#Best Value Destinations 2024

[goingplacesfarandnear]

Experts Reveals Top Destinations for US Travelers in 2024

By Karen Rubin, Travel Features Syndicate, www.goingplacesfarandnear.com From French Polynesia to Tokyo, San Juan to Cancún, Skyscanner, a metasearch travel booking tool, combined its search and booking data with its annual consumer behavior survey to produce its annual Travel Trends report for US travelers for 2024. Here’s the lowdown on the top-trending destinations seeing the biggest increase…

[wanderlustphotosblog]

Unveiling the Top Travel Destinations for 2024: A Traveler's Guide

Are you looking for an incredible travel destination for this year? Check out my hand-picked list of the most unique and amazing places in the world to visit in 2024. From exotic locations to cultural hotspots, this list has it all!

When I was young, I had a subscription to National Geographic and I used to dream about visiting the far-flung places I would see on its pages. As I grew older and started to travel more, the travel bug got a hold of me even more. Now, I am starting to check places off my travel bucket list and share my experiences with you. In this article, I am going to share my list of the top travel…

[theeagertraveler]

Top 5 Reasons to Visit Sri Lanka in 2024!

Sri Lanka, a gem in the Indian Ocean, beckons travelers with its diverse landscapes, rich history, and warm hospitality. As 2024 unfolds, there's no better time to explore this enchanting island. Whether you're drawn to vibrant city life, wildlife adventures, serene hill country, tea plantations, or cultural marvels, Sri Lanka offers an array of experiences that will leave you captivated.

1. City Life: Colombo

Embrace the vibrant city life in Colombo, where ancient traditions meet modern elegance. The Gangaramaya temple, a beacon of serenity, houses life-sized Buddha idols and a mesmerizing white jade Buddha. Cross the street to Beira Lake and discover the Seemamalakaya, an architectural marvel by Geoffrey Bawa. Colombo's blend of history and contemporary charm makes it a must-visit.

2. Wildlife: National Parks

Discover the incredible biodiversity of Sri Lanka by exploring its 14 national parks. Take a safari game drive in renowned parks like Yala and Minneriya, where elephants, leopards, and a myriad of other wildlife await. For an immersive experience, book a safari through reputable lodges like the Wildlife Tented Lodge, which offers luxury accommodations and guided wildlife encounters..

3. Hill Country: Ella

Ella, nestled amidst waterfalls and iconic landscapes, invites you to hike up Little Adam's Peak for a breathtaking sunrise. Capture the perfect photo at Art Cafe Umbrella and relish your stay at Secret Ella or indulge in luxury at 98 Acres Resort, which offers picturesque views of Little Adam's Peak.

4. Tea Plantations: Nuwara Eliya

Take a scenic train ride from Ella to Nuwara Eliya, where misty scenes and tea plantations create a magical setting. Engage in tea-tasting tours, explore Horton Plains National Park, and unwind at Oliphant Bungalow. Nuwara Eliya's cooler weather and scenic beauty make it a haven for tea enthusiasts.

5. Cultural & Historical Value

Discover the cultural treasures of Kandy, your gateway to UNESCO sites like Sigiriya and the Dambulla Caves. Stay at the eco-friendly Aarunya Nature Resort, savoring the beauty of tea plantations. Explore Sigiriya's "Lion's Rock" for panoramic views and delve into the ancient wonders of Dambulla Caves, a well-preserved temple complex.

Summarizing Reflections As Sri Lanka emerges from its past, it welcomes travelers with open arms. Meet friendly locals, savor delectable cuisine, and marvel at the pristine beauty of this island nation. Don't wait – book your ticket, plan your journey, and get ready to capture the essence of Sri Lanka in 2024. For more travel inspiration and tips, visit TheEagerTraveler.com. Embark on a journey that promises memories of a lifetime.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Red Lobster was killed by private equity, not Endless Shrimp

For the rest of May, my bestselling solarpunk utopian novel THE LOST CAUSE (2023) is available as a $2.99, DRM-free ebook!

A decade ago, a hedge fund had an improbable viral comedy hit: a 294-page slide deck explaining why Olive Garden was going out of business, blaming the failure on too many breadsticks and insufficiently salted pasta-water:

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/940944/000092189514002031/ex991dfan14a06297125_091114.pdf

Everyone loved this story. As David Dayen wrote for Salon, it let readers "mock that silly chain restaurant they remember from their childhoods in the suburbs" and laugh at "the silly hedge fund that took the time to write the world’s worst review":

https://www.salon.com/2014/09/17/the_real_olive_garden_scandal_why_greedy_hedge_funders_suddenly_care_so_much_about_breadsticks/

But – as Dayen wrote at the time, the hedge fund that produced that slide deck, Starboard Value, was not motivated by dissatisfaction with bread-sticks. They were "activist investors" (finspeak for "rapacious assholes") with a giant stake in Darden Restaurants, Olive Garden's parent company. They wanted Darden to liquidate all of Olive Garden's real-estate holdings and declare a one-off dividend that would net investors a billion dollars, while literally yanking the floor out from beneath Olive Garden, converting it from owner to tenant, subject to rent-shocks and other nasty surprises.

They wanted to asset-strip the company, in other words ("asset strip" is what they call it in hedge-fund land; the mafia calls it a "bust-out," famous to anyone who watched the twenty-third episode of The Sopranos):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bust_Out

Starboard didn't have enough money to force the sale, but they had recently engineered the CEO's ouster. The giant slide-deck making fun of Olive Garden's food was just a PR campaign to help it sell the bust-out by creating a narrative that they were being activists* to save this badly managed disaster of a restaurant chain.

*assholes

Starboard was bent on eviscerating Darden like a couple of entrail-maddened dogs in an elk carcass:

https://web.archive.org/web/20051220005944/http://alumni.media.mit.edu/~solan/dogsinelk/

They had forced Darden to sell off another of its holdings, Red Lobster, to a hedge-fund called Golden Gate Capital. Golden Gate flogged all of Red Lobster's real estate holdings for $2.1 billion the same day, then pissed it all away on dividends to its shareholders, including Starboard. The new landlords, a Real Estate Investment Trust, proceeded to charge so much for rent on those buildings Red Lobster just flogged that the company's net earnings immediately dropped by half.

Dayen ends his piece with these prophetic words:

Olive Garden and Red Lobster may not be destinations for hipster Internet journalists, and they have seen revenue declines amid stagnant middle-class wages and increased competition. But they are still profitable businesses. Thousands of Americans work there. Why should they be bled dry by predatory investors in the name of “shareholder value”? What of the value of worker productivity instead of the financial engineers?

Flash forward a decade. Today, Dayen is editor-in-chief of The American Prospect, one of the best sources of news about private equity looting in the world. Writing for the Prospect, Luke Goldstein picks up Dayen's story, ten years on:

https://prospect.org/economy/2024-05-22-raiding-red-lobster/

It's not pretty. Ten years of being bled out on rents and flipped from one hedge fund to another has killed Red Lobster. It just shuttered 50 restaurants and declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Ten years hasn't changed much; the same kind of snark that was deployed at the news of Olive Garden's imminent demise is now being hurled at Red Lobster.

Instead of dunking on free bread-sticks, Red Lobster's grave-dancers are jeering at "Endless Shrimp," a promotional deal that works exactly how it sounds like it would work. Endless Shrimp cost the chain $11m.

Which raises a question: why did Red Lobster make this money-losing offer? Are they just good-hearted slobs? Can't they do math?

Or, you know, was it another hedge-fund, bust-out scam?

Here's a hint. The supplier who provided Red Lobster with all that shrimp is Thai Union. Thai Union also owns Red Lobster. They bought the chain from Golden Gate Capital, last seen in 2014, holding a flash-sale on all of Red Lobster's buildings, pocketing billions, and cutting Red Lobster's earnings in half.

Red Lobster rose to success – 700 restaurants nationwide at its peak – by combining no-frills dining with powerful buying power, which it used to force discounts from seafood suppliers. In response, the seafood industry consolidated through a wave of mergers, turning into a cozy cartel that could resist the buyer power of Red Lobster and other major customers.

This was facilitated by conservation efforts that limited the total volume of biomass that fishers were allowed to extract, and allocated quotas to existing companies and individual fishermen. The costs of complying with this "catch management" system were high, punishingly so for small independents, bearably so for large conglomerates.

Competition from overseas fisheries drove consolidation further, as countries in the global south were blocked from implementing their own conservation efforts. US fisheries merged further, seeking economies of scale that would let them compete, largely by shafting fishermen and other suppliers. Today's Alaskan crab fishery is dominated by a four-company cartel; in the Pacific Northwest, most fish goes through a single intermediary, Pacific Seafood.

These dominant actors entered into illegal collusive arrangements with one another to rig their markets and further immiserate their suppliers, who filed antitrust suits accusing the companies of operating a monopsony (a market with a powerful buyer, akin to a monopoly, which is a market with a powerful seller):

https://www.classaction.org/news/pacific-seafood-under-fire-for-allegedly-fixing-prices-paid-to-dungeness-crabbers-in-pacific-northwest

Golden Gate bought Red Lobster in the midst of these fish wars, promising to right its ship. As Goldstein points out, that's the same promise they made when they bought Payless shoes, just before they destroyed the company and flogged it off to Alden Capital, the hedge fund that bought and destroyed dozens of America's most beloved newspapers:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/10/16/sociopathic-monsters/#all-the-news-thats-fit-to-print

Under Golden Gate's management, Red Lobster saw its staffing levels slashed, so diners endured longer wait times to be seated and served. Then, in 2020, they sold the company to Thai Union, the company's largest supplier (a transaction Goldstein likens to a Walmart buyout of Procter and Gamble).

Thai Union continued to bleed Red Lobster, imposing more cuts and loading it up with more debts financed by yet another private equity giant, Fortress Investment Group. That brings us to today, with Thai Union having moved a gigantic amount of its own product through a failing, debt-loaded subsidiary, even as it lobbies for deregulation of American fisheries, which would let it and its lobbying partners drain American waters of the last of its depleted fish stocks.

Dayen's 2020 must-read book Monopolized describes the way that monopolies proliferate, using the US health care industry as a case-study:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/01/29/fractal-bullshit/#dayenu

After deregulation allowed the pharma sector to consolidate, it acquired pricing power of hospitals, who found themselves gouged to the edge of bankruptcy on drug prices. Hospitals then merged into regional monopolies, which allowed them to resist pharma pricing power – and gouge health insurance companies, who saw the price of routine care explode. So the insurance companies gobbled each other up, too, leaving most of us with two or fewer choices for health insurance – even as insurance prices skyrocketed, and our benefits shrank.

Today, Americans pay more for worse healthcare, which is delivered by health workers who get paid less and work under worse conditions. That's because, lacking a regulator to consolidate patients' interests, and strong unions to consolidate workers' interests, patients and workers are easy pickings for those consolidated links in the health supply-chain.

That's a pretty good model for understanding what's happened to Red Lobster: monopoly power and monopsony power begat more monopolies and monoposonies in the supply chain. Everything that hasn't consolidated is defenseless: diners, restaurant workers, fishermen, and the environment. We're all fucked.

Decent, no-frills family restaurant are good. Great, even. I'm not the world's greatest fan of chain restaurants, but I'm also comfortably middle-class and not struggling to afford to give my family a nice night out at a place with good food, friendly staff and reasonable prices. These places are easy pickings for looters because the people who patronize them have little power in our society – and because those of us with more power are easily tricked into sneering at these places' failures as a kind of comeuppance that's all that's due to tacky joints that serve the working class.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/05/23/spineless/#invertebrates

[thesirencult]

Pick A Card Reading : New Year Guidance

What you need to leave behind in 2023.

What you should keep from 2023 and wisdom it gifted you with.

What you should start doing in 2024.

PILE 1

What you need to leave behind in 2023.

7 Of Pentacles Leave behind not aligning your goals with your values. Sunk cost fallacy is when you don't stop doing something that is costing you and harming you because you have been doing it for a while. This is so 2023 babies! Are assesing your input vs the output you receive. Where in your life are you selling yourself short?

What you should keep from 2023 and wisdom it gifted you with.

4 Of Swords, 6 Of Pentacles In 2023 you learnt that everything comes with the cost. The cost though, better not be your physical and menatal health. A piece of wisdom you shoul keep is that resting is as important as growing. Also, remember to not sell yourself short and to stop self sacrificing and overgiving. Equal giving and taking is a moto you should keep repeating throughout 2024 and the end of 2023.

What you should start doing in 2024.

4 Of Cups, 10 Of Cups In 2024 you can start practicing being grateful for all you have already received or want to receive. Focusing on what you have and what you want to accomplish is more important than looking into what you lack. This will help you fight off any remaints of the "scarcity mindset". Also, practice patience and learn to bask in the light of the journey, not obsessing over the destination.

PILE 2

What you need to leave behind in 2023.

King Of Cups Rx, 3 Of Cups Rx What you need to leave behind in 2023 is your inability to express your true emotions and to listen to your heart instead of your mind. Many people around you do not have your best interest in mind. You have noticed that due to how they act when you succeed on your endeavors. Leave these people back in 2023 and use their jealousy as fuel to gas yourself up. Your inability to see your worth clearly is another hinderance. Learn to autonomously realize what your true value is without needing to use others as a mirror. Sometimes the mirros around you are broken and a change of surroundings can go a long way. Being autonomous and self-sovereign will help you navigate life in 2024.

What you should keep from 2023 and wisdom it gifted you with.

9 Of Swords 2023 taught you that negative self talk and a toxic environment affect your self esteem, image and life choices. You should hold close to your heart all the moments you suffered and you were left alone with your thoughts. This will help you understand that you are far more powerful than you think and that in big life choices we are always on our own with only Spirit by our side. If you wanna go fast, go by yourself. If you wanna go further, go with others, but, remember, that others have to want to reach the same destination as you, or else, you will keep visiting cities in ruins.

What you should start doing in 2024.

The Lovers Be independent and learn to make choices all by yourself, without considering how it affects others, if your choice is not directly harmful to them. Being a part of a unit and team is amazing but spreading your wings and flying is even better. Your vibe attracts your tribe. Be yourself unapologetically and authentically. Stop trying to blend in and fit in or you will bleed out.

PILE 3

What you need to leave behind in 2023.

8 Of Swords, The Fool, 6 Of Wands Let go of the belief that others can hold you back or that your past dictates your future. Do not let others tell you what you're capable of accomplishing. Everything lies in choice and perception. Master the last two and you have the key to open the door of success and happiness. Stop closing your eyes to the truth. You are capable of setting yourself free. YOUR choices dicatte your life. You are responsible for yourself and your future. Leave behind analysis-paralysis and planning but never following through. Keeping the promises you make to yourself is as important, if not more important, than making them. Clear your head and your vision. Stop feeling unlucky and fallen from grace. Stop thinking you are uncapable of being seen as succesfull, powerful, beautiful and being able to connect with others. You can be a leader and example for others in the future. Authority comes from self-belief. It should make you mad that people with one third of your talent, wisdom and capabilities are achieving more because their ego is inflated. Be the good guy who wins in the end. Your scars are your medals. Show em. Let yourself be seen.

What you should keep from 2023 and wisdom it gifted you with.

The Hierophant, 7 Of Wands, 10 Of Pentacles IDK. Maybe, I said, MAYBE THAT YOU ARE THE ONLY THING STANDING IN YOUR F*ING WAY AND SPIRIT WANTS YOU TO SEE THAT YOU'RE MEANT TO BE HAPPY AND WEALTHY AND SUCCESFULL, you naughty little thing! In 2023 you saw a glimpse of what lies ahead and what you can accomplish, if and only if, you dare to have faith in yourself and to trust in the highest power. Remember that you are not meant to follow the "traditional" path to success. This reminds me of the "Dumb Money" movie. Outrageous succes. Overnight success in the making for years. Looking in the dashboard and seeing the 000s pileing up while brushing your teeth in 8am unaware type of success. Rebel against the norm. You're in service of spirit because you have a pure soul. You are chosen and protected, you dumb lucky b*tch (I'm aggresively affectionate and you KNOW it). You are meant to be a leader and a guide for others. You are the reverse of pile 2 when it comes to this. Others can see the power and the beauty of yours. They love basking under your warm rays. You are the one unable to see your light. Just like a star, you only see the darkness around and the lights of others. You have been cursed to be unable to see your own beauty and light, so, take this as a sign and continue shining, tone it UP a bit. Connecting with Spirit/Universe/God and channeling is something you learnt this year. You might be my creator/energetic healer/tarot reader/coach/astrologer/crypto bro pile.

You are a creator at heart. A trendsetter, an influencer (in your own unique way). Keep sharing your ideas as they attract abundance and wealth in all forms, as well as your tribe. Sidenote. This year you had to protect yourself and learnt how to set boundaries. If someone disrespects you do not hesitate to get those claws out pantheress. Community, legacy, wealth and abundance were the pillars around the pieces of wisdom this year gave you. Also, read "Think And Grow Rich" by Napoleon Hill. Be brave and fierce.

What you should start doing in 2024.

Ace Of Swords, The Magician, Temperance

What you should start doing from now on and going forward is learning how to act as the equaliser, alchemist and embodying the witch/wizard archetype.

The next year your consciousness will further heighten and your task is to communicate your insights with others.

Accept and believe that you are a winner and develop the "winner's mindset" that will lead to triumph.

Don't play small, for once. Be selfish. Hold the mirror up and see the light. This is your light. No one can take it away from you. Profit from your light, don't let others be warm while you are burning yourself up or shivering in the cold.

Act with your personal interest in mind (Honestly, how much of a people pleaser are you? Do I have to tell you that? *Totally hugging you and playing with your hair while flaming you.*

Go watch some YouTube beauty influencers from 2016 and take some notes from Kim Kardashian when she was searching for her earrings in the Carribbean or somewhere, while people were dying.)

Keep on having that tunnel vision and focusing on personal gains.

Be resourceful. Create, transform and pivot when it is necessary. We are making this whole thing up along the way, this is LIFE, get over it, lol.

Meditating will help you ground yourself and set those energetic boundaries.

Hmmm, last random thoughts : Dare to blend multiple energies and to unite extremes. Be your OWN niche. Keep connecting people with spirit and their highest potential. Be a mediator for others and lastly, share as you keep on studying and learning.

We are not here to be perfect, we are here to BE. FULL STOP. PERIOD

Bye my fellow unhinged b*tches.

XOXO, the CEO of being unhinged, 💋💕🤎

S

[creatingnikki]

things to remember in 2024

i. more quiet time, more silence. more shavasana, more stillness.

ii. keep promises you make to yourself. everyone else can be disregarded — the promises they make, the promises you make to them.

iii. there is no "should do this" or "should be that way" as a universal rule book. your experiences and lessons teach you what are your values, preferences, and takes on life and people. you don't need to convince others of them, you don't even need to most times articulate them to follow them and do as you please.

iv. things that increase your risk of chronic health (mental and physical) issues: sitting, smoking, and situationships. your legs, lungs, and love life deserve much better.

v. 'the best way to take care of the future is to take care of the present moment'. fight the instant gratification, the fomo, the yolo. do the healthy thing for you in the moment, every moment.

vi. go to the salon, the bookstore, the train station, the beach, the bakery more than you go to the bar, the boy's house, and self doubt/loathing.

vii. travel even if you don't have a big budget and cannot do everything you'd want to in that destination because you do now want some travel experiences and stories while you're still in your 20s. make it a priority now, you don't want to feel bitter later.

viii. stop trying to frustrate and confuse yourself so much. you are both the vivacious, warm, kind, person and the somber, detached, pensive person. it's not one betraying the other. it's both you — the sunflower and the black orchid.

ix. ask people of things, it's no virtue to only give and not take. however, don't be so sensitive or shattered if not given or denied. people don't have as much power over your heart as you believe. your heart is happily vacationing on the moon most months of the year away from this worldly chaos. it's your ego that cannot take it. acknowledge the role of your ego, learn to understand it so that you can work with it.

x. do the cringe things. post a hundred reels on Instagram even if you get five likes on each. cringe at that part of you that cringes when you do the things you want instead of cringing at yourself. when you do that you're viewing yourself as a third-party judging yourself and honestly love aren't there thousands out there to do that job already? so then you stick to your job — support yourself no matter how you decide to live your life.

xi. love and romance are not the centre or purpose of your life. you are. the genre of your life is neither rom com nor tragic passionate romance. it's slice of life. love and romance will happen when it happens and will be one part of your life. but all the other parts? they belong to you — to your art and writing, to your joy and exploration of yourself and this world, to your family and friends, to food and cats, to travel and music, to peace and sleep. live a full life.

xii. set processes for your routine that streamline everything and make it easy. your morning work commute, your night skincare, going over your monthly budget, saving and investing for your goals, how you organize your life and time. and when problems show up, simply problem solve. don't take it personally, try to not feel dejected and doomed. and for the times you do, don't try to fix anything. take a shower, eat a good meal, go to sleep.

xiii. when setting boundaries, and when those boundaries are crossed, you don't have to break your head trying to get the other person to change their behaviour. instead, you should change your behaviour. if they cross a boundary, then that should be your cue for a behaviour change, a decision. don't be at the mercy of another's understanding and compassion to have your life be aligned to your needs and values.

xiv. three steps taken > three hundred steps planned. pausing for three months > abandoning for three years. three people you love and who love you > thirty people who are fluff. idk why three is the magic number here but you get the gist. moderation, my love, and balance. regulation and removal.

xv. cut out the noise. you'll figure out more of what that means as you begin to do it. it's social media, yes. it's societal conditioning, yes. but it's also the things your loved ones say despite having the best intentions at heart for you. it's the things the younger you believed and thought and wrote. it's the friends and lovers who come and go and don't really know you well. it's all of it. you have to cut out the noise. build noise-cancelling headphones for your soul over time and carry them with you everywhere.

