#(he needs to feel like hes fighting for a cause and that hes being righteous in his anger to not break down and think about what hes lost)

[blushouyo]

thinking very hard about the ending of tfone and megatron's reasoning behind the things he says and does... at first i couldn't reconcile with the way he spits out the word prime when referring to optimus bc ???? the primes were never the problem... it was sentinel ?? but then i realised that other than it being bc sentinel tainted the idea for him somewhat. it's also probably bc he's deliberately separating orion from optimus for his own sake... deciding that his best friend really did die when he dropped him as the other option is too difficult for him to even think about acknowledging in his current mental state... 🥲

[letters-to-rosie]

random Ekko thoughts

so I'm trying to get a little fic writing in, and I was thinking of some timebomb takes I've seen recently. I realized that a lot of opinions people have on their relationship and how it's depicted center around Jinx, and I was wondering what care people give towards writing Ekko, so here are some things I like to include when writing him:

perfectionist. Ekko, at least in League canon, goes back and forth over and over to craft a perfect moment. I think he'd be observant, detail-oriented, probably a little neurotic, definitely the type to replay an awkward interaction over and over in his head in the shower or before falling asleep

emotionally guarded. first, I gotta say I don't think Ekko would want to be this way. but he's been through so much he finds it useful to have walls up. it's not like all the toughness is a defense mechanism—he fights for what he believes in and is clearly very brave (who else makes hoverboards ffs). he does miss, though, the times and people that allowed him to be more vulnerable, and he treasures it when he has it. his childhood ended way too soon

chronic overthinker. this goes back to the perfectionism, but I think he'd constantly be questioning everything. he's good on his feet, but he likes to have a plan, and he'd tends to think about those for a long time

charismatic as hell. this one I think is proven by the show, lol. Ekko seems very personable, likes to haggle (at least as a kid), and is liked enough to lead a resistance movement. I think he'd make good speeches and be good at convincing people. this would, of course, cause drama with Jinx, because he'd be like "all these people believe in me and my former best friend doesn't," ow

drama. I like to give him a pretty dramatic inner monologue, lol. I also like to think he's self-aware enough to realize he's being dramatic in the moment and to then continue the drama anyway

enjoyer of thrills. hoverboard. need I say more?

childish and playful side. didn't get to have a full childhood and cherishes getting to let that side out. cue fluff

fidgeter. it preceded the tinkering

player of mind games. this is mostly based on how he treats Caitlyn and Vi after kidnapping them, putting them through what essentially amounts to tests (for, imo, understandable reasons). he also goads Jinx into a game he knows he'll be able to win. I think he'd apply this thinking to other scenarios, be they big or small

too-big sense of responsibility. would feed into the drama for sure. he feels the weight of his community on his shoulders, and because he wants things to go well, and because they're counting on him, he takes on a lot that he maybe should not

self-righteous. he strikes me as filled with righteous anger. he's right, most of the time. on the occasion he isn't, this causes problems

proud. wouldn't be a real issue in most situations, but it's there

irreverent. he flips off cops as a kid. we love him for this

smart. this is obvious, but sometimes can be forgotten in the fandom. I'd see Ekko as book-smart and having street-smarts (or at least a lot more than Jayce, but that's a low bar). I think his verbal skills would also be a bit more polished than some of the other science-inclined characters (cough cough Jinx). I think it's also notable that among the others (Jayce, Viktor, Heimerdinger, Jinx), Ekko is the main science character who has no access to proper schooling at any point. sure, he has his job with Benzo, but it's unclear how much that would have taught him. Silco probably got at least books for Jinx, and the others had real teachers. there's an element of resourcefulness in Ekko's smarts which is laudable, imo

very dorky. we love a man with range. I feel like he would be able to operate on multiple levels, one in which he's this cool charismatic leader and another when you get to know him better, who makes science puns and has a lot of insecurities, which naturally leave him replaying awkward conversations in the shower. layers!

idealistic. you have to give people what they need to live

heart of gold. one thing that always strikes me is that Ekko is really the only member of the main cast concerned enough with the plight of the average person in Zaun to make it his whole business. he's tending to the crisis in a way that is simultaneously very grounded and (again) idealistic, where substance use recovery is very much needed in the setting but he's also (perhaps in contrast to Vander) throwing himself into battles that are unsustainable because he believes in his cause, even if the persecution is so bad he has to hide over it

disaster bi (this one is for me)

Ekko's a really layered and interesting character. I wanted to bring up some things I think about when writing him because of posts I've seen recently about him being reduced to "Jinx's boyfriend" (due to anti-black racism, of course) and posts just kinda about timebomb in general? I think because it's been canon that Ekko has a crush of Jinx for so long, it's easy to take that for granted and not give much thought to his side of the ship. we also spend a lot more time in Jinx's head than his in the show, even though the brief moment we do spend in his head introduces a whole new art style and the best song on the soundtrack (fight me)

obviously, I'm a shameless Ekko and Firelights stan. he's my favorite character in Arcane and one of my favorites in anything ever, so it was fun to flesh out my headcanons, things I think are extrapolatable from canon, and just some of the traits that go into writing him. if people have others (or just traits and things they think are interesting) I'd love to hear them! I love my brilliant and contradictory boy!

[bunji-enthusiast]

Bunji I was wondering if you’ve seen Rise of the Guardians

And was hoping you could make reader like North/Santa or Bunny or even Tooth or Pitch I think they would be fun to write and read

(I feel like Sandman would be like Groot and I font want you to make doubles and I feel like Jack would be super easy to write and he’s everyone’s favorite but I wouldn’t mind if you decide to write either of them)

𝐀𝐧𝐨𝐧𝐲����𝐨𝐮𝐬 𝐖𝐚𝐭𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐫

Bunnymund!reader

Summary || Somewhere between dimensions—where Spring kisses the void and reality feels like soft soil underfoot. The air is heavy with residual magic and fractured molecules, the kind of place that shouldn’t exist…but does, because you do.

Note // funny you say this, cause I already had something in the works for Bunnymund!Reader for this thing! I love, love this movie with my heart. Definitely a timeless piece ❤️

You don’t remember falling. But you remember landing.

Sharp. Sudden. Like your name was ripped from the wind and tossed into this world without a warning.

The crater you made is still steaming when she floats down.

Atom Eve. All will and pink light. Her hair rides the breeze like a flame not quite ready to burn out. She's cautious, her hands flickering with latent transmutation energy. Not a villain, not a victim—but unsure if you're either.

You flick your ear. Dust yourself off. Aster Bunnymund doesn’t do ‘damsel’ and certainly doesn’t do ‘defenseless.’

“Alright,” you say, stepping forward, claws flexed just a little, your boomerangs humming low on your back. “Which galactic gremlin decided it'd be real cute to hijack the Easter Bunny mid-delivery route?”

Eve cocks a brow. “You talk. That’s new.”

You smirk. “So do you. Should I clap?”

“Are you… a kangaroo?”

The air stills.

You tap your foot twice. A flash of light, and a tunnel opens behind you, lined in wildflowers and softly glowing eggs. You don’t go through. Not yet. But you let her see.

“You bite your tongue, sheila,” you mutter, crossing your arms. “I’m a Pooka. Guardian of Hope. Bringer of Spring. The original chocolate alchemist. And definitely not your average marsupial.”

Her eyes flick to the ground, registering the blooms sprouting beneath your feet—life, actualized by magic and intent.

Then back to your eyes. “Right. Definitely not average.”

You sense her hesitation. Not fear. Curiosity, laced with that righteous concern heroes carry like second skin.

“Look,” she starts, her voice gentler now, “I thought you were a threat. Some kind of illusion—this place messes with matter. You fell through a quantum rip that shouldn’t even be here. Which… doesn’t explain the sentient eggs.”

“Oi. Barry and the boys are sensitive. Don’t call ‘em eggs.”

The sentient eggs in question hop into formation behind you, saluting Eve with wobbly pride.

She tries not to laugh. Fails. “Okay. That’s… kinda adorable.”

You roll your eyes.

“Fine,” you sigh, finally relaxing. “Not here to fight. Was delivering some Hope to a struggling planet—next thing I know, boom. Spliced sideways through a transdimensional chocolate storm and now I'm talking to a bio-alchemist in a pink cape who nearly atomized me on arrival.”

She floats down fully now, feet touching the ground with a quiet crunch of flower petals.

“Sorry,” she says, sincere. “I don’t usually go full defense mode unless I’m—”

“Stressed?”

She blinks. “Yeah. How’d you know?”

You tilt your head. “You glow differently when you’re carrying too much. Hope’s a tricky thing. Harder to hold when it’s not your own.”

There’s a pause. A silence. One of those rare, golden ones.

Then she says, “How’d I get so lucky?”

You shrug, flashing a half-smile. “Maybe the universe thinks you needed a reminder. Or maybe…” You gesture at the blooming life between you. “Maybe Hope shows up where it’s most at risk of being lost.”

She doesn’t answer. Not with words.

But she nods, slow and soft, and for a second, you both just stand there—two beings carved by magic and trauma and too many choices, meeting not as enemies, not even as allies. Just as beings who get it.

You tap your foot once. A tunnel flares open.

“Take care, Atom Eve,” you say, stepping toward the glow. “And if you ever need a bit of Hope again…” You wink. “Just look for the chocolate.”

And with that, the Guardian of Hope vanishes into the soil.

Spring lingers in your wake.

Somewhere on the outskirts of a war-torn city, where spring never had the chance to bloom. The sky is smeared with ash and steel-gray clouds. Blasted concrete and shattered windows sprawl like broken bones. Inside a crumbling clinic, laughter echoes—soft, weak, and impossibly brave.

They’re just kids. Orphaned. Sick. A few too young to understand what war means. But they believe in you.

And that’s more powerful than any weapon.

And, you’re bleeding.

Not badly—but enough. A slash across the arm from one of those shadow-stitched mercs, the kind of thing that smells like sulfur and broken dreams. Hired muscle. Or worse—Fearlings in disguise.

But you don’t move. You crouch low in front of the children, boomerangs already humming, glowing faintly in your palms.

They cower behind you. A girl tugs on your fur. “Bunny?”

“Shh. Gotcha, darl’, don’t worry.”

You flick your wrist.

A bladed boomerang arcs into the night, cracking into one of the creeping figures slinking across the rooftop. It falls in a burst of ash and bone.

The others don’t run. They laugh.

Too many. Even for you.

But you're the Guardian of Hope, dammit. You don’t run either.

You push the kids back toward the cracked stairwell, the one you reinforced with roots and a bit of stubborn magic. Not much time. Not much strength left.

And then—A ripple in the air. A pink shimmer. A shift.

And suddenly they’re gone.

Not the kids—the shadows.

They implode, flash-fried into bursts of energy and torn atoms. You blink, senses whirling.

And there she is.

Atom Eve.

Hovering in the ash, surrounded by a corona of light and fury.

Eyes glowing, palms still hot from the transmutation. Hair snapping behind her like a banner of war.

“You again,” you mutter, straightening with a wince. “Told you to look for chocolate, not carnage.”

She lands next to you, quick scan of the kids huddled behind your barrier. Her eyes soften. Then harden again as more figures crawl from the smoke.

“Guess I was looking for both.”

One of the mercs lunges. You step into it, elbow crackling against its ribs, and spin a kick that launches it back toward a waiting construct of hers—an energy spike that spears it midair.

“Nice form,” she murmurs.

“Yours ain’t bad either.”

Then: a pause.

“They’re sick,” you say suddenly, voice low as the ground shakes beneath another blast. “Some of ‘em don’t have much time. But they believe. They still believe.”

“I saw.” Her jaw clenches. “That’s why I’m here.”

You fight side by side. Like it’s instinct. Like you’ve done it a hundred times before.

