#3. the dude has literally DIED dozens of times

[theseancekid]

anyway this is your reminder that Klaus has the highest pain tolerance out of all the umbrella kids!!

[mediumgayitalian]

fic rec friday 13

hi!! welcome to fic rec friday. every week, i pick five fics i have bookmarked and rec them with a little review. check them out!

I Need A Hero by @theroyalsavage

The "Nico is a superhero, Will is a med student" AU nobody asked for or wanted.

OBSESSED WITH THIS AU OBSESSED WITH THIS AU OBSESSED WITH THIS AU. I AM LOSING MY MIND AND HAVE READ IT SO MANY DOZENS OF TIMES. genuinely one of my top faces like its so fucking GOOD!!! the romcom romance of it all!! makes me lose it!!! the angst of loving someone who is constantly putting himself on the front lines!! the fear of not knowing if he's coming home!! being his healer, holding his life in your hands because he doesn't trust it with anyone else!!!! what if i rioted!!! what if i chewed clean through my ceiling!!!!! what if i swallowed my phone!!!!!!!!!!!!!! what if i clawed my way out of the pit of despair!!!! i am!! gonna!!!!!!!!!!! AHHHHHHHH!!!

2. As If His Hands Were Enough (to Hold an Avalanche Off) by @theroyalsavage

Nico di Angelo has been through enough to know life doesn't always work out the way you plan. But fate is a funny thing, and, in Nico's junior year of college, it hands him salvation in the form of freckled cheeks and a smile like the sun.

OH dude this author is actually everything to me. prepare for an onslaught of their stuff bc i am OBSESSED, but this one especially....oh it's special man. this had me LOSING MY MIND. seph’s acceptance made its way into my devotion scrapbook. never be ashamed of loving anybody….what a fucking thesis. i also ADORED how a) story didn’t end with them getting together, went thru them learning each other too and b) nico didn’t get fixed by dating will. he got fixed by loving himself, something he learned to do by loving will. crying.

3. Of Gods and Men by @theroyalsavage

There is something profoundly strange about the forest behind Will Solace’s new house. The trees, it seems, breathe magic. The truth is this: there are things that the forest hides that humans cannot understand. Nico di Angelo is one of them.

I LOVE PARTICULAR AUS!!!!!! AND I LOVE YOU ROYAL SAVAGE!!!!! dude god nico and mortal will is always gonna knock me flat bc its so canon, you know? will is going to be a consort of a god one day. and to read it in fic has me HOWLING but this one in particular....OH the ending is gonna knock yall flat fr!!! if you like percy refusing immortality for annabeth youre gonna LOVE this!!

4. Kitchen Nightmares by @theroyalsavage

Nico is the owner and head chef of an upscale restaurant in Hell's Kitchen, New York City. There's nothing easy about running a business, especially when you have to juggle an overprotective father, a college-age sister, and a staff about as under control as a stampede. The last thing Nico needs is a rival in the form of the ugliest food truck on the face of the planet. And yet, that's exactly what he gets. Of food fights, fledgling friendships, and Nico di Angelo's stupid little soft spot for Will Solace.

i know ive literally said it like five times now but NO ONE does an au like theroyalsavage idc. dude romeo & juliet but food truck and fancy restaurant?? hello!!!! omg!! i literally sat my ass down and devoured this i could not stop myself. and then i hit the end and started it right back up again. the love without having the space to establish anything….inherent homoeroticism of rivalry…..my heart!!

5. don't wanna be lonely, just wanna be yours by @theroyalsavage

Will Solace, café manager extraordinaire, just wants to coast through their monthly open mic night in peace. He definitely is not banking on meeting a handsome stranger with the voice of the gods and the death glare of a high-ranking member of the KGB. And yet, that's exactly what he gets.

telling someone you’re not even dating you’re in love with them after like five months is insane behaviour will solace i get you 😭😭 he is so real in every scenario all the time like he is genuinely perfect for nico who is equally as insane and deserves someone who is fully obsessed with him. god.

thank you for joining me this friday!! happy reading!!

[quasiquack666]

Chapter 321 spoiler stuff I guess

(Screen readers pause now)

1: Bruh Kayden looks shredded to pieces. I can't tell how much I'm delighted anymore by his bruised ass, or if I just feel bad now.

2: Tbh I don't know why they trust Blues around? Blues tried to kill Jiwoo a dozen chapters ago. Sure he probably won't now but??? It's confusing. I would never trust someone like that again around my son.

3: Wow, finally, a more proper Kayden and Jiwoo comfort hug. I felt slightly robbed during their weird side-hug after the Gestella skirmish. More dad-son hugs please.

4: Thanks for all the hair-down Kayden references. I appreciate the contribution to us artists LMAO.

5: "Not much help". Excuse me you bitch, your boyfriends basically saved your ass, you would've died, especially when Gestella only showed up later.

6: "A guy called Andrei". This must be a translation error or something, no way Kayden is actually talking about Andrei as if Jiwoo doesn't know him...

7: "Why aren't you turning back [into a cat]?" What? Kartein don't you already know this? Dude it's the same thing from when Kayden fought Andrei before. One of my fave Kayden scenes, the image of him bloody and bruised and turning to the basement. It's so easy to tell that Kayden is in agony. Kartein even noticed back then that something was up, he just didn't say anything then. Lol nevermind that Kartein does the exact same shit. And it's meh that the writers feel the need to explain this in words, through Kartein's odd question, when they already did so in a much more masterful way before.

8: "Someone lady Gestella has in her heart". Blues my dude, I know you admire her to the point of obsession, but it's okay to realize she's delusional and fell for catfish-level letters. This poor old lady would be doomed on a dating app.

9: BRO we literally got a second scene of Kayden's back as he goes to the basement alone to feel his pain. I thought it would be different this time...

Conclusion: I dunno. Eh. I don't feel much about this chapter. But it was fine enough. I'll take anything that isn't literally traumatic in terms of characterization though. Which is a pretty low bar at this point.

Just to end on a better note, I really do appreciate the hair-down references. Those are great hehe. I need to practice then maybe I'll post something I like.

[bigskyandthecoldgun]

1 2 3

ao3

“This is…not what I signed up for, Eddie,” Steve says, carding his fingers through his hair and repeating the motion to set it back into place.

“This is actually insane,” Eddie agrees, voice fluctuating in volume slightly, and Steve can see his silhouette pacing back and forth behind the tinted window of the booth.

Steve wishes there were a seat closer to him, but the only decent one in the room is the couch by the booth window. He’s sure there’s a second seat in Eddie’s booth, the one that Robin typically sits on; maybe he’ll ask for it later. “Was Joyce serious when she said it’d take her four hours to get help?” he asks, and he watches Eddie nod. Eddie’s got really long hair for a guy—curly, too—and it bounces in sync with his head. Steve groans. “This guy’s gonna kill half the town in four hours!”

Eddie’s pacing abruptly stops, and he grabs the mic. Steve’s headphones squeak with the feedback. “Steve, that is not helpful,” he says.

Shit, yeah. Especially not when Eddie’s doing most of the phone stuff. All Steve has to do is answer the calls and…maybe save somebody’s life. “I know, I know, I just—ugh,” he sighs, scrubbing a hand over his face. “Who is this Whistling Man dude anyway?”

He watches Eddie’s silhouette plop back down in his chair. Must be nice. “He was this serial killer back in the sixties. Henry Creel. Went around in a freaky mask whistling that one song—Ella Fitzgerald, Dream-something—”

“Dream a Little Dream of Me, yeah, I know the one,” Steve says. That must’ve been the song they’d heard before.

“Well, he killed about a dozen people in Hawkins. Mostly teenagers. He had no reason for it—no motive, he just…did,” Eddie explains.

Jesus, that’s dark. “So…what happened to him?” Steve asks. The most he knows is that the guy died at some point. In a town like Hawkins, a serial killer seems so…out of place. On the outside, the town seems like a run-of-the-mill, middle-of-nowhere, normal place. Steve would’ve never guessed it had such a horrifying history.

Eddie’s sigh is crackly over the speakers. “Well…cops chased him over to the abandoned lab, up to Ellis Point. We call it Whistling Point now. And it was—shit, it was on the—it happened on this night, actually,” he says. So…maybe a copycat? “The cops cornered him, and he jumped into the river. His body was never found.”

“Wait, if his body was never found, is he—is he alive? Dead? What’s the story?” Steve asks.

“Story is, he’s biding his time. Waiting to take revenge on the town,” Eddie says in a low, theatrical voice, and Steve rolls his eyes, fighting a smile.

“Okay, okay, that’s the story,” he says. “What’s the truth?”

Because old Henry Creel is probably, like, sixty, seventy years old by now—unless he’d been, like, a teenager killing teenagers—which means that even if he were still alive, revenge-seeking would probably be out of the question. “Other than we have a whistling killer on our hands tonight?” Eddie asks, and Steve nods. “Shit, Steve, I got no idea.”

Steve shifts, uneasy. “Well, I guess we’ll have to end up finding out what we’re dealing with, whether we like it or not,” he mutters. “But—y’know, chin up, man, we’ll do our best.”

“Yeah,” Eddie murmurs, “I guess so.”

“At least we got the word out,” Steve says, though that raises another question. “”What kind of listening figures do we get around this time?”

Eddie gives him a snort-laugh. It’s a nice sound, compared to the literal mortal-peril shouts of Joyce from earlier. “On a Thursday? After midnight? Could be…around thirty-five?” he says, and, huh, that’s not bad.

“Thirty-five, as in thirty-five hundred? I didn’t realize Hawkins had that many people,” Steve says, pleasantly surprised.

“No, thirty-five people,” Eddie clarifies. “At best.”

Yeah, that makes a lot more sense.

“Are you serious? We only have thirty-five listeners?” Steve asks, trying to hold back his laughter. It’s absurd, really, just how far he’s fallen. But it’s his own fault, truly. That disaster back in Chicago…God, it’s a wonder he still has any semblance of a career.

“Yep. Thirty-five. It’s a school night,” Eddie tells him, like that makes it any better.

Steve bites back a smile and pinches the bridge of his nose. “And, uh…what’s the population of Hawkins?” he asks.

Eddie makes an uncertain sort of sound. “I dunno exactly. I’m not secretly an encyclopedia, Steve, but it’s…a little over a thousand, I wanna say,” he says. Steve hums. “How many did you get before your fall from grace, my liege?”

“Oh, you mean before my career exploded and I ended up on a midnight hour talk show in a town of a thousand people?” Steve shoots back, easily playful even though it’s still painful to talk about, a little bit.

Snickering, Eddie toys with something behind the tinted window. “Yeah. Before that.”

That’s a hell of a question. Steve blows out a long breath. “Around five for most shows on the low end, I think. Big guests could pump that up to ten, fifteen, easy,” he recalls. It’s not necessarily that Steve had lived for the attention—although that hadn’t hurt—but it had been nice, honestly, to know that people really enjoyed what he has to say, that people would listen to his ideas and opinions and take them as something with worth.

Eddie lets out a bewildered laugh. “Holy shit, Steve, five thousand on the low end?! We could only dream of that!”

Ah.

“Five million,” Steve corrects.

An unholy noise passes through his headphones, and Steve almost chucks them right off his head, but it stops just as soon as it had started. “Mill-i-on?!” Eddie squawks, pronouncing each syllable like a separate word.

It makes Steve feel a little sheepish. “Yeah, y’know, that’s—sometimes, that’s just the way that it goes,” he murmurs. “At least The Whistling Man hasn’t killed me yet…I guess.”

“I never did ask you—oh, shit, hang on, switch the songs,” Eddie tells him, and Steve watches the ‘on air’ sign flicker back to life as the music fades out.

“Alright, folks, that was Gloria Gaynor’s I Will Survive,” Steve says smoothly, switching out the records. “This next song is Asia’s Heat Of The Moment.”

The sign flickers off. “Nice work,” Eddie commends.

Steve mimes tipping an imaginary hat in Eddie’s direction. He clears his throat. “Uh, you were saying something about—were you gonna ask me something?”

“Yeah, um—I was just gonna say, I never did ask about how that whole thing went down. The Chicago thing,” Eddie says. Steve feels his gut churn with nerves. He doesn’t like talking about this. It’s one thing to know that the person he’s talking to knows about the biggest screw-up of his career, that they had heard the broadcast, but it’s another to explain it himself. “So…are you gonna tell me what happened?”

It’s not as if Eddie’s an asshole. Sure, he can be kind of a dick, and he certainly knows how to take a bit to the worse end of ‘too far,’ but he’s not, like, awful. Steve sighs. “Okay, so…I was interviewing this politician, right?” he starts, and he sees Eddie’s silhouette nod. “And, uh, he was a contributor at the station. Big-wig type deal, y’know? So, I—the PR people working for the people I interview usually give me a list of stuff that’s off the table, a list of topics that they require I bring up, stuff like that, and—anyway, I’m supposed to ask this guy about the platform he’s running on, his policies, whatever.”

Eddie chuckles. “What, you disagreed with your guest? That’s it?”

Steve takes a deep breath. It’s not like he has issues keeping his temper in check, most of the time; he’d used to, when he’d been in high school, but a career in entertainment has really hammered the value of patience into him. “We’re talking about this guy’s campaign. And he starts going on about how his platform is around family values,” he tells Eddie, running a hand through his hair nervously. “So, now he’s talking shit about the ‘dangers of homosexuality,’ and my blood’s starting to boil.”

“He sounds like a douche,” Eddie says, so quiet that Steve almost misses it.

He nods. “Yeah, he is. I try and steer the conversation away, because I’m a professional, and that’s just what you do when there’s some stupid shit happening on your show, but he won’t stop. He won’t shut up about it,” Steve grits out. It still gets him worked up, thinking about what had happened that day. “Next thing I know, I’m coming out on live radio to fifteen million listeners and yelling at some jackass for ruining my show.”

The silence that stretches after he says it makes Steve tense. For the most part, no one in Hawkins has given him shit for what had happened—not directly, anyway. Steve’s still amazed he’d managed to get hired. He thought he’d be blacklisted. For all intents and purposes, he might as well be, but Owens had given him a job here, and that’s more than anyone in Steve’s position could’ve reasonably hoped for.

It’s why he and Robin had become such quick, close friends. The relief that comes with knowing someone else on his show is queer is indescribable. Chicago—his whole career—had been fantastic, he’d done so well, but it had been really isolating. He couldn’t risk his career, which meant he couldn’t go out and meet people, make meaningful connections, without chancing that they’d go to the tabloids if they were to ever break things off with him.

