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MEL & VIKTOR - MORE PARALELLS (the only reason they didn’t interact is because Riot is a coward)

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I feel like everyone in marauders fandom needed a break and arcane s2 came out at the perfect time

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why do people portray walburga and her relationship with sirius in such an exaggerated way? like torture??? i get that we don't have a lot of information about what went down, but its such an extreme choice

thank you very much for the ask, anon!

unsurprisingly, the answer to this is under the cut, because it comes with a trigger warning for discussions of physical and sexual abuse.

my interpretation of things is that it's a really interesting bleed-through into fandom of two real-world views a lot of people have:

firstly, that it's uniquely horrifying when a woman who is also a mother is cruel to children [or, indeed, when she's anything other than completely self-sacrificing and nurturing].

grimmauld place is a dozen different gothic literature tropes in a trenchcoat, and the text hammers that home with absolutely no subtlety whatsoever. it is walburga in the portrait - haunting sirius, serving as a physical manifestation of the rot of blood purity, making grimmauld place seem as much of a prison as azkaban - rather than orion because the reader wouldn't find it anywhere near as disgusting or frightening to see a man in that role, and the narrative meaning intended by the portrait therefore wouldn't come over as clearly.

[the subtext to walburga's character - that the portrait and the house are liminal spaces between life and death, a hint at the extraordinary grief she carries which will be revealed in deathly hallows - would also be interpreted very differently by the reader if they belonged to orion. walburga's grief - for both sirius and regulus - is inextricable from what the series thinks is "true" about motherhood and womanhood.]

and this - i think - is why, even though sirius does talk about the emotional abuse he experienced coming from both of his parents, the fandom is laser-focused on walburga. she's a bigger presence textually and she's a bigger presence textually entirely because she exists in defiance of deep-rooted societal opinions about how mothers should act.

[which we also see in the fandom's responses to petunia versus vernon and molly versus arthur...]

the second real-world view which bleeds through into the fandom's treatment of sirius' childhood is one which lots of people hold and which therefore has major, major repercussions for people in abusive households and relationships: the idea that abuse which isn't physically extreme [or, in the case of children, but much less often adults, sexual] isn't "as bad" as abuse which is.

and part of this is that the social norms we live by treat extreme physical abuse [and child sexual abuse] as objectively wrong, but treat abuse which doesn't meet this threshold of extremity much more subjectively.

a parent who beats their child so badly that they almost die will inspire outrage from all quarters. a parent who hits their child with a belt once across the backs of the legs as punishment for misbehaviour, but claims this is a form of reasonable physical discipline which doesn't cause their child any lasting harm, will find plenty of people willing to defend them as well as plenty of people willing to condemn.

and - of course - societal prejudices connected to things like gender, race, class, and so on play a big part in these splitting of opinions. a man who rapes his five-year-old child will be - in public, at least - unambiguously regarded as a criminal by everyone in a community. a man who rapes his female partner will find plenty of people willing to argue that it's her duty to provide him with sex and he was merely requiring her to fulfil that duty. a man who rapes his male partner will find plenty of people willing to say that gay men are all hypersexual and the victim loved it.

this subjectivity of response is also one of the reasons why emotional abuse, financial abuse, coercive control, stalking, and other forms of non-physical abuse still aren't taken as seriously as they should be. there's a widespread perception - and not just among police - that they're not dangerous in and of themselves.

from the fandom perspective, then, it seems to me that the writing of abusive situations often focuses on extreme physical violence as a way of authors offering "proof" to their readers that they take the fact that the character was abused seriously.

there is a worry - i think - in many authors' minds that if they wrote walburga never laying a hand on sirius, they would be accused of claiming his childhood was normal, his experience was fine, his parents' treatment of him was justified, or that he shouldn't be thought of as someone who was abused.

but - of course - something it's crucial for us to do in real life is be alert to just how complex and individual abuse is, and how poor our pre-conceived notions about what it is and what it isn't tend to be. i think the same is true in fandom, and it's why i think portrayals of non-physical abuse which take that abuse as bad enough are so important.

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I don't think Jayce was ever the one who was against Hextech weapons. I think that was always Viktor's side of the partnership, and I think this for a few reasons:

1 ) Jayce comes from a family of tool makers. Weapons are tools. Jayce's earliest drawings of himself as a mage is him holding a magical hammer. I don't think Jayce set out to make magical weapons but I think he was always open to the idea as that drawing shows us.

