#I NEED MORE PPL TALKING ABOUT THE AFTERMATH OF THE FINAL BATTLE......

[brainrot-stitch]

Chat. Wiwi headcanon time (spoilers btw!!)

He's smart, we know this. He's perceptive, if u will. Imagine him investigating the wisps, moving through the dark forest of dead, clawing trees. Following these blue flickers of light, each time he gets close to one is flicks out and another appears later in the path. He gets to the cliff and reaches towards the will o wisp in the sky, the only one so far thats let him get this close, but stops as he feels himself teeter on the edge. He sees the cliff, realizes the danger of being this far out, and goes to take a step back. Before he can tho, he feels a gust of wind against his back, just enough to cause him to stumble.

And he falls.

Just imagine

William Wisp didn't trip.

They pushed him.

Anyways he's also a silly billy and has wild fucking ptsd from being literally torn apart by the trickster ok bye (I did it I finished pd I'm I'm shambles rn)

Wait not.ok bye I'm back hiii ok I'm a big fan of the hc that will smokes

Like it's just silly and I have my reasons

Also after everything. Like the final battle. An unconscious nervous habit he'd pick up would just be like crossing his arms over his chest/stomach

Would make him feel a bit more safe in a way. Less vulnerable. Less like he's about to be torn in fucking two

Ok now byebye actually yall might get more headcanons later who knows

[percyjacksonfan3]

The Last Olympian Thoughts

So because I have absolutely 0 self-control or restraint when it comes to this series and its characters, and for The Last Olympian in particular, I could not put TLO down. Because of this I figured I couldn’t do the usual photo reaction posts I have been so far, because the spam would just be ridiculous, so I am stealing the idea from @yourstrulytaaay​ to do a masterpost instead. (Adding a Read More cause this got ridiculously long)

Fun fact, TLO came out right after i finished reading the series for the first time so it's the first PJO book i bought  and my only hard cover one for the og series. I checked the year and turns out it was published 2009, which means i was actually 9 when i read the series for the first time. I realize this is not really a fun fact but i thought i was older when I first read the series so it's blowing my mind a little ‘cause now I’m 21 and everything hits different and i still have so much love for this series and the characters Okay onto book thoughts: - i was right that this book is gonna destroy me, the first line alone made me so excited and nostalgic it's ridiculous - I love Rachel and Percy sm tbh. Her being a bit of peace and normalcy in his life without always reminding Percy of who and what he is is so good for him. Just a little escape

- of course by the end of the book that's not the case any more but by the end he's lived his prophecy so he doesn't need it as badly, plus he and Annabeth are solid again - Percy saying Annabeth has been hard to be around lately... Ouch my heart. Luke really is the last thing that keeps them from being together and Percy is so jealous and Annabeth so torn and in pain, i feel so bad for them both

- Beckendorf 🥺🥺 - the telkhine with the Lil Demon lunchbox!! I forgot about him. Percy: 'i left him alive, partly because his lunchbox was cool' is one of my absolute favourite lines tbh - Paul taking Percy crabbing and being imperative in helping Percy kill the giant crab 💖 Paul Blofis is important and deserves the world, okay? - aw Percy, you can't save every demigod bb

- 'i had to fight him eventually. Why not now?... What difference would a week make?' Oh Percy you have no idea - real talk tho, the fact Kronos possessed Luke's body would also mess me tf up. Percy keeps forgetting it's not Luke anymore and yeah, that would be so so hard and confusing af, like what another smart little mind game for Kronos to pull on top of everything else - the fact Percy fights Kronos before getting the Achilles Curse and actually doesn't die within seconds is... Astounding. He kicks him in the chest! And yeah Kronos is weaker and still adjusting to Luke's body, but Percy is having trouble fighting Luke cause they used to be friends - Percy breaks Kronos' time magic!! Like?! Boy is POWERFUL.

