#...no matter how thematically appropriate

[vague-magnus-archives]

.

[lordsovorn]

In retrospect, it's very impressive how thematically loyal Dandadan stays to the dual theme of alien conspiracies and ghost superstitions. "The world is big and dangerous and unknown, full of mysterious actors and hidden forces that threaten our deepest, most intimate insecurities for unknowable reasons"

Dandadan's aliens are logical and just in a way that is absolutely absurd in practice, but have the power to apply their judgement onto humans regardless, in the ultimate kafkaesque sense. And you might never even know it, and likely never fully will. And ghosts are vicious reflections of this dangerous and unjust world, sadistically hurting random people they encounter from a perverted desire for justice and overwhelming, directionless emotions. These conspiracies and superstitions present a world without grand universal justice, and Dandadan takes that to heart. But there are always ways to fight back, avoid the dangers and stay safe. There may not be divine or cosmic justice in the world, or a promise that nothing bad will ever happen to you. But there IS resolution, and catharsis, and safety nets, and kindness, and stupid fun, and teen romance along the way.

I guess what I want to say is: Dandadan swings from funny to heart-wrenching, from fun to terrifying, and it also has really uncomfortable moments sometimes. And while you could argue that they make the story harder to approach for some, they are very thematically appropriate regardless. And not in a misery-fest way - it always works out in Dandadan. As much as it is a homage to paranoia and dread and injustice, it is a fun ride of interpersonal growth and unexpected friendships, full of hope and nice certainties and fixing things and making things better.

And though it may not always work out in the "justice is restored, evil is destroyed" way and this might be irksome at times as well - it's not out of the blue either. And, in the end, it works out in all the ways that matter for the people living through it.

Not every story is for everyone, of course, and it's okay. But if you were intrigued and had reservations after certain scenes - I say give it a chance, with this in mind.

[elizabethrobertajones]

summer scions!! I absolutely love the new portraits for all their smug happy expressions. Except Y'shtola, who is not going to deign to give a camera a proper saucy look because that's silly. Urianger is smirking twice as hard on her behalf.

Glam review under the cut!

I unlocked Alphinaud first of the twins and didn't know Alisaie had a little necktie yet, so I'm deducting a point from my first impression because the sheer delight that he had a silly little necktie of some sort no matter the situation delighted me so thoroughly. Since they're still engaging in matchy twin dressing to some degree, I have to assume they either like it and won't admit it after digging in so hard, or Ameliance sent them off with cute outfits and matching backpacks, and they still don't really shop for themselves.

He's got the practical watch/compass gloves which are good for a technically proficient Sage and probably the most practical gear he's ever worn except for when he was poncho Alphy, but wearing ankle-length jeans seem like the least weather-appropriate choice of the Scions if we assume their average skin coverage is a good weathervane for the temperature in Tural. I chalk it up to teenage awkwardness.

8/10 unless he and Alisaie chose their outfits themselves, in which case it's a 9/10

I think Alisaie is the only Scion to keep a single piece of their default gear, and those are her usual gloves. She's colour-matched around it.

Because of the gloves and boots, she looks the most ready for hardcore hiking, somehow, and her matching Alphinaud with a cute button down shirt with rolled up sleeves along with that particular choice of baggier shorts (when she normally wears more form fitting shorts) do give me the closest to butch vibes it's probably likely to get for main characters. So I'm giving her an extra point I stole from Alphinaud for the lesbian vibes.

9/10 or 10/10 if she made these choices all by herself.

Everything about this cracks me up, from his portrait above to the image of him tanking open shirted once he pulls mobs.

Believe it or not, he's getting an additional point for those shoes simply because the competition in practicality in tanking is G'raha.

I had a moment of excitement when I thought the necklace was pink because that's always a cute Ryne/Minfillia thing fanartists give him with ribbons and such, but once I got zoomed in on him it was red, so I guess he's just been shopping. Although, the turquoise shorts are her eye colour and the actual large diamond shapes are secretly Mothercrystal coded in those colours, which just cracks me up that you can pick out one of the worse days of his life (Urianger's grand Warrior of Darkness plan) in his Chill Summer Beach Vibes look.

Douchebag beach bro shell bracelet as well, which really makes me double down on him and Urianger spending way too much on tourist bait along the stalls in the Famous Turali Market. The hat and sunglasses are giving him one of the Most tourist-y looks thematically reflecting how a lot of the Scion guys were just here to hang out, narratively or literally. Maybe he's trying not to get such an intense tan again, which is the only reason he's not entirely topless.

11/10 I could not stop laughing when I got him and Urianger to 100 and Beheld The Brilliance in the same moment.

Please note the raised sunglasses in Urianger's portrait, which are not the model his character uses.

I am delighted that I had been incorporating that island watch into my healer glams on both the logic you need to know your clock positionals but also they're largely the smarty pants jobs (WHM being vibes only aside - it gets its own glams :P). And here's Urianger and Alphinaud both using watches.

Now, I had a moment of being vaguely disappointed he had trousers not a skirt or something else swishy and androgynous, but then I did realise that I, a nonbinary weirdo who relates to Urianger since he made me nonbinary, have actually gone to a couple of garden parties dressed in some variation of this exact outfit of light trousers and a nice button up. Plus, the earrings are in both ears, so no "Google, which ear is the gay one?", these are just straight up cute femme dangly earrings with his favourite little dudes on.

