maeve-on-mustafar

[maeve-on-mustafar]

Being a fan of DC characters who are not the Batfam is its own special kind of hell, because you constantly get the urge to write fic about them or get a new story idea you want to brainstorm, but then you remember the character is not a part of the Batfam and no audience exists for your story.

[maeve-on-mustafar]

Friendly reminder that you wouldn’t be getting your healthcare taken away if more people had just gotten up off their asses and voted for Kamala.

Trump supporters are bad. But the people who knew Trump would make good on all of his threats and still did nothing are worse.

Seeing as how the Big Beautiful Bill just passed, here's are some websites that offer discounts on medications:

- GoodRx

- SingleCare

- Pharmacy Checker

- WellRx - this one compares prices across different pharmacies

- Cost Plus - thanks to @thedamnqueenofhell for suggesting!

-NeedyMeds - a nonprofit that helps pay for prescriptions. Thank you to @allitdoesispause for the suggestion! They also suggested checking the manufacturers website for a paitent assistance program, which can give you a coupon for free or cheaper meds.

- Scriptcycle - thank you to @teleomancer for the suggestion!

-Ask for a discount card - thank you to @cccshutdown for the reminder!

-Walmart - They have a $4 generic list! Thank you to @tristese !

- Nurx - is a Planned Parenthood alternative. You can get birth control and other medication here. Thanks to @tomhenks!

- Costco Pharmacy - which offers discounts and you don't need a membership to access. Thank you @alarmed-father!

- Walgreens RX Savings Finder - This let's you compare prices and applies discount codes from sites like GoodRx to find the most affordable option. Thank you to @maledictionwolf !

- CVS - which automatically applies discounts if you don't have insurance. Thank you, @imtrying-ok !

- MDsave - which provides lower costs for self-pay procedures. Thank you to @mustacchiofurioso who also recommended the next entry.

- Jasonlabs - for labwork.

Stay safe, everyone. Things are about to get much, much worse in the US.

EDIT: if you're worried about doctor/therapy appointments, see if there's a sliding scale clinic near you (and ask your therapist if they offer sliding scale prices)

@scribblingandscrawling recommended Open Path, a service that offers sliding scale therapy

@Ilbertas had a great suggestion to check your community and colleges for free clinics.

[maeve-on-mustafar]

And to all of those people couldn’t be bothered to vote for Harris and are now directly complicit in helping Trump retake power: please bother to do the parts of the above that would help other people survive the next four years. Please?

reminders for today:

if you or someone you know might need it in the next few years, purchase plan b. the shelf life of plan b is 4 years, and we might not be able to access it as easily as we can now in the days ahead.

if you are larger/plus size: go online and purchase ella instead of plan b. plan b is less effective if you aren’t under 160 pounds.

if you can, purchase books that project 2025 is looking to ban.

mass deportations are starting. if you see ice vehicles or agents, yell ice raid and la migra as loud as you can.

if someone asks who you voted for, keep your mouth shut. they’re fishing for traitors.

if anyone, anyone at all asks about your neighbors or their legal status in the us, you know nothing. don’t be the reason that their family is separated.

if anyone asks about your religion or lack thereof, keep it vague. this administration will look for any excuse to persecute you.

your friends are trans or queer? for the next four years they’re not. don’t expose anyone’s status as a trans or queer person to anyone else, even if you think you can trust them.

did someone you know get an abortion? no, they didn’t. they were never pregnant.

in short, don’t be a snitch, and keep to yourself these next four years. we’ll make it through this even if it seems hopeless at times.

we can survive this. we’ve survived before, and we’ll survive again.

[maeve-on-mustafar]

If anyone is interested, the top five books I would recommend to anyone wanting to get into Star Wars media for Obi-Wan and Anakin would be:

1. “Revenge of the Sith” novelization by Matthew Stover

2. “Obi-Wan and Anakin” comic five-issue miniseries by Charles Soule

3. “Brotherhood” by Mike Chen

4. “Clone Wars Gambit: Stealth” by Karen Miller

5. “Clone Wars Gambit: Siege” by Karen Miller

Can you tell me which movies, books, comics etc, should i watch/read to get into star wars? I found out about obikin though ffs and i love it!! I really want to get to know more about them

fair warning: star wars is a rabbit hole that goes far deeper than you could possibly imagine. it looks like a puddle and then you step in it and it's actually a lake and you're drowning. so watch out! that said, you're in for a treat bc there's SO MUCH material available.