2 ) Viktor comes from the undercity, which no matter how you look at when he would have left it for Piltover, was often damaged and harassed by armed Enforcers. Just based on his upbringing, Viktor would be very aware of the fact that any weapons made for Piltover will almost certainly be put in the hands of Enforcers and those will be used against people in the undercity. Jayce does not have this social awareness. I don't think Jayce was at all malicious, just naive,. According to Caitlyn, he had zero political interest before becoming a Councilor and really everything he knew or thought about the undercity came from his partnership and love for Viktor.

3 ) Jayce is genuinely torn on the need for Hextech weapons because again, this isn't a deeply held belief for him in S1, this is him being supportive of Viktor's vision for their shared dream.

Jayce let Viktor be the moral guide for something he didn't really have a strong feeling about one way or the other. This is why he's so torn in S1 when it seems like they might actually need Hextech weapons in Piltover to survive against a Shimmer-armed undercity (in a classic theme of arms race escalation and all it entails that permeates the show). The narrative demonstrates though that this is Jayce's naiveté at play to think the weapons could be used only against their intended targets. Weapons once made will always be used and they will be used, including against children. Viktor already has this awareness that weapons will be used against the undercity, Jayce gains it through the attack on the Shimmer factory and the death of a child bystander who looks like Viktor. To Mel's credit, she also urges caution and backpedals on her own desire for Hextech weapons in a bid to deescalate the conflict.

4 ) In S2 Act 1, Jayce is all-in on Viktor's vision for Hextech, because he's mourning Viktor who is non-responsive in the Hex cocoon and close to death. Mel, who in 1.09 realized that Jayce and Piltover matter more to her than her mother's approval, also stands up against Hextech weapons.

5 ) But, and this is critical, Jayce has always fundamentally seen Hextech as a tool. That's why when the situation escalates, he pushes back on Hextech weapons on a broader scale, but he is willing to bend enough to make weapons for Caitlyn and her strike team, because he loves Caitlyn and he sees this as a defensive tool to keep her safe, in my opinion, and as an alternative to a war that would be worse.

This is critical to note because Jayce doesn't have an iron spine when it comes to resisting Hextech weapons because it's not his deeply held philosophical belief the way it is for Viktor. It is a received belief that he holds to honor Viktor, out of love for him, and that can be swayed if the specter of protecting another loved one arises. Jayce is wildly conflicted about this, I believe, based on his expression in the forge after he makes Caitlyn's gun, but this is a man who cannot bear the thought of losing another loved one.

Hextech was always about love for Jayce, not philosophy, because he is not ideologically driven and never has been, it was always Viktor's ideals he was supporting.

Thank you for coming to my TED talk ;P

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Two gestures - Jayce's and Viktor's journey

Just something that's been on my mind because I've seen so many positive interpretations of this scene in season 1, where Jayce stops Viktor from speaking in front of the Council after the Hextech gem was stolen by Jinx:

People interpret it as Jayce protecting Viktor, as a positive gesture, and while I think it's absolutely possible to interpret what's going on in Jayce's head as something like that, I think that in the narrative this scene also serves a very different purpose.

The context of this gesture is a scene where Viktor is the one person who'd be fully within his rights to speak in the Council chamber, because the question posed is this: Could the Zaunites figure out Hextech and weaponize it? There's the call to address this danger immediately, and Viktor tries to speak, undoubtedly to speak for his people, the Zaunites, who are only talked about as dangerous in this room, as something to be kept in check. But Viktor doesn't get to speak, Jayce stops him and gives a whole spiel about wanting to take responsibility, something he undoubtedly is sincere about, and then unilaterally decides that all Hextech operations will be suspended, including closing down Jayce's and Viktor's lab.

It's the first time that Jayce talks over Viktor like that, that he disregards him and his opinion, that he makes decisions for Hextech, for the both of them, without ever consulting Viktor. There's at least two reasons Viktor reacts with the facial expression above to Jayce's speech: He does not want to suspend Hextech operations, because he is running out of time and increasingly desperate to finally do good with their invention. But also and maybe mostly, he is hurt, because suddenly, he has lost his voice, suddenly, Jayce talks over him and takes it upon himself to decide the future of their lab.

This is the moment Mel decides she wants Jayce on the Council, that he's a good investment in that context as well - and we all know that Jayce meddling in politics very much is what leads to all the mistakes he makes in season 1. When Mel presents her plan, we see this shot of Viktor - this is him increasingly fading into the background, and we see him breathing heavily, obviously agitated by what's happening, but silent, always silent:

Jayce stopping Viktor from speaking in front of the Council is the beginning of the whole catastrophic journey between Jayce and Viktor in season 1 - the first time of many that Jayce disregards Viktor. The last time he does, it's when he takes it upon himself to decide whether or not to weaponize Hextech, in a conversation where Mel and him only ever talk of this as his, as Jayce's choice. "The decision is yours", Mel says, while Viktor sits there - silenced, ignored after Mel and Jayce stand up and talk over him, literally, talk of 'their own people', the Piltovians, that they have a duty to protect from the Zaunites, from people like Viktor. It's all slipping away from Viktor.

