#Anyone has a theory?

[aitadjcrazytimes]

[n3xus-apparatus]

Also I haven't seen anybody talk about this yet- but in the amazing digital circus (obvious spoilers ahead)

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

In episode 3 it's revealed by kinger that darkness calmed down his abstracted wife, and in the pilot we saw caine put abstracted kaufmo into "the cellar with a whole crowd of other abstracted people, *a very obviously dark room with no visible light sources*

Just saying that seems, interesting, and implies caine somehow figured out darkness potentially calms them, maybe after the incident with his wife kinger told caine about it and he adjusted their holding area? but it's nice to see he's trying to be accommodating for them, plus it looks like there's water in there? Maybe water is also calming for abstracted individuals?

[mossy-aro]

ultimately i think my insistence on aro positivity honestly is as much a political stance as a personal one.

when i say aro positivity is crucial and that i dislike doomer-ist posts that express sentiments like 'I hate being aro so much I wish I was dead instead’ it's not because I don’t think there can and should be a space for negativity and acknowledging self-hate, or the many ways being aromantic can really suck sometimes. i find that to be very important!

that being said. there is smth here about how self-hate posts are sometimes just arophobia that we inflict on ourselves. and when we put that out into the ether it (intentionally or not) can become arophobia that we inflict on other members of the community. i think there absolutely needs to be a place for negativity and the expression of anger and frustration and self loathing even - these are all good things to talk about because these are things that we experience. that being said, it can also be genuinely upsetting and triggering to people to have what is essentially arophobia shown to them and then have that be validated by other aspec people. your personal thoughts can affect your wider community on a level you may not anticipate. and i understand it i truly do! it took me so long to be able to recover from accepting being aroace - it threw my entire world off kilter and made me question everything about my place in the world.

but my insistence on aro joy and positivity is because ultimately i do believe that building is at the core essence of it all. that ultimately discussions and the purpose of community should be about construction, not destruction. and this is both a personal and a political stance. talking about how much you hate yourself and cultivating online discussions/spaces where negativity about aspec identity is the main and only theme is destructive - if that’s where we let the conversation end. these thoughts can and should be used as a vehicle to look for a path forward!

joy and positivity create a space where the focus can become on forging a path forward, on construction, on community building instead of tearing ourselves and others down with negative thoughts. it’s not productive or healthy when it stops at a place of negativity - it becomes actively destructive to the essence of community.

and i do think that this is especially poignant considering the fact that being any kind of queer, but especially aromantic (and/or asexual) means forging a path for yourself and making your own happiness where there is no obvious way forward. our communities exist mostly online (right now, anyway), there is little recognition of our existence in the real world, the effects of amatonormativity are both pervasive and actively dehumanising, and there are legal, economic and social structures in place actively making our lives more difficult. yes that all sucks! it’s good to acknowledge that. we need to in order to change it. but more importantly, that’s not the end. we are still here and our happiness, our future is for us to determine. even if we can’t change the laws or society, loving yourself and understanding aromanticism as a political identity (as well as personal), as a radical worldview, and as a protest against amatonormativity is essential for both community and personal well being. the personal is political.

tldr. i guess my point is that as a community, we should focus on building, improving, and nurturing ourselves and each other (construction) as opposed to destruction. we should recognise aromanticism and asexuality as political identities as well as personal ones and rely on community and self-love in the absence of anything else as a form of protest and political power. destruction (the recognition of everything that is wrong) is essential as a starting point - but where do we go from there? we rebuild.

[hawkinasock]

My personal take on the Abundance Yanqing theory.

[copper-ice-cube]

of fucking course the sugar plum fairy's lair is the FREEZER

the rest of calorum is the fridge and when people die its food getting eaten by the hungry one

but the sugar plum fairy steals spirits away to her mountain lair so they don't get eaten!

aka putting them in the freezer so they're dead but not eaten yet!!

and when she dies lapin says all the spirits have to go to the hungry one!!!

and there is imagery of the heat of the old dragon's lair melting lapin and all the sugar plum fairy's treasures away!!!!

aka frozen food being defrosted/reheated to be eaten!!!!!

fuck fuck fuck of fucking COURSE!!!!!!

[nellasbookplanet]

Here’s the thing:

I want Predathos to get out.

