blake-allykat

[blake-allykat]

Coyote | Sheryl Hester

[blake-allykat]

Crying bc the events of Pacific's Rim are literally happening right now. January 8 was the day Mako and Raleigh fought those kaijus in the Hong Kong double event. January 12 is the triple event where they close the breach. In two days we cancel the apocalypse.

[blake-allykat]

And I've been waiting...

Waiting...

Waiting...

Waiting...

...For you.

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Vengeance Saga has me acting up

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Can we please appreciate Odysseus being a silent stalker in the shadows, taking out suitors with his bow, not deigning to speak to them as he takes them out one by one

until some of them go "we have to strike him in the darkness too! we know the halls of this palace! the odds can be tilted!"

and Odysseus, built this palace with his very hands, has to step out of the shadows like "are you this fucking stupid"

[blake-allykat]

Buying you time

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[blake-allykat]

i want more nuance to be entered into the discussion of the green girl sorority and how differently cynthia plays elphaba in comparison to those who came before her because while a lot of people are rightfully like "why was elphaba not black from the beginning" and celebrating that she is now being played by a black woman, i think we need to be careful in just writing off all the elphabas of the past as Random White Girls when the role was championed (and often followed/succeeded) by a jewish woman

the pop culture archetype of the Wicked Witch has deep roots in antisemitism stretching faaaar far back. there is a level of reclamation happening in casting idina menzel, a jewish woman, to play the Misunderstood and Maligned young girl who is branded as exactly that. and stage!Elphaba is also written and acted with jewish stereotypes in mind--she is loud, aggressive, no-nonsense, blunt. she is quick to advocate for herself and shut down the discrimination she faces. all of this is very intentional! her personality is abrasive from years of abuse, and that makes propagandizing her easy. this is literally the thesis statement of the musical--it's not about aptitude, it's the way you're viewed.

cynthia's performance of elphaba is fucking INSPIRED despite going in a completely different direction. she's much more reserved, analytical, one of her key character traits is how well she can read people (see her calling out Galinda as insecure/putting on airs in their first scene together, clocking that Fiyero is using his party guy persona as a shield for his own depression) elphaba's attempts to blend in and make herself smaller all fail simply because of her existence, if not that then because she feels empathy so strongly she often struggles to hold back from acting, protecting.

personality wise, though, cynthia's elphaba is very quiet and closed-off, not at all the bullet-to-the-face that she is in the stage show, and... she still gets propagandized and maligned. though this seems to contradict the other interpretation, it tells of the other end of the spectrum of propaganda, one that black women watching (and many, MANY other marginalized folks) are sure to identify with--it does not matter how "nice," how reserved, how small a black woman makes herself. a racist society will still scrutinize her every action for a way to parse ill intent from it, brand her as an angry black woman who is dangerous and wicked, and write off any humanity she has in the process.

these two very different interpretations tell of the lie of assimilation. the fact of the matter is, when you are marginalized, there is no way to sand down your edges enough to make the people oppressing you "accept" you. that is why wicked is a tragedy at its core. whether loud and aggressive or quiet and unimposing, there is nothing elphaba could have done to make the people of Oz see her as anything other than a scapegoat to blame all their problems on.

so while i definitely appreciate that people are excited for black girl era elphaba, i would encourage us all to still show appreciation for what came before--that was not white girl era elphaba. that was jewish girl era elphaba. two houses, both alike in dignity, two stories both worth being told.

[blake-allykat]

Unmute !

[blake-allykat]

Time for the yearly tarot spread!

I asked the same questions as last year and used the same decks.

First card I asked "What is the theme of this year?" and I pulled Six of Cups. It's all about playfulness and connecting with the child within (within my womb maybe?).

The second card I asked "What do I need to focus on this year?" and pulled Dreaming. I need to focus on following my intuition and trusting my gut feeling. There was also a bit about connecting with the inner child again.

For the third card I asked "What do I need to be aware of?" and pulled the Wings. I need to be aware of if I have room to spread my wings. Are my ideas able to take flight? I have been thinking about work and if I'm going to stay or if it's time to move on...🤷‍♀️

For the fourth card I asked “Who is guiding me?” and pulled the Snake. The Snake is about healing, taking the time to repair, replenish, and renew. I neee to give myself space to flourish, shed the past and practice radical self acceptance. The Snake sounds like she wants me to do some work in not sure I'm ready for lol.

My final card I asked “What is coming this year?” and pulled the Knight of Pentacles. So a mature and responsible person, someone methodical and persistent. Could it be me doing all the FET meds and scheduling?

[blake-allykat]

what if i just rest my eyes for a second

[blake-allykat]

DID YOU HEAR ABOUT THE NEANDERTHAL CHILD WITH DOWN'S SYNDROME? Because they're all I've been thinking about when I'm sad for the past few days. Their existence makes me less sad.

[blake-allykat]

Just wondering...do you think David thought-spoke privately with Visser Three in #48 and told him the Andalite Bandits were human and that's why he starts looking in #49? Because that's my headcanon

Oh man, I do NOT know what to make of #48, but I do like this take. If David dropped V3 that hint, and if V3 saw mecha-Rachel as a distorted but still human-looking morpher, I could get behind this.

And you're right that Visser Three is the barrier to figuring out the andalite bandits are human. As early as #4 the kids overhear Temrash 114 and Iniss 226 debating: "is Visser Three wrong? What if they're not Andalites at all?"/ ... "Visser Three wrong? Maybe. But I'm not the fool who's going to try and tell him." Heck, as early as #1 the yeerks are looking for "some kids who were shooting off fireworks in the construction site", and presumably they don't mean andalite kids. So like, clearly some of the controllers are at least open to the possibility of human morphers. The only thing stopping a full-scale human morpher search is Visser Three a) having TWO of the galaxy's biggest andalite supremacists in his brain, and b) having absolute power over the Earth invasion.

So I've always headcanoned that some technician controllers start looking for irrefutable proof of human morphers as early as Elfangor's death, and that it just takes them ~2.5 years to come up with something ironclad. Ax's presence may have slowed the process — he's obviously an andalite and not just someone in morph as Elfangor — and Tobias's ability to stay "in morph" for 2+ hours and to go directly from being "in morph" to a different morph almost certainly muddied the waters. But yeah, maybe it's not that the technicians finally persuaded Visser Three; maybe Crayak engineered it that way.

[blake-allykat]

do u ever get emotional about the fact that tchaikovsky, a gay man, wrote his Romeo and Juliet overture for his brother and his brother’s gay lover bc I sure as hell do

[blake-allykat]

Chinese weighlifter Li Wenwen successfully defended her title, winning the gold medal in the women's over 81kg category at the Paris Olympics on Sunday!

In her private life, the Li is actually a fan of traditional Chinese Hanfa.

(source)

(Saw this post on Facebook and loved it, and since Facebook always steals Tumblr posts, I figure I can do the reverse and steal this Facebook post)

[blake-allykat]

I love this fandom so much! 🤣