Viktor becomes invisible, he loses his voice and all choice he could and should have in how his and Jayce's inventions are used, he loses his agency. And we know what the decision to weaponize Hextech leads to, in the whole narrative but also for Viktor - it's when he finally loses the trust he had in Jayce and starts experimenting recklessly with the Hexcore by himself, leading to Sky's death.

It's very deliberate that the first scene in the Council with Jayce stopping Viktor from speaking mirrors the scene in the last ep of season 1, same place, where Jayce with the opposite hand gesture invites Viktor to speak in front of the Council, a Zaunite voice for the Zaunites declaring that there's a proposal for peace:

At this point, Jayce has learnt that he was wrong, that he has made so many mistakes, not least of which disregarding Viktor, not giving him a voice, not listening. So that's why Viktor gets to speak here, and that's why he is silenced in the first scene.

In this light, it's of course extra tragic that everything happening in season 2 is then again the result of Viktor losing his agency because of a choice Jayce makes for him - that all Viktor wants at that point is dying with as much dignity as he can muster, and what he gets instead is again Jayce deciding for him, disregarding the promise made to Viktor to destroy the Hexcore, instead merging Viktor with it. Viktor's choices and wishes are disregarded so often by Jayce within the story, and it's only in season 2 that Jayce finally really learns and gets to restore agency to Viktor at the very end through his love.

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i think i browse the arcane critical tag as an amateur writer first, a fan of the show second. it reads like a rolling report on all the ways people think a story can lose the spark that made it special.

i don’t think season 2 was bad. i do think the writing faltered in ways that are almost painfully familiar.

for both its strengths and weaknesses keeping the writing of arcane in mind is so useful to me.

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some of you guys need to get into 18th century english lit. you want ‘virtue rewarded’ so bad.

“why does this character who has done terrible things deserve a happy ending, how can you be okay with that, why do they deserve anything nice”

well see it’s because the entire concept of what people “deserve” is a messy ethical quagmire that has really troubling implications no matter how you use it

but also it’s because i like fictional miserable little assholes and i do what i want

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when you date james potter, you get a new bestie

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"The Brothers Karamazov", Fyodor Dostoevsky (translated by Constance Garnett)

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This may be controversial amongst high school English teachers but I think that if we wanna teach students about antiblackness in America maybe they should read a book that’s actually by a black person

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General Fandom: Sirius was the confident, dominant, taller one, and Remus was the insecure, submissive, smaller one.

Some poor bastard: Actually, Remus in canon can be quite the little shit, and he speaks fondly of prowling the forbidden forest and getting into Marauder mischief.

General Fandom: Ah, okay, so Remus was the confident, dominant, taller one, and Sirius was the insecure, submissive, smaller one.

Some poor bastard: But Sirius is described multiple times as tall, and he consistently does what he wants with little to no regard for authority.

General Fandom: Gotcha, so Sirius was the confident, dominant, taller one, and Remus was the insecure, submissive, smaller one.

Some poor bastard: *headdesk*

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oh wow not the ramble doing numbers

could write an essay on the tragic irony of that scene (where mel is talking to jayce over Viktor who is dismantling jinx’s bomb) but like… in brief??

people are saying she’s being classist or ableist in leaving viktor out of the conversation and while that dimension to the power differential between them is definitely there (and I could write whole lot on that too) i just don’t think it’s the main reason why that conversation goes the way it does.

mel doesn’t speak to viktor because she is suggesting the goddamn militarisation of hextech. viktor is a principled scientist.

rewatch the scene closely. mel watches both jayce and viktor at first. while explaining the situation. while Viktor is dismantling the bomb, while giving the council’s opinion. but she stops engaging with viktor as soon as he asks her:

- V : “wait what are you suggesting?”

this is where she stops talking to him. because what she wants is the goddamn militarisation of hextech. to use on the undercity where viktor is from, no less. mel says straight up:

- M: “we should prepare our own countermeasures.”

it is right there. i don’t understand where the ‘manipulation’ conversation is coming in with this scene when she isn’t even attempting to speak around the violent measures she is willing to support. mel is being quite upfront about it. to me this was mel’s most ‘ambessa’ moment. it makes perfect narrative sense that in the episode following this one we meet ambessa and get to see mel’s relationship to martial law and Noxus’ kinds of state sanctioned violence that far exceed the brutality we have seen even piltover direct at zaun.