Not because I hate the gods or want to see them killed or driven off (in fact, I find the 'the gods are tyrants' arguments to be laughably incorrect and deeply hope c3 ends with the pantheon still present) but because ending the campaign without facing Predathos would be a huge anticlimax. If Bells Hells simply kill Ludinus and go back home, it will feel like killing the minion but never actually getting to the big bad. What if c1 had ended with killing the Briarwoods but never getting around to Vecna. What if the m9 had actually managed to kill Lucien with their trap in Aeor before he made it into the Astral Sea to set off his plan. We wouldn’t have gotten to see the nature of the somnovem, the horrific flesh city or the peace of putting it to rest, the wild creativity that was the final battle of imagination. If c3 ends without showing us what the fuck Predathos actually is I will go lie facedown on the floor for a week wondering what we missed out on.

Now, this doesn't mean I want the hells to purposefully let the beast out of its cage. I would prefer the campaign not end with the heroes finalizing the villain's plan and setting off calamity 2.0, thank you very much. But if Ludinus still has an ace up his sleeve that makes Predathos' release all but inevitable (which I honestly expect)? Maybe even if there’s a party split and one or a couple of the hells take the decision into their own hands (looking at you, Ashton)?

I'd love that shit. Show us what Predathos truly is. Let it eat Ludinus maybe. Give us a glimpse of the true end if it’s let loose on Exandria. Have there be a horrific realization of oh, this is what the Vanguard was arguing in favor of. And then kill it.

[autumnblooms]

I’m still not over this

I found some new Procreate brushes today~

[swan2swan]

I had an epiphany about ships today.

[redr0sewrites]

i will forever defend these two- NOT to start discourse but they are both so heavily mischaracterized by the fandom its INSANE like omg yes they are flawed but they are also trying their best PLEASE leave them alone 🙏🙏🙏

as usual im yapping in the tags if anyone cares

[unnecessary-dinosaurs]

the fandom at the end of season one

[burningfunobject]

S2 arcane spoilers!!

Anyone else notice how dim viktors eyes look in the new season like

And it's like this for nearly every other shot

Compared to his eyes in s1

And he's rlly out of character too

And sure that could be the trauma of EVERYTHING that's happened

But I feel like it's more than that

The hexcore is controlling him obviously so maybe we'll see him try to fight against it??

I really hope he does bc I don't think the whole magic arcane Jesus thing is really working for me tbh

OR if he doesn't manage to get free of the hexcore maybe he decides to lean into it by baking himself even more robotic buy powered by hextech or whatever the new equivalent would be

I've also been thinking maybe he'll start upsetting the chem barrens?? But it seems kinda unlikely

[stellas-and-tonitruses]

⚠ SPOILERS FOR CHAPTER 93 AHEAD! ⚠

now that we have finally met demetrius, it seems like a great time to dissect his first scene and proper conversation! :]

his wide, unfocused stare hides ✨unexpected complexity✨, as expected of a desmond

he's impatient (common desmond trait at this point)

he's nonchalantly exceptional, as we expected and have been repeatedly told thus far

...but most importantly, amidst a sea of accomplishments, he is burdened with a lack of people skills and visibly frustrated by it, as evidenced by his conversation with damian in this chapter.

the analysis and speculation continues under the cut!!

so, a breakdown of the main meat of his introduction

similarly to every single time there's an interaction between damian and another desmond, damian is the one who reaches out first by calling out to demetrius, who immediately asks him what he wants. damian tries to begin with small talk, congratulating him on his accomplishments of the day

demetrius is brief and to the point, but it doesn't feel to me like he is annoyed here. perhaps curious, perhaps indifferent, we don't know -- demetrius is a boy of few explanatory thoughts, after all

merely in the next page, demetrius is revealed to have a blank mind for most of this conversation.

i don't believe this is a sign that demetrius was experimented on or anything. obviously, this does not rule out that he has been experimented on, but i don't think his lack of thoughts are indicative of that, nor do i believe anya was too far away (in previous chapters, she has read the thoughts of people at greater distances than this with ease!). i think this has something to do with his upbringing, but also very importantly his state of mind at the moment

his eyes are wide open, but his stare is unfocused. i think this is an intentional choice to hammer in that he's not really here at this moment, listening to what is undoubtedly to him pointless praise. he has likely tuned all of it out completely.

