#Foils are my favorite narrative tool

[patheticblorbloscholar]

There is just something so sexy about foils. Two beings so intertwined the narrative repeatedly forces them into proximity.

[snowblack-charcoalwhite]

I read on reddit that Aemond in season 1 had character traits of book Daeron because they intended not to include him. But after season 2, they clearly reconsidered, although I still don't understand the decision of Daeron not appearing yet. However, it is also possible that one of the reasons why Aemond was portrayed so poorly and out of character in season 2 was because they wanted to focus on Daeron and continue to sideline Aemond more in season 3. Because Daeron is famous to book readers for being very different from his brothers and it was directly stated in the scene where Gwayne talks to Alicent. So if that actually happened to Aemond, I would be extremely disappointed. I have no problem with Daeron, just like I loved Aegon in this season. But it is clear that Aemond was made into a villain so quickly to justify Alicent's decision to abandon her family. And if Aemond is once again further villainized to serve as a stepping stone for Daeron, I don't know what to think anymore when my favorite character is treated so horribly. Not to mention that with the current mindset of the writer, Aemond is just a scapegoat waiting to die to bring the last glorious moment to Daemon,who has spent the whole season being whitewashed.

Hello!

The Daeron situation might be a part of the problem with Aemond so rapidly going into psycho mode. But the main trouble IMO lies in that:

a) HotD characters (as I wrote in some of my previous posts, so excuse me for repeating myself) are merely tools for pushing the writers'/HBO's agenda. Aemond has to be a plain villain (and Daemon's foil - but, just as you said, one that is lesser and is there mostly to root against). But Daeron most probably is (or will be) just as much of a narrative's tool as his brothers are, and it seems like in the writers' minds no Green character is allowed to become as beloved and popular as the Black ones (namely Rhaenyra and Daemon, especially the former). So, they are bound to either add something unsavoury to Daeron's character after all or -

b) - given how shallow the writing and the character development are in this show, even more likely he simply will be explored so poorly that, even if the audience forms a positive opinion on him, the emotional connection between the character and the viewers will be nearly nonexistent.

And, as much as I don't want to sound like a doomer, writers' words about Aemond's development is season 3 don't inspire much hope for the better.

[lover-of-whatever]

Fandom AUs do tend to lean towards not engaging with the material so much as treating it as a mere prompt to slap any aesthetic on. Swap AUs have become infamous for changing characters into something completely unrecognizable, but I don't think the Au is an inherently bad idea. I think Swap Au's are at their best when the two characters in question are already narrative foils and come from similar backgrounds/can easily be put in the same situation as the other.

My favorite example is kinda cheating because there is kinda basis in canon for it, but it's from one of Don't Starve Together's skin sets, called The Triumphant. The context for it is that upon being placed on the throne that controls the world of DS, you become a pawn for "Them" and they warp you into a worse version of yourself. But it's okay, you get a cool goth outfit and magic powers. Every character gets a super evil version of themselves, all but Maxwell. Maxwell as a playable character had already spent years as an evil pawn, before that he was the timid and dweebish William Carter. His time hanging out with/being used by some weird shadow shit straight up had him take on a new identity. Default Maxwell is already "Triumphant", so in order to have a skin in the set he is instead reverted back to William and literally dubbed "The Untriumphant". This is literally a Swap AU but instead of two people it's Maxwell swapping with everyone else out to kill him lmao. That in of itself is hilarious and more Swap Aus should do that actually, but that's not the example I'm going for.

Wilson is the kinda protagonist of the series, poster boy is more accurate, but he has the most involvement in the narrative for a playable character. As a result the official narrative of the game is that it was Wilson at the end of the first game that freed Maxwell from his throne and took his place. While their roles as protag and antag are loose, esp since Max is no longer the main antagonist but another guy just a part of the ensemble, they were written to have reasons to hate each outside of circumstance. While neither would admit it, they are very alike. Both are stubborn and insist on being gentlemanly, but are ultimately just massive dorks. Maxwell more the former and Wilson the latter, but Max is still subject to the butt of jokes by the rest of the cast and Wilson is literally called "The Gentleman Scientist". Both had ambitions in their respective fields but sucked at them, and when in a moment of desperation They took advantage of their desire's and offered them a trade. Max/William practices magic and Wilson science, and each insist that their. Methods let's call them is superior to the other. Their fighting is ultimately pointless, the world they live in is capable of both. They may be able to come to an agreement if they were to admit they both really wanted the same thing, knowledge. Knowledge is what drives the game; you may die and no longer have the tools of the previous sessions, but you have your memory. You can learn from your mistakes and get progress. Wilson isn't GREAT at science, but the mc/posterboy/protag is a scientist for a reason, he's as curious as the player is.

The main difference between the two is that William didn't get full understanding, his magic in the real world was all just a performance using something he didn't fully understand. He literally faked it so hard he became his persona. The extent that Wilson understands his knowledge isn't clear, but in his circumstance he has to use that to survive an environment out to kill him. When Maxwell is freed and has to live in that same environment, he does the same.

How much of Maxwell is William and how much is the result of Them? The extent of Them's influence isn't clear, but what is clear is that Maxwell would not have come into existence without Them. Every cast member has the potential to become Triumphant, not just from the potential to do evil in everyone but because They would enable that evil. Wilson's Triumphant skin is even a bloody three piece suit like Max's for Pete's sake. Wilson literally would of looked like Maxwell after taking his place. To swap the two would be to explore the worst aspects of Wilson, and William as his own character with less Them influence. What about their dynamic changes now Wilson is the one with more power? How then would they view each other? Would they still have that iconic slap fight gif or is William nicer/weaker than that?

I think it's neat :)

[navigatebetweenthelines]

Isn't it interesting how against each enemy Ranpo, Dazai and Atsushi each get to "keep" a member from the opposing side as an ally. Ranpo does this way more because he's the best but basically

For The PM:

Dazai -> Chuuya

Atsushi -> Akutagawa

Ranpo -> Kyouka

For The Guild:

Dazai -> Francis

Atsushi -> Lucy

Ranpo -> Poe

They're already doing this with the current antagonist. Dazai already has his eyes on Sigma. Atsushi and Teruko had a heart to heart 💕/hj. And Ranpo already did it with Mushitarou but it could be argued he's already won Bram over.

I'm too sleep deprived to find a meaning behind it but im going to say bc each antagonistic group represents an aspect of abuse when they accept and "reform" these characters it is symbolic of that aspect being "solved" by the narrative. Like how in order for Ranpo to save Kyouka he had to accept the risk of keeping Atsushi as well. That "people are still worth keeping around even if they could hurt us" is a theme that Kyouka struggles with early on. She is terrified by her ability to kill. It is because Ranpo accepts the harm Atsushi could bring that Kyouka goes down that path and begins to accept her past and herself. I think this theme of "By accepting Character B in spite of [flaw], Character A has healed that pain for the both of them" is also in every other pairing.

Talking about Ranpo AGAIN bc he's my favorite. But Mushitarou and Yokomizo are direct foils to Ranpo and Poe. Mushitarou is a personification of a reality where Ranpo not only failed to save everyone he loved but he actively contributed to their deaths. It's why he's the most vicious towards him. By not killing Mushitarou or making good on his threat Ranpo accepts the horrible possibility that he might lose people. It upsets him, clearly, but in order to move forward he has to trust them. Obviously Mushi is way more than just that, i mean figuratively it is one of the tools associated with him.

Also interestingly enough, other characters get these chances. It isn't just them but they do it the most.

[doom-dreaming]

for the ask game :)

🍺🖤💗🎉

🍺 who would you have a drink with? As the other half to the answer I already gave, I'm gonna say Chief, if only as an attempt to make him loosen up a little. Relax, big guy. Take a couple hours for yourself and enjoy the company of your family. It'll be okay.

🖤 least favorite Halo character? Hm. This isn't so much a strong dislike as it is an indifference? There are a handful of characters I don't like, but for this I'm going to answer Tartarus. I know he serves a narrative purpose as a tool and henchman for the bigger villain (Truth) and he acts as a good foil for Thel as he goes through his development arc - someone who is so blinded by the lies the Prophets are feeding him that he doesn't want to hear reason - but he falls flat for me. Especially against the other antagonists of the series, he seems the most basic and one-dimensional. He's just kind of. there.

💗 favorite Halo game? To play? Halo 2. On an emotional level? Halo 4.

🎉 share your favorite character headcanon Well, I started developing one for Fred the other day that I haven't been able to stop thinking about, but I think my favorite headcanon above all others is that John still has freckles and a tooth gap. It's cute.

[beevean]

You! You get it!

What was even the point of including Hector and Isaac, if you changed their delicate, equal relationship into “Isaac thinks Hector is a moron, Hector doesn’t even seem to remember Isaac exists”? Are they even foils of each other? In what way, “Isaac is a super flawless badass and Hector is a poor little meow meow”? :V

And I was so mad when I saw the flashback of Dracula manipuating Hector. Nevermind that it completely reverses the canon fact of Hector being the favorite (which makes his betrayal even more poignant IMO), but, there’s not a single person in the show that even respects him! Dracula, Isaac, Carmilla, Lenore - everyone seems to think of him as a useful idiot at best! And Hector really does nothing to dispel the notion! No joke, when S3 started with Isaac wanting to kill Hector, I thought “get in line boy, everyone already hates Hector, you ain’t special and you’re just doing this because the wiki demands it”. I rarely saw a character being so throroughly disrespected by the narrative.

(and if someone comes to me saying “oh but lenore does respect hector in s4″ i will bite them. see if i don’t. fuck that manipulative bratty rapist.)

I really liked the “I want to live” scene, I did. Maybe it’s because, despite all my gripes with N!Isaac, I can’t get enough of his VA and how he speaks. But I can’t get over how Isaac acknowledges how Hector had no agency in what he did. That’s not forgiveness, that’s a slap in the face - yeah, it took 2 seasons for Hector to actually do shit, didn’t it. And Hector is just like “oh you’ve changed” (yeah thanks for telling us, show. again. i didn’t forget how much netflixvania loves to tell you stuff as if you were as stupid as hector), but, did he even spare a thought about Isaac all this time? What is their relationship now? Are they even friends? Why should I care about Isaac’s feelings for Hector, when he went from “that idiot” to “fuck him imma kill him” to “oh right he was an idiot and nothing that happened was his fault”?

(I also can’t get over how Hector wanted to resurrect Dracula while Isaac was the one learning to move on from him... they fucking swapped the characters and everyone worships this Isaac that is actually Hector in disguise HATRED AND MALICE HECTOR WAS SUPPOSED TO BE THE ONE REALIZING THAT HE CAN BE MORE THAN A TOOL)

EVERYTHING NETFLIX FANS LOVE ABOUT N!ISAAC, THE COD MANGA DID BETTER 17 YEARS AGO. I AM READY TO DIE ON THIS HILL.

But then again, we’re supposed to feel sorry for poow widdle Isaac because the mean bad humans didn’t like that he was travelling with demons... which also gave him a convenient excuse to kill and build an even bigger army while still being “sympathetic”. So yeah. Bias all around. Hector is fetish material, Isaac gets to have everything he wants and gets the profound speeches. Guess Ellis didn’t find the idea of him suffering appealing enough :\

[macgyvertape]

FF14 Heavensward notes

Took me a month to realize its Heavensward not Heaven-sword.

I’ve given up on crafting/gathering classes. I don’t intend to keep playing after finishing the story in all the expansions and I don’t want to invest the time to level. Its getting tempting already to just watch the cutscenes for other classes instead of leveling them 

Its also nice to decide to not care about transmog hunting or saving items for glamours unless I know I’ll use them. When I played WoW during Legion I invested a lot of effort in glamorous and now I don’t even play that game.

 It took 5 months to get through HW, so in post expansion patches I gave up and looked up major Shadowbrings spoilers because I wanted to know why Greek gods are in this game? Ppl were talking about hades and I was wondering if it was a crossover with Hadesgame, but no it’s the same dude who shoots the cat boy who shows up whenever I look up anything about Garleans or Ascians. I can see why he’s so popular he’s peak “poor little meow meow” 

So know I know the overall shadowbringers plot directly related to skunk hair asshole and warriors of darkness so its nice that I’m not totally lost on cosmic lore 

Main Quest

Oh wow voice actor budget went up, and Alphinaud got a new voice actor who sounds bland

Ishgard is a very weirdy scaled city, everything is so tall and vaguely gothic and all the clothing fashion dates to late middle ages with Hennins and Henry the 8th style fur coats

Oh nice that we get choice in dialogue and can be sympathetic towards Iceheart. That she has the echo, is she like our narrative foil?