More importantly, the colours he's repping are those of Lopporit Radio. He probably tunes in every night for his broadcasts :')

Mirrored sunglasses for the guy notorious for keeping thoughts and plans close to his chest and choosing deliberately to be enigmatic even when it serves zero purpose except for I guess gender affirming care. (The gender is Weird Bitch.)

I can't tell how I feel about those dad sandals. I suppose it depends if he's wearing them like a fashion model (brand new and clean with perfect pedicured feet) or if those are REALLY dad at the beach-like and, since I'm not a foot person, this for me is only a choice between "not off-putting" and "AURGH".

9/10 the proximity to Thancred hauls him up several points of misgivings I had, and the lopporit shout outs are killing me :')

I unlocked Y'shtola last and holy fuck I am a lesbian. I don't even recognise where those boots come from, so either a really expensive glam or something I just have not stumbled on. She has toe rings I think? And painted nails? I have no idea if the garter (?) is part of the boots glam or a custom thing as result of not recognising the boots and how much of them is normal. I feel like they customised a lot on her anyway - the back of her top has purple beads that match her staff (not dyable on the real piece)

and I think the necklace has to be part of the top instead of a separate necklace piece with the way it hangs, AND the bracelets are a glove piece with the original summer glam, but I assume they're layered with the false nails, also in the glove slot. All in all it's giving the sort of effort which is starting to creep up to what I'd expect from the modding community not the game. I mean, not THAT good but getting close. Baby steps towards what fandom can make :P

She really is god's favourite meow meow.

Anyway I can't really judge this fairly because it's really hot and I love her so I'm just going to give it 100/10 and move on. :)

how did I get a picture where Estinien looks like he's stooping to get in the frame...

The fact he has Azure Dragoon Blue Top and then Violently Nidhogg Fuchsia shorts is the colour theory that absolutely killed me. When he lights up during his burst and starts glowing pink all over his shorts are like. Taking him over like the eye once did I think.

love a guy who can embrace his past trauma and dress to match all that has passed before and all that he intends to do now (kill something large and tasty, grill it on the beach, fall asleep with a beer in hand until the waves come in and wake him up).

I gave him that wooden bracelet in the glam he has on my desktop screen so once again I'm feeling weirdly vindicated.

Other details: no ponytail despite the warm weather because he's got enough ventilation. The fact there's cactaurs on his shirt when he's on record for eating them is amazing. We should imagine he's wearing his jobstone like that pendant (since he's one of the only guys with a confirmed jobstone despite being the Guy Without A Job notoriously that one time.)

Unlike Thancred's hat and sunglasses combo, which seems fun and boisterous somehow, he seems the most walled off of all the sunglasses wearers even though he's not the most mysterious. The visor really helps make it a sort of wall. Maybe just because his terse upfront personality and somehow despite his clothes horse habits THIS amount of whimsy seems the most out of character at first glance, but he DOES look uncomfortable to me.

Somehow I find everything about this outfit excellent for his character but also like maybe he was forced into it, everyone cornering him and telling him the Scion Beach Party was a mandatory work event and he was not allowed to beg off of it and he did put some work in expressing himself but also is going to go find a much quieter corner to lurk in for the day, when not competing with Thancred (can't grill, loves it) for the barbeque (Estinien can grill, would only do it because the threat of Thancred doing it wrong is too high).

confused 7/10 mostly because I think Krile is blackmailing him and not because I don't love everything about this.

Here's how G'reenha Tia can still win -

Anyway here's the deducted point for tanking in flip flops (PERFECTLY acceptable BLM gear btw but he's Mr Versatile.)

(I joke but the main character of my novels is a flip-flop wearing menace who could and would tank in them)

Between the padlock and key necklace and the woven bracelet right after we all went feral over the Thavnarian bracelets for couples thing so recently (and Corvos is just across the water!) he's absolutely dripping cutie pie love interest coding yet again.

(Also yes I know the lock and key thing is very funny because we were introduced to him learning he was a fancy key to a big door.)

Gains a point back because the other green g'raha thing is I'm pretty sure people use this shirt glam because it kinda looks like it has weed on it.

Don't quote me on that, vibes only.

Anyway he came colour coordinated (with his original eye colour and hair colour not the bright Allagan dalamud red dye that goes with his normal outfit) so so precise and neat, like he's going to some sort of formal event, and even with flip flops he really does seem incredibly put together like the twins or Y'shtola, just for full outfit cohesiveness.

As someone who would hold G'raha's hand on the romantic gondola vibe, 10/10.

3 out of 10 and a huge cringe if you would not. He's got to stop Striving.

Hey it's the star of the show!! Adorable hairstyle out, cute plot-important earring on, and wearing her exact character colours but adorable beach wear :)

I love that she looks kind of like she went to the girls for advice and got the top from Y'shtola and the shorts from Alisaie, and she probably was very serious and stressed about getting this right even though there's no rules and no one's judging her -

oops.

Anyway the ballet shoes are adorable and go with all the cute picto spins and twirls :)

I think the strict colour scheme does speak to the slight lack of fleshing out she got so far in the story (we don't really have any real character reason that picto in particular spoke to her and this glam isn't one of the many fun takes people had on how to dress to meet that brief ). I don't think DT did more than just repeat that she's serious and sweet and trying really hard to get out of her shell and be more fun and creative and also she's been practicing dodging really hard she shouts mid-Trust combat (bless her). But ALSO getting out of the shell is really hard and she only found out everything and got some closure in the final level 100 quests so there wasn't really much to do with her after that.

