aripithecus

[aripithecus]

Hello! I have two other very good paleofiction books that you might enjoy. They are Moctu and the Mammoth People and it's sequel The People Eaters, by Neil Bockoven, and Jih's Journey by Xavier Giovanni McClean.

I haven't heard of these before! Thank you for telling me about them! I'll add these books to the paleolithic fiction catalogue, too :) I've been looking for a fiction book to read, so I'll start with one of your suggestions!

[aripithecus]

by TAKUMI™︎

[aripithecus]

screaming THAT'S A SAW FISH every time i look up saw sharks bc the images are all jumbled up together

[aripithecus]

Racism has them so confused.

[aripithecus]

AM radio is like literal magic. There is music all around us that we can't hear, and to hear it you just have to tap a crystal (diode) to the earth and listen to it with another magic rock (magnet) and a tin can. You dont even need electricity to make it work because this music around us is literally all the power you need. Oh and at night when the sun has set, the light of the day gets replaced by MORE music because the signals can travel further at night. This is magic. If you even care.

[aripithecus]

San Francisco Garter Snake (Thamnophis sirtalis tetrataenia), family Colubridae, northern California, USA

ENDANGERED.

Photograph by Bonnerscar

[aripithecus]

They didn't communicate much, but they have something in common

[aripithecus]

Mistletoe

And I wish y'all a Merry Christmas!! 💚

[aripithecus]

I'll just mess this up if I keep working on it, so I'll stop here. My attempt at painting an adult homotherium.

It's the first time I paint snow so hopefully it will be better next time 😅

[aripithecus]

people with bad taste are always like “yurr hurr The Beach is about zuko and mai and how they’re a great couple” while intellectuals know that Actually The Beach is about mining any and all of the untapped friendship potential of this striking exchange

[aripithecus]

Azula

It constantly upsets me whenever I see people say that Azula doesn’t deserve any sympathy, that she was a monster, she deserved what was coming for her, she abused people (to a certain extent she did to Mai and Ty Lee)*, a playing victim, doesn’t deserve any redemption arc etc…

And so, i’ve decided to write this so people can understand her character better.

In the comics, it became clear that Azula’s accusation of their mother (Ursa) liking loving Zuko more than her, was indeed true. Never once did we see Ursa actually alone with Azula unless she was reprimanding her. Ursa was always just with Zuko. It was only once did we see Ursa actually with Azula (albeit Zuko was there too), and even then Ursa was neglecting Azula and just paying her full attention to Zuko. You can say Ursa loved Azula, sure, but the fact is that Azula never felt she was loved by her mother. Why would she? Ursa never praised her when she actually did something praiseworthy, or even when she behaved better than Zuko.

A child, especially a child as perceptive as Azula was, could’ve only reached the conclusion that she was never loved if there wasn’t any evidence to prove her wrong. Compare Ursa’s goodbye between her children. She kisses them both, but she only wakes up Zuko to tell him she loves him. For Azula, she has no knowledge of Ursa even coming to her room.

Now for Ozai. According to Zuko, Ozai favored Azula over him because she was a prodigy, which was true, but notice how even in flashbacks or in the comics, Ozai was not seen spending time with Azula like how Ursa was with Zuko. Ozai only favored Azula for her talent, and that was it. As a child, Azula only received praise from her father when she did something praiseworthy and her ideals matched his. Was Ozai truly spending time with his daughter? No. Did he truly love her? No.

In contrast to Ozai’s treatment of Azula, Ursa’s was the complete opposite. Ursa only paid attention to Azula when she did something wrong. To Azula, it was better to be scolded than to be ignored so she did bad things.

People always fail to remember that Azula never had any guidance, unlike Zuko. Ursa was always with Zuko. When she’d reprimand Azula for her actions, she’d never tell her why they were wrong and only send her away. Azula actually questions her mother as to why she couldn’t do what she did, but Ursa only tells her that she should treat the flowers with respect. Ursa NEVER explained to Azula what was wrong with what she was doing.

Notice the difference in how Ursa treated her children when they misbehaved. Ursa’s first thought for Zuko is to understand her son’s reasoning behind his actions while for Azula, her first thought was to only scold her.

Again in this scene, Azula was just asking a simple question but yet again, Ursa scolds her for it and doesn’t tell her why it was rude. Azula only understood why it was inappropriate when Zuko interjects and gives her an example. ‘Fine but I still think Dad’s better’ is basically her response to Zuko. Ursa never tried to get Azula to understand why her questions were inappropriate.

Even Iroh was playing favorites with them. It’s obvious that Iroh didn’t even know Azula enough to know that she wasn’t the usual doll loving girl since he gifted her a doll while he gifted Zuko a dagger. Take note that Azula was merely 11 years old when she was left completely alone with Ozai for the next 3 years.

Azula grew up in a militaristic environment surrounded with only her servants and cruel war aged old men. Her friends were rarely there since Ty Lee had run off to the circus and Mai probably didn’t even come to the palace that much either since she was closer to Ty Lee.

Azula was completely left alone with Ozai. She was forced to mature and have the mindset of an adult at 11, to forgo her childhood innocence and anything else that may prove to be a weakness in the future. Ozai made sure of that.

So growing up, Azula basically didn’t have a mother, father, grandfather or an uncle. There was literally no one to guide her to the light unlike Zuko.

As Azula grew older, Ozai’s expectations of her only grew higher. That was how Azula’s obsession with perfection began.

‘Almost isn’t good enough!’