all the star wars material is basically divided into tiers of credibility, with canon films at the top and legends comics at the bottom. it's best to start at tier 1, move to tier 2 when that's done, and so forth, or else you might get a slightly skewed understanding of the lore.

tier 1: the movies. there's the six core lucas movies, the prequels and the original trilogy, which are the gold standard. that's the heart of it. if you haven't seen them, that's your first task. then other movies like rogue one, the clone wars, solo, the sequels if you feel the need, can round out your understanding of the scope of the lore.

tier 2: the tv shows. there's so many of these and hundreds of hours of content to pick through that fill in gaps between movies. the clone wars is your source for so much obikin interaction. the kenobi show is essential for vaderwan. andor is just good tv, skeleton crew is coming out now and also good. rebels and bad batch are excellent too. there is the mandalorian and other sequels era stuff too.

tier 3: canon books and comics. of the film novelizations (which i still consider solid canon despite disney deciding ex post facto they are not), i highly recommend stover's revenge of the sith. it's the most important book to obikin and one of the best star wars books in general. disney has put out some good canon star wars books, (lords of the sith, padawan, ahsoka, i've heard good things about the thrawn series) and GREAT comics, especially the darth vader run, which i highly highly recommend. all marvel star wars seems to hit so if you like comics you really cannot go wrong reading through any of the 2015-onward marvel comics.

tier 4: legends books and comics my beloved, while wildly varying quality, the good is so so so good. most of the prequels books are now classed this way but were canon when the prequels came out. there is a lot of obikin in books by karen miller (wild space, clone wars gambit). i love all books by james luceno (darth plagueis, labyrinth of evil). greg bear's rogue planet is wonderful for young anakin and young master obi-wan. there's a YA series called jedi quest which has them too. an example for obikin comics is star wars: obsession, part of the larger dark horse republic run, which is good.

i just found a list i made earlier of books with obi-wan and anakin in them if you want to check that out, but star wars extends far beyond the boys if you want to explore. there's just so much good lore and entertainment out there if you look <33

[maeve-on-mustafar]

Hey, hmm, just curious, but are you the one that left those comments in Mr Forgettable for whatever reason? If not, someone copied and pasted your posts there

I absolutely did not. I’d never heard of that fic before you mentioned it in this comment, and a fic all about how much Anakin sucks and needs to beg for forgiveness from Obi-Wan and how Obi-Wan’s biological kid is inherently a better Padawan to Obi-Wan than Anakin ever was isn’t one I’m going to spend my time reading.

(Also, it’s yet another fic that pretends Obi-Wan’s sassier and more impatient remarks in AOTC just never took place, which is disappointing but not surprising.)

[maeve-on-mustafar]

I really hate how many of my fellow queers just want to draw arbitrary dividing lines between us. Like, really? We have enough politicians trying to demonize us, and you’re going to go into catty mean girl mode because you’re an Aries and I’m a Scorpio? What does it even matter?

it does still make me insane specifically how many queer people lovingly embrace astrology. I went to a poetry workshop yesterday that was genuinely quite good but also included an option to disclose astrology designations during introductions and so many people broke out some variation of "I'm a [x] sum but I have a [y] placement and it SHOWS" girl no it doesn't. that's meaningless correlation you completely invented the causation

[maeve-on-mustafar]

🥺 I just love them.

[maeve-on-mustafar]

It’s not something I ever see if fic, but I actually love the idea that Anakin is a lot better with everyday civilian children than any other Padawan his age because 1) he helped take care of younger kids when he was a slave, and 2) he recognizes the advantages and privileges Jedi children have that the average family in the Old Republic doesn’t.

Do you know how shows always have teens taking care of a babydoll as some sort of homework? Like, I don't know if americans really do that. But Imagine if the Jedi do.

So they give the padawans these baby dolls to take care of for Idk how much time and Anakin, being Anakin, just...is unfairly good at it. He names the baby doll Jinn and imagine Obi-Wan having breakfast with Anakin who's pretending to feed the baby doll thing and just...staring because it's extremely uncomfortable.

Then Obi-Wan shares a tea with Quinlan or idk, any other Jedi and he's looking over at Anakin who is in the background with a damn stroller, while Quinlan's padawan (Ayla, if I'm not mistaken?) already lost one arm of her doll and just left it there on a corner because of course a normal teenager would find this boring. And Obi-Wan is starting to get desperate because "Is this normal? Is this because he wasn't raised in the temple? Is this a Tatooine thing?"