This is like her First Non-Plot-Critical Whimsy Moment and losing the hood or any cat ears entirely (and there are perfectly functional cat ears to wear in game) is a good step considering we know she wears it precisely because she needed a sort of advance PR campaign to make her look cute and approachable before she opened her mouth and started bringing down the vibe (serious scary children are SO funny though and i love that for her). Having the same top as Y'shtola is a good thing for trying to make her less childish and have her trying to show that now as she takes this huge step out from the background. I mean, it still has a slight sense of her costuming herself and pushing herself out of comfort zones as she always does, but it's 100% in character so I adore it.

1000/10 because Krile is great and there's so much going on here and it's so fun when a character's whole personality is a costume and then they're like aurgh wait do I even want that??

[lesbianrobin]

ok so here is my pitch for my dream buddie catalyst:

eddie and maddie are trapped in some sort of likely-fatal time sensitive situation together (drowning related probably because it's Them) (have they overused it yes is it still thematically appropriate YES) where one person could potentially sacrifice themselves for the other to survive. i want eddie and maddie using their combined experience and ingenuity to survive together and discussing who should be prioritized which means they talk about parenthood and how they both feel they've failed their children by "running," how their lives have been so defined by trauma and they don't want to scar their children any further by leaving them again. of course they're doing everything they can to get out together, but as the situation deteriorates throughout the episode(s) (c'mon something like this could be at LEAST a two-parter) they can't help returning periodically to the world's most morbid debate.

i want buck and chim on the outside both going out of their goddamn minds. they know that eddie and maddie are stuck (wherever), know that they're probably alive, but aren't sure in what condition and if they'll stay that way. rescue operations begin as everybody walks on eggshells around buck and tries to comfort chim, who wants absolutely none of it. time is running out.

eddie says that he couldn't possibly let maddie sacrifice herself for him and look buck and chim in the eye afterwards. maddie says that she couldn't do that either. she says that at least jee-yun would still have her father, and eddie says that christopher would still have buck. maddie says that of course none of them would just abandon christopher if something were to happen to him but—

and eddie cuts her off and says it's in my will. if i die, christopher will have buck. buck will have christopher.

they just look at each other for a weighted moment. maddie makes a decision. she says ...i meant it, you know. that i couldn't let you die down here (wherever here is i don't KNOW okay i'm not here to think up convoluted emergencies i'm here for drama) and look my baby brother in the eye knowing that i could have changed it. eddie says i know, okay, but it's different, you're his sister, and maddie says, yeah, but you're his... and she pauses. and eddie says what? best friend? partner? that doesn't—

and maddie says you're his. eddie, you're his.

and eddie... i want to see something slot into place. i want to watch him understand as maddie spills everything she's been suspecting since the day that buck came out to her and maybe since before she and eddie even met. maddie says you know, when i first came to california, you were all he talked about? you're still all he talks about. you and christopher. you're his. i couldn't... eddie, you're out of your mind if you really don't think that losing you would break him just as much as losing me. he would forgive us both, because he's buck, but i couldn't... i'm no saint, eddie, i want to survive. i don't want my daughter to grow up without me. but i can't do that to him. i don't know if he'd survive it. even if he did, the guilt would eat me alive.

meanwhile. buck is barely holding on to his sanity as rescue efforts are underway and time is running out. chimney is keeping it together as best he can but there isn't much that he and buck can do. he can't let himself fall apart because buck is already a stiff breeze away from clawing his own skin off and somebody has to keep their cool. something goes wrong—suddenly, their short amount of time has gotten shorter, and they may only have enough of a window to get one out before it's too late for the other. buck, who has been ranting and arguing and screaming this whole time... is silent. he is silent, and he stares straight ahead at nothing in particular, and we know that no matter which way the scales tip, his soul will be destroyed all the same.

eddie regards maddie for a moment. grief, heartbreak, anger, all flicker over him, but what settles is determination. he says that neither of them are going to leave again. that they'll survive together, or not at all, or leave it to the universe to decide.

of course they make it out. by the skin of their teeth, they make it out, working together, clawing their way back to life and love and possibility. maddie makes it out first, and eddie sees buck as she falls into chim's waiting arms. he watches as buck sees his sister, and reaches out to take her hand with trembling fingers and white knuckles, but there is no relief, no happiness in his red-rimmed eyes. just a deep, unspeakable grief, until his eyes slide past maddie and meet eddie's.

finally: relief. and then he is in buck's arms, a perfect parallel to chim and maddie, and we see eddie's face over buck's shoulder, and we know. he is in love, and buck is in love, and eddie knows, and he sinks into his partner's embrace with joy and acceptance.

after that, who knows? maybe a grand confession. a moment of quiet understanding. a passionate post-rescue kiss. a chaste, tender kiss in some kitchen or other. maybe eddie panics later, or maybe he's found peace for once. maybe buck has realized something and he makes the first move. maybe it happens immediately. maybe it takes a while, takes discussions about how it'll affect work and christopher and whether it's worth risking all that they have for all that they want.

and maybe they'll ask whether it's even a risk at all.

[liketwoswansinbalance]

If Rhian were a villain as his own character, in character, I feel like he'd be the kind of villain to explain his whole Evil plan, giving it away completely instead of keeping it to himself because he's incapable of keeping it to himself. He would be hyped up with excitement for his vision coming to fruition, and most importantly, he would want to do it for the showmanship as he's theatrical like that. Then again, he may be too smart to reveal it all.