But, hey, at least he’s got nothing to lose now.

“Holy shit,” Eddie breathes at last, but the song’s coming to an end.

The sign flickers on, and Steve swaps out the records again. “Our next song comes to us from our intern’s friend—this one’s for you. Kate Bush’s Running Up That Hill,” he announces, the sign turning off once the music starts up. Steve clears his throat, an all-too-familiar sinking feeling settling in the pit of his stomach. “So…do you totally hate me?”

There’s a half-aborted mix of a squawk and a shriek, and he watches Eddie’s silhouette nearly topple out of his chair. “What?! No! No! Jesus—I wouldn’t—I’m—that’s awful, Steve, I’m…I am so sorry,” Eddie says. “Shit. Shit, it’s so not funny to make fun of your career falling apart, then, oh, Jesus H. Christ.”

Steve lets out a nervous little laugh. “I mean—why did you even make fun of me in the first place?” he asks, because he is kind of curious.

Eddie’s silhouette flaps around in an indecipherable series of gestures. “I thought you were, like, just another radio douchebag! But you’re not! You’re actually a really good dude, and now I feel really bad for making fun of you,” he groans, and Steve smiles at him.

“Well, in your defense, it’s not like I was eager to make the reason why I was fired known,” Steve says. “It’s rare to find someone who doesn’t know why it happened. It was kinda nice, in a weird way…? To get treated like just some guy.”

“Be still, my beating heart! Handsome, charming, and a down-to-earth, good guy? I never stood a chance,” Eddie mock-swoons, and Steve rolls his eyes. “You know, Hawkins is kind of a tiny town, but it’s not, like, awful. I wanna get out of here as much as the next guy, don’t get me wrong, but don’t beat yourself up for ending up here.”

A small smile worming its way onto his face, Steve nods. “Yeah, it’s not half bad. Gotten a couple dirty looks, but you get that anywhere, being queer,” he says, and Eddie inhales sharply. And that…sucks. “I, uh—sorry, I know some people aren’t really cool with just bringing it up casually—”

“No, no, I’m not—I just—I get that,” Eddie tells him gently. “The, um—the dirty looks. I know what that’s like, that’s all.”

Something warm lodges itself into Steve’s chest. “Oh,” he says, “um, cool. Is that because of…?”

“I mean, kind of. I’m—a lot of people assume things, whether or not they have even a grain of truth to them. But they mostly give me dirty looks because they think I’m a satanist,” Eddie snickers. “I mean, I’m not, but—with the way I look, the conclusions people jump to are…definitely understandable.”

Steve tilts his head. “I’ve still never seen what you look like, y’know,” he says, and Eddie’s silhouette tenses a little in the window. “I mean—I’m sure you look—”

“Oh, shit, we’ve got another call coming in,” Eddie tells him, just as Running Up That Hill is beginning to fade into its outro, and Steve clears his throat. “Take it when you’re ready.”

Steve adjusts the volume slider to fade the song out before stopping it completely, watching the ‘on air’ sign flicker back to life as he presses the first phone line button to accept the call. “Hello, caller, you’re live on 189.16—The Scream,” he says smoothly. Then, recalling that this could very well be a 911 call, he winces. “Is everything, uh…alright?”

Heavy breathing is the only thing that he’s met with.

Steve’s brows furrow. “Okay…? Who is this? Are you—hello? Hello?” he tries, because maybe it’s someone that’s been hurt. He hopes it isn’t. Not because he wouldn’t have to deal with the situation, but because he isn’t really sure how efficient Hawkins General’s ambulances are.

There’s just more heavy breathing from the other end.

“Okay, what’s your name, and why are you calling in?” Steve tries, because he can’t help if he doesn’t have any information.

Some whistling comes through the speakers of his headphones, but it’s shaky. The tune isn’t right. “You know my name,” the caller says with a clearly put-on, gravelly voice. “I’ve come back from the dead to kill again! No one is safe!”

Oh, great, some bored dickhead has decided to make light of a murder. “Do you accept requests?” Steve asks, one hip cocked as he crosses his arms. “I’ve got a list of names I’d love to see in the obituaries.”

The caller makes a couple of half-choked noises in confusion. “Uh…maybe,” they say uncertainly. “You must—um—you must make a sacrifice to us—oh, shit—I mean, me! Dude—dude, what do you want? We want cheese dusted pretzels. I mean—! I want cheese dusted pretzels! Or I’ll…cut your face off!”

Eddie groans. “Goddamn kids! I’m cutting them off,” he huffs. He does, and the dial tone is actually a pretty welcome sound this time around. “Sorry, Stevie, I know you’re not big on pranks.”

A small smile makes its way onto Steve’s face in spite of his annoyance. “Needless to say, I won’t be going out to buy anything for these kids, and none of you should be going out tonight, either,” he says. He swaps out the records again. “We’ve got an actual killer out there. Anyway, this next one’s dedicated to all of you staying inside with your doors and windows locked. This is Never Let Me Down Again —Depeche Mode.”

The ‘on air’ sign flickers off. “Hey, Robin just paged. She’s calling in, but she doesn’t want it on air. You good?” Eddie asks, and Steve nods. “Hey, Rob. You’re on with both of us.”

“Guys!” Robin near-shouts, and Steve winces. “Oh my God, okay—Chrissy isn’t home yet. Her jogs never last this long. And I was listening to the show in the car—holy shit, by the way—and now I’m starting to get paranoid, because there’s a killer on the loose, and I just keep thinking about all the different things that could’ve happened, and she took her cell phone, but the thing is huge and clunky, so what if she dropped it while she was getting chased or something? She drives her car all the way out by—”

“Robin, hey, calm down,” Steve says, as soothing as he can make himself sound. “I’m sure she’s okay. Her jogging route goes off Coal Mill, right? That’s so far from the station, and we don’t even know if that whistling asshole is still conscious. Joyce got him pretty good with her taser.”

Robin takes a deep breath. Steve kind of hates that he knows Hawkins’ layout enough to reassure her like this, but how can he really hate it when he hears her quietly laughing in relief on the other end of the line. “Right. You’re right. I’m being—ugh. Sorry, you know how anxious I get sometimes,” she sighs, and Steve hums. “She’s probably just fine. Thanks, Steve. I’ll keep the radio on just in case something does happen, but I won’t go anywhere, don’t worry.”

“You’ll page me if—you’ll page when Chrissy gets home, right?” Eddie asks, and, shit, Steve can’t believe he’d forgotten how close Eddie and Chrissy are.

“Yeah, ’course I will, Eddie,” Robin says, and her voice is soft. “You guys just…keep your heads up, okay? I believe in you. Talk to you soon.”

The dial tone sounds again, and Steve sighs. “Hey, Eddie?” he asks, and Eddie hums. “What the hell was that? Not—not the thing with Robin, the whole…kids pretending to be a killer, who, right now, is stalking the town…thing.”

Eddie groans. “It’s…a thing.”

“A thing?” Steve repeats, incredulous.

“Kids around here, they pull pranks pretending to be The Whistling Man. They think it’s funny! But it’s not. It’s not funny at all,” Eddie mutters darkly.

Steve stews in his own nerves. “So there’s no chance that our Whistling Man was just a prank, right? That Joyce…”

He can hear Eddie swallow. “No, that…that was real,” he says, and Steve swears under his breath, scrubbing a hand over his eyes. He watches Eddie’s silhouette sit up a little straighter behind the tinted glass. “Let’s stay positive! We still have a show to do.”

“I’m gonna need a seat that isn’t halfway across the universe if I’m gonna get through the rest of this,” Steve tells him, gesturing over at the couch. “You got a spare in the booth?”

There’s a long pause.

Steve calls Eddie’s name after a solid thirty seconds of silence. “Yes, I—yeah, I do. Give me a second to put it outside the door,” Eddie says.

“I’ll just come grab it from you,” Steve tells him, “no big deal.”

“No, no, it’s okay, really, I—I’ll just put it out there. Just wait.”

He watches Eddie’s silhouette move towards the corner of the booth, and Steve makes his way over to the door. They’ve got, like, a little over a minute left until the song’s done and they’re left with dead air, so he might as well save them some time. The hall’s wide and warm, and Steve waits outside the door to the sound engineer’s booth, hands in his pockets. The door swings open, and he’s face-to-face with Eddie Munson for the first time since he’d arrived in Hawkins.

Eddie’s eyes are wide with surprise, big and brown under the curly bangs of his hair, the rest of the curls cascading down just past his shoulders. He’s pale, with a light line of freckles right under his eyes, going across his nose, and his plush, pink lips are parted in a perfect ‘o.’ He stands up straight—he’s about Steve’s height, maybe a little shorter—and brushes a lock of hair behind his ear, ringed fingers catching slightly on the dark curl. Steve follows the line of his arm, scans over the tattoos there, and he registers the giant letters of some heavy metal band sprawled across Eddie’s shirt, right over his chest. His eyes drag back up to Eddie’s face, a pretty pink color slowly spreading over his cheeks as Steve looks at him.

He’s kind of gorgeous.

Oh.

Oh.

Oh, no.

[ladynicte]

Not hostility. 2. He had been stuck in a dungeon for a while partially because Nico lied to him. 3. Where? 4. Leo never knew Nico before and didn't know anything about him. Plus Nico was giving creepy vibes to everyone partially on purpose. 5. Where? 6. That's not what happened. 7. Again, Nico creeps pretty much everyone out partially on purpose. 8. That ESPECAIALLY never happened.

Oh so you do want me to keep going nice✨

Either way putting this whole answer under read more so it doesn't clog up anybody's dash cuz it got really long

Dude I don't know where your idea that he was being purposefully creepy comes from. He's literally denoted to smile at them a bunch of times even though Nico later one describes that emoting at all is difficult for him. If anything I would say that denotes he was trying to be friendly and it just didn't work.

He was for sure trying to stay away from them because Nico has a very hard time with living people plus living people who specifically seem to dislike him and only him.

But trying to keep your distance from a bunch of older kids you don't even know after you went through the most traumatic experience of your life plus the guy you are in love with just went missing together with his girlfriend isn't the same as purposefully going out of your way to creep people out just because

1. How the hell is not hostile to hope a child who was supposed to be under you special care dies a most painful death simply because it isn't convenient for you and your oppressive system that he lives. Maybe it's not personal but it sure as hell it's hostile.

2. Nico was said a dozen times to had been tricked by Hades, which he had no way of knowing he would have been tricked because yet again he's like 12 at this point Hades is his dad and prior to this had never lied to him.

Also love how you don't even bring up my point about Percy trying to hurry Nico up and wishing he could throw stuff at him so he would stop groaning while Nico had just gotten out of the jar. Funny

And yet again the point was to show hostility, it doesn't matter what motive there was for the hostility the only point was to show hostility against Nico, which I would argue pointing a sword at his neck it's pretty hostile.

3. Here

4. So what? That's not the point. First of all Leo did know Nico, not personally but he for sure saw how desperate to save Nico, Hazel his friend and a girl he was supposedly into, was. Also even if Nico was a complete stranger, he was literally a war prisoner, who couldn't even speak for a while, and actively needed his sword to even be able to walk.

I don't know about you but if I see a kid who has been kidnapped actively starved and literally went through hell, even if I don't know him, even if he's "Purposefully creepy" as you put him I'm still not gonna go out of my way to showcase to him how much he creeps me out and how much I don't like him, you know. Cuz basic human decency and all.

5. Yet again, here

6. First the screenshot

Yes Jason wanted to leave Nico in the jar, and you can say it was a strategic move, he was still abandoning Hazel's brother to his own slow demise. And that's still a bad thing to do, hell it breaks Hazel's trust in him to the point she starts thinking, what if I'm no good for the mission and he abandons me next.

He denotes that being a child of Pluto was hard enough as it was which means he does see being the child of one of the Chthonic Gods as a reason to be mistreated, and he's making the effort to not do that.

Which good for him but you know no other demigod gets that treatment it's only specifically the children of the king of the dead.

So yes that's literally just what happened.

7. Love how you don't even try to say that didn't happen because it was like straight up three chapters of that.

But so what? He's being creepy on purpose therefore he deserves to get chunked into water and left to his own luck? Really that's your point here?

First of all Frank is a good few years older than Nico, hell Frank has an almost three years gap with Hazel (Which don't quote me on this but I'm pretty sure before the reckon when Nico himself was younger than Hazel it was a full three years) so why is he having beef with his girlfriend's scrawny brother.

And Nico's not even being creepy on purpose. But hell even if you think he was being creepy on purpose to Jason or Leo to keep them away, when was he ever creepy on purpose to Frank.

Frank and him already knew each other previously, and Nico never had any issue with him, it's only said that he likes to tease him sometimes.

And right after Frank is done talking about how pissed at Nico he is, Nico literally tells Hazel he likes her boyfriend.

But Frank was already reluctant about Nico even from back when they were in Camp Jupiter while he wasn't hostile like he got during the Quest, he did denote that Nico wasn't like Hazel, which in turn got Percy to defend Nico.

So yeah, so what. I don't get your point yes everybody is creeped out by Nico. Nico doesn't like creeping people out.

But the whole point of that answer was to say yes everybody is creeped out by him and reacts hostile to him, you just saying yes they are all creeped out by him is honestly just telling me I am right.

It doesn't even matter if he does it on purpose after being on literal Tartarus, but he's not even doing it on purpose mate.

No not even partially, he's aware he does that, doesn't mean he's doing it on purpose.

8. I will say The Camp becomes a better place for Nico post-Solangelo but before that no not really.

Nico actually sorta has some friends in Camp Jupiter, and Hazel says they just look at him as a travelling oddball, on the other hand in Camp Half-Blood, Nico never once felt comfortable or like he belonged, he was always leaving because he always perceived hostility against him.

The only times that Nico's life in Camp is described as anything else than hanging in the shadows and running away is after he reunites his Divine family to go battle against Kronos together, and stop the world from ending.

That's said to us by Percy who is denoted to be a pretty unrealiable narrator especially towards Nico so who knows how trustworthy that information even is

But we know that doesn't last very long from Nico saying so himself, plus the fact that right after that book we come back to Nico having left yet again, and Annabeth the only remaining Camp as we are told the Camp literally falls apart if neither Percy or Annabeth are there to attend it 24/7 during TOA, only briefly mentions Nico as yeah the dark creepy kid who's gone right now.