Haurchefant really is a bro, saving me from an escort quest then supporting me during trial by combat

Back to main storyline, time to go fight all those Crystal Braves we trained. A based plotline would have the message “this is why PMCs are bad”

Its really hard to judge Ilberd’s  “you’re being used as a pawn just like me” when like i have no idea of the stakes of the conflict I’m involved in, but I do feel like a pawn in the Dragon vs Catholic snow elf war. Also his accent in voiced dialogue took me by surprise

Told Auphinad “why don't we just leave?”, and i know it doesn’t change anything but i like to pretend thats why we are going to see Iceheart

We get to call Iceheart Ysayle now, which is great that we can travel with her

Breaking into the Hive quest is the worst quest yet, like holy shit it fucking sucks with how easy it is to pull too much aggro and how trash White Mage is at doing damage

Ysayle is the best part of this expansion, road-tripping with her

Heavansword makes the whole Primal summoning super interesting, if the dragon is to be believed summoning not the actual god but your biased perception of one. (After looking up spoilers guess all gods are fake lmao)

 Wow Ysayle having a crisis of faith and we just leave her there…..

So glad Lolorito gets voice lines as he explains his plans. What a smug conniving asshole, he's the most engaging antagonist yet and its been 1 conversation. Ilberd still asshole but barely not as bad as i thought that he supported a bloodless coup to get resources for his home country rebellion against the Empire. Sucks that I guess he’s being cast away as a political pawn

Whats the irl equivalent here for the Crystal Braves and them being used as a tool in a coup? They’re obviously a PMC but I guess the Syndicate plants was just a hostile takeover

Wow so the big twist were the Dragon brothers were swapping along eyes like its Naruto

Nice to see Estinien and Ysale team up since it seems the war was founded on bullshit, and just kept going by the Elf catholics trying to gain more power

The moment where my friend and I pause to talk about how attractive Hilda is. All that leather and those boots, its that feeling where I’m both attracted to her and envious because I want to look like her but that leather look is a lot harder to pull off irl

RIP TO Haurchefant, my favorite snow elf dude. “A smile better suits a hero” I’m gonna burn this whole ass church down, actually a very tragic death 

Like I am trying to follow the story and the characters but somehow the way it was presented and that I only play a few hours a week I didnt realize Fortemps and Haurchefant were related until the father was literally sobbing and saying son

WHYS THE EMPIRE HERE? WHATS ALLAG? WHAT HAPPENED TO THE DRAGONS AND YSALE? Like she seemed to be dropped from the story. Varis zos Galvus, I want to look him up but the wiki is full of spoilers :(

Fool me once with Nero in the Crystal tower shame on me. Fool me twice, Lucia is a Garlean that’s it time to be suspicious of anyone with any sort of bangs or headband

Y'shtola is back, the expansion has gotten better, and she has a nice outfit upgrade

Hilda is back again as we say goodbye to all the characters, wish she had been in more quests 

Ysayle heroically sacrificing herself for us, sad to see it happen and fuck the empire 

Doing Heavensword dungeon: I thought we had killed Lahabrea. My friend: somehow Lahabrea has returned

The part where the pope-king transforms, its comical how ginormous he becomes

Estinien becoming Nidhogg has been the most interesting thing for his character. I know he and Alymeric are fan favorites are fan favorites but I’m meh about them 

Are the ascians on the fucking moon?! Was this a much bigger reveal pre-Endwalker and all the moon's haunted memes?

“Warrior of Darkness” looks like bog standard scruffy dude video game protagonist. Is he meant to look like the generic scruffy guy from the marketing?

Great to see Thancred back again in a cool new outfit plus eyepatch! Lmao he emerged from the livestream bucknaked!

Aymeric is just fucking stabbed in the street! Drama

The rescue the hostages mission was the worst mission in a while, super long and really slow as WHM as it doesn’t let you heal the NPC way through

I don’t fucking trust Unukalhai because they’re wearing a mask, and I don’t trust Urianger because he wasn’t running around Ishgard with us (aside from the Ascian cutscenes the player sees)

Don’t think we’ll be getting Minfilia back from being bonded with the Mother Earth Crystal Spirit. Especially if she wants us to kill all ascians, have we never not been in a “holy war” aside from fighting the Empire? (Having looked up spoilers lmao)

Alphinaud’s really going through it 

Aymeric is asking us out for a drink, shame I’m meh about him

I didn’t like Emmanellain and that was before he ordered a protestor shot and killed. Punching Thancred while whining is like point of no return for like-ability

FUCK this grand melee, have to do this long ass fight over again because my healer can’t burst down the boss before he casts the party wipe spell.  He still cast it again on Very Easy but atleast it didn’t kill me

Can’t believe we just toss the eyes into the abyss and don’t do anything to destroy them. Lord of the Rings style i expect these to reappear since there was no volcano. LMAO less than an hour later and there’s some going to get those eyes

Aymeric wants a dinner date with the player, sorry buddy but your not my type

Rip to the scions but the Warriors of Darkness party has better fashion

Tragic backstory, LMAO alphinaud was just like “would your plan even work?“ and they’re like “uuuhh enough talking”. Somehow Uriangar with a bandanna over his face is perfectly disguised, from everyone but the player. Like its been years of IRL experience wearing masks that covering just the bottom of your face doesn’t stop people from recognizing you

Excited to finally see Yda and Papalymo

Urianger is such an over dramatic asshole (complementary)

The warriors of darkness are pretty sympathetic

So Lahabrea and Igeyorhm got sucked into the eyes and are still there? I guess Elbidius didn’t care to get them out, or couldn’t? Even spoilered on a bunch of Ascian lore I’m still confused 

Baelsar’s Wall dungeon: i liked Ilberd as an asshole character right until the mechanically complex fight where he went “sloooppppy” every 15 seconds. ╰（‵□′）╯

Nero shows up talking about Omega, congrats to you Mr 2nd Place Pathetic Loserman

Very relieved Yda takes off her mask and she isn’t a Garlean

Side Quests

The Dark Knight quest feels very edgy in a fun way, especially when Fray’s eyes glow red. At first I was like "oh dark knight like batman" then I realized edgier and more like Konrad Curze. Shame the class starts at lvl 30 it seems cool thematically and I do love wielding a giant 2h sword but I don’t want to level this class right now

I unlocked Red Mage, I like the style of it but there are a lot of buttons. The tumblr infographic was actually really helpful and I now enjoy playing it

I thought WHM was questline was boring, but now after doing the final lvl 60 quest I just hate it. It took me 10 min running around the caves to find the right spot and then it was just healing a dragon (flashbacks to healing a tree)

I love the Dancer outfit but the class abilities and playstile are super confusing

Doing the gunbreaker quest, and there are tiger-men? (Radovan) like my character is a human who has cat traits but this is more on the furry side where the tiger has human qualities

[entrapdaknation]

Mario's narrative role in Area 88

I frequently gush over my favorite Area 88 manga character, Hoover Kippenburg, but Hoover's story is entwined with that of another character, Mario Bandini. For a long time, I disregarded Mario as annoying, and scratched my head over how a soldier that unprofessional lasted five minutes in the Italian military. The more I thought about Mario, however, the more I realized that he serves as a useful storytelling tool. I think I finally understand the role that Mario plays in the Wolfpack arc.

First, Mario is a force of internal disruption for Area 88. He's an unpredictable, undisciplined soldier in the midst of an emergency where the mercenaries must maintain order among their ranks to survive. His antics adds to the existing chaos of the crisis, after large portions of the base have been destroyed, only a handful of Kfirs are left to protect it, and the tactics of Wolfpack are still unknown. With a few sentences, he undermines some of the pilots' trust in Hoover's leadership, at a time when the mercenaries must form a united front against Wolfpack. In short, he brings additional stress and uncertainty into a situation already brimming with stress and uncertainty. The question that always hangs in the air is, how will Area 88 cope with this dangerous wild card? How should we cope with wild cards in stressful situations?

Second, Mario serves as a narrative foil to both Shin and Hoover. Mario naively sees combat as exciting, whereas Shin understands that war is hellish. Mario came to Area 88 willingly and enthusiastically, whereas Shin was forced to be a mercenary. Mario is an attention-seeker who isn't nearly as skilled as he thinks he is, whereas Shin and Hoover are an adept fighter pilots who keep their egos in check. Mario is indifferent to death, whereas Hoover grieves over the deaths of his NATO colleagues and Shin is revolted by the killing he must perform. Finally, Mario thinks (and fights) only of himself, whereas Shin and Hoover grasp the importance of teamwork in combat. In essence, Mario is an example of how not to be soldier, a teammate, or an adult. If we behave like Mario in real life -- naive, narcissistic, individualistic -- we will alienate others, humiliate ourselves, and wind up mired in problems of our own creation.

The Wolfpack arc could have focused exclusively on the Wolfpack squadron as the chief antagonist, but by incorporating Mario into the storyline, the manga adds another layer of conflict. Area 88's threats come not only from without, but from within. Furthermore, Mario serves as an example of how not to behave in a chaotic situation, and how immaturity and self-centeredness never end well for the person embodying them.

[thyandrawrites]

After annoyingly long time it's so refreshing to get more clear indications that Dabi does care for the League and its members, even if he claims otherwise. I don't think I'll ever get over this.

PS. Thanks for all the metas you have written about Dabi. About 6 months back I was sure that he'd die but after reading your metas I realized it wouldn't make sense so thanks for giving hope that our favorite arsonist will get his his redemption^^

"dABi's IRRemdeemAbLEE eeeeeVULLLLL hE doESN'T cARe aBoUT aNYoNE oR aNyThiNg beSiDes hImSeLf REEEEEEEEEEEEEE" Then why did he help Toga then? It doesn't benefit him or his plan at all. Sure, he wants his plan to succeed, and in his mind, the plan is #1, but if he was sooooooo horrible, why did he even bother to go out of his way to do that for her? Maybe, just maybe, he isn't an irredeemable monster after all.

So it's 100% confirmed that Dabi's "I don't give a shit, fuck everyone and everything." attitude is a front. As soon as Himiko Toga appreciates him for what he did, he goes "It's not like I wanted to help you or anything." lol

three different asks, but I'm answering them all together.

Dabi does care a lot more than he shows it. This is a deliberate character flaw of his that Horikoshi has been writing with purpose. He's too self-reliant to warm up to the concept of needing others. This of course doesn't mean he feels 0 warmth for them. It just means he lacks the tools to be conscious about it.

I'm saying that Horikoshi writes this flaw with purpose because Dabi parallels his narrative foil, Shouto, in this.

Before Shouto received character development—or more specifically, before coming to terms with his fire side and accepting it as his own power and not his father's, Shouto used to be aloof and self-reliant to a fault, too. He fought alone, tackled problems and challenges on his own without caring if he was leaving his classmates behind, wasn't keen on communication until called out on it, wasn't friendly and saw people who didn't take him seriously as an obstacle in his way. All of this clearly mirrors his brother; they're both laser-focused on goals with no room for sentimentality. Dabi also takes himself very seriously, is a lone wolf, left the League in the dark for a long time, and frequently complains to them for being less motivated than he is.

What this highlights is not that either of them is unable to care, but that they struggle to see others as peers. It doesn't come naturally to them. They have to make an effort to be social, to hang out with a group instead of just hanging at the corners of one, or ditching it for their own purposes.

A big point of Shouto's arc was that he was always thinking in terms of "I" and never of "we." He almost failed that joint excercise with Momo because of it. He took the lead without thinking much of it, and treated her like an asset to their victory instead of a peer. This was not because Shouto was purposefully acting cruel or callous to Momo; he did it subconsciously, but still came across as aloof and cold enough for her to have an inner crisis and start doubting herself. Dabi is very much the same. He doesn't see the League as a "we", but often does his own thing and treats them as assets to his victory against Endvr. This clearly despite how much his action show true care for them.