[secretdestinypainter]

Traveling the most beautiful places this 2024:

“Visit to Europe (Vienna)"

In my opinion, traveling is the most interesting thing that is liked by almost half of the people on Earth. Traveling is an adventure that broadens horizons, opens minds and enriches lives. It makes the person happy and fresh of any age, whether it’s about exploring exotic destinations, immersing oneself in different countries and cultures, or simply seeking relaxation in nature and embrace.

Traveling to different countries in a very short time is very difficult to memorize, and making all the events perfectly fully organized or managed is a big task, but having something that makes us memorize about our events in advance is a big support, like tinyti.me website makes this problem easier in today's world by making their website available for us to create events which help in perfect management.

I think Vienna is one of the most beautiful cities in Europe. The historic core of the city is a massive UNESCO Heritage Site brimming with incredible museums, beautiful galleries, and sprawling Baroque palaces.

The city is a history buff’s dream. There’s an incredible café culture, a nearby wine region, tons of amazing eateries, awesome live music (including world-class opera), and much more.

I’ve been coming here for years and I never get tired of visiting. Technically speaking I love the city so much that I used to run tours here!

Naturally, I’ve stayed at countless hotels during my visits. Here’s my list of the best hotels in Vienna:

1. Hotel-Pension Wild

This two-star hotel is one of the few affordable lodgings in the city center. It has simple but bright rooms that feature comfortable beds, plenty of space, and large windows that let in a lot of natural light. The design is a bit dated (the carpeted rooms don’t look particularly stylish) but everything is clean and functional. Rooms include basic amenities like a flatscreen TV, desk, and free Wi-Fi. The bathrooms are pretty small, but they’re clean and the showers have good water pressure. The hotel offers a hearty continental breakfast and the owner is friendly and welcoming. If you’re on a tight budget, there are small, no-frills single rooms with a shared bathroom available as well.

2. Hotel Domizil

This boutique four-star hotel has small, clean rooms with décor that makes you feel like you’re back in Vienna’s imperial past. The rooms have plenty of light and lots of antique touches, such as wooden desks and tables, and upholstered armchairs. Rooms also have free Wi-Fi, a flatscreen TV, and a coffee/tea maker. The bathrooms, while not particularly fashionable (the tiles are kind of ugly), are very spacious and the showers have excellent water pressure. The breakfast, which can be included in the price, has tons of variety, including lots of different fresh breads and cheeses.

Located in the city center, I think this is one of the best value places to stay if you want to be in the center of it all.

3. Hotel Mozart

One of the few hotels in the Rossau neighborhood (just northwest of the city center), this budget-friendly three-star hotel boasts large rooms with lots of natural light. Rooms are spacious and decorated in light colors and feature hardwood or parquet floors. There are lots of other wooden touches too, such as desks/tables, and large wooden headboards. Free Wi-Fi is included, as is a flatscreen TV and AC (a must if you’re visiting in the summer). Some rooms include coffee machines. The hotel boasts a filling breakfast spread each morning with lots of fresh fruit and pastries. There’s also a bar on-site and the staff are always happy to share their tips and advice too.

4. Hotel Johann Strauss

Located in the Wieden neighborhood, this stylish four-star hotel is named after the eponymous 19th-century Austrian composer. The hotel is set in a historic Art Nouveau building that’s been entirely renovated, with rooms that have lots of natural light and a soft, welcoming color palette. Rooms include a flatscreen TV, minibar, coffee/tea maker, desk, and sofa. I really like that there’s a lot of art around the property, including in the rooms (naturally, much of the art is music centered). The tiled bathrooms are huge, with lots of light and great water pressure. I especially like that the breakfast buffet is enormous and features a lot of variety. The staff is exceptionally friendly too and happy to help you make the most of your stay.

5. Hotel Am Konzerthaus Vienna

Located in Landstrasse near the iconic Belvedere Palace, this luxe four-star hotel feels more like a five-star property. It has a chic lobby and large, bright rooms with super comfy beds. Everything is fashionable and trendy, with lots of rich colors from a darker palette. The large bathrooms are bedecked with dark tiles and are well lit, featuring plush bathrobes and relaxing rain showers. Rooms also include a flatscreen TV, desk, and coffee/tea maker. The breakfast buffet is huge and has a lot of options, but I especially love that the on-site restaurant has a Michelin star (it does amazing modern takes on traditional Austrian dishes).

The hotel is a perfect choice for travelers who want some luxury without breaking the bank.

6. The Ritz-Carlton Vienna

This is arguably the fanciest hotel in town. A five-star property right in the heart of the city, this hotel is spread across four historic palaces (yes, actual palaces). While the hotel feels palatial, it has understated décor with a chic minimalist design (think lots of white space with touches of color or artwork). The marble bathrooms are huge and the showers have perfect water pressure. The rooms are also massive and have big, comfy beds (as well as desks, AC, sofas, and electric kettles).

There’s also a gigantic breakfast buffet offered each morning and a free glass of champagne when you check in. The hotel also has a pool that plays music underwater, a fitness center, sauna, steam room, and three different spas on-site. In short, it’s the pinnacle of luxury in the city and the best choice for travelers looking to splurge on an elegant stay.

I hope this blog helps you a lot when traveling next time to Europe (Vienna), So, whether you're embarking on a solo adventure, a family vacation, or a romantic getaway, This spirit of travel guides you on a journey of exploration, discovery, and adventure.

[borisbubbles]

Eurovision 2024: #32

32. THE NETHERLANDS Joost Klein - "Europapa" 26th place (Disqualified)

Decade ranking: 120/153 [Above Ochman, below Andrew Lambrou]

Yeah, #NotForMe. Don't like the blue chicken, don't like the awful murine clickbait faces, don't like how he tried appropriating Käärijä's legacy for his own benefit. In fact, there's a lot I don't like about Joost Klein. Get used to it. Feelings are mixed but they are trending towards the NEGATIVE.

The face of a man I want to trap inside a garbage truck.

What is funny to me though, is that I certainly could have liked "Europapa" if the Dutch hadn't made certain decisions. I have to remain honest. My ranking, my rules, my lack of taste. It didn't work for me.

The song's not without merit though. It's a fun eurodance number at a glance. "Europapa" works best when you hear it live after a few drinks and blurt along with its lyrics. It's an EXCELLENT concert and streaming entry, whipping up a good time out of thin air with few pretences.

As a Eurovision entry though... eh. It tried to be a lot of other things: A tribute to his dead parents, an introspective unspooling of his mental health, a spoof, a meme, a middle finger to society, like all at once? It has that Subwoolfer-like quality of straight men in a mancave brainstorming on how what a Eurovision entry looks like: stupid nonsense. How does that work? The answer to that is "barely", and only if you take it at face value.

The song is not really about Joost dead's father and his world view. That ... I think... is deliberate false advertisement. It's not untrue, but presenting it as the sole truth is a deception. If you delve into the song, you'll find that it's a little bit more complex (and less wholesome) than that.

Verse 1 is about desperately running away from your problems (Joost naming all of the destinations, clawing at people for money, having lost everything but time) and verse 2 tackles validation, desperately craving it and yet not feeling sated. "Europapa" is a coping mechanism first and a song second. It's a deep dive into Joost's inner workings and his soul, but one that exposes him as insecure and vulnerable and putting up a front of irreverence as a mask to the outer world. As per the second verse:

"I'm running from myself, I'm crying out for help - I even give people loads of money and there's nobody who gives me aid [...] turn the radio on, I hear Stromae's "Papaoutai" I won't stop [feel satisfied] until they say "yeah, he [Joost] is doing well, eh?"

Now, this is actually... not a bad thing. It proves that "Europapa" is authentic and has surprising complexity and layers. That's what distinguishes it positively from Finland, which is hollow and cringe.

The problem with the emotions is that they clash with the rest of the song?

Fewer sentiments kill the party mood quite AS hard as one of "Are you feeling alright? 😨 Is everything OKAY?😨 should I call a therapist?" 😨". For me it defo kills the vibe. I don't want to END a fun party song with concern for the singer's wellbeing. The fact that Joost is cishet and therefore incapable of talking about his feelings and yet PUT THESE VERBALIZED EMOTIONS IN PLAIN VIEW IN HIS EUROVISION SONG is enough to set the alarm bells ringing.

Of course it could have worked if the live got it right, but um lol. Let's be honest here: The live was BAD. It was INTENDED to be So-Bad-It's-Good, sure, because that's the only way cishets know to do camp. I don't mind a spoof of a 2008 joke act. It just was... performed and staged so poorly it became the thing it intended to parody.

You sir, are NOT Käärijä.

The best parts of the entry (the emotional complexity and the hak break) are completely washed away by a combination of the awful clickbaity faces, TERRIBLE vocals (the post-chorus "EUROs" in literal Cookie Monster Voice are amongst the ugliest sounds anyone created for Eurovision), nightmare fuel visuals and that ghastly, ghastly outro.

Actually, about that outro. That is what made me turn against Joost. It's the WORST section of ANY song this year. It's the combination of whiplashing from extreme rapture into literal mourning at the drop of a pin (which is kind of... really icky human behaviour when you think about it) with pushing it down our throats by including it in the recap. Make The Guillible Cry With Cheap Emotional Manip, it's not a tool exclusive to Israelis.

And you CAN actually blame this intrusive display of emotional expoitation squarely on Joost because he's a known perfectionist and therefore must have planned the execution of the outro the moment he and his cronies decided to include it in the song.

It did tie the ending together alright. But because it wasn't a showing of personal growth, or strength or accomplishment, which it could have been, it did not align with the rest of the song. Instead it underlined that Joost hasn't moved on and is hopelessly stuck in the past, desperate for validation.

Instead of underlining the cheerful, fun aspect of Europapa it instead brought my attention the dark, emotionally disturbing bits as the last thought, and that ultimately is what killed it for me. The song is a cry for help, which is nothing to be cheerful about.

Aaaaand that's the opinion on the song and the live performance. But we're not done yet because I must address what came after that. 🙄

So, let's tackle the press conference first. Zero complaints about that. I was annoyed with Joost before due to how desperately he tried to push himself as "Käärijä's" successor and fabricated his own PR campaign on TikTok (DIE TikTok), but his behaviour at the PC made me do a complete 180 on him. Him shooting pure unfiltered truth pellets at the EBU and Eden with no regard for the consequences was fucking GLORIOUS. All the things he said needed to be said and were said without a filter. It was pure oxygen and precisely what we all needed to hear, spoken because of its TRUTH and not for clout.

Then, the disqualification. It was 'a valid DQ' purely from a rules perspective but come on now. This was not a DQ worthy incident. He didn't touch the woman and she deliberately, repeatedly refused to respect his privacy despite multiple warnings AND an agreement he made with the EBU. How has this even been reported as a 'crime'? He APOLOGIZED profusely to the lady in question and she refused to hear him and called the police on him. Sometimes you just have the misfortune of running into a Karen on a bad day. And given how riddled with tension this year's backstage was, every day of rehearsals was a bad day for everyone involved.

The DQ went through because the EBU can't fucking clear up the slightest inconvenience. By the time the police became involved, there was no turning back, and they were forced to DQ as per their bureaucracy. The rest is backpedaling.

Both of these things made me feel more sympathetic towards Joost as a person. At the end of the day he's a deeply troubled, complex, tragic figure who (barely) functions on copium and is really terrible at expressing his true feelings and the events surrounding his DQ check out with that. He needs support from those who love him (and enter therapy.) The other delegations taking his side (other than ofc KUN(ts)), is a wholesome signal and proves that Europe can be United By Music even when it is Divided By Politics first. If this disqualification is what leads to some much-needed overhauls for next year (ideally the sacking of Österdahl, the cancellation of the MorroccanOil sponsorship and KAN's expulsion, in any order), I will gladly accept Joost's role in that as the proverbial sacrifce that needed to be made.

Ironically, it was the disqualification that made me realize I shouldn't bump Joost higher out of sympathy for his personality. I didn't miss Europapa on Saturday and barely noticed its absence. The results in the Grand Final were great, specifically because Switzerland won and Croatia beat Israel in the televote. If Joost competes, Swizterland and Croatia's TVs go down in western Europe, while Israel is still top five (since she beat Joost in the semi). He also shoves Bambie out of their serendipitous 6/6/6 placements to boot.

That realization is why I need to eliminate him NOW and not later down the road. I don't care for the song as a Eurovision entry, I DISLIKE the live performance and his presence could have made the results worse for me. Easy elimination at this stage.

Those that care about "Europapa" can keep singing its praises and should. Joost will need and shall appreciate the support after this nightmare Eurovision.

Ultimately though, I am not of his fans.

THE RANKING

[positivexcellence]

towwn: don’t call ‘em resolutions! instead, we’re sharing a few long-term goals for 2024:

🏡declutter 🗑️reduce waste 👗make more sustainable fashion choices

that’s where @retoldrecycling comes in. the sustainable startup, recently featured on @sharktankabc, is on a mission to change our recycling behavior & eradicate textile-based landfills. sign up and receive a compostable bag to fill with items you’d like to unload 4x per year. simply send back the full bag to avoid stuff ending up in global landfills. retold sorts + repurposes everything via its partner network – thrift stores, charities, upcyclers + more.

we’ve also learned from our pals + animal welfare experts at the international animal rescue org @fourpawsusa that recycling isn’t just good for the environment, it benefits animals too. four paws’s #wearitkind campaign advocates recycling clothes + textiles to help keep new animal-based products out of the supply chain, as well as avoid pollution & deforestation that destroys habitats. a win for people + planet + animals.

now part of @mcuban’s investment portfolio, here are some key basics about retold:

retold accepts your best stuff (wedding dresses) or very old & worn items, including your dog’s blanket! most clean, dry household textiles/clothes are accepted, but not pillows or cushions. the majority of materials are reused domestically. partners ensure that items sent overseas have value + purpose at their final destination. as bags are received, customers get rewards: promo codes & offers from many sustainable brands, including @paradisperdusnyc, @vitaminaswim + @boody, which fashion ratings app @goodonyou gives high marks for eco-friendly, ethical practices & animal welfare.

by raising consciousness over what we throw away & just starting small – think: a retold bag in the laundry room ready for those solo socks – we can create easy recycling habits that become 2nd nature. subscribe to @retoldrecycling to get a jumpstart on your 2024 eco-intentions + follow @fourpawsusa to learn how you can support the #wearitkind pledge to reduce, refine and replace animal-based fashion with kinder, sustainable choices.

[gacmediadaily]

Great American Media unwraps its Christmas movie season for 2024! 

See all of the details below, with premiere dates coming soon!🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄

Great American Media Press Release:

‘GREAT AMERICAN CHRISTMAS 2024,’

WITH HIGH-QUALITY, 

ORIGINAL HOLIDAY FILMS 

FOR THE WHOLE FAMILY,

RETURNS TO 

GREAT AMERICAN FAMILY

AND STREAMING ON PURE FLIX 

BEGINNING, OCTOBER 17

MOST ORIGINAL PREMIERES 

IN GREAT AMERICAN MEDIA HISTORY

NEW YORK, NY – August 28, 2024 – Great American Media, the leader in high-quality faith and family productions, announced the return of beloved holiday franchise, GREAT AMERICAN CHRISTMAS, for its fourth year on Great American Family. The festive season kicks off on October 17 and will also be available on the company’s owned streaming service, Pure Flix. Great American Family offers an unbeatable lineup of new Christmas movies starring some of the genre’s most cherished stars, including Mario Lopez, Candace Cameron Bure, Danica McKellar, and many more—talent who have delivered the highest ratings in the history of the genre. Pure Flix, the top streaming home for faith-based content, will feature high-quality Original Christmas premieres alongside subscriber favorites from previous years. Together, the two platforms will present more Original faith and family Christmas content than any other media company. GREAT AMERICAN CHRISTMAS on Great American Family is a 24/7 Christmas movie event running throughout October, November, and December. The programming features cherished holiday traditions and new, surprise-and-delight moments, culminating with the 138th Tournament of Roses Parade, broadcast live from Pasadena, California, on January 1, 2025. Whether watched on Linear TV or in streaming, Great American Family and Pure Flix are the go-to destinations for authentic, high-quality, Original Christmas content. “Great American Christmas has quickly become a highly valued holiday tradition” said Bill Abbott, President & CEO of Great American Media. “Our early success is owed to our incredible family of talent and a commitment to storytelling that embodies the true spirit of Christmas—the holiday as it’s meant to be celebrated. Stories about love, faith, hope, and joy set us apart from others simply making movies in holiday settings. The extraordinary number of high-quality, original faith and family premieres this holiday season elevates Great American Christmas to a leadership position in the holiday space,” Abbott concluded. BELOW ARE A FEW NEW, ORIGINAL HOLIDAY PREMIERES, DATES RELEASE SOON:

A CHRISTMAS CASTLE PROPOSAL, starring Rhiannon Fish and Mitchell Bourke. Olivia, a commoner, travels with Prince Alexander to his family’s magical palace, Torovia so their families can spend a first Christmas together. The couple’s plans for a enchanted Christmas are threatened by comedic mishaps caused by cultural differences between the families.

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CHRISTMAS IN SCOTLAND, starring Jill Winternitz and Dominic Watters. A New York installation designer helps a small Scottish community create a dazzling light display to win “Best Christmas Village” festival. The designer is forced to work with a wealthy heir who doesn’t like Christmas, though feelings may change if the pair succeeds in creating joy for the community.

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A VINTAGE CHRISTMAS, starring Merritt Patterson and Christopher Russell. A dedicated preservationist battles a developer’s ambitions to tear down a historic Post Office with ties to her family. The choice of old versus new threatens to divide the small town unless there is a solution for the greater good of all concerned.

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THE FABRIC OF CHRISTMAS, starring Ferelith Young and Harmon Walsh. Firefighter Liam and quilting teacher, Amy, come together to make the perfect quilt for Liam’s sister’s Christmas wedding. Two headstrong people discover the importance of putting personal differences aside to create what is most important at Christmas.

🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄

A ROYAL CHRISTMAS BALLET, starring Brittany Underwood and Jonathan Stoddard. A retired ballerina is pressed into service working with a visiting team of royal ambassadors to put on the season’s performance of “The Nutcracker” and finds herself center stage in an unexpected Christmas romance.

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A CHRISTMAS LESS TRAVELED, starring Candace Cameron Bure and Eric Johnson. A local business owner finds an audio cassette in the player of her recently departed dad’s classic red truck. The message instructs Desi to go on a holiday road trip down memory lane where she meets a man who needs her help and who offers help in return.

🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄

A LITTLE WOMEN’S CHRISTMAS, starring Trevor Donovan, Jen Lilley, Jillian Murray, Laura Osnes, Julia Reilly, Jesse Hutch, and the great, Gladys Knight. A modern retelling of Louisa May Alcott’s classic novel.

🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄

GET HIM BACK FOR CHRISTMAS, starring Alexa PenaVega and Carlos PenaVega. Special appearance by the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders, Mario Lopez, Victoria Jackson, and Natasha Bure. Bella made it big in music. Jack stayed behind in his hometown working at The Salvation Army to help his family after his dad passes. Bella returns home after a heartbreaking split with her chart-topping singing partner and asks Jack to write the perfect song to get her boyfriend back. Carlos PenaVega wrote and performs an original song, “Get Him Back for Christmas” performed for the film at AT&T Stadium.

🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄

A CINDERELLA CHRISTMAS BALL, starring Danica McKellar and Oliver Rice. Choreographed by Gleb Savchenko. With only the Internet, a plane ticket and a lifelong determination to find her birth family Chelsea travels to royal hamlet, Havenshire, at Christmas. Along the way, Chelsea sneaks into a castle, teaches a stubborn Prince how to dance, and looks to be in the perfect place when the bells toll Christmas Eve.

🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄

🎄🎄

WREATHMAKER CHRISTMAS, starring Kristin Wollett and Casey Elliott. A wreathmaker slips on ice and injures her arm which puts her holiday wreath deliveries in jeopardy until a selfless neighbor steps up to keep her business afloat.

🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄

HOME SWEET CHRISTMAS, starring Candace Cameron Bure and Cameron Mathison. Two former childhood friends reunite after a beloved family members passes, leaving the future of his magical maple sugar farm in their hands.

🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄

ONCE UPON A CHRISTMAS WISH, starring Mario Lopez and Courtney Lopez. A local mayor discovers his childhood Christmas wishes are coming true. With his childhood friend, the pair can inspire residents to showcase the town’s warmth and values while pushing back a major developer’s desire to take the community in a different direction.

🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄

SLEIGH BELLS AND SUGAR PLUMS, starring Jill Wagner and Jesse Hutch. A historian seeks inspiration for her next project in her family’s hometown of Aurora, which is famous for experiencing the Northern Lights. While there, she bonds with a local tour guide who shows her the town’s Christmas traditions and witnesses a harbinger of miracles to come.

🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄

A SHELTER AND SEASON’S GREETINGS, starring Ash Tsai and Eric Guillmette. Caleb is injured in the Army and recovers through help from shelter therapy dogs. As a sign of thanks, Caleb returns home to help Amber run the local shelter and, in the process, discovers his feelings for Amber go beyond gratitude.

🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄

CHRISTMAS BY CANDLELIGHT, starring Erin Agostino and Harmon Walsh. Juliet pitches Christmas candles to her boss to earn a promotion and enlists the help of a candle store owner (Tom) who refuses at first but reluctantly agrees when he realizes the money will help make his daughter’s Christmas wish come true.

🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄

COUPLED UP FOR CHRISTMAS, starring Sara Canning and Marcus Rosner. Two heartbroken strangers pretend to be dating others to win the affection of their true soulmates.

*SPECIAL PRESENTATION WORLD PREMIERE TBA – ONE NIGHT ONLY – Thanksgiving Night, November 28

🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄

PURE FLIX CHRISTMAS 2024 STREAMING PREMIERES, DATES RELEASE SOON:

A PARIS CHRISTMAS WALTZ, starring Jen Lilley and Matthew Morrison. A novice dancer, Emma encounters professional dancer Leo whose love for competitive dance is diminishing until a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity presents itself for the dancer and his beloved choreographer to take Emma’s dancing to next level.

A HOT COCOA CHRISTMAS, starring Susie Abromeit and Torrance Coombs. The modern-day reimagining of William Shakespeare’s beloved classic “Much Ado About Nothing” set at Christmas.

*THE BELOVED MOVIE FRANCHISE THAT STARTED IT ALL, TBA OCTOBER 14: A WORLDWIDE STREAMING EXCLUSIVE

12 GAMES OF CHRISTMAS, starring Felisha Cooper and Johnny Ramey. A group of friends are magically transported inside a Christmas-themed board game during a holiday party. They must play through all levels to return home just in time for Christmas.

CHRISTMAS TIME IS HERE, starring Rukiya Bernard and Dewshane Williams. Nia hopes to save her father’s beloved inn and is initially excited to meet Julian who she believes will help her only to discover Julian’s first thought was to change the legacy property.

A KINDHEARTED CHRISTMAS, starring Jennie Garth and Cameron Mathison. A small business owner gets inspired to donate to the town anonymously which has everyone in the community following suit all while a local reporter tries to find out who the secret Santa is.

CHRISTMAS IN MAPLE HILLS, starring Emily Alatalo, Bukola Ayoka, Ayinde Blake. A charismatic veterinarian needs to track down the enigmatic owner of her family’s land to preserve its legacy.

ANGEL FALLS CHRISTMAS, starring Chad Michael Murray and Jessica Lowndes. A devoted doctor with little time for Christmas works a miracle for her patient and finds acceptance and love in the unlikeliest of places.

ROYALLY WRAPPED FOR CHRISTMAS, starring Jen Lilley and Brendan Fehr. The director of an international charity is called to the Kingdom of Valdonia by its royal family where she grows ever closer to a prince.

CATERING CHRISTMAS, starring Merritt Patterson and Daniel Lissing. A struggling catering business lands the Christmas event of the year but will have to cater to the whims of the town’s top socialite.

CHRISTMAS AT THE DRIVE-IN, starring Danica McKellar and Neal Bledsoe. A property lawyer works to prove her local drive-in is an institution and cannot be closed and then meets the proposed seller, who happens to be the heir to the property.

CHRISTMAS BY CANDLELIGHT, starring Erin Agostino and Harmon Walsh. Juliet pitches Christmas candles to her boss to earn a promotion and enlists the help of a candle store owner who refuses at first but reluctantly agrees when he realizes the money will help make his daughter’s Christmas wish come true.

A CHRISTMAS LESS TRAVELED, starring Candace Cameron Bure and Eric Johnson. A local business owner finds an audio cassette in the player of her recently departed dad’s classic red truck. The message instructs Desi to go on a holiday road trip down memory lane where she meets a man who needs her help and who offers help in return.

THE FABRIC OF CHRISTMAS, starring Ferelith Young and Harmon Walsh. Firefighter Liam and quilting teacher, Amy, come together to make the perfect quilt for Liam’s sister’s Christmas wedding. Two headstrong people discover the importance of putting personal differences aside to create what is most important at Christmas.

A CHRISTMAS MIRACLE FOR DAISY, starring Jill Wagner and Nick Bateman. An interior designer scores a landmark property remodel before discovering the new owner is someone special from her past life who is now parent to an adopted daughter.

CHRISTMAS IN SCOTLAND, starring Jill Winternitz and Dominic Watters. A New York installation designer helps a small Scottish community create a dazzling light display to win “Best Christmas Village” festival. The designer is forced to work with a wealthy heir who doesn’t like Christmas, though feelings may change if the pair succeeds in creating joy for the community.

A CHRISTMAS STAR, starring Sara Canning and Daniel Lissing. An astronomer predicts a new meteor shower will appear above a town and needs to convince locals not to light an annual tree to see the phenomenon.

COUPLED UP FOR CHRISTMAS, starring Sara Canning and Marcus Rosner. Two heartbroken strangers pretend to be dating others to win the affection of their true soulmates.

I’M GLAD ITS CHRISTMAS, starring Jessica Lowndes, Paul Green, and Gladys Knight. A salesclerk dreaming of an opportunity on Broadway encounters a jingle writer also in need of a professional miracle. Little do the pair realize, an angel of a business owner has divine plans for everyone this Christmas.

*ONE OF THE BEST FAITH MOVIES OF 2024, TBA OCTOBER 21 – A WORLDWIDE STREAMING EXCLUSIVE

PHOTOS: Courtesy of Great American Media 2024

ABOUT GREAT AMERICAN FAMILY

As the flagship linear TV network of Great American Media, Great American Family is America’s premiere destination for quality family-friendly programming, featuring original Christmas movies, rom-coms and classic series that celebrate faith, family and country. Founded in 2021, Great American Family is home to year-round seasonal celebrations the whole family can enjoy together, including Great American Christmas, the network’s signature franchise featuring holiday themed movies and specials. Great American Family is available in 50 million households via cable and satellite providers; visit https://www.greatamericanfamily.com/channel-finder/ or text FAMILY to 877-999-1225 to find your local channel. 🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄

My Quick Take:

2024 is sure to be another heartwarming and cozy Christmas movie season with Great American Family's faith and family movies. I'm so excited to see so many of our favorite TV movie stars return to the network for their 4th annual Christmas movie event! So many Great American Family Christmas movies are now on my must-see list, including A LITTLE WOMEN’S CHRISTMAS, SLEIGH BELLS AND SUGAR PLUMS, A VINTAGE CHRISTMAS, A CINDERELLA CHRISTMAS BALL, HOME SWEET CHRISTMAS, and more! I could go on and on... I hope you find many delightful Christmas movies you are looking forward to seeing during this Christmas Season on Great American Family! Please share your thoughts in comments below...

Joyous Christmas Blessings 

to You All!

God bless us, everyone! 

Net

[nathanriverschesky]

Jamie and Doug's Cinematic Wedding Film - Hidden River Events - Asheville NC | Nathan Rivers Chesky

Jamie and Doug's Cinematic Wedding Film - Hidden River Events - Asheville, NC | Nathan Rivers Chesky https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zICMTUuS4W8 Jamie and Doug officially joined their lives together in the lovely green spring along the Swannanoa River, just outside of Asheville, NC at the best all-inclusive wedding venue, Hidden River Events. https://ift.tt/5GCOAug For more information, please visit my website: www.nathanchesky.com Or https://ift.tt/MAemhDi ✅ Subscribe to The Channel Nathan Rivers Chesky - Photography and Film and stay connected with the artistry of capturing life's moments: https://www.youtube.com/@nathanriverschesky-photogr7684 ✅ For Business Inquiries: ashevilleweddingvideo@gmail.com ============================= ✅ Recommended Playlists: 👉 Cinamatic Wedding Films: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLmL4vCiyFGDFyfox5NRgTnyUSIqsI4AUj 👉 Full Wedding Ceremony Videos: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLmL4vCiyFGDEjrWRdhQy5qvG-nvz2BWui ✅ Other Videos You Might Be Interested In Watching: 👉 The Biltmore Estate Indian Wedding Video: https://youtu.be/UFo3nbi8gk4 High Hampton Wedding Film: https://youtu.be/XldZyJuQVsE 👉 Amy and Kiki - Cinematic Wedding Film - Black Mountain, North Carolina Lake Eden Events https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2V0ec1pW0I 👉 Kinga and John Wedding at Castle Ladyhawke - Cinematic Wedding Film https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CgTKYzpnFF0 ============================= ✅ About Nathan Rivers Chesky - Photography and Film. Welcome to Nathan Rivers Chesky - Photography and Film, your inclusive destination for capturing life's most precious moments through the lens of creativity and elegance. Hi! I am Nathan Rivers Chesky, your Asheville-based wedding photographer, and videographer. If you value photography that embodies your character, employs movement, and balances the playful and the romantic. I create imagery focusing on candid moments with subtle direction, creating an atmosphere of comfort and honesty. Whether your destination wedding is in Asheville, NC, or somewhere a bit further out, I am your creative photographer/videographer if you are looking for photojournalistic reality captured with a stunning glow. For Collaboration and Business inquiries, please use the contact information below: 📩 Email: ashevilleweddingvideo@gmail.com 🔔 Subscribe to The Channel Nathan Rivers Chesky - Photo & Film and stay connected with the artistry of capturing life's moments: https://www.youtube.com/@nathanriverschesky-photogr7684 ================================= Copyright Disclaimer: Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational, or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use #weddingfilm #wedding #weddingvideo #asheville #ashevillewedding © Nathan Rivers Chesky - Photography and Film. via Nathan Rivers Chesky - Photo & Film https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCeVVN_TxK604ZqTAmwHaQ7w July 09, 2024 at 05:56AM

[alyjojo]

The Person On Your Mind in January 🏔️ 2024 - Leo

Whole of their energy towards Leo: The Lovers

Feelings: 6 Pentacles

Intentions: 3 Cups

Actions: 6 Wands

This person is in love with you 😍 I’m not sure if this is an ex or if there’s been a separation, I don’t see any arguments, but Judgement clarifying The Lovers indicates wanting a second chance, assuming there was a first chance that didn’t work out. They’re willing to put in the effort and show you they mean it, and by effort I’m seeing like…practical things, gifts, money, fixing your stuff, helping you out with anything you need, you’re showing up as Pentacles here and they seem to speak your language in that way. Acts of service 💯 That could just be them too. They feel you were destined to meet, you could be destined for them, like a gift from the universe. In someone’s case, this could be like a best friend or a parent that’s super supportive of you & your relationship with someone, if you’re in one. If so, they could feel like you & your person were made for each other - The Wheel of Fortune, or maybe they were present in the happenings leading up to your meeting or dating, it all feels like synchronicity. They feel very close to you.

They intend to celebrate! Either a wedding, that’s here for someone, an anniversary, a proposal 😏, any celebration of love. Either they’re telling/showing you this and winning you over again, or telling the world because they want to make it official, or supporting you and coming to your party to celebrate. Maybe throwing you a party. In actions, they will be successful, and helpful, they may try to watch the finances though and make sure things don’t get too crazy. Some will let you know just how much they love you and they’re not letting go. Some may have a grudge against a lover or something, and they’re getting over that for you. Like if you’re okay with xyz, so are they. If there are grudges being held against them, they’re taking accountability and proving it to you, that they’re sorry & they mean it. Love this person’s energy, it’s genuine no matter what 💚

Messages:

Their side:

- Questionable past/morals

- All About YOU 😳

Your side:

- Similar Values

- My money is my LIFE 💰

Possible signs:

Heavy Capricorn, Scorpio, Cancer, earth 🌍 & water 💦

If you’re dealing with:

5 Cups & 4 Cups rev shows you could be missing some of your people, or they miss you. Whether wires have gotten crossed or things have changed, people have grown, something has you in your feelings where others in your life are concerned. You could have regrets or sadness about things you can’t change, opportunities you feel you’ve missed. Or in some cases this can be switched.

Aries - would be with you in a heartbeat if you weren’t already taken, or switch it

Taurus - feels betrayed by you, but they’re handling it & working things out regardless, or switch it, probably no reunion but you’re moving on

Gemini - wants to talk to you, or you do, whatever is discussed or acted on is probably healing & very positive for both of you, could have some deeper feelings hiding underneath intellectual word vomit - look past it

Cancer - nostalgic about a time when they had you and you both had it all - together, could be financial or emotional, there’s a lack, a void 😞

Leo - moving on from the/any drama

Virgo - leaving or already left, this is done

Libra - story 1: mind games, breadcrumbing, giving you enough to keep hanging on, and no more, they’re a waste of your time & emotions 💯 story 2: they’re pissed at you for making them wait forever

Scorpio - very happy & busy with family stuff

Sagittarius - has emotions for you but they’re concerned about how it would work or just work in general is taking priority, it’s stressful

Capricorn - putting more effort into things they’ve let slide or haven’t been working out, being proactive about problems

Aquarius - overcoming a major hurdle, possibly at work or with a business, things are looking up for them in a big way, very successful

Pisces - not speaking to you, they’re healing from whatever has happened between you or just in their world, could just be sick for a bit 😷

[a-tale-never-told]

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

//Hey, everybody, Mod Sam here! My apologies if I wasn't occasionally online active this week or if I'm putting this out a bit earlier than expected, as the majority of you would be expecting from me.

//I've been incredibly busy these past few days, running errands, packing for my Christmas vacations, and enjoying well-needed quality bonding time with my loved ones. As a result of that, updates and progress on the Twilight Syndrome Arc have been rather sluggish this week, in comparison to other ones.

//Since it's officially the beginning of the holiday week, and it's going to be Christmas Eve tommorow, I imagine that you can all understand where my priorities are currently at the moment, guaranteeing a safe flight from Florida to my destination. Still, I should've probably informed all of you earlier during the week, to not cause confusion about where I exactly was these days^^

//I just wanted to create this brief Chrismas/New Year post because I feel like I owed all of you some form of explanation as to my current status at this point, and because I'm in an overwhelming Chrismas mood right now, and I want to announce my gratitude to everyone here for the amount of love and support you gave me^^

//2023 has been an absolutely difficult, stressful, year for me as it has been for almost everyone who experienced it. I can confidently say that I will not be looking back on this year fondly, as I'd gone through a particular lot of stuff this year, both awful and amazing at the best of circumstances. However, I don't wanna focus on the negatives this time around, as I'm in a positive mood and I think we're all getting tired of experiencing complete sadness these days, aren't we?

//Hopefully, 2024 will be a far better experience for me, both personally and for my writing capabilities, as I still have so much potential to show, if the last ask I answered is any indication of that. Fingers crossed that we'll be able to finish the first arc in January-February of 2024 and with enough planning and time, move on to the second arc.

//I just want to express my gratefulness and appreciation towards all of my fanbase here, because you guys are truly amazing! I always value your token kindness and advice on how to do wonderful character writing, really I do. And it's because of this that I want to express my thanks to all of you here, for making this story a reality, and for constantly being supportive of me, and I don't know how much I can repay you enough.

//Have a wonderful Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, and I'll see you all in 2024!^^^

[salmandeveloperslahore]

Complete Guide about Best Construction Projects in Lahore 2023-2024!

Best Construction Projects in Lahore, Lahore is frequently referred to be Pakistan's heart. It boasts a thriving real estate market and a lively culture. In recent years, there has been a surge in development Best Construction Projects in Lahore, which serves both inhabitants and investors.

The year 2023–2024 is predicted to be a particularly interesting one for the building sector in Lahore. This extensive study will examine the Best Construction Projects in Lahore for 2023–2024 to assist you in making well-informed investment selections.

Why Lahore?

Let's take a look at why Lahore has become a popular destination for construction and real estate.

Cultural Hub:

Lahore's cultural riches, historical landmarks and culinary delights are renowned. The unique blend of modernity and tradition in the city attracts people from around the globe.

Economic Prosperity:

Lahore, Pakistan's major economic hub, has a thriving business environment. This city is a hub of business and personal opportunities.

Education and Healthcare:

Lahore is home to some of the best educational and healthcare institutions in the country, making it a great place to raise a child and live.

Growing Population:

Housing, commercial space, and infrastructure are in high demand due to the city's increasing population.

Building dreams, shaping legacies - where Lahore's skyline meets ingenuity, and every structure narrates the tale of architectural brilliance and timeless grandeur.

Top Construction Projects for Lahore in 2023-2024:

Explore the most promising construction project that will redefine Lahore’s skyline by 2023-2024.

DHA City Lahore:

Location: DHA City Lahore will be a major residential and commercial centre on the outskirts Lahore. It is strategically located near the Lahore Ring Road, and the Lahore to Sialkot Motorway.

Key Features:

Modern security measures.

High-quality infrastructure.

Scenic views

Close proximity to healthcare and educational facilities.

The ideal fusion of contemporary and classic architectural design.

Investment Potential:

DHA City Lahore is a great investment opportunity, as the value of the properties will rise in the next few years.

Lahore Smart City:

Lahore Smart City's location is near the Lahore Bypass and provides easy access to Lahore’s key locations.

Key Features:

Smart infrastructure and integration of technology.

Green Spaces and Parks

Eco-friendly initiatives.

Residential and commercial options are available in a wide variety.

The proximity to Lahore’s business districts.

Investment Potential:

Lahore Smart City offers a great investment opportunity, as it blends modern living with sustainability.

Bahria Town Lahore:

Location: Bahria Town Lahore has multiple phases in the city and is one of Lahore's most popular housing societies.

Key Features:

World-class amenities.

Gated and secure communities.

Numerous entertainment options.

Commercial hubs.

Educational Institutions

Investment Potential:

Property in Bahria Town Lahore has a long history of providing substantial returns. Both residents and investors continue to choose it.

Park View City Lahore:

Location: Park View City Lahore, located near the Raiwind Road provides residents with easy access to Lahore’s urban centers.

Key Features:

The lush green environment.

Modern infrastructure

Gated community

Nearby educational institutions

Shopping and dining options are nearby.

Investment Potential:

Park View City Lahore offers a tranquil lifestyle and excellent investment potential that will appeal to those who are interested in green living.

LDA City Lahore:

Location: LDA City Lahore can be easily accessed from all parts of the city via the Ferozepur Road or Lahore Ring Road.

Key Features:

Community development that is planned.

High-quality infrastructure.

Near major highways

Nearby educational institutions

Recreational facilities

Investment Potential:

LDA City Lahore provides affordable housing options that offer great investment potential for budget-conscious investors.

Things to consider while selecting a building project:

The right construction project for Lahore in 2023-2024 must be carefully chosen. Consider these key factors:

Location: Take into consideration the distance between the project and your workplace, healthcare institutions, or educational institutions.

Amenities: Assess the amenities available, including security, green space, and recreational facilities.

Investment Potential: The investment potential of a project can be determined by analyzing its past performance, future prospects and property value appreciation.

Developer Reputation: Make sure the developer is known for delivering quality work on time.

Budget: Establish a budget that is clear and aligned with your financial goals.

Future Development: Keep an eye out for upcoming infrastructure and development projects that may affect the value of your property.

FAQ's:

Can foreigners invest in Lahore construction projects?