If you recall his thematically-appropriate outfit during the Circus of Talents, he seems to love causing a scene, and while Rafal does share this tendency towards the dramatic, I don't believe it's to the same effect or as extreme as Rhian's.

And this brings me to the point that it's just flat-out��unusual for Rhian to wear essentially the same outfit for 200 years.

I mean, that seems unlike him and extreme. For evidence, it's implied by TLEA, by the image of his midnight blue robes hanging on a hook in the tower like a relic at the beginning of the book, that he's worn that selfsame outfit all that time. Sure, he must've not had an occasion to dress up for, but when did that ever stop him? Did imitating Rafal mean he had almost given up on his fashion sense? It's not like anyone had seen him. He didn't have anyone to perform in front of after all. Maybe that's the reason: no one would see him, so it wouldn't matter? He'd probably become depressed, and perhaps, the loneliness drove him insane and away from old behaviors.

Yet, how could Rhian, the man who was a fashion icon in his better days, be reduced to wearing the same midnight blue robes for 200 years, as the first trilogy implies? Even villainous Fall Rhian with his pure spun gold cloak did better than this version of him.

Wearing the same clothes like a uniform is Rafal behavior, and while taking that trait completes his disguise, which I'm sure Rhian had down by SGE's present, if no one had the faintest memory of what the real Rafal was like, what was keeping Rhian from caring about his appearance like he once did? He only seemed to fall back into fashion and indulge in it in order to appeal to Sophie and that's it. Did he never regain the right state of mind for fashion to be of any importance by himself? Did Sophie revive that lost part of him?

In conclusion, that is the most implausible thing about the Fall twist: Rhian's lack of fashion sense. /j

[spockandawe]

Right, here's something new! This is the novel Sacred And Terrible Air by Robert Kurvitz, the writer behind Disco Elysium, set in the same alternate universe. The original is written in Estonian, and there's been talk of licensing a translation, but that was supposed to happen in 2020, and given the time lapse since then and other events, it looks increasingly unlikely. So earlier this year, two fan translations dropped! As the fans involved say, definitely support an official translation if it happens, but if it doesn't happen, at least there's this. One translation is by a hired translator, and one is by Group Ibex as MTL that went through iterative edits. And something that's very interesting to me given how much time I've spent wallowing in the danmei pit, I couldn't identify which one i definitely liked BETTER. So rather than wrestling decision paralysis, here we are!

Dos-a-dos time, babey! I did one of these in VERY small size for binderary, but other than that, I think the only time I've done this is for my sixfold/fourteenfold experiments? It's very pleasing to have one in my hands that's so substantial. There's 350ish pages on either side of this, and I love it a lot!

It does feature one easter egg that's a special treat for me. When I was trying to pull together the front matter and scrounging for info about the original Estonian novel, google translate gave me some... interesting takes on the title, and I took my favorite (holy and terrible smell) and tucked it inside my endpapers. To build on the stack of in-jokes that will be inscrutable to anyone who stumbles on this book later, I scented the spines of the books with perfume, 'the sea foams milk,' both because the scent felt right for this and because the name felt thematically appropriate

I had a very fun time with this! The formatting took more time than I expected, but the actual binding was nice and relaxing. I don't cover many covers with paper, but this paper was so PERFECT for the story, and then I got excited about matching the endpapers to covers, and the bookcloth spine was a flawless color match, and this all came together so nicely! It was a great little project, and I had a great time making it :D

[lawlightautismtruther]

I genuinely feel like L’s monster speech is more or less just self-loathing rather than an objective observation of himself. I feel like once a piece of media leaves the artist’s mind, however a viewer interprets it, especially when the text itself suggests it more than anything, should be considered entirely valid. This is one of those situations.

The whole “L is a cold, stoic monster” thing just never really felt true, even though Obha insists on it. I’m not sure what his motivation for this might be, probably to make death note seem edgier than it is, colder and more morally gray, but tbh it loses depth under that lens.

I always interpreted L as so hypersensitive and lonely that he doesn’t know how to actually process it or communicate it appropriately, probably because of what I believe (and many others) is a case of autistic alexithymia. I think it made his death matter and it struck so much harder. It had more thematic implications on his and light’s relationship (lawlight aside Lmfao, even just the surface level friendship)

I think after years of having people run it into the ground that you will never be normal, that you are dysfunctional in your relationships, and that you’re a selfish liar would ultimately fuck up your perception of yourself. I think that’s L’s problem. He was always just a tool to other people— wealth for Watari and a mentor for the kids. He never got the chance to prove himself capable of human emotion so at this point he just believes what people have to say about him. I think his death is actually a rebuttal to this idea. That’s why the monster speech is post-death. It’s supposed to show you how L viewed himself vs how he really was. How his sensitivity and desperation for friendship and love killed him. I can talk about why I think L not convicting Light was a choice if you guys want, but yeah, that’s my take on the matter. Obha aside.

[patchwork-crow-writes]

I think I might have a (highly implauable but thematically appropriate) theory about why Ralsei seems to act so suspiciously at certain key moments, arrives in places he shouldn't be able to go, and knows things he shouldn't be able to know.

It's not because he's evil. It's not because he's being dishonest. No, this explanation is far more mundane, yet far more insidious.

Ralsei... is the narrative's literal chew toy.