Neither pre-development Shouto nor Dabi are actually callous or cold-hearted, but they still project that image anyway, consciously or not. This is more clear with Shouto. Once the ice prince facade melts off (figuratively and literally, since he used to wear ice as part of his costume, lol), Shouto is shown to be a lot kinder than he initially appeared. My point is, Dabi is the same, deep down. He just has far more layers of trauma to peel off before you can get at that kindness. Shouto had people in his corner early on since he enrolled at UA, so he moved on fairly quickly from that initial aloofness. Meanwhile, Dabi is still largely stewing in that simmering juice of trauma/denial/anger that blinds him to the range of his other healthy emotions. (Shouto used to be blinded by that hatred too, by the way. That's a big element in his backstory with Inasa).

But slowly, Dabi too is getting there. This chapter showed us the first deliberate step from "I" to "we". He made Toga a part of his plan, and that's big for him. it shows that he cares, yes, but he already did that, though admittedly in a lot less straightforward way. The novelty here is that this act shows that he's slowly starting to accept and extend help, without immediately fearing that stepping away from toxic self-reliance would label him as weak

[mayhem-ensues]

Scarlet Blaze thoughts

I will preface this by saying that Edelgard is my favourite Fire Emblem character, so if you're looking for a critical take on her or her routes, you are better off looking elsewhere. That being said, I did have kind of a big problem with the route, but that's more related to Three Hopes story in general rather than anything Edelgard specific.

I have to start off by saying that I was worried before the demo that we were going to get a sanitized version of Edelgard in this game and I'm so glad that we didn't (yet, I don't think it will now but the full game could theoretically still disappoint me in this regard). Her scenes talking about changing her plans with Hubert were my favorite scenes from the demo, in particular her line about miracles was so good and so right for her.

Also seeing Caspar and Linhardt's dads on screen was great. The whole chapter of Edelgard outmaneuvering Arundel and Ferdie's Dad was my favourite part of the demo and their realization that she'd already secured the support of the Empire's most important nobles was a big part of that.

Also Edelgard reinstating the Southern Church as a tool to use against the Central Church is such a great power move, and using Bernie's shitty dad as assassination bait is even better. Obviously in the narrative of 3H Edelgard was constrained more by having to act around the Slither's so seeing Edelgard get to take full control of the Empire was excellent.

Plus Monica is a fun addition to the cast, and the fact that she was already friends with Edelgard from before the game really emphasizes how fucked up and evil the Slithers are. Like, they really took one of Edelgard's only friends and replaced them with one of their own so she's forced to live with the fact that a friend not only died for her, but also that the Slithers could do again if they wanted to.

Also I have to say that I am very excited to see Rhea in the antagonist role without her Crimson Flower characterization. I think how she reacts in CF makes perfect sense (most people don't react well when they have to relive every single one of their traumas after all) but it does make her a way less interesting antagonist and foil for Edelgard than she could and should have been. I'm not getting my hopes up but I really do hope this game does have Edelgard and Rhea interact as enemies and explore some of their similarities and of course, their extreme differences.

If I have one negative and this is tbf, my biggest problem with Three Hopes as a whole so far, is that I think skipping through so much of the build up that is done in White Clouds is going to cause problems with the rest of the story and I think there are already some pretty clear signs of that in Scarlet Blaze. To illustrate my point, the fourth chapter of Scarlet Blaze is about the Empire invading Garreg Mach and I want to draw a comparison between said invasion in Three Houses and in Three Hopes.

The Invasion of Garreg Mach in Three Houses is probably my favourite chapter in the game. Byleth and the rest of the Black Eagles have spent nearly a full calendar year calling Garreg Mach their home, and now because of the decisions they made they must walk into their home as invaders. Not only that they also must fight people who genuinely trusted them, and who they betrayed. It’s an extremely powerful moment and the fights against characters like Rhea, Seteth and Flayn have genuine weight to them and the whole feeling is enhanced by the music and the performances from the voice cast and everything about it just works (okay except for not getting a proper cutscene to show Byleth going into their dragon coma.)

Three Hopes doesn’t have any of that. All the characters spent like a couple of weeks at Garreg Mach before they split, and Shez has zero reason to feel any different about fighting people like Seteth and Flayn than they do any other enemy. A moment that was impactful in 3H is being repeated here but stripped of all the things that made it impactful. I know we haven’t seen the battle at Garreg Mach yet because the demo doesn’t go quite that far, but I do feel like this is an instance where Three Hopes White Clouds speedrun is dulling the game’s story.

Anyway that's my thoughts on the part of Scarlet Blaze the demo gave to us. I'll post about the Deer and the support conversations a bit later.

[slugtranslation-hypmic]

Hihihi this is may be a weird question but is your opinion on the main hypmic cast?

In brief:

(Spoiler alert: It was not brief. Stuck under a cut for length)

Ichirou: He's a good kid. I wasn’t super into him at first, as main protagonists very rarely hold my interest, but I appreciate him now for the struggles he goes through and the growth he’s experienced across the series.

Jirou: Jirou is also a good kid in his own way. I didn’t know what to do with him for a while, but now I feel like I understand him too. I don’t think he quite gets what makes Ichirou be as loved as he is, nor does he really understand what makes people love him for who he is. But that’s okay. He’ll get it someday.

Saburou: If you had tasked me as a fourteen year old to create an idealized anime boy sona, I would have come up with someone shockingly similar to Saburou. I’m fond of him. He can be a bit mean at times in a very fourteen way, but deep down, he’s a good kid too. All the BBs are good kids.

Samatoki: I just can’t not make fun of him. His posturing is so ridiculous to me that I am constantly filled with the urge to clown on him. Oh, you think you’re so tough? You think you’re a big tough guy? Well, I’m just a little bastard; what are you going to do about it? But underneath the posturing, I do feel sorry for him and admire his strengths a lot. He’s a good kid too under a very funny exterior.

Juuto: I’m enjoying learning more about him from the BB/MTC+ manga, but I’m a bit surprised at how much of a dick he is even deep down. Still, he has plenty of good qualities too, and I like him in a vague sort of way. I’d throw fruit at him over a fence but wouldn’t put any malice in it.

Riou: What a delightful individual he is. The BB/MTC chapter about him really resonated with me. For a character so outwardly obsessed with the military, Riou has an incredible understanding of the weight of his actions and such a deep appreciation for every living thing. There’s a lot of his depth to his simplicity, and the level of care he exhibits towards everyone is delightful to witness. An absolute favorite among the cast.

Ramuda: Self-recognition through the other (derogatory). In all seriousness, Ramuda’s story arc and actions are great narrative tools for me to examine some things about myself and grow to try to be a better, more considerate person towards myself and others. I want to see him achieve freedom and happiness.

Gentarou: I enjoy Gentarou quite a bit, although I think he gets overshadowed by the other members of Fling Posse at times due to my sheer passion for Dice and Ramuda. He’s my favorite character to translate at the moment, which is apparently heresy among Hypmic translators. More than the sheer fun of writing his witty banter, I find him to be a very intriguing individual, and I’m excited to learn more about him. I want his happiness too.

Dice: Oh, Dice... He’s a really good kid in a way that the BBs could never be. He’s deceptively good, and he does choose to hurt other people and himself in ways that characters like Ichirou don’t. But he also finds the goodness in the oddest places, like a person finding a coin in a cracked sidewalk, and that’s delightful. His narrative is one of the most compelling for me. What a champion of a character.

Jakurai: Wow, what a good foil for Ramuda. Let me bounce narratives off of you like a mirror. I’m slowly learning to find him compelling in his own right, however. This is also a self-recognition through the other (derogatory) scenario, but there’s more of an emphasis on the derogatory part.

Hifumi: A funny little individual bearing a lot of sadness and a whole lot more courage. Like most of Matenrou, I admire him a lot, but I think that Matenrou resonates much more strongly with other people than they do for me, so I prefer to sit back and let other people appreciate them. I think he’s very brave and very fun to read/write.

Doppo: The biggest fucking mood in existence. When you move past the stereotypical aspects, you end up with another character who has a lot of deep flaws but also an incredible amount of courage. I’m excited to see where they go with him, but again, I’ll sit back and let others take the first row here.

Kuukou: Having already drafted Saburou, if you came back to me at age eighteen and asked me to make an idealized anime boy sona, you would probably have ended up with a character astonishingly like Kuukou. He brings me sheer joy. Astonishingly, I feel like Kuukou has exhibited the least growth out of any of the cast, and yet I do not mind a bit. He is the closest to the perfect man I have ever met. I would drop everything to be this dude’s homie if he existed in real life. Just a champion individual.

Juushi: Juushi’s a good kid. I’m very fond of him and like writing him, but much like Matenrou, I feel like he does a lot more for other people than he does for me. Therefore, much of how I work with him is less, “How do I enjoy this character as a reader?” and more “How do I nurture the traits about him that other people love?”

Hitoya: Hitoya strikes me as a damn good person with a lot of heart who sometimes lets his anger drive him a bit too much. He’s also utterly ridiculous, of course, but I try to write him with as much strength as possible to be present behind his words. He honestly seems like a great person to know in real life, not simply as a fictional character, as well.

Sasara: I have to clown on him to assert dominance. Joking aside, I admire the depths of his character and the growth he’s shown over the series. He can be pretty callous at times and goes to odd lengths to get what he wants, but I think he’s now starting to realize how much his actions affect other people. For a while I was really in his camp as a hardcore Sasara lover (back before he was a main cast member - I love writing quirky minor characters), but now I approach him with the idea mentioned above, ie how I can present him for other people.

Roshou: Whenever he’s around the rest of Dotsu Hon, I think he’s kind of an idiot. I mean that in the best way possible. It’s very endearing. Yet moments when he’s on his own are where I think he best shines, and I would love to see more solo material for him. He’s an incredibly good support character, and I admire his passion for his students.

Rei: I really enjoy asshole antagonists, which is why I liked Ramuda for a while before the clone story came up behind me and struck me into the ground with its mighty fists. Now Rei fills this role. I would love to learn more about him and team up with the Buster Bros to pelt him with rotten eggs in a fun bonding activity. I’m sure there is some strong backstory that will absolve him of at least some of his shittiness, but until now, I’m still not excusing his whole abandoning his children thing, not to mention the human trafficking thing he pulled with Ramuda.

Otome: I hate translating her, if only because she and Rei frequently talk about things in extremely vague terms that I have no context for. It’s hard to make her sound idiomatic in English while also not shooting myself in the foot by accidentally filling in the wrong information. But with that aside, she’s okay. I like her, I guess. Her motivations are pretty interesting.

Ichijiku: Ichijiku was written for people who are sexually attracted to women, and I’m not at all, so I 100% approach her in terms of her pull on other people. She’s fun on her own, though, and I’m impressed at her ability to walk in high heels. Her complete disrespect for everyone but Otome brings me no end of entertainment in reading and writing.

Nemu: YOU. Maybe this is some stupid toxic masculinity thing, but I always feel embarrassed speaking affectionately about male characters but not at all about female characters. Therefore Nemu gets all of my loveposting. She’s a wonderful girl! She has such a strong spirit, and I’m completely overjoyed that she’s making her own decisions and becoming her own character defined on her own terms. I want to watch her grow up big and strong. Fuck yes, baby girl! Fuck it up! I’m very proud of her.

[brooklynmuseum]

Closing out National Poetry Month, our Spring Interns paired some of their favorite poems with works from our collection. We hope you enjoy!

— Jeffrey Alexander Lopez, Curatorial Intern, American Art & Arts of the Americas

Image: Suzuki Harunobu (Japanese, 1724-1770). Page From Haru no Nishiki, 1771. Color woodblock print on paper. Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Peter P. Pessutti, 83.190.1

from Citizen: “Some years there exists a wanting to escape...” [Excerpt] By Claudia Rankine 

/

I they he she we you turn only to discover the encounter

to be alien to this place.

Wait.

The patience is in the living. Time opens out to you.

The opening, between you and you, occupied, zoned for an encounter,

given the histories of you and you—

And always, who is this you?

The start of you, each day, a presence already—

Hey you—

/

— Halle Smith, Digital Collections Intern Catherine Green (American, born 1952). [Untitled] (West Indian Day Parade), 1991. Chromogenic photograph, sheet. Brooklyn Museum, Gift of the artist, 1991.58.2. © artist or artist's estate 

Ode to Enchanted Light by Pablo Neruda

Under the trees light has dropped from the top of the sky, light like a green latticework of branches, shining on every leaf, drifting down like clean white sand.

A cicada sends its sawing song high into the empty air.

The world is a glass overflowing with water.