- OUCH - honestly Luke, Thalia and Annabeth's family breaking the way it did... Don't talk to me. Poor Annabeth, Luke betrayed them, Thalia joined the Hunters because of Luke's betrayal so she's pretty much AWOL all the time and then Luke dies. Like Rick wtf, my heart can't take it? -Percy and Tyson having each others backs when talking to Poseidon in the underwater palace is the brother-brother relationship we love to see - Percy trying to stick a sand dollar in the vending machines at school 🤦🏻‍♀🤦🏻‍♀ - the whole underwater interaction at Poseidon's palace? Perfection. Awkward family drama and all - Connor falling out of the tree when he sees Percy because he's so excited 😂😂

- 😭💖

- k, ik Clarisse isn't perfect but tbh if i was a child of Ares whose father was disrespected and hated by my fellow campers (ares deserves it but still) and that disrespect trickled down to how the other campers treated ME (which if Percy is reliable here, it obviously does) then i would also be irritated at being used for muscle and nothing else? And just expected to fight with the people who act as if they'd rather not have Ares kids around the rest of the time. Like Clarisse isn't totally wrong - Percy reading the prophecy, seeing he's meant to die and just being like 'i do not see it' and refusing to outright think about it makes me so sad for him - (but it taints every action after and he's super reckless afterwards bc of it- including finally breaking and accepting the Achilles Curse) - (also him taking this as the last straw and finally beginning to show Annabeth how he really feels, cause fuck it, he's dying anyway) - Give me more info about Rachel's backstory and family Rick!! -  how did i forget Percy willingly eats chocolates that taste like cardboard because 'i didnt have anything against cardboard' like sir? Ik Silena didn't want them but still? - 'she'd always been cute, but she was starting to be seriously beautiful' STOP, MY HEART CAN'T TAKE IT - Percy staring at Annabeth and forgetting what they're talking about cause hes so distracted 👌🏻

- hmm yeah... For some strange reason.... - i forgot how Percy totally bombs this convo bw them and now want to cry 😭 Annabeth is trying to talk about what's important and Percy, you sweet oblivious man, you're shooting her down without even realizing - love that they're both on the same wavelength tho. Percy two lines before, hmm it's cool to date ppl from other cabins, wonder why im thinking that around Annabeth, my best friend in the world, and then Annabeth a beat later, hmm, let me bring up Silena and Beckendorf and how it's important to be with the people you love when you have the chance, no way Percy will miss this huge hint right? - they're the best - k i honestly forgot Percy full on physically intimidates Leneus like that - luke telling his mom if he ran away the monsters wouldnt get her..i can just imagine luke crying when he says good bye before running away because he thinks it's his fault his mom is like that and he cant take care of and protect her anymore because it's too hard - uh oh now i have angsty pre-lightning thief luke fic inspo... Him, Thalia and Annabeth on the run... The ANGST -  Rick holds absolutely nothing back in this book and i am in pain - HESTIA!! 💖💖🥰 - actual loml - i love that Rick titled this book after her and that he wrote such a great series about the importance of family (biological, found or otherwise) and home, and that he said actually Hestia is the most important bc shes the most humble and keeps the peace and knows when to fight and when to yield and you protect what you love, which is your home - i just... Adore Hestia - Grover! Missed you babes - Hades is so so horrible to Nico, always comparing him to Bianca :/ - but i do love Hades, Persephone and Demeter together they make me laugh - oh god the River Styx - Achilles 🥺 - Annabeth being Percy's lifeline is, and continues to be, A Lot™ - 'my name was Percy Jackson. I reached up and took Annabeth's hand.' LOL Why am i crying? - Like the fact there is no Percy without Annabeth, and that remembering her literally reminded him of who he is in his very soul... It's fine im fine - i won't even get into the parallels of her being his lifeline now and then later when Hera takes his memories but leaves the memory of Annabeth for Percy to fight to get back to (anyone who wants to yell about it with me... Feel free to message) - badass Percy is my fav Percy tbh - him defeating Hades?? Like? Hades is arguably the most powerful god, okay - i feel bad for Nico but if i was Percy I'd do the exact same, Nico, sorry man but this is a high stakes time crunch deal and Nico is literally the only hope of persuading Hades and distracted by his own internal stuff - flashbacks to Luke, Thalia and Annabeth hurt, ow - George and Martha are the best - damn i forgot Hermes full on nearly kills Percy here, yikes - Luke stop cockblocking Percabeth challenge