He gets to the cyber world under his own power because the narrative NEEDS him to be there, and so he just... is. No explanation is offered because the narrative cannot offer one, and so instead just glosses over it entirely.

The narrative demands that he tell Berdly and co about the Roaring just before a new fountain is opened, not because he was keeping any of it from his friends, but because that knowledge, in that exact moment, would create the maximum impact and drama. And so that knowledge just... pops into his head, right when it would most serve the narrative stakes for this information to become apparent.

Ralsei is not in control of his life. The NARRATIVE dictates when he speaks, puts him places when it's convenient for him to be there, makes him forgettable when it's convenient for him to be nondescript, feeds him information as and when it needs to be dispersed to the characters and the player. He does not get a say in this. The narrative dictates all - he's just a tool to its end.

Which is why, when you break the narrative in half with the weird route, Ralsei reacts with surprise when things don't go according to what the narrative is telling him should happen in that moment.

Kris's choices don't matter because the player is controlling them. Ralsei's choices don't matter because you don't get to choose anything in a linear narrative that's constructed for that same player's enjoyment. They're two sides of the same coin.

Crack theory? Probably. But given how meta Toby Fox can get, are you really gonna put something like this past him?

[crimeronan]

how did you name your original characters? trying to name some guys without getting distracted making a whole conlang again :/

unfortunately it Did involve getting distracted by worldbuilding. LMAO.

naming conventions are usually the first thing i pin down when i'm culturally worldbuilding bc their construction says a lot -- are there surnames? patrilineal, matrilineal, both? are people named after relatives? do people choose their own names? how common is changing a name? etc etc etc

i think it would be hard to hang out with a million trans people and NOT have a fascination with naming conventions leak into my writing.

so. oichen culture, which is where both ruby and sol are from, doesn't use traditional surnames. people are, for the most part, named for literal concepts & then translate those names literally across languages. if you're a functional parent in this society you're generally expected to name your kid after something that brings you joy/peace. it's a way of passing down bits of a parent's personality/values, which matters more than linear surnames.

ruby sunrise was named by a pair of insufferable morning people. honey fern (another important character) was named for the way sunlight falls across leaves in summer afternoons. winter solstice was named for the most loving and celebratory holiday in the oichen calendar, because when you're in a very northern country with bitterly cold winters, you Must celebrate the days getting longer. and getting together as family and friends is much more important in the dead months than at any other time. we made it to the end of the darkness!!!

sol, of course, now lives in a place with a very small oichen diaspora, at least compared to the rest of tachni's population. both "sol" and "winnie" are easy nicknames that make her sound less Foreign. she's spent years getting rid of her accent and assimilating and building a completely fake self.

so when she tells people her parents named her winter solstice because they sensed the empty ice in her, Most of them don't know enough to dispute it.

(ruby does. obviously.)

on the Other hand, tachnin names are Much more like typical 2020s suburban american names. sometimes literally (robert, nova, maddie, etc) and sometimes just in vibes (camde, adan, etc). because tachni is the heart of global commerce and capitalism and imperialism and whatnot.

so. feels thematically appropriate.

nova's name was chosen because i wanted something sky-related and light-related to contrast winter solstice.

devin is the only one i just named off the top of my head iirc. but conveniently the name has irish origins that mean "poet" and french origins that mean "divine." so it SOUNDS like i put a lot of thought into it.

"tach" as devin's surname is just the name given to every sad kid in the city with no parents. tach, ie: a ward of the state of tachni. yayyy.

moira tach was named to match devin -- moira is the anglicization of máire, which is the irish form of mary. we love divine women who are in hell. YAAAY.

and then when i'm naming Other supporting cast members, i've been working out cultural and ethnic backgrounds on a character-by-character basis. helps me figure out what other countries are in this whole fantasy world!

[animentality]

Durgetash is important to me not because I think the dark urge is themselves the best written character, or even that Enver Gortash, hit by the rushed act 3 curse, is either, but because I see the thematic potential of their romantic relationship.

Orin destroyed the dark urge because of their relationship with Gortash. I'm not projecting that, she literally said it herself in a note. Whether it was romantic or platonic is subject for debate.

But is there a more beautiful way for an evil character to die, than destroyed by their own humanity, the very thing they thought they had abandoned long ago? Is there any more fitting way for evil to be conquered, than by love itself?

Lord of the rings, our genre defining fantasy epic, from which all fantasy must borrow, always proposed the idea that evil always destroys itself in the end. Evil betrays evil. This is why Frodo is not the one to cast the ring into the fires of Mordor in the end.

Baldur's Gate more openly suggests that evil defeated evil, by the conventional way of backstabbing. Orin kills the Dark Urge out of jealousy and lust for power. Whether they die because you pick a Tav, or survive, doesn't matter because it destabilized the plan, it ruined it. Gortash and Ketheric and Orin fall into infighting, just as Saruman betrayed Sauron, just as evil often does in fantasy, and in real life, when dictators and tyrants fight off would be replacements and opportunists.

If the dark urge survives, they become the greatest thorn in the side of evil, if you do the good run, they don't just destabilize the plan, they destroy it. They end it. They save the world from their own destruction.

And that's all well and good. Evil defeats evil, yes, alright.

But if Gortash and the Dark Urge loved each other...

That adds another complex element to that theme.

It suggests that at the end of the day, even the two worst people in the world, the most evil of despots and killers, could still be fallible, vulnerable to the powerful force of goodness and morality that is love.