Consuelo Kanaga’s black and white photograph captures a dazzling, yet fleeting moment from everyday life. Three textured glasses cast shadows whose patterns are almost kaleidoscopic in effect. We can imagine Kanaga passing by her kitchen table, as she is brought to a halt to take a closer look at, and ultimately to photograph, the simple beauty generated by the play of light and everyday objects. The close-up scale of this image emulates the singularizing framing techniques deployed by Surrealist photographers, who also took parts of everyday life and blew them up in the photographic frame, thereby encouraging their viewers to look at life around us from a different angle. It is a way of saying: Here, take a closer look. Viewing the world with wonder, along with the joy that this act brings, are encapsulated in Pablo Neruda’s poem Ode to Enchanted Light. The speaker observes the way light passes through trees and creates enchanting patterns. He not only observes, but feels the beauty in the simple details of life, from the way light falls from the sky, to the sheen of leaves, to the buzzing of cicadas. Approaching life through such a hopeful lens evokes a glass-half-full perspective. In fact, the speaker is so hopeful that he believes “The world is/a glass overflowing/with water.” I think Kanaga would have felt the same way. 

— Kirk Testa, Curatorial Intern, Photography Consuelo Kanaga (American, 1894-1978). [Untitled] (Glasses and Reflections). Gelatin silver photograph. Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Wallace B. Putnam from the Estate of Consuelo Kanaga, 82.65.25

Easter Wings By George Herbert

Lord, who createdst man in wealth and store,

      Though foolishly he lost the same,

            Decaying more and more,

                  Till he became

                        Most poore:

                        With thee

                  O let me rise

            As larks, harmoniously,

      And sing this day thy victories:

Then shall the fall further the flight in me.

My tender age in sorrow did beginne

      And still with sicknesses and shame.

            Thou didst so punish sinne,

                  That I became

                        Most thinne.

                        With thee

                  Let me combine,

            And feel thy victorie:

         For, if I imp my wing on thine,

Affliction shall advance the flight in me.

Easter Wings by George Herbet and Martin Bach’s flower vase from the Brooklyn Museum’s Decorative Arts collection reveal the interrelationship between form and function. In Easter Wings, Herbert strategically varies the line length to create an image that enhances the meaning of the poem; when you turn the poem on its side, it resembles the wings of a bird, of which are symbolic of the atonement of Jesus Christ. In doing so, the author is not only telling us his message, but he is showing it visually as well. Similarly, the vase takes the visual form of its function. Its floral design amplifies the meaning of the object, as the vase is meant to hold flowers. In both instances, we see how aesthetic properties of a work echo the meaning and function of the work itself.

— Amy Zavecz Martin Bach (American, 1862-1921). Vase, ca. 1905. Opalescent glass. Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Alfred Zoebisch, 59.143.16. Creative Commons-BY 

I am the Earth (Watashi wa chikyu) [Excerpt] by Kiyoko Nagase, Translated by Takako Lento

I am warm, moist soil  I am a single supple stalk  I draw my life  all the way up into corollas of wild berries on the roadside 

I am amazed at  a breast of water welling  to flow into the inlet of a muddy rice paddy  I am amazed at  myself being  hot steam blowing fire and sulfur up  from the bottom of the great ocean, deep indigo.  I am amazed at  the crimson blood flow  covering the earth’s surface in human shape;  I am amazed that it swells as the tides ebb and flow, and gushes out monthly under distant invisible gravity … I am the earth.  I live there, and I am the very same earth. 

In the four billionth year  I have come to know  the eternal cold moon, my other self, my hetero being,  then, for the first time, I am amazed that I am warm mud.

The vivid imagery conjured up by Kiyoko Nagase’s poem is beautifully visualized by Emmi Whitehorse’s painting. The emphasis on deep Earth tones and abstract corporeality in both the poem and the painting really creates an intense metaphysical link between the environment and the self.

— Amanda Raquel Dorval, Archives Intern Emmi Whitehorse (Navajo, born 1957). Fire Weed, 1998. Chalk, graphite, pastel and oil on paper mounted on canvas. Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Hinrich Peiper and Dorothee Peiper-Riegraf in honor of Emmi Whitehorse, 2006.49. © artist or artist's estate

Seventh Circle of Earth by Ocean Vuong

On April 27, 2011, a gay couple, Michael Humphrey and Clayton Capshaw, was murdered by immolation in their home in Dallas, Texas.

Dallas Voice

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2

                                              3

                                       4

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     6

                                                                                            7

________________________________________________________

As if my finger, / tracing your collarbone / behind closed doors, / was enough / to erase myself. To forget / we built this house knowing / it won’t last. How / does anyone stop / regret / without cutting / off his hands? / Another torch

streams through / the kitchen window, / another errant dove. / It’s funny. I always knew / I’d be warmest beside / my man. / But don’t laugh. Understand me / when I say I burn best / when crowned / with your scent: that earth-sweat / & Old Spice I seek out each night / the days

refuse me. / Our faces blackening / in the photographs along the wall. / Don’t laugh. Just tell me the story / again, / of the sparrows who flew from falling Rome, / their blazed wings. / How ruin nested inside each thimbled throat / & made it sing

until the notes threaded to this / smoke rising / from your nostrils. Speak— / until your voice is nothing / but the crackle / of charred

bones. But don’t laugh / when these walls collapse / & only sparks / not sparrows / fly out. / When they come / to sift through these cinders—& pluck my tongue, / this fisted rose, / charcoaled & choked / from your gone

mouth. / Each black petal / blasted / with what’s left / of our laughter. / Laughter ashed / to air / to honey to baby / darling, / look. Look how happy we are / to be no one / & still

American.

Ocean Vuong’s “Seventh Circle of Earth” has persisted as one of the great, affective moments of poetry in my life since I first heard Pádraig Ó Toama’s gorgeous reading and discussion of it on his podcast, Poetry Unbound. I decided to pair Vuong’s poem with Mary Coble’s Untitled 2 (from Note To Self) because both works are urgently immersive into the violence and experience of LGBTQ people in the U.S., and for how each work uses text and physicality to address presence, pain, and erasure. Vuong’s poem is actually footnoted to a quote from a news article about a gay couple murdered in Texas. The page is thus blank, absent of text. The reader has to sink below the main stage, the accepted space of word and story, to find the voices of this couple and the depth of their story’s tenderness, eroticism, and utter devastation. Coble’s piece foils the structure and effect of Seventh Circle of Earth by taking what was subverted by Vuong—text and the narrative of violence—wholly to the surface. Her photograph captures her own legs tattooed without ink with the names of LGBTQ individuals victimized by hate crimes. I cannot help but think of Franz Kafka’s short story “In the Penal Colony,” in which prisoners’ “sentences'' are inscribed by the needle of a “punishment apparatus” directly onto their bodies. I was struck by how the curator’s note for this photograph describes Coble’s artistic endeavor here as “harrowing.” The needle in Kafka’s short story is indeed called “The Harrow”. The noun harrow is an agricultural tool that combs plowed soil to break up clumps of earth and uproot weeds and clear imperfections. The verb to harrow means to plague, and in the story’s original German the verb for “harrow”, eggen,  is also translated as “to torment”. Kafka and Coble conflate these definitions of “the harrow” in their respective works: they use a needled device, like the true noun definition, as an instrument of torment because of someone else’s idea of punishment and justice. Here, violence is brought to the surface, intimate in as much as we are brought right up to the artist’s skin and into the presence of her and her community’s pain. Together, one can see how each creator physicalizes their respective artistic space to tell the stories of LGBTQ people, of what is tender and harrowing, below the surface and written into the skin. 

— Talia Abrahams, Provenance Intern, IHCPP Mary Coble (American, born 1978). Untitled 2 (from Note to Self), 2005. Inkjet print. Brooklyn Museum, Gift of the artist, 2008.10. © artist or artist's estate 

To my daughter Kakuya   by Assata Shakur  

I have shabby dreams for you   of some vague freedom   I have never known.   Baby   I don't want you hungry or thirsty   or out in the cold.   and I don't want the frost   to kill your fruit   before it ripens.   I can see a sunny place  Life exploding green.   I can see your bright, bronze skin at ease with all the flowers   and the centipedes.   I can hear laughter,   not grown from ridicule   And words not prompted   by ego or greed or jealousy.   I see a world where hatred   has been replaced by love.   and ME replaced by WE   And I can see a world replaced                                       where you,   building and exploring,   strong and fulfilled,   will understand.   And go beyond my little shabby dreams. 

This poem is featured in Assata Shakur’s memoir, Assata: An Autobiography. It details her hope for a better world that  her daughter can grow up in. This poem is positioned in the book when Shakur is facing increasing prosecution as a result of her  activism and affiliations with the Black Panther Party and Black Liberation army. Being written more than 30 years after this picture  was taken, the poem summons me to think about the trauma that many Black women face and how much of that trauma gets passed  down to their children. The black and white photo of a mother and daughter provides a nice visual to the poem. “The image of a Black  mother and child sitting on their luggage reflects the little-discussed history of segregated transportation in the northern United States. Through the 1940s, Penn Station officials assigned Black travelers seats in Jim Crow cars on southbound trains” (Brooklyn Museum). The photograph of train passengers waiting outside of Manhattan’s Pennsylvania Station especially echoes the verse “I don’t want you  hungry or thirsty or out in the cold.” The overall optimistic tone of Shakur’s poem alters our relationship to the image as we imagine  the mother pictured above hoping for the exact same things

— Zaria W, Teen Programs intern Ruth Orkin (American, 1921-1985). Mother and Daughter at Penn Station, NYC, 1948. Gelatin silver photograph, sheet: 13 15/16 × 11 in. (35.4 × 27.9 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mary Engel, 2011.22.3. © artist or artist's estate

Crunch.  By Kailyn Gibson 

I retch as a mass of sinew lies between my lips.  The sensation is unbearable.  Fortunately, the jar of flies has gone missing again. 

Slowly, surely, and yet never sure at all,  the quiet of buzzing rings through the in-between. 

It is a symphony wrought from blood and bone. 

Saliva drips from bleeding, hungry gums,  And the crunch of glass echoes the grinding of molars.

If I proffered a sanguine smile, would masticated shards look like teeth?  Would they gleam just as prettily?  

The flies ring,  and the rot calls. 

— Kailyn Gibson Edgar Degas (French, 1834-1917). Portrait of a Man (Portrait d'homme), ca. 1866. Oil on canvas. Brooklyn Museum, Museum Collection Fund, 21.112 

Excerpt from Autobiography of Red A novel in verse by Anne Carson

7. If Helen’s reasons arose out of some remark Stesichoros made either it was a strong remark about Helen’s sexual misconduct (not to say its unsavory aftermath the Fall of Troy) or it was not.

8. If it was a strong remark about Helen’s sexual misconduct (not to say its unsavory aftermath the Fall of Troy) either this remark was a lie or it was not.

9. If it was not a lie either we are now in reverse and by continuing to reason in this way we are likely to arrive back at the beginning of the question of the blinding of Stesichoros or we are not.

10. If we are now in reverse and by continuing to reason in this way are likely to arrive back at the beginning of the question of the blinding of Stesichoros either we will go along without incident or we will meet Stesichoros on our way back.

11. If we meet Stesichoros on our way back either we will keep quiet or we will look him in the eye and ask him what he thinks of Helen.

12. If we look Stesichoros in the eye and ask him what he thinks of Helen either he will tell the truth or he will lie.

13. If Stesichoros lies either we will know at once that he is lying or we will be fooled because now that we are in reverse the whole landscape looks inside out.

This excerpt comes from Appendix C of Anne Carson’s Autobiography of Red, a novel in verse. A translator and classicist herself, Carson mixes fact with fiction in her unconventional retelling of the myth of Geryon and Hercules, beginning with a roundabout introduction to the poet Stesichoros. Autobiography presents a captivating example of recent Queer projects that take up Classical material as their basis. A fascination with the Classical past has pervaded our modern conception of sexual identity politics, down to the very etymology of the word “lesbian.” In this fascination, I see the same desire to capture Classical imagery as cultural heritage which has also pervaded American museums, albeit with significantly different aims. The fresco pictured above comes to mind, which passed through many collectors and was even purchased by the museum before anyone pegged it as a modern piece—not an original Roman fresco. John D. Cooney, a 20th century curator of our Egyptian, Classical, and Ancient Near Eastern Art collection, wrote that “the unclad and somewhat winsome charms of the lady [probably] diverted objective glances.” Both in the case of the fresco and Carson’s novel, the “unclad and somewhat winsome charms” of the Classical past shape and reshape our understanding of history.