- i love!! Percy's love for New York!! So much!! - Percy leaving to live in New Rome in HoO is a lie and this is all the proof i need for why - the fact the entire last half of the book is the battle and aftermath... Such great buildup and pacing. All the tricks and twists and battles in this War of Manhattan? I would not take out a thing, Rick, you legend - of course then the final battle in hoo with the gods is what? Two pages? Ugh, don’t talk to me about my hatred for BoO and HoO - 'no detours you two' is still the cutest thing!!! - THE HUNTERS!! Thalia i missed you - good job Percy, you finally spent your sand dollar - Minotaur!! - 'dont i get a kiss for luck? Its kind of a tradition right?' Percy finds out he's gonna die and is out of fucks to give and honestly I support him - also Michael just standing beside these two while they're flirting like umm 👀 👀 while a monster army marches towards them, nbd - Annabeth taking Ethan's knife meant for Percy!!! Cause she just knows his weak spot without him even telling her! They literally invented love - Feral Percy is so scary omg, i love how well Rick incorporates the Achilles Curse in this novel, with the whole heightened weaknesses and stuff ans the parallels to Achilles arrogance being what killed him and Percy's loyalty, fierceness and protective instinct being his own heightened weakness - the fact that Percy is the one who inadvertantly kills Michael Yew tho, I'll never recover from that - the fact Hades offers Maria di Angelo a golden palace by the Styx like how Poseidon offers Sally a palace under the sea tho. Let's talk about that parallel - the entire talk with Prometheus is so so good - not me picturing young Luke hiding in the closet to get away from his mom when she has an 'episode' -i love callbacks in stories and all of the callbacks to the rest of the series in this book make me very happy (medusa, minotaur, the underworld, Rainbow!! My baby!!, Daedalus and more) - Percy summoning a wholeass hurricane against Hyperion - the Party Ponies! They're so chaotic, i love it - Dionysus! 😁 I can't help it, i love him - Percy absolutely losing it when he sees Sally and Paul asleep in the car 🥺 - Rachel telling Percy he's not the hero screws with him so much :( poor bb - although i really really love how Rick wrote this, it's so refreshing to not have one chosen one save the world, but a combination of people - the drakon, Silena and Clarisse make me cry - the Patrochilles references, im not okay - Annabeth giving up on Luke after hearing what he did to Silena and Percy telling her that doesn't make him happy 😭 that whole interaction makes my heart ache - Percy giving Hestia Pandora's pithos 🥺 - and Hades, Nico and the others coming for a final attack is so badass, i love it - listen im glad the og trio were the ones to confront Luke on Olympus but the fact Thalia got so close and then pinned by a statue of HERA makes me so sad. Ik her and Luke were finished and she coped by cutting him off completely and giving up all hope but i would pay money to know what they would have said to each other to say goodbye - Ethan 🥺 - Poseidon joining the fight against Typhon is so cool, such a great scene - 'PEANUT BUTTER!' - Annabeth you brilliant badass you - RIP Luke, you werent great but you werent the worst either - the gods just rolling up seconds too late, wondering wtf happened in Olympus and who the dead body is - the chapter where the Olympians meet and give out rewards is one of my absolute favourites (again i am incensed we didn't get anything like this in HoO) - will Percy turning down immortality ever not make me scream in glee? No? Alright then - Annabeth being relieved like Percy was relieved at the end of Titan's Curse tho - oh Hermes :/ - its so hard reading all this and knowing what comes in HoO... Like it's such a cathartic, earned and mostly happy and peaceful ending and then HoO comes along and undermines it all - aww Rick let Paul see Olympus somehow pls, he deserves it, he killed a dracanae - (i would also love to see it) - Percy being more upset Rachel took his pegasus than her going to Camp and possibly dying, lol, priorities dude - i honestly think that Rick had other ideas for the second Great Prophecy and how things would go down in BoO, cause the prophecy like... Barely applies to BoO, Doors of Death are in book four, and explabations of it is all so unclear when Rick is usually pretty good with that stuff - PERCABETH - lol Percy complaining about privacy when he and Annabeth are caught kissing literally in the middle of the very open and public dining pavilion, okay - BEST UNDERWATER KISS OF ALL TIME - that's it and im a glass case of emotion - very happy to say that this series remains my favourite of all time 💖