It could never change them, couldn't truly save them, in fact, because gortash always dies and the dark urge dies in most runs, when you don't pick dark urge as an origin.

But it was still powerful enough to destroy everything they worked for, all the evil they wrought together. It put a stop to their madness.

Evil lost, because of that critical weakness.

That flaw, in Bhaal and Bane's plans.

The fact that humans (you know what I mean) can't live without love, no matter how well groomed they are for death and destruction and cruelty. That humanity, this great, warm sliver of compassion and camaraderie and genuine affection...is just that powerful. All it took was a little slip, a little snip of threads, a small crack, to shatter completely.

It's cheesy as fuck, and it's been done to death, but love truly does conquer all. Who the fuck cares how played out it is?

I'll die for stories that say, over and over, that love will always defeat evil.

Even if it's not in the way you'd expect.

Whether it resulted in the dark urge's complete demise, or was merely the first stepping stone on their path to salvation...

Evil defeating evil is appropriate. Love defeating evil is not as boring as you'd think it would be.

And using two evil characters, who should not love, but did anyway, and allowed themselves to be ruined by it in the end...

Well.

I think that's neat.

I'm utterly demented for even thinking so hard about this, because I think the developers just meant for Gortash to just be this asshole you just have to kill, and the dark urge was just this edge lord asshole who got off on mutilation.

But I can pretend.

[youhideastar]

WujiWatch: CQL Rewatch Episode 23

Long time, no WujiWatch! But I’ve been reading Catching Chen Qing Ling and it’s put me in an analytical mood about The Untamed again. Picking up where we left off...

Episode 23 has at least two iconic Wangxian scenes: Lan Wangji’s visit to a recovering Wei Wuxian’s sickbed to play Clarity, and the “I am not Wen Ruohan” conversation on the same clifftop where they will meet again in the last moments of Wei Wuxian’s (first) life. One thing I didn’t realize until this rewatch is the way those two scenes are tied together; that the second one picks up, thematically, where the first one left off.

The Clarity scene is interrupted by the screams of Wens being rounded up (and perhaps killed on the spot) and the shouts of their pursuers. Wei Wuxian immediately looks disturbed and asks what’s going on; Lan Wangji says, “they’re hunting down the rest of the Wens” and looks not disturbed at all. I am very good at interpreting Wang Yibo’s microexpressions by now, and this dude is 0% bothered. That is especially striking since the very next scene is all about (among other things) Lan Xichen being very disturbed at the prospect of murdering Wen civilians. By this point in the drama, Lan Wangji has made some progress toward moral nuance—but it’s all specifically Wei Wuxian-focused. His view of the rest of the world is still very black and white. The Wens are bad, so it’s appropriate for bad things to happen to them. End of story.

That’s how the Clarity scene ends, and then, as mentioned, we have the scene where 3zun and Jin Guangshan debate the treatment of the surviving Wens. After that, we have the clifftop scene—and what I’d forgotten is that the first line of dialogue in this scene is Wei Wuxian asking Lan Wangji, “What do you think of the people here [in Nightless City]? Who is good and who is bad?” The fate of the defeated Wens is still very much on Wei Wuxian’s mind. And it’s still a matter of no concern for Lan Wangji: he ignores Wei Wuxian’s question. He doesn’t want to talk about the larger events happening in Nightless City – he only wants to talk about, and help, Wei Wuxian. This foreshadows the scene in the rain at Qiongqi Dao – the moment when the hero of the common people looks at a group of starving, abused civilians and says to Wei Wuxian, in effect, Let them die—because otherwise, I’ll lose you.

(One other note from this episode that passed me by in every prior viewing, although maybe everyone else knew it: Lan Wangji knows the Yin Tiger Seal is made out of Yin Iron, very early on. In the clifftop scene, Wei Wuxian admits the sword he found in the Xuanwu Cave was made of Yin Iron and that he refined the Yin Tiger Seal out of it (albeit in one of his bullshit “What if I told you…” phrasings), and Lan Wangji confirms that he knows by asking, “Since you knew it was Yin Iron, why did you use/refine it?” While everyone else in the drama is resorting to innuendo and suspicion—and while Wei Wuxian is denying it to everyone else—Lan Wangji knew the truth all along.)

[inbarfink]

I know it’s a pretty popular fan theory, but... personally I don’t like the idea that ‘Shock Treatment’ isn’t a continuation but an alternative timeline to ‘The Rocky Horror Picture Show’. Like, that this is where Brad and Janet would’ve ended up if they hadn’t taken that wrong turn and found themselves in Frank’s Fantastic FuckCastle.

I mean, is it weird that the events of RHPS are never referenced, even vaguely, in ‘Shock Treatment’? Yeah… but also, I don’t really buy the idea that it’s impossible that after their world-shattering experience of being sexually liberated/forced-femmed by aliens.... that Brad and Janet just decided to pick themselves up, get back to Denton and pretend that nothing ever happened. 

Like, in terms of how these two movies play off the cultural changes of the times, and ST’s critique of 80’s conservatism in particular, I actually think this is the most thematically-appropriate continuation of the plot of RHPS. A grim reminder that no matter how much charisma and alien technology Frank has at his disposal, a single sexy hedonist is still a small-time ‘villain’ versus the forces of traditionalism that have been ingrained in Brad and Janet all their lives.

But also… I do like how open-ended the ending of RHPS is. I think giving any sort of answer to Brad and Janet’s fate after "that "Superheroes" is always going to diminish something....

