but it signals to me that I still have a lot more I don’t understand about what my interests really are. Thank you for any thoughts you have if you reply

----------------------

I applaud your efforts to improve yourself. You are correct in saying that there's a lot more you don't understand about what your interests are and the role they play in how you relate to others. You seem to be describing a common phenomenon known as projection (you can read previous posts about it).

Review the third paragraph you wrote above. Do you know that the way you describe your friend is precisely how a lot of people describe Te doms? The positive aspects you liked are characteristic of dominant Te and the negative aspects you disliked are characteristic of inferior Fi. It's not a coincidence that this happened.

Jung said: "Projections change the world into the replica of one’s own unknown face." When you are prone to projection, you don't see the world as it is but as you are. As such, your judgments don't reveal any objective truth but a subjective distortion.

For example, as you first explore what you like, it's natural to gravitate toward "like-minded" people. Why? They reflect back to you your own positive qualities, and the validation feels good. However, people who are like you will also possess similar negative qualities as you. When those negative qualities start to bother you, it's because they hit too close to home. Seeing those negative qualities in someone else starts to make you more aware of negative things in yourself that you are not yet ready to confront. Invalidation doesn't feel good. To put it in crude terms, you were basically falling in love with a version of yourself and then fell out of love as soon as your flaws were revealed.

Everyone wants to see themselves in a positive light, so it can be painful to face up to one's own negative side. People at low levels of ego development don't yet have a strong and healthy ego (which is most people). One way to compensate for a fragile ego is to form an unrealistic self-image that serves to hide the negative aspects of oneself. However, since reality keeps threatening to intrude upon and even shatter an unrealistic self-image, people need some way to maintain that false image in the face of threats. This is achieved through a variety of defense mechanisms (see the dedicated article).

Projection is a defense mechanism. Projecting your darker aspects onto another person means you don't have to look at them in yourself. It's a way of deflecting painful truths. Defense mechanisms operate unconsciously, so it's not a "choice" you make per se but something you get in the habit of doing because it feels better than the alternative of facing the truth.

One reason defense mechanisms are considered unhealthy is because they keep your self-awareness low, too low, to the point of interfering with personal growth. According to psychoanalytic theory, even when you have a genuine conscious motivation to improve yourself, your personal growth will be quite slow as long as the full truth about you remains repressed and hidden in the unconscious, masked by a complicated network of defense mechanisms.

While it might sound like projection is a "bad" thing because it's unhealthy, if you can admit that you're projecting, it's actually an opportunity to know yourself better, to see your own darker side and address it properly rather than keeping it repressed. You can spot projection whenever you're being judgmental and there is a distinct recurring pattern in how you judge people. You can also spot projection by stepping back and considering whether your judgments are truly fair and objective.

Being able to spot projection gives you a chance to turn your attention around onto yourself, to reflect on why exactly those particular qualities bother you so much. Do you possess those same qualities? If so, acknowledging the truth grants you a chance to change for the better. If not, would having those qualities make you feel deeply ashamed or lead you to hate yourself? Exposing repressed shame or self-loathing is necessary for correcting a distorted self-image.

Caveat: The truth has the potential to hurt. Digging into defense mechanisms is a risky thing to do depending on whether they are being used to mask some deep-seated pain and suffering. If you suspect that this process of self-examination could be very destabilizing, it's best to work with a therapist to increase your self-awareness in a gradual and safe manner.

#entj #inferior fi #projection #judgmental #defense mechanisms #ask

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codenamesazanka · 4 months

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What do you want shiggy to see?

This is going to be hard to answer because I dislike Deku and find much of his saving of Shigaraki so far extremely unconvincing. You should also ask someone who likes Deku, because I cannot properly give you a good, unbiased answer. I am sure the memories I will talk about will be ones that move Shigaraki in the near-future canon, but I'm seeing them through very negative light and will call it bad writing. And I am right. But I'll tell you what I personally think.

The thing is, when I made that post about Shigaraki's memories, it's because Deku barely knows anything about Shigaraki, because the 'Villain' label means nothing except 'horrible person i need to defeat'; barely knows what happens in the shadows that creates villains, which is why I want him to see Shigaraki's memories and understand why Shigaraki is so angry and in pain. And from that, how he can stop Shigaraki and give him hope, saving him.

Meanwhile, Shigaraki already knows Deku is a hero who wants to save him, is a Good Guy, loves his friends and teachers, wishes to do good in the world - that's just being a hero. He just rejects it. Shigaraki already knows the Hero System and how it works, and he hates it.

What is in store for Shigaraki is to be convinced by Deku that he should stop, that the world shouldn't be destroyed, and that he should regain hope, let his heart be saved and released from all that hatred and pain. So the memories he should see would be moments where he can be reassured of Deku's sincerity and determination to improve things, and moments where Deku experiences despair - something Shigaraki can relate to! - but Deku makes the choice to keep the world going anyways.