And then the day when the assignation ends finally rolls over and Obi-Wan is relieved because finally he won't have to see more of the absolute horror that is watching a young teenager acting like a great single parent to a doll. And for the first time so far, Anakin gets the best calification ever. But THEN they tell him to retrieve the damn doll and Anakin goes all puffy like "I CAN'T JUST GIVE JINN AWAY"

And the masters are like...trying to placate this teenager who suddenly is having the weirdest reaction they have ever seen and they call Obi-Wan because how they deal with a meltdown over a doll? But Obi-Wan being Obi-Wan just says one of these attachment speeches and extends his hand to ask for the doll and Anakin is already shaking while everyone is like wtf is wrong with this kid. And Anakin just...stright up starts running, that's right, he kidnaps the doll he has been taking care of for what, a month? two months?

So you have the hilarious image of Anakin running with a doll and Obi-Wan running after him yelling at Anakin because of course they would do that.

And I don't know how or what, but then they come closer to some shaft in the temple or maybe a balcony somehow and Obi-Wan tries again to tell Anakin is just a kriffing doll, padawan, isn't alive at all! And Anakin trips and loses the grip on the doll, so the baby doll falls down the shaft.

Cue to Anakin looking in horror sending waves of loss through the force as the babydoll falls while everyone else is just...confused, utterly confused.

[maeve-on-mustafar]

How much do you want to bet that this live-action remake opts to downplay the relationship between Hiccup and his dad because this hellscape era of Marvel dialogue makes all screenwriters petrified of having having a genuine and sincere moment between characters that’s not instantly undercut by jokes?

to me the HTTYD remake is one of the more egregiously offensive of the live action remakes (alongside the lion king). you know the people who storyboarded and animated the original aren't getting any kind of residuals, and this "new" version is beat for beat, shot for shot. i don't even really think the general public believes the narrative that something being animated means it's not worthwhile until it's remade in live action, it is exclusively greedy studio execs hoping to milk every dollar out of every propped-up, mangled corpse of "IP" they own. it is insulting on so many fronts

[maeve-on-mustafar]

This is what happens when people refuse to vote. Your inaction allows Nazis to win. 🤷‍♀️

[maeve-on-mustafar]

This is so cute. 🥰

But it's our's????

[maeve-on-mustafar]

It will never not make me sad that 14yo Anakin thought Obi-Wan didn’t love him and thought he had to work hard enough to “make” Obi-Wan love him.

still here never left killing myself and so on and so forth

[maeve-on-mustafar]

Just a tip for anyone who’s struggling with their health insurance claims being denied or the medical provider trying to bill you for more money after your your health insurance already paid: always get an itemized invoice from your medical provider, and ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS file an appeal with your insurance company to get someone to take a second look, either if you think you’ve been denied incorrectly or if your doctor is trying to shake you down for more money (which sadly happens a lot).

Someone shot and killed the CEO of United Healthcare on the street in Manhattan. The company is one of the largest insurance providers in the country, one of the 10 most profitable corporations in the world, and is notable for its algorithmically-targeted denial of care, ruled illegal in three states.

[maeve-on-mustafar]

I know it’s super popular in SW fandom to clown on Anakin for ever trusting Palpatine in ROTS, and I’ll never defend it as a reasonable decision, but I think a lot of the criticisms of Anakin during this moment miss some crucial points.

The first is that when Anakin started meeting with Palpatine, he was twelve. It was with the Jedi’s full knowledge and permission. Of course, Palpatine is out to manipulate Anakin, but Anakin has no reason to think he can’t trust Palpatine. After all, the Jedi are his guardians, and they’re responsible for keeping him safe. Why wouldn’t Anakin trust Palpatine when Palpatine starts positioning himself as more sympathetic and understanding of Anakin’s differences than the rest of the Jedi? As far as Anakin knows, Palpatine is a trustworthy person who the Jedi approve of, and he has no reason to be on his guard in this situation. Which is exactly what Palpatine wants Anakin to believe, and then he has a decade to sink his claws into Anakin.

The second is by the time the Jedi are asking Anakin to spy on Palpatine, Anakin has already lost several important people in his life. The Jedi Council has already driven Ahsoka away by choosing politics over standing with her, and Shmi is dead in part because Anakin couldn’t go to her when he was having nightmares about her dying in agony every night. Now he’s having the same nightmares about Padme, who he’s not even supposed to be married to, and he’s also expected to spy on Palpatine, the dude who as far as he knows, has always been nice to him. Anakin has lost two out of the five people he loves the most because of the Jedi, and he’s at risk of losing two more. I don’t think this justifies his later actions, but I can see where he’s coming from. And so does Palpatine, and he’s able to use his knowledge of Anakin’s fears against both him and the Jedi.