Yes, Pakistan does allow foreigners to invest in construction and real estate projects. However, there are certain regulations. Consult legal experts to learn more about the specific requirements and processes.

What is the expected return of investment on these projects?

Return on Investment can depend on many factors including location, developer's reputation and market conditions. For accurate projections, it's best to consult real estate experts.

What are the financing options for purchasing property?

Many banks and financial institutions offer financing for the purchase of property in Lahore. There are choices for house loans and mortgages to assist investors in financing their investments.

How can I stay informed about these projects' progress?

Developers use social media and their websites to post updates often. You may also speak with real estate brokers that specialize in these kinds of projects to get the most recent information.

Conclusion:

The building sector in Lahore is anticipated to expand considerably in 2023–2024. Diverse initiatives will be created to satisfy the requirements of inhabitants and financiers. Whether you're searching for a more eco-friendly lifestyle or a contemporary way of life, Lahore has a lot to offer. It also offers reasonably priced accommodation. You should weigh each project's location, amenities, and financial prospects before choosing one. Make sure you acquire a piece of Lahore's booming real estate market by speaking with professionals and keeping up to date.

[mariacallous]

Noma is widely considered the best restaurant in the world – not only for the quality of its food, but the standard it created for fine dining. It brought a new era of excellent, locally focused cuisine, helping to break the stranglehold French food had on the cultural imagination when it came to gourmet greatness. Noma trained some of the finest chefs of a generation, spreading its ideas and values far and wide like fungal spores caught on the wind.

For 20 years it dominated and defined the restaurant scene, but soon it will be no more. Although its brand may live on in other ways, Noma recently announced that it will close its titular restaurant at the end of 2024.

Anxious questions fill the silence: is the era of fine dining over? Will we stop choosing our next vacation destination based on hot new molecular gastronomic contraptions we saw on the pages of the New York Times or in the feed of a foodie Instagram influencer? Has the multi-hour, dozen-course tasting menu – with ingredients rendered into mysterious foams, mists, or blobs for your delight and occasional exhaustion – finally come to an end?

Noma is just one of many high-profile restaurants to close in recent years. Restaurants have notoriously thin profit margins, thanks to quickly rising rents in cities around the world, energy and other overhead costs, and food being an unstable and expensive product. The pandemic and its various lockdowns were too much for many restaurants to manage, leading to much-loved establishments, such as Chicago’s Blackbird and New York City’s Prune, to permanently close.

The recent success of the films Pig and The Menu and the TV show The Bear brought mainstream exposure to the exploitative and abusive nature of many fine dining kitchens, but they were preceded by years of investigative reporting about physically and sexually abusive star chefs, widespread wage theft, a huge disparity between the income levels of diners and the workers making and serving their food, and internship programs necessary to gain entry into the industry that amount to years of unpaid labor.

Noma officially blamed its closing on the difficulty of executing such consistently high work for so long under grueling conditions. Talk of burnout and the search for work-life balance transcends all forms of work, but is especially present in businesses that are considered passion projects or in the creative arts.

Some former employees, however, have told a slightly different story – of an unsustainable workplace with an environment of hostility and control and of poorly compensated but painstaking work. One intern told the New York Times of long hours spent constructing beetles out of fruit leather with tweezers in complete silence; she also said she had been instructed never to laugh.

There is also the difficulty of meeting clients’ expectations of constant novelty and trends like hyperlocality and restaurants with private farms. Consider Willows Inn, a former restaurant/hotel on Lummi Island, Washington, which claimed to source rarified ingredients like pink singing scallops and heirloom beets from the island, its ocean waters, and the Inn’s own farm.

It later turned out that Willows Inn was charging diners $500 a night to eat food that was often shipped in from the mainland, including chickens bought at Costco and supermarket vegetables. The restaurant’s one-acre farm, disgruntled employees said, could not feed daily diners without significantly greater acreage. This disparity – between the restaurant’s small farm and its brisk custom – would have been immediately obvious to the Inn’s rich clientele, had any of them known anything about agriculture.

Willows Inn closed amid a flurry of other controversies, including allegations of an abusive atmosphere. But it was hardly the only restaurant caught creating an illusion of farm-to-table freshness and a fantasy of knowing exactly where each ingredient originated. When Eleven Madison Park, one of New York City’s most famous and expensive restaurants, announced that it was going vegan, the result was a fiasco, with reports of food waste, misleading marketing, poor labor practices, and chefs paid minimum wage.

Can an industry that has been run on income inequality, labor exploitation, underpaid and undocumented workers, widespread abuse, and catering to the most entitled rich people in the world successfully pivot into something more flourishing and less soul crushing? Maybe. But in the meantime it seems more likely that we’ll see more reports of destination restaurants closing down amid nasty revelations and revolts by burnt-out workers.

But the wealthy will always find ways to cajole the talented and the exceptional to entertain them privately. (Recall Beyoncé performing a private concert at a party for Colonel Gaddafi’s son.) Our greatest culinary minds are not going to disappear. If they can’t make their restaurants work, they’ll instead show up at private estates and compounds to serve the tech giants, oil barons and shady world leaders who can pay them. They’ll be trotted out, humiliated, to pose in Kardashians’ Instagram posts, or flown in secret to fill the bellies of warlords and tyrants when the price is right.

But people will still care, deeply, about food – about its pleasures, about its future and its limits, about how it is grown and harvested and consumed.

Chefs will still wake up sweaty at 4am thinking about what new thing could possibly be done, at this point in the trajectory of human civilization, with a carrot. Gourmands and people who miss Gourmet magazine will still look at a picture of a perfectly roasted duck and long to put it in their mouths. Diners who used to save their slim disposable incomes for annual trips to great restaurants, to be transported by a mouthful of potatoes to their childhoods or maybe to a better future, will have to find new pathways to ecstatic states.

It’s not the money-makers and the money-spenders who are going to lose out on Noma’s absence. It is, like everything else, going to be about the people who care.

[the-gordianknot117]

A “B-Class” Underdog in an “S-Class” Crisis.

Fubuki’s role in the webcomic Monster Association arc holds a special place for me out of all the things I love about the series, so here I want to delve into it. I’ll organize the content of the post in the following way: first, a quick look at Fubuki’s introduction arc and what it establishes about the character; then, what role is assigned to the esper during the Monster Association, how she is portrayed during those events, and in what way this relates to the overall themes of the arc and the rest of the cast; finally, what outcome the arc holds for Fubuki and where it leaves her at the beginning of the next. Webcomic spoilers. 

Disclaimer: my opinion is based on the story so far and future webcomic updates can always make this post obsolete/flat-out wrong and my interpretation of the characters completely off the mark.

EDIT 04/06/2024: I decided to change the opening image because I realized that the previous one from Chapter 74 was too low-res, so I opted to change it with the first panel from Chapter 77 (I also removed the text boxes from the page; I apologize for the end result, but this is the best I can do).

Before jumping into the main topic of this post, it is important to remember what preceded the war between heroes and monsters. After the Alien Invasion arc and before the clash between the Hero Association and Monster Association, ONE placed three mini-arcs introducing a trifecta of characters (Chapters 42-50): King, Garou and Fubuki. This isn’t a casual choice. The mini-arcs are inextricably connected to the MA, providing the required groundwork for what follows and forming one cohesive and unified narrative structure resulting in the Garou saga as a whole, whose shared themes and plot threads, introduced in Chapters 42-56 (the mini-arcs and Garou’s Hero Hunt), carry over to the events of Z-City (Chapters 57-94).

Garou's debut monologue/flashback (Chapter 46: 1, 2 and 3), in particular, sets the stage and introduces all the main leitmotifs (i.e., “hero versus monster”) and narrative trails that will be explored in more depth over the course of what follows. For example, “unfairness” (especially, but not only, as in social injustice and in relation to mob mentality), which is explicitly referenced here and is a very central theme of the MA arc, is also present, in one form or another, in every single one of these characters’s storylines and their introductions:

King is the hero Saitama’s heroics are misattributed to, while the real deal has to rise from the bottom of the rankings, accused by the public of being a fraud and a suspicious troublemaker. At the same time, King ended up trapped in a misunderstanding he didn’t cause, and, to make things worse, he keeps finding himself stalked by monsters at every turn, with his fame becoming an unbearable burden more than a privilege;

for Garou, his battle against “unfairness”, referenced in his introduction, is the driving force of his character arc and his crusade against the status quo;

Fubuki, whose powers destined her to greatness but lived under the shadow of her sister, an anomaly of the esper world (Chapter 50).

Even outside of that, there are other recurring elements that encompass all the characters featured in this lengthy, multi-focal “prologue”. For example, King and Fubuki’s mini-arcs, aside from establishing the characters themselves, illustrate the flaws, dysfunctional sides, and shortcomings of the association our main characters work for. The Hero Association is a corrupt organization plagued by rookie crushing, rivalries and flawed and sometimes dangerous individuals - all things that, to a certain extent, justify Garou’s criticism of heroes and the society sustaining them. Additionally, and much like Saitama, both King and Fubuki are living proof (in their own ways) of the unreliability of the HA’s ranking system as a way to gauge “strength” and the individual value of its heroes: if King was granted his placement in S-Class simply because of a massive misunderstanding, Fubuki deliberately chooses to stay way below her actual level, in a “safer” environment with no challenges.

As for their impact on the series, every one of the three newcomers will have a significant role to play in the all-out war over the ruins of Z-City:

Garou is the main character/antagonist of the saga, whose journey constitutes the backbone and emotional core of the story; 

King, an ordinary man that somehow ended up being considered the strongest hero of humanity, and Fubuki, the B-Class Rank 1 and the leader of one of the biggest factions of the HA while also an esper with a mysterious past that will resurface during the Z-City’s battle, are two significant additions to Saitama’s group and expand his circle of positive influence in the HA, bringing entirely new side-plots and endearing dynamics to the table.

With the conclusion of the last mini-arc, we enter the events leading to the Monster Association arc. After Fubuki is introduced and Garou hunts down Tank Top Master and co., in fact, the Monster Association makes its entrance by rescuing the Hero Hunter right when Fang, Bomb and Genos put him into a corner. This is what leads to the events taking place in Z-City. With the debut of a group of monsters capable of rivaling the S-Class Heroes and keeping them busy while Garou develops in character and power over the course of the crisis, the chessboard is complete and the spectacle can finally start.

Since Fubuki’s moments in the MA’s conflict are inextricably linked to her introduction, just like the MA arc itself can’t be separated from its “prologue”, I think it is necessary to take a (very) brief look at Fubuki’s first appearance in the series and the setup it provides for her involvement in the MA arc.

Fubuki’s Introduction Arc: Establishing an Underdog.

Before the encounter between Fubuki and Saitama, it’s worth pointing out the general perception people have in the setting of the series of our protagonist and his “heroics”: 

Chapter 19 (this and the pages that follow with Tank Top Tiger); 

Chapter 22: 1, 2 and the last few pages from the same chapter; 

the entirety of Chapter 23 (in particular the pages: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6); 

Chapter 31, where Saitama pretends to be exploiting his colleagues’ heroism: 1, 2, 3.

The examples above paint Saitama, in the eyes of the public, as a troublemaking rookie hero rumored to steal other heroes’s achievements to rank up and profit from their efforts. Therefore, for Fubuki, who formed a group in order to maintain and secure her rank and whose permanence in B-Class is motivated by the unreachable first spots of the upper classes and their harsher competition, press like this is bad news. We do know, in fact, thanks to the dialogue in the apartment at the end of this arc (EDIT: I wrote a post about this scene), that Fubuki is well informed about other heroes and the rumors surrounding them (like the Three Disciples of Atomic Samurai and Amai Mask) and in Chapter 47 Fubuki herself states that she keeps an eye on the heroes who impress her. 

With similar rumors circling around this hero skyrocketing through the ranks and the voices painting him as a troublemaker, Fubuki, worried for her status, decides to pay a visit to Saitama’s apartment and deal with this “threat”. This marks the starting point of her journey within the series. 

Having met the man, the recruitment attempt goes south when Saitama expresses his disregard for rank and factions, firmly refusing to join the group (Chapter 47). Fubuki doesn’t take that too well (Chapter 47: 1 and 2; Chapter 48). In the “fight” that follows, Saitama sees right through the façade, showing the cracks and the frailty - clearly displayed in Fubuki’s inner monologue - of the surrogate sense of realization Fubuki created for herself in a challenge-free environment (B-Class and the group). Upset by her egoistical obsession for rank and factions, in a reality where humanity is facing constant world-ending threats, Saitama warns the esper about the kind of future awaiting her (Chapter 48: 1 and 2), predicting a scenario that Fubuki will soon experience, where her status as B-Class Rank 1, her group, and all her illusions of security won’t matter: it’s foreshadowing for the role Garou will play in her character arc, something I will return to later. The “big fish in a small pond” strategy may have worked so far and granted Fubuki results while sparing her perils and failures, but this bubble world is only a frail and temporary protection that prevents Fubuki from facing reality and her demons, on top of causing harm to others and their work as heroes.

After having used to no avail her telekinesis, which didn’t even cause Saitama to flinch, Fubuki’s sudden and uncharacteristic reliance on physical strength, completely at odds with her fighting style and behavior in battle as the series will consistently demonstrate (more on this later), reveals how, at this point, her assault is nothing but a desperate act of frustration and powerlessness against an opponent she can’t beat, something she is painfully aware of. There is nothing Fubuki can do against this insurmountable obstacle that speaks unpleasant truths: her tears in Chapter 48 reveal how fully aware Fubuki is of being completely outmatched by Saitama, who, she believes, is going to dismantle everything she built and take from her all her achievements. 

But then, the situation takes an unexpected turn when Genos and Sonic’s battle interrupts the “fight” between Fubuki and Saitama, with the latter now dragged into another conflict enraging right in front of his house. It’s in this instance, as she witnesses Saitama take down an S-Class criminal without breaking a sweat, that Fubuki realizes how much of an outlier Saitama really is: this feat is the final proof that Saitama truly “isn’t normal”, as she suspected all along and learned during the battle, and that there is more to this hero than what might appear at a first glance. After Sonic’s defeat, we are finally back at Saitama’s apartment. It’s here that Fubuki starts to be observed from a more sympathetic angle, and so the reasons behind the B-Class esper’s actions are finally addressed: feeling smothered for her entire life by her sister’s extraordinary telekinesis and wanting to be number one. Despite her brilliant intellect, physical strength (“体力”) and incredible psychic powers, the immense telekinetic potential of Tatsumaki always loomed over Fubuki’s life. Fubuki knows that, even with all her aforementioned talents, she is unable to overcome solely by herself this single but significant advantage Tatsumaki has over her: the overwhelming telekinesis Tatsumaki was born with. For this reason, the younger esper decided to create an organization that could level the playing field between them and help increase Fubuki’s chance of success. Future chapters will reveal how much, much more there is to topics only “teased” here (like the real nature of the sisters’s relationship, their conflict and their past, etc.), but, for now, this is the essential groundwork for what is yet to come. During their talk, King pays a visit to Saitama and this allows us to learn about yet another side of the B-Class esper: by seeing Saitama’s (S-Class) acquaintances and their casual and friendly interactions, Fubuki wonders if Saitama will allow her to be part of this strange group of people, unlike any she has ever seen before. This page (and the fourth panel in particular), not coincidentally placed at the very end of the arc, contains, unfiltered and unconcealed by the façade (it’s a thought bubble after all), Fubuki’s inner longing for human bonds, an overarching theme that ties together and encompass her entire character arc - the Esper Sisters arc, in particular, deals with this.

With that being said, from the perspective of a first-time reader, by the time the hero raid starts and Saitama’s group involvement appears to be inevitable, we have only seen Fubuki in a handful of scenarios, as significant as they might be. We have never observed Fubuki in action as a hero in a serious situation. From her reactions to Genos and Sonic and her comments on Amai Mask, Tatsumaki and King (Chapter 50), we may conclude she isn’t a particularly impressive asset at the HA’s disposal. The dismissive attitude and the comments of other characters, coupled with her concerns about the battle occurring underground between heroes and monsters (Chapters 62-66), cast a shadow of doubt on Fubuki’s potential as well. Furthermore, prior to Sitch’s call, Fubuki’s chunni antics during the Hot Pot seem to suggest she talks big in non-dangerous scenarios while being completely useless otherwise. From this first impression and from what is said about her, we may guess Fubuki just hides behind her subordinates and exploits others for her gain without having the strength to sustain herself in a critical situation like the one our characters are about to experience. Sure, there are instances where it is hinted at the fact that Fubuki is no mere B-Class:

like this one (Chapter 24), the first reference to Fubuki in the series,

or this, always from Genos (Chapter 50), 

or this line from Tatsumaki’s during her battle with Psykos (Chapter 62),

but these “hints” are buried under remarks that seem to dismiss Fubuki’s prowess and her overall utility on the battlefield. So, while the introduction arc established this new character and her storyline, there are still many things left (purposely) in the dark, leaving Fubuki’s role in the series a question mark - King, the other new member of the group, is another wild card as well. What can we expect from Fubuki as the Saitama group’s participation in the war draws near? It’s easy to write her off as someone you can’t rely on the moment the situation goes south and a hindrance to the powerful S-Class heroes accompanying her.  

A “B-Class” Underdog in an “S-Class” Crisis.

But that is not what happens. In Fubuki’s case, ONE didn’t fall into the trappings and the clichés usually associated with female characters, only useful as healers/support to their male colleagues and utterly helpless on their own, barely relevant in the plot and lacking any agency whatsoever. Quite the opposite, in fact.

But let’s go in order.

While the heroes sent by the HA commence their mission against the monsters, the Saitama group, completely unaware of the whole thing, has gathered at Saitama’s apartment and is having Hot Pot. Here Fubuki’s lack of experience in normal social settings is demonstrated by the completely out-of-touch gimmicks she employs in order to fit in and improve her standing. Why this behavior? For a multitude of reasons. First of all, she is in an unfamiliar environment while subjected to social norms she is completely foreign to - later in this post I will discuss Fubuki's friendless and sheltered backstory. On top of that, if we look at it from the perspective of the character, Fubuki sits at the table from a position of total disadvantage:

she is at Saitama’s apartment, the hero she tried unsuccessfully to recruit. Furthermore, not only did Saitama refuse to join the group, but he also displayed a level of power worthy of an S-Class Hero (as Fubuki learned in Chapter 49);

she is surrounded by his acquaintances;

she is outranked by pretty much everyone, save Bomb (not a hero) and Saitama - and while one of the reasons Fubuki is drawn to the place is due to how power, rank and status do not seem to matter, those concepts are still so deeply ingrained in her mind that she feels the need to put up appearances and resort to her habits when dealing with other people; after all, it’s too early for Fubuki to get over this mindset, which wouldn’t make sense at this stage of her character arc;

as far as she knows (aside from Bomb), all of them are stronger than her (for the same reasons I explained in the previous point);

none of these peope are bound to her by a boss/subordinate relationship, and the circumstances of this “gathering”, aside from being all colleagues/heroes, aren’t related to work reasons. 

From her point of view, the only way to navigate these tricky waters is to try to appear “powerful” in order to be accepted and respected. Adopting the Fubuki’s group leader persona is, for the character, the way out of her disadvantageous position. At first glance she might come off as arrogant by doing so, but in reality it is the opposite: even if she takes pride in her own telekinesis, Fubuki recognizes that alone it still isn’t enough in a world of “monsters”; Fubuki is profoundly insecure about her own capabilities, bordering on (as the Esper Sisters clearly shows) a lack of self-worth. The existence of the group, staying in B-Class and the safe approaches she takes in life denounce how afraid she is to be reminded of being “weak” (which is how she actually sees herself) and being perceived as "inferior” by other people. The act isn’t a delusional attempt at recruiting the people around her but rather an overcompensation for her lack of confidence and strength. The façade covers these weaknesses, prevents the outside world from peeking into what is hidden underneath the surface and displays an image of superiority and power. Likewise, under the guise of the façade even Fubuki’s desire to be allowed into the group is reshaped in these interactions with the others into her pretending to “admit” Saitama and co. into the “Fubuki’s group”, which covers and reverses her desire for human contact in a way that “protects” Fubuki from otherwise coming off as “weak” - she actually wants to be accepted in it and for Saitama to permit her to become part of them, because the group represents an oasis of ordinarity and healthy, equal and friendly human bonds she always lacked in her life, and yet she can’t help but resort to the protective, faux persona because that it’s the only way she knows to interact with people, since there are no other precedents in her life, no previous knowledge or life examples on how to befriend others and behave in this kind of context. It could appear contradictory, but ultimately it’s a psychological defensive mechanism Fubuki displays in order to justify and strengthen her position, especially (but not exclusively) in the presence of people who outclass her, as in this case. That said, we do get to see a glimpse of sincerity from Fubuki when she asks Genos about his relationship with Saitama - previously, in Chapter 48, learning about a S-Class being a disciple of a B-Class left Fubuki completely astonished. Fubuki receives no answer from the cyborg, but her question denounces her eagerness to learn more about the group she desires to become part of (Chapter 50) and that, at the same time, seems to subvert any rule of human relationships she knows of. This exchange also highlights Fubuki and Genos’s exceptional phrasing skills, so there is that too.

