#And how Name's trauma was treated

[respectthepetty]

Because I'm my own worst enemy, I have not quit watching Remember Me. Watching episode 13 since I missed it when I was getting speeding tickets on the Autobahn and to my absolute shock, this happened:

This entire conversation was nonsense!

Why would you ask me to marry you when we are breaking up? Um... I don't know. I just followed my heart.

PENDEJOS! (derogatorily)

Then, Champ's sister showing up at his door to tell him she's getting married and is pregnant is so on brand for that ridiculously dysfunctional family.

What is the timeline of this show?! Why is it skipping entire YEARS! Marriage equality did not happen in the United States until 2015, so is Golf sporting that hair in 2015?! MAKE THIS TIMELINE MAKE SENSE?! Name and Em have been in an undefined relationship for 52 years now, yet Nan is already shouting he will get engaged in a year. He is declaring he is pre-engaged, but Em can't even call Name his boyfriend?!

The only good thing to come out of this episode was this moment

And even this was too late in the series.

One more episode, and I'm released. I apparently hate myself more than I hate this show which is why I'm forcing myself to finish it, and that's saying a lot. This is the BL balance. I watched too many good series in 2022, so I needed one show to humble me out and remind me not to take those other shows for granted.

[yunmeng-jiang]

that man does NOT think of wei wuxian as his gege

[sukibenders]

Lottie Matthews: *a teenage girl stuck in the middle of the wilderness, stranded with other teenage girls and two boys and a coach, all traumatized and simply wanting to go home, starving, struggling with guilt and her own mind, trying to find comfort in whatever she can---which ends up being a supernatural force, some of the girl's cling to it, because it's provides comfort, while others turn against her because it's too far out of the realm of belief even though she stabbed a bear through the skull and fed them from it, but in the end she's just a teenage girl placed on a pedestal that she didn't ask for but took it because it would help her friends, only for years later said pedestal she didn't ask for causes her to be seen as a pariah amongst the same girls that she survived the wilderness with.*

Some people: Lottie is most definitely the villain of the series! Look how she's tearing the girls apart and making them the worst versions of themselves! She's just crazy, and none of this is even real. I'm glad Shauna--

[loveguts]

i’m not a transandrophobia truther in the slightest don’t get me wrong, but i think some people on here really need to realize and comprehend the fact that cis women, way WAY more often than not, hold extremely significant social and political power over trans men the vast majority of the time in our day to day lives

[toonagi]

OCTOPUS BLAST

looklooklook it's my first fan character since chai the flareon and that one kingdom hearts oc i made in high school

paprika as a concept has been bouncing around in my head like a dvd screensaver for a couple months now, i just wasn't able to draw them until recently. they're a pacific octopus and an extreme gear racer & mechanic and also a huge dweeb who wears pants over a wetsuit like a FREAK. everyone say hi paprika

[sapphire-weapon]

probably the most interesting observation about RE fandom since the release of RE4make is that RE4make brought in a shitload of new fans, and yet it created absolutely zero new leon/ada fans.

this isn’t even a case of “fandom only cares about m/m” either, because i’ve seen a dramatic uptick in support for leon/ashley. it’s just that the only people that i’ve seen making leon/ada content have already been doing it for years.

it’s just fascinating to me because for like 20 years, leon/ada was THE SHIP in RE fandom, outclassing even chris/jill, and it seems to have fallen out of favor ever since capcom starting releasing the new remakes.

you know, the remakes that are determined to write the characters as though they were actual people and not ridiculous caricatures.

funny how the ship just falls apart when you do that. which is what i’ve said for actual literal years, but, much like RE2 leon, no one ever listens to me.

[needscaffeine]

this is your reminder that a lot of fandoms are toxic and if being in a fandom messes with your happiness you should get yourself out of there. you dont deserve that. what you deserve is to feel good about yourself.

[sister-hawk]

if you've ever shown me kindness, know that you will have a special place in my heart forever. till the day i die.

[luxrayz64]

jill tuck

[trashlie]

FP203/End of Arc Thoughts

I was trying to figure out the best way to handle my end-of-fllashback-arc/203 thoughts and rather than trying to rewrite everything I’ve already written, I’m going to just copy my reddit commentary over into this post, and then try to follow up on things that I want to discuss in more detail or that I think deserves to be focused on lol. So if you read the comments in the episode discussion posts on reddit, there’s nothing new here! 