So yeah I don't think he was super popular there neither, but I think it's pretty telling he felt comfortable in Camp Jupiter after being there for less than a year, and never managed to feel accepted by Camp Half-Blood even after three years

[girlfriendsofthegalaxy]

tuesday again 3/21/2023

i didn't want to sit down and write this bc i was having too much fun playing viddy gaem

listening

IT'S QUICKER AND EASIER TO EAT YOUR YOUNG!!!

"i'm starving...darling,,," is very sexy but the way the lyrics slowly slide into something more and more horrifying until the chorus hits??? mwah. lovely.

my one critique is that this song is...breathy, for lack of a better word? does not showcase the man's magnificent pipes. oh well! there are other songs.

how'd i find this: im gay, also he is one of the most popular indie artists in the World. his first album went platinum six fucking times.

-

reading

i read all of frank miller's sin city bc im on a noir kick and i didn't have a good time. the closest i got to fun was (deadly little, always described as "deadly little") Miho, a mute japanese??? generic asian??? assassin who is tits out not in these panels but in almost all others, rollerblading around mowing down guys with her katana. that was a painful sentence to write.

i read a lot of genre fiction. i read a lot of older genre fiction. they are not written with me, a bisexual "woman", in mind. and that’s ok bc not everything has to be written with me in mind. rarely have i read something that is more For The Boys Only!!! than frank miller’s sin city. felt kind of gross and a little put off the whole time i read these and they made me a little bit upset and afraid of men in a way i have not felt since high school. now it does feel odd to go “i didn’t think this noir was very pleasant >:(“ but miller’s work feels unpleasant and distinct from, say, chandler or hammett in a way i am still having trouble articulating. it is possible that the misogyny in chandler is a flavor i already know and barely register the taste of anymore. it may be that i got tired of looking at miller's women with twelve-inch waists and nipples as full and perky as their mouths.

mostly i think the labor market in sin city is super fucked up. women in sin city exist to have their value extracted from them in a way that is different and worse than normal capitalism. like, i can see how someone would read these comics and go full SWERF. women are literal trophies, both arm candy and in a very upsetting trophy hunting way. especially in the final volume, women are machines of potential profit. aside from one landlady and one cop and one child who grows up to be a prostitute, all the women in this whole city seem to be prostitutes or prostitutes who have married up and out. like there aren’t really even any women on the street just walking or in diners. it’s all dudes.

this is probably a comics vs novels thing, but miller is often sadistic in a way that chandler is not. a guy dies on a page to make cool art. they fuckin mow through dozens of goons a volume. if a guy dies in chandler it’s usually bc chandler's philip marlowe has stumbled across a dead body accident and it becomes a tremendous pain in order to tip off the cops that a body needs retrieving without getting framed for the kill. marlowe (and by extension chandler) is a people person-- he is a detective bc he likes figuring out what makes people tick. he is alert and it's hard to get one over on him but his resting state is congenial. despite his job, he still does believe in the concept of justice.

sin city (more of a comment than a question) says "if people piss you off you should kill them." this is not to make light of the very real Situations that protagonists in sin city find themselves, but there are very few problem solving skills on display other than "apply dick" or "apply gun". VERY RARELY, "apply pussy". that last one almost never works out tho.

aside from All That, it does contain some of the best straight up art (not just comics art) ive ever seen. the command of light and shadow is incredible. the command of negative space is incredible. panels aren’t busy unless they’re showing the chaos of a scene. he doesn't draw every single brick bc that's not important to the scene. it’s really quite stunning.

also the MOVEMENT in this fringe is incredible. do u see what i mean about the nipples tho

-

watching

i gotta lotta fuckin bones to pick with the manda/lorian but they're all spoilery. this shit fucking sucks man. it's twenty fucking twenty three we have had well over a century to master storytelling through the art of the moving image.

all three eps so far have felt very weirdly edited-- like a lot of changes happened after filming and there wasn't enough time for pickups?? this is a gajillion dollar show just reshoot some shit on your little fake stage i am Begging you. at least bo-katan looked hot. god she's awful i love her

again again i say to ye, what if star wars was good? i am slightly terrified that andor may have ruined me for any s/tar wars that follows but by any metric these first three s3 mando eps are simply not good television.

-

playing

ty @pasta-pardner for gifting me Weird West some weeks ago bc it is the new thing i am obsessed with. this first trailer gives a better sense of the Vibes than the launch trailers imo

i find it is scratching a lot of the rpg itches that new vegas does: you wander around beautiful western settings running into weird shit, followed around by a hot butch you've recruited to your cause. unlike new vegas, it is a little less forgiving and you have to really scrap and loot everything that isn't nailed down.

this is a top-down action rpg with a weird little aiming system that is sort of a 3D twinstick? it takes some getting used to, and shooting is not the part of any game i am particularly good at. here's xbox wire's screenshot, which gives a good idea of how isometric it is and what enemy detection looks like. i do wish i could expand the minimap, bc some of the locations like mines or bigger towns can really sprawl.

i have one big annoyance bc it is a thing that made me take a break and sulk for a bit: as you're traveling across the map (not open world, location-based), you can run into Travel Encounters. you can decline to engage with some of them. you cannot save within or between the encounters unless you stop and make camp. if you're on a long journey to a different corner of the map, you might run into three Travel Encounters. if you die on the third, you are catapulted back to your starting point. this is tremendously annoying in the early game, so either take short trips or get good at about-facing and exiting areas quickly.

a writer i admire likes games that let him tell stories about what happened in the game to other people-- this is a game that very much facilitates that. i was ambushed during a Travel Encounter by the some outlaws, bc i accidentally let one escape while i was trying to collect a bounty on his boss, and that specific named grunt came back with a Vendetta. but! i met a dying outlaw from the band who kidnapped my character's husband in a different second encounter, swapped some bandages for a treasure map, and he is now a Friend for Life. so he showed back up to help me during that ambush AGAINST FELLOW OUTLAWS WHO SEEM TO HAVE SOME SORT OF MEMORANDUM OF UNDERSTANDING??? mWAH. DELICIOUS. LOVE SYSTEMS INTEROPERATING.

ive put like six hours into this, and it has five chapters with five different characters. i have not progressed past the first chapter bc i am having so much fun poking around. i am so so so grateful that the first character is a wife seeking revenge and not the other way around. ppl are throwing big baby tantrums in the steam forums about this but you know what? some husbands should be macguffins sometimes. widens their perspective.

i am fascinated by the drips and drabs of lore this game is feeding me. there's an order of witches with huge underground temples that (crucially!) they did not build, but have adopted for their own uses without really understanding who built them and why. i want to know so much more about their whole shit. there are werewolves but idk what their deal is bc i haven't met any yet.

i am a simple woman! i only demand perfect cowboy western-flavored rpgs and so far this is holding up. i will have more thoughts as i go along but goddamn is it fun to play. we truly do love a competent little rpg with interesting lore and good stealth mechanics that lets you loot everything in sight.

-

making

mostly fallow week, wrists hurty

made this tuna-chickpea salad for lunch. it is quite rich for a lunch. there are a lot of components that may be challenging to digest all together for a milennial with tummy troubles.

this would have definitely been improved by solid instead of cheap chunk tuna (or salmon. this would be great with canned salmon) and if i actually chopped the baby spinach instead of going "it's fine" and flinging it all in. or maybe wilting the spinach, but that's a lot of extra work and this would be a very warm, wet salad :/ the point is the chickpeas really want to sink to the bottom. i like that there is no cooking involved, only assembling, but realistically i have only half of these ingredients in my house at any given time. screengrabs from the site bc i paid a dollar but there's no reason you have to

[nugulover69]

top 5 toku guys?

Oh yeah a chance to be subjective and ramble abt men my favorite thx

1. Gai - Jetman

Peak archetypal Inoue scumbag. He's a creep he's pathetic he's deeply repressed in multiple ways but most importantly he's cool as fuck. Him and Ryu have the most yaoi dynamic that has ever yaoied, every scene between them they were having sex actually ! Spoilers ! his death is also both the most earned and deserved death ever. Earned as in he proved himself to be a force for the greater good after rejecting the responsibility constantly, he died surrounded by ppl who love him and was killed performing a heroic act; deserved bc he was very much a creepy asshole, ESPECIALLY to Kaori. Like I love him but Kaori didn't deserve any of that

(Toshihide Wakamastu also super hot. like having a guy that looks like THAT wear leather gloves all the time should be illegal)

2. Jan - Gekiranger

Best sentai red hands down. His arc of becoming a more focused and less feral hero (his domestication arc if you will) is so well done. Him and Leo have a fantastic rivalry (literally destined to kill each other shit) that is also super yaoi. He could have easily been super annoying but thankfully his irrational behavior comes off more endearing (and understandable literally everything is new and confusing to him) thanks in part due to Hiroki Suzuki's great acting (and great face). he's just a lil kitty cat!!!!

3. Asakura - Kamen Rider Ryuki

He's killed dozens of ppl, he was born in a toilet and ate literal shit for years, he serves cunt while having never bathed in his life, he's the character of all time

I adore how the writers do TWO redemption fakeouts w/ him (didn't actually want to reunite w/ his brother nor cared abt that little girl he was "protecting") to drive the point home that this guy? is a agent of pure violence and chaos. he is basically non-human and cannot be reasoned with. This makes him a great narrative foil for "desperately tries to see the good in everyone" Shinji and a great yaoi foil for "literally my job to keep you in order" Kitaoka

Ryuki was a perfect starter kamen rider/toku show for me solely bc of this dude. my hole made for me <3

4. Taiga - Kamen Rider Ex-Aid

Me darling ice king <333 Seriously Taiga is the best character in ex-aid (aside from Poppy). I love how he mirrors Hiiro; both highly prideful and that pride leads them to do more destructive things in pursuit of what they believe is the greater good but really is more so just abt salvaging their bruised egos. And neither them could save Saki as Kuroto guaranteed her death by spraying her w/ more gamer disease

That and his partnership w/ Nico is so charming; hilarious in how Nico's bullheaded attitude forced Taiga to lighten the fuck up and genuinely heartbreaking when Nico was totally hysterical when Taiga nearly died. In short, he has layers like an onion and the sour taste of one too luv himmmmm

ALSO ALSO THE ONLY GUY WHO WANTED TO KILL KUROTO BUT EMU AND HIIRO WERE LIKE "noooo we can't kill this bio terrorist that'd be wrong :( for some reason" based Taiga always correct

5. Yellow/Gaku - Gaoranger

This pick is entirely subjective. He's not super deep or complex by any means (nothing in Gaoranger is, even for a sentai it's light on everything expect batshit insanity) BUT he is very Gender and Just Like Me fr

I love how his character (battle hardened military grunt) could've easily been a no-fun straight man but he acts more like an eldest brother to the team (rational and strict when it comes to immediately dangerous matters but amicable and goofy when it comes to boosting team morale). That and his lil details like randomly speaking English or being morally against eating birds give him that bit more flavor

Honorable mentions to Kusaka, Sosuke, Kyosuke, Gokai Gai and Tendou bc this post is long enough as is lmao

[silvanoir]

over my head on this but not giving up

Uhhhhh....ermmmm.... the guy. The guy I befriended?

How before I did I got the feeling something was very wrong and he needed someone to care about him? and then learned there was more than one thing... 2 things.... then many things.... I'm back to one thing, the more he tells me. The thing that is wrong is.... HIS ENTIRE LIFE. Childhood to current day. He lets me know of at least 3 major traumas every week.

He doesn't sleep, sometimes for days. And when he does, at the point of exhaustion he passes out, its nightmares. Knowing what I know now, I get why.

All the silliness? An act. Literally an act. He thinks of himself as an entertainer, thinking up "material". No one else in work seems to realize this. I didn't for 10 years, had me fooled.... even at the start of this friendship... 'till I really got to know him.

I still care about him. Because he's still got a good heart. And we like a lot of the same things. But I'm worried. He says things like "I'm not really supposed to be alive" Yes you are, dude!!! I hate to see anyone suffer, especially those I like... but he thinks he deserves it. Part of its good ol' Catholic Guilt, part of its that he's been treated cruelly and surrounded by the worst life has to offer for so long he thinks that's just how it is. It isn't!!! it doesn't have to be!!!

Today alone he told me about how he heard yesterday how someone he knew from his punk band days was stabbed and killed in Philadelphia in a random attack... and this is at least the 3rd guy he was once close to that's died tragically, and he doesn't take any of it well. I told him "You have too much tragedy in your life" he replied "its non-stop" ... it really does seem to be. No wonder he's got anxiety.

I don't know if my constant little efforts are making a dent in any of it. Earlier in the week I gave him money in a card to help him pay off his cellphone bill (he has a bunch of bills up this week and is struggling to pay them while in a lot of physical/emotional pain). He tried to give it back, like I knew he would... but then told me NO ONE EVER in his life gave him money in a card, not even a grandparent. He saved the card in special folder and hid the money for now because he's in a bad living situation (I am not the only one who has tried to convince him to get out of there, can't go into details). Tomorrow I'm bringing him bagels. I had a coupon for free half dozen bagels, and the first time we hung out after work I had the same coupon and gave him all the bagels... and he liked that...

uhhhh.... sorry about your dead friend.... have... bagels ????

I'm trying ;_;

[blueteehood]

About Nightwing Annual and the path they're going with Jason

So. Nightiwing 2021 Annual came out and it made me think about Jason and everything I don’t like about what’s going on with his current character arc. I’m going to try very hard to keep it simple. If anyone wants me to elaborate on any point I will.

Both Dick and Jason’s run as Robins was… a long time ago. In actual years. Which is one of the reasons sometimes the fandom (and DC writers I’m looking at you Tom Seeling you’re on thing fucking ice with me) forget things about them as Robins. One common misconception was that Dick never accepted Jason as Robin and treated him badly all the time. Which. Isn’t. True.

So I honestly like it when new books bring stuff back like Nightwing 2021 Annual did. Some good old stuff we got to see again:

1) Dick’s fight was with Bruce, not really Jason. When Alfred said he wasn’t home he came back to help. And once he realised Jason needed attention, he stepped up.

2) Dona being fabolous and Roy in his stupid yellow costume. Also Discowing. Good times.