Boomerangs whip through shadow.

Constructs burn holes in the dark.

You summon roots from below—twisting vines of life that bind and break the enemy—and she builds shields around the children, hexagons of raw will and pink brilliance.

The battle burns hot, fast, and then—

Still.

Just rubble. Breathing. And the tiny sound of coughing behind you. You crouch by the kids again. One hands you a melted egg, soft and slightly lumpy.

“You dropped this,” he says.

You smile—tired, cracked, but real.

“Thanks, mate.”

Eve walks over, sits beside you in the dust.

“You always do this?” she asks, watching the children settle back down, laughing despite the ruins.

“Only on Tuesdays,” you grunt. “And maybe when the world’s got the nerve to forget what Hope looks like.”

She doesn’t speak for a while.

Then, soft: “You shouldn’t have had to do it alone.”

You glance over.

‘Neither should you.’ You think. You nudge the egg toward her. “Go on. Eat it. Might turn you into a rabbit.”

She laughs, actually laughs, and takes a bite.

“You’re insane,” she says.

“Probably,” you reply. “But Hope usually is.”

The wind is calmer now. The smoke from the fight drifts upward in lazy curls, not frantic anymore—just memory. Shadows retreat into their holes when the light’s too strong, and right now, there's nothing brighter than the kids’ laughter.

You sit on a broken chunk of concrete, one leg stretched out, the other bent, arm resting casually over your knee like you didn’t just take down half a strike team with glowing boomerangs and sheer obstinance.

The smallest of the kids—Lani, maybe six—climbs into your lap without asking. You don’t flinch. Don’t pull away.

You just smile, slow and fond, like this is the part you actually came for.

“Bunny,” she says, whispering like she thinks it’s a secret. “When I grow up, can I be magic too?”

You chuckle, adjusting your arm so she’s more comfortable.

“‘Course you can,” you say. “Already are. You laughed during a war. That’s top-tier sorcery.”

She giggles, muffling it in your fur.

Eve watches from a few feet away, leaning on the edge of the clinic wall. She doesn’t try to interrupt. She just watches, her arms folded, but not in that defensive way—not anymore.

There's a softness in her face that wasn't there when you first met. It’s cautious. Thoughtful. A little sad.

You look over and catch her eye.

“Something on your mind, love?” you ask, voice low but not unkind.

Eve hesitates, then walks over slowly. She crouches near the kids, but keeps a respectful distance, like she doesn’t want to disrupt the magic.

“How do you do it?” she asks, barely above a whisper. “They’re hurting. The world’s burning down around them, and still... they laugh. You make them laugh.”

You shrug a little. “Hope ain’t a shield, Eve. Not really. It’s… a seed. A fragile little thing you plant in the worst dirt, with barely any light. You don’t tell it what to be. You just give it a chance.”

She lets that sit for a beat. Her eyes flick to Lani, then the others playing with your eggshell constructs, turning them into crowns and pretend swords.

“I’ve tried to fix things,” she says. “Big things. Buildings. Systems. Families. I can rewrite molecules but not… not what people carry in them. Not always.”

You tap your claw against your chest, just once.

“’Cause you’re trying to heal cracks by covering ‘em in steel. Doesn’t work. Not when what people need is to remember why it’s worth fixing in the first place.”

Eve looks at you. Really looks.

And something clicks behind her eyes.

Not a solution. Just… space. Space for something new to grow. Lani suddenly looks up at her.

“You’re the pink spark lady, right?”

Eve blinks. “Uh… yeah. That’s me.”

“You were really cool,” the kid says. “You made the bad guy pop like a balloon!”

Eve smiles, surprised at herself. “Thanks. I was kinda hoping no one noticed how shaky my hands were.”

“I did,” says a boy behind her, grinning through missing teeth. “You were shaking, but you didn’t stop.”

Eve exhales slowly. That means more than she expected.

You give her a small nod.

“See? Told you. Magic.”

She looks at you again, not with awe—but with something gentler.

Respect. Maybe even belief.

“...You know,” she says, “I think I get it now.”

You grin.

“No you don’t.”

She frowns. “Excuse me?”

“You don’t get it,” you repeat, standing slowly as Lani slides off your lap. “Not yet. You’re startin’ to. But the real secret is you never fully get it. You just keep showing up.”

A beat. Then you add, “You gonna keep showing up?”

Eve looks down at her hands. Then at the kids. Then back to you.

“Yeah,” she says. “I think I am.”

The kids are asleep now. Safe. Tucked under makeshift blankets, heads resting on one another, small chests rising and falling. Eve stands by the doorway, arms folded, eyes scanning the distant skyline. And you—well, you’re still seated, sharpening the edge of a boomerang that doesn’t really need sharpening. Just something to do with your hands.

That’s when the hum starts.

Low. Unnatural.

A moment later, a distortion peels into the air with a flicker of blue light. A thin ripple opens like a tear in fabric—and a man steps through.

Long coat. Balding head. A wicked scar running down his jaw. Cool green light from a teleportation badge still flickering on his collar.

Cecil Stedman.

Your ears twitch.

You feel the shift in the air before he speaks. Not malice. Not even threat. Just calculation. Cold as steel.

“You're taller in person,” Cecil says, looking right at you.

You stay seated, brushing a few egg fragments from your lap. “And you're more wrinkled than the rumors.”

He doesn’t laugh. But the corner of his mouth moves, like it almost happened.

Eve turns slightly, but doesn’t speak yet. Just watches. Like she’s weighing something.

Cecil’s eyes scan the scene. The kids. The cracked earth. The torn-open shadows that haven’t quite dissolved.

“I saw the fight,” he says. “Drone footage. Satellite pings. You held your own.”

“Did more than that,” you mutter. “These little ones are still breathin’, aren’t they?”

Cecil nods once. Slowly. Like he’s filing away the confirmation in a long ledger of debts and dangerous favors.

“Hope,” he says after a beat. “That’s what you’re about, right?”

You glance at him. “That a problem?”

“No. It’s inefficient. Messy. Wildly unpredictable.” He pauses. “But it works. Sometimes.”

There’s a longer silence. Eve shifts, finally stepping in.

“What do you want, Cecil?”

He looks at her. Not surprised. Not threatened either. But there's a flicker of... awareness. A different kind of calculation now.

“You,” he says plainly. “And him.”

You snort. “What, the GDA looking to hire a rabbit now?”

“I’m looking for results. You got them.” He steps forward, one boot crushing an empty eggshell. “I’ve got too many variables on the board, and not enough people who know how to work outside the rules without setting the board on fire.”

Eve folds her arms tighter. “You want us to work with you?”

“No. I want you to work near me,” Cecil says. “I know better than to try and leash a wildfire. But I also know you’ve both seen what’s coming. You feel it, even if you can’t name it yet.”

You look up slowly.

“…Pitch,” you murmur. “Or somethin’ worse. Somethin’ whisperin’ to the broken pieces of this world.”

Cecil doesn’t blink. “I don’t care if it’s called Pitch or the goddamn Boogeyman. If it threatens Earth, it goes in the ground.”

The air’s quiet again. Except for the soft breathing of the kids. You flick your boomerang into its holster with a clean snap.

“You don’t believe in what I do,” you say. “But you’re not stupid enough to ignore it.”

Cecil’s voice is low. “I don’t believe in magic eggs. Or flower-covered boomerangs. But I believe in results. You saved these kids. That earns respect. And maybe… a line I can call when the sky starts cracking.”

Eve glances at you.

You meet her eyes.

There’s no need to speak.

You just stand. Tall. Dust-covered. Ears twitching in the wind.

Then: “We’re not soldiers.”

Cecil nods. “Good. I’ve got too many of those already.”

He turns, raising his badge. Light flickers. But before he disappears, he looks back once.

“I’ll be in touch.”

Then he's gone. Just the wind again.

Eve exhales. “He’s the kind of guy who puts a knife in your hand and tells you it’s for the greater good.”

You nod. “Aye. But if the blade’s comin’ either way… might as well decide where to aim it.”

Eve chuckles dryly. “And here I thought I was the jaded one.”

You grin. “I’m ancient, love. Comes with the ears.”

The world is quiet here. Not because it’s peaceful—but because it’s trying to be. The kind of quiet that grows in between the cracks of heartbreak and healing.

You hadn’t planned to stop.

You were passing through—tunnel to tunnel, root to root, delivering hand-painted eggs and tiny woven charms of spring to a few kids at the hospital down the block. You were meant to disappear again. Back into the warren. No attachments.

But something held you here. A tug.

Hope sometimes plants itself in strange soil.

She’s kneeling in the garden bed, sleeves rolled up, dirt under her nails, hair tied in a lazy bun. The green shirt she wears looks lived-in—creases from cradling a baby, wrinkles from sighing too hard, maybe. There's a tiny little shovel in one hand and a ceramic rabbit figurine tucked between a patch of marigolds.

Your nose twitches.

“Symbolic, or just seasonal?” you ask from the fence.

She startles, turns—but doesn’t flinch. That’s rare. Most people do.

Her eyes lock onto yours with practiced wariness. The kind you only learn after losing something you thought was real.

Debbie Grayson.

You recognize her from the files North once handed you. And from the grief that trails behind her like a whisper in the breeze.

She squints at you, shading her eyes. “You’re not exactly hiding. Big, fluffy, and wearing what looks like boomerang holsters.”

You smirk. “Only the finest Outback leather.”

She stands, brushing her palms on her jeans. “So, what are you? Magic rabbit? Alien? Fever dream?”

“All three, if the day’s long enough.”

There’s a beat. Then, surprisingly, she laughs. A quiet, tired sound, but real.

You hop over the fence without a word, landing soft on the mulch beside her. “You’re Debbie.”

She nods. “And you’re real, apparently.”

“Name’s Bunnymund. E. Aster, if you’re formal.”

Her brow lifts. “Like the Easter Bunny?”

“Guardian of Hope,” you say with a half-bow and a twirl of one ear. “Not just eggs and chocolates. Though I do pride myself on presentation.”

Debbie leans back against the edge of a raised bed. There’s something sharper in her gaze now, like she’s connecting dots.

“You’re not here for Mark.”

“Nope.”

“Not for Cecil?”

You shake your head. “Never been fond of secret labs and grim philosophies. Man smells like old smoke and newer regret.”

That gets a full laugh from her, this time. She covers her mouth.

You take a seat beside a tomato plant, careful not to crush the stems. “I stopped by to see some kids. One of them said her mom used to tell her spring comes early if you smile hard enough. That sounded like magic to me.”

Debbie’s smile fades slightly. “That sounds like something I’d say to Mark. When he was little.”

You glance at her sideways. “You’re still sayin’ things like that. Just takes longer for the echoes to come back.”

There’s quiet between you. The kind that doesn't need to be filled.

She watches the breeze flutter through the wind chimes hanging by a wooden post. “Do you ever get used to it?”

“Losing someone you thought was unshakable?” you ask, ears low.

She nods.

“No,” you say gently. “But you get stronger around the shape of the hole.”

Debbie looks down at her hands. “I thought I married a good man. A hero. Turns out he was just… playing the part.”

“He was loved,” you say. “That part was real. Even if he didn't deserve it the way you hoped.”

She doesn’t answer. Just presses her fingers into the soil.

You reach into your satchel and pull out a small wooden egg. Painted in delicate brushstrokes—flowers, vines, tiny stars. You offer it to her.

“What’s this?” she asks.

“Hope. Takes different forms. Sometimes it’s a promise. Sometimes it’s just... the courage to keep showing up.”

She takes it slowly, like it might disappear if she touches it wrong.

“You’re stronger than he ever was,” you say softly. Debbie looks at you as you stand.

“I’ll be around,” you add. “If you ever need help. Or someone who still believes in good men. Even if they’re hard to find.”