— Kira Houston, Curatorial Intern, Egyptian, Classical, and Ancient Near Eastern Art Modern, in the style of the Roman Period. Part of a Fresco, early 19th century C.E. Clay, paint. Brooklyn Museum, Ella C. Woodward Memorial Fund, 11.30.

Late Fragment by Raymond Carver From A New Path to the Waterfall, Atlantic Monthly Press, 1989.

And did you get what you wanted from this life, even so? I did. And what did you want? To call myself beloved, to feel myself beloved on the earth.

— Shori Diedrick Brackens (American, born 1989). when no softness came, 2019. Cotton and acrylic yarn. Brooklyn Museum, Purchased with funds given by The LIFEWTR Fund at Frieze New York 2019, 2019.12. © artist or artist's estate

Jaguar By Francisco X. Alarcón

some say                                    dicen que ahora                  I'm now almost                           estoy casi extinto       extinct in this park                      por este parque    but the people                            pero la gente who say this                               que dice esto don't know                                 no sabe that by smelling                          que al oler   the orchids                                 las orquídeas in the trees                                 en los árboles they're sensing                          están percibiendo  the fragrance                             la fragancia of my chops                              de mis fauces  that by hearing                          que al oír the rumblingc                            el retumbo of the waterfalls                        de los saltos  

they're listening                         están escuchando          to my ancestors'                       el gran rugido   great roar                                  de mis ancestros

that by observing                      que al observar     the constellations                      las constelanciones     of the night sky                         del firmamento 

they're gazing                           están mirando at the star spots                       las motas de estrellas    on my fur                                  marcadas en mi piel that I am and                            que yo soy always will be                           y siempre seré the wild                                     el indomable

untamed                                  espíritu silvestre living spirit                               vivo de esta of this jungle                            jungla

While the author of the poem speaks about animals, their words can also speak on behalf of the erasure of indigenous peoples in South America. Much like the jaguar, indigenous traditions and culture are very important to life in South America. Despite their marginalization, Indigenous peoples throughout the Andes used coca leaves to help with the altitude. The use and cultivation of coca are criminalized throughout most of South America despite it being essential to indigenous cultures. This vessel was used to contain lime which would activate the coca leaves.  Much like the jaguar, indigenous traditions are also faced with endangerment despite being woven into the fabric that is Latin America. Through the opposite man and woman figures, the vessel shows the duality that is important to the Quimbaya people which is still relevant to Colombians today.

Aunque el autor del poema habla sobre los animales, sus palabras también comunican el sentimiento común de la supresión de los indígenas en Suramérica. Con la mención del jaguar, se puede entender en el poema que la cultura y las tradiciones de las personas que son indígenas son sumamente importantes para la vida en Sudamérica. A pesar de su marginación, los indígenas en Los Andes utilizan la hoja de coca para ayudar en la altura de las montañas. El uso y el cultivo de la hoja de coca fue criminalizado (penalizado) a través de Sudamérica, aunque su uso para los indígenas era vital y esencial para su cultura. Este recipiente que se utiliza contiene limón lo que activa la hoja de la coca. Similarmente al jaguar, las tradiciones de los indígenas siempre estaban en peligro aunque estuvieran entrelazadas en las telas de lo que sería Latinoamérica. A través del hombre opuesto y las figuras de mujeres, el recipiente muestra la dualidad de lo que es importante para las personas que son Quimbaya, algo que todavía hoy es relevante para los Colombianos.

— Jeffrey Alexander Lopez, Curatorial Intern, American Art & Arts of the Americas Quimbaya. Poporo (Lime Container), 1-600 C.E. Tumbaga. Brooklyn Museum, Alfred W. Jenkins Fund, 35.507. Creative Commons-BY 

[himikiyo]

autoclave // himikiyo analysis

this was originally posted on dra and ao3 back in summer 2020, but i’m crossposting it here upon request! this meta piece looks at himiko and korekiyo as foils within v3′s narrative and can be read as a tool to help in writing them (in a romantic sense or otherwise) or simply as a character analysis.

you can find the ao3 post here

although this is an old post, i’m still very proud of it and always seeking to introduce himikiyo to a wider audience so rbs greatly appreciated!

intro

so, this a blog i’ve been wanting to write for a long while. about a year ago (probably longer by the time this is actually posted), i wrote my ‘why i ship himikiyo’ blog. it was my first attempt to try to condense some of my reasons and feelings into a more organized format, rather than scattered over zillions of different conversations, posts, and so on. even at the time though, i wasn’t satisfied. i knew i probably wanted to make a follow-up at some point, but it wasn’t really a top priority.

now, after mulling over ideas for a few months, i’m finally ready to give it a try. in some ways, this is a sequel to ‘why i ship himikiyo,’ and that’s kinda the angle i’m coming from, but this isn’t meant to just be about romance or shipping. the original blog was a general overview on my personal reasons why it became my favorite ship, something i could link to people who asked me why. today, i’ll instead be comparing their characters, pointing out some similarities, and talking about their potential dynamic from that perspective.

as friends, enemies, or anything else, i think they have such a unique, fascinating dynamic, and as i’ve steadily talked to more and more people over the past couple of years who feel similarly, the more reasons i find. if this blog inspires even one person to make some content of their own, that would make me very happy.

getting to the point, what specifically am i going to be comparing? the main focuses are themes of vulnerability, control, and repression. in these areas, i think it could be argued that they serve as foils to each other, illuminating what could have been if himiko wasn’t able to move forward, or if korekiyo was. korekiyo is the dark to himiko’s light. just as she starts on the path towards real change and growth, kiyo is there to show the dangers of making the opposite choice.

please note that this blog touches on themes of depression, including a mention of suicidal ideation, and sister’s abuse of korekiyo is brought up multiple times, so take caution if topics related to that make you uncomfortable!

big chunks of my argument rest on the fact that this abuse did occur, but i don’t discuss the textual support for it at length, as many other people have already done so (and this blog would be like 2k words longer if i did). instead, it’s assumed that the reader already understands the basic idea that kiyo is an abuse victim. if you disagree, you probably won’t enjoy it much, and that’s fine. it’s not a point i’m remotely interested in debating.

aside from that, as always, this analysis is just my own interpretation!

emotional repression

first off, emotional repression. it’s true that many characters in v3 engage in this to some extent, hiding perceived weaknesses or undesirable emotions. a whole blog could be written talking about the whole cast on just this issue. unsurprising, considering the truth vs lies theme of the game. but once you dig a little deeper, korekiyo and himiko’s specific ways of hiding their feelings have more in common.

although many characters in the cast have ways of hiding their true emotions, like angie’s perpetual cheerfulness, kaito’s reckless confidence, or kokichi’s mischievous nature, they still do show emotion in some form or another. none of those three could be called stoic, that’s for sure. one way himiko and korekiyo differ from their classmates is that they both try to repress their emotions entirely, rather than simply masking them with other ones.

in himiko’s case, this should be obvious. her early apathy and struggles around learning to be more expressive form the basis of much of her character development. she doesn’t express much passion or seem to hold strong opinions on anything in the first couple of chapters (aside from her magic, of course). even after she begins bonding with angie, her comments about atua aren’t exactly *emotional.* she does draw comfort from having a source of escapism and someone else to make decisions for her, which i’ll be talking more about later, but her overall demeanor doesn’t change much. tenko and shuichi both talk about how hard it is to even interpret her facial expressions.

this is perceived by the majority of the cast as being pure laziness, and himiko’s own comments about things being too much of a pain don’t exactly do much to convince them otherwise. it’s not that simple, of course, but because it seems to be, pretty much everyone dismisses her as not being worth their time. despite how bad it must feel to be treated that way, himiko has no reason to try to change their minds. excessive laziness is a flaw, but not necessarily a weakness. it’s a choice — if that’s the reason for her behavior, she could do plenty of things and be successful at them, but she doesn’t feel like it.

the overwhelming depression and fear she actually feels, however...that’s a vulnerability that can be exploited. himiko is easily the physically weakest one there, not a good thing to be in a killing game. with her fragile mental state on top of that, she could be a very tempting victim. indeed, ryoma’s death in chapter 2 proves how depression and suicidal ideation can easily be taken advantage of. all of this was probably on himiko’s mind. she wanted to avoid seeming weak to others, but even more than that, she wanted to avoid seeming weak to herself.

distraction and escapism are very common coping methods. sometimes even just thinking about all the horrible things going on around you can be enough to crush your will to carry on. the more you bottle things up, the more it might feel like if you let yourself give in even for a moment, you might never be able to get it under control again. falling apart wouldn’t do anything to change the awful situation she’s in, and would, in her mind, reveal once and for all what a useless burden she really is. as we see several times, such as after she investigates rantaro’s dorm room in chapter 6, himiko is someone who desperately wants to be useful and have worth to her friends. this isn’t outwardly expressed much until after she’s developed, but it’s doubtful the actual feeling came out of nowhere. that desire to be useful was there all along.

one of the biggest examples in the first half of the game is the aftermath of her magic show. as the ultimate magician, her talent is her biggest source of pride. himiko mentions several times how her magic is supposed to make people smile and heal broken hearts. not only do most of her classmates freely ridicule her magic, her show is co-opted by kirumi for murder. it becomes the exact opposite of what she wanted to accomplish, accelerating her downward spiral and prompting her to give up even more control to angie. the student council is another chance to give herself meaning, and it works, but only for a while.

this repression and distancing from her emotions is also shown in her initial lack of connections to others. pre-development, himiko doesn’t try to get close to the others. if anything, she pushes them away. in both kaede and shuichi’s first free time events with her, she acts disinterested and makes no real effort to engage. likewise, tenko’s affection is entirely unwanted and unwelcome. himiko repeatedly makes it clear that they aren’t as close as tenko thinks they are. even angie, arguably her one friend in the first half of the game, is the one to approach himiko. angie is a very outgoing, controlling person, and that suits himiko’s needs at the time, but i don’t think they would have gotten close if angie hadn’t been the one to initiate it.

setting aside the extra variable of tenko’s pushy behavior, these examples show a pattern of fear and distrust. you never know who might betray you — if you don’t get close to someone in the first place, you can’t get hurt. additionally, keeping everyone at arm’s length lessens the risk of someone finding all the parts of herself she wants to hide. untethered, she’s free to ignore reality as much as possible.

korekiyo clearly has a whole mental health cocktail of his own, and is even more isolated. he’s not shy or antisocial — far from it. he likes to be around people in order to observe them, and doesn’t seem to have any qualms about contributing in trials or chatting with others, especially when anything connected to anthropology comes up. however, like himiko, he keeps everyone at arm’s length. he’s not really shown to be close to any person in particular. because of his sister, he’s likely never had a true friend of his own, at least not since he was a young child. the mere idea of it would be unthinkable. it would be a distraction from his mission.

by maintaining his role as an observer and his classmates as research subjects, he can both more easily fulfill sister’s wishes and separate himself from the real danger of the situation. even during the time limit in chapter 1, he shows no fear for his life, as if it all has nothing to do with him. though he does call everyone his friends before his execution, it’s not a sentiment that anyone seems to take seriously, and maybe rightfully so. it’s possible to have casual friends and acquaintances who you don’t know much about, but for a deep, meaningful connection to be established, some level of emotional vulnerability is needed. with kiyo, that’s never given.

while his affect isn’t quite as flat as himiko’s, he comes off as ‘creepy’ from the very beginning, and some of that is due to his calm, unruffled attitude. multiple people are disturbed by how casually he can talk about gruesome topics, and when his lab is discovered in chapter 3, shuichi is quite surprised by his behavior, emphasizing how unusual it is. both positive and negative emotions — his gleeful shouting and rushing around to check out all the artifacts and his threats to kokichi respectively — are openly on display for the very first time.

prior to the chapter 3 trial, both korekiyo and himiko are shown to lose their composure in relation to only two things: being able to show off their talents, and having things related to those talents threatened. those biggest interests are deeply important as sources of comfort and meaning, and they also provide a sense of control. however, nobody can keep things bottled up forever. there’s always a breaking point, and these smaller events hint towards the fact that they’ll each eventually lose that control in spectacular fashion.