3) Jason was a violent Robin. That was the whole point of his unpopularity that led to that pool that got him killed by the Joker. I’ve seen a lot of people complaining about that scene and saying things like “Jason doesn’t need Dick to tell him to focus on the victim” and I respectfully disagree. YES, Jason Todd is extremely empathetic, especially with victims. He was smart. He was the Robin with the highest GPA. He was and did many good things. But let’s not forget that he was also the Robin with the bad temper that beat up criminals with excessive force SOMETIMES. Not always, he wasn't deranged or anything, but yes, he lost his temper sometimes. Again, that was what made him so different from Dick and that led to that fucking pool. So this is why that moment where Dick gives him advice about what being Robin means - which clearly takes place in the BEGINNING of Jason’s run as Robin - didn’t bother me as much.

Also, I liked the general idea of the book, with Dick and Jason having a chance to bond without their other dozen siblings.

Now, on to the bad stuff.

1) That motherfucking crowbar.

When Urban Legends #6 came out, I was mildly disappointed with many things that we don't need to discuss now, but when Jason decided to drop his guns, I tried to be optimistic. This is not ideal, but maybe we are getting All Blades Jason back? And he's going to show all his extensive martial arts training, right? RIGHT???

Wrong. Tom Seeling (have I mentioned he's on thin fucking ice with me?) gave him the most generic ugly medieval(?) sword ever

Jason I know you're a nerd you don't need to show off your medieval fair props my dude

and now Tom Taylor gave him a CROWBAR. LIKE A TUG. LIKE TALIA AL GHUL DIDN'T PAY FOR HIM TO TRAIN ALL AROUND THE WORLD- you get my point.

Also, I know at this point half of the family died and came back and I supposed Jason's death is no longer a Big Deal but… Dick was the one that didn't even get the chance to bury his younger brother. So seeing him joke with the crowbar thing just felt wrong

2) Another thing: The hint on Bruce being a bad parent, AGAIN. I'll be the first to admit that teenager Dick Grayson was a bit of a drama queen. So maybe that bit about Bruce forcing the competition between the Robins was just him still angry at his father figure. And we could say that Jason complaining about being compared to him was just his frustrations speaking. BUT that would be nuanced. And I don't believe in nuance where DC is involved.

This is, once again, pushing the bad parent Bruce agenda. And believe me, there's nothing I want more than to have all those fucking times Bruce beat up his kids addressed by literally ANYONE. I wanted that to be discussed and recognized as something bad so Bruce can Stop Doing That and we MOVE ON with the whole Bad Parent thing. Because I don’t want to see Bruce hitting his kids, for fucks sake. I also don't want to see this “Bruce has always been a bad parent, since back on Dick and Jason’s childhood” thing passing as canon while we have more recent bad parent events that should be addressed. Like RHATO #25

3) And finally, the whole no killing thing. Look, my favorite Jason, UTRH Jason, considers that there’s a big difference between killing the Joker, killing Two Face or killing a low tug. Yes, he put seven (?) heads in a duffle bag. He also did that to take control over all the gangs without a gang war. The best Jason for me isn’t Battle for the Cowl Jason who commits serial murder. It’s the Jason who calculates before every single kill he makes. It’s the smart, sharp Jason with overly elaborated and dramatic plans.

I'm not mad he didn't kill that guy. My whole point is that Jason doesn't consider death the only possible solution. Also, he was in jail. he knows that there's all kinds of bad punishment out there. That's not the problem. It's just that if they are going to make Jason stop killing entirely... well I don't want that.

Which leads us to the controversial point that is going to get my batfandom membership card revoked: I don’t want The Red Hood to stop killing people so he can join the Bats. We already have a bunch of former Robins that follow Bruce’s rules. I don’t want to see Jason ending up like Tim. I miss Red Robin (2009) morally gray Tim Drake who used to plot murders so much I could cry. And I don’t trust DC to not bring Jason back to the flock just to have his character disappear in the middle of all the other bats and birds.

That doesn’t mean I don’t want Jason to have a family. I want Jason Todd to make peace with his brothers and sisters. Heck, I would even like to see him and Bruce fix their parent-child relationship. But that’s their family. The Batfamily is another thing entirely. I don’t want Dick's and the other’s love to be conditioned to Jason following all their rules. I think the Red Hood and the Bats and Jason Todd and the Waynes should be separated things. Because you know what that would be? Good writing. And, in case I didn’t make it clear, I kinda want that.

[razorblade180]

More Actor AU

The previous one <-

Ruby:Justice will be swift! Justice will be painful- *pie to the face* Ahhhh! Nora!

Nora:HAHAHAHAHA! I couldn’t resist!

xxxx

Yang:Do you think she thinks less of me?

Jaune:You and Ruby are sisters. You may fight but that doesn’t mean she doesn’t care.

Yang:Yeah, Ruby...

Jaune:.....Wait are you talking about Blake?

Yang:*caught of guard* Uhhhhh

Jaune:Because why would she think less of you for choosing to act like a first responder?

.......

Ren:*outside* He has a point!

Director:Stick to the script!

xxxx

Raven:Does she have it?

Qrow:You’re going to have be a little bit more specific.

Raven:*slams hand and leans* Does. Salem. Have. The Tape?

Qrow:Tape?

Raven:Yeah the sex tape, it was in the vault.

Qrow:Whaaat? Who’s on it?

Raven:*smirks* Who isn’t on it?

Qrow:Oh shit....*downs whiskey* Tai is gonna kill me!

xxxxx

Apathy:*roaming*

Ruby:Quick, the door!

Weiss:*shakes it* They’re locked!

Yang:Let me-*trips up stairs* agh! My face!

Weiss:Yang! *snickering* Oh gods, are...are you okay?

Yang:Uuuuugggghh. Imma just lie here. Guess we die. *raise head*

Weiss:Uh oh, bloody nose. Time out.

Apathy:*shuffling backwards*

Blake:*on the ground* Imagine, asking grimm just to leave?

xxxxx

Nora:Psst camera man. Pan to Penny.

Penny:*getting make up done* Yo!

Nora:Ready to die a second time!?

Penny:Hell yeah! Gonna make the people cry twice! *puts in red contacts*

xxxxx

Cinder:*chokes Raven* I’m taking what’s mine.

Raven:Last time I checked your name isn’t Tai. So get your hands off my throat. *looks off set*

Tai:*face palming*

Yang:*red* Mom!!

Raven:Someone was thinking it.

xxxxx

Fiona:*reading lines*

Robyn:She’s very focused right now. I think she’s nervous. *grabs megaphone* Cameras go live in five minutes.

Fiona:*tearing up*

Robyn:No wait! I was lying! Please dry those tears!

Fiona:Stop stressing me out! I’m new here.

Robyn:*hugging her* Ssssshhh I’ll rehearse with you.

xxxxx

[Volume 3]

Blake:*getting first aid*

Adam:*staring at camera* Funny thing about Blake Belladonna, she hates reshoots.

Blake:Do not...

Adam:She hates them so much in fact that she’ll do whatever it takes make the first take an absolute masterpiece. Blake Belladonna however also does about half of her stunts. Good stunts too. All those flips and hand to hand, that’s just her being cool. *puts hands together* I’ve worked with her since day one. I’m in most of those actions scenes. So let me tell how insane this girl is.

Blake:Oh geez...

Adam:Ten minute ago, we’re just shooting the scene where her character and my character are fighting. The plan was I “backhand” her and she falls on the ground. Now we’re not perfect. We’ve accidentally grazed each other before. But when I tell you Blake literally just sat there and watched as my hand swung at her....

Blake:Man, I don’t know what happened! *snorting* I knew it was coming, but then the next minute I had no time to go with it.

Adam:Now normally, a sane person would yell cut, but not Blake. I’m looking at her shocked as she’s staring back mouthing “roll with it.” And against judgment, I did.

Blake:It doesn’t get more authentic than that! Plus it only stung.

Yang:Until we finished the scene! We look at you and this red mark is appearing and you’re like “yeah, Adam knocked the hell out of me.”

Adam:And now I feel bad!

Blake:Nah man, perfect scene. Way to improvise.

Yang:Blake Belladonna everyone.

xxxx

Fennec: *dies*

Corsac: Corsac no!!!

Ilia:Wait, your Corsac.

Corsac:Shit, really? Damn, read the long lines all volume.

Ilia:W..wait...*smiling* d..did switch roles? Has no caught that?

Blake:N...no? *looks around* We didn’t right?

Sun:*containg laughter* Please...please tell me we haven’t mixed the roles all season? You audition for...?

Corsec:Fennec. I’m playing Fennec right? *snickering*

Blake:I...uh..how’d we-

Corsec:I’m just fucking with you.

Blake:Oh my god! Dude, I thought we messed up so much shit! My heart!

Crew:*laughing*

Blake:Y’all are jerks. I type the credits don’t scare me like that!

xxxxx

Ghira:*tears cloak off*

Tyrian and Salem: Dayuuuuuum! Look at that man!

Ghira:Pfft, god damn it. You ruined my roar! Hahaha.

xxxxx

Director:Alright Jaune. So in this scene you punch the wall because you just learned about Salem being immortal. Remember to hit hard enough get a good bang for the mic, but we don’t want you breaking your hand or anything.

Jaune:Got it!

Director:And action!

Jaune:*cracks wall*

Everyone:......

Jaune:......

Nora:Welp, he didn’t say anything about breaking the wall.

xxxxxx

Cinder:*holding sister* Diva in the building yall. Introducing mini me.

Ember:I get paid!

Cinder:Yeah you do!

Everyone:(The resemblance is uncanny.)

xxxxxx

Interviewer: Has it feel to work with distinguished talents like Tyrian.

Mercury:There isn’t a moment that man lets me rest. I could have one scene and that guy is offset staring at me and shimming or wearing a prop just throw me off-he’s doing it now! *smiles*

Tyrian:*in Salem’s costume* I don’t know what you mean Mercury? Are you...*props leg up* distracted?

Mercury:Serious doesn’t exist with that man on set.

xxxxx

Interview:Adam, how’s it feel to be the most hated character.

Adam:It’s hilarious. I go the store to get a coffee and the cashier is doing a double take as they stare at me wearing a shirt with Pumpkin Pete on it. Before they process who I am exactly I’m just like, “please tell me you have pumpkin spice?” And their perception is ruined immediately.

Interviewer:Ever get hate at events.

Adam:Oh it’s a game now! Not by my choice. This was Yang’s idea.

Yang:*pokes in* Y’all talking about the game where I make people upset? *sits in his lap* excuse me.

Adam:Against my will...*snickers* anytime I go to a convention with Yang, she enters the room from the opposite door and let the people gather to her while haters gather to me.

Yang:By the time I reach him I see about a dozen people glaring at him while my fans are following me until I get where I need to go. Right before I do, I walk up to Adam as if I didn’t know he’d be there, then jump into his arms happily. Everyone shuts up. They don’t know how to cope.

Adam:That’s with almost any hero in this show. I’m minding my own business and then they cling to me for shock value. Yang and Blake are the worst though.

Yang:I’ve sat in his lap like I am now at a Q&A before because people booed when he showed up. The beef isn’t real people! My arm is fine!

xxxxx

Jaune:*staring at Pyrrha’s statue*.....

*foot steps approach*

Jaune:*looks left* !?

Pyrrha:*holding flowers* A tragedy, this person’s death. You knew them?

Jaune:I...y...no. Just heard of her.

Pyrrha:Really? Cool. Reall strong person. Her people were heartbroken when she chose Beacon. But it was the place she dreamed of. Ashamed she died. Gone, never to be seen.

Jaune:She may be gone, but I know she had no regrets. Pyrrha was a huntress through and through, and I believe she fought like one until the end.

Pyrrha:*nods* Yeah, I think so too. *containg joy*

.........

Pyrrha:This isn’t the real scene by the way.

Jaune:I was about to say! Like, what the hell is happening!? I read the script and missed this part!

Pyrrha:Hahahaha! Good improvising. *claps* way to roll with the nonsense. I can’t believe you said no though! That’s how you get haunted.

Jaune:*laughing* I thought I was! Ghost Pyrrha walking with flowers saying “oh you know her?” I thought I did until you showed up!

Ren:We just shoot random scenes of you talking to Pyrrha and never address it. Jaune is just crazy now.

Pyrrha:I’m down for that!

Director:No! Well....no! Stop trying to get more lines!

Pyrrha:Awww.

xxxxxx

Ozpin:You know originally I brought my kid here so we can bond and he was like “awesome!”

Cameraman pans over to Oscar and Penny sitting on a bench eating together, laughing.

Ozpin:*smirking* I was played, but I respect it.

xxxxxx

[Volume 6]

Jaune:*walks up to Ruby* Promise that you’ll meet us there.

Ruby:I promise. *smiles*

..... *both lean in*

Ruby:......*kisses him*

Everyone:!?!?

Nora:Woah! Cut!

Ruby:Huh? What’s up?

Nora:There’s no kiss!

Ruby:Really? Feels like a kiss should be here. Huh, my bad. Thought it was written in.

xxxxxx

Ruby:*posed up in chair* They had to cut out me kissing Jaune. That’s fine, still kissed him.

xxxxxx

Nora:All I’m saying is maybe I should get a kiss with him.

Director:Nora, just ask him out on your own time.

Nora:Pffft what? Me, into Jaune? No..... I just think it would make good narrative sense.

Director:How!?

Nora:......*walks away* It just would!

[xaibaugrove]

Everyone in the Krew is Problematic

I was inspired to go on this rant by someone who recently brought up a question in a server I’m in, asking why so many people in the fandom seem to hate Mako and Makorra and why. This wouldn’t be the first time I defend Mako and it most likely won’t be the last, but it might be the first time I tear him and everyone else in the Krew down in the process, only to bring them back up. Hear me out though.

I think I’ve totally accepted that a lot of people in this fandom will always hate Mako and that I will have to perpetually defend him, I understand that this is the relationship I’ve chosen with this world. But what I still will never understand are the reasons why people hate/dislike him because compared to how much they love other characters in the Krew who honestly aren’t that much better than him (in some cases, even worse!), it doesn’t make any sense.

Let me also preface this by saying, I love these characters with all my heart and soul, probably more than I should love fictional characters, but this is the life I live and with that being said, I am going to tear them apart just to prove a point. Okay, here we go.