Anyway. The (relatively) peaceful dinner is then interrupted by the increasing evidence that something strange is going on underground, deep below the surface of Z-City. Upon hearing strange noises coming from the neighborhood, Saitama is the first to leave the apartment, in search of the culprit. Later, Fubuki senses Tatsumaki’s telekinesis and realizes how her sister is exerting more power than usual (Chapter 62); a few moments later, Sitch’s call confirms her worst fears (Chapter 62 and Chapter 66): something serious is happening and it involves Tatsumaki and the other S-Class Heroes. With these developments, Fubuki immediately drops her façade, as evidenced by the changes in her demeanor. During this arc, the leader/recruitment shtick will never reappear (not even once) and Fubuki will never try to boss around her S-Class colleagues or attempt to recruit them because the luxury of fooling around or losing focus is something she cannot afford in a scenario like the one the group is about to face, whose gravity is perfectly clear to the B-Class (Chapter 66). She also will never act cocky or overconfident either (aside from employing it as a strategy against Psykos), and for this reason, she will never take on the role of the goofy comic relief of the arc. Naturally, even in these worrisome times, Fubuki still retains her distinct personality and psychological habits. In Chapter 69, in fact, the esper once again puts up a “front” with Genos, but, unlike the “Hot Pot” shaenenigans, here she is simply remarking the value of her actions to someone who is stronger than her, while she is still maintaining the focus on the situation at hand (I already talked about this sequence at the beginning of this post).

In the following events, Fubuki is one of the heroes who will distinguish herself the most out of those taking part in the battle and her efforts will be vital for the final outcome of the arc. Dropped into a war zone with little information at her disposal, at a time when all the top-ranked heroes suffered inglorious defeats against the Monster Association’s Cadres, Fubuki ends up being the one who single-handedly defeated the leader of the Monster Association in one of the major fights of the arc - I talked about her accomplishments, as well as other stuff, here. ONE purposefully introduced a character who is insecure about herself, overly cautious and unadventurous, and threw her in a desperate situation where her strength and abilities could shine without anyone else interfering. At the same time, ONE took away from Fubuki all her psychological reassurances, her group, her plans, and her careful preparations for a mission. Fubuki has nothing to fall back on, and she gets separated from the Saitama’s group early on too. During the arc, the esper is essentially by herself, left to her telekinesis and wits. But even when she was together with Fang, Bomb and Genos, instead of hiding behind them or relying on her companions and taking credit for what they performed in her place, Fubuki proved her value without ever becoming a liability or turning into a damsel in distress they have to keep an eye on. Instead of acting like a delusional aspirant leader, Fubuki understood her position and followed her companion’s orders/directions without question (Chapter 69). Despite all her glaring flaws and issues, Fubuki is a hero and acts as one when the situation requires it - for example, when Genos, Fang, Bomb and Fubuki found themselves in front of the proverbial Threshold Guardian of the Monster Association, Overgrown Rover, Fubuki’s first thoughts were directed toward eliminating the mysterious being before it could reach the surface and endanger innocent lives. To be fair, Fubuki isn’t the only example of this. Keeping company to her, the MA arc contains several other examples of characters subverting our expectations and playing a surprisingly major role in the battles: in regard to “rank”, there is Amai Mask who is “only” the A-Class Rank 1, yet his exploits and performance in the arc put to shame the vast majority of the S-Class (Chapter 78), who outrank him; for “power levels”, King is only an ordinary (or below ordinary) human being strength wise, the very opposite of what people believe him to be, nevertheless he was able to hold down a group consisting of four Dragon Level Threats and buy enough time for the other heroes to show up. It’s worth noting that King, Fubuki and Amai Mask’s unexpected and surprising intervention all happen back-to-back (Chapters 73-74) right after the defeat of the strongest and highest-ranked heroes on the scene (the S-Class Rank 2, Tatsumaki, and the S-Class Rank 3, Silver Fang) that occurred in the chapters preceding their entrance.

On the other hand, during the MA arc, there are multiple instances of Fubuki being underestimated for the B-Class Rank and her supposed negligible strength, which serve to cement and reinforce her status as an “underdog”: 

Genos didn’t even take Fubuki into account when assessing the strength of the group for the upcoming battles (Chapter 66); 

after coming face-to-face with Tatsumaki’s power (Chapter 62), Psykos completely dismissed Fubuki’s telekinesis and later mocked her former president when the two reunited in Chapter 74; 

stating that the monsters’s leader shouldn’t be someone who has trouble with a “B-Class lackey”, Homeless Emperor and the other Cadres abandoned Psykos to herself (Chapter 74);

all of the above is given a poetic comeuppance:

Fubuki saved Genos from a Dragon Level Threat (Overgrown Rover) that otherwise would have killed him (Chapter 69);

Psykos took down Tatsumaki rather easily in the end and played with her prey, enjoying the torture she was unleashing upon the now helpless HA’s ultimate weapon (Chapter 71), only to be utterly beaten by Fubuki;

Homeless Emperor ended up subjected to the same treatment he reserved for his former leader right on the next page, when Zombieman caught the human Cadre off guard (and contrary to Psykos, Homeless Emperor didn’t even put up a fight against the hero). 

Fubuki also plays the role of the underdog not only as a B-Class but also as a “member” of the Saitama’s group too, whose members consist of:

the past his prime martial artist who trained the Hero Hunter and failed to capture him,

Fang’s older brother, who isn’t even a hero; 

the fraud hero who is mistakenly believed to be the Strongest Man; 

the “second choice” esper herself; 

and, finally, the new rookie S-Class Hero.

It’s a ragtag group of “outsiders” who were informed about the situation at the last moment and so joined the fight late, only to make the difference just when the mighty S-Class sent by the HA failed their task due to the overreassurance and uncooperativeness of some of its heroes.

In any case.

Fubuki’s and Tatsumaki’s relationship is also re-contextualized (or, better yet, clarified) during the MA arc. Chapter 70, in fact, justifies Fubuki’s wary attitude toward her sister with a concise and effective demonstration of what Tatsumaki is capable of doing at any given time: after detecting a connection between Psykos and Fubuki’s telekinesis (Chapter 62), Tatsumaki decided to suddenly drag the MA’s headquarters to the surface with barely any concern for the heroes or the hostage, and that simply due to her obsessive attitude toward her sister. As for Fubuki herself, this chapter (and, retroactively, her statements about Tatsuamki at Saitama’s apartment) go to show that hers isn’t a mere “inferiority complex”: Fubuki is actually scar(r)ed and afraid of Tatsumaki (Chapter 62: 1 and 2; Chapter 70: 1, 2, 3; Chapter 71), for the latter being a time bomb ready to explode at any given moment, barely held together by a childish and fickle temper. This is clearly shown effectively by every instance of Fubuki taking notice of her sister. In Chapter 62, the sole presence of Tatsumaki’s nearby completely changes Fubuki’s state of mind and mood at Saitama’s apartment. In Chapter 71 Fubuki doesn’t even consider the possibility of Tatsumaki being in danger against the Cadres, but her to be the source of danger. In both occasions, when she senses her sister in Chapter 62 and when she advice Genos to stay underground, Fubuki is clearly more afraid and unsettled at the prospect of having her sister around than to deal with monsters. Actually, she refers to Tatsumaki as “monster” when the base is ripped apart and lifted to the surface. Her concerns toward Tatsumaki isn’t isolated though: the members of the Saitama’s group themselves express reproval and criticism for the S-Class esper’s careless actions, echoing Fubuki’s concerns (1, 2). The narrative is pretty explicit at portraying Fubuki’s opinion of her sister not something biased or unjustified, but shared by  the rest of the cast and based on factual reasons. This is top-notch build up to the next arc that it still makes very intuitive the type of relationship between the sisters and their estranged past even without showing anything about their backstory. The Esper Sisters’s arc will delve deeper on the subject, revealing the roots of Fubuki’s traumas and exploring how Tatsumaki’s twisted ideas (spawned, in turn, by her own traumas and by an extreme and literal interpretation of Blast’s words) affected Fubuki’s life for the worse, as well as plenty other topics. 

That said, it’s worthy taking a look at Tatsumaki’s role during the events of the Monster Association. While Tatsumaki’s immense telekinesis is highlighted throughout the arc, it is also significant how the Rank 2 Hero utterly failed at dealing with Psykos and the Dragons: by bragging about how she was going to kill every single one of the MA’s Cadres, criticizing her colleagues for not having already eliminated them, and boasting about taking all the glory for the successful operation (Chapter 70), in a single excruciating instant Tatsumaki lost her chances at ending the entire arc early, and was unceremoniously taken down by Psykos (Chapter 71: 1, 2) before she could do anything against the Dragons - at the start of the arc, Tatsumaki was throwing a tantrum insulting her colleagues (Chapter 58: 1, 2 and 3) because she believed she could handle the entire monster organization all by herself and believed that there was no need for reinforcements. As a result, while the Cadres were left completely unscathed and had the time to reorganize (now reunited to their leader), the scattered and injured heroes were trapped beneath the unstable debris of Z-City, confused and unaware of the state of the mission: Tatsumaki’s actions benefitted the monsters far more than the HA, to the point where the Hero team would have lost the battle if it hadn’t been for outside factors cleaning up her mess. In the wake of Tatsumaki’s defeat and the extraordinary but short-lived Fang counterattack, just when King’s antics were losing their hold on the Dragons, the “second choice” esper, the “weaker Witch Sister”, Fubuki, is the one who puts a stop to the MA leader’s S-Class demolition spree, right when Psykos was an inch away from victory.

Before getting to this part, there is something I haven’t addressed yet.

I haven’t mentioned one seemingly minor but important detail from Chapter 55 that is significant for what follows, so I think now is the right time to talk about it: after Fang, Bomb and Genos failed at stopping Garou, who was rescued by the sudden appearance of the Monster Association, the group reunited at Saitama’s apartment, where they discussed the recent events together with Fubuki. During the talk, Fubuki guessed the existence of a leader behind the monster attack. In the following chapters, her statements are proven correct: the Monster Association, more than an ensemble of monsters working together toward a goal, is an organization ruled by a single leader (Psykos) that acts as the mind behind its organization and the activities of her underlings, who, otherwise, wouldn’t be as cooperative and well organized without her supervision. As for how the monsters fare as a team without the direct presence of a leader on the battlefield, we later see how Royal Ripper, Bug God and Senior Centipede fighting against Garou without cooperating or properly working together resulted in the death of the Centipede while the other two, although victorious, were reduced to a sorry state (the dialogue box from Royal Ripper in the third panel of the page); or what occurred to the Cadres once Psykos was taken out of the picture (more on this later). All this evidence proves that monsters are indeed unwilling (or incapable) of cooperating without the presence of someone (a human esper, in this case) pulling the strings behind the scenes - and even then, sometimes, the mysterious beings are unruly even with an authoritative figure commanding them (e.g., how the ugly kid was kidnapped by Royal Ripper against Psykos’s will). It is a small thing, sure, but it proves Fubuki capable of deducing schemes or patterns from a few clues. Her victory against Psykos depends partly on Fubuki’s intelligence and her ability to exploit her opponent’s flaws. By the way, Fubuki correctly identifies the mysterious enemy attacking her at the end of Chapter 77/beginning of Chapter 78 as the Hero Hunter Garou, despite she never having encountered him before, as the narrator points out. 

And now, finally, Fubuki’s highlight of the arc, her battle against Psykos.

Let’s start from its inception, writing-wise: tying the newly introduced “B-Class” esper to the leader of the Monster Association, who is therefore revealed to be a human (with nice implications for the overall human/monster narrative), not only does wonders for economy of storytelling, but also places the B-Class newcomer, Fubuki, in a very “plot relevant” position, providing a personal reason for her participation in the arc beyond its original significance once her connection to the leader of the villains is brought up, with the further consequence of Psykos developing into something more resembling an actual character compared to the mere evil mastermind role she fulfilled prior. The fact that this happens shortly (27 chapters) after Fubuki’s introduction also avoids the risk of throwing Fubuki into a bubble of irrelevancy needlessly stalling her storyline before it could reach a turning point, such as this battle. 

Regarding the lead-up to this battle, the lack of action scenes starring Fubuki before the MA (save the one with Saitama) preserved her status as an “underdog” and maximized the impact of Fubuki’s actions during her involvement in the Z-City battles. For example, shielding Genos and withstanding point blanck several blasts from Overgrown Rover proves Fubuki to be a force to be reckoned with. Furthermore, this “feat” adds further believability to her chances of fighting a Dragon Level esper and winning. Showing what is strictly necessary for a character and keeping vague what isn’t required at the moment (or that could be more effectively disclosed little by little) is sometimes beneficial for a story and can lead to satisfying payoffs down the line.

In this particular case, Chapter 74 is where the payoff starts to bring a narrative “revenue” to the lead-up preceding it. 

In one of the tensest moments in the entire series, when none of the top heavy-hitter heroes were left standing and Psykos was about to launch an all-out assault against King, 

Fubuki makes her entrance, halting once again the Dragon’s charge. We are left wondering: what is Fubuki going to do against Psykos, the leader of the Moster Association who put on its knees the Hero Association’s S-Class team? Psykos is of the same opinion, already savoring the flavor of the upcoming revenge. While the Dragon Level esper mocks her opponent and rejoices at the prospect of eliminating both Witch Sisters on the same night, Fubuki, unmoved by these provocations, unleashes a powerful psychic attack against the other esper, leaving Psykos screaming in pain in front of her subordinates, who promptly desert their leader. 

In the battle that follows, Fubuki gives proof of her talent and mastery of her telekinesis through the use of Psychic Whirlwind, a technique that allows her to manipulate the direction of her psychic waves. For anyone else (minus a certain esper) this technique would appear as nothing more than a pointless discovery, a fascinating but ultimately useless and inapplicable invention. Still, the B-Class came up with a use for this finding of hers, in particular in battles against other espers: by disrupting the other telekinesis user’s psychic signals in a swirling maelstrom of her own waves, Fubuki nullifies their attacks (1, 2, 3) allowing her to wait for the most opportune moment to deliver the “finishing” blow. A technique that favors ingenuity over raw output, prudence over recklessness, flexibility and innovation over mere brute strength, truly represents Fubuki’s style, her way of fighting and her personality. In OPM we are used to battles ending in a “stomp” due to the mere power gap between opponents, but here the staggering difference is on the “technique”/skill side of things and Fubuki obtains victory without gaining any power-up or “zenkai” boost of sort over the course of the battle, but solely thanks to her superior telekinesis skills and wits. It is even rarer, especially in this arc, for a character to be assured of their victory, boast about it during the battle like Fubuki does here, and then win.

On why this clash is fundamental for the arc, structure-wise, suffice it to say that if Psykos wasn’t taken out of the picture and her authority undermined, the heroes would have found themselves facing another Dragon Level Threat, and an esper at that. Even worse, a Dragon Level Threat who leads, coordinates and keeps united with lethal effectiveness the other Cadres. In a similar scenario, Psykos, unlike the more short-sighted and less tactically skilled subordinates (ready to backstab each other at the first chance), wouldn’t have allowed Zombieman to restrain Homeless Emperor and would have coordinated the Dragons against what was left of the hero party; furthermore, none of the emerging heroes had what it takes to deal with this formation (Black Sperm, Evil Natural Water, Homeless Emperor and Psykos herself): reaching the surface would have culminated in a blood bath for the heroes. By the way, Tatsumaki was also able to recover and rejoin the fight later solely because Fubuki lured away the enemy capable of dealing with espers (Chapter 73), otherwise, she would have kept her role as the MA leader’s personal stress relief toy for the rest of the battle. The entire arc would have taken a completely different, and plenty more gruesome, direction if it weren’t for Fubuki - obviously, she is not the only deciding factor, but undoubtedly one of the major ones.

But what makes this battle interesting is the story of the two espers and how ONE takes advantage of this battle to explore Fubuki’s character. In this regard, perhaps the “boldest” decision made by ONE during Fubuki’s moment of spotlight is to not “sugarcoat” or “whitewash” her personality but to stay true to the character: the duel starts, as we have seen, with Fubuki resorting to an underhanded strike against Psykos, a sneak attack that catches off guard the other esper during the pre-duel conversation, honor and fairness be damned. Truly a classic hero’s move, right? And that’s just the beginning.

During their reunion and the battle that follows, Fubuki never attempts to talk no jutsu Psykos out of her evil schemes with a speech that exposes the inconsistencies of her adversary’s thesis and gives the evildoer a new purpose and a new understanding of life through some kind of life-changing advice. Fubuki’s “argument” against Psykos is, instead, a plain admission of what her true intentions were at the time: she opposed Psykos simply because of egoism. Fubuki reveals that, when the alarmed members of the "Society for the Study Supernatural" approached and informed her, the president of the group, about Psykos’s plans to use the club for exterminating humankind, her real thoughts were at the time: if the weak and ordinary people have all disappeared, how could she (Fubuki) define herself? What makes one strong, if the weak are no more? All Fubuki’s struggles and efforts would have been for nothing if that occurred. By protecting those “inferior” to her, Fubuki preserved a gap that makes her tower over those who, by existing, allow the esper to standout. To Fubuki, reality appears to be made of contrasts and opposites that exist solely to distinguish the extraordinary beings from the masses: those who are special/”witches” from the common “folk”, the strong from the weak, the leader from the subordinates, those at the top and anyone else below. Furthermore, from her perspective, every interaction between individuals is nothing but a fight for supremacy, which inevitably leads to a polarization of roles, dividing the “contestants” into two rigid “groups”: on one hand, those who win or are capable of imposing their will (the “strong”) and, on the other, those who lose/submit/become followers or subordinates (the “weak”); as a result, when they aren’t actively competing one against the other, humans can coexist solely by occupying different spots within a “boss-subordinate relationship” and never on an equal ground - hence her surprise when Saitama and co. proved this false. What matters, then, is not to be on the lower spot of said asymmetrical “relationship”: only by being “strong” a human being can avoid the discrimination and the suffering reserved for the “weak”, which includes not only those who don’t possess enough strength but also those who refuse their powers. In the Childhood Flashback (Chapter 99), a very young Fubuki used her psychic abilities solely for self-defense and didn’t try to fight her classmates, asking them instead to stop harassing her; that only encouraged the bullies to torment her even more. Tatsumaki, on the other hand, “gained” the respect and the fear of Fubuki’s bullies due to her immense powers and her lack of restrictions, which included throwing a kid into space and lifting an entire school full of children - and thus scaring away, from Fubuki, not only the bullies but anyone else too (be it from school or otherwise), effectively isolating Fubuki with the only company of a traumatized and unstable sister. If dialogue is an invitation to further abuses and the unwillingness to use one’s potential against others is perceived as a lack of strength, the only alternative is to learn the language spoken by everyone: violence. Therefore, in this toxic reality, what determines right and wrong, good and bad is the extent of one’s own power and their propensity to use it against others. When we look at the (very few) human interactions Fubuki was exposed to in her life, prior to her introduction arc, these were all regulated by violence or disparity in power, and Fubuki’s sole role model taught and actively encouraged her to employ force against others (which is how Tatsumaki herself deals with any problem), giving an example of how it’s done, as shown in Chapter 99. The kids who called her a “witch” and mistreated her (Chapter 99), her sister who always used her telekinesis as a way to deal with others (Chapter 99), Psykos with her lofty world-domination goals and her method of recruiting/subduing esper groups (Chapter 77) and, later, even the Hero Association itself, where rookie-crushing is commonly practiced and heroes are ranked in a highly competitive environment, where the success of one goes at the expense of another: it’s a life-long confirmation that might makes right. Divergence/differences were all settled on who held more power and any other method of resolving a disagreement was nothing but a display of weakness. Being ruthless against any opposition and being quick to resort to force were always rewarded and encouraged, being cold, distant and aloft were signs of strength; any appreciation and respect from others always came from the power one possessed and the effectiveness of its usage. The shy kid, who avoided employing her telekinesis for offense and asked her bullies to stop instead of attacking them (despite having the power to do so), was only a prey deserving of being picked on and her “fault” was appearing weak and refusing to use her innate talents “correctly”. Fubuki only started gaining respect and admiration from others when she embraced Tatsumaki’s advice and used her telekinesis against others or as a display of power - as we see in high school. Therefore, in the flashback, Fubuki is doing nothing but putting into practice what she learned back then, following the same “reasoning” (retaliating to an incoming threat) and applying the same method of taking care of the problem (force) that the world taught her. Consequently, Fubuki then concluded: “Psykos is my enemy and enemies must be destroyed”. After rationalizing the situation, identifying her vice-president as her enemy and remembering how to deal with threats in the only way she knows, Fubuki confronted an insane Psykos in the club room. The vice president, still in the middle of her delerious rant, tried to find Fubuki’s support against the other members of the club. In the club room, instead, Fubuki proceeded to fight, defeat and seal her powers, leaving Psykos screaming in pain and vowing revenge.