In the series, in this long process of Deku trying to save Shigaraki, there are few good moments - Deku being extremely stubborn about saving Shigaraki despite Shigaraki's taunts and Nana giving up, Deku telling Shigaraki somewhere inside of him is still a person - but overall Deku's journey getting there so far, and all the things he's doing at the moment? Imo, pretty terrible effort.

Like, what would Shigaraki even see? Well, he could see how when Gran Torino says "killing is saving", or when Heroes are discussing the "Coffin In The Sky" plan, Deku is silent. Offers zero objections.

Deku may want to save Shigaraki, but isn't willing to say so, isn't willing to speak up against others. He accepts Gran's cape, he sits and listens and goes along with the plan (that in Chapter 402 Shigaraki would end up saying he dislikes, "those jerks that hurt me over and over again").

Now, this might not seem like a big deal - you can say, Deku's just trying not to start a screaming match, he has to go along with what the adults says anyways, it's actions that matters more than words since Deku's still trying to save Shigaraki, isn't he?

But Shigaraki's childhood was full of this type of thing: his mom and grandparents trying to keep the peace, never speaking up for him against Kotarou even when Tenko isn't there, trying to comfort him with hugs and treats when out of sight of Kotarou to show that they actually do care... but never enough actually fight for him, even if it meant shaking the stability of the household.

After fighting Shigaraki to save him will come the need to fight for Shigaraki, against the rest of the Heroes and government and society. If Deku can't do that while he's got it in his mind to save Shigaraki, it doesn't ensure confidence.

Now it would be cool if Shigaraki sees this and calls it out! Force Deku to admit he hasn't been trying his best, but will do better. I don't expect it though.

Memories of Deku's accomplishments aren't actually much better. Deku has indeed saved someone who hates him and hates Heroes - that's Kouta, the five-year-old. Deku has saved Eri, the visibly sad and abused innocent six-year-old. So he's got a track record of saving Sad Children, which explains why he wants to save The Crying Child inside of Shigaraki, and that's a genuine thing Shigaraki can believe in... but what about the adults? The much more dangerous, jaded, have-gotten-their-hands-bloody Villains?

Shigaraki already thinks Gentle and Nagant are a "flip-flopping screw-ups." Deku's second encounter with Muscular has him asking Muscular like five questions, before giving up on him. So far Muscular and Shigaraki haven't been all that different in their taunting of Deku. There's also Overhaul that Deku meets again, and Deku is also uninterested in helping Overhaul who's worried for someone important to him until Overhaul expresses remorse. That's fair—except so far Shigaraki has also not expressed remorse.

The only difference between Shigaraki and these two villains is that Deku knows for sure there's sadness for Shigaraki due to the psychic bond, while he can't know that for Muscular or Overhaul, so he didn't pry deeper or go the extra mile for them. Shigaraki might not care about these two, but Shigaraki also hates hypocrisy. It's why he couldn't stand Stain and tore Overhaul's arms off and mocked ReDestro for staying up in a tower.

There is Aoyama. The scene where Deku says "Doing wrong doesn't make you a Villain for the rest of your life!" is good. That is a memory that Shigaraki can see and consider. It is made, imo, weaker when Deku gave conditions - that Aoyama hated and regretted working for All For One, that Nagant didn't 'sell her soul'. Because what if Shigaraki eventually did come to willingly work for AFO, and was even grateful to him, as he has explicitly said in the text? You can argue all you want about AFO manipulating Shigaraki - which Shigaraki himself acknowledges - but if there ever was a moment where Shigaraki enthusiastically participated in a crime, would Deku still stand by what he says about not being a Villain for life?

Again, it would be cool if Shigaraki sees this and ask Deku about it! Idk if that would happen though.

I think if we go back to memories from when and before the series begin, though, that's where I think we can find memories that Shigaraki can see and be swayed by.

Deku being a bullied quirkless child is a big one. What I want is Shigaraki seeing those things and adding it to his long list of 'everything i've witness in this world tells me it's shit' and being mean to Deku about it, because then this is something Deku can refute using his own experiences of injustice, alienation, and despair. This is something Deku can point to and say, 'Yeah, the world can suck, but don't give up.' Shigaraki finds the world not worth keeping around because he thinks it's rotten and there's no fixing it. Deku has seen part of this rot, but still thinks the world is worth defending. They should discuss that.

Related, that means the moment where Deku saves Bakugou who earlier that day told him to kill himself is also a good memory. Convincing argument that awful, angry brats can change, and is worth saving so they can stick around to change.