But for those who don’t go on the reddit, then it’s business as usual below this cut! 

Oh my god, the end of this episode. I wonder how much she actually told Nol - did she name Alyssa? Was everything we saw something she was telling him? The thought of her telling him about falling from the window and embracing that feeling, of laying there on the ground and wishing she could just take flight like a bird, too. I had assumed that this was more like... her reminiscing on her own, but the dialogue at the very end is definitely for Nol - talking about how everything moved on, time continued, and she had to continue to deal with the effects of it. There’s something vaguely optimistic about it, and I know it’s because present Shinae is talking and because this reflection is combined with all the things she has experienced since then, what she’s come to learn. Watching time pass - her father fall into the habits that got her into her current mess, the selective color on the beanie and sweater from Alyssa, the progression of her hair growing out, their middle school graduation. There’s so many things I want to pick out of here and I hope I’ll remember to do that as I gush over this.

I didn’t expect those teachers to be fired at all.* We already know that Shinae has a wariness towards adults, and for the ones who actually helped and respected her, to be fired because of what happened to her is really devastating. The math club teacher was the one who found her and probably saved her life, and she was punished. I mean, on the one hand, I understand? The idea is that as teachers who hear the rumor mill, who know when students are being bullied, they should intervene. But we know and we’ve seen that intervention never does anything, and all it did was create a guilt complex in a girl too young to bear that weight of responsibility and one that continued to grow.

(* a teacher friend of mine says rather than fired, she thinks those teachers were probably traumatized, as well, and quit of their own accord)

There’s something about these little snapshots of Shinae with Maya, Rika, and Minhyuk - even if Shinae had never learned to be truly open friends with Maya and Rika until they were older, it’s clear that the after effects of that fall DID affect their friendship. Had she never fallen, maybe they would have been able to grow into close friends sooner. Shinae put her guarded walls up not only because she didn’t trust others after Alyssa hurt her, but also because of the ramifications of association with her. Teachers were fired, her father’s life became harder, Minhyuk lost all of his friends; she didn’t get close to people so as to not bring them down as much as because she didn’t trust them. She told herself she doesn’t like people to comfort herself both because people can hurt you and to try to stave off how much she, too, wished to win peoples’ favors. But because she closed herself out, because she cut off others and kept her distance, we saw the fall out that occurred with Maya, who was already jealous and felt othered. Something I’ve always thought is that it was never that Maya disliked Shinae - it was that her feelings were at odds with their relationship. When Maya first met Kousuke in the hospital she took his ass down defending Shinae. So many of Maya’s issues with Shinae were because of how Shinae closed her out, how she felt like Shinae didn’t want to be her friend. It’s just. idk it’s something that really gets to me, seeing these little snapshots of the four of them having fun together, despite how the rest of their school was alienating them and pulling away. Despite everything, they had each other. And I’m a mess!!!!!

“We all kept moving forward... because life doesn’t stop for anyone. Keep riding along and see where the road you’re walking takes you... Even if the road needs some maintenance or is being blocked... It’s just a temporary delay... We all eventually reach our destination.”

Who are the words for at the end? The dead end - is it both of them, hers? Hers but applies to them both? Shiane thought this favor from Kousuke would help, at least patch things over and take care of her father’s debt, but now it’s left her stuck in a new situation she cannot get out of. Nol thought he would be able to make his escape, but his detour is leading him to jail time.

There’s something SO optimistic about the concept that we all eventually reach out destination but this... this is just yet another dead end. But maybe there’s room for them to find their ways out of this dead end together, the way Shinae was able to carry on with Maya, Minhyuk, and Rika at her side?

(Sidebar: that moment with that narration and the four walking around together looking like they’re having fun, while Alyssa goes to? from? dance practice? GOD there’s something about that moment that just GETS to me, the juxtaposition of Shinae with her friends against the one who could have been but failed at it in every way.)