A fitting backstory for an arc where the dichotomy between humans and monsters, heroes and villains, is questioned and explored. However, there is one more thing I still want to add about Fubuki’s monologue and how it lines up with the rest of her characterization. I think that her actual reasoning to protect the “weak” is a bit more complex and nuanced than what Fubuki let’s out, especially when we consider her backstory. In the previous paragraph, I talked about Fubuki’s upbringing: no one would grow up normally in similar conditions, especially not when every single experience piles up and enforces such toxic ideas with no alternative being ever presented to the character - after all, the first (and only) positive influence that entered her life, Saitama, only appeared when Fubuki was already an adult, long after the high school incident. Similarly, no one who suffered continuous abuse and discrimination from the “ordinary people” for being different and was also isolated by a toxic parental figure who considers non-esper “inferior” would have a high opinion of common people - the “weak” Fubuki is referring to in the flasback. Tatsumaki, in fact, has rather extreme views on this matter, believing that those who possess telekinesis powers are special and inherently superior to ordinary human beings (Chapter 99) and those views (like being inherently superior due to genetics and powers) were obviously projected into Fubuki: Fubuki’s speech at Saitama’s apartment is quite indicative of this (Chapter 50). Someone with a past like this is more than likely to have a warped and unordinary way to perceive and relate to people, and Fubuki is no exception. With that being said, we shouldn’t forget a crucial aspect of Fubuki’s character: her longing for human bonds and the fact that she still decided to become a hero and risk her life for the sake of others later in her life. How can the above statements be reconciled with those sides of her? Well, Fubuki justifies and rationalizes her need for other people by using as a “template” the only significant example of a relationship she ever had in her life, the one with her sister; this time, however, with Fubuki in her sister’s role. This means that Fubuki flaunts a cold and aloft exterior, pretending to be more uncaring and merciless than she is - which doesn’t mean that she is a saint, see how she promptly and ruthlessly dealt with Psykos and Saitama, for example. Fubuki’s philosophy belief system is informed on the criteria that being ruthless and powerful is what a human being should strive for, whereas showing empathy and avoiding violence are the marks of the weak, something she should hide in order to not appear vulnerable to others. Coincidentally, this trait is also shared by Tatsumaki, who similarly avoids showing any signs of weakness in front of her younger sibling (Chapter 104). Therefore, recontextualizing her actions in this light and taking pride in having adopted an egoistical point of view is not a source of shame for her, because the moral system that the environment she lived in inculcated in her doesn’t register her actions as regrettable but actually encourages and enforces this mentality, persuading Fubuki that coldly crushing opposition and standing atop of others is the only way to live, unless she wants to become a victim. Nonetheless, even with this mindset, what at first sight might appear to be cold and stern behavior conceals a more benevolent and less harsh side of the esper, like with her group (for example, in chapter 105) and other people in general. For example, for how egoistical she claims to be, Fubuki doesn’t hesitate a second to take damage and risk her life for a person that was hostile to her pretty much the entire time (Genos), and, always in this battle, her first concerns were for the innocents that could be injured by Rover if the monster reached the surface. This is not what a sociopathic and cynical person would do or think of. For all those reasons, I personally believe that Fubuki choosing to fight Psykos in high school might actually represent the moment Fubuki decided, perhaps subconsciously and deep down in her soul, to become a hero, and that “sparing the weak” is how Fubuki rationalizes her desire to protect others, as warped and twisted as it sounds. Her necessity to cover up her “kinder” and “softer” side is in line with the general psychological habits of the character: applying the same psychological defense mechanism she resorts to for for human relationships even to her desire to be a hero would be perfectly consistent with mentality of the character - in a way, it’s not too dissimilar from Tatsumaki’s herself and her reasons to be a hero. Therefore, it’s not far-fetched to say that this tendency of costantly rationalizing and justifying the role and value others play in her life also factors in her monologue and explains why she stepped in and protected innocents from a wannabe genocider, albeit in such a contorted way. A clue that seems to point into this direction is that the detail about Psykos’ telekinesis “surpassing Fubuki’s”, thus prompting her retalation, as a reason of their clash is something brought up solely by, well, Psykos, who happens to hold a massive inferiority complex toward the president of the club and wants to prove her superiority by taking revenge for her previous defeat. While Fubuki acknowledges her egoism, in her monologue she elaborates on her reasons and reveals that the main factor that made her stop Psykos were her aims at wiping out humanity and take out of the picture the “weak”. Fubuki doesn’t mention Psykos’ telekinesis at all and the only times she comments on them it’s in the present, in relation to her technique countering them. Surely that also factored, but the main reason Fubuki defeated Psykos were her inhuman goal, which lines up to what I wrote above.

As for the flashback itself, ONE interwines it inextricably with the battle occurring in the present, as Fubuki and Psykos’s recollection of the old days is shown to us through glimpses, hints and fragments of the past from the point of view of both Fubuki and Psykos. 

This apparently innocuous panel perfectly translates visually what Psykos is stating in the balloon text, i.e., the difference in raw power between the two espers, favoring Fubuki at the time, which is symbolized by Fubuki walking far ahead of the vice president of the “Society for the Study of Supernatural”. But it underlines another, more important element: the distance on a human level between the two (but then again, future updates can always add more context to this and disprove anything written here), even before the Third Eye incident. Fubuki never pays attention to the vicepresident and she doesn’t show any interest in Psykos and what she is saying. Actually, Fubuki never talks to Psykos in the flashback, and the one above, contained in the section from Psykos’s POV, is also the only panel where the two are together and their sole “interaction” in the entirety of the flashback. What this window into Fubuki’s past reveals is a reality inhabited not by close bonds, friends or personal relationships of any kind, but only by followers, underlings and rivals. And as much as Psykos fangirls over Fubuki, throwing praise and rambling about the latter, her admiration for the president appears to come exclusivey from Fubuki’s telekinesis: every time Psykos talks about Fubuki, she is actually only talking about Fubuki’s psychic powers, never about Fubuki herself, as a person - see, for example, the panel above. It is worth adding that Psykos, even in the present, only refers to and addresses Fubuki as “president Fubuki” or simply as “the president” (“会長”), which is Fubuki’s formal title in the Society for the Study of Supernatural, and never by her name alone (not a negligible detail, I think) - it’s the same as the members of the Fubuki group, who always refer to their leader as “Miss Fubuki” and variants, but never in a more direct and informal manner. Fubuki, meanwhile, infantilizes Psykos and demeans her (for example) by employing a harsher and more hostile version of the speech patterns she employs in her interactions with her subordinates, the Fubuki group - it is worth noting that Tatsumaki does the same with Fubuki herself. All this confirms a trend in Fubuki’s life: that power is the sole value a person possesses, strength is what grants respect, recognition, and adoration from others, and hierarchies, titles and ranks serve to underline the gap between human beings. People started showing interest and respect for Fubuki (as in high school) specifically because of her abilities and because, in the case of other telekinesis users like Psykos, Fubuki’s telekinesis eclipsed theirs. Adding fuel to the fire, Psykos began catching up to Fubuki in terms of psychic output around the same time she went insane and threatened humanity (probably, as a result of the Third Eye and whatever contact she might have had with the entity known as God), which surely cemented in Fubuki the perception of others as constant threats, ready to take anything from her at any given moment, especially when the gap in power is reduced.

A couple of words need to be said about the art:

ONE does a terrific job at conveying through his drawings the unsettling and creepy atmosphere surrounding this battle. The panels with Fubuki, never so witch-like, overflow with an eerie and malevolent aura, emphasizing how intimidating she must have appeared to Psykos: like in the panel above, a figure standing on the battlefield enveloped in an ink black dress, seemingly molded out of the solidified darkness of the night, a curtain of shadows and hair strands covering her face save for the void and glowing eyes. The “because I’m an egoist” panel is also very visually striking: an almost monster-like close-up of Fubuki’s face that reflects the unheroic undertone of her speech bubble. ONE’s style, morphing to max out what the single panel is striving to express and characterized by visceral and raw, nervous, lines, perfectly translates on these pages the personal conflict at the center of the sequence. Other choices, like the near absence of other people in Fubuki and Psykos’s flashback, outside of the members of the “Society for the Study of Supernatural”, drawn as indistinct and impersonal silhouettes, and the mysterious shadowy figures of the “Invisible Hand”, drive home a sense of isolation, emptiness and alienation pervading the recollection of these characters’s lives. The lack of dialogue or real human interactions is also further reinforced, in the flashback, by the panels containing only one character at a time - with the exceptions mentioned above, like in the panel where Fubuki is seen walking far away from Psykos, giving her shoulders to us and the vice-president - and empty or human-free backgrounds, which reflect how disconnected these characters are from other human beings, too absorbed in their own cumbersome individuality that they can’t even share, in the panels, the same space with someone else. [EDIT 28/05/2023:] I was re-reading the wc and I noticed how, when a character suffers alienation and estrangement, other human beings are consistently portrayed as vague silhouettes, especially when this happens in flashbacks: aside from Fubuki, it occurs with Genus (Chapter 9) and Garou (Chapter 54: the entire flashback really, but for examples 1 and 2) [end of the EDIT]. Fubuki, surrounded by a white and void background that underlines her estrangement from the rest of the club and the concerns of its members (who lack individual features), is deeply immersed in thoughts far removed from the protests of the shapeless crowd she apparently doesn’t share (not in the same way, at least) and is separated from them, in the only panel where they are together, even visually. When she is not fangirling about the power evoked by the president’s telekinesis, Psykos rambles on and on obsessively about her delusions of world domination and the recounts of her accomplishments against mysterious esper organizations: there is no actual dialogue with the person she is talking to (Fubuki), but an interminable and uninterrupted monologue that never receives a reply or a response of any kind from the silent interlocutor. The narrative doesn’t shows us the vice president hearing Fubuki’s responses - if there were any - and in general Psykos is portrayed to be paying attention only to herself, babbling about her goals and telekinesis, with Fubuki representing solely a symbol of power to her and not an actual person; as their battle demonstrate, Psykos was so caught up in herself and her schemes that she didn’t even listen to Fubuki’s lesson about flexibility and innovations as a fundamental component of telekinesis improvement, and focused more on simply increasing her telekinesis - which, ironically enough, led to her defeat against Fubuki herself. In general, the way the flashback is presented reveals that there was no dialogue, communication or interactions at all between the two, despite Psykos being the vice president of the club: Psykos was doing her own thing, regardless of Fubuki's actual opinions, while Fubuki herself left Psykos to her own rants and took notice of the vice president only when she directly conflicted with Fubuki’s own interests. Psykos utterly shocked and surprised reaction when, in the club room, Fubuki answered to her question by ruthlessly retaliating and attacking is quite indicative of this: Psykos never actually knew Fubuki nor suspected, despite the utter disinterest shown by the president, that Fubuki wouldn’t have agreed with her plans - to be honest, Psykos also believed that the rest of the members of the club would join her too. As for Fubuki, instead of trying to comunicate with her follower and talk her out of the plan, she instantly resorted to violence and dealt with the vicepresident with no hesitation - note the logical progression from to her childhood flashback where Fubuki didn’t use force but asked her bullies to stop with a teenager Fubuki following her sister’s lesson. This flashback is a wasteland of real human bonds.

Now, let’s observe how Psykos works as a foil to Fubuki and how the two parallel each other, starting with their appearances. 

The black color-themed B-Class Hero versus the Monster Association leader in white.

(love how the onomatopoeias highlight the difference in power and demeanor between the two espers: wider, “louder” and more aggresive for Psykos while smaller, “quieter” and less chaotically disposed for Fubuki)

This is no casual choice in an arc staging the most archetypal of battles, “heroes versus monsters”. Since the MA blurs (on the surface) the line between the heroes and the monsters, in this fight that is reflected both from a writing and visual standpoint; for the former it has been discussed above, while for the latter, the white versus black aesthetic of “good vs. evil” is swapped between the hero and the villain. While a white-dressed “villain” facing a “hero” wearing a black outfit surely isn’t a new concept (it really isn’t), here it is applied for the battle between a non-final antagonist and one of the members of the main cast - in Garou versus Saitama, the black and sketchy appearance of the villain fighting a white and plain caped hero reverts to a more traditional iconography. It perfectly highlights their nature as a foil and opposition. But there is more: the visual appearance of the two espers is also a callback to the chessboard allegory for the Monsters vs. Heroes battles raised by Psykos herself in Chapter 71 (and earlier by Garou in Chapter 54) and therefore here we have the clash between the white queen and her black counterpart. And just like in chess, where white moves first, Psykos appeared on the surface before Fubuki; likewise, by showing up when she did, the B-Class ended up protecting the (literal) King ( “キング”) of the HA, right when the MA Cadres were about to checkmate him. 

On the telekinesis side, the two once again differ by adhering to opposite “schools of thought”: 

Psykos’s high school obsession for raw power didn’t fade in adulthood, and overwhelming her enemies with direct and brutal displays of sheer psychic output is her go-to way to dispose of them. Psykos’s confidence in victory at the start of her battle against Tatsumaki, for example, hinged on the tremendous psychic powers she posses (which, she believed, were in the “territory of the Gods”); the moment she saw Tatsumaki’s actual might and how far it surpassed her estimates and telekinesis, Psykos lost her cool and started panicking (Chapter 62). That said, Psykos doesn’t exclusively rely on brute force and the webcomic proves how the leader of the Monster Association can use her mind in battle. When Garou blocked her direct attacks and found her weak spot, Psykos resorted to a distraction before instantly squashing the martial artist (Chapter 59: 1 and 2); after the initial shock, Psykos exploited Tatsumaki’s fatal flaw and took down the Hero Association trump card (Chapter 71). Furthermore, as specified several times already, Psykos is a fairly competent leader and the only one capable of leading the other Cadres effectively by coordinating her subordinates. Still, in the years between the high school clash and the battle of Z-City, Psykos focused more on increasing her telekinesis than to refine it, and and the only time Psykos’s technique is praised (or commented on at all) is in regard to the similarities it shares with Fubuki’s (Chapter 62: 1 and 2). As Fubuki versus Psykos showcases, this has three corollaries: 1) even after all these years and her new immense powers, Psykos was still inferior to Fubuki as far as telekinesis mastery goes; 2) Psykos didn’t (or was unable to) develop her "signature style”; 3) back in high school, Fubuki was already a skilled psychic, capable of teaching others about telekinesis (well, after all, the name of the club, “Society for the Study of Supernatural”, already implies this and shows how Fubuki was an experienced telekinesis user even at the time), insomuch that Psykos’s is still very much reminiscent of hers. Psykos (or the high school club in general) isn’t an isolated case: Fubuki also taught telekinesis techniques to the Fubuki Group (Chapter 99). Lastly, as a testament to the similarities between the two espers’s telekinesis, in the battle against Tatsumaki (1 and 2), Psykos uses a technique that, later in the Esper Sisters arc, will also be employed by Fubuki against her sister (Chapter 100: 1 and 2) - “Hell Cluster”. 

In contrast, Fubuki, while certainly no slouch power-wise (once again from this post), prefers a more refined and sophisticated use of her psychic abilities, as evidenced by her mastery of Psychic Whirlwind. Instead of trying to match the vastness of her sister’s powers, Fubuki researched more into innovative applications of her psychic abilities in an attempt to nullify the gap between her and the older sister. As the battle proves, much to Psykos’s dismay, the MA leader’s stronger output falls short against Fubuki’s Psychic Whirlwind, and the B-Class esper’s unnerving calm adds to her frustration. 

From the comparison, it’s evident how Psykos lacked originality and was always dependant from others since didn’t have the creativity or ingenuity to improve her abilities by herself, whereas Fubuki honed her skills and became an expert telekinesis user on her own, without anyone else indicating the way. Psykos is an imitator, a follower who lacks her own identity and solely driven by her desire for more power, and this is perfectly reflected in her telekinesis. All in all, Psykos preferred choice is to rely on others and follow the easiest path. Fubuki’s victory against Psykos is another example of the series proving how struggling and pouring effort into something without taking the easy route will always pay off, while using a shortcut and parassitically piggy-backing on others will backfire in the end.

But let’s keep moving forward.

Even their body language reflects their characters: 

lost the smugness along with the glasses (Chapter 74), Psykos is left with uncontainable anger and staggering confusion. Psykos’s gestures are heavy and ungraceful just like the telekinesis she employs against Fubuki: her body bends forward with both arms raised in the sheer effort of keeping up the offensive with her taxing psychic attacks (examples). 

On the other side of the ring, the B-Class is totally in control, and her postures range from relaxed to vigilant (these panels, for example), in an esper-like equivalent of a martial arts guard, while also flaunting a cocky and overly confident attitude like in the image above.

And so does the content of their speech bubbles: Psykos erupts in an endless catalogue of insults and death threats, declaring that, while their previous battle in highschool ended with her defeat, things won’t go the same way this time and Fubuki will be the one that will end beaten (actually, “destroyed”). The B-Class responds with taunts and cryptic ultimatums, requesting from the MA leader an immediate surrender, as if the outcome of the battle was already decided; Fubuki shows no outward surprise toward Psykos’s achievements but only contempt and dismissal, as if dealing with the kid Psykos once was, a follower and disciple that never grew up, in spite of all the years that passed - which infuriates Psykos. The temperament they exhibit here is perfectly reflective of their telekinesis’ philosophy and their characters in general. There is also how Fubuki skillfully employs her words for achieving victory. Instead of trying to justify herself or negate the true, Fubuki openly admits that she twarthed Psykos’ plans and ruined her life simply because she vicepresident was threatening the “weak” (and so Fubuki’s agenda), in order to exploit the latter anger and inferiority complex that, promptly, fall for the trap - and Fubuki expresses relief at having successfully tricked her. All the other taunts and mocking remarks also fulfill the same purpose: unnerving Psykos and inciting her into a careless assault.

But what about their respective allegiances and the role they play in them? Additionally, how do these two compare as leaders? First of all, as obvious as it is at this point, Fubuki and Psykos are tied to warring factions that mirror one another, which goes to reinforce the dualistic nature of their confrontation and how Psykos represents a narrative foil to Fubuki. Moreover, considering the position the two hold in their respective organizations, it’s clear how the tables have turned since high school: now Psykos is at the helm of an organization she founded, whereas Fubuki is only one of the many “employees” of the association she works for, the top-ranked Hero of Class B and the leader of the Fubuki group sure, but still not one of its higher-ups or key leading figures of the HA. As for their subordinates: for Psykos they are nothing more than assets (she sacrifices the Demons against the S-Class as cannon fodder in order to gauge the invasion force’s strengths and weaknesses before devising the Dragon match-ups) and there is no other relationship between her and the monsters, who are unaware of her real identity prior to Tatsumaki’s defeat; consequentially, the moment Fubuki undermined Psykos’s leadership, the MA esper was immediately abandoned by her allies, who followed Psykos simply for reasons of opportunism and not out of loyalty; similarly, in high school her genocidal plan met the protests of the members of the club (while the Third Eye made her more insane than how she already was), which goes to show how Psykos was always unable to inspire loyalty in her underlings, who abandoned her at the first disagreement/difficulty. This couldn’t be more different from Fubuki and the members of the Fubuki Group (Chapter 105) (up until now, at least), who actually matter to Fubuki on a personal level beyond her reasons to stay in B-Class, form a faction and the psychological reasurance that comes from a group; even if their relationship is still a hierarchical boss/subordinate dynamic instead of friendship, nonetheless, it is still a healthy and positive bond, as clearly shown in the Esper Sisters arc; in regard to her highschool club, Fubuki was the one the member of the “Society for the Study of Supernatural” turned to, asking to intervene against the vicepresident and deal with her mad plans. 