I am despite everything still a sap so Deku's memories of heartfelt moments with All Might would be good. This can make Shigaraki even more bitter and resentful towards All Might, but might show him that All Might is just a flawed human who tried and failed, something I think Shigaraki knows but refuses to forgive. Seeing it might nudge something though? Plus, the deep affection and loyalty between Deku and All Might - as well as between Deku and his friends - is something Shigaraki can relate to, with his League.

I'm likely missing lots of moments. But these are the ones that come to mind.

Thanks for the ask anon! Sorry.

#nalslastworkingbraincell #ask #asked #answered #anon #anonymous

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eastgaysian · 1 year

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do you think that a lot of s4 critique (esp on tumblr) is coming from the tomgreg “field”? bc i mean - they all seem very disappointed with the way this season is playing out and, without meaning to be patronizing, i’d say unmet expectations like that can cloud (or at least colour) one’s general opinion on a piece of media immensely. we’ve all had it happen to us in some way at some point, so i get it but also…don’t shit in everyone’s müsli just bc a specific relationship didn’t happen in the way you’d envisioned :( alsooo tomshiv is much gayer than tomgreg could have ever hoped to be idc idc

it's something i've been avoiding saying directly, because it feels slightly dickish, but We Can All See With Our Eyes that there is a correlation between people heavily invested in tomgreg and people who are expressing dissatisfaction with s4. it's also fairly obvious that i stopped giving a shit about tomgreg over the course of the year+ of getting harrassed and finally getting my blog terminated for expressing mild criticism wrt patterns of misogyny in fandom. which i think entitles me to a little bit of dickishness.

the thing is, you can have whatever opinion on a show you want for whatever reason you want. it's fine to say you're disappointed in the relative lack of tom and greg this season, because that's what you were personally invested in. your emotional response to the season is your emotional response. full stop. a big part of why i've been enjoying this season so much is because i started watching this show after my dad died, and it's very cathartic for me to watch such a realistic and thoughtful depiction of grief in all its messiness and complexity. i'm connecting to these characters more than ever because i've been there. that's personal! that's subjective! that's okay!

what irritates me is: a) being disingenuous about the reason you dislike the season, b) in a way that implies disliking the season is the 'correct' opinion to have, either on a moral basis or because this season is objectively and uniquely bad writing/directing/editing, c) to the extent that it creates a noxious and unpleasant fan environment to participate in.

i understand where the urge comes from to defensively say "no, it's not just about my businessman yaoi, there is actually a high-minded, intellectual reason for me to spend all my time bitching." because yeah, there are people who are delighted to go fuck you anyone who cared about tom and greg, you were watching the show wrong, and that's aggravating.

deliberately misrepresenting your opinion as something with a more "rational" basis doesn't make you any better off, because it's laughably obvious when that's what you're doing, and it undermines your initial position, which was not inherently invalid in the first place. it's fine to be sad that the thing you personally wanted to happen did not happen. you can say that. you can call people dicks for being rude about it. it's fine. it's literally okay. we are all just saying shit online.

but you are just not going to be able to convince me that season 4 is overall badly written, or that it suffers from unique mechanical issues that were not already present throughout the show. it's not going to happen! d*sha redscare was literally in s3! the fact is that in a season where logan dies in episode 3, and if anybody tries to say that was a bad writing decision you know they're pulling it out of their ass, it simply Is Not Possible for tom and greg (who barely had a relationship with logan and so has fuck all to do in the wake of his death) to spend 15 minutes an episode engaging in slapstick routines. is it an awkwardly truncated storyline? maybe! but succession is littered with those, and that's because it makes the choice to prioritize its main story, which in s4 is more focused and thoughtfully written than ever.

i won't even touch on the queerbait discourse because i do not think queerbait has ever been a useful term and the idea of trying to apply that kind of analysis to succession is too idiotic to even bother engaging with. the virgin representationcel vs the chad [i will not talk about my politics on tumblr but i am a trans fag of color deeply disillusioned with most of the discourse on 'representation']. representation win! the chair of fictional fox news cheated on his wife with her cousin #gayrights. Be serious.

#mingbox #long post

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austerlitzborodinoleipzig · 1 month

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Ranking Shoma's programs

I've never been a big Shoma fan. Not that I don't recognise his talent but i've no particular emotional attachment to him.

I have a lot of respect for his body of work. I think he's probably the most musical skater out there, and since he moved to Lambiel i've started to really enjoy his programs. They don't always move me, I don't rewatch them often (besides one or two exception), but everytime I've watched him skate during competitions they usually leave me thinking "Damn... This is good..." Objectively great but not my skater.

That said, and since I love doing that, here are all Shoma's competitive programs, from his senior career, ranked from least to best, according to my tastes.