this leads into my next topic, but before that, i want to mention one more detail. after korekiyo’s execution, kokichi says that “it’s not good to lie to yourself” in relation to himiko’s behavior. the timing was incredibly appropriate. the connection to korekiyo isn’t brought up by anyone, but in his last scenes, he was likely lying to himself as well — about his relationship with his sister.

it’s not uncommon for abuse survivors to minimize the severity of the abuse or outright deny that anything bad happened at all, because that’s what the abuser groomed them to believe. i won’t go into listing them all, but even with the series’ questionable track record when it comes to handling sensitive topics like abuse and mental illness, there’s plenty of hints that the situation was far from the mutual arrangement kiyo makes it out to be. unfortunately, he never gets the chance to heal and, as kokichi would put it, stop lying to himself.

not only does he die believing his own lies, everyone else believes them too. feel free to correct me if it turns out i forgot a line, but as far as i remember from the many times i’ve been through v3, with the exception of optional flavor text if you check places like his room or lab, korekiyo is never specifically mentioned again after his death. he’s the only one in the game this is true for (except maybe tsumugi but like. the epilogue isn’t that long.) even posthumously, he gets no opportunity for change. this is one example of how korekiyo’s stagnation acts as a foil to himiko’s growth.

behavior when upset

in the previous section, i established that both characters keep things bottled up in favor of projecting a calm, apathetic front, but when pushed to the limit, that control will slip, leading to emotional outbursts. digging even deeper, their mannerisms when those outbursts do happen or come close to happening share some similarities as well.

the most notable example is that they’re both shown to shake uncontrollably when distressed. in korekiyo’s case, the entire screen shakes too, and at one point in his breakdown, the influence gauge damage sound effect even plays, the only time this happens without the player actually getting something wrong. plenty of other characters are shown to have meltdowns in some form or another, kirumi probably being the most dramatic example, but kiyo and himiko are the only two whose sprites shake like this.

trembling or shaking is, of course, one of the major symptoms of panic attacks. feeling out of control, stumbling over your words, sweating, a sense of impending doom...as someone who has personal experience with panic attacks and how they feel, i see korekiyo’s breakdown as a pretty clear example of one. while himiko never has reason to reach quite that level of distress, and seems to internalize her feelings more than korekiyo anyway (eg her going totally silent and unresponsive vs him getting increasingly outspoken and combative), there are enough clues to suggest that she has similar tendencies.

it’s possible that part of the reason they both keep their feelings so tightly locked down is because of this tendency towards intense anxiety. a natural reaction to fear of losing control is to try to control things even more.

secondly, they both fixate on the supposed failure of an event instead of being concerned about the murder that just occurred. in chapter 2, himiko’s magic show is ruined by the discovery of ryoma’s body in the water tank. as everyone else reacts to that and starts investigating, himiko is mostly still focused on her show. she’s shocked about ryoma, of course, but most of her dialogue in the investigation is about being sad her magic show couldn’t make everyone smile and defending her magic. this carries into the trial, until the trick is figured out and she’s forced to agree.

in the next chapter, korekiyo’s dialogue in the latter part of the investigation matches up with that pretty closely. he feigns surprise at tenko’s death, but doesn’t even bother pretending to be that concerned about it, focusing on the seance instead. the fact that he can’t stop talking about the seance failing instead of the more pressing matter at hand is commented on and maki tells him off pretty harshly, much like how everyone reacts to himiko’s stubbornness about her magic.

obviously, the biggest difference here is that himiko was merely framed for ryoma’s murder, while korekiyo really did kill tenko. it’s possible that reacting the way he did was a calculated effort to avoid suspicion, and i do think that he was pretty confident he’d be getting away with it at that point, but i think at least a small part of it was a genuine attempt at maintaining control. knowing you’re about to be on trial has to be pretty damn stressful. even for an experienced killer like korekiyo, the class trial experience is not the same as something like evading the police in the outside world. the single minded focus, the small pool of suspects, the life or death stakes...all of that makes the killing game riskier.

both of them stay focused on a topic they’re intimately familiar with, and whose stakes are lower than the murder at hand. this is yet another tactic of denial and distraction, using the magic show and seance respectively to avoid fully processing (and potentially panicking over) the possibility of impending death. much like some of the other things i’ve already discussed, this is fairly common, and something i’ve experienced myself. when faced with something overwhelmingly distressing or traumatic, in that initial period of shock, you can find yourself focusing on something that doesn’t matter at all in the grand scheme of things, because that’s easier to cope with in the moment.

to make this a bit easier to understand, i’ll provide a couple of other examples. in my fic ‘the things that scare us today,’ himiko can’t stop thinking about how someone’s going to need to clean the blood off the counter, rather than thinking about how the source of the blood is the person she just caught korekiyo burying in the woods. or for a real life example, after i got the news that my mom died, one of the first things i started worrying about was who was going to help me do my makeup for the funeral, because i wasn’t very good at doing it myself yet. completely irrelevant compared to the fact that i’d just lost the most important person in my life, and yet that’s what my brain latched onto.

the fact that (in my experience) this sort of reaction happens most often when faced with extreme loss isn’t a coincidence. coping with death is one of the core themes of chapter 3 and korekiyo’s character as a whole, and one of the threads that ties him and himiko together.

next, my final example before i wrap up this section. this one is less significant than the others, but i still felt like it was a detail worth noting. korekiyo is one of the characters in the game who is never really shown crying (though you can hear it in his voice towards the end, particularly in the original japanese), and himiko is first shown tearing up during their last conversation, and full-on crying for the first time right after his execution. this marks the real beginning of her character development, and i think it’s interesting that such an open display of emotion happens right after the death of someone who shared so many of her unhealthy coping mechanisms.

(also the fact that she kinda started crying while they were still talking and she was telling him she couldn’t accept it [the case ending up like this] lowkey hints that maybe she’s sad abt him dying too but i said this wasn’t a shipping blog so)

self-soothing

now, how about the other side of the coin? the ways they act when attempting to prevent distress are comparable too. they’re both interested in aspects of the supernatural or occult, and those interests form the basis for escapist fantasies. when the worst happens and they’re forced back to reality, they each use the death of someone important to propel them forward instead of giving up.

korekiyo is incredibly vocal about his interest in seances, spirits, and all things macabre. some of the pushing for a seance is because he wanted to kill, of course, but he talks about it even before chapter 3. he can’t possibly have been planning the seesaw trick before his lab was unlocked, since he’d have no way to know the equipment for the caged child would be there, and yet he mentions performing a seance as early as the chapter 2 flashback light. this, coupled with the anecdotes about participating in them before, indicates that his passion is genuine.

this belief in spirits and communicating with them is absolutely crucial to his stability and sense of self. we as players can see that the sister tulpa is just that, a tulpa. she’s something originating from his own brain, completely separate from the actual person who died. but korekiyo himself wholeheartedly believes it’s his sister’s spirit possessing him, and this is what gives him his mission and reason for living.

he mentions that in the year between sister’s death and his own near death experience, he “nearly went mad.”

exactly what this might have entailed is up for debate, but it’s safe to say that if he describes it that way, he was far more erratic and visibly unstable than he is by the time of the killing game. he never mentions his parents or other important people besides his sister, and talks about traveling extensively for fieldwork, so it’s also a safe assumption that he had no support system for dealing with his grief. the comfort of believing she returned acts as an anchor, easing his distress and allowing him to, at the very least, appear functional.

his beliefs about death are also integral to his comfort with killing. contrary to some popular opinions, i don’t think he ever enjoyed killing. felt no remorse? yes. felt a sense of satisfaction in pleasing sister? yes. sadistic enjoyment in the actual act, just for the hell of it? no, i don’t think there’s any evidence to support that. he even takes offense at being characterized as a “bloodthirsty, indiscriminate killer.” whenever he mentions needing/wanting to kill, he specifies that he wants to kill for sister. korekiyo doesn’t strike me as an innately violent person. without the incentive of thinking it’s what sister wants/something he must do for someone else, i doubt he would become a serial killer.

by the time of his death, he’s killed dozens of girls and become desensitized, but he probably didn’t start out that way. most people faced with needing to take a life would struggle quite a bit. by fully embracing beliefs about ghosts and thinking that death is just a change of form and not really a bad thing, he could justify his own actions and avoid feeling guilty.

if this belief system was damaged, it would shatter him. not only would his rationale for killing be fake, he would have been doing it for NOTHING, and he’d have to grieve his sister all over again, this time with no hope of an eventual reunion. having “nearly gone mad” the first time, a second time would be even worse. this is all he has.

(maybe a bit of a tangent, but him hugging himself and other forms of physical self-soothing are also very obvious. this is meant to be indicative of the whole tulpa thing, but it also suggests that he’s very touch-starved and has probably gone without any kind of non-violent contact from others for a long time, even something as simple as a hug. turning to this kind of outward self-soothing in public settings where it’s likely to be seen as weird or socially inappropriate fits well with a history of childhood trauma, which can hinder the development of coping skills.)

himiko’s stage magic isn’t actually occult or supernatural, unlike korekiyo’s hobbies, but she wants people to see it that way. the game not exploring her interest in actual, witchy magic was a wasted opportunity in my opinion, but regardless, it’s not much of a stretch to imagine she likes it. her status as a mage and the power that comes with the abilities she insists she has helps keep her from feeling weak and afraid, as i talked about in previous sections. it pushes away negative feelings just like korekiyo’s beliefs push away guilt and loneliness.

when angie introduces her to her religion, that’s an even better tool for escapism. himiko doesn’t discard her mage persona, but she devotes much of her time and focus to helping angie and praying to atua. trying to convince yourself that you’re strong and powerful can be helpful, but giving up control to a separate, all-powerful being is even better. she doesn’t have to accept responsibility for scary decisions or fear what might happen. all she has to do is follow directions and atua will make sure everything’s okay. this is part of why cults can seem so appealing.

whenever those negative feelings start cropping back up, like when tenko interrupts her praying or when angie reveals that tenko betrayed the student council, himiko retreats back into that mindset as quickly as possible, deferring to angie’s judgment. it shields her from the full impact of everything going on.

just as korekiyo finds purpose in his mission to reach 100 friends, pursuing that goal above all else, himiko finds the motivation to help the other survivors end the killing game after chapter 3. she shuts down and openly gives up for most of the investigation and the early part of the trial, only finding her way after getting a couple of pep talks and taking on the responsibility of going forward for angie and tenko’s sake as well as her own.

himiko’s motivation from these deaths is a positive force. she grows as a person and helps the rest of the cast through the second half of the game, ultimately ending up one of the survivors despite monokuma and tsumugi trying to crush everyone’s spirits time and time again. her strength is adaptive, and far healthier than the sources of comfort she was relying on before.

kiyo’s motivation, on the other hand, is a negative, destructive force. stuck on a self-destructive path and unable or unwilling to find a new source of strength, he ends up essentially digging his own grave. he’s inflexible, prioritizing his mission over everything else to the point of actually hindering that very goal. he acknowledges that he knew he’d have plenty of chances to kill after escaping the academy, but couldn’t resist the temptation to go through with it anyway. with patience and self-control, he could’ve made it out and accomplished what he wanted.

personas for control

comfort and companionship aren’t the only purposes of the tulpa. her personality, likely reflective of what her real life counterpart was like, is more aggressive and controlling than korekiyo’s. for instance, she directly insults the other students and generally acts quite arrogant, in contrast to korekiyo consistently saying that he considers all of them friends and only lashing out when he’s panicked.

this is also why she only comes out when he’s in serious distress. as i’ve said before, it’s natural to feel the need to regain your composure and take control of a situation when you feel yourself slipping, but the more upset you get, the harder it is to accomplish. korekiyo’s abilities to control the direction of a debate and generally seem powerful rest on a rather delicate foundation. the moment that calm veneer is stripped away, it becomes obvious how unstable he actually is. he’s not used to being the one in control, the one with power. sister is. asserting control over others through aggression is a tactic of bullies and abusers.

i’d venture a guess that it might feel reassuring to be on the other end of that for once. he knows firsthand how good she is at getting her way, so maybe some small part of him actually hopes that coercing the others into voting wrong is possible. however, he’s not completely on the other end — sister is still clearly controlling him through the trial, and her primary reason for making herself known is to keep his behavior in check. this shows how deeply ingrained her manipulation is. years after her death, in a life or death situation that would make anyone panic, he’s still subconsciously punishing himself for not living up to her draconian standards. this can also be seen earlier in chapter 3, when his lab is discovered. after getting overly excited about doing a seance and shuichi refusing him, he apologizes. this is the only time the voiced line “forgive me, i lost myself” is used. the polar opposite of sister’s “apologize, apologize, apologize,” to the point that it would make sense as a reply to it.