 If anyone ever wants to come gush about anything Riordanverse related feel free, because as you can see I have a lot of thoughts about it all

[jaimetheexplorer]

I brought down by niks latest interview.Saying "J never needed redemp.He was a guy who certain circumstances in his life e.g. Kingslayer so then he needed to redeem himself bc he did this horrible thing when killing the Mad King. Then N said the redemp arc where he had to be good guy, stay with Bri etc that's not GOT.You cant erase ur prev life.Jaime bel that redeem urself meant redeeming his past and he couldnt. He can't cut off who he was.The idea of leaving C alone is impossible to him" Wtf?

2/2 Downhearted anon. Just that interview makes no sense. In prev season interviews, wasnt Nik wanting Jaime to escape Cersei for good and be with Braime forever, like he was the biggest Braime shipper??? I dont understand. Does he think ppl don’t remember stuff? Its a shame theres no way to ask him about this.

Dear Downhearted anon,

I have to admit I read only a short excerpt from that interview, so I might have missed some of the other content, but, from what I read, this is what I can say.

There are different layers to his comments, IMO. One is the take on the story, and the other is the justification of the writing choices. And, as much as I might vehemently disagree with the former, what I take issue with is the latter.

When it comes to the take on the story, we have to remember that he has to talk about the actual content of the show. The show, unfortunately, did go with the idea that Jaime is essentially doomed to never escape his past. I do not believe that is his arc in the books for many reasons, and I think it was extremely underwhelming, nihlistic and unsatisfying even just taking the context of the show into account. But, unfortunately, nihilistic and unsatisfying is what we got. The show was aiming for romanticizing incest and abuse romantic tragedy with JC, in the end (I actually think there was a far more disastrous chain of events at play, which required multiple OOC developments for multiple major characters just to arrive to Jon killing Dany - but that’s a longer story), and it is what it is. He has to talk about the reality of the episodes, not the alternatives.

If you take most of Nik’s comments, and go back to read D&D’s and Cogman’s interviews from the past, you’ll notice that it’s mostly stuff that’s lifted straight from their quotes, even down to the language: “good guy/bad guy”, “he doesn’t have a redemption arc”, “it’s just life, and he has made some mistakes”. I don’t know whether this is because he had a “final season” briefing with them and came around to see things their way and agree, or because he was told this is what he was supposed to say about the story, or because even though he doesn’t agree with it, this is what was written in the end and so this is what he talks about. His reasoning for saying these things is anybody’s guess and kind of beyond the point. But, where before he used to have his own take on the character and his arc, he’s now basically regurgitating the party line.