If, instead, we consider what they accomplished for their respective factions, both espers did quite the heavy lifting for their parties. Fubuki and Psykos, in fact, turned the tides from a seemingly unavoidable defeat by taking out the worst asset from the enemy line-up when no one else in their place could have done it. I already talked about the impact Fubuki had on the arc, and when we look at Psykos, her actions achieved the same for her faction: if it weren’t for the esper, the Cadres wouldn’t have defeated Tatsumaki by themselves. By sneak attacking the S-Class psychic, Psykos basically gained the other half of the arc for the Monster Association. Later, when Fang eliminated Fuher Ugly and Gums in a matter of seconds, it was always Psykos who made possible the defeat of the powerful hero (Chapter 72: 1 and 2). Lastly, the one who managed to calm down and convince the Cadres to launch a coordinated attack against King was once again the psychic (Chapter 73 and page one of Chapter 74, already linked before). As we can observe, even in the role they played in the battles, the two espers mirror each other, and without them, their respective factions would have suffered defeat much earlier in the arc.

But Psykos’s nature as a foil doesn’t stop there. While Fubuki chose to stay in B-Class, Psykos, who started as a way weaker follower, became a Dragon Level esper and formed a powerful organization of 17 between Demon and Dragon Level Threats - the reason she became stronger and was later capable of reuniting such force, though, seems to be linked to the Third Eye and God more than to her own merits, and this “blessing” came with rampant madness, but nonetheless, the point still stands. Not yet ready and fully operational, her forces brought the HA’s strike team to its knees. Psykos demonstrates how resourcefulness and determination can lead someone from a humble starting point to impressive results, which provides the perfect contrast to Fubuki, who, talented and blessed with abilities as she is, is stifling her potential and her career under a too cautious and risk-averse mindset. Sure, there are outside factors at play, but the series criticizes Fubuki’s unwillingness to challenge herself, and her character arc (from her introduction up until the Esper Sisters) constantly pushes Fubuki out of her “bubble world”.

Conversely, Psykos represents a cautionary tale for Fubuki, her egoistical ambitions and her obsession for power, if the B-Class were to give in to her worst sides. Even before the Third Eye came into play, in fact, Psykos already intended to “rule the world from the dark” and always sought to acquire more and more power, using the club for her goals, which included submitting other esper groups, in a similar way to how Fubuki’ uses her group in B-Class (well, without the world domination part, obviously). On the subject of world domination, whether or not Fubuki agreed with her is left unanswered, but, by looking at what is shown, it’s very unlikely that she did. From what the chapter reveals, it’s only Psykos who keeps bringing up the “world domination” plan and Fubuki never shows any interest in this topic or Psykos’s rants in general - to the almost comical degree that Fubuki ignores Psykos entirely. We know that, in the present, Fubuki is trying to build up an organization that could aid and shield her from her sister, but that’s pretty much it: it would be a massive and baseless stretch to ascribe Psykos’s goals to this, as if Fubuki was following the same plans of the vice president before the latter became insane. In regard to the reason behind the creation of the “Society for the Study of Supernatural”, while it’s mostly up to speculation, I believe that Fubuki founded the club partially because of her terrible, sheltered childhood and complete lack of friends, employing for the first time here the same hierarchical structure and dynamic that we will see later on with the Fubuki group, and, also, as an organization that one day could aid her against her sister (hence why they were studying psychic powers); but again, this is more my headcanon than anything concrete. Considering how things went and how Fubuki grew up from this experience, I would argue that the fiasco and the kind of people that joined the club cemented the negative life views that Fubuki already possessed from childhood, doing additional harm to Fubuki’s already scarred outlook on life. For example, in the flashback it’s mentioned that Fubuki made people join her club simply through talk, whereas Psykos believed that wasn’t enough and that it was better to rely on telekinesis to expand the club’s numbers and submit other psychic groups with force, to the degree of actively hunting them down. It wouldn’t be absurd to conclude that Psykos further confirmed to Fubuki that human beings only interact on the basis of power, violence and hierarchies, gathering around those they consider superior and always aiming to gain more strength at the expense of others. It’s ironic, though, how Fubuki ended up applying this lesson against Psykos herself. Speaking of bad influences, many seem to be under the impression that Fubuki was manipulating and using Psykos in high school. I honestly can’t see this at all. First, because Fubuki doesn’t even interact with Psykos in the flashback - she doesn’t talk to her, much less coerce, exploit or use her in any way - and also because Psykos is shown doing things out of her own volition, while Fubuki has zero interest in her activities and appears to have no say in Psykos’ own goals. So no, Psykos doesn’t seem to have been under Fubuki’s influence, much less manipulated by the latter; Psykos was actually following her own personal, questionable goals independently from Fubuki’s will and opinions (which is, admittedly, just like the entire sequence, a great subversion of clichès on ONE’s part). All in all, the very reasons Psykos and Fubuki sought for power greatly diverges: before becoming a mere puppet, Psykos wanted to dominate the world and rule it from the shadows, whereas Fubuki gatheres people and resources to free herself from Tatsumaki. For one power is the end-point, for the other is a mean to an end. In any case, Psykos’s quest for more power led her to acquire the Third Eye, the ability to peek into the future. But that came with a price. This new ability turned Psykos into a ruthless and bloodthirsty vessel carrying on the will of a mysterious entity beyond her comprehension, which left Psykos, once defeated and unable to realize this obscure mission, a husk of her former self, whom Fubuki, in her attempt at solving this mystery, is trying to recover as of Chapter 134. It’s rather poetic how Psykos, who was a follower driven by her own particular agenda, became nothing but a puppet, a subordinate that could only follow her master’s bidding. Psykos’ search for power and her obsession for it led her to fly too close to the sun, too close to a source of power that consumed her, reducing her to a mere instrument of an obscure design. Her fate is the result of the key differences between Psykos and Fubuki: for all the warped views she possesses, in fact, Fubuki never forsook humanity, and her self-driven will and ego would have never let her become a servant of someone’s else scheme (for now, at least). This is what truly sets them apart and why Psykos represents a dark mirror to Fubuki with none of the morals to placate an insatiable lust for power (she is called Psykos for a reason, after all).

Since both Fubuki and Psykos play a major role in this arc and their battle represents one of its most significant moments, I believe that a comparison between them and the two most important characters of this saga, Garou and Saitama, is warranted, as it reveals interesting analogies, parallels and correspondences between them, not only by highlighting the similarities between the duos of foils of Saitama and Garou and Fubuki and Psykos, but also between the hero (Fubuki/Saitama) and the monster side (Psykos/Garou), while we also take into consideration how the esper sideplot mirrors the main storyline and reinforces its overall narrative. 

Before going into the comparison itself, a little introduction to Saitama and Garou’s dynamic/relation is needed - Saitama-Garou’s dynamic is a topic in itself and I can’t cover it all here as this post is about Fubuki and it’s alreay long enough, so I will keep it brief. Down to their very appearances, Saitama and Garou are polar opposites in an archetypical sense, Saitama as the white-caped hero and Garou as a horned monster immersed in shadows, both inspired by a cartoon they both saw as kids, which led them down to the path of the hero as a serious “hobby” and a monster capable of overturning the traditional narrative and re-shape the world, narratively and ontologically “arch-enemies”; in this pursue, both of them followed an almost suicidal “training” in order to achieve their dream, but while one was an ordinary young man with no particular skills or abilities, the other was a genius martial arts talent; and while Saitama always stayed true to his childhood dream, Garou compromised his desire for fairness and justice, taking the “easy” route in order to fix the rotten world by choosing the side of the monster, which, in his mind, is synonymous of “underdog” and “emarginated”.

Now, onto the comparison. First of all, the two espers, Fubuki and Psykos, were introduced trying to recruit into their organizations, respectively, Saitama, the protagonist of the series, and Garou, the main character/antagonist of the saga, who, up to that point (and, to be fair, even after that) were forging their personal paths without any sort of affiliation (Saitama works for the HA, sure, but he didn’t pledge allegiance to any of its numerous factions but kept minding his own business). In regard to the circumstances where these characters first met, ONE flips the conventions. On the “hero” side, after the failed recruit attempt, Fubuki fights Saitama over factions and ranking; for the “monsters” it’s the opposite: Psykos sends her subordinates to Garou’s rescue when the Hero Hunter is cornered by the heroes and about to succumb. On the one hand, we have heroes infighting and, on the other, “monsters” providing assistance to each other. The two sides are one the “inverse” of the other, playing and subverting the tropes usually associated with the archetype they represent (”heroes”, “monsters”) and the traditional narrative templates that usually accompany those. As if we were witnessing the events unfold from Garou’s point of view, we observe first the issues of the HA that render its service to humanity imperfect and flawed, proving him right about the shortcomings of the hero system and its members, who seem to not behave like actual heroes but rivals ready to take down the competition, more worried about ranking than anything else, while the cooperative and organized monsters, with their providential intervention, at first seem to live up to Garou’s childhood expectations.

Nevertheless, things are destined to change, and, in a way, the roles the “recruiter” and the “target” (Fubuki and Saitama, Psykos and Garou) play in these two dyads are reversed between the two groups in the chapters following their first meeting: Saitama and Psykos represent, in fact, a turning point for Fubuki and Garou’s characters arc. While Saitama plays a more personal and character-charged role in the development of the esper, in the case of Garou, Psykos’ entanglement in the hero hunter story completely changed the course of Garou’s hero hunt, and her meddling - the very existence of the MA, Garou’s rescue, Psykos’ offer to him, Royal Ripper and co’s ambush, the fight between Psykos and Garou that trapped the latter in the depths of the base, etc. - all shaped Garou’s journey, leading, albeit inadvertedly, into the final stage of the MA arc. In this sense, Fubuki and Garou’s involvement in the war between heroes and monsters was determined by having crossed paths with, respectively, Saitama and Psykos, who provided, for a matter of fact, the circumstances under which these characters were present at all during the events of Z-City - Fubuki, who, drawn to Saitama’s group, stayed at the apartment, from where she and the others later joined the battle, while for Garou everything that followed the intervention of the MA on his side, and, later, the kidnapping of the ugly kid, forced him to be part of the Z-City war as a third “party”. Coincidentally, both Saitama and Psykos reside in Z-City, the epicenter of the conflict: Saitama living alone (prior to Genos) in the unhinabited area of the city; Psykos deep below the sourface and under the monster lair, in a secret chamber unacessible to anyone but her. Interesting enough, both Saitama and Psykos are behind the creation of the two organizations: the HA was created because Saitama saved the butt-chin kid, which inspired his grandparent to come up with and fund the HA, whereas Psykos is the founder and leader of the Monster Association. Despite that, the true identities of both of them are unknown to the members of the respective organizations: one is considered by most an unremarkable troublemaker rookie hero, while the monsters are only aware of Psykos’ coverture, the one-eyed psychic monster, and don’t suspect real her identity as a human being. But let’s go back to comparing the relation between these characters by putting side by side the two dyads of foils (Fubuki and Psykos, Saitama and Garou), which is probably the more narratively meaningful angle from where to look at these foils and the configuration that brings out the most parallels and similarities between them, as well as how these affect the story and play into the underlying themes of the arc. As mentioned before, the espers, as leaders of organizations trying to recruit them, play a similar role in Saitama and Garou’s storylines, which serves to further portray the hero/monster factions (both, as Garou laments in Chapter 76, very disappointingly human) as far distant from the ideal concepts the latters have of these archetypes, thus highlighting the distinct nature of Saitama and Garou themselves in comparison to said factions and their members (the majority of them, at least). And while Saitama has already experienced the flaws of the HA before (and several characters embody these in even more pronounced ways), nevertheless, Fubuki and her recruitment attempt, given its placement in this saga, brings up again an endemic issue within the HA, creating a deliberate and direct correspondence between Saitama and Garou’s storylines, as her precedent is soon followed by Psykos’ own introduction and her desire to make the Human Monster join her forces. These encounters end up prompting Saitama and Garou’s criticism for, respectively, Fubuki (for her obsession with ranking, factions, and status) and Psykos’ monster association (which is completely alien to Garou’s notion of monsterhood, as later remarked in the aforementioned Chapter 76) - Saitama and Garou are also not amused by their telekinesis too (but to be fair, in Saitama’s case, this is a recurring gag he has with any psychic user he comes across). The parallel between them is further reinforced by both the “rookie” hero and the wannabe monster finding themselves standing against their colleagues’ opinions, when said colleagues will push them into committing a murder: the ultimatum the monsters set for Garou, in order to prove his monsterhood, consisted of killing the ugly kid after the Human Monster didn’t murder 100 people as per their first request and failed to take down a passerby hero (who happened to be Saitama) (Chapter 56); Saitama is pressured by the majority of the still stand majority of the heroes into delivering the final blow on Garou (Chapter 94). Linking these two moments there is, once again, the presence of the espers, who express the views of their respective factions: Psykos, who asks Garou to prove his monsterhood by killing 100 people (a stark contrast to the kind of monster Garou aspires to be), while Fubuki advocates (like the other heroes) for the elimination of the Human Monster (Chapter 94). Against this unfairess, both Saitama and Garou do not sacrifice their integrity by abiding to the decisions taken by the majority. Instead of going against their personal beliefs and moral system, they keep carving their path on their own accord, even when it means being the only voice of reason or fighting against overwhelming odds. Interesting enough, this careless attitude is antithetical to Fubuki and Psykos’ spirits; the espers avoid reckless actions, relying instead on groups (though, in Fubuki’s case, has a particular reason) and only picking battle they could win (or think, they could win) - Fubuki’s character arc hinges in part on the character is confronting this, when it becomes a limit and prevents her potential. If Garou and Saitama are characterized by following an ideal, a romantical view of the archetypes they aspire to, Psykos and Fubuki are more pragmantical and utilitarians, less concerned with abstractions and more functional in their approach to the path they chose. By the way: in regard to Fubuki, what I stated above refers mainly to her introduction arc and how she is presented in it, and less about her as a whole, though certain elements still apply to a certain degree. 

In regard to the confrontations, for what concerns one of the leitmotifs of the saga, namely “skill” versus “raw strength”, Fubuki versus Psykos is the opposite of Saitama versus Garou: in the esper showdown, “the good-aligned” character wins thanks to wits and superior technique against the “power-oriented build" of her opponent; in the final battle, instead, the absolute power of the caped hero prevails effortlessly against the martial arts of the “monster” prodigy. No matter the plans they devise, the power-ups they gain, their determination and their previous astonishing accomplishments, whether it is pure brute force or refined techniques, in the end the villains are destined to lose ”unfairly” against their designated “heroic” counterparts in the decisive duel between them; this predetermined outcome rhymes with the “the hero always wins and the monster always loses” motif that permeates the whole saga (evoked in Garou’s monologue, mentioned at the beginning of this post). After overcoming the biggest hurdles on their path (the S-Class) and right when their victory was at hand, the unexpected and out of nowhere appearance of their “nemesis” (coincidentally, two B-Class heroes) denies Psykos and Garou the chance of achieving success. Over the course of their respective battles, both the leader of the Monster Association and the Human Monster slowly realized this: Psykos, as her telekinesis is repelled by Fubuki, starts to fear that her battle against her former president will have the same outcome as the previous one in high school; Garou steadily recognizes he is battling an hero embodying the world’s “unfairness” against whom his martial arts, fighting prowess and power-ups all fall short, unable to overcome that very outcome he always strived to subvert and that now seems to await him too, as a “monster” that can’t escape his fate (Chapter 88; Chapter 91; Chapter 92). Both Psykos and Garou are defeated not by traditional heroes, champions of morality and paradigms of virtues, but subversions of those: an egoist driven by warped world views and a jaded man who became a hero just for “hobby”. [Updated 11/03/2024: I was unsatisfied with the previous conclusion I wrote for the present paragraph, so I decided to completely rewrite it and hopefully clarify my original point] The fact that this sideplot and the two espers, considered either individually or in relation to one another, parallel and mirror Garou and Saitama’s story beats is not a random choice. Dichotomis, dualisms, and contrasts are all heavily featured in the arc (human/heroes vs monsters, individual vs society, strength vs technique, the dualistic visual motive of black and white present in both the esper and the final battle as noted earlier, etc.), with foils and mirrors being one of the many ways those concepts are manifested along the course of the story. This is a precise writing decision that reflects the irresolved identity of the protagonist of the arc, Garou, a young man who wanted to change the world and eliminate unfairness but, feeling unable to do so as a "hero", compromised and decided to become its opposite, a “monster”. His inner turmoil and his spirit torn between these two "roles" reverberate throughout the saga and its plot and characters, assuming a concrete shape, plot-wise, in the form of two battling organizations (the Hero Association and the Monster Association) that are a manifestation of the archetypes Garou's perceives in perpetual opposition between one another, heroes and monsters. Therefore, the entire arc lives and thrives on the conflict spawned by these apparently irreconciliable opposites, before the cathartic resolution of the arc overcomes this opposition and brings new-found unity to Garou, when, after his defeat, Saitama reveals that, in reality what Garou really wanted be was a a hero but chose the path of the monster. This, and the appearence of the ugly kid, brings resolution to the saga and represents a new blank, starting point for Garou, now free to figure out who he really wants to be and choose his own path.

Before moving on, there are a few other topics I want to address:

starting with how Fubuki and Psykos’s story intersect with Garou’s. The backstory of the two espers resembles in a way Garou’s summation of the unfortunate villain’s tale (Chapter 46), since it follows its plot and features all the parts required for the play to be represented: Psykos, the hated “Villain/Monster” opposed by the “Majority” (the members of the “Society for the Study of Supernatural”) and defeated by the intervention of the “Hero”, Fubuki, who stands in defense of the current social landscape. And no matter how she tried to surpass Fubuki after the high school fiasco, in the events of the MA arc Psykos still loses again, beaten by an “egoistical” subversion of a hero supported by society - which is all very reminiscent of 1, 2 (Chapter 46). But this story doesn’t stop at simply mirroring Garou’s monologue because it directly connects to the Human Monster plotline. In fact, as the recollection ends and the clash between the espers concludes, with Psykos falling on the ground and Fubuki looking from the distance and questioning Psykos about what made her change, the one who emerges from the night is none other than Garou. The Hero Hunter’s reappearance at the end of the battle couldn’t be more fitting since Fubuki victory over Psykos follows, once again and like in high school, beat for beat the narrative scheme of “the hero fighting the monster/villain” loathed by Garou. No other scenario would have provided a better setup for Garou’s return other than this specific battle. While his kid self powerlessly observed the “tragedy of the monster/villain” occurring on screen countless times (Chapter 46, pages linked above), now, from over the rocks and behind a new frightening appearance, he similarly stares over the conclusion of the esper battle - another iteration of the hero and villain’s tale - before intervening (Chapter 77), facing the hero. Garou is obviously not “vindicating” Psykos, but his return following Fubuki’s victory, seems to almost break, meta-narratively, the “curse” of the “villain/monster” losing unfairly to the heinous “hero” (re-evoked in the psychic battle), since his arrival renders (apparently) meaningless all the victories and the efforts Fubuki and the other heroes obtained against all odds and through immense struggles up until that point, as a new, unstoppable threat emerges from the shadows of the night the same moment the leader of the Monster Association was finally defeated. This reappearance also underscores how far Garou’s progression as a character has come: if in his first appearance Garou declared his resolve to become “the strongest monster ever”, with this entrance, the Hero Hunter has seemingly reached (or at least is on the verge of achieving) that goal, the “Disaster Level God” (”Absolute Evil”), the being capable of changing the status quo. For these reasons, it’s quite symbolic that Garou, in his new “transformation”, is standing above two associations (embodied by Fubuki and Psykos) that mirror each other as two faces of the same coin (see what I wrote about Fubuki and Psykos’ appearances, Psykos being a foil to Fubuki and what purpose this serves as a storytelling device), which also echoes Garou’s rumination from Chapter 76 (1, 2 and 3). Furthermore, this scene perfectly bridges the first half of the arc, the hero versus monster battles, which culminate with Psykos’ defeat, into its conclusive phase, where Garou takes center stage and emerges as the ultimate threat to the two battling organizations. There is another common detail between the espers and Garou, which is to say the setting of their flashbacks: school, also recurring in the other Fubuki’s flashback featured in Chapter 99. In school or its immediate surroundings, those three characters all experienced a crucial event (or, for at least two of them, Fubuki and Garou, the culmination of a process ONE decided to encapsulate into specific turning points) that will affect the rest of their lives, leaving traces and prompting reactions that constitute the basis of their characterization in the present of the series: Fubuki’s pivotal childhood flashback took place near school and involved her classmates (and her sister); Psykos’s first clash with Fubuki occurred in high school; the experiences with his classmates and the school personnel (Chapter 54), mixed and overlapping with the television cartoon villains he rooted for as a kid, led Garou to his current crusade against mob mentality. Far from being mere scenography, in every one of these sequences, “school” is framed as a microcosm that already exhibits forms of inequality and discrimination that plague society as a whole (like herd mentality), marginalizing and oppressing those who do not conform with the popular opinion of the majority or are, simply, “different” (like in Fubuki’s case). Despite their formative function, schools fail in OPM at their pivotal purpose of preparing the new generations for the roles they will take in society, and the school personnel, as well as parents and adults in general, are either absent, like in Fubuki and Psykos’s flashback(s), or actively enforce and promote injustices, as in the case of Garou.