MAKO

Most of his detractors list the usual criticisms, which are valid when isolated. He cheated on Asami, he lied to Korra, he was a terrible boyfriend and essentially he treated the women he claimed to love or care about horribly. Gee, it’s almost like the man was a teenager with no experience in having long-lasting, healthy relationships and was raised in the streets by gangmembers while doing anything to survive and provide for his younger sibling after seeing his parents killed right in front of him and suddenly being orphaned…

I think Mako has been torn down enough, so I won’t get too deep into the tearing down part for him. It really does baffle me how someone can claim to be woke and not comprehend how someone coming from poverty could possibly be a product of their environment. Like, does everyone think that poor people automatically have hearts of gold and turn out like Little Orphan Annie? Why are people surprised that when someone has a shitty life, they might do shitty things?

Also, sooo many people love Zuko, who actively tried to cause harm to Aang, Katara and Sokka numerous times, and sympathize with his troubled past. But like, sure Zuko had an abusive father and his mother peaced out of his life for whatever reasons but at least he had his uncle. Mako had his parents for maybe 8 years before they were murdered in front of him and then had...no one for the next 10 years? Except for Bolin, sure, but no other parental figure in his life. Dude literally had to become him and his brother’s own parent and joined a gang to survive, and after all that, the worst he does is acts as a bad boyfriend toward Korra and Asami and he is instantly thrown to the wolves. Something doesn’t add up. It’s just...I don’t get it.

Yes, the way he treated people was bad, but people can grow? That’s a thing humans can do. And he was a teenager, my god. No, we cannot allow our past to be an excuse for how we treat others, but we have to be aware that there is a growth process to being human. And being human in and of itself, isn’t pretty. You think Mako is problematic? Don’t get me started on your fave.

KORRA

Ok, I love this woman to death but she is ridiculously problematic. She pursued someone in a relationship and essentially forced Mako to cheat on Asami by kissing him against his will, that’s already pretty awful and shows a lack of empathy on her part, also kissing people without their consent is no bueno. But also I just have to say it for the people who might not know this. One of the fundamental reasons why Makorra didn’t work was because KORRA WAS ABUSIVE. Okay? It wasn’t just that Mako was inadequate at relationships and didn’t know how to people, it wasn’t that she was secretly confused and wanting Asami the entire time (biphobia at it’s best) one of the main problems in the pairing was that Korra was crazy abusive towards Mako. Seriously, why don’t I see this more often in those discussions??

If we need examples, I have dozens. Honestly, it’s really easy to see how terrible Korra was to Mako, I’d actually argue that she treated him worse than he treated her. I mean, they were both terrible to one another, but in Korra’s case she went through the motions of being completely infatuated with your first teenage crush, getting with said crush, then crashing and burning once you realize that you have no idea how to treat a romantic partner so after the butterflies wear off you subject them to all the wonderful aspects of your anger issues. Not only did she scream at Mako during every argument they had, she also threatened him with bodily harm if she got really angry. Remember how their relationship crashed and burned in Book 2? Here are the things that Korra did during that time. Let me reiterate, this was not okay.

Mako is visibly shaken by this!

This woman burst into her boyfriend’s place of work and violently kicked his desk out from in front of him with all his coworkers present. That is not normal behavior. That is a red flag. And after she came back, had amnesia or whatever and forgot they broke up after that scene, let’s not forget that Mako was legitimately Afraid to break up with her again. Korra made her partner frightened that they might suffer bodily harm if they upset her. Again, and I can’t stress this enough, this is not okay!

The little scene in Book 3 when Korra is lifting Mako like 100 feet off the ground with airbending while he’s screaming in fear just to make Asami laugh is cute, right? I’ll admit, I loved that little moment too, it’s one of the only instances of Korrasami development that we got, but also, there were sooo many things wrong with that scene lol. Not only does Korra terrify Mako for literally no reason, it’s also sort of just her continuing to exercise some degree of power over him for her own amusement. Almost like a subtle reminder to him saying, “I am stronger than you in every way and I can break your femur like a twig if I wanted to… but I won’t, so look how much fun we’re having!”

Now of course, there are reasons why Korra acts like this. She was isolated for almost her entire life and never learned how to treat people and be around people. The Avatar is human because they must live amongst the people they protect and that helps them develop empathy and cherish life. The White Lotus deprived her of that fundamental aspect of her duty as the Avatar and it showed throughout the beginning of the series. Clearly, she was young, didn’t see how her actions could negatively affect others and hurt the feelings of not just her partner but also friends and family (she was really awful towards a lot of people in her life!). But as the series went on, we see her having less outbursts and learning to control her temper more.

One can only assume that she does not have the same behavior with Asami because for one, I don’t think Asami would play that shit, she seems like she would electrocute a bitch in a heartbeat and not hesitate if needed, but also Korra is not the same shitty partner she used to be as a teenager. Again, kids do stupid things. Adults do stupid things. And we learn and we grow. Korra will probably make some more mistakes in her relationship with Asami. I don't think anyone can have one bad relationship and suddenly learn all the lessons they can from it and have a perfect one the next go around. I can totally picture Korra losing her temper and raising her voice at Asami if she gets frustrated and forgets who she’s dealing with. Managing anger issues is hard, I know this from experience, and it doesn’t magically get easier. Of course, if Korra does pop off, Asami would definitely put her in her place because she’s a bad bitch who doesn’t take anyone’s shit, next character.

ASAMI

You know her, you love her, you fantasize about her and you probably have her on your list of fictional characters you would totally bang if you had the chance (I know I do), yes, even your best girl is problematic. It’s interesting to me that a lot of people sympathize with Asami and very few openly criticize her (so few that I’ve never seen anyone say a bad thing about her). What’s there to criticize though? The poor girl was cheated on by Mako, had her feelings disregarded by Korra, who claimed to be her friend but pursued her then-boyfriend behind her back and then made up for it by simping for her for the rest of her life? Also her mom was murdered when she was just 6 years old, her father threatened to kill her once and physically abused her, then died right after they started repairing their relationship, essentially making her an orphan at the ripe age of 22. Suffice it to say, Asami has been through it.

So, how could she be problematic, you ask? Why, of course, through the classic Bryke technique of romance progression in storylines called Kissing People Without Their Consent

To be honest, I did gloss over this with Korra, simply because there were sooo many other issues with that woman and I just couldn’t go through every single one in as much detail but that doesn’t negate how serious this whole sneak attack kissing thing is. Sure, Asami is very emotional and lonely and sort of desperate too, (it's a little sad, really) but Mako is clearly uncomfortable and completely caught off guard by the kiss. This is also the second time this happens to him in the series! There are a couple factors that might contribute to why Asami does this and acts this way, maybe Korra’s general awfulness rubbed off on her (don’t make a dirty joke) but this is still wrong.

AND that’s...pretty much it. Kissing people without their permission is a big no no, though. Not wanting to gloss over that, but Asami really is a good person who just did a not-so-great thing. Getting burned by Mako twice probably made her a little less inclined to be as forward with anyone though, and it looks like she now takes her time and is patient in her relationship with Korra. It even seems like Asami is the only person Korra is afraid to upset, as Korra does seem more gentle and calm when around her. And who knows? Maybe Asami living a life where a majority of the time she got whatever she wanted when she wanted it might have also influenced her to be more assertive or even imposing within her relationships.

If anything, those three fools getting into relationships with each other just showed how not ready they were to be in relationships in the first place and also how not okay they were.

BOLIN

Originally I titled this as “Everyone in the Krew is problematic (except Bolin)” but then I remembered that Bolin totally kissed a woman without her consent so I deleted the shit out of that!

This asshole looks genuinely pleased with himself after essentially assaulting Ginger. Not a good look.

Sure, Bolin is baby. He will always be baby to me. But that does not erase the fact that he also actively supported a fascist dictator. Not only was the kissing without consent thing bad, but there’s also that. No matter how many times people around him warned him about the fact that he was on the wrong side of things, that he was helping someone who was putting people into concentration camps...Bolin wanted to believe the best of Kuvira. He ignored obvious signs that the woman was a dictator committing human rights violations like crazy and you know, there’s gotta be a reason for that too.

Maybe Bolin wanted to feel like he was doing something good for once. When you think about it, with his role as the comic relief in the Krew, and sort of constantly being infantilized by his older brother, I wouldn’t be surprised if the man developed some insecurity in his ability to do anything good or useful for anyone without screwing it up in some way. In Kuvira’s army, it seemed like he was actually taken seriously, he felt like he was doing something that mattered. Korra had being the Avatar, Asami had her business and mindblowing philanthropy (honestly, her ability to be as charitable as she is profitable is insane) and Mako had his police work (ACAB, tho). Bolin had...the role of being a joke. A superficial actor. A former pro-bending meathead.

Bolin lived his entire life following after his brother that once they were adults and Mako finally decided to live his own life for once, it left Bolin completely lost. And lost young men are perfect recruits for fascists.

So, in conclusion, my whole reasoning behind destroying the integrity of my favorite characters is to prove a huge point. All of these characters are problematic. They have flaws, some bigger than others (looking at you, Korra. Just...wow), but ultimately, even if your fave is problematic... that’s okay. A lot of people, mostly younger people it seems, are really obsessed with being right about everything that they do and stan. And that’s a wonderful thing, so much change has come about by the younger generations calling out people who do fucked up shit, don’t want or try to improve, and get away with it. But it’s also caused a lot of people to be unforgiving and completely unwilling to acknowledge when people do improve and try to be better.

Personally, I love my problematic Krew because having issues that you’re constantly working on internally is human. It’s human to make mistakes, it’s human to grow from those mistakes. And it’s inspiring to me, who is wholly imperfect, to see myself reflected in fictional characters who aren’t perpetuating unrealistic ideals of human nature, characters who are messy, crazy and ultimately human.

As one of my favorite manga artists and queen of impeccable character creation Rumiko Takahashi once said:

“I think that perfect people are not very interesting.”

And I will always wholeheartedly agree.

[chojuuro]

do you like or hate kabuto?

short answer: yes

long answer: also yes.

i have what may seem like conflicting feelings toward him, but understand that a) my venus placement is in aquarius and b) he deserves a little throttling as a treat

let me explain (under a cut because i got Started)

kabuto is someone who is SO interesting and weirdly personal to me. a kid who grew up with no identity of his own, who's trying to find his place in this world the way he knows best. which, i mean, he's been kinda fucked since day one and it DESTROYS MY ASS and not in a fun way

he was, i think, 7 when danzo picked him up, after 3 years in an orphanage where they just. gave him a name. because he had amnesia and DIDN'T. KNOW. HIS BABYHOOD. boy didn't know his NAME or his parents or anything

and THEN danzo got his grubby hands on him when he was SEVEN. worst part is he went willingly because he wanted to help the orphanage with the funding that danzo cut.

and THEN THE OROCHIMARU SHIT ASLKFJ and then when kabuto killed nonou unknowingly and then had his entire identity crisis, probably his first real one. hm. HM.

at which point orochimaru showed up, ensnared the poor boy with promises of identity, of finding out exactly who he was, of making a name for himself.

kabuto has been a spy his entire life. dozens of different hats, of different identities, of different masks to hide the kid who never really got to explore or figure out who he is. orochimaru died, and kabuto spiraled.

orochimaru was his only constant. the only thing he could come back to, that he knew, vaguely, would always be there. that he knew he always had a solid place with.

after the amnesia, after the orphanage, after ROOT, the spy work, the death of his mother, orochimaru's slimy grip, after trying to deal with the aftermath of everything? dude is a fuckin shell of the man he never got to be. and it KILLS ME.

don't get me started on how he's a fucking nun now. i do not perceive nunbuto. but i can't help but feel like maybe he wound up running the orphanage because he literally had no idea where else he could go. ROOT doesn't exist anymore, also FUCK that place. orochimaru is doing whatever That era of orochimaru is doing and i imagine part of kabuto wants to distance himself from them, at least for a while. no way the hospital would trust him enough to work there, even though his medical ninjutsu is SO strong and he could be licherally one of the best medics in konoha. he probably IS. but will konoha give him the chance to prove himself for it? not in a thousand years.

and maybe im biased bc little 11 year old me simped for him really hard. maybe im biased bc i can totally get the loss of sense of identity, the identity crises, the wanting to be better. the internal struggle of not knowing who you are, of having other people tell you who you are for you.

he's done a lot of really fucked up shit, obviously. he's literally a criminal. brought souls back from the dead just to fuck around and find out during the war. shows up uninvited at ALL TIMES. he's pretentious and he's smarmy and he's an asshole who worked under orochimaru for a huge chunk of his life, so you KNOW that he's been On Some Shit and honestly? to little fault of his own. he's a victim of circumstance, of grooming on multiple accounts, of his own mental health and the lack of care that konoha takes in anybody's psyche. good thing i have an oc to fix that for me aha

let me be clear that this does not excuse any of his actions. but it does explain them.

anyway *climbs off my soapbox* i love He but i kinda wanna beat him up sometimes

[miraculouscontent]

“Truth”-related asks:

Anonymous said:

I just watched truth and man, we didn't need any of that... I'm so tired...

Anonymous said:

Me after reading that summary: We coulda had it aaaaaaaaaaallllllll, decent wri-itiiiiiiiiiiiiiiingggggg

Anonymous said:

oh. lukanette breakup. how surpri— oh wait, no it wasn't.

bunnybunblitz said:

Me, skimming your summary of truth: life is a nightmare life is a nightmare life is a nightmare abort abort

Anonymous said:

Truth was a living nightmare, and that's the truth!

*defeated sigh*

Anonymous said:

The way all that just make me start disliking Adrien so hard wow I have enough of him so hard can they get ride of him for one damn episode?

Anonymous said:

Wow! Writers got on completely new level. They somehow made people to be annoyed with Adrien, even without putting him in episode.

My meme image of “I’ve had enough of this dude,” about sums it up.

It’s almost impressive???

Anonymous said:

I have the impression that you should slowly gather materials for "Treatment of Marinette S4"

You know, when you’re right, you’re right.

Anonymous said:

Hey there... Got a lil rant, I hope you don't mind in sea of anons you're probably getting. I guess if show didn't treat Marinette as their favorite punching bag and lukanette as a thing to get over with to be back on love square bullshit I wouldn't be this salty. We all knew lukanette isn't a endgame, but we actually care about Luka ans Marinette as characters and as a couple, and we knew there was a break up brewing.

But I mlb writers for setting things up, canonizing them over provocative tweet and leave them to dust right at the beginning of s4. And, oh sweet irony as they kinda accidentally made Lukanette totally better than love square (let's be honest if they knew what they were doing we wouldn't get any breakup from narrative and character development standpoint),,, because their heroine for once is loved and appreciated but that's another discussion and they hate that for her. Also, thomas arstruck can suck my toe.