Azula needed to be only perfect. Anything lesser than that was not appreciated by Ozai. Since Zuko was a failure to Ozai, that only meant that he was harsher in perfecting Azula to be the heir he desired. Since Azula was capable of incredible feats as a child, that means his expectations of her was even higher than his was for Zuko. Azula was expected to not only just excel, but to be the finest of all firebenders (second only to him of course).

‘My father gave me far more leeway than he ever gave Zuko, but he is not a patient man.’

‘This scheme is indeed my master stroke, destined to place me in Father’s good graces forever.’

- Azula (Tale of Azula)

From this we can deduce that Azula was not always actually in Ozai’s good graces, unlike what Zuko thought. Azula knows the consequences of disappointing and disobeying her father from watching Zuko, and she knows that even she herself isn’t exempted from her father’s cruelty.

The higher you climb, the harder you fall— this quote perfectly describes Azula demise. Azula was known as a prodigy even as a child so only perfection and brilliance was expected of her. Failure was considered improbable. No one expects her to fail, so if she does, her punishment is twice as worse as it should be.

Take note, Azula actually loved Ozai. He was the only parent who praised her, who understood her worth, who agreed with her ideals even when she was just a child. Ozai approved of Azula. Azula had seen his approval as Love, which was why Azula never betrayed her father and did everything he commanded her to. To Azula, Ozai was the only person who truly loved her and didn’t actually fear her. She wasn’t going to lose that one and only person who loved her.

Azula was afraid. She was actually afraid of what her father might do to her for speaking out against him. She knows from Zuko’s experience of what Ozai was capable of. Her brother had spoken out of turn in the war meeting, disregarding Ozai’s opinion in the plan of General Bujing, which then resulted in the Agni Kai between father and son. Ozai had struck Zuko with lightning when Zuko showed defiance and disrespect.

Azula knew she wasn’t an exception, and it was her instincts of self-preservation that prevented her from comitting the same mistakes that Zuko did. Zuko was the prime example of what she would be if she wasn’t what her father desired. She became what she was so she could survive.

Azula was every bit a victim as Zuko was, and probably even more.

[aripithecus]

An absolutely gorgeous piece of fan art, featuring Ozai and Ursa from Avatar the Last Airbender, on their wedding day. Their feelings about the arranged marriage are shown so well in their expressions! (I found this image on Reddit and felt it deserved to be shared. All credit goes to the artist, @bluemist_72 on Instagram. @bluemist, if you see this, sorry for sharing without asking first, hope you don’t mind!)

[aripithecus]

hi, my name is aaravos dark’ness dementia raven way and I have long silver gray hair (that’s how I got my name) that reaches my mid-back and icy yellow eyes like limpid tears and a lot of people tell me I look like the Fallen Star (AN: if u don’t know who he is get da hell out of here!)

[aripithecus]

have you ever drawn Korra? I think I read that you were kinda iffy on the show (could be wrong! I’d love to hear your thoughts) but I would love to see her in your art style :)

I do like the show, but I haven't drawn her in such a looong time! here's the girl~

[aripithecus]

Learn the difference between a villain and an antagonist please I beg

[aripithecus]

Rewatching Treasure Planet (great movie, watch it) made realize something about the way that stories convey information to their audiences. There's been a lot of discussion on the overuse of plot twists and how many stories prioritise surprising their audience over telling decent stories. However, if you instead reveal the "twist" to the audience before it becomes known to the characters, you can build tension and stakes. Treasure Planet comes right out and tells you that Long John Silver is the main villain almost immediately after his introduction (And even before he's introduced we're warned about a cyborg, so you'd have to be pretty dense to not put 2 and 2 together and realize he's a bad guy). So when the audience watches him and Jim bond and grow closer, it builds tension for when Jim finds out and it highlights the tragedy of their friendship, because we all know it's not going to end well. Then, after the truth is revealed, stakes are created because we want the friendship between Jim and Silver to be repaired, because we know it was real, but we don't know if can be after what Silver's done. And all of this would have been lost if Silver's true nature had been a cheap plot twist. The tragedy would be completely overshadowed by the surprise and betrayal, and any investment in their relationship would have been built on the false impression that Silver was a good guy.

Another good example of this is Titanic. Even if you were somehow ignorant of the ship's sinking, the film makes sure you know that it sank with its framing device of Old Rose telling her story to people salvaging the Titanic's wreak. And Titanic's plot structure could only possibly work if you know the ship is going to sink. I'm not just talking about building tension, tragedy, and stakes for the characters like with the above example, I mean that if you didn't know that the Titanic was going down walking into the film, the abrupt shift from romance to suspense-disaster would be an increadibly tough pill to swallow. But it works because we expect it. You don't walk into a film called Titanic without expecting the damn boat to sink.

However, the sad thing about both of these examples, is that despite all the benefits that came from telling the audience these things ahead of time, I think the main reason the creators didn't make them plot twists was because they couldn't have. Treasure Island is the single most influential piece of pirate media out there, and you'd have to have been living under a rock for over a century to not know the Titanic sank. So, the writers had to work around the fact that these important turning points in the narratives were common knowledge, and they wound creating incredible stories as a consequence.

I want to see more of this style of writing in stories where the writers aren't forced to do it. We've clearly seen that you can tell some really damn good stories by giving information to the audience before the characters learn it, and I just wish more works would do that instead of trying to surprise people with shocking twists.

[aripithecus]

These cunning eyes...

Commissions are open, feel free to write me💕🎀