You tap your foot once. A shimmer of light, and a tunnel begins to open beneath you.

She steps forward, voice quiet but steady. “Thank you.”

You pause just before disappearing.

“You keep planting,” you say. “I’ll keep watch.”

And then—gone.

Just wind, earth, and the quiet sound of chimes in a garden where grief and growth now share roots.

Chicago sleeps fitfully below, the sky strung up with restless stars. Streetlights flicker like uncertain thoughts. Somewhere between yesterday’s grief and tomorrow’s storm, you return.

You step out of the tunnel not with a bang, but with the soft whisper of dew on grass. The roof creaks beneath your weight—not built for seven-foot Pookas, but holding firm like everything else in Debbie’s life lately.

She’s already up here.

Wrapped in a coat two sizes too big—probably Nolan’s. There’s a glass of something amber by her side, untouched.

She doesn’t look surprised when she sees you.

“I was hoping you’d come back,” she says. Not like someone asking for a miracle—more like someone who knew the wind would shift eventually.

You tilt your head. “Rooftop stargazing. Classic grief move.”

She lets out a breath that’s halfway to a chuckle. “You’re not wrong.”

You sit beside her. Careful not to crack a tile. “It’s quieter up here. Easier to pretend the world makes sense when it’s small beneath your feet.”

Debbie leans forward, eyes tracing the skyline. “Mark’s gone. Off-world with Eve. I told him it was the right call, but—”

Her voice breaks, just for a second. “God, he’s still just a kid. My kid.”

You say nothing. Just let the moment be.

Debbie reaches for the glass. Holds it. Doesn’t drink.

“They left yesterday,” she says. “The GDA gave me the usual: ‘classified mission, planetary risk, he'll be fine.’ But I saw Cecil’s eyes. No one is ever just ‘fine’ when he’s involved.”

She turns to look at you now. Direct. Unblinking.

“I don’t need a bedtime story. I need to know if there’s anything you can do. You’re not from here. You’ve probably seen things we haven’t even dreamed of.”

You lean forward, arms resting on your knees. “I don’t work for Cecil. I don’t track missions. I don’t answer to flags or labs or secret satellites.” Then softer, “But I listen.”

Debbie exhales slowly. “And what do you hear?”

You close your eyes.

A hundred whispers ripple through the air—joy, dread, faith, pain. But one stands out: a flickering thread of hope that bends but doesn’t break.

“Your son’s still burning bright,” you say. “He’s scared. Determined. Holding the line.”

Her lips tighten. “So I just wait?”

“No,” you say. “You hold. You stay strong so he has something to come home to.”

There’s a long pause.

“I don’t feel strong,” she admits.

You reach into your satchel and hand her something—a pendant made of twined silvergrass, woven with delicate threads of moonlight.

“What’s this?” she asks, fingers tracing its soft spiral.

“Anchored hope,” you say. “You wear it when you’re scared, or angry, or tired of being the one who holds everyone else together. It won’t fix the pain, but... it reminds you why you endure it.”

Debbie closes her hand around it.

“Will it help?” she asks quietly.

You look at her—not the sadness, not the strength—but her, the full weight of all she’s endured and still choosing to stay kind.

“It already is,” you answer.

Silence settles in again, not awkward this time—just shared.

Then she says, “You’re not what I expected.”

You grin. “Few of us are.”

You stand to leave, but before you vanish into the earth again, she speaks once more.

“Come by again,” she says. “Even if it’s just for tea.”

You give a half-bow, one paw to your chest. “You got it, Debbie Grayson. And if tea turns into smashing the occasional lab or decking a morally grey GDA director—well, I’m flexible.”

She actually laughs, you disappear beneath the stars.

And above, a mother wraps her coat tighter, pendant in her hand, eyes on the sky—not waiting anymore, but holding.

Holding fast.

Within the week, Mark and Eve are back. Battered. Changed. Alive. Chicago breathes a little easier tonight, but the air still hums like a string pulled too tight. You feel it the moment you step through the tunnel into her backyard — the tension hasn’t left, it’s just wearing a different face.

You don’t knock. You never need to. The ground splits gently beneath your feet, and you step out beside the flowerbeds Debbie had finally gotten around to replanting. Poppies. You remember — she told you they were her mother’s favorite.

The back door creaks open before you can move.

Debbie leans on the frame, mug in her hand, tired warmth in her eyes.

“I figured I’d see you again,” she says, brushing a loose strand of hair behind her ear. “Come on in, unless you’ve got some mystical rule about doorways.”

You grin. “Only when dealing with vampires and bureaucrats.”

She actually laughs. That’s new. And healing.

You duck under the frame, careful not to knock anything over, and follow her to the kitchen. There’s a kettle warming. The scent of ginger and chamomile floats through the room.

“They’re upstairs,” she says, before you can ask. “Mark’s asleep. Eve’s pretending she doesn’t need rest. She’ll crash in an hour.”

She sets a second mug in front of you. “Thought you might want something warm.”

You tilt your head. “You brew tea for interstellar rabbits often?”

She smirks. “Only the ones who leave hope charms on my roof.”

You take a sip. “I hear those are limited edition.”

Silence laps at the edge of the moment. Comfortable now. Familiar.

Then, Debbie speaks again — softer.

“You were right, you know. About holding fast.”

You glance at her. She’s not looking at you, just watching the steam rise from her cup.

“I didn’t know how I’d do it. Not after Nolan. Not after everything he said to Mark. But then Mark came home, and he looked at me like... like he still needed me to be his anchor. Not just his mom. But his safe place.”

She looks up, eyes glistening—not with tears this time, but with something brighter. “So I held. And he came back. And I didn’t fall apart.”

You reach into your satchel, pull out a single egg. Painted in soft blues and greens, with a blooming tree etched across the shell in gold leaf. You slide it toward her.

“Spring’s not just a season. It’s a promise,” you say. “That even after the harshest winter, things can grow again.”

Debbie touches the egg gently, reverently. “Thank you, Bunny.”

You lean back in the chair, resting one foot over the other.

“You’re welcome, Debbie Grayson.”

She finishes her tea in silence, and you sit there together a while longer. No world-ending crises. No gods or monsters. Just two people — one human, one Pooka — breathing the same quiet air and watching the future grow roots beneath them.

The sun barely stretches through the windows, painting the walls in soft golds and peach-colored light. Somewhere upstairs, a floorboard creaks. Quiet footfalls. Slower than usual — sore, likely — but familiar all the same.

You're still seated at the kitchen table. Debbie’s already left, humming something to herself as she busied with breakfast. She hasn’t said much, just the occasional look, like she was still trying to believe things were calm enough for a morning this normal.

You feel him before you hear him.

Mark.

He’s moving carefully, like he’s not sure if his body’s ready to be up again. A low groan escapes as he comes into the kitchen, one hand rubbing at his shoulder.

His eyes land on you. He blinks, and again.

“...You’re still here?”

You offer a crooked grin, ears flicking in mock offense. “Hey, I brew a mean cup of chamomile.”

Mark’s face twitches — he’s trying not to smile. He fails.

He pulls a chair, sits slowly. Winces a little.

“I figured you’d disappear like you always do after everything cools down.”

“I was going to,” you say, resting your paws on the table. “But then I remembered someone owes me a rematch in bowling.”

Mark chuckles — hoarse, tired, but real. “You still cheated. You can’t hover the ball all the way to the pins.”

“Not my fault you never specified Earth rules.”

Silence settles for a moment. Not heavy, not awkward — just the kind that comes when you’ve both been to war and made it home.

Then Mark speaks, voice softer.

“Thanks for showing up.”

You look at him. Really look.

There’s still blood dried along the hem of his sleeve. Bruises darken under his eyes. But it’s his expression that catches you — worn, but clearer than it’s been in months. Like something inside finally stopped spiraling.

“Any time,” you say. “Especially if kids are involved. You did good, Mark.”

He glances down, jaw working.

“I didn’t feel like it. I got so—” His hands curl into fists. “I wanted to kill them. I almost did. I don’t think I even cared if I made it out.”

You lean forward.

“But you did. And you didn’t lose yourself. That’s what matters.”

He meets your eyes, searching for something in them. Something that says he isn’t alone in that kind of rage.

“What if it happens again?” he asks, quieter now. “What if I stop holding back?”

You tilt your head. “Then you lean on the people who remind you who you are.”

A beat.

“That includes me, by the way.”

Mark exhales, a slow smile forming. “Thanks, Bunny.”

You shrug, pawing a bit of toast from the tray. “Besides, I’m technically your emotional support cryptid at this point. Comes with the cape.”

Footsteps again. Eve.

She enters in a too-big sweatshirt and messy hair, still pretending not to be sore.

“Of course you’re still here,” she mutters, but there’s no venom in it. Just affection.

Mark glances between you both. “We’re doing pancakes or what?”

You grin.

“Only if I get the first one.”

Eve plops down beside Mark, elbow nudging his ribs — gently, though he still flinches with a groan. You smirk into your mug.

“Tough guy,” she teases.

“Don’t start,” Mark groans. “I’m lucky I’m not still in traction.”

“You’d heal in like… ten minutes.”

“Not the point, Eve.”

Before either of them can escalate into their usual back-and-forth, Debbie reappears from the hall, balancing a large plate of pancakes like it’s an Olympic sport. She’s already smiling when she sees the three of you sitting there — her expression softens in a way that feels... earned.

“Good,” she says. “You’re all here.”

She sets the plate in the middle of the table, and somehow it’s exactly the kind of pancakes that tell you you’re safe: golden, fluffy, warm. A few have smiley faces burned into them — probably for Oliver, but you nudge one onto your plate like you’re claiming treasure.

“Maple?” you ask innocently, peering up at her.

Debbie rolls her eyes, grabbing the syrup bottle and tossing it to you. “You’re lucky I like you.”

Eve reaches over to snatch one of the smiley pancakes before you can. “I saw that first.”

“You cheated, I sniffed it out.”

“You don’t even have a nose under all that fur!”

You both pause.

Mark points a fork at you. “Wait. Do you? Actually? Because I’ve been wondering—”

Debbie slaps a hand on the table, firm. “No anatomy talk at breakfast.”

Everyone freezes. Then laughs.

It’s… light. The kind of laughter that doesn’t come from jokes, but from relief. From being here. From being alive.

Mark tucks into his pancakes with a quiet hum, chewing slower than usual — thoughtful.

“You know,” he says, glancing around the table, “I can’t remember the last time it felt like this.”

“Like what?” Eve asks, leaning her head on her hand.

“Normal,” he says. “Not perfect, but… normal.”

You don’t say anything — you just nod.

Debbie stands behind him, running a hand through his hair without saying a word. The gesture makes him still. Then, almost shyly, he leans into it.

Eve watches him. Then glances at you. “Thanks for not vanishing this time,” she says.

You grin between bites. “Can’t vanish on an empty stomach.”

Debbie moves back to the stove, and as she does, she speaks without turning.

“You’re welcome here,” she says. “As long as you need.”

You pause mid-chew.

It’s quiet again — but this time it’s that same warmth from earlier. The kind you can sit in for a long time and not want to leave.

Mark catches your gaze.

And you know, in that moment, he believes it too.

[kissesandarsenic]

Day 23 - Age Gap

Picturing a priest in his early-forties being corrupted by a woman fifteen years his junior. 

She’d be the niece of a devout follower. She’s just moved to this small town, kicked out of home for running amok and causing chaos. Her uncle pleads with the priest to talk to her. To lead her back down a righteous path. She was such a good girl once upon a time. Surely the priest can help her back into the Lord’s loving embrace?

So he visits her and she’s not unlike people he’s met before. Disdainful. Rude. Snarky. 

Alluring.