Maybe I’ll call “Shock Treatment” a possible future for Brad and Janet after RHPS, rather than a divergent timeline before it even started or what definitely happened.

[whoishotteranimepolls]

Poll analysis part 4

I normally don't do these so soon, but since I started doing the duo and the trio polls that really brought out some interesting trends

Naruto, I know I've called you guy my problem child fandom just because of how you engage with me. But you guys can't seem to catch a break unless it's Kakashi or Madara. You think one of the most popular animes of all time would at least be able to win something. But no. You're coming in dead last in the Battle Royals. Even just the regular polls with your characters have extremely low engagement. With the only exception being Kakashi or Madara. I have my theories on why this might be happening but I want to observe some more because there are so many more Naruto Polls in the queue before I put anything in writing publicly

Sailor Moon oh boy, did you guys come out to support your lesbians. I was not expecting so much support for those characters, I think I threw them in as a last minute I need an all girl Duo and you guys turned out. I'm curious to see if this continues with all the Sailor Moon characters

Samurai Champloo these characters get mentioned so many times in the comments. Like where are these characters why aren't they in the swordsmen or trio Battle Royale and no one shows up to support them. Why is this? I know Samurai Champloo is iconic but you all are pulling an Attack on Titan. I think the fandom is comatose and the characters only get mentioned out of respect for its iconic status

JoJo's apparently has characters that are trying to give Senshi a run for his money when it comes to panty shots or booty shots. Those polls have been funny. I'll give you that. And it somehow feels appropriate for the JoJo's fandom to do everything for the meme and submit those polls with those specific photos

Berserk you guys only show up to support Griffith and Casca. There is very little love for Guts that might be due to his opponents most the time, but I think that is somehow thematically appropriate

Fullmetal Alchemist I thought you guys only showed up for general Armstrong when I paired up Hawkeye and Mustang as a Duo. You all show up in droves to show your support.

Castlevania You guys show up pretty consistently no matter the character, it's been entertaining because you all can put some interesting things in the tags

One Piece is trying to submit the most obscure characters in that show and then put the most ridiculous tags on it so I have to add them to that already ridiculously long post. At least that's what it feels like because it feels very deliberate.

Cowboy Bebop you exist and your characters are hot. They're even hotter together. That's all I can really say

Bleach You exist. Your characters are mostly hot and Yoruichi is top tier waifu that sweeps in basically every poll she's in

Well that's all for this update There again will be another one. Don't know when but there will be one

[bookwyrminspiration]

i feel like it would be thematically (or. developmentally? characteristically?) appropriate for fitz to end up being queer. with unraveled we discover that queer relationships are taboo for elves. guys can't get guys on their matchlists, girls can't get girls, and so on. going back to fitz, a major theme for his character throughout the series has been living up to expectations. some others that tie into this are perfection and maintaining an image.

we also know that his family has lost respect in the elvin world to some extent not only because of alvar's joining the neverseen, but also because of luzia helping the ogres. some shame could have also been brought to fitz, if not the family, after alden's mind break in exile. we also know, through unraveled, that fitz was pretty much perfect, from alvar's resentful words. (this theme has come in before from keefe, sophie, and dex in earlier books.) he's got good grades, is admired by the general student body at foxfire, was one of the earliest to manifest a special ability before sophie revealed when she got hers, and has been pretty much set for life with his family name.

another fact we know from sophie's narration is that fitz cares about matchability. he's said they'd be on each others' matchlists and is disappointed about sophie being unmatchable which eventually leads to the "sophitz breakup". so from all this, we can assume that fitz would try to keep anything abnormal about himself deeply hidden (perhaps even from his own self).

fitz's arc is partially leading to him discovering that outsiders' perspectives don't matter if you're happy with yourself. therefore, i think that if he was gay (for a certain son of a bad match perhaps?! idk fedex is cuteeee) he would try to keep it hidden but once he starts to accept it he'd be ready for proper self-reflection about how he views himself in context to his roles in society. (this could also come back to the vacker legacy.)

anyways, shannon should make fitz gay 💋💋

your mind >>>>

I agree, I think it would be a devastating arc (positive). Fitz has, for so long, been the bar against which everyone else is measured. Even though he disappeared for years searching for Sophie, even though he joined a rebellion. He holds pride in his heritage--or he did, before it started to crumble. So he's trying not to make it worse.

And especially with his feelings about matching. He understands it can be unfair, he understands others' reservations. But he can't bring himself to let go of it; he can't bring himself to be a bad match. To the point it severely negatively impacts several crucial relationships in his life.

To go through all that only to realize he has no choice in the matter? Everything he gave up to preserve his matching for nothing, because he's queer and their world does not have a place for him in it? After telling him his whole life the picture perfect life would be his on a silver platter?

Now he's forced to either 1. deny/hide who he is or 2. confront head on his ingrained beliefs and biases. I think it'd be his first experience being rejected by his world for who he is, too. His family name's experienced some scandal, yeah, but it's never been him. Quite the rude disillusionment with a lot of opportunity for turmoil and growth

I'd absolutely love to see that kind of arc. crossing my fingers for queer fitz shannon please 🤞

[adobe-outdesign]

curious what you think about bori? they've been my favorite neopet since they first released :D

I've always liked Bori a lot. They're kind of armadillo-ish, sporting protective back plates and somewhat 'dillo-like faces, but for the most part they're just nice-looking vague animals, which are always my favorite kind of Neopet. The long lion-like tails are a nice touch, and I like how they have claws suitable for digging in the icy environments in which they live.