For my part, I never completely disagreed with the idea that Jaime does not need redemption per se. Jaime doesn’t need atonement for slaying the Mad King, for sure. He needs recognition for that. He needs atonement for a other horrible things he’s done, but even those (e.g., pushing Bran, the incest) are more about moral gray areas areas than villainous behaviour per se, since he’s never committed atrocious acts just for his own selfish gain, or for power, or because he enjoyed hurting and killing. More importantly, I have always seen Jaime’s story as more of an identity arc, where redemption is just one component. In that sense, I can agree with the take that that he is a “complex character who, at times, has made some terrible mistakes”. Jaime is not, and never was, a straightforward villain who needs to atone for his sins. He’s a much more complex and layered mix of sins and honour, and goodness and idealism turned bitterness and cynicism, and a messy product of living most of his life in toxic and abusive environments who, in some situations, has committed some horrible mistakes that he needs to own up to and face the consequences of, and who is trying to redefine and reinvent himself in the aftermath of some life-changing events such as losing his hand, meeting Brienne and growing disillusioned with Cersei. 

The problem is that, while D&D preach about Jaime being a complex character who does not need a ‘cheesy’ linear redemption arc, they also, in the same breath, justify an ending that shoves him precisely into a clear, black-and-white, simplistic category (”he just accepts he is a hateful man”) or display the psychological depth of a 5th grader (go check out their take on the sept scene in their Oxford Union Q&A and their inability to think in any more complex terms than “good guy/bad guy” or to understand that not all “bad” actions are equal). They’re not deep writers, and that shows painfully in their execution. But I can understand the “no need for redemption” arc, from a theoretical/philosophical perspective.

What I take far more issue with is justifying writing choices by attempting to play the realism card, or the adult writing card, or the “this is GoT” card, basically implying that everyone who dislikes or criticize it is being unrealistic, immature or unsophisticated for not accepting the only inevitable outcome to a story (I wrote a twitter thread about it this week). Just because your story has decided to depict things in a certain way, it does not mean that that is the only realistic option for the story, and that people who expected/wanted/hoped for something different were fooling themselves, let alone that it had to be written that way because that is how life works.

Sure, there are people who fail to break away from their (abusive, traumatic, toxic, what have you) past and move on, but there are also plenty of people who do, and who end up thriving. One outcome isn’t any more realistic or true to life than the others. And, while some might think this is a hyperbole, it is highly irresponsible, IMO, to say that being unable to escape toxicity and your past is “the way things are”, when there might be people out there who do struggle with trauma, toxic and abusive relationship (or know people who do).

On top of that, it is rather silly to imply that we were expecting some unrealistic, too-easy scenario, where Jaime flipped a switch and totally erased his past overnight. That implication is misguided, at best, and dishonest, at worst. We put up with four entire seasons of show-only “non-linear” storytelling when it comes to Jaime, and were incredibly patient with it. Wasn’t the point of those four seasons precisely to show that life is complicated and he couldn’t just let go of his past so easily? We watched that. It happened. Nothing about this was easy or unearned.

Had we been shown a Jaime who was 100%, stupidly and completely devoted to Cersei at every turn, cruel, evil, selfish and not caring about the innocents, of course expecting an outcome where he just leaves it all behind for a honourable wench or what have you would have been a ridiculous expectation to have. Indeed, back when Jaime did come across as that kind of character, nobody was expecting anything from him. He could have died with Cersei under those bricks and most wouldn’t have cared.

Instead, for years, we were shown a Jaime that did struggle between his toxic past/Cersei and his honour and, far more often than not, we saw his honour win out. While I can see an argument for saying that didn’t guarantee an outcome where he did break free of his past for good, it’s not like like there was no buildup or seeding for the more positive, less nihilistic alternative. So I don’t find it so far fetched to have expected the events of S7 to be the last straw that finally tipped the scales completely to the other side (especially considering how 8x02 was written very heavily to imply just that or, at the very least, did not seed any doubt).