I have a LOT of thoughts about the ramifications of Shinae's fall. The way she tried to leave everyone out hurts, but also what else do we expect from her? The thing about that fall is that prior, Shinae still believed she could change things in her life. She believed that she could leave her past (at her first school) in the past and start over, make friends, find somewhere to fit in, but life was far from kind to her. She made so much effort to try to defy everything, to set things right, to do the right thing and defend herself, but it only made things worse. And if she'd told the truth, the teachers would probably have had a fair investigation on their hands. But in that moment, when Shinae sat in the hospital and realized how much harder life was going to become for her father, that's when she concluded she doesn't deserve to fight it, that she can't change anything. Why would she name those girls when the last time she called anyone out, everything blew up in her face? If she'd never gotten the girl who bought their project in trouble, maybe the bullying would have been quieter. Less this than it was. Why would she dare name them again? The fact that they completely declared innocence though, ugh. I mean, do I expect them to fess up? Absolutely not. They are the type of bullies who believed they're allowed to bully a bully - in their minds everything they did was righteous and Shinae got what she deserves.

As for Alyssa, I hope we get to see things from her side one day. What kind of anguish or horror, what she felt, and if she holds any regret for it. I think she does. I think you have to be a truly rotten person to feel no regret, especially since we know she didn't actually mean to push Shinae and even in those last moments she still slipped up and showed concern for her, even if she could never reconcile it.

"I thought it was going to help me get there... but it turned out to be yet another dead end." Ugh, the impact of those words, combined with Nol and Shinae sitting and looking over at each other like that. ;~; It's something so... idk. vulnerable, something they share even though they didn't know it until this moment. I have to hope that Shinae opening up to him will help. Nol needs to understand that he is not the only one who has been dealt an unfair hand by life, that he's not the only one who has been tormented by his own existence, and to see that despite it all, even if it's faint, you eventually come out on the right side. Even now, Shinae may be facing a dead end, but look where she has ended up compared to the Shinae of 3 months earlier. My girl ;~; my heart ;~;

What a very satisfying way to wrap up this arc. Idk there's just. There's something about that passing of time that GETS to me. The selective color and the hair growth and Shinae going through the motions of friendship, the way this was one of the hurdles that hindered her friendship with Maya and Rika who, to their credit, did stay by her side even if it was at the request of Minhyuk. I believe in my heart that though Minhyuk asked that favor of them, Maya still said yes because she wanted to, because she hoped that one day she and Shinae could become the friends she'd become with Minhyuk, that she could open up and trust them. I think that's still one of the most beautiful things about Maya and Shinae fighting and making up - there was so much caught up between them, and it was on both ends. Shinae not trusting Maya and expecting the worst of her, Maya holding things against Shinae she didn't deserve, Shinae keeping everyone at a distance, Maya wanting to be a friend Shinae could rely on and trust. Just... all the ramifications on a whole! Shinae becoming this very independent person so that she could never bring anyone down, because her father was absent, because she HAD to be independent to get by and survive and to protect herself and others ;~; I have SO. MANY. FEELINGS.

Rereading the ending and I think it's very possible this narration is still Shinae to herself, but just based on the way they're sitting hugging their knees, looking over at each other, she has to have told him something significant, and after everything we just went through, even though I previously thought she wouldn't name Alyssa, I'm now of the mind that why would we be shown all of this if she didn't at least say she had a friend who wasn't good to her, and how the fall ultimately happened. In fact, it makes me wonder if this might well be the first time Shinae told ANYONE how the fall happened, that others were involved, the kind of bullying incident that lead to it. Ugh. ;~; I can't imagine that she skimmed over it if he's looking over at her like that. Like, you'd think if she was vague, he'd be like everyone else and want to ask questions, or have an expression that clearly reads he knows she's not telling her the truth, but the use of showing only their partial expressions, something so... idk VULNERABLE, I think she's shared something she's probably never shared before? Aaaahhhhhhhh ;______; Big steps, maybe.