in order to deal with intense stress or discomfort, he lets the tulpa deal with it. this distances him from the problem at hand and responsibility for it as well as providing comfort. by hiding behind and deferring to the judgment of someone he sees as wise and powerful, he can feel protected and taken care of. something that he’s probably never genuinely experienced.

we can guess that needing to apologize to her for any number of transgressions, including being visibly upset, was part of their dynamic. furthermore, korekiyo sees it as a good thing, a sign she wants the best for him. apologizing and submitting to her whims, making her happy, would then bring relief and confidence, and this pattern continues with the tulpa. giving control to get control.

himiko’s use of personas and other selves is much more subtle, in keeping with the fact that she’s on an upward trajectory instead of downward. it’s also more of a conscious choice. she knows she’s putting on an act. korekiyo represents what could happen if she goes on lying to herself for too long and starts to actually believe it. the all-powerful, universally revered mage is a fantasy version of herself that’s much more capable of solving her problems. if only she could become that himiko instead, everything would be better.

this tendency of hers actually seems to decrease throughout the game, but she still goes back to it when she’s especially rattled, reinforcing the idea that it’s a defense mechanism. for example, after she’s trapped in the hidden room and finds the secret passage to escape, she claims it was her magic that let her escape before continuing on to explain the real reason.

pushing negative emotions onto ‘someone else’ could also, in both cases, help fend off the possibility of rejection. if they never present their true, vulnerable selves, then any negative reactions won’t hurt as much. both of them tend to be on the periphery of the group. i’ve already discussed how part of this is due to their own actions of pushing people away, but that’s not quite the whole story. neither of them seem to be taken seriously by many people, and nobody really holds back when it comes to teasing or insulting them.

tenko is the only person who fully indulges and supports himiko’s magic. pretty much everyone else has at least one scathing comment about it, and people like kokichi and miu go much further with their insults, as they’re wont to do. she does grow closer to the others in the later part of the game, but there’s still a sense of distance that’s very obvious compared to, say, the training trio’s friendship. maki is still making snide comments to her by chapter 6, while himiko is clearly trying to get more friendly with her. part of that is just maki being maki, but overall, there’s a sense that the other characters don’t quite see himiko as being on the same level as them, something that takes until the very end to fade away.

similarly, hardly anyone seems to care when korekiyo tries to talk about his interests. people tend to be either creeped out, or generally resigned to yet another anthropology lecture. any talk about seances or the occult gets double the negative reaction. kaito and maki in particular are quite hostile towards korekiyo at times, though the worst moment of kaito’s was toned down significantly in english compared to the japanese dialogue. korekiyo doesn’t make much of an effort to integrate himself with the group, but why would he when it seems like nobody wants him around anyway?

it’s hard to say whether the group’s dislike bothers him or not. he never gives a clear indication that it does, and maybe he truly thinks it doesn’t. but deep down, there’s probably a great deal of self-loathing waiting to be unearthed. a sense that nobody could ever understand or love him, that sister is the only one who would accept him and care for him. his entire belief system regarding love and healthy relationships is warped.

post-trial wrap up

finally, here we are. the only place this building pattern of similarities could lead. the end of the third trial, prior to korekiyo’s execution, is the scene where everything comes together and his role as himiko’s foil is made clear. it’s an important scene for his character, obviously, with all the reveals packed into it. perhaps even the most important. it’s also one of the most important scenes for himiko.

after voting time, we get into the reveal of korekiyo’s motives. at first, it’s a pretty standard format — him addressing the group, with everyone getting a chance to chime in here and there. every blackened in the series does this. throughout, the focus of the conversation begins to narrow. this also happens pretty much every time — the blackened starts off by explaining the details relevant to everyone about why they did what they did, and then it becomes more personal. everyone else is still present, but the conversation is mostly with just one or two people. generally, these people are the protagonist and the person closest to the blackened.

individual trials have slight variations, of course, but this loose pattern tends to hold true. ishimondo, kuzupeko, hinanami, saimatsu, kaimaki...just to name the most obvious examples, all these very popular ships feature a heart-wrenching exchange before one of them is executed. regardless of how you feel about any given pairing in a romantic sense, those final moments are for very significant bonds. it would feel odd any other way. if you’re about to die, of course you’d most want to talk to someone you care about.

what would it be like if kaede reached out to someone like kokichi instead of shuichi? or what if kaito gave parting words of advice to tsumugi instead of comforting maki? it would feel weird and jarring. the scene would be confusing you instead of making you cry. close relationships are what we expect the focus to be on in those moments.

with that in mind, who is korekiyo primarily addressing once the focus narrows? himiko. it’s not as in your face as some of the other examples i mentioned since there isn’t as much of an established dynamic there, but it fits the pattern all the same. there’s no one else it could be. nobody is anywhere near as connected to him as himiko is. even if you say their only connection is the fact that he killed the two people she was closest to and leave it at that, that’s still far more significant than what he has with the others.

himiko is the first and most receptive to the idea of the seance, and participates most actively in helping him set up (she chooses the stone from the courtyard, chooses the room, and so on). she’s the only person kiyo directly goads and tries to provoke for no strategic reason whatsoever. she’s the one who pushes to hear his explanation when everyone else is content to have him punished as quickly as possible. everyone else is disgusted, but she’s the one who’s truly upset. the tension is palpable. this is the single most important relationship in the room.

hence why himiko is also the recipient of his last anthropology lesson, a piece of what seems to be genuinely well-intentioned advice. it’s directly in response to her saying she can’t accept it. she can’t accept the case coming to an end this way, can’t accept the unfairness of it all. she can’t accept angie and tenko’s deaths, but also, i’d argue, can’t accept korekiyo’s. not like this, anyway. though it’s rooted in anger and frustration, she wants more time.

she needs him, or rather, needs to understand him. she needs closure and acceptance, something that will let her keep going. she ends up having to find it after he’s gone, of course, and acceptance isn’t something that can be given anyway, but in some sort of scenario where he lived longer, she wouldn’t be able to leave him alone regardless. she’d be constantly digging and provoking, trying to get something out of him that would fill that void.

on some level, i think korekiyo recognizes that, and recognizes at least a few of their similarities. his morals are skewed, but he’s not a malicious person when he doesn’t feel he has to be. he doesn’t set out with the goal of hurting anyone. that’s just collateral damage. i don’t think he’d have any desire to make someone suffer the way he did, beautiful though it might be. so why not help her a little, offer a bit of guidance?

in his own way, he’s trying to teach her and reassure her. this really hammers home the contrast between their characters. the core traits that he serves as her foil for are coping mechanisms, especially related to death. he’s the dark, the wrong path that himiko must find the strength not to choose. what better way to emphasize that than essentially having him tell her so? he gives her his answer, all the tools that he feels she needs in order to come up with her own, and then leaves it to her. others can watch and advise, but himiko has to make a choice by herself.

bonus notes, or ‘i held back for 6k words, we’re shipping now’

if you got this far, thank you for reading! i hope it was thought-provoking and did more to show why i feel that their characters make each other stronger and are so deeply intertwined. if you want to stop here, that’s cool, i know this is a longass blog. but if you stick around, i have a few more casual/loosely related thoughts that didn’t make it into the main blog. a lot of them are more ship-oriented and/or fic inspo, so if any give you an idea you want to play around with, go for it.

(tho if anyone actually does use any specific ideas of mine, a link back to this post would be cool of you)

- they’re uniquely positioned to understand each other and work thru their trauma. i think any sort of understanding or tenderness from himiko would mean way more than from anyone else bc of all those connections. any kind of bond formed from seeing those similarities and just. being able to see each other as they truly are would be so special

- it’s not an ‘easy’ ship and that’s part of the appeal. it’s not simple or effortless. there’s always trauma and emotional baggage to work through. there’s always two different sets of walls that need to be taken down, even in non-killing game settings. there’s conflict and difficulty and gray morals and that’s some of the beauty of it. it takes work and determination to create something healthy and nurturing out of that and i think that’s what makes enemies to friends to lovers type dynamics so fun in general. the happiness at the end feels earned.

- kiyo calls himiko’s magic show fun during the ch2 investigation and that makes my heart warm ok? we stan supporting each other’s passions. relatedly, the singular dirty joke he makes in the entire game is directed at her and i just think that’s a fun little note

- himiko having to go past kiyo’s lab every single time she went to and from angie’s...maybe once or twice she stopped and they talked about magic or smth

- himiko is generally pretty expressionless at first, and obv korekiyo’s expressions are mostly hidden by his mask so like?? one of them seeing the other smile for the first time or smth small like that, and realizing that it’s okay to open up a little bit and nothing bad will happen? p l e a s e someone write a fic of that or i’ll have to just do it myself

- i tend to see them both as being simultaneously touch-starved and kinda avoidant of physical contact w most people so like,,, them eventually trusting each other enough to get that comfort? it kinda ties back to my point abt them being uniquely important/significant to one another. i don’t believe korekiyo needs to be ‘redeemed’ either to be a good character in general or to be ‘deserving’ of himiko, but redemption arcs are good shit sometimes, and she’d be an ideal person to help him w that in a setting where she’s already learned those lessons abt growth herself

- nothing says ‘maybe i cared about you’ like ‘your death was the catalyst for me crying so hard i passed out and didn’t wake up until the next morning’

- i thought nobody rly realized/talked abt them being foils (& i still stand by the fact that it’s not talked abt Enough), but literally today 6/6 i saw someone call kiyo himiko’s foil in the comment section of one of lucahjin’s videos on youtube & that’s what made me finally finish this fucking blog so i happily stand corrected

[wolfstar-in-color]

Creator’s spotlight: alifeincoffeespoons

It’s September and our fourth Creator’s Spotlight is here! We are so happy to share with you today the thoughts of a wonderful creator: @alifeincoffeespoons. We’ve rec’ed her fic Sirius and Harry go to Whitecastle here and we did the description for one of her artworks here (which includes the rec of some mitski songs!!).

As usual, here you have one of our favorite quotes of the interview, and under the cut you can read the full interview!

“Remus and Sirius understand each other on a level that few other characters in the series do. They have so many shared experiences and so much history, and there’s so many different ways to write them as a result. They are also foils, but somehow also a matched pair — they move in sync so easily.”

alifeincoffeespoons prompt: “It’s a rare sunny day when Remus sees Sirius, for the first time in three years, and he has to resist the urge to call emergency services immediately and announce that he needs to be hospitalized on account of a broken heart.”

Q: Tell us a bit about yourself

A: My Tumblr username is alifeincoffeespoons (inspired by Eliot’s “The Lovesong of J. Alfred Prufrock”) and I go by spellingmynamewrong on AO3. I’d probably be considered part of Gen Z, and I’m Asian-American, which inspires a lot of my work. I usually create works of writing, though I also dabble in fanart occasionally. I’m a fan of both modern and canon divergent AUs; I’ll write canon compliant content occasionally but not very often, given how tragic canon is. 

Q:How did you start creating in the fandom? What did you wish to bring into the fandom?

A: I started writing back in middle school, and I’ve been reading and writing fanworks on-and-off since then. My first work of fanfiction was for Harry Potter too, although I didn’t start writing for Wolfstar until later on. I want to write works that make people think more deeply about — and even critique — the existing world of Harry Potter. There are a lot of deeply problematic aspects of the original work, as we all know, and I think we have an obligation as creators to call them out and demonstrate why they are so problematic.

Q: What things about Sirius/Remus as characters or in their relationship inspire you to create around them?

A: Remus and Sirius understand each other on a level that few other characters in the series do. They have so many shared experiences and so much history, and there’s so many different ways to write them as a result. They are also foils, but somehow also a matched pair — they move in sync so easily.

Q: What things would you like to highlight about the Wolfstar fandom and your experience in it?

A: It’s such an expansive fandom! That’s one thing that’s dawned on me over time — it has so, so much history, and so many individuals are or have been involved in it. 

Q: What type of content do you wish you saw more in the fandom?

A: I’d love to see more content that deals with the historical circumstances of the wider world around them — I’m a big sucker for historical fiction and real-world context. If we’re going for a particular sort of story, I’d love to see more superhero AUs. Also, a Good Omens AU. I saw fanart for it once and it’s never left my mind. There are so, so many possibilities there. 