I don't know what's your opinion on soulmate and destiny thing, but I'm totally in opposite. I remember The Good Place (love the series btw!) quote about how soulmates are made with love and nurture of people and not some cosmic forces. And to see how show is pushing for Destiny ™️ I'm kinda disheartened. But I guess I never really liked love square execution in the first place when it turned out that Marinette is butt of the crush joke for 3 seasons and there's 0 development from that. Like Thomas, that's not funny running gag. Thanks for reading! Hope you're doing well!

Thank you for the rant, and I agree!

It’s so strange how all their attempts to push for the love square just push me more towards Lukanette. How do the writers do that???

Anonymous said:

Yeah that point where she exclaims Luka in shock just angered and confused me. She LITERALLY transformed because Luka was akumatized. And her being shocked is only there to get her under the truth spell.

This episode is held together by knots and strings at this point.

Anonymous said:

Wow, "Ladybug likes Chat Noir humor." Then why every time Chat Noir makes puns, Ladybug looks like she wanted to strangle him on spot.

Ladybug = us

At that point, they should’ve just said, “[The writers] like Chat Noir’s humor.” Like--writers, please don’t use Ladybug as a tool to simp for your sunshine boy, it looks really pathetic.

Anonymous said:

Based on the ellipses you used I'm guessing you're not a fan of Jagged talking about the "Guitar is my only family" song.

Oh, no actually... I mean, I do because it’s there to torment Luka, but the ellipses was because of the intentional pause in the episode. Jagged was looking sympathetic

Anonymous said:

Truth was awful, the only good thing we got out of it was a Lukanette date (yay :'D) and we got to know Luka's father (although we all been knew).

Honestly if we could find a way to edit it so Luka and Marinette properly kissed then we’d just chop it out of the episode and call it the only canon thing.

asexual-individual said:

So, given that "Truth" didn't introduce the protection charms, I'm going to take a wild guess that they're not introduced until after "Gang of Secrets", meaning that Marinette won't get any close friends that it's safe to tell her secret to.

I was legit so sure that it was a guardian benefit and now I’m just left confused/curious about what causes CharmBug. Like, what, do you get CharmBug by purifying your one thousandth akuma???

Anonymous said:

I am absolutely positive no one quality checks these episodes before they’re sent out. Ladybug getting caught off guard on Luka being Truth even though she knows he was akumatised, and the horribly upbeat music playing as Marinette lies in bed absolutely defeated is so bad there’s no way this was double checked before it was sent out to TV stations

At this point, I’m convinced that they don’t care and are jamming through episodes as fast as they possible can.

cobraonthecob said:

I'm willing to bet that the writers go through critical and salt blogs just to see what the fandom's thinking, and then they think we're serious and they sprint with whatever we say.

guys please reconsider and also lower your alcohol levels

Anonymous said:

It was awful in general, but why add the paternity thing in the break-up ep? It detracts from, well, everything else and makes obvious they are copypasting fan theories instead of thinking of plot points.

I really do think they knew that Luka being upset over Marinette’s secret wasn’t enough to akumatize him so he needed something else.

Anonymous said:

Let me get something straight: The episode was explicitly about Marinette going on dates with Luka and that they were together. Yet Juleka is once again part of the shipping squad with obligatory "Marinette is only weird because she's with Adrien"-theories, and she's totally cool with that?

Yup! :3

guys I just adore mob mentality, did you know.

guys--

Anonymous said:

Ok, but the fact that everyone considers Marinette’s crush on Adrien to be her big secret is stupidly unrealistic. They KNOW they’re all aware of it - the girl squad even figured it out by themselves before they were told and think it’s totally obvious (as long as you’re a girl cause guys are clueless about feelings right). As far as they’re concerned it’s not actually a secret so they SHOULD be spilling the things they think only they and Marinette know. I mean, I can think of dozens of possibilities for Tom and the rest of the girls already, but Alya?

We had a front row seat to the damning secret Alya knows from back in season 1, but I guess asking this show to acknowledge continuity is too much. Still, the episode could have been so much more interesting if Alya had said, “Marinette’s the one who really gave Adrien the scarf for his birthday, but he looked so happy thinking it was from his father that she couldn’t bear to tell him that Gabriel hadn’t actually gotten him anything.” (I suppose reminding people of that wouldn’t fit into the writers’ poor attempts to make Gabriel sympathetic though 🙄).

Lol, just imagine the entire battle being sidetracked by Luka being brought to tears by how selfless and sweet his girlfriend is while Shadow Moth is too distracted by how this will ruin his reputation to get him back on track.

JKHJDSKGFSG

YES.

ALL OF THIIIIIS.

THIS IS AMAZING.

Anonymous said:

Marinette deserves to tell Luka she's Ladybug and have some support on her side tbh, it's disgusting to see the writers breaking up clearly the only thing that brings her joy and peace currently

HONESTLY.

And judging from that one trailer, she IS going to tell someone her secret and it’ll probably be freaking Alya; you know, the girl who blabbed about her Adrien crush to Nino and is thus THE LEAST TRUTHWORTHY PERSON. (”bonus” if it’s before the amulets)

I’m having nightmares already about Alya distrusting Lila because Marinette is Ladybug and not because Alya believes in Marinette. DX

Anonymous said:

Now that it’s been confirmed (in the worst way possible) that Jagged Stone is in fact Luka’s (and possibly Juleka’s?) father, how would you handle the whole mixed family aspect considering Jagged and Anarka’s relationship, Jagged and Penny’s, Anarka and Penny’s, Jagged and Luka’s (and Juleka’s?), and Penny and Luka’s (and Juleka’s?)? Topics like mixed families and family relationships are something that needs to be handled sensibly and sensitively given how it hits home for a lot of real-world people. Since we obviously can’t trust the ML writers to handle such topics the way that they deserve to be, how would you go about it knowing what we know up to this point about each character on their own and how they interact with one another?

Luka and Juleka were “accidents,” but Anarka kept it a secret from Jagged since Jagged was already hyped up to go on his next tour and Anarka knew their relationship was crumbling (possibly he already dumped her as his guitarist and she was annoyed about it). Jagged eventually learns that he has kids and is hesitant towards the idea, but because of him doting on Marinette (who’s the same age as his kids), he opens up to the idea.

Anarka and Jagged in present are mixed between tolerating each other for the sake of their kids and being chaotic best friends. The bad blood died out a while ago and there’s occasional tension but because Anarka is a single woman not interested in Jagged and Jagged is single with a possible thing for Penny, they make it work

Anarka and Penny have an awkward relationship. Penny wants to schedule time for Jagged to hang with Luka and Juleka and Anarka is confused at the very concept of a schedule, like just take them whenever okay??? isn’t it easier that way??? and Penny is like, “...oh, I guess so?”

Jagged and Penny, it depends on if they’re in any sort of relationship. If they’re in a relationship, Penny is either open to the idea of him learning to be good with kids if she’ll eventually want kids with him, or mixed because these are another woman’s kids and it’s really awkward. If they’re not in a relationship, then Penny could also be mixed since she’s crushing on him but I could also see her either finding it sweet that Jagged wants to hang out with his kids or finding it a hassle to schedule them in.

Jagged and Luka is rough. Luka has so many conflicting feelings on his idol ending up being his father. Jagged will probably even comment on Luka’s shirt + necklace and all of Luka’s merch in an attempt to bond but that kind of comes off desperate/awkward and Luka’s not about that life. I could also see Luka taking all the stuff down and swapping out his shirt, but being hesitant to remove the necklace because it’s a gift from Marinette. He might try to wash off the signature. He knows it’s not Jagged’s fault exactly but Anarka seemed to have bad blood with him and even if they get along now, Luka’s bitter. Jagged meanwhile wants to connect with Luka because hey musician energy!! but is gonna mess up a lot and say a lot of awkward things. Marinette will probably have to be a middle man between the two because it’s easier for them to talk with her around.

Jagged and Juleka don’t have a significant relationship at first. Juleka never care who her father was and she wasn’t crazy about Jagged Stone like Luka was. Jagged does try to connect with her but they clash majorly due to Jagged being so “loud” and Juleka being so quiet. Jagged will see it as a huge accomplishment the day where Juleka says something coherent (i.e: not a mumble) to him.

Yeah though, keep in mind for all of this that I’m not a family relationship kinda girl, so this isn’t my forte (I’m probably the most sympathetic to Jagged out of the whole fandom; not to say I agree with his actions but I have a history of hating babies and children, so not cool of him if he ditched Anarka but like, I get it, doesn’t make him better but I get it from a non-realistic standpoint of “ew, parenting”).

Anonymous said:

You know what? Imma gonna ignore canon for a bit more than I’ve been doing. The only thing I take away from “Truth” is that Marinette loves Luka and Tikki looks adorable in hats. That’s it have a good Saturday! 💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙

Anonymous said:

If there’s one small detail that I thought was genuinely cute this episode, it’s Tikki posing in the mirror with her little hat collection.

Ahaha, those are good takeaways!

And yes, Tikki looked good in hats, but at what cost. (guys, where’s our jealous Tikki episode where Tikki is jealous of the attention Marinette has to give the other kwami wait no they’d just make it Marinette’s fault go back go ba--)

Anonymous asked:

Am I the only on squicked out by how Adrien acts all noble and claims he would never force Ladybug to tell him anything, but when it becomes apparent that he has to ask her a question before the akuma can he goes all ‘what are your three favorite things about me?’ :3c I mean, he had decent amount of time to think up a bunch of innocent questions that couldn’t hurt her in any way like ‘what is your favorite color?’ or ‘do you like cookies?’ or even ‘what’s the capitol of France?’ But instead he basically demands she compliment him. Coming from a guy who spent most of the last two seasons refusing to take ‘no’ for an answer that’s a bit… icky.

THIS

He could’ve phrased it in any way and he used it to get compliments from her. :|

At least Ladybug asked a legitimate question about how he felt about her guardian status.

Anonymous said:

I had this idea for an episode: Luka finds out that Marinette is LB because he is in danger. Let's say he gets yeeted off a building by an akuma and Marinette (in her civilian form) jumps after him, transforms while Luka sees it (he's shook, obviously), she grabs him and saves him from falling. I think that would be pretty epic, do you think you could write a one-shot based on that idea if you feel like that? I would forever be thankful. Have a nice day!

I like the idea, though I feel like that’s been done a lot before in identity reveal fanfics.

Anonymous said:

You know, despite them all getting interrupted, I thought the attempts at Lukanette dates was really cute. Luka picking up Marinette from school, the two trying to see who is the biggest jagged fan, getting ice cream at Andre's, it's really cute! I only wish Hawkmoth and the writers weren't such dickheads.

It’s so adorable!

Like--show, you aren’t doing a good job at getting me off the Lukanette train.

Anonymous said:

Are you sure the Lukanette breakup wasn't Marinette's fault? I mean, the episode frames it like she's refusing to tell the truth, even if it's for a good reason.

I’m not sure when I said that the episode didn’t frame it as her fault?

Things are ALWAYS Marinette’s fault, it’s literally a rule of the show.

Anonymous said:

You know the truth episode actually gives more reasons for lukanette in my opinion based of its description you said. Luka is ridiculously understanding and also almost manages to fight off hawk moth as well as taking probably a week at least for him to get to that and yet he, while he’s upset, still tries to be there for marinette. Also makes the relationships she has with her friends and family worse if the secret they think she has is that she likes adrien while dating Luka.

YES!!

And oh my gosh, I feel the friends and family comment so badly. Just throwing it out there, maybe you guys don’t actually support her???

Anonymous said:

How do you feel about Luka having no negative reaction to this whole "Marinette loves Adrien" thing? I understand that he isn't exactly the jealous type, but still, it seems weird to me that he just accepts it while Marinette is dating him. I love Luka a lot, but in this situation his reaction was just so unrealistic...

Honestly, I find it really interesting. Plus, it’s Truth who’s being told those things, not Luka, and Truth has other priorities.

And--I mean, I’m positive that Luka got into the relationship knowing that Marinette wasn’t completely over Adrien. She wanted to see if they’d work and he wanted to date her. It’s both of them being a little selfish in a way and I like that.

That’s why I think he doesn’t have a big reaction to the Adrien call. He seems amused more than anything, and Luka is empathetic also so he knows not to take Marinette’s stammering/mistakes to heart because she doesn’t mean them. We already had evidence of that in “Desperada.”

writingamongther0ses said:

Even if Lukanette had stayed together, I have a feeling Alya would complain that it's not Adrien...which could lead to a character growth opportunity for her when her complaining leads to Luka getting hurt when he overhears and becomes an akuma. But that's too interesting.

Interesting character relationships??? In THIS show???

never

Anonymous said:

After watching Truth the only thing I can feel at the moment is bitter. Not angry, not sad, not disappointed. Just bitter.

Bitter’s a good way of putting it, yeah. *sigh*

Anonymous said:

The fact that the second episode released managed to get a bingo really says a lot about how predictable the show's garbage fire writing.

I KNOW, RIGHT??

I knew the Lukanette episode would be a big card filler but DAMN.

Anonymous said:

I hated all of Truth, but perhaps the worst part was how hard they tried to remind you that, no matter how much of a good time Marinette and Luka have together, it's Adrien who Marinette will end up with in the end. From Alya rudely insinuating "girl, you're acting stupid, is Adrien at your house?", to Luka receiving a PICTURE of Adrien from a kwami, to Marinette talking on the phone with Luka while her Adrien pictures are in the background, to Marinette CALLING LUKA ADRIEN, to Truth demanding that people tell him Marinette's secret, only for them ALL to say "She's in love with Adrien Agreste.".

It's absolutely anger-inducing because it tries too hard to let the audience know to forget about Luka because Adrien is lurking in the corner and he and Marinette are endgame. The fans are right, Luka IS a second choice, but not in the way they think. Luka's a second choice, not for Marinette, but for the Miraculous Ladybug world. for the WRITERS!!!

But what bothers me the most is that everyone saying that Marinette loves Adrien is accepted as truth even when Marinette herself says she's over Adrien. Her words are ignored, how she feels is ignored, because everyone else(including the girl squad, when they're supposed to be her "friends") tells her that she's supposed to be in love with Adrien, and so she "has" to go along with it because ENDGAME. It's the show saying "stupid naive Marinette, you're too immature and dumb to know how you really feel, let someone else do the thinking for you!"