mel knows she cannot speak to viktor about this because… and i don’t know how many times I can say this… it’s a proposal for the godamn militarisation of hextech.

of course she anticipates viktor’s reaction because she’s intelligent enough to know that his reaction is that of any principled scientist. before anyone can get a word in edgewise we see viktor immediately, vehemently trying to shut the idea down:

- V: “absolutely not. That is not what we created hextech for.”

jayce brings up heimerdinger here too and says he would never do it which is so telling. heimerdinger was a council member, yes, but he is first and foremost a scientist who adheres to science’s ethics and academic rigour (albeit to a pedantic degree because he has no real concept of human life spans).

in this scene viktor is rightfully much more pissed off at jayce. that he even considers the proposal is a testament to just how much more absorbed in mel’s world of state politics he has become as opposed to viktor’s one of science. after mel has left viktor scoffs and says:

- “Ridiculous. You cannot be considering this.[…] We’re scientists. Not soldiers. We agreed hextech is to improve lives not take them.”

a large part of what is so tragic about the machine herald storyline is that these tables have entirely turned. of the many, many mel and viktor parallels i think it’s often overlooked that it’s mel who becomes increasingly opposed to endorsing war and militarisation, ultimately killing her own mother, the symbolic figurehead of both, while it’s viktor who ends up creating the very thing he was insulted to even think of with hextech. an army that can’t die… used by ambessa no less.

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— Megan Fernandes, “Do You Sell Dignity Here?” from I Do Everything I’m Told

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Guy who didnt satisfy his partner during sex cryign and punching himself in the balls going STUPID STUPID STUPID!!

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could write an essay on the tragic irony of that scene (where mel is talking to jayce over Viktor who is dismantling jinx’s bomb) but like… in brief??

people are saying she’s being classist or ableist in leaving viktor out of the conversation and while that dimension to the power differential between them is definitely there (and I could write whole lot on that too) i just don’t think it’s the main reason why that conversation goes the way it does.

mel doesn’t speak to viktor because she is suggesting the goddamn militarisation of hextech. viktor is a principled scientist.

rewatch the scene closely. mel watches both jayce and viktor at first. while explaining the situation. while Viktor is dismantling the bomb, while giving the council’s opinion. but she stops engaging with viktor as soon as he asks her:

- V : “wait what are you suggesting?”

this is where she stops talking to him. because what she wants is the goddamn militarisation of hextech. to use on the undercity where viktor is from, no less. mel says straight up:

- M: “we should prepare our own countermeasures.”

it is right there. i don’t understand where the ‘manipulation’ conversation is coming in with this scene when she isn’t even attempting to speak around the violent measures she is willing to support. mel is being quite upfront about it. to me this was mel’s most ‘ambessa’ moment. it makes perfect narrative sense that in the episode following this one we meet ambessa and get to see mel’s relationship to martial law and Noxus’ kinds of state sanctioned violence that far exceed the brutality we have seen even piltover direct at zaun.

mel knows she cannot speak to viktor about this because… and i don’t know how many times I can say this… it’s a proposal for the godamn militarisation of hextech.

of course she anticipates viktor’s reaction because she’s intelligent enough to know that his reaction is that of any principled scientist. before anyone can get a word in edgewise we see viktor immediately, vehemently trying to shut the idea down:

- V: “absolutely not. That is not what we created hextech for.”

jayce brings up heimerdinger here too and says he would never do it which is so telling. heimerdinger was a council member, yes, but he is first and foremost a scientist who adheres to science’s ethics and academic rigour (albeit to a pedantic degree because he has no real concept of human life spans).

in this scene viktor is rightfully much more pissed off at jayce. that he even considers the proposal is a testament to just how much more absorbed in mel’s world of state politics he has become as opposed to viktor’s one of science. after mel has left viktor scoffs and says:

- “Ridiculous. You cannot be considering this.[…] We’re scientists. Not soldiers. We agreed hextech is to improve lives not take them.”

a large part of what is so tragic about the machine herald storyline is that these tables have entirely turned. of the many, many mel and viktor parallels i think it’s often overlooked that it’s mel who becomes increasingly opposed to endorsing war and militarisation, ultimately killing her own mother, the symbolic figurehead of both, while it’s viktor who ends up creating the very thing he was insulted to even think of with hextech. an army that can’t die… used by ambessa no less.

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I have concepts of a fanfic

me as a writer