Finally, I see a lot of fans acting as though Jedi were constantly warning Anakin for years that he couldn’t trust Palpatine, and Anakin ignored them. That’s not actually what happened. Mace Windu trusted Palpatine completely at the beginning of the war, so much so that he agreed with Palpatine to allow Padawans on the battlefield. At the beginning of Matthew Stover’s ROTS, it’s outright stated that multiple Jedi have come to Obi-Wan throughout the years with concerns about Anakin’s relationship with Palpatine, but Obi-Wan doesn’t take them seriously. Later, when Mace tells Obi-Wan that they need to start spying on Palpatine to monitor his accumulation of power, Obi-Wan is stunned, because he’s always seen Palpatine as their ally, and not someone to be wary of.

Blame Anakin for his bad decisions all you want. But don’t blame him for hanging out with a guy who the Jedi allowed to have access to him since he was a kid.

[maeve-on-mustafar]

Thank you so much for answering my ask!

And I think this:

“It's just important to me that Jedi like Obi-Wan cry—that they feel anger and grief and terror just as much as any other sentient creature. What they do is allow those emotions to flow through them and not blindly guide them. Yoda and Mace have compassion for Obi-Wan here, but they also expect him to separate himself from his emotions and look at the situation rationally. Obi-Wan does that, even if he has qualms and is pushing down tears. I think it's extremely compelling, not OOC.”

is a really valuable insight to who Obi-Wan is. It’s not that he’s simply “the ideal Jedi”, is that he struggles a lot with the notion of potentially damaging the relationship between himself and Anakin, who is his best friend and the person he’s closest to. It’s a struggle that’s really relatable and also underscores the tragedy of what’s to become of their friendship.

Hi! Since I know you love Stover’s ROTS novelization, I wanted to ask you what you thought about that part of the novel where Obi-Wan is holding back tears at the thought of betraying Anakin’s trust? I’ve seen some people call this passage OOC because Obi-Wan wouldn’t get so emotional when doing what was required of him as a Jedi, but I thought it was a sign of how Obi-Wan’s relationship with Anakin was so strong that it was the one thing that could come close to making him second-guess his Jedi duties. Did you have any thoughts about it?

Yeah definitely, I think canon Obi-Wan is a deeply human character, who exhibits the full range of emotions over the course of the saga, and those emotions are why he's such a compelling figure in Anakin's tragedy. We see him crying multiple times, notably during the climax of the Kenobi show, as he is especially emotionally vulnerable to Anakin. He cares so deeply about his brother-son-student-friend, and that love is trapped in circumstances beyond his control.

Obi-Wan holding back tears in this passage dramatizes how overwhelmed he is by his conflicting desires he feels to protect and defend Anakin, and to do his duty to the Order and the Republic. He's doing his best to balance everything, and it's not going particularly well. Anakin is wounded and slipping away, and Obi-Wan's actions have contributed to the circumstances that hurt him. He doesn't realize that Anakin is dangerous yet, but he does know that he's losing his trust.

I think in this moment he's not exactly second guessing his commitment to the Order, but he does tacitly reveal that he finds Anakin's extreme loyalty to be sympathetic to some degree, even admirable, a sign of his big heart and his generous, reckless dedication to the people he loves. Obi-Wan struggles to criticize it, as he's complicit in it when it comes to Anakin. It's a flaw they share, to differing degrees. Obi-Wan is mostly able to moderate it, and Anakin simply is not.

We know that Obi-Wan doesn't deliver a coup de grace either time he defeats Anakin in combat, and you can argue about whether or not it is consistent with the Jedi philosophy or an abnegation of his duty, but his love for his Padawan is never in question. He does his duty by taking the fight to the Sith, but he also cannot actively kill him when handed the opportunity on a silver platter. He's not an emotionless repressed robot, he's a man gutted by his desire to cling to a friend who betrayed him, and doing everything he can to rise above it.

It's just important to me that Jedi like Obi-Wan cry—that they feel anger and grief and terror just as much as any other sentient creature. What they do is allow those emotions to flow through them and not blindly guide them. Yoda and Mace have compassion for Obi-Wan here, but they also expect him to separate himself from his emotions and look at the situation rationally. Obi-Wan does that, even if he has qualms and is pushing down tears. I think it's extremely compelling, not OOC.

[maeve-on-mustafar]

Somehow, it’s always ancient POC who are somehow incapable of accomplishing anything without “alien” intervention. But I wonder why that is? 🤔