It starts with coy glances and chaste touches. Graduates to teasing comments, shorter skirts and the press of her leg against his. Her warmth is like nothing he’s ever known. He’s been so good all his life. Never gave in to temptation. He kept his head down, kept himself pure, and focused on what was right and holy. His divine purpose. 

But she pulls these… desires out of him. He is weak in her presence. He can’t fight back when she leans in and presses her lips to his. Carved from sin but she feels like heaven. She stirs up all these base wants and turns them into needs until he feels like a teenager again.

The same age he was when she was born. God, how far he has fallen. 

He spends his mornings praying for the strength to tell her no, to save them both. He begs on his knees for the Lord’s forgiveness and then lowers himself once again in a confessional booth to worship between her legs hours later. 

Guilt chews at him. Eats him alive whenever they’re apart. But her soft hands possess a healing balm that soothes him in ways prayer and verses could never hope to accomplish.

He is Hers.

Completely and utterly and devoutly. 

Loretta and Salt's Kinktober Masterlist

[yanderes-galore]

Will you be willing to write a yandere concept for geto suguru from jjk with a sorcerer reader? I can't see him with a non-sorcerer reader.

Sure. He could technically be with either, but the dynamic is WAY different.

Yandere! Suguru Geto with Sorcerer! Darling

Pairing: Romantic/Platonic

Possible Trigger Warnings: Gender-Neutral Darling, Obsession, Manipulation, Violence, Genocidal views, Condescending behavior, Blood, Murder, Attempted brainwashing, Kidnapping, Psychological warfare, Degrading behavior, Possessive behavior, Forced companionship/relationship.

Compared to regular humans, Geto is very polite and caring towards his fellow Sorcerers and Curse Users.

Safe to say that his obsession being a Sorcerer or Curse User is the most common obsession he'd have once he's a Curse User.

Even more so if you're someone he knew before defecting.

You don't necessarily have to believe in his cause, he could care less as long as he has you.

Geto would feel you both are the superior race compared to normal humans.

He'd probably view you as family in some way like he does his commanders.

I will say this though, Geto is really fake.

Manipulation and fake personas are something he uses to get others to trust him often.

He knows the values of Jujutsu Sorcerers.

You like to protect the weak, which is the reason he prefers Curse Users.

You have such naive views in his eyes.

He's tossed away such views years ago.

Poor you... trying to get in his way like the rest of the Sorcerers?

I imagine Geto has some respect for you but believes your allegiance is misplaced.

This may also work better if he knew you along with Gojo.

Maybe you three were friends up until the Star Plasma Vessel incident.

You no doubt sensed Geto's change in demeanor but he always hid it from you.

He cared for you in his own way, just like he did with Gojo.

But you were too oblivious to the truth in his eyes...

Don't you know the world would be better off if Curses didn't exist and people could live life without them?

If Geto told you of such a thought, you might even agree with him.

Until he started committing massacres.

To see your friend go down such a path is... tragic.

You stayed with Gojo, even if Geto tried to convince you to stop being so oblivious.

Such a rift left you on poor terms with the Curse User.

Oh, he still adores his beloved companion and friend...

He just hates that you decided to protect the monkeys rather than cull them.

It's a shame, really....

You have such potential.

Geto would probably not kill you for a couple reasons.

One, he most likely either knew you before or sees you as a possible student.

Two, he doesn't want to waste your potential.

Meaning Geto would focus on isolation and capture more than killing you.

If anything, he'd want to give you a chance at change.

You can help him break the cycle... you just need to learn how to kill non-sorcerers.

Due to how charismatic Geto is with people, he'd try and convert you by force.

Now, now, don't fight him.

Fighting him will only make things harder for yourself.

I can see Geto doing everything in his power to break you down.

I'm talking things like kidnapping, isolation, degradation, all sorts of things to mess with your head and break your resolve.

Geto may even kill non-sorcerers in front of you to show how weak they are, how you couldn't help them even if you tried just like he couldn't....

Geto would take pleasure in this, too.

If you just agreed with him, if you just listened...

You wouldn't have to go through this.

But, no, you want to be all innocent and righteous.

Fine, be that way, he'll make you see his way.

Geto would break you, making you used to all the bloodshed and whispering small words of propaganda and encouragement in your ear... then he'll make you his little puppet.

He's condescending, laughing when you shake at the blood covering your clothes and hands.

This is the real world, dear!

Why not help him remake it?

He stops being condescending and degrading when you break and listen to him.

At that point you're no longer a Sorcerer... you're a Curse User.

Part of Geto's family.

By this point he'd either treat you like a student/successor... or a lover in his cult.

He's so much nicer when he takes the fight out of you.

He plans to reform you, to bring back that fight against normal humans.

There's no need to cry... he'll comfort you once you transition over.

Sorcerer principles are so weak.

Once you drop them, Geto greets you with open arms.

If you're a student, he welcomes you as his newest successor... ready to be trained with a new mindset.

If you're someone he knew years ago, he greets his old friend with open arms.

He knew you'd eventually come to him.

You just needed some convincing.

Geto's possessive once he converts you by force.

His pet monkeys aren't allowed to touch you and you're never out of his sight.

You're important to him, which is ironic as this is the man who would shatter your mind just to keep you.

Your abilities are soon used for his motives.

Soon enough you're forced to depend on Geto.

He makes you feel like you need him with his words and manipulation.

Soon you'll forget all about being a Sorcerer.

Surely you realize Geto knows best and wants to see you improve, right?

Soon you won't even want to leave his arms ever again... trapped and lulled in by his venomous words.

[spinosacha]

OK I'm sorry I didn't intend this to be a mini essay but it became one

I think the person who's going on about moral purity to you isn't aware that one of the major aspects of media literacy is being able to identify propaganda within media.

I'm not saying that arcane is propaganda, not intentionally anyway, but that you need to be aware of how things are portrayed, and that's a major part of identifying propaganda, writer intention, and even how your own internal bias effects how you interpret things. Depiction isn't endorcement, but positive portrayal is. It's not a case of moral purity, its understanding what the show is trying to tell us by how the characters actions are portrayed.

Yes Silcos death is a pretty clear cut sign that the writers dont think he's the good guy, so let's go for singed instead, singed gets the happiest ending in the show but nobody believes he is meant to be taken as the good guy. Why? He does bad things for a righteous reason (his daughter) so what's the difference between him and how caitlyn is seen?

I'd argue its the fact that the writers don't commit to caits bad actions. Cait uses a chemical weapon on the undercity, but the writers intend you to believe she doesn't harm any civilians in the process. The logistics of that don't really match up, realistically civilians would be harmed, but the show portrays it so that they were not. What's the reason for this difference between how chemical weapons act in real life, and how they act in the show? Well, if the gray was like real chemical weapons, caitlyn would have more blood on her hands, why are the writers actively avoiding that?

Then she is manipulated into becoming the Head of martial law- but even then, she's still shown to be the one in the right, she criticises Ambessas methods at every turn, is willing to betray her the soonest opportunity she gets. Police violence? She's very against that!

So you get this character who should by all means be truely morally gray, she is using a chemical weapon, she is a dictator, for what she sees as a good cause-but she's somehow still as blameless as she possibly could be. This creates the feeling that the writers aren't trying to portray her actions as all that bad. She has tbe aesthetic of a morally gray character without the backing of one.

Compare that to singed. He does horrible experiments, there's a reason for that that is arguably noble (saving his daughter), but there isn't a "but". You can't say "singed created shimmer, but actually nobody got hurt by shimmer!" Like you can say "cait gassed the undercity, but nobody got hurt by it! (Who didn't deserve it)"

Without this distinction how do we differentiate between depiction that IS endorcement and depiction that isn't? How do you identify that a piece of media is condemning far right ideology or promoting it? This has nothing to do with puritanical thinking, and disregarding how things are portrayed is textbook poor media literacy, unfortunately.

(As is not being able to convey your thoughts in a civil and responsible manner funnily enough, which looking at her blog.. she doesn't excel at that one.)

Anyway! Sorry for the essay lol, the weird moral highground people are taking over media literacy when not even understanding what it entails has been bothering me and her response to you and others embodies that so much I had to say something haha. Hope you don't mind :)

You put it really nicely! I tried to add to your take but I think you explained it really well, it’s def the propeganda aspect that I also wish more people would be aware of and how to be critical of the ways things are depicted in media and what bias that could reveal.

But yeah, most of the time I don’t engage in discourse fights but I was feeling a bit feisty yesterday lol. I think Arcane lents itself well to talk about morality in a very interesting way but I think we in the fandom could stand to speak in a bit nicer tone to each other but I get that people are passionate.

[oathkeeper-of-tarth]

So, I'm curious: What's your take on Aylin's experience after/if she kills Lorroakan?

Allegedly, there's some information floating around somewhere that said Aylin was angry with Selune after she killed Lorroakan, but I can't find where this info is.

If you saw posts about that here on tumblr it was probably posted by @justanotherignot! I've actually been meaning to gather up all the devnote tidbits about Selûne from Aylin and Isobel for a while now, so thank you for the excuse to do so and ramble a bit.

Player: I was just wondering what it was like in that cage of Balthazar's. Aylin: Let us not dwell on those dark days. Their memory is a vortex within my heart that leads directly to the Hells.

What is happening is, well, it's the century of unthinkable horror catching up to her. It's the Trauma(TM) - in one of the conversation options she's literally triggered by the mention of someone being run through repeatedly! It's the growing awareness that although she's been freed (and possibly reunited with her love), the secret is out and there are always going to be assholes gunning for her, aiming to use her as an "artefact" and power source to fuel their ambitions, without any regard for her, you know... basic personhood and well-being. Also, Lorroakan was blatantly lying. He didn't find any super special way to siphon her immortality with "no harm, no pain of any kind", he was just replicating Balthazar's soul cage (you can even find a letter from Ketheric to him, showing Lorroakan was pestering them).

On to the stuff from the game files! First, the conversation with Aylin directly after the Lorroakan fight in the tower. I'm going to be putting the context notes in square brackets next to the lines they apply to. I also plucked some audio out from the files for some of these because I love the delivery.

Aylin: The fire-haired fool is dead. Yet as I stare upon his corpse, I feel… sadness. Why? [Slow and curious, angry and confused by all that has happened.] Player: What kind of sadness is it? / I know something of sadness - or at least the ballads do. What does it feel like? Aylin: A gripping in the chest. As though I'd lost someone, something. [Lost in thought for a moment; confused.] Aylin: A paladin's fatigue, no doubt. You were excellent in battle, as is your way. And I am proud to fight at your side. [Remembering herself. She is Dame Aylin.] Aylin: I will catch my breath, then to camp I will bring my bones. Moonmaiden be with you. Player: Smiting is a weighty duty - sometimes it can be tiring. / Perhaps smiting has lost its pleasures. Aylin: Say it can't be so. For I am Selûne's sword. And ever must be. [She means it, but on the periphery of her consciousness is a tiny crack. Wondering about her fate.]

The above never fails to get me - she is Dame Aylin! Sword of the Moonmaiden! Glorious immortal paladin, champion of a righteous cause! She smites evil-doers for breakfast, that's, like, her whole thing! What do you mean she can't just pick up where she left off and go about her merry smitey way? What do you mean the thing that is supposed to be the literal core of her entire being (forever) doesn't feel good and glorious anymore, but just makes her feel sad and empty? No, no, no, we can't have that.

Player: One of the greatest tragedies of revenge is that it can only be taken once. / Because you won't get to kill him again? Aylin: Perhaps. Yet if I could run him through a thousand times, I wonder-- [Lost in thought, she's been triggered to remember her own fate being run through over and over.] Aylin: Battle has tired my mind, made me susceptible to flights of fancy. You were excellent in battle, as is your way. And I am proud to fight at your side.