Meanwhile Adrien moving on with Kagami is accepted even when he still flirts with Ladybug(and forces her to build up his ego when he asks her what she admires most about him; I know it was a spur of the moment thing, but meta-wise, it was obvious love square pushing.), because "he's trying to respect her feelings and date someone else!" It's one of the main gripes I have with the show: that teenage girls are too emotional and confused to know what they really want, but teenage boys are mature and rational enough to make up their minds about who they love without holding any animosity towards anyone.

The all-white, all-male writing team pushes the Chinese girl's feelings aside and forces her to hide and erase them if they're not want they want her to feel, while the white boy gets congratulated with a pat on the back for doing the bare minimum and always, ALWAYS, takes the moral high ground(even in superhero form when he's supposedly goofy.). When she's the lead.

"Luka's a second choice, not for Marinette, but for the Miraculous Ladybug world. for the WRITERS!!!“

LOUDER FOR THE PEOPLE IN THE BACK

It’s just tiring. It’s not even me being sick of the love square, but it being forced into everything when it’s not even relevant. The episode strategically throws more and more of Marinette’s Adrien crush (I did the math, I know this) into the mix and it provides nothing but the same tired jokes. Heck, they keep leaning on the lucky charm Marinette let him borrow (not GAVE, let him BORROW) back in Season 1 because they basically have nothing else to go off of.

[transgenderer]

@kata4a tagged me

What was your:

Last beverage: coffee this morning, unless water counts. im gonna have some cranberry juice with lemon soon. so good Last phone call: i dont have phonecalls often! probably IT at my job. maybe a tinder dude like a week ago Last text message: tinder dude ive been talking with, he seems cool so far Last song you listened to: golden jackal song! what a great song. Last time you cried: like a week ago i cried right after work in the bathroom. not sure why

Have you ever:

Dated someone twice: my first boyfriend! we broke up and then briefly got back together a couple months later. god. that relationship was bad in such a boring way, i was just desperate but wasnt particularly into him Kissed someone and regretted it: not really? i mean. ive had bad kisses. but its never caused like Consequences Lost someone special: like, they died? nah. i alienated my long distance best friend when i was in like 9th grade and havent talked to her since. bummer Been depressed: lol Been drunk and threw up: ive never thrown up AFTER getting drunk but for some reason last year i vomited on the WAY to the wine garden. i think i overexerted myself or something?

List 3 favorite colors: hmm green, orangey-pink, like teal/turquoise

Last year, have you:

Made a new friend: hmm. sort of? ive gotten much closer with people i hadnt been close to before. idk if ive like properly befriended any totally new people? idk. its ambiguous Fallen out of love: i mean, sort of aidan? i was never really in love with him :/ Laughed until you cried: i think so? idk if i do this Found out who your true friends are: is this code for "been betrayed"? weird. i havent been betrayed Found out someone was talking about you: my friends talk abt me sometimes i love it :) i love it when people talk abt me. i love it when ppl on here mention talking about me irl. Anyone on your fb friends list? facebook more like fakebook

General:

How many people on your fb friends list do you know in real life?: (facebook fakebook)

Firsts:

First surgery: when i was a baby i had my thumb stuck at a right angle! they had to like. cut a tendon First piercing: i dont have any piercings! First best friend: girl from preschool who lied all the time. so weird and bad First sport you joined: i did t ball when i was real little First vacation: my parents took me to hawaii when i was reallly little i think

Right now:

Eating: pbj for dinner :/ Drinking: just water I’m about to: post, I guess (i second kat)

Your future:

Want kids: hard no Get married: hopefully! Career: hopefully math PHD and then yknow. do something with that. probably not in academia

Which is better:

Lips or eyes: hmm, lips probably, i dont usually look at eyes lol. i feel like face is about the hole tho... Hugs or kisses: probably hugs? kisses are nice too but theres something so safe... Shorter or taller: taller :/ kind of a woman moment Older or younger: older, double woman moment. gender Romantic or spontaneous: this is a weird dichotomy. spontaneous i guess? Nice stomach or nice arms: arms! love arms Sensitive or loud: sensitive Hook-up or relationship: relationship! or at least, yknow. more than once Trouble maker or hesitant: troublemaker

Have you ever:

Kissed a stranger: depends if you count tinder boys i barely no Drank hard liquor: yeah Lost glasses/contacts: ha i dont need glasses. fucking poindexters Sex on first date: literally dozens of times Broke someone’s heart: yeah... :/ Arrested: nope! ive been like, accessory to a felony tho (cooking DMT) Turned someone down: loads Cried when someone died: i think my great grandma? Fallen for a friend: yeah...

Do you believe in:

Yourself: i guess? idk really know what this means Miracles: ofc not Love at first sight: i mean...idk, i feel like this is weirdly undefined as a concept. like, obviously you cant KNOW someone on first sight. you can know someone after a first meeting, mabe... anyway you cant love someone you dont know Heaven: lol nah Santa Claus: no? Kiss on the first date: yes? Angels: no

[steve0discusses]

S5 Ep 3: Apdnarg is Really Hard to Spell

 Yo guys, people are getting vaccinated, the sun is parting through the clouds, and I felt so nice that I even stopped listening to quite so many throwback 00′s BTS mashups (and yet I keep clicking on these dissonant catastrophes thinking “this time it’s got to be better. This time they’ll figure it out.” and like, no. Turns out you can’t match Brittany’s Toxic with BTS’ Black Swan. You can’t do that.)

This must be a sign that things are getting better. If anything, it means my personal tastes are improving. I mean I only clicked on like 3 “Dark Academia” Playlists where I could pretend I’m some sort of spooky witch in an abandoned library with a bad music player and basic taste in classical music (like can we ban Satie from Youtube for a little while?). Hell, I might even do a prompt update to this blog!

Yeah, you heard me, I’m actually going to stay ahead of the update schedule for Yugioh Abridged (maybe. I haven’t actually watched cuz of spoilers, I just noticed the thumbnail pop up on Youtube and was like “Damn it, they came out of hiatus??? I got hurry UP.”)

Anyway, speaking of the sky parting.

I’ll have you know my bro said this is actually more like a circumcision and it was one of the worst thing I have ever heard.

We get a chance to take in this lineup of confusing and varied character designs, and Joey. who is...still Joey.

The animators probably had to hold a strike in order for them to put Yugi in the audience, lets be real. There are TOO MANY PEOPLE in this shot and one is wearing a turban where you draw every single wrap. I hope those artists charged by the line.

Tea has a subplot where she’s just very frustrated with everyone she knows. They have been traveling together for like many weeks and got trapped in a foreign country so I get it. But at the same time, it’s kind of hard to picture Tea with female friends.

Because right now you got this 12 year old child, the other duelist who does not care about anything besides cards, and Kaiba’s 3 dragon cards that we’ve all collectively decided are female.

Hell it’s almost like the writers are asking themselves why Tea is here. Maybe they forgot. There’s no more ghosts to bus, no more people to knock out with her ass with random Olympic feats. Tea’s just sidelining.

(read more under the cut)

Mokuba is a itty bit bit taller this season, and so I guess that means he can legally climb on top of the cherry picker in order to give a riveting speech.

Really says a lot about Mokuba that he is so unphased about talking to, I dunno...an entire planet of people. Kind of a shame we never see this courage from Mokuba used for anything other than talking really, really big and giving everyone around him a really hard time.

Mokuba takes a moment to dunk on Yugi Muto, as is Kaiba tradition.

And then introduce the first pair of duelists, which obviously must be between the few people in this tournament that we actually know and care about.

Thankfully, in between last episode and this episode, Yugi has figured out who his own Grandpa is. This is a relief, because Yugi is such a mess, that I was fully convinced it would take over half a season for him to recognize it. I mean how long did it take him to figure out he shares a body with a ghost? Like half a season?

Instead Yugi recovered gracefully from not recognizing his grandpa, but it’s not like he bothered to tell anyone else, so the rest of our cast is just gonna be like “Is he my hairdresser? The guy who delivers my mail? Who is this guy who made absolutely no significant changes to his outfit or voice?”

Like sometimes this show goes full Spongebob silly kid’s show and you never know when to take it seriously or not. They might be sacrificing the entire cast next episode. I really don’t know. But for now their big concern is who is grandpa??? Like an innocent card version of “Are you my Mother?”

Faced with public speaking, Yugi decides to have a melt down.

We have seen him face monsters, we’ve seen him on TV dozens of times, he’s been in multiple competitions...but give a speech? Of course he can’t do that. The kid doesn’t attend enough school to know how to do that. Them’s learning skills.

And that was when a newly assembled wife-jet spliced through the sky like a souped up razer scooter and deposited 1 fully equipped Seto Kaiba in a Buzz Lightyear jetsuit.

THE RECOVERY.

Seto always watching over his Brother, ready to save this awkward party if it kills him (and it really should, that suit is held together by two seat-belts), making sure to get on that platform before Yugi starts going off about how he’s half an Ancient Egyptian. (Ah, life before social media. You could just be hella famous and also half a dead dude and people would just not know. I kinda miss the time before I knew literally everything about everyone.)

Please admire how close those flames are to setting Mokuba’s heavily hairsprayed mane completely alight. It would be an unforgettable spectacle.

These were absolutely just random ass jet packs that Gozaburo Kaiba made to kill hell tons of people, right? Like Seto found it in the family cabin, clutched to the heart of some crispy fried corpse and was like “neat! Mokuba! I found a cool toy!” and just plucked that thing out of that skeleton’s clutches and has been flying around for months?

Like this is Seto Kaiba’s Butter Glider, right?

Seriously what type of vehicle license do you need for one of these things? RIP My ‘Seto only has a scooter license’ headcanon.

Which I’m only even thinking about because I’ve had to try and make an appt with the DMV for days to get a freakin REAL ID. I went to sleep in 2019 and I could fly on a plane. I woke up in 2021 and it’s like “Want one last screw you?” and just...can 2020 please stop screwing me over? It’s March.

Anyway, the Jet is removed soon after, so no, this is not part of his new outfit. He goes right back to his Post-S4-Trauma-Normcore.

After wrestling this competition out of his brother’s hands and confusing everyone in the audience, Roland must have gotten the memo to cut the microphone before Seto got too excited and we were quickly ushered on to the next stage of the tournament.

One sec...the BTS Mashup playlist I just clicked on did a Black Swan X 7 rings mashup and it’s the worst thing my ears have ever heard.

Holy crap. I had to actually turn down my volume. Like...Ariana Grande already has music that has way too many overlapping singing parts on it--and then lets just stick a 52-person boy band on top? That’ll fix it. Yeah. Go ahead.

Wow. Even I had to change the song and you know how much I enjoy pop culture mistakes.

Spot the Mickey but like a million times easier because it’s a Massive Dick Shaped Dragon.

Yep. That’s my grocery shopping outfit. Except maybe not a lab coat and a duel disk. Wish I had a duel disk, that would make social distancing just a hell ton earlier. Just a “Yo, only one person in checkout, please” and then bap them on the head with a propelled discuss/hologram.

Anyway, Grocery shopping/Doctor man dueled the Purple Hair Boy, and considering that Purple Hair got screen time and shook Yugi’s hand once--I think that Doctor man doesn’t stand a freakin chance.

Good. I hate him.

Also, every time he breathes he’s gonna fog up his glasses. I have experience in this area. He can’t read his own cards in the same way I can’t read my phone if I’m in the refrigerated aisle.

So the way this tournament works, is everyone has to sit in the stadium to watch the show. Kinda like showing up to a football stadium just to watch a recorded TV monitor...but then again...that is how it feels to watch a football game at a football stadium when it’s live (at least with the tickets I usually get.)

And as we watch Grandpa waiting for his competitor, we find out that his competitor (Joey) is too busy eating snacks to give him the time of day.

Why do cartoon hot dogs always have lettuce? Is that seriously supposed to be relish? Or is there a place in the world where you put lettuce on your hot dog?

Sorry, bro has just informed of his favorite hot dog order, which is absolutely terrible so I will share it with you: a Five Guys hot dog with ketchup, mustard, pickle relish, onions, mushrooms, pickled peppers, and you guessed it--topped with freakin lettuce.

My own kin. How am I over 30 and just finding out that my baby brother thinks it’s normal to walk into a restaurant with normal god-fearing law-abiding people and order lettuce and mushrooms on a hot dog?

I have fully failed him.

The rest of this episode is watching both Joey Wheeler and Mokuba have a shared panic attack while Seto does freakin nothing.

Please remember that Seto has both a jetpack and a dragon wife plane and could have easily solved this problem. But nah.

Then again, Seto Kaiba has given this crew so MANY rides, that maybe he’s tired of being the Soccer Mom for the team?

Like they don’t actually say this episode, but Seto was the one in charge of like...this entire place, do you think he made the 2 for 1 special just to get Joey where it hurts the most? Or does it actually not take any subterfuge to screw Joey Wheeler because he’s just naturally this way?

Like Mokuba wasn’t there when Joey was told “stay right here, and then we will all go together to fight Dartz” and Joey was like “I’mma save Mai from herself although she told me not to!” and then he Hella Died. But, Mokuba did see the result, AKA, Joey’s dead body being carried on the back of Tristan. Maybe Mokuba never realized that Joey died because he went out of his way to be late?

Lets do a tally of every time I can recall with my dodgy memory that Joey was threatened to be DQ’d/pretty much was DQ’d either by his own fault or no fault of his own

-When he wasn’t allowed to go on the boat to Murder Island because he was a stupid nobody kid who did not have a dueling glove

-When he wasn’t actually supposed to be in Pegasus’ tourney and was, in fact, secretly using half of Yugi’s entrance ticket the entire time

-when Bandit Keith stole the ticket that Joey got from Yugi so then Joey had to borrow Mai’s ticket although she had just used it so it really shouldn't have counted. Because, really anyone could have just piggy backed off of each other’s ticket until the whole boat went through that castle.

-When his account was hacked to get entered into Kaiba’s tourney when Kaiba very clearly told him he could not apply solely because he was Joey Wheeler.

-When he was late to his sister’s eye surgery because he got mugged by Marik’s Rare Hunters, so she almost refused to do the surgery.

-When Joey got possessed by Marik, and as Marik, threatened to murder everyone else in the tournament including both of the Kaiba brother’s who’s tournament it was, and then chained himself to Yugi Muto to throw both of them to the bottom of the ocean.