16 - Moonlight Sonata, choreo by Mihoko Higuchi (2018/2019 FS)

Yeah, this was a big miss and tbh it's not wonder Shoma's season went middlingly well and that he missed the podium at home Worlds. This program is just not good. The music is overplayed, the choreo is a cut and paste from Shoma and Mihoko's then well established style. Lots of jumps-crossover-jumps-some choreo that consists in looking intense while moving the arms. A miss.

15 - Turandot version 2, choreo by Mihoko Higuchi (2017/2018 FS)

I rewatched it recently and the music cut is just bad. Why you would cut the "vincero" part I have no idea but here it is. Shoma does a good job with it, but it's nowhere close to the first version of this program.

14 - Winter, choreo by Mihoko Higuchi (2017/2018 SP)

I just really really dislike Shoma's packaging from late 2017 to early 2019. It's just a lot of warhorse with really mid choreo. Shoma's musicality saves it but that's about it.

13 - Ladies in Lavender, choreo by Mihoko Higuchi (2016/2017 SP)

It's still intensely Shoma, and by that I mean skate on two feet and move your arms choreo but the music choice is better. At least it's not a warhorse.

12 - Turandot version 1, choreo by Mihoko Higuchi (2015/2016 FS)

Gets bonus points for including Gira La Cote in the music cut.

11 - Stairway to Heaven, choreo by Mihoko Higuchi (2018/2019 SP)

The step sequence is very nice and Shoma's musicaly makes this program.

10 - Great Spirit, choreo by Shae-Lynn Bourne (2019/2020/2021 SP)

Gets deduction points because of some truly bad costumes. Honestly a bit of a let down. The choreo feels far too safe for the music.

9 - Legends, choreo by Mihoko Higuchi (2015/2016 SP)

Much better than any other SP Mihoko choreographed for Shoma. The step sequence alone is more interesting than anything Shoma skated to for the following three seasons. Unexpected like.

8 - Timelapse, choreo by Kenji Miyamoto (2023/2024 FS)

In retrospect, Shoma's farewell FS. Not that great. I love Spiegel im Spiegel but the other piece of music left me cold. The choreo wasn't anything special too, but the performances, especially the NHK one, were absolutely magical.

7 - Bolero, choreo by Stéphane Lambiel (2021/2022 FS)

First of all Bolero gets too much hate from the fandom and y'all lack taste. It's a truly great piece of music and I can think of at least half a dozen warhorses that need to be banned before Bolero. (Romeo and Juliet, Experience, Exogenesis...).

Second of all Sholero goes hard. It is a bit empty at the beginning, but the relentless pace of the music makes for an exciting watch, and in case of a clean program, it's exhilarating. The step sequence at the end is outstanding. Doesn't place higher because the choreo sequence feels almost like an afterthought and honestly Stéphane and Shoma could do better.

6 - Gravity, choreo by Stéphane Lambiel (2022/2023 SP)

Did not enjoy it last season (I thought it wasn't a good fit for Shoma, it felt too much like a Lambiel program). Has grown on me a lot since then. It's the most Lambiel-y Shoma has ever skated and it's good that he did it. Variety! Some diversity in the steps. Makes us of the whole body, not just the arms.

5 - Oboe Concerto, choreo by Kenji Miyamoto (2021/2022 SP)

Quintessential Shoma in that it feels close to a Mihoko program, like Winter, or Ladies in Lavender, but is so so much better. More variety in the choreo. It makes us of the whole body, not just the arms.

Shoma's skating with it's outstanding musicality and uninterrupted flow is a perfect match for Baroque music.

4 - Dancing On My Own, choreo by David Wilson (2019/2020/2021 FS)

My greatest regret, regarding Shoma's career, is that he did not get more programs from Wilson. Imho, given how musical Shoma is, he would have been a perfect fit.

That said DOMO is perhaps the most emotionally loaded program out of them all. Shoma went through hell and high water with it, and when it was performed cleanly, it sang.

3 - Mea Tormenta, choreo by Kenji Miyamoto (2022/2023 FS)

Glorious, iconic, it's a program I don't think anybody but Shoma could have skated. Just stunning work all around, and one of the best men's programs in recent years.

2 - I Love You Kung Fu, choreo by Stéphane Lambiel (2023/2024 SP)

Shoma at his most raw, emotional and soft. Great, great music choice, just magic on the ice.

1 - Loco, choreo by Mihoko Hiiguchi (2016/2017 FS)

I don't know what that says of a skater, when their most successfull program happened during their second senior season, and they've been chasing that high ever since (looking at you Kaori's Piano).

In any case, Loco is as good as the fans say it is, and then some. It highlights all the best aspects of Shoma's skating (the performance, the passion, the musicality) while being absolutely unhinged. Truly one of the highs of the sport.

#figure skating #shoma uno #ranking programs is my passion

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