Aylin: I will return to camp shortly. I just need a moment to… to… [Lost in thought.]

She so very desperately needs some rest and a chance to come to terms with everything that happened and that was done to her. And it's clear it's going to be hard because she is defaulting to trying to deny anything is wrong, is clearly trying (and failing) to just be her old self immediately, has blatantly internalised a lot of that classic I Am A Sword stuff on top of everything (even though her mother is huge on free will and choice!), and is just really not well-equipped to handle any of this at all.

Next, this is the post-Lorroakan convo you get if you have both Aylin and Isobel in camp.

Aylin: Ah. Ally mine. We are reunited once more. [Warm, but drained. She's not feeling like herself.] Aylin: I was just regaling sweet Isobel with tales of our prowess. Isobel: Very impressive. Thank you for helping Aylin - that wizard sounded absolutely dastardly. [Good humored. Soft in tone. A little uncertain - she's not sure why Aylin isn't herself.] Player: My pleasure. He had it coming. Aylin: He did, and it came. Now, my friend: bask in your victory. I will do the same. Aylin: But fear not: when the time comes for you to face the foe of foes, Isobel and I will stand by your side. [Rallying her soldierly spirit, but still a little drained.] Isobel: We wouldn't miss it. Not for anything. Aylin: Go well, friend. We will see you soon. And with our great powers combined, this city will be saved. Player: Hopefully he'll be the last. Aylin: There are always more bastards behind bastards. But we will run through them all, each by each.

Player: I hope you can rest easy now, Dame Aylin. Aylin: I always do, with darling Isobel by my side. Aylin: Enjoy the spoils of your victory. Spin memories of Lorroakan's death in your mind like silkfloss.

If Isobel isn't there (meaning she died in Act 2), you get this version:

Aylin: Ah. Ally mine. We are reunited once more. [Warm, but drained. She's not feeling like herself.] Aylin: I was just reviewing our fight against foul Lorroakan; your moves and mine. The victory was soundly won. Aylin: Don't you think? [Uncharacteristically, Aylin is seeking input. She's usually so confident about everything, but killing Lorroakan has not had the intended effect on her.] Player: Indeed I do. Let his demise serve as a warning to anyone else who'd seek you out. Aylin: Let him be the last. If my dear mother has any mercy, she will ensure it. [Trying to stay her usual self, but her mask is cracking a tiny bit here. Privately, Aylin is dealing with a great deal of anger toward her mother, the goddess Selûne, But she's not yet willing to face it. How could her powerful mother let all this happen to her?]

Player: We fought well - though I was a little worried about you afterward, in truth. Aylin: Set your mind at ease, my friend. Dame Aylin is more well now than she has been this past century. [Good humored. Soft in tone. A little uncertain - it's true she's better now than she has been, but why does she feel so shitty, then? (She's in the beginning of reckoning with the trauma of what happened to her).]

Player: I hope you can rest easy now, Dame Aylin. Aylin: Yes. I wish for the very same. Aylin: Enjoy the spoils of your victory. Spin memories of our prowess in your mind like silkfloss.

So, a few things pop out for me here. First, you get the more explicit anger at Selûne if Isobel isn't there, as opposed to the "hahah, I will smite all the bastards who dare come after me, no matter how many there are" line. "How could her powerful mother let all this happen to her?" just... damn, hits hard, even if you subscribe to the theory that Selûne simply could not intervene in the Shadowfell imprisonment beyond sending those poor people whose graves you find in front of the mausoleum.

And here Aylin really lays it on thick with the denial that there's anything wrong at all. Combined with the letter you get from her in the epilogue if Isobel is dead, it just paints such a bleak, sad picture. I can just see her going all out on the Sword of Selûne duty-bound paladin side of things, no rest, no healing, no stopping even for a moment, no dealing with anything at all, from the trauma to the bitterness towards mum. Until whatever horrible breaking point comes, a year or a century from now. The need for Isobel's humanising influence is so clear. I've touched on Isobel's side of things here.

Speaking of having a bone to pick with Selûne, if you're playing as a cleric/paladin of Selûne, you can get some extra very honest dialogue with Isobel in Last Light:

Player: Why has the Moonmaiden waited until now to take an interest in this curse? Isobel: Maybe she was waiting for one of us to find this place ourselves. Free will, and all that.

Isobel: Though if it were my place to ask why she let Ketheric turn; why she allowed this village to rot at his hands - believe me, I would. [A cold edge in her voice]

Player: Are you faring all right? It can't be easy holding a lone candle in such darkness. Isobel: All things with her strength. You know the litany. [A little sarcastically. She's got a bone to pick with Selûne but isn't being too overt.]

Side note: the amount of devnotes for Isobel's lines that say she's delivering them "with swagger" and being "cheeky" makes me smile every time. Love her. Love her snark.

Also, to get it out of the way: no, I'm fairly sure Aylin did not break her oath. I see this brought up a ton and I just see no way for it to be the case. There is nothing to suggest this outside of a wording similarity and it just makes no sense. Girl is clearly some flavour of Oath of Vengeance (she uses Abjure Enemy, so this is the case even mechanically, even though she's obviously an NPC and not a standard player-build paladin) and she killed a very shitty guy who was also explicitly after her in godawful ways. You can do far worse things in the game than her dramatic speech and backbreaker and not break your OoV.

[scoobydoodean]

I’ve seen a lot of your posts about cas having communication issues and it being a character flaw, and a lot of it with dean specifically which causes a lot of the conflict in their relationship. Do you think his communication problem is a result from him not being human and not fully understanding how to communicate as one, or that it has to do with how strongly he grows to care for dean so he hides things with the mindset of protecting him. I started wondering about the latter just because it seems like in season 5, once he is fully on their team, cas is very blunt and straightforward with his thoughts and feelings, often being shown as one who does not lie very well, but it changes after the season 5 finale. It makes me wonder if that’s when cas really fell for dean so it started holding him back from truly communicating with him. Or maybe you have a different opinion on the reasoning altogether, I was just curious on your take

I think it's a combination of things. One is absolutely that he (I personally think in a somewhat misguided way) wants to protect Dean (and his friends more broadly). In 6.20, Cas talks about coming to Dean's house and almost asking him for help, but being unable to bring himself to ask when he thinks of how much Dean has been through and realizes that Dean will uproot his life to help him.

CASTIEL: Raphael was stronger than me. I wouldn't survive a straight fight. So I went to an old friend for help. But watching him, I stopped. Everything he sacrificed, and I was about to ask him for more.

Cas doesn't want to put Dean through another apocalypse. And when he initially agrees to work with Crowley and Crowley suggests bringing Dean into the loop, Cas reiterates that Dean is to be left alone.

CROWLEY: We'll need expert help. CASTIEL: From whom? CROWLEY: From experts, of course. I know of two eerily suited 'Teen Beat' models with time on their hands. CASTIEL: No. Not Dean. He's retired, and he's to stay that way.

The thing is, trying to protect Dean isn't the entire picture. Season 6 is riddled with Cas slowly making concessions, and one of the very first ones he makes is turning a blind eye to Crowley forcing Dean to work for him. So it isn't all about protecting Dean. Excluding Dean is also about trying to prove he can handle all of this by himself, and feeling shame if/when he can't or when he has to make moral compromises to achieve his goals. Crowley digs into Cas's hubris in 6.20 when he says:

CROWLEY: Everything you've worked for -- everything that Sam and Dean have worked for -- gone. You can save us, Castiel. God chose you to save us. And I think...Deep down...You know that.

Crowley paints a picture of Sam and Dean needing protection, but also of Cas being needed, and being powerful enough to do it all on his own—telling him he is special and worthy and deserving. Hubris is never far from lack of self-esteem. Buttering Cas up like this works because deep down, Cas does not feel secure and needs to believe that he is worthy and righteous. He seeks that feeling of worthiness from God, from the other angels, and from Dean at various points throughout his life.

One of the places we get the shame angle from Cas is in 6.03 when he first tells Sam and Dean about civil war in heaven and explains why he never reached out for help.

DEAN Cas, why didn't you tell us this? CASTIEL I was ashamed. I expected more from my brothers. 

Cas was not successful at playing sheriff and whipping heaven into shape. He thought God was behind him because God resurrected him, but things didn't work out in his favor instantly. Raphael appeared as an adversary. So maybe God wasn't really behind him. Maybe Cas wasn't actually that special after all. Season 6—as much as it features a fallout between Dean and Cas—is also a fallout between Cas and God, as Cas slowly realizes that God is not watching him and cheering for him (anymore), starts to resent him, and then tries to replace him.

I think when I look at the show more broadly past season 6 and the other instances where Cas hides things and tries to do everything on his own, those instances tend to carry these same themes of Cas desperately wanting to protect the people he loves, but also being desperately insecure, looking for other people from God to the angels to Dean to give him validation. Cas tends to try and gain that validation through missions/ quests that make him worthy and deserving. And the idea of needing help with those special, holy missions feels like failure, because then he wouldn't have done it all on his own. When his missions fail or he isn't able to do it all on his own, it chips away at him slowly but surely. Cas all but tells us this in 12.19 "The Future". He talks about a range of failures he's recently suffered—some of them involving not being able to protect Dean or save Dean, some involving the larger holy mission (to protect humanity from cosmic threats) and he says he was trying to do it all on his own and that he shut Dean out because he needed a win on his own.

CASTIEL: Well, I didn't mean to add to your distress. I – Dean, I just keep failing. Again and again. When you were taken, I searched for months and I couldn't find you. And then Kelly escaped on my watch, and I couldn't find her. And I just wanted I needed to come back here with a win for you. For myself.

I also think the way Cas approaches these sorts of discussions—first saying the win is for Dean (just like in 6.20 when he says he did everything for Dean) then admitting that the win is actually for himself—he's also revealing that he has trouble admitting to himself that hubris is ultimately a part of his motivations when he does things like this. He tends to tell himself he is just trying to keep his friends safe or that they need him to prove himself, but deep down, it's that Cas is insecure in ways that have little to do with his friends, and everything to do with his upbringing and being uprooted from his life and not knowing how to feel worthy without a mission to serve because serving the mission is what he was brainwashed to believe made him worthy and deserving for his entire existence. After leaving the heavenly cult, he replicates the experience of using The Mission as a means of receiving praise from others as confirmation that he is worthy. (Which would be why one of his visions of paradise in the 12.19 draft script is himself shirtless looking poweful with his wings on display and Dean thanking him).

All of that said... I do also think Cas is sometimes just impatient. I mean in some ways, this connects to hubris, but I think keeping people informed about his whereabouts probably does sometimes feel like a chore to Cas. If it's something he truly believes he can handle on his own no problem, he sees involving his friends and dealing with their questions as an inconvenience, and he's very sure that he is going to succeed and be back before they ever know he was gone. And sometimes he's right. But he is also sometimes very very wrong, either misjudging what he can accomplish on his own or failing to account for the unexpected. Then he gets himself into hot water and Dean is upset (or the angels in some cases), and that means Cas fails the mission and still feels insecure and loops back to looking for another mission that will prove he is worthy and deserving. The problem being... you can't rely on other people to give you your self esteem and also need to actually be self aware about your own limitations. And all of that is neat.

[gengor]

Okay, so I’ve wanted to make a big fe3h politics post for a while now. I wanna come at this from a different angle, and think about how authorial intent and/or bias factor into the political messaging into my interpretation of the characters. So, in this post, I'm going to:

Explain how the writers show that they ultimately want Dimitri’s route to be the ‘good route’ and show how the political ideologies of Dimitri and Edelgard are clearly spelled out for the player (Claude will get a separate post)

If you're not already in the boat of ‘fe3h is a political game’, then just scroll past this lol. Fe3h talks about racism and misogyny and debates how the world should structure its government. It is very political.