-I think there was a point when he threatened to attack Kaiba in Kaiba’s own tourney while not possessed? Like several times?

-when he got struck by Lightning and almost did not stand up fast enough after being struck by lightning, which is apparently a type of DQ in Duel Monsters.

-When he tried to save Mai from getting hit by a fireball, but then Yugi did it instead, and then so many people were standing on the dueling platform that Kaiba couldn’t possibly DQ them all.

-When he entered the restricted area of the blimp in order to hassle Kaiba into landing the Blimp, which Kaiba did not do.

-When Marik killed Joey before Joey could press the “go” button on his duel disk to play the card that should have won Joey the match.

-When he was dueling a lawyer in a digital universe but then the dice was like...weighted? So Noah had to walk over and be like “The hell is this weighted dice? This is my perfect digital world? How did you even do that?” and then Joey won because the match was no longer legit.

-When Joey yelled at Noah too much and so Noah turned Joey to stone for being a rude ass spectator

-When Mai was like “Wheeler and Valon, listen closely: do NOT murder each other” and then Joey did a murder on Valon so she was like “I guess I have no choice, I was very clear” and killed Joey straight up.

-When Joey decided to block Seto’s fireballs while Joey Wheeler WAS a playing card, somehow disrespecting both Dartz and Seto Kaiba at the same time.

-When Joey was playing cards but then got absorbed into a giant Leviathan and basically couldn’t play anymore after that.

-There’s probably hell ton of S0 stuff I just haven’t seen yet.

-This episode

And Joey runs fast for a montage of wacky things that really have no business being in a theme park. Things like this:

(remember when Bakura almost died from a rock that ended up being a balloon? It comes full circle.)

The stuff that the Kaiba brother’s think is normal and fun.

Anyway Joey fights off a bunch of hologram snakes and bats and everyone is like “Should we tell him it’s just holograms???” And it’s like wow, guys, how many times have these ‘holograms’ straight up murdered Joey Wheeler and everyone else on this cast? Too many? Because I have a google doc with so many deaths on it. 7,805,844,048, to be exact.

Anyway, he gets there with five seconds to spare and Mokuba’s like “well at least you were still entertaining while we filmed you in front of a live audience being a total spaz for 15 minutes straight, so I’ll let you go.”

Grandpa and Joey start playing, Joey completely oblivious that this is just an older Muto, while Hawkins walks up awkwardly and is like “hey guys. I’m so sorry about this.”

(welcome to my font choices, for those new here, I have to make weird font color choices to make sure it’s legible for the colorblind and also for the non-colorblind. This one is not much contrast, so I may change it up in the future, but for now, this is Grandpa Muto’s new font. I apologize to every graphic designer reading this. Please don’t tell anyone who has ever hired me for graphic design about this blog.)

What’s funny about this exchange is that after they find out that Yugi’s Grandpa is Apdnarg (HOLY my brain cannot get around the spelling for that, and I will not change it in the caps. I cannot do a ‘pdn’ ever again), they don’t stand on his side of the field or anything. Hawkins is legit Solomon Muto’s only fan during this exchange and like...damn. Way not to back your Grandpa, Yugi.

Yugi immediately strides up to Mokuba to non-confrontation-ally inform him that he has stepped over a line and Mokuba is like “what are these things you say called ‘lines?’”

According to Mokuba, Solomon Muto begged him to be in the competition so he could relive his glory days (glory days making no sense here, because the game has only been released for the past 15 years, so glory days is like...the before times that can only be referring to disgraced archeologists and Pegasus ((who is, in his own way...a disgraced archeologist, too))) and Mokuba was like

“You trained Yugi Muto, right? Hey that’s good enough for me. This drama is gold. People will eat it up. Hell yes. Don’t be afraid to abduct him a little bit. Maybe trap a couple people in a digital hellscape for a little while? Now we go by Pegasus house rules here, so fire as many lasers as you want, but just make sure not to hit anyone in the face. Oh man, we are going to be swimming in cash. Love it, Muto Sr, love it.”

But I dunno, I feel like Grandpa won’t make it past next episode. It is Joey. We kinda need him to make it past Ep 4 of the arc. If Grandpa Muto becomes the new Joey Wheeler, that will be a weird transition for this show to make.

But that’s all for today, as always, here is the link to read these in chrono order becuase there’s SO MANY that you don’t need to read backwards--don’t do it--just use the chrono tag (and I don’t know if you can add compound tags, but I did separate the Season from the Episode, so if you write S4, it should only pop up stuff from S4. I didn't’ do that to seasons 1-3 though because I just...didn’t.)

https://steve0discusses.tumblr.com/tagged/yugioh/chrono

And because I brought it up: here it is, the best BTS Mashup that I found on my deep dive. Like legit--this one isn’t a mess:

Most of other ones are horrible in a fascinating way. Like I’m not even a BTS fan, I think I sort of age out of that metric, I’m just bored and quarantined. And lets be real, we all appreciate a good bop when we hear it.

[thanksjro]

More Than Meets the Eye #29 - The One Where Everyone Gets Super Shiny

Our issue opens up with Swerve laying down the Story So Far in the Exposition Dimension.

Fantastic, you funky little man.

If Swerve looks like he’s been tossed through the car wash a few dozen times, it’s because this is where our new colorist comes in! Everyone, please say hello to Joana Lafuente- known for her love of gradients and attention to light sources, this actually isn’t the first time we’ve run into her. Lafuente worked on colors for several issues of The Transformers (2009), Last Stand of the Wreckers #3, and a few issues of MTMTE Season 1. However, she was matching the styles of her co-colorists on a majority of these, so we haven’t seen her style properly until now.

Getting into the story proper, Cyclonus is busying himself with staring out the window at a PNG of space, as he is wont to do, when he hears the tell-tale sound of tires squealing down the hall towards his room. Oh, goodness, whoever could that be?

Nearly forgot about him, didn’t you? Yeah, it’s a little difficult to follow up on things like a character’s recovery from a horrific disease when you’ve got comic event contract obligations to deal with.

After getting tackled by Tailgate, who reminds us all about the time he stuck his dirty little fingers into a dude’s brain meat, Cyclonus takes the little nerd on a walk through the ship.

You’re not going to convince me to reread “Dark Cybertron”. I don’t care how much of a marshmallow you are, it’s not happening.

They’re passed by Megatron and a bunch of crew members carrying that coffin we saw at the end of last issue down the corridor, Tailgate has a moment, and we get a taste of Cyclonus’ distaste for the Autobots as a whole. Tailgate is mildly offended by this, as he gropes his chest in distain, showing off his shiny new Autobot badge- a gift for not dying a terrible, gruesome death.

Good job, Tailgate. Proud of you.

They’re also passed by an absolutely blitzed Jackpot and Mainframe, the former singing Tailgate’s Tyrest-stopping praises as the latter carts him over to the Medibay to deal with the almost alcohol poisoning he’s got going on. Cyclonus remarks that Tailgate was missed, though Tailgate can’t help but wonder if that’s really true.

Y’all like slowburn romance, right? Because these two dumbasses have been roommates for two years, and we’ve just gotten to the point where physical contact can happen without one of them needing to be dying.

Anyway, it’s been a good day for Tailgate so far. Let’s hope it stays that way for the little dude.

...And that’s a series wrap on Tailgate! Let’s give him a hand, folks!

Hopping back in time to Megatron’s trial, things get underway, as Optimus Prime takes a nap in the judge’s bench as Gripper- whose name you don’t need to remember, as he’s not actually important- tells everyone about how brutal the Decepticon Justice Division is, even to Autobots. Which isn’t really supposed to be their deal, given their, y’know, name, but I suppose nobody’s perfect.

Up in the stands, in an… opera box, I guess? Rodimus is watching the proceedings, when Atomizer walks in. Which I guess you can just do in a Cybertronian court case. Sure.

Atomizer, in case you forgot, is the dude who has a bow and arrow, and used to be an interior designer.

Say, didn’t Whirl has a bow and arrow in the last issue when he attacked Megatron? Mighty curious, that.

Rodimus and Atomizer briefly reflect on the DJD, recalling the horror that was Vos- not that Vos, the other one. Rodimus would really just rather this all be over with so the Lost Light can get back to finding the Knights of Cybertron, and it’s at this point that Atomizer breaks out a thing he really ought not have- the count for the vote on whether or not Rodimus should stay on as captain. Rodimus doesn’t want to look at it, because it was supposed to be anonymous for a reason, and tells Atomizer to destroy the list entirely.

Hm, that’s not a terribly determined face there, Rodimus.

Back in the present, specifically in Swerve’s, Groove is threatening to break Streetwise’s arm, as we get the downlow on just what exactly our Legislator buddy’s deal is. Turn’s out, Swerve got one of the things reprogrammed, so that he follows not the Autobot Code, but something else entirely.

Hey, Swerve?

I don’t expect you to know this, because I don’t think you were present when they revealed this information to the readers, but… your new bouncer is made of people. He’s a dude made of other dudes, namely the Circle of Light. There’s a chance that you reprogrammed a sentient being, my good bitch.

Anyway, Swerve’s in a fucking mood because his shoulder hurts, someone’s stealing his shit, and Megatron has joined the narrative. Over at a nearby table, Skids, Nautica, and Riptide take a gander at the tabloids. Trailcutter, who is positively smashed, to the point where he’s just leaking booze out of his face like it’s his job, isn’t terribly interested in that, however.

What an astute observation, Riptide. And people say you’re stupid!

Trailcutter wants to drink some more, because it’s very likely he’s got a problem, but the mention of “Megatron’s super fuel” makes him feel like it’s time to stop hounding Swerve and start performing crimes.

Back during the trial, we get to Starscream’s testimony. He’s wearing his crown. He’s acting like a self-righteous asshole, as he defends Megatron.

Well, “defend” in the technical, legal sense, I suppose.

But really it’s more about him insulting Megatron’s intelligence, strength, and courage, in front of a LOT of people, while also trying to make himself look better in the war crime department. Megatron doesn’t appreciate this very much, if his murder-face is anything to go by.

Megatron lets Ultra Magnus (his defender, if you’ll recall) know that he wants a private word, and court goes into a brief recess.

Back in the present, Nightbeat’s busy looking at a pin-up of Rung’s alt-mode, when someone knocks on his door. That someone is Chromedome, who’s trying to solve the mystery of The Missing Declaration of Love. Not that he says that specifically out loud.

You two were married, why- okay. No point in yelling at this digital copy of a comic book.

Anyway.

So, the whole screaming thing only happened the one time, and everything was back to normal on subsequent plays of Rewind’s message. Nightbeat seems to be leaning towards the depressive isolating getting to Chromedome, which Chromedome responds to by telling him to get the fuck out. Alas, someone’s blocking the door!

YO WHAT THE FUCK-

Back with Trailcutter’s subplot, our drunken friend is in the middle of breaking into the Medibay. Our trio of cool-colored pals watch him from back at the bar, by way of a laptop that looks like it was built the same year I was born.

As Trailcutter attempts to commit a crime, Megatron, Ultra Magnus, and Ratchet pass by, trying to figure out how to handle the whole coffin situation. Trailcutter’s about to punch the locks off a door, and Nautica decides that this is where she’s going to draw the line today, leaving the gaggle of fools to their shenanigans. Then Tailgate glomps Skids, throwing the computer to the ground and breaking it, as Trailcutter finds the door to the Medibay magically open.

If you don’t know what glomping is, there’s a 60% chance that you’re not old enough to vote in the US.

Trailcutter sneaks into the Medibay, we get a reminder that Ambulon is super dead, and Trailcutter commits theft from a food bank. What a guy.

This is the point where security shows up, armed with a great deal of guns, one of which is Megatron himself. Trailcutter, instead of feeling super powerful, actually feels positively awful after consuming Megatron’s rations of “super fuel”. Because he, as an Autobot, doesn’t want to be within 50 yards of Megatron, Trailcutter breaks out the forcefields the moment the guy approaches him. And oh, what a doozy this one is.

Trailcutter’s gotten himself a fancy new trick- this forcefield he’s broken out lasts for a solid half-hour, and he can’t turn it off. I’m sure that won’t bite him in the ass at any point in the near future, no-siree!

Back in the past, Rattrap is commending Starscream on playing the field and getting the public slightly more on his side, but Starscream’s too busy patting himself on the back to really pay attention. He knew damn well that Megatron wouldn’t like what he had to say on the stand, and now things are finally looking up for ol’ Screamer.

Over with Optimus Prime, Slamdance is showing off how the general public is really into this whole “folks being held accountable for their actions” thing.

In the present, Chromedome and Nightbeat seem to have remembered they have alt-modes and are driving down the hall back to Nightbeat’s room- wonder what the speed limit for the Lost Light is?- and discuss just what the hell happened. The current theory is that the Rewind they saw was a Data Ghost- a collection of information so dense, it had a not-quite-physical presence that wasn’t 100% removed when he died.

Which is a little fucked up, but let’s see where this goes.

Nightbeat undoes the 40,000 locks on his door while Chromedome bleeds guilt all over the shag carpet over the fact that he hasn’t been looking for Dominus Ambus like he said he would.

C’mon James, gimme that Chromedominus endgame.

Nightbeat finally opens the door to find a small problem.

Hm. That’s… not normal.

Over in the Medibay, Trailcutter’s bubble has burst, allowing Megatron to slap him in the back of the head. This head-slapping induces his FIM chip permanently, making it so that he can never get drunk again.

Weird party trick, Megatron. Kinda shitty, really.

Megatron then gives Trailcutter the job of director of security, because he needs direction in his life. Trailcutter just sort of takes what he’s given, because I suppose you can’t really argue with a guy who can literally slap you sober, and also threatens to destroy you if you fuck up even once. Nice, Megs. Nice.

MEGATRON THAT’S BEEN SITTING LIKE THAT FOR OVER HALF AN HOUR YOU FUCKING WET NOODLE

So, since there’s mystery juice all over the floor and no one’s died, Megatron assumes that the coffin ought to be fine to crack open.

Please note that Megatron is not a medical professional, and his views are now peer reviewed by medical professionals. Megatron is in no way endorsed by the WHO.

Anyway, Rodimus is in there.

Pretty fucked up.

Back in the past, recess is over, and Ultra Magnus comes bearing bad news- Megatron wants to change his plea to “innocent.” This gets about the reaction one would expect from just about anyone.

Well, except Rodimus, who’s too busy reading that list that he wanted destroyed. He’s very sad about it.

I know, what a bummer!