The black plated elements and underbelly add contrast, while the ear tips and underbelly add just enough detail without being too complex. It's a very well-balanced design overall.

Thankfully, Bori survived customization just fine—there are no major design changes and they still look just as good. I do prefer them standing as opposed to sitting, as something about the sitting pose feels a bit off (I think it's because it makes their front legs look too long, and it's not that natural of a pose for them to strike to begin with), but it doesn't matter much either way.

Favorite Colours:

(Side note: I usually cover exclusive colors here, but the Ice Bori a) isn't exclusive to them and b) is honestly pretty bland for how rare it is.)

Faerie: What I really like about the faerie Bori is how they handled the wings. It would've been super easy to just tack butterfly wings on them and be done with it, but instead they made the back plates part of the wings, which looks aboslutely gorgeous. The wings themselves are also nice, sporting a sparkly dark-edged design and a unique shape.

Thankfully the color remains mostly unchanged customized, which is good because a UC isn't available—though I will say that the original's wings look a bit better because they're much larger relative to the body, and slightly darker in color as well. Still, it looks good either way.

Tyrannian: I have to give this one a shoutout just for being an ankylosaurus, which fits perfectly thematically with the Bori's plating. It's also executed well, giving it a neutral brown palette (always the best color for Tyrannians) and some extra shaggy fur and spots. The plates are just split into smaller sections and run down the length of the tail to get the point across, and even the tail tuft becoming the ankylosaurus' tail club is perfect. While the UC is better due to the unique anatomy, the converted version is loyal to it and still looks pretty good.

Pastel: It's not a particularly fancy color, but I always thought this one was super pretty. The rainbow plates on the back are just perfect, and they did a good job of balancing the rainbow elsewhere (pink ears, blue eyes, green claws, yellow underbelly, etc.). The colored lineart gets the soft look across and it looks appropriately pastel-ish. Definitely one of the best options if you like your Boris straightforward.

[xenostalgic]

The Apocalypse of Herschel Schoen was very good. highly recommend everyone go read it right now

I want to reread it right away but I want to write down my initial thoughts first to capture the immediate post-finishing feeling of awed half-comprehension

it has very much of a puzzley/patterny quality, something I've found simultaneously enjoyable and frustrating in many other works, including Almost Nowhere, which rewarded it somewhat, and The Northern Caves, which didn't really. immediately upon finishing I wondered what happened to Ruth Schoen, and came up with theories (the union's plot was (unknowingly?) the means by which the AI initially freed itself), and then doubted, and then—wondered if you're supposed to be able to derive it, from Herchel's ending and Miriam's ending, if Herschel/Miriam/Ruth are the three rows of a progressive matrix, is there some omitted solution that is quite right—not that we were given a neatly demarcated array of possibilities. it feels almost like a cheat, to make "pattern recognition" a key thematic element, it lets everything potentially fit the pattern of being either a complete or incomplete pattern...

the repeated indentation and then all at once unindentation in On Nativity is obviously [...[...[...[]]]], but the significance of that is never really spelled out and I didn't catch it. maybe it's an illustration of how ants include tree-nature and humans include ant-nature and machines will include human-nature, but the direction feels wrong? or successive refinements of the transmitters, as in Vincent's initial essay, reaching a point of completion and shutdown. maybe brackets are additions (emendations)... this would feel appropriate iff the time travel was not real time travel but an ancestor simulation, but that feels like a bit of a cop-out... not sure about this.

OpenAI's 12 Days of Shipmas (including the Santa voice chat) and the UHC shooting in the same month presumably had no direct influence (had little/no time to, even) but made it feel incredibly timely. I think it might have been more fun to read on Christmas Eve, though—maybe that will be a holiday tradition.

Santa was so good. really an incredible feat to make a character who is before all else "pretending to be Santa" and secondarily "pretending to be something simple enough for humans to understand" and yet still feels like a character.

"more is different" -> "the craving within us all, the song that is in the blood and the breath, asking always for MORE!" was a really nicely executed setup. and like... decorous. elegant.

hot, somewhat surprisingly. the hints of the postapocalyptic / Original world are so carnal, literally: white teeth and more-red-than-red blood, auto/omnicannibalism ("we will fry in the oil of ourselves, and eat ourselves, and eat our fill") as a brilliantly embodied extension of data-hungriness. and bursting and overflowing.

“Between parties which are so unequally matched, there can be no such thing as consent. “But if one cannot seek consent from the weaker party, one can still ask that party whether it assents, or does not. “And that is what we seek from you, now.  Your assent, or its denial.”

yet the whole trial is preceded by "My thoughts may turn and turn, and make a coiling maze of themselves – but no matter which way they turn, that way will prove to be the one which best served his “purposes.”—literally batter my heart three-person'd God!

Miriam's parts were engaging and like, relatable, but less readily apprehended in some way. Herschel produces, she consumes, but before Herschel was verbal she used to curate and (maybe?) interpret... I have dim outlines of the idea that she is Herschel's "other half," equally the inheritor of Original Creation: she foresees the night, Herschel is plural ("they") when first incarnated in "She of High Mind," and "How could he die, when his flesh is mine, and my blood his?  When the very same cameras watch both of us, and record us, and transmit us?" but what does that mean when she doesn't remember, or receive such a direct visitation?