So, I’m gonna quote from the translated writer's interview

“Kusakihara: Edelgard’s route’s theme is literally “military rule.” It’s the route where you haveyour own cause and convictions, and even if people you know stand in your way, you mow ‘emdown. In contrast, Dimitri’s route began with the idea to make it “righteous,” the easy approach.It’s just, at the beginning, poor sensitive Dimitri ends up like that because of the circumstances… We sprinkled in juxtapositions like that.

Everyone: (laughs)

Kusakihara: Once he’s fallen, he goes through some twists and turns and awakens to the true king’s path. I wanted to write the righteous route as the conquest route’s opposite [TN: lit.“paradox”]. Claude started with the keyword of “schemer hero,” and I thought he’d weave more plots behind the scenes, and you can’t hate him, but he’s still a bad guy… But as I was writing him, he ended up more of a pure good guy than originally planned (laughs).

Tell us how Edelgard and the Empire got to the position they’re in now.

Kusakihara: I think most of the characters walking the path of conquest up until now have been men. I also think villains are often men… I wanted to do something unexpected, or make it harder to predict future events, so that role went to a woman this time.

Yokota: There’s a contrast between her strong side, pushing through with her conquest, and her adorable side, and I think she turned out to be a good character. Also, sure enough, we left in the longstanding series trope of “empire = bad guys.” With the name “empire,” I feel like there really is this vague image of “probably evil.” Regarding the story, it started with the element of “let’s make it Romance of the Three Kingdoms,” but we also wanted to have a school life. That meant it would have to be temporarily peaceful, and from there, we needed something to spark a war. To that end, something needed to be the bad guy… or rather, shoulder a role close to that, or the story wouldn’t work, so we had the Empire support us in that way.”

Okay, so I don’t really think I need to say all that much to convince you further that Edelgard was their planned villain. It's pretty cut and dry. But the next question to ask is: what is the ‘ideology’ that she’s willing to cut people down to achieve? Well, Edelgard falls into this conservative trope that my partners has got me to start calling ‘evil leftist wizards’ but it’s been called killmonger syndrome by some people online too.

There is a pattern in lots of fiction, both Western and Japanese, to create an antagonist who seeks power to implement left-leaning or progressive goals. Oftentimes, the narrative doesn't really engage with the validity of these claims and will make these characters condemnable by ‘evil via association’, or maybe they ‘have some points but they're just too radical in their methodology’. There is also a tendency of these types of narratives to use right-leaning language and iconography interchangeably with left-leaning language (it goes hand in hand with the way so many conservatives will accuse leftists of ‘being the real fascist’) 

Some mainstream examples of this trope include Amon from the Legend of Korra. He fights for *equality* and the liberation of nonbenders, but the writers are clearly trying to tie him to fascism with the imagery of the rising sun, and having him do a literal Sieg Heil in many of his posters. 

Another example is Viktor from Arcane, who, in the latest season, became the series' main antagonist who wanted to end discrimination, Erik Killmonger, who wanted to bring an end to racism in America by any means necessary.

Edelgard falls into this trope. She wants Fódlan to move past an antiquated system of theocratic nobility, which is a left-leaning goal. But the game wants her to be condemnable via association because she cooperates with a lot of cartoonishly evil characters from TWSITD to get her goals done or engages in other morally grey/condemnable actions to get her goals accomplished. So, while I think it's fair to criticize her for many of the things she does, she is ultimately how the game is choosing to portray leftism, and frankly, it's not a great or insightful critique of leftism. 

So where is Dimitri in all of this? Well I think Dimitri represents the politics of the writers, which scews very centristy.

Why do I think Dimitri is a centrist? He told us this point blank in the appropriately named event: Crests: The Good and the Bad 

“I believe that Margrave Gautier was wrong to disinherit Miklan simply because he did not bear a Crest. Still, there is always a reason for why such customs stand the test of time. Imagine what this world would be like if no one placed any stock in Crests...Bloodlines that carry Crests would dwindle. The metaphorical blade used to oppose threats would eventually rust.This same argument has been made time and time again across the years. Both sides are at once right and wrong.”

 “I believe those with Crests and those without should acknowledge the others' strengths and learn to respect each other based on personal merits. And that doesn't apply only to Crests. The same holds true for lineage, race, faith, ideologies…” Source

I wanna draw attention to that word. “Ideologies”. Basically Dimitri is saying judging people on their race is bad but then he lumps judging someone based on their *ideology* to be an equally bad thing. 

It’s worth noting that Dimitri will verbally condemn racism, but he still participated in quelling a rebellion from Duscur. Source The game tries to make this seem more palatable by having Dedue adhere strictly to whatever Dimitri says, turning Dimitri into a white savior type character. 

While Dimitri might say things that sound progressive, there’s signs in there that he isn’t actually left-leaning. Dimitri can see issues with the current system but believes actually challenging the status quo to be wrong. He will *always* be the Lord who protects the church and upholds the system of nobility. The system of nobility which has women being sold off to their husband's families to produce heirs, the system of nobility that concentrates Fodlans power solely in the hands of white people (see Claude and Balthus’s character premise for proof… and also note that Hapi is Dimitri’s only platonic ending with a woman) 

In this sense, Dimitri has kind of become my favorite Lord, not because I think he’s right, but because he feels like the perfect window into the mind of how centrists operate. He has SO much power in this world as the king and or crown prince, but he chooses to appease conservatives instead every time.

And to be clear, I don't think people who sympathize with him are stupid or wrong to do that. Opinions on media don’t automatically translate to politics. I personally don't sympathize with him because I am hyper invested in the politics here. But I still really enjoy him as a character.

Edit: I feel like I didn’t conclude this well.

I think ultimately the thing I wanted to say about fe3h discourse is that it’s important to acknowledge that the writers were trying to side with centrism by using Dimitri as their ‘good choice’. And any criticism Edelgard should keep in mind that the writers are trying to use her morally grey behavior to undermine progressive revolutions. Tying her to imperialism was an intentional choice done to undermine the legitimacy of her goals. The premise of a ‘progressive imperialist movement’ is kind of just something that can only come out of the mouth of a conservative to begin with.

[dancermk]

HELLO MY FELLOW TRAVELERS!

I, like many viewers, have been completely entranced by Hawk and Tim’s love story in Fellow Travelers. As a mature queer person, this show has been very emotional, and I am deeply invested. (I WILL riot if Tim doesn’t get to die in Hawk’s arms, and know that he is, and has always been, loved by Hawk.) But I digress.

Something that I have been fascinated by are the differing opinions that have surfaced about the characters, especially Hawk. I’m not looking for any arguments here, everyone is entitled to their opinion, and this is simply mine. To me, Hawk falls hard and fast for Tim. He breaks all his own rules for Tim - they topple over like a house of cards.

When we are introduced to Hawk, he’s cold and heartless with the men he hooks up with - they are nothing more than a body to fulfil his sexual needs and desires. He doesn’t do repeats and he doesn’t bring them home. But Tim, he instantly begins returning to, gets him a job, then allows him into his own apartment, etc. When Tim pushes back, Hawk relents further, letting him in emotionally, sharing parts of his past, crossing lines by introducing him to others in his circle, and so on.

Hawk is a traumatised man, carrying guilt and anger and shame, and a bucket load of fear! Yes, he has some internalised homophobia, but interestingly, he’s also extremely righteous about his homosexuality -and I don’t believe he thinks being gay is wrong in any way. (His response to his father is indicative of this).

I can personally say that I’ve never thought it was wrong to be queer, yet I spent much of my life hiding who I was and feeling shame. It’s an odd thing! Perhaps it is that the shame forms purely from what is outside of us, while what is inside of us can love another person of the same sex, knowing it is right and pure. Perhaps these contradictions between self and society are what causes so much pain and conflict?

But back to Hawk. Hawk is undoubtedly most affected by his teenage first love experience. A love that he fucked up through his own fears (fear for many men is unacceptable and a sign of weakness), and now carries the burden of believing he is responsible for their death. Hawk doesn’t allow himself to love again, until Tim. And we see many times throughout the show how much Hawk fears losing Tim. And in the end he’ll have to face that fear. I think that, in part, not attempting to have a life with Tim, is also fuelled by his fear of fucking it up and losing Tim - so it’s easier to just not attempt it! In episode 7, when he loses his son, part of that spiral is Hawk recognising that he can’t really prevent loss, and he wasted his life trying to be something he’s not - still losing his child and Tim along with it.

But Hawk is a survivor! And no one has the right to hate or judge him for it. I don’t think some young people truly understand what it feels like to live in a world where who you love can put you in jail, and destroy your life. I grew up in the 70s/80s and my experiences were bad enough, but I try so very hard to think about what it was like before that! When being queer was a crime and a mental illness! That’s pure terror! And for Hawk, he chose to survive the best way he knew how, and he wasn’t able to change because that’s fucking hard when all you’ve known is living in constant ‘fight or flight,’ and when have chronic trauma and experience collective trauma.

I think in episode 8 we’ll finally get to see Hawk grow - I certainly hope so - because he deserves to be free. Our beautiful Skippy has been free for some time, and while we mourn for the cruelty of a world that would take such a truly decent man, I am glad he got to live freely. Being closeted is the worst kind of suffering- a compartmentalised and fragmented existence where you are never truly whole, and therefore can never be the best version of yourself.

Before I go, I just wanted to also talk about being in a closeted relationship-which I experienced in my youth. I think that Hawk and Tim’s intense and toxic and exquisitely beautiful relationship, in part, arises from this. Because two closeted people in love live their relationship in secret, in a bubble, only in certain rooms, with none of the outside world reflected back at them. It becomes the two of you against the world. It’s so insular. Hawk and Tim literally live their 1950s relationship within two rooms - their apartments. All their memories are held within those walls. And it only belongs to them. They know each in ways that no other living soul does. It’s all-consuming and often unhealthy, but also stupidly romantic.

Anyway, sorry for this long winded post that no one will read and is likely full of grammatical errors because I’m tired! This atheist is praying we get everything we need from episode 8! Acceptance, forgiveness, understanding resolution, healing and a whole lot of love! ❤️

Cheers queers! 🏳️‍🌈

PS Matt and Johnny are exquisite on and off screen and I am so thankful to them for bringing these characters and this story into our lives!

[tljisthegoat]

If Ben Solo never comes back, then we definitely NEED a good answer as to why he isn't a Force Ghost. The best answer is that Anakin, using his newfound abilities saves Ben Solo from death. With the big catch being that he's seemingly stuck in The World Between Worlds.

Rey learning about the entire history of the Star Wars universe is a must. What better way to show off her previously established scavenger expertise than to have her scrape together all the info she can on her travels across the universe.

You can also have this be a good way of showing how empty she feels after the loss of Ben.

She'd feel his absence like a cutting void. Not unlike a black hole. Swallowing all the light in her soul. She'd feel suffocated by this facade of being a Jedi. When she's always been a lonely scavenger desperately clinging to hope.

Hope isn't something she's felt in what feels like an eternity. What cause is there to truly fight for. What would that even mean for her now?

All roads lead to Rey's tragic downfall. A grief-stricken heart smothered and shattered by war. Darkness fills her hollow heart with righteous anger. Her eyes turned a sickly yellow, her skin paled significantly. Her hair looks like a wild beast's mane, wild and unruly. Longer than it's ever been, reaching down past her shoulders.

She will get back what's hers. Ben Solo.

[beej-honnecticutt]

MASH S7E22 -Rally ‘round the Flagg, Boys- HUNNIHAWK ANALYSIS (and extra, but mainly Hunnihawk):

(Disclaimer: this is my opinion. If you have a different one, that’s okay!)