Considering how Psykos refers to Tatsumaki as Fubuki’s arch nemesis and the fact Tatsumaki “connects” Psykos to Fubuki solely for the similarities between their telekinesis (and not because she has any recollection of Psykos herself), it wouldn’t surprise me if the club was a secret thing Tatsumaki wasn’t aware of; this is actually 100% consistent with what is stated in the Esper Sisters arc. When we remember how taken aback Psykos was by Tatsumaki during their clash, as if she had never witnessed her powers before and had only a vague knowledge about the older Witch Sister’s capabilities, it is fair to say the two hadn’t ever met before Chapter 62. Moreover, Tatsumaki never “recognizes” Psykos: the connection Tatsumaki draws between Fubuki and Psykos is strictly based on their telekinesis; taking into account the Esper Sisters arc (where Tatsumaki keeps referring to Psykos as a monster) and how Tatsumaki never refers to Psykos as a Fubuki’s acquaintance from highschool she remembers, it’s safe to assume that she didn’t know Psykos at all and wasn’t aware of her existence or Fubuki’s highschool club in general; if she actually knew Psykos, then the story would have conveyed this information much more clearly and directly (through dialogue, or by showing Tatsumaki looming somewhere in the flashback or in another manner), instead of outright omitting to mention something of this importance - and that because Tatsumaki didn’t know Psykos before the Z-City incident. As for “Fubuki’s friend” (“友達”) (Chapter 62) that is how Tatsumaki always addresses people orbiting around and/or seemingly having a (even remote) connection to Fubuki (panels from Chapters 101 and 102). Besides, during the flashback, we only see Fubuki in a school environment or wearing a school uniform, never in other scenarios; she isn’t present when Psykos recruits and submits other espers groups, which is strange given how Fubuki always leads her subordinates and likes to assert herself as the leader/strongest - at the same time, Fubuki never expresses any interest on the world domination stuff and the other esper groups, so there is that as well. In the panel I posted before (followed by my thoughts on that topic), the only one with Fubuki and Psykos together, both of them have a school bag and are wearing a school uniform, indicating once again that the only place where they interacted, and where Fubuki interacted with other people in general (which is to say the other members of the club), was school and its immediate surroundings, and nowhere else - another subtle proof of Fubuki’s isolation and sheltered existence, all things the Esper Sisters arc delves into and explicitely addresses. The part of the flashback that shows the activities of the club is also entirely from Psykos’ POV, not Fubuki’s, who is basically absent for the majority of it. From this, I can infer a couple of things: it’s as if something, or better yet, someone, was restricting Fubuki’s freedom and preventing her from having any contact with the rest of the world outside of school hours; at the same time, this could be another evidence that submitting other esper groups was Psykos’s exclusive interest that Fubuki did not share; or, better yet, a combination of both. The only time (that we are aware of) the Fubuki Group acted on their own (fighting and defeating a rampaging monster classified Tiger Level Threat, if not above) without being led by their leader occurred in Chapter 134, when Fubuki was too busy trying to contact Psykos telepathically. So, I wouldn’t be surprised if Tatsumaki only allowed Fubuki to attend lessons and school activities, while, for the remaining time, she was under strict surveillance.

So these are Fubuki’s accomplishments in this arc. But not everything goes well for the esper.

After all, the Monster Association is the ultimate reality check for the Hero Association and the majority of the cast. Considering how this arc is filled with thematic comeuppances and poetic matchups with characters being subjected to the “rule of contrapasso” and suffering instant karma as a result of their mistakes, what has been specifically reserved for Fubuki?

For starters, as it was already observed, Fubuki, who prefers to avoid unnecessary risks and is unwilling to throw herself unprepared into a situation, is catapulted with little to no infosmations and without plans into a war between the top heroes and a group of Dragon Level Threats - and the heroes are losing the battle. Despite all her efforts to play it safe, a chain of unforeseeable circumstances pushed her out of her comfort zone at the epicenter of a disaster. This is incredibly ironic in itself.

Furthermore, in the battle against Psykos, we also learn that the technique Fubuki mastered through hard training, Psychic Whirlwind, was already perfected by Tatsumaki. Outside of a typical example of ONE’s humor, this clarification by the narrator will have dramatic repercussions in the next arc, when the two sisters will collide. It also ties to the theme of unfairness: despite Fubuki’s efforts, hardship and ingenuity, her sister was capable of achieving the same result solely thanks to her natural-born psychic potential.

During the arc no one who was helped or rescued by Fubuki thanks or acknowledges her. Genos didn’t change his standoffish attitude toward the esper after the Overgrown Rover battle and, while trapped under the debris, he dismissedively replied to the B-Class telling him to not reach the surface (Chapter 71), the place where her sister was battling the MA. When Fubuki appeared just as the Cadres were about to attack King, the B-Class esper reassured the S-Class Hero that she wasn’t going hinder him (Chapter 74), despite having actually saved King and the whole situation. In Chapter 94, Fang asked King to free him from the rocks and in turn King called for Fubuki’s help; once freed from the boulders by the esper and in response to the fellow S-Class’s concerned question, the martial artist only thanked King. Now, make no mistake: this is not meant to depict Fubuki as the poor Woobie surrounded by ungrateful snobs guilty of mistreating the totally innocent psychic sweetheart; all these characters have good reasons for treating Fubuki like this. If anything, what I’m trying to say is the opposite: in her mini-arc, we learned how much Fubuki regards rank and status as manifestations of individual value and, therefore, how focused she is on securing and improving her standing. Now, in circumstances warranting public recognition as a reward for her prominent role in the war, these efforts go unnoticed, and Fubuki’s chances to shine, as in being recognized by other characters, are negated. It’s another splendid example of the “law of contrapasso” being applied in the arc. It’s solely in the next one that Fubuki will be rewarded for her actions and determination: Tatsumaki will acknowledge her strength (Chapter 101: 1, 2) (well, before going full psycho), Saitama will help her against Tatsumaki (I talked about this here), the members of the Fubuki group will express their gratitude for the way Fubuki took care of them (Chapter 105: this page and the following ones) and Fubuki will, finally, move to A-Class (Chapter 107).

[EDIT: 11/12/2023] I now realize that I didn’t include perhaps the most important consequence of this fight: well, time to correct this mistake. Once the esper battle ends with Psykos being defeated and laying on the ground, Fubuki comments that Psykos was never a strong “child” (she was a weaker esper than Fubuki, after all), and that something must have changed the vicepresident in order for her to acquire vastly more powerful telekinetic powers, with the side effect of twisting and corrupting her mind even more than it already was. I want to clarify that the kanji “強” and the expression “ 強い” refer to “power”, “strength”: Fubuki is questioning how someone who was weaker than her got Dragon Level telekinesis and what unnatural change might have occurred to Psykos (Fubuki is therefore referring only about Psykos’ telekinesis). Fubuki then wonders if that was the result of the Third Eye, the power Psykos obtained before coming up with the plan of wiping out humanity. It’s at this point that Fubuki realizes that Psykos’s plan in high school wasn’t dictated by her own agenda, nor was it another case of Psykos’ personal brand of crazy (like world domination), but the result of something sinister and external, something that threatens humanity as a whole. What was an episode from Fubuki’s teenage years she promptly dealt with and then forgot about, with the only consequence of cementing an already disastrous outlook on life, is now re-entering her life in the form of an unsettling mystery heralding the apocalypse. From this moment on, Fubuki priorities change: her previous concerns, including the source of her traumas, Tatsumaki, all pale in comparison to what this discovery represents. And while Fubuki, as a hero, feels responsible for Psykos’ current state and wants to help her, Psykos is also the key to deciphering this mistery, and so, learning more about the future Psykos saw and the entity that looms over mankind will be one of Fubuki’s main drives in the upcoming chapters, like in the Esper Sisters arc (Chapter 99: 1, 2, 3) and in the following events (Chapter 134) [End of the EDIT].

The lowest point for Fubuki during the arc, though, is represented by Garou: by crossing paths with the self-proclaimed human monster (1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6), Fubuki finds herself in the predicament Saitama foreshadowed back in Chapter 48. 

This sequence isn’t the umpteenth instance of a character being used for a meaningless gag, but a turning point for the story and Fubuki herself. After all, it marks the return of the saga’s main character after we left him alone over the rubble of what once was Z-City, questioning his humanity the moment his body seemingly started failing him for all the accumulated injuries of his previous battles. Garou’s triumphal reappearance requires, therefore, its due pathos to set the tone for what has to come, reestablishing the main character/antagonist of the arc as the ultimate barrier in front of the heroes in a way that conveys the tonal shift this development carries. Consequently, ONE dials up the “horror” factor by drawing Garou’s exterior as a distorted demon-like figure standing menacingly in front of the tired and caught off guard esper (1 and 2). His new terrifying appearance perfectly embodies Fubuki’s fear of overwhelming power that leaves no possibility of victory or success to those who try oppose it. Any hope to win, any chance at overcoming this new threat vanishes in the face of the strength beyond reason that he radiates, reminding to Fubuki how her struggles and efforts were all for nothing. As I mentioned in one of the previous paragraphs, his appearance seems to nullify Fubuki’s success, to render pointless and meaningless everything she achieved moments after the tides were turned - as we know, Garou didn’t take away from Fubuki’s contribution of the arc, but, narratively, his role in the final phase of the arc seems to throw into despair what the heroes conquered through their battles, representing an invincible final boss no one can defeat.

The Hero Hunter, in fact, makes his entrance right in the moment of her victory against the leader of the Monster Associations and overwhelms any preparation, connection, power and technique Fubuki could have ever employed against him. If the encounter with Saitama gave Fubuki a taste of the unsustainability of her short-sighted mindset, Garou completely shatters the illusion of fulfillment and protection her bubble world gave her. Remaining in an environment with no bigger fish than her, dodging dangerous situations, creating a group and securing the highest spot she could in the HA’s hero score - it was nothing more than administering a palliative instead of treating her real issues, and Garou, as the overwhelming “monster” Saitama predicted, exposes that as such: all Fubuki’s attempts at escaping her own demons crumble against the Human Monster and Fubuki is left with profound despair. Fubuki fear is also effectively used to frame the terror that Garou brings on the battlefied after he effortessly takes down the S-Class.

For several chapters we are left wondering what actually happened to Fubuki and Garou even claims to have killed her in Chapter 83. Solely as Garou viciously beats the last S-Class, we find the B-Class profoundly shocked, delivering (to King) the answer to what Garou previously asked her (Chapter 84: ”What do you see?”): “Fear”. 

But Fubuki did actually try to fight Garou. As already stated above, not even a few moments after taking down a Dragon Level Threat, Fubuki was suddenly confronted by the appearance of a new formidable opponent. Left with no other option than to defend herself, Fubuki attacked the demonic silhouette with Hellstorm (1 and 2). By that point, though, very few heroes (or monsters, for what it matters) could face Garou head-on, let alone defeat him, and so the Hero Hunter easily deflected Hellstorm’s rock-barrage with martial arts powered up by his newly acquired “lighter” and stronger body.

As for what “fear” actually means to Fubuki and where the roots of it come from, we have to look at her fight with Tatsumaki in the next arc. Against her older sibling, the same sensation Fubuki felt in front of the Hero Hunter resurfaces once again, filling Fubuki with despair (Chapter 100). It’s the fear of having to battle an overwhelming power that, no matter all her efforts and her struggles, squashes her chances of success and leaves her at the mercy of her adversary. The fear of being powerless in a world where power and strength are the only languages universally understood, what determines right and wrong and the fate of an individual. The hopeless sensation of being forever the “weak”, completely harmless against an opponent that trascends her strength.

In Fubuki’s encounter with Garou there is also a nod (or should it be called a foretaste?) to Fubuki’s childhood flashback from the next arc: as her trauma kicks in, Fubuki instinctively assumes the same “defensive” position her young self took against her bullies as shown in the Flashback from Chapter 99; it’s noticeably distinct from the fetal-like posture of Darkshine, demoralized and trapped underground, or from any other character reduced to a distressed or depressed state during the arc, and seems it was drawn like that on purpose for character-related reasons. Be it intentional or not, it’s a great detail, especially because while the panel seems to convey, at first glance, everything required of it in the context of the sequence, it acquires a deeper meaning in the light of a flashback contained in the next story arc, retroactively adding an ulterior and more personal layer to Fubuki’s reaction here.

As much as the esper is affected deeply by what she just experienced, however, Fubuki doesn’t turn into a damsel in distress or comic relief. ONE doesn’t ridicule her with misplaced gags nor does he downplay her fear for cheap laughs, but uses this sequence (and, to be honest, nearly every panel involving the character) to advance and progress her story and flesh out her characterization. Beside, nobody saves Fubuki, uplifts her morale, or helps her overcome that cloud of terror. King, who found her and stayed with the psychic up until the end of the arc, didn’t bring the B-Class out of that state, because Fubuki will have to do that by herself in the Esper Sisters arc, where the B-Class, confronted by the same feeling of hopelessness and fear, will have to fight back the very source of her traumas, Tatsumaki. Here we have the other purpose this fight fullfills, beside realizing Saitama’s prediction: the encounter with Garou serves as a meter of comparison for a similar, hopeless situations Fubuki will find herself in the next arc, this time, during a much more personal confrontation, where, instead of reasignation and despair, Fubuki will find the courage to stand against an immensely powerful threat. Thanks to the precedent of Chapter 78, the growth she underwent and the way she will face bravely a similar, desperate situation become all the more powerful and impactful than they already are.

Worth mentioning is that the actual threats of the MA arc, in the sense of those aiming to kill the heroes and the kid, aka the Cadres, never reduced Fubuki into a damsel in distress: only Garou represented for her a “death” scenario, if Garou wasn’t, well, Garou, but, in that case, the same would apply to every other character in the arc not named Saitama. By the way, the “fear” sparked by Garou didn’t stop Fubuki from proving her usefulness even at the very end of the saga: in the last chapter of the arc, although still shocked by the Human Monster, Fubuki lifted the builders trapping Fang, freeing the martial artist from the imprisonment Psykos and Homeless Emperor confined him to. 

Always in Chapter 94, we find out that Fubuki, alongside King and the few conscious S-Class heroes, witnessed Saitama single-handedly defeat the Human Monster who almost took down the HA. The same hero who “foresaw” the scenario Fubuki found herself in was also the one who put an end to Garou’s rampage. With his victory against the “Devil” (Chapter 94), Saitama proves to Fubuki and to several other characters as well that he is not simply “very strong” but one of those incredible beings that defy any common sense. This development will have major consequences in the setting and in the following arcs. With the end of the battle and Garou’s disappearance, the Monster Association arc finally comes to a close.

So, when we look at the bigger picture, what does Fubuki gain at the end of the Monster Association? Not a promotion, not a power-up, not an improvement in her relationships with her colleagues - nothing. Instead, Fubuki has to carry the burden represented by Psykos and the consequent sense of responsibility for her state, the looming mystery of what Psykos saw in her vision (the “Source of Madness”), and, as aforementioned, the realization of Saitama’s “prophecy” in Garou. Despite her impressive achievements for the HA, Fubuki’s participation in the battles didn’t improve her condition; if anything, it worsened it. Defeating Psykos leads Fubuki right to the worst-case scenario she could think of: a direct clash with Tatsumaki. The Esper Sisters’s arc is kickstarted specifically by that battle.

Aftermath.

We reunite with Fubuki a few days after the conclusion of the MA arc (Chapter 96). She is heading to what we will soon discover is the HA’s prison, where Psykos is imprisoned. Her mission is desperate: learn about the vision of the future and, eventually, rescue Psykos, the only person who posseses any clue about this nefarious future, from Tatsumaki, who intends to execute the MA leader on the spot. It’s a race against time and the odds are stacked against her.

Fubuki’s arrival at the HA’s parking lot (Chapter 98) is a clear callback to her introduction arc, with Fubuki in a reversed role: she is the one who, unintentionally, interrupts a fight between Saitama and a co-ranker, much like Genos and Sonic put a stop to her “fight” with Saitama when the latter was still a B-Class. On this occasion, bumping into Saitama is not her objective but a lucky coincidence that will assist her down the line. It all goes to show how much things have changed for the character since her first appearance and how different Fubuki’s goals are now. If the MA arc threw Fubuki into danger without warning or preparation, the Esper Sisterts’s arc has Fubuki taking action not for egoistical reasons and within the restricted mindframe of her own benefits, as she did in her series debut, but for the sake of Psykos’ current status, her human connections and humanity’s future. Fubuki’s priorities and concerns are no longer the foolish obsession with her own status, the power dynamics of B-Class and the petty competition for ranking, but the quest to learn more about the impending doom that threatens humanity as a whole and the selfless (and thus heroic) volition of rescuing Psykos, who becomes the embodiment of the responsibility Fubuki will have to take care of as a leader and a hero; a burden that will get even heavier later when the Fubuki group as well will become the target of Tatsumaki’s wrath. For their sake, Fubuki will have to take a stand against none other than her sister.

But let’s see what happens next.

Having run into Saitama, Fubuki manages to convince him to follow her, and the two enter the structure. This leads to one of my favorite Fubuki moments, her “dialogue” with Saitama in the elevator:

Just to be clear, not for pairings and stuff, but exclusively for what this represents for Fubuki and her story. I do not ship any character in this series (nothing wrong with shipping though) and I’m not implying any kind of romantic undertone in what follows.

Up until this point, Fubuki kept her “leader” act on like she usually does (Chapter 98). On this page, though, the same Fubuki who in her series debut antagonized Saitama and went even as far as to rookie-crush him is now praising him, who now as an A-Class outranks her (the very thing Fubuki originally wanted to avoid), for being stronger than her - which, on these terms, is a massive compliment and form of acknowledgement coming from Fubuki. The same person that fought the B-Class rookie out of fear of being surpassed by him is now openly recognizing the accomplishment of this “rival” and showing Saitama her respect. The same Fubuki, who always tries to appear strong in front of others and conceals her weaknesses and limits, is now telling Saitama that, after having fought Garou herself and then witnessed their battle, she recognizes the newly promoted A-Class as one of the individuals who stands above the rest, and, even more significant, Fubuki adds that she can say that despite having renounced doing it herself (“reaching the top”).

For Fubuki, lowering her “denfenses” and opening up to another person is extremely rare, if not unique. Serious situations (like the Hero’s raid against the Monster Association) or unexpected turns of events (like Garou) can temporarily wear off the aura she tries to cover herself with, but these are extreme scenarios with outside factors at play beyond her control. As soon as she can, Fubuki immediately reverts to her usual persona. In downtime and without direct external pressure, it is even more unlikely for the psychic to be genuine and sincere toward someone else when the preferable option of her façade is on the table, shielding and protecting her from exposing too much and coming across as “weak”. Previously in the series, every time Fubuki admitted a limit or complimented someone else, she did it only reluctantly, when in difficult situations (e.g., the Overgrown Rover’s fight) and/or discussing someone who was not present; she never did so of her own volition or in a scenario that didn’t necessarily require it.

For this reason, Chapter 98 is so significant. Sure, the threat of Tatsumaki looms menacingly over Fubuki, but the situation hasn’t gone south yet, and by bumping into Saitama, Fubuki has found an unexpected source of help that evens the odds, if only by a little (from the “in-universe” perspective of the character). Furthermore, with Saitama already accompanying Fubuki, her words here can’t be interpreted as flattering with an ulterior motive. On the contrary, what Fubuki is doing here is a sincere and outward manifestation of respect for Saitama and what he achieved, while, at the same time, an open admission of her “weakness” to someone who has surpassed her, in rank and power. Those are sincere, genuine words prounenced with no other intention but to pay respect toward someone she values as a person. The events of Z-City - meeting Saitama and his circle, the HA-MA war, the pivotal battle with Psykos, the “Source of Madness” and the fear awakened by Garou - made her realize that her concerns about being “number one” and her attempts at achieving a sense of illusory accomplishment were nothing more than an immature delusion in a world devastated by frightening monsters and villains, especially after learning of a threat looming on the horizon, and realizing that Saitama’s words, from when they first met, were indeed true. Hadn’t all of that occurred in the way it did, this page wouldn’t have contained such a poignant showcase of growth for the character that wraps up a plot thread that began back in Fubuki’s introduction arc, when Saitama warned Fubuki about her way of life.

And this is only the start of the Esper Sisters’s arc. What lies beyond is another crucial chapter of Fubuki’s story, representing the culmination of her process of growth and maturation up until this point in the story.