(as a side note, if we wanna involve anya in this situation more, we could assume that he is intentionally cloaking his thoughts from anya or any other potential mind-readers, but while i do think donovan is very likely involved in project apple, i severely doubt the financial benefactors of project apple would spend likely a lot of money to figure out a way to shield the thoughts of a middle schooler, regardless of who his dad is, from potential telepaths. as far as we know, anya is the only one with this specific power and demetrius is unlikely to have any information that would incriminate the operation. if that was an issue, i don't see why they wouldn't spend their money to protect melinda's mind, since she likely has way more info than demetrius ever could.)

moving on from that side note though,

we do not see demetrius' face as he says this! this is important to me

we are left unaware to whether or not he is disappointed or just trying to abscond to take a nap (he really needs one)

but then, he says this:

this, to me, is a direct attempt at connecting!! he's trying to reciprocate the small talk, the praise, trying to continue the conversation. his thought, "i don't understand him," may feel contradictory but to me, it only underlines his frustration about this, because he knows what damian is going to say next:

even though it was expected, this is not what demetrius was hoping to get out of this. his downturned eyebrows give a feeling of discontent. he is not blank, he is visibly frustrated, visibly annoyed.

and we are thus made aware of a boundary demetrius and melinda both share:

never mention donovan.

for one reason or another, this is the boundary damian has overstepped with both his mother AND his brother now, without ever being informed that it IS a boundary in the first place

so demetrius, upset, turns around to leave and throws this at damian:

this is important, because damian has shared a very similar sentiment to anya before, albeit in a mournful tone.

demetrius likely feels similarly neglected by his parents, but is long past feeling sad about it. he has moved straight to anger, understandably!

but the bigger reason for his frustration, imo, relates to a problem damian once again ALSO has: people treating them as a gateway to their father and nothing more.

demetrius has more than likely also been treated like this, and probably still is unless his peers have learned not to engage because of his brief, snippy responses, so he is familiar with the feeling of being used.

...and damian unknowingly treated him the exact same way, even though he's also grown to hate it.

of course, he's 6 years old and he meant no harm by this -- he's just a lonely boy trying to be noticed by his neglectful parents, after all, what else could he possibly do?

but for demetrius, this is the end of the conversation. he is not his father's manager, he's not even that close to him, so why does his brother only ever talk to him when it relates to their father?

as he said before: he doesn't understand him, and why he keeps doing this. does he not know there is little info to be gained?

he doesn't understand their father either, with his impossibly high expectations, never pleased, never happy, never available

and lastly, as ewen and emile try to introduce themselves

demetrius has one final thought.

and he casts aside this entire conversation, leaving the scene as empty as he entered it.

of course, the chapter doesn't end here, but this is where demetrius' involvement in it does, leaving us with a newfound understanding that while to damian, demetrius represents everything he can only strive to become... to demetrius? his accomplishments ring hollow in the face of everything he wishes he could understand.

we do get an extra flashback that hearkens back to a better yesterday, but while donovan is lacking some very important details (those scars, that dead disinterest that follows his every move -- he seems mirthful somehow here), we don't know if this scene represents a time when they were closer or if it's simply evidence that as far back as everyone can remember, demetrius has been doing nothing but studying all the time

could this be evidence of something nefarious relating to project apple? eh, not particularly, not to me. the boy's just studying hard, any relation to project apple would have to be more recent in the timeline imo

TL;DR:

demetrius has been built up throughout the past 92 chapters as a figure larger-than-life, and this has been thanks to most of our knowledge of him being directly affected by damian's perception of him, as the younger brother living under his shadow

however, he has now been humanized by his flaws: a short temper and a lack of social skills that comes paired with a clear want to connect, to understand, to converse. he seems to be a very lonely kid, everyone around him either jealous, putting him on a pedestal or actively seeking to use him under the false impression that he has important connections, and although he doesn't mean to, damian has unknowingly been treating demetrius in the same way, only seeking him out when he wants to know something about donovan.

interestingly, him and melinda share the same trigger, that being donovan himself, though we do not yet know if their reason for this is also shared.

CLOSING THOUGHTSSS

it has been so exciting finally meeting this little goober-- i thought i might never see the day 😭😭😭

thank you to whoever read this far, i literally made this blog just now so! HOPE I DID WELL!

💖

[z0mbiefrank]

i do wonder why so many of the diy patch pants/vests/jackets i see online these days don't have many band patches at all. most are political or decorative

[thestarsloth]

Yaz Sammy and Ben are literally the "its finally me and you and you and me just us

and your friend steve"

[clawsoutspotsoff]

Spooktober: Mummies

What do you do when the person's heart is a feather?

[arthur-lesters-emotional-baggage]

Am I allowed to cross off "Arthur starts a cult" on my Malevolent Season 5 bingo?