I’ll be talking about the episode in general and then towards the end of the post I’ll focus more on the Hunnihawk aspects of it, mainly because I have so much to say and I better say it in order or it will get confusing

Without further delay, enjoy the ramblings

The Hawk/Charles/Soldier fight in the O.R was so refreshing. We’re no strangers to seeing Hawk lose it (unfortunately) but he rarely ever does it in the O.R, where innocent lives literally depend on him. He prides himself on being one hell of a doctor, and to have that questioned for doing his job properly (and the constant verbal assault, especially from Charles) must’ve felt like a kick in the balls for him.

The Flagg/Hawk interactions are just GOLD, I feel like Flagg is supposed to represent war personified from Hawk’s perspective: stupid, irrational, aggressive, and confusing. Full of toxic masculinity, faulty ideals, hateful behaviour, and not one good reason for doing what he does…

The Hawk/BJ rational/emotional battle was incredibly entertaining due to the clash of egos (or rather BJ’s moral-superiority complex and Hawk’s hurt pride.) I love them sm🥹

BJ being a self-righteous lil bitch to Hawkeye but not allowing anyone else to be:

BJ: He’s Hawkeye Pierce’s patient.

Soldier: that’s what I’m worried about! I want him taken care of by someone who’s gonna take care of him.

BJ: look, whether you like it or not, Pierce saved your friend’s life.

Soldier: Oh, sure, when he got around to it! Thanks to my pushing it.

BJ: listen to me. Captain Pierce is just about the best surgeon we have around here. Now, what he says is right for Elmerson is right for him, you’re gonna have to believe that.

Soldier: oh you guys all stick together don’t you?

(A few moments later)

Col. Flagg: *who had sent Charles to spy on Hawk to try and prove he’s a communist spy* did you bring me something?

Charles: yes, my resignation. I will criticise Pierce, I will ridicule him, I will even humiliate him, but I will not spy on him.

Gifs of BJ saving Hawk from a Patient Attack bc the hunnihawk vibes are immaculate and I need visual aid.

BJ: I noticed I don’t practice what I preach.

I believe this sentence right here to be way deeper than it seems. This is a realization for Beej, he just found out he’s no longer something he was (level-headed.) A part of him he took obvious pride in is no longer there. He lost it. This is the realization that Korea had changed him more than he thought. And we’re only on season 7!

He used to be an unmovable object, and now he’s throwing around the phrase “I oughta break your neck” in a fit of rage in the middle of a physical altercation.

Hawk: Yes. And thank you.

This, from a hunnihawk standpoint, means so much to me. Cause Hawk’s not surprised by this information, he already knows BJ. He’s the only one that has really witnessed this change, and he still loves him.

Even with the hypocrisy, the self-righteousness, the blindness to some of his own faults, he still loves him as he is.

Hawk has every opportunity during the episode to jump at BJ for being so insensitive towards him, but he doesn’t. He’s very mature about it, and part of it might be he doesn’t want to fight anyone else, but I think there’s also an element of letting BJ deceive himself and live in his world of fantasy, letting him believe he really has everything under control.

Even though he doesn’t, and it’s abundantly clear he does not.

And when BJ finally explodes, Hawk is the one that has to physically hold him back (or at least try). It’s so poetic that Hawk (who lost it at the beginning of the episode) and BJ (who frowned upon it and has been insufferable about it) have their roles reversed by the end of the episode to protect each other (BJ from an attack, and Hawk from doing something he would regret.)

There’s a lot to say about the way the war changed every one of them, but I believe BJ’s character development to be the most interesting of them all. War broke down Hawk’s defences, but it destroyed BJ’s vision of himself. He’s infinitely more bitter, aggressive, angry and hotheaded than he was when he arrived.

(He’s not all lost, of course. He’s still fundamentally the same BJ, but there’s such a stark contrast between his first season and his last in terms of behaviour, self-control and self-expression.)

In conclusion, I’m obsessed with these fictional characters and how human they are.

(Idk if any of this made sense. Half the post is me theorising about the intent behind two sentences in a twenty-minute episode that came out 50 years ago. It’s 3A.M. But if you got this far, thanks for reading it! Hope it was at least entertaining. Feel free to drop your opinions.)

[thephantomcasebook]

I am sooo disappointed in S2 HOTD, and now I understand why you were warning us about S2 writing. I encourage you to watch Ben Shapiro's S2 review of HOTD. Everything he states hits the point as I feel of S2 writing. But I really feel that if Miguel was still on S2 he would basically steer the ship right, as in writing and direction of the story. Sara Hess needs to be fired definitely. But I don't understand why you don't like Miguel, once he gave us a solid S1. If you want audience to understand why Aemond turned evil from S1, then show us when he immediately returned from Storm's End and Alicent and Otto argue the stupidity in Aemond's decision to kill Luke, once Aegon was offering peace terms to Rhae Rhae. Please explain why you hate Miguel.

I hate Spotchnik because he is the sire of all the bullshit of Season 2.

People, fundamentally, don't understand this point. Sara Hess was not on the original writing staff of HOTD. There was no original writing staff for HOTD. There was Ryan Condal and GRRM that wrote all of the scripts for Season 1.

Sarah Hess was brought on by Spotchnik and his wife as a producer to hack up and rewrite Condal and GRRM's original scripts in order to fit with the overall narrative that Spotchnik (and mostly his wife) wanted to tell in the story.

Sara Hess rewrote and reworked elements of Condal and GRRM's scripts during shooting.

Things such as Criston Cole being a thug rather than the most dangerous man in Westros. Turning Alicent and Rhaenyra's rivalry in the original scripts into a closeted lesbian romance.

Example:

A.) In 1x08 there was no rape of a maid by Aegon. Aegon is introduced in the Condal and GRRM script as having to be collected from a brothel and dragged back to the Red Keep where Alicent scolds him for neglecting Helaena and embarrassing her by his frat boy antics in public.

Sara Hess is on record saying that she and Spotchnik did not jive with Aegon just being a whoring, lazy, drunk. And they wanted to make him more villainous in order to show how Alicent is perpetuating "The Patriarchy" by covering up a rape.

B.) There was no fighting pits in 1x09. In the original script by GRRM and Condal. Aegon is abducted from a tavern while drunk by Misaria and is used as leverage by Misaria for more privileges in Otto's service - not to stop the fighting pits.

Sara Hess wrote Aegon to be involved in fighting pits cause it was "Game of Thrones" - which is her excuse for every bad writing decision she made.

All of 1x09 was rewritten and restructured by Sara Hess at the behest of Spotchnik in order to make the Greens bad. From the awful scene between Alicent and Rhaenys, to Aegon's fighting pits, and the Dragon Pit Massacre.

Tom Glynn-Carney told the story about how he had it out with Sara Hess and Spotchnik when they added the rape scene in 1x08 that wasn't there during the table read. He told them them they were kneecapping Aegon and giving him nowhere to go. To this Spotchnik told him to shut up and do his job as he his told to do it.

My point is that Sara Hess was the hatchet woman of Miguel Spotchnik and his wife. She was brought in by them to purposefully fill HOTD with their sanctimonious bullshit political agenda.

Spotchnik was fired, not because of his wife, but because the new heads of HBO after the merger with Discovery and Warner sent back his Season 2 treatment and told him to start again. Spotchnik threw a massive tantrum because the previous heads of HBO gave him free reign to do whatever he wanted with Artistic Freedom. But the new heads of the studio did not agree to those terms. So he quit and cried like bitch on the way out. And HBO did him a solid by not telling anyone how bad his Season 2 treatments really were.

And since I've read them, I can tell you they're some of the most righteous trash you'll ever read.

Everything you hate about Season 2 is a symptom of a disease that Miguel Spotchnik bio-engineered and spread from bringing on Sara Hess to hiring Olivia Cooke and Emma D'Arcy for their identity and political activism rather than talent.

The taint of Spotchnik's and his wife's vision of HOTD remains long after they've been booted. Mostly because they never got rid of Sara Hess who was the main scribe to most of the bullshit in Season 1 that doomed Season 2.

Two heads of the Hydra were chopped off but one still remains to blight the countryside.

[bliss-in-the-void]

Satoru, Suguru, and the Detriment of Their Origins. (How their characters completed each other.)

This is going to be an analysis on how their differences came together and contributed to their downfalls once they parted. I really like how this turned out—it’s very interesting.

Long post, read under cut:

Satoru:

Blamed the Jujutsu Higher-ups for even burdening him and Suguru, who were both sixteen, with the task of escorting Riko—who was only fourteen—to Tengen. The fate of the entire world rested on the shoulders of three kids who were only put in their position because of abilities assigned at birth, and nothing else. The three of them literally had no choice in the matter. Also, because of what happened with Haibara. Satoru deduced that the elders shouldn’t be in charge of sending kids off to their deaths to fight uphill battles.

So, he in turn decides to raise strong allies in the form of students so that they one day can overthrow the elders in hopes of establishing a more fair and just system for sorcerers. Here, he recognizes the need for sorcerers to exorcise curses to protect the populace, but does not agree with the system as it stands.

Note, Satoru before the Star Plasma Vessel incident had barely any motivation to exorcise curses other than the fact that he could do it. He did it for fun. He just liked using his powers. He was always a self-assured person.

Suguru:

Blamed non-sorcerers for generating curses in the first place, and developed a deep hatred for them that was seeded after Toji (a non-sorcerer) ‘killed’ Satoru and killed Riko, as well as after he witnessed non-sorcerers applauding the death of Riko, a fourteen year old girl. He met Yuki, Tsukumo, who introduced to him the idea of getting rid of the source of curses. He also blamed humanity for conjuring a curse that killed Haibara. His turning point was finding two young sorcerer girls, Nanako and Mimiko (~seven years old) caged up like animals by non-sorcerers. It probably reminded him of his own childhood—I can only imagine how his parents must have at least alienated him for his abilities, since they were not sorcerers. It also in part probably reminded him of Riko, and how she’d been a young girl unfairly targeted due to her abilities. It definitely triggered him.

So, his goal became to rid the world of non-sorcerers, so that curses wouldn’t exist. To do this, he had to abandon all of the principles he had subscribed to thus far and become a villain who kills people—but he did it for his cause.

Note, Suguru has always been a self-righteous person. It’s a bit different from who Satoru is. He has had time to think about his place in the world because unlike Satoru, he was born to a normal family and had to find where he belonged himself. Satoru, on the other hand, was told where his place was from the moment he was born.

So, Suguru defined himself as somewhat of a hero who valiantly, selflessly swallows nasty curses to protect the populace.

Satoru never had to define himself. He was already defined at birth. A wielder of the Six Eyes and Limitless, a once in a lifetime anomaly, a scale-tipping, monstrosity more powerful than anyone else.

These origins are both of their downfalls, and this is ultimately why the two needed each other so badly. They did complete each other as people.

As I said above, Suguru had to define himself. He had to affirm to himself that what he was doing was for the good of the people—it was how he had convinced himself society had to run. The strong protect the weak, it doesn’t matter if one had a choice or not. If you are strong, you have a duty to become a protector.

The issue with this mindset is that he has absolutely no attachment to it whatsoever. The only thing it does for him is make him feel good about himself in his early days as an active sorcerer. Even Satoru calls him out, letting Suguru know he “hates righteousness” and that he just “makes himself feel better” by “spouting bullshit”, the bullshit being his ‘heroic’ beliefs. At his core, Suguru believes himself to be a hero of sorts, which is why when things go sideways, he does a one-eighty and decided to kill all non-sorcerers rather than protect them. In his mind, he’s still affirming to himself that he’s the hero. It’s just that now, he’s protecting other sorcerers. The enemy has changed. He’s still the self-righteous, martyr-Suguru he has always defined himself as, sticking his neck out for the good of his cause.