ALSO THE WAY MINHYUK BRAGGED THAT HE COULD HAVE HIS PICK OF ANY SCHOOL. ANY OF THEM and in the end he still chose to stay where he could be near Shinae. Left in the dark about what happened, aware that he's the only person who cares about her, the weight of his guilt for not being there to stop it to help her and how it shaped him into who he is. We all talked about how Minhyuk is so overprotective to the point that it blinded him to important things - like how Maya felt - but in the same way this transformed Shimhan, Shinae, Maya, and yes, probably Alyssa - Minhyuk was inherently altered. I said it on my tumblr, but there's something about how Dieter thinks Minhyuk is overprotective of Shinae because he doesn't trust her to handle her own problems, but really it's that Minhyuk, too, was traumatized by what happened and his inability to be a person who could help her. Knowing that he was the only person who cared about her, the only person who was willing to know her truth, made him grow ever more protective of the small, scrappy girl who just wanted to be peoples' friends and never deserved anything that happened to her. When you think about it, it must have been such a hard decision for him to make, to go to university in Chicago. And when he did, IT HAPPENED AGAIN! Shinae's stalker sister, being stuck at the Hirahara Corporation, knowing she's at work with people who have manipulated and hurt her. You literally cannot blame him for the intense overprotective way he treats her - it's not that he doesn't trust her or doesn't think she has it in her. It's that HE has never gotten over what happened to her and how easily it can (AND DID!!!!) happen again. It's that Minhyuk treasures Shinae and wants to show her the value she has and, in the same way as Shimhan, wants to protect her from things she never deserved to deal with ;~; don't touch me I AM EMOTIONS.

I have been lol thinking a LOT lately about Minhyuk and his entire character, how without the background context, it's so easy to blow his protectiveness out of proportion, but once you have the actual details, it's like... wow how could Minhyuk turn out any other way? It feels like the kind of nightmare that hovers at the edge of your mind - maybe it doesn't pop up anymore but you can't help but worry that maybe it will show up again. Frankly, the love that Minhyuk has for Shinae is so.... ;_______; I still haven't recovered from when he burst in yelling that he's the only damn person who cares about her like ;____; EVERYONE WAS SO HEAVILY AFFECTED BY THAT INCIDENT :( Minhyuk and Shinae talking about how he needs to let her take care of her problems seems even bigger now that we know what we do - how that kind of fear must still cling to him.

[florenceisfalling]

its ok the situation is long behind me and i have never experienced a bad feeling about it ever 👍 (lying)

[meepcries]

I finally watched Episode 11 of Buddy Daddies. I NEVER want to hear a complaint about Unasaka Misaki ever again!

[townofcrosshollow]

I've learned from my mistakes and grown from them. I've lent an ear to criticism, internalized it, evaluated it, put in the work required to do better. I'm on my way to a future where I don't have to worry about these problems anymore, because they've been dealt with and I have the tools to deal with them again. I'm learning to be kinder to myself, and that being kinder to myself involves admitting my flaws and working to improve them.

I truly believe that the best feeling in the world is knowing you've put in the work to get better ❤️❤️❤️

[lakka-arts]

hey. what is it called when. when this. this happens.

because it happens a lot.

[the-cryptographer]

Morrigan’s romance is pretty weird because it’s like... extremely narratively satisfying for me to watch this bratty teenager hopped up on social darwinism spend the first year of her life seeing the world away from her abusive mom and have a complete meltdown over her ability to care about another person and a pregnancy she’s not sure she wants.

But also like... that’s super fucked up and creepy. And I definitely feel like Origins Morrigan does not have a handle of her own wants or needs or even a her own sexuality independent of her mom’s plans for her. So it is maybe the least romantic romance option in the entire series and also my favourite. Glad you understand.

[empty-blog-for-lurking]

@void-tiger THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!! I admit it's not really well thought out especially the other reality part

With Veronica and Kuron, it's specifically related to my Post s8 au (here, here is where I talked specifically about their relationship and the tag is here). Right after Lance resurrected Kuron (and fell into coma) Veronica found him while she was looking Lance who wasn't exactly.....doing well for some time, and had kinda went awol on everyone. Veronica had known enough about the entire clone arc thing from Lance and Shiro to not be weirded out but doesn't think that Kuron is evil or even dangerous (the first time they met, Kuron was waking up delirious, slipped and knocked himself out) so after a chaotic hospital trip, some explanations and after some more time and various discoveries, Veronica offers Kuron to room with her.