Q: What is your favourite wolfstar fan content (fic/fanart/gifset/etc) and how does it inspire you?

A: This is so hard to choose! Let’s go with some tropes instead — I love fix-it fics, and I also find canon divergent AUs very interesting, particularly ones that involve giving Harry a better life. I’m also a big fan of Modern AUs, though. I also love humor — whether that be a full-on humor fic or just one with humor interspersed lovingly throughout.

Q: Which of your own identities inform your creative processes? How has that process been for you?

A: My Asian-American identity likely informs my creative process the most. There are so few Asian characters represented in media still, particularly fan-created content, and I’d like to see that changed. What I usually do is incorporate small details that can feel universal but also give readers an insight into a particular culture — usually through food or similarly common experiences. It comes fairly naturally, actually, since I often write about Asian or Asian-American characters in my original fiction as well.

Q: What advice do you have for other content creators with diverse backgrounds in the fandom? What would you say to people that might feel they don’t have the “right” experience to participate in the creation of content related to Wolfstar?

A: If you’re comfortable, definitely share your experiences — we always need more diverse voices in fandom. I don’t think there’s any particular history or characteristic you need to be an active participant in Wolfstar fandom. 

Q: How could we build a more diverse fandom?

A: Firstly, by seeking out and supporting content that features characters with diverse backgrounds. Secondly, by calling out rhetoric that marginalizes diverse creators. Thirdly, by doing our best to do better ourselves.

Q: What’s your favorite thing to modify in Sirius’s or Remus’s characterizations to bring new perspectives to them?

A: I’ve often written Sirius as Asian, mostly because I think it truly does add another layer to his characterization. I’ve explained some of my reasoning behind that in this Tumblr post I wrote eons ago. I often also write Remus as Jewish — I saw this headcanon a long time ago and it’s stuck with me since. My characterizations of them are always shifting, though, and I’m sure they will continue to over time.

Q: What does diversity mean to you? What does that encompass in fannish spaces?

A: Diversity doesn’t just mean including a POC in your work or an LGBTQ character; it means giving them meaningful, non-stereotypical narratives and characterization. In fan spaces, that means supporting creators from diverse backgrounds and works featuring well-written, diverse characters. It also means, as a creator, doing research on the cultural backgrounds of characters you are writing about, particularly if you do not belong to that culture yourself.

Q: Is there a resource you would recommend for fans to read when it comes to learning about diversity?

A: If you’re interested in learning more about Asian-American culture and diversity in particular through literature, two memoirs I read recently and enjoyed were Cathy Park Hong’s Minor Feelings and Michelle Zauner’s Crying in H-Mart. I think they give insight into the Asian-American experience and are also incredibly moving. There are lots of resources for writing out there, on Tumblr, Reddit, and elsewhere. Also, sensitivity readers, if you are a writer, are critical. 

Q: Is there a project/organization that you want to hype?

A: Given what’s been happening in Texas and in countless other states across the U.S. — horrific attacks on bodily autonomy and the right to choose — please donate to Planned Parenthood.

Q: Any cause that you want fans to know about so that they can support it?

A: Rental assistance — the Supreme Court recently struck down Biden’s eviction moratorium. If anyone you know is at risk of being evicted, please direct them to local and state rental assistance programs (a tool to search for them: https://www.consumerfinance.gov/coronavirus/mortgage-and-housing-assistance/renter-protections/find-help-with-rent-and-utilities/).

Q: Leave us with a quote or work of art that always inspires you.

A: Whenever I need to write, I’ll put on a Phoebe Bridgers song if it’s a sad section I’m writing, and if it’s a relatively happier section, I’ll put on a NIKI song. Other artists that inspire me: Mitski, Lorde, Lucy Dacus, Taylor Swift, Lily Allen, and Lizzo.

[createandconstruct]

What are your thoughts on Kuja? In my opinion he is one of the best antagonists in the final fantasy series because he goes through some character development during the story and one can understand his motives

Another FFIX ask! And it's Kuja related!! First I have to admit I've only played FFVII, FFVIII, FFIX, and FFX, so I don't have the full scope of FF antagonists. From what I've played of the series Kuja is definitely one of my favorites so far. His development and motives contribute to that but I think what I like most about Kuja is that he's not the "Main villain" or "Final Boss" in terms of the game or its narrative. He's just another tragic cog in the machine of life, war, and death that has plagued Gaia for centuries.

The game appropriately pulls the rug out from under you multiple times to reveal the greater antagonist - which is immediately a trend for RPGs - but the way in which it is done in FFIX fits well with its portrayal of perpetrators of war. There is never just one "man." FFIX sets up Brahne as the "main antagonist" when you first begin. She's the evil queen trying hard to foil your adventure and the princess' escaping escapades. You soon learn however, that Brahne isn't simply fun and games, Garnet is leaving the castle to try and prevent the woman from starting a war. Brahne is creating and enslaving an entire race to serve as soldiers just for this pursuit for power, which she calls greed. But then you meet Kuja who the characters quickly identify as the one "pulling the strings" of war. He feeds Brahne's hunger for power and enables her by helping her obtain the eidolons to use as weapons of mass destruction, committing genocide against the Burmecian and Cleyrans. Thus, Kuja is hit with the spotlight as the one responsible for the black mages creation and their manipulation, and the one responsible for enabling and equipping Brahne with the weapons she desired. Note: Kuja’s actions do not remove responsibility from Brahne but just prove that she was just another pawn in someone else’s quest for power.

Yet Kuja is not at the top of the food chain. He has his own motives for obtaining power, as, due to his inability to trance, he feels he does not have enough. Disc 3, really had me spinning in my head the first time I played when we, the audience, are given a wider scope to learn of Garland (beyond the main characters) and find that once again, there is someone else playing puppet master of the Gaian wars and tragedies. Brahne is to Kuja what Kuja is to Garland. Puppets for their greater goals. And yet we keep going deeper because even Garland is a tool created by the Terrans in their desperate, unachievable goal of immorality - probably the greatest form of power a living creature could achieve. Though, the quest for power, no matter the nature of said “power,” is shown to always end in ruin and more importantly, regret.

Brahne dies, gaining a clear mind in her final moments realizing only then that her true happiness was enjoying peaceful days with her husband and adoptive daughter. No amount of power would return those days to her. Garland realizes he has failed in the quest for Terra and has allowed Kuja to become powerful enough to destroy Gaia - the planet that holds the only remains of his creators' planets. Garland dies asking Zidane to stop Kuja, unable to do nothing himself, failing in the end after a millennium of work. Interestingly, Amarant is the only one able to break this cycle because he accepts his weaknesses and the help of others. Learning to live besides those he'd viewed as weaker and insignificant. Because of this he ends his quest for power that he's being following using violence before it ends in regret and ruin.

Unfortunately, even after witnessing the fates of Brahne and Garland before him, Kuja only mocks them and denies the eventuality that death will come for him as well. When told straight out by Garland he is going to die, the idea that after all he has done, all the power he has accumulated, he will disappear, the world continuing on without him - he breaks. The end of the game is a true depiction of the worst an individual's fear of death can bring. After my first playthrough and some life experiences, when I replayed the game Kuja's breakdown at the end really hit me. Everyone has the realization at some point that after their death the world will continue on without them. Whenever we die, the people we love will continue living; there will be music, books, art, movies, and media we will miss and never experience; the world will continue going and changing without us. That realization, when you have it the first time, can numb you - especially when you don't have a healthy mind set or support system. Which is exactly what happens to Kuja. He is hit by the closing door of his mortality and so he does the only thing he can in his fear - close the door on everyone else so he doesn't have to go alone. Because that's what he's truly afraid of.

Which is why, Zidane's act of kindness at the end, simply sitting with Kuja as he passes, is probably one of most significant acts in the game and a closing message on how to overcome the fear we all have for the inevitability and loneliness of death. Simply put: do not be alone.

Kuja's end is the best one he could have had given his circumstances and actions. He passes with regrets and awareness of the tragedy and horror he has inflicted upon the world and people, but at least when he does go, he is not alone. I guess that's why he's a great antagonist to me.

Also, Darkness of Eternity is such a freaking jam. 11/10

[smallkyubey-archive]

GIMME AN ANALYSIS ON YOUR FAVORITE WH CHARACTER it can be as in-depth as you want, whether it's an essay or just a few sentences

OKOKOK this is gonna have spoilers for basically up until sirius' conclusion so to anyone who doesn't wanna see those just close ur eyes and scroll past please :]

he isn't my favorite character or even favorite human by any means but i think ashe is a really interesting character!!! especially in the ways he interacts with other characters, specifically noel and claire

in claire's case, he tries to get close to her from day one, and later when he kills her at the end of his scenario, you learn that he intentionally stayed with her because she thought she was dumb enough to be manipulated (and in a way he was right, he started screaming at her door that wilardo was after him and she let him in no questions asked!!)

it's later revealed that she reminds him of lillia (her younger sister) and really it's not just personality, claire's younger self looks INCREDIBLY similar to her. also i think this is part of the reason it's why ashe agreed so quickly to making a "shortcake utopia" with claire in wilardo's scenario (also considering lillia died when ashe was out buying shortcake for her..)

also it's super interesting to me that in sirius' route (when wilardo gets his hands on the witch's heart first), ashe hardly questions the deaths of sirius/claire/possibly wilardo and leaves the mansion instead, probably hoping to find the heart elsewhere! for someone who's so goal-driven it was surprising to me that he was just like "huh. well claire has a hole in her chest and three people are dead/missing. anyway the door is open now, i'm gonna go!"

he and wilardo both want their wish bad enough to kill for it, but they both have different methods- wilardo just killed people easily, he shot sirius and claire without a second thought and got his wish. on the other hand, ashe has:

-knocked wilardo out, stolen his gun, and cried until claire opened her room's door to help him (where he then shot her)

-broken into sirius' room in the middle of the night just to read the books in the back of sirius' room

-slept in sirius' room with him just to kill him in the middle of the night

-cut sirius' head off, disguised sirius' corpse as his own/essentially faked his death, and then snuck past noel/wilardo just to kill claire while she was asleep

he also refuses to eat any food he hasn't seen somebody else try a bite of first, and at one point claire makes breakfast and he immediately claims he feels sick/goes back to his room to hide there instead of eating something he didn't cook himself.

the stuff with him and noel starts becoming really obvious in the bonus stage/sirius' conclusion, i'd even argue they're narrative foils of each other- noel says it himself! in the end, they have the same wish (to reverse time and bring back a dead loved one) and noel acknowledges that if he told ashe to give up on that wish, it'd essentially be telling him to accept the reality that his family is dead (or in noel's case, that claire is dead, which he's reversed time thousands of times to prevent)

at the end of sirius' conclusion ashe also compares himself to noel's father, and ashe genuinely believes that he is no better than nicholas. it's pretty easy to overlook but nicholas also says this

the last line is what stands out to me, at numerous points ashe tells himself that "you lose if you worry, you lose if you hesitate" and that he has to convince himself to be "a heartless demon" if only for the time it takes him to kill claire and achieve his wish. he truly believes he's an awful person and thinks everything good he's done was just an act of getting closer to people, stating that "you can do good things without being a good person."

obviously noel doesn't believe this, and the thing is, neither he nor claire can really believe ashe is a bad person (even when noel knows he's an enemy and claire knows that ashe has killed her over 4,000 times)

even at the end of sirius' conclusion ashe is still set on his goal, when he wakes up and the mansion is gone, he briefly considers killing claire. he imagines her as a faceless demon, a "tool" to grant his wish, and the only thing that makes him stop and reconsider is when he remembers noel's words and imagines lillia in claire's place instead. he drops his weapon and doesn't even stick around for the rest of the group to wake up.

i think if he had died in the mansion and/or never gotten the speech from noel, he could've become a hater demon- if his hatred for humanity was so strong he went out of his way to kill multiple people for his wish and struggle to do so even when he was near death, i think he would qualify to be one.

also i think the parallels between him and charlotte are interesting too, even if you don't get to see much of them- for her, she was only able to kill people because they saw her and hesitated, while ashe has the whole "you lose if you hesitate" thing. considering she's his associated demon i don't think it's entirely coincidental!

sorry this went off topic/wasn't really an analysis of my favorite but i just think he's neat :]