He lost his grip because he was not emotionally attached to being a sorcerer. He was just attached to being a hero. This is why when entering Jujutsu High, Yaga puts such a huge emphasis on digging deep and finding a strong, personal reason to be a sorcerer. He recognizes that he fell short in that aspect when it came to Suguru, and doesn’t want it happening again. Resolve is very, very important so that once doesn’t lose their mind.

Now, let’s take a look at Satoru’s mind in contrast. He is the strongest sorcerer. The ‘honored one’. He always has been. He had bounties on his head before he could walk, and grown adults feared him even as a child. He was always seen for his abilities first and not his soul, so he identified with his powers more strongly.

This caused him to become disillusioned with himself. He believed that being strong was all someone could need, and that he was untouchable. He was relied on by everyone. “Gojo can handle it.” “Just wait for Gojo.” He was the trump card. That’s why he strolled up to Shibuya so nonchalantly—the way he was raised gave him a natural arrogance. It’s not because he’s a jerk. It’s because that’s all he knows. He was raised believing he was all powerful, so what else can he default to? He was literally wired that way.

Unfortunately, because he leaned so heavily on his powers, he forgot who he was as a person. Especially after Suguru, the only person he was able to form a vulnerable emotional bond with, compared him to his powers and left him.

Caveat I want to make about that point: Suguru was the only person who treated Satoru like a human being. Everyone else saw him as the Six Eyes. Because he made Satoru feel seen, because he tried making Satoru a better person (teaching him manners, acting as his moral compass), Satoru grew attached to him. So, when Suguru’s psyche took a turn for the worst and he left Satoru in Shinjuku, the line “are you the strongest because you’re Satoru Gojo? Or are you Satoru Gojo because you’re the strongest?” dealt a fatal blow to his heart. This was the one person he trusted deeply, reducing him to a man with powers, just like everyone else his whole life did. It caused a rift in their relationship. It caused Satoru to rethink his entire identity—how much of himself was based off of his powers? How much of himself wasn’t based off of his powers? Suguru’s presence allowed him to feel more human and less like a creature than he ever had. But those words pushed him back into that constraint.

In chapter 236, Satoru reveals to Suguru that somehow, though he had love for everyone around him, he felt a line had been drawn where he felt more like a creature than a human being.

A TikTok user (lauravpvp) pointed out something that drives this point home. Satoru wears a blindfold over his eyes 90% of the time. As his powers grow, the coverings get thicker and more restricting. He starts with glasses, then bandages, and then the black blindfold. Eyes are the window to the soul—and as he gets stronger, the less he shows them; the less he beard his soul.

We look into someone’s eyes to see how they’re feeling, to connect to them. His eyes are always covered, so he prevents that connection and prevents people from knowing how he feels. He dehumanizes himself that way.

Because of that, when he goes into his fight with Sukuna, he goes believing he’d the strongest and that he would win. It’s all he’s reduced himself to. This blind attachment to his powers, to the idea that he had to do it alone, is what lead to his downfall.

Because he learned the hard way that he wasn’t the strongest.

In his final moments, he reinforces what he had discovered after Suguru left him in Shinjuku.

Strength alone is not enough. Why?

He said that if Suguru had been there to pat him on the back, he would have truly been satisfied.

Suguru, who had to fight to find his identity his whole life—who, because he spent so much time defining himself, helped Satoru define himself in ways that were separate from his abilities. And Satoru, who identified himself with his abilities so much that it reinforced Suguru’s confidence in his own abilities.

They completed each other. Suguru’s moral compass and strict principles held Satoru’s head on right, and Satoru’s confidence and youthful heart kept Suguru motivated and away from the dark.

Without each other, Suguru descended into madness and Satoru lost sight of his human side.

[clairedaring]

I’m enjoying spare me your mercy and love JJ and Tor but I wish the series was 12 eps instead of 8 eps so there’s more time for the plot and to develop their relationship haha. Their relationship development feels slightly rushed now

Hi nonnie 😭😭😭😭😭😭

sighs. loudly sighs again... i get you anon, really i do. i'm really just here constantly mourning about how condensed they've made this series out to be when the source material they're trying to adapt is so long. i think @waitmyturtles 's latest post about smym ep 4 sums up well what some non-novel reader audience will feel about kantew's relationship.

detailed discussions with novel spoilers under the cut, read at your own risk 😭

since it's probably no longer a spoiler since the series has adjusted to change the culprit, i can probably discuss spoilers from the first novel in this post for comparison sake.

so at the end of book 1, Dr. Somsak is revealed to be the murderer for most of the deaths presented but he also knows that Kan has been euthanising patients -> They get into a gun fight -> Dr. Somsak gets fatally shot but isn't dead and got sent to the hospital -> Kan kills Somsak (his first intentional murder) before he could testify in court but the case is closed because all the deaths were indeed caused by Somsak.

I think in this sense, Book 1 made more sense because this was all happening while Kan and Tew were in an established relationship, henceforth in the latter half of Book 1 when evidences were starting to point at Kan, it paid off well to see Tew so distressed and hurt because he didn't like being lied to and he couldn't believe his lover who's he been fucking is a serial murderer (even though he isn't).

The betrayal comes around again in Book 2 when Tew finds out he's been lied to AGAIN. And you could tell the angst hits harder is because we SEE them together as a couple, as boyfriends in a budding established relationship, not as people who have only been seeing each other for a few weeks.

I understand the need to adjust and cover the big plot points but yea I feel the same way anon... their source material was more than enough to be covered in 12-16 eps as opposed to 8 eps. or alternatively as @waitmyturtles suggested in her comment here, it would have been much better to present kantew as an established couple from the beginning and flashback to the past before starting to unravel their relationship.

sighs.... i think Tor and JJ are killing it with the material they're given though. Carrying this type of script is just hard though because sometimes chemistry and acting skills alone isn't enough for a convincing romance narrative.

loudest sighs... lord i wish we got more KanTew scenes before they killed Dr. Somsak off to move tbe story along like pleaseeeee. I was robbed.

I wish I could be mad at Lux but then again they've been able to really incorporate a lot of debates on Euthanasia which Book 1 severely lacked into these first four episodes (something @lurkingshan has also noted here) I can't be entirely mad because you can't say there aren't good adjustments...

But it just so happens that Spare Me Your Mercy has ended up more of a series about clashing opinions on Euthanasia than a crime investigation/romance/suspense series... but the actors have promoted it to be the former rather than the latter so I've really only got myself to blame for expecting more on the relationship development 😭😭😭😭😭

also my apologies nonnie for dumping all this on you... smym is shaping up to be my no. 1 series of the year (because of all the euthanasia debates) but not at all for the reason i expected it to be (for the romance between the cunty and charming doctor and the dorky righteous gullible cop)

[deathmetalunicorn1]

League of Villians dealing with a member that has hannahki due to a hero, ANGST!

I actually had to look up what Hanahaki was as I didn’t recognize the term, but once I saw it I knew what it was (I just didn’t know the name).

-It had been a fight that went wrong very quickly, and you had been hit in the crossfire.

-You were a member of the League of Members, your friends- your family, but you had a supportive role, using your healing abilities to keep your friends safe.

-The heroes knew about you, and many tried to convince you to become a hero, wanting to use your abilities for the Hero Association, which you had no intention of doing.

-Your parents had used you, forcing you to heal others despite the backlash it had on your body if you did too much in such a short amount of time. They extorted your quirk for money, charging a small fortune to have you heal others so they wouldn’t have to go to the hospital.

-After your parents were found out and arrested by the Hero Association, they tried doing the same thing, using the guise that you were a hero, and it was the duty of heroes to help others!

-You were tired of helping others, as you remember begging so many of the ones you were forced to heal to save you from your cruel parents who would beat you to comply, only for them to ignore you. And you told the Association you didn’t want to heal others, not wanting to use your powers, they tried to gaslight you, telling you that your quirk was meant to help others and to not do it would cause suffering for so many.

-What about your suffering?

-That’s when you met Shigaraki and the League of Villains, your safe space, people who cared about you as a person, who never made you use your quirk if you didn’t want to.

-You didn’t do ‘evil’ things like they did, but you did nothing to stop or report them which basically made you a villain, but you ignored the self-righteous words of the heroes who constantly tried to ‘save you’ from them.

-You knew that you were safe right where you were.

-It was a battle with a newly emerged hero who used flowers to fight, from binding to stunning with pollen and other flower-based attacks.

-When he had seen you hiding around a corner, watching your friends fight, making sure none of them would get seriously injured, he came to evacuate you from the area, thinking you were a civilian that hadn’t been able to get away.

-He realized who you were, and he grabbed your wrist, telling you that you had to come and heal his comrades that had been hurt, but you refused, trying to hit his hand to get free.

-He grew angry at your defiance and when Dabi saw you being accosted, he shouted, trying to get this hero away from you, rushing towards you. When Dabi sent a wall of fire at this hero, he shot a hand towards you, hitting you with something that blew you back, away from Dabi’s flames, but you knew that Dabi would never hurt you.

-You clutched at your chest, feeling a sudden heaviness growing as your eyes went wide, trying to gasp for air as you coughed up flower petals. Your hands covered your mouth in horror as Dabi saw what happened and when the others realized you had been hit, Shigaraki ordered the retreat.

-Himeko was beside herself in tears about an hour later at the hideout as you were struggling to breathe, coughing up flowers as it felt like your esophagus was struggling to open and you were growing weaker and weaker, unable to get the air you needed.

-Spanner was panicking, hugging you close, trying to comfort you, “What do we do?!” Twice was panicking, holding his head as he kept flip flopping, saying you needed a hospital while the other personality said they needed to hunt down this hero and make him fix you!

-Shigaraki was quieter than normal, not liking the sight of you suffering so much and when you lurched again, coughing up more petals, he glared, standing suddenly, “We’re going! Twice- you and Toga guard Y/N! Spanner you carry Y/N- Dabi with me!”

-Spanner held you close as Shigaraki led the group to the Hero Association, furious that you had been attacked, and when they stormed in, instantly they were surrounded by heroes, ready to take them all on until their focus quickly went to you as you coughed up more petals, your body beginning to convulse from the force of the coughs, trying to clear out the flower petals.

-Eyes went wide and instantly All Might, who was front and center, demanded the hero that did this to you be brought forward, as this attack was deemed illegal, due to it being so dangerous, and to see that an innocent had been hit made the situation worse.

-The hero, Flower Power, seemed smug, like he had won, “Looks like my plan worked! I knew you all would turn yourselves in to save Y/N!”

-He didn’t realize that there was a Twice clone high above, livestreaming the whole thing, showing how cruel some heroes actually were as Flower Power continued to monologue, acting like he was hot shit since he got the League of Villains to turn themselves in to save you, and to get you back in their custody so you could heal people again.

-Surprisingly, All Might was the one who grabbed Flower Power, looking scary as he glared down at him, “You harmed an innocent and willingly put their life at risk. Fix this now!” being faced with a very pissed off All Might would make anyone wet themselves, and he was quick to reverse his attack on you, instantly clearing your lungs.

-You gulped down air, gasping loudly as Spanner held you close, calling out your name in worry as Himeko kneeled next to you, rubbing your back and took the face mask for oxygen from Midnight who rushed it over.

-All Might threw Flower Power down, and many were looking furious at him that he would do such a thing, calling for his immediate termination from the Association, while others had to admit, while extreme, his methods did manage to do a lot.

-All Might allowed Shigaraki and the rest of you to leave without a fight, once you were stable, not willing to fight, as it showed that while villains, they still did what they had to in order to help you, showing that they weren’t truly bad people, they just did bad things.

-All Might told Shigaraki the next time they would meet, they would be taken into custody, something Shigaraki wasn’t bothered at, as he was only worried about getting you back home where you were safe once again.

-Nobody was going to take you from them, as you were there of your own choice. Nobody was going to use you. Nobody.