Veronica and Kuron's relationship at first was rather messy. Vero does sympathize with Kuron's situation but with family issues and her own tendency to be more private/secretive she doesn't have the spoons to deal with him. And in return Kuron does understand and appreciates what Veronica is doing for him but he's also someone who was pretty much abandoned by almost everyone he cared for and was doomed to die in his own mind while someone else used his body, so isn't having a good time either. This would lead to a screaming match, a fight and eventual reconciliation.

i think at first Veronica and Kuron are trying to figure out what even happened to Lance and how to help him but eventually their search expands into a major plot mysteries and loose threads (for eg Lotor's entire deal, some old experimentation by galra with shiro clones (and possibly more Shiro clones who survived) and i am visiting my old hc about gradual exposure to quintessence turning humans into eldritch horrors and nature of quintessence being perceptional and cultural) (Kuron is immune from turning into one due to Haggar's research on humans and clones and Lance using said research as pretty much a blueprint. Veronica however isn't)

Overall i feel their relationship swings between a genuinely healthy friendship who also tend to get codependent and encourage each other's worst habits.

As for the Narti Allura and Lance brotp- Again it's not really well thought out, even less so then Vero and Kuron. In this au Allura is travelling through different realities to get to her own one (I have been debating about giving her amnesia and at first it sounded like a good idea, but right now I am not sure :/. Her powers are still a mess though and she will get crippling fear of death, I am not budging on that). One of these realities she visits is this one where due to a series of butterfly effects voltron team (the humans one) never really formed but did

This reality is lot similar but also quite different, some of these differences being- 1)War being delayed and Allura being sealed in cryopod much later as well as Lotor being older when his parents got corrupted. 2) Delay in war causing Honerva's memory to come back causing a rift in her and Zarkon relationship until they both are against each other (sometimes). 3) Honerva occasionally working with Lotor but it's a strained relationship and Lotor hates both his parents as well as anything to do with quintessence bs 4)Lance found the blue lion much sooner as a kid and then getting taken in by Lotor before he could reach Allura (and also being in vicinity of Honerva which yknow....not good) . 5) Allura was released some other wat sooner and found surviving Alteans and through them and other planets formed the coalition she's currently head of. 6) Narti was sent out to assassinate/take over Allura but didn't (they fought and then talk it out), after which she joined Lotor. She does get controlled by Honerva but wasn't killed. 7) Allura got the white lion before ending up in cryopod

The end ultimately leads to 'shadow zombie' apocalypse (which is kinda because of anti-quintessence thingy? Like it feeds on quintessence and is shadowy) a few years later which kills off Zarkon, Honerva, Lotor and a lot of the empire as well as much of the universe and the blue paladin 'died' (aka Lance just straight up fakes his own death and had nearly gotten away with no one knowing it too if weren't for meddling Narti), and with so many big players dead, Allura's coalition or rather The Council took charge in rehabilitation and fixing what's left (I do think it was lot more complicated than random zombie apocalypse, I feel like it was culmination of everything?? Sorry I am still trying to figure it out)

Lance and Allura meet through Narti, and it was all years ago and now they are Trying. The work is tiring, overwhelming, the present is better but also still bleak, there's a seemingly new incident everyday, all the people who survived and the societies that still exist only Just started to reach a stability and peace and it's fragile as shit and all three of them are Trying™ in spite of the trauma and pain and despair and everything. The apocalypse isn't a problem anymore but it did leave behind a lot of mess. These three pretty much trauma bonded for life

These three are very messy adults and also they are raising Lance's clone they found. She's their little baby, all three of them love her so much, but also they are messy people living in messy world and are kinda fail at parenting. They are not horrible but also- Allura tends to baby her too much, Lance has tendency to project his own trauma and is over-protective, Narti has screwed sense of what is and isn't dangerous for a human child and just let her do whatever and also tends to bother her like a funny owner of a grumpy cat. Also all three of them are embarrassing soccer parents, so there's that.

I do think there's lot more to it, but i feel it's already long enough and i want to flesh out these three's personalities and dynamics a lot more. A lot of this most likely will be changed cause I am very indecisive at the end of the day. Anyway thank you so much for asking!!! Sorry this is late (I was kinda on a trip for a week and also rewrote the other reality stuff three times but ehh)

I think we as a society should bring back brotps. I think we should be weirder about characters being friends the same way people are weird about ships. Make those two characters who interacted once or twice besties. Make it difficult for them to get rid of each other even if they want to. Go nuts