By Nikolaj’s own admission in TONS of interviews, he had been fighting with D&D for years because he expected things to move in a certain direction and kept getting frustrated when they didn’t, or when they confused him. He wanted the exact same things we wanted for Jaime and in his relationships with Cersei and Brienne since SEASON 2. He might have resigned himself in the end to having lost the battle, but he behaved exactly like us for years. So, assuming he believes what he is saying, if I could talk to him, I’d ask him how is it that he got the same feeling of “expectation” for something that in the end never came? Maybe because the seeding for both options were there all along? Maybe because, if the seeding for both options were there all along, the alternative isn’t so far fetched and inconceivable after all? Maybe because if the alternative isn’t so far fetched and inconceivable after all, then what we got isn’t the only inevitable way this could go down? Food for thought.

Of course, I want to believe that he isn’t that tone-deaf and unsophisticated as an actor (and a writer) not to realize that the only problem with the way Jaime and JB were written in S8 was not the fact that they didn’t get a HEA. Ignoring the writing quality, for a moment, and just focusing on the writing choices, there were literally dozens of ways of writing a story that ended even in a similar tragedy (EVEN with Jaime dying with Cersei), that would have been far better and more satisfying than what we got. The problem isn’t that Jaime didn’t declare his everlasting love for Brienne or that he didn’t stay together with her. The problem is that we patiently waited through all the buildup and seeding mentioned above, for years, for a relationship that ended up being butchered within 30 minutes, destroying literally everything it ever stood for (first and foremost trust and respect - I am not going to list everything, but Jaime trying to sneak out without so much of a goodbye and being completely indifferent to her pain after she vouched for him and saved his life multiple times was not only OOC, but completely unnecessary to the plot, unless it aimed to destroy the foundations of their bond, way beyond the romance).

To conclude, I’ll leave you with GRRM’s own words, when asked about Jaime’s redemption arc that he, unlike the show, has explicitly stated he wishes to explore:

“I want there to be a possibility of redemption for us, because we all do terrible things. We should be able to be forgiven. Because if there’s no possibility of redemption, what’s the answer then?”

The show decided that the answer is that we don’t escape our past. We are doomed from the beginning and any attempt to change and move on is eventually futile (and that ended up being true of nearly every character in the show, not just Jaime). But that doesn’t seem to be at all the stance GRRM has on this whole thing, and I would dare anyone to tell me that GRRM’s vision and his writing are inferior, too easy, or less realistic than what we got from the show.

There’s no guarantee that Jaime will survive in the books, or that he and Brienne will get a HEA (although I do not rule it out at all).  But the fact that the man who invented these characters and this world has a different stance on Jaime and redemption automatically invalidates any nonsense show people can say about how this was the perfect and only way it could end, and that expecting anything different from this series was wishful thinking.

[scarlethallow160]

we had our second dnd session tonight, and even though it was fun overall, i felt kinda...engh in the aftermath? idk i always feel self-conscious after our sessions bc besides the dm, i have the most “experience” n knowledge compared to everyone else so i worry that maybe i kind of overdo it..? bc besides one friend everyone else is either awkward or doesnt really care about progressing the story and just wants to goof around which is fine! but also kind of hard to get things going. and like i dont want to hog the stage but whenever we need to decide on stuff or plan where to go etc. no one says anything so i kind of start leading things and have fun rping our characters with the friend thats also comfortable doing it but then they start hinting that we’re becoming the center of attention but im like yall arent saying anything tho 😭 even when i try to engage w the other characters :\\ and it gets even harder when ppl arent paying attention or just start having side convos and its just me n the dm trying to progress things. and the fact that we have like seven players, excluding the dm, makes things even more difficult. idk i felt esp embarrassed after this session bc our current table sucks bc its small so our dm basically had to sit across the room which made hearing/getting things going difficult, then the one friend whom i love and adore got reeallly drunk and kept interrupting and acting rly silly which was entertaining but also kept derailing the campaign and made trying to decide on a plan rly difficult bc i kept trying to get ppls opinion on a plan but everyone just kept talking n having unrelated convos, then they got mad when i was finally able to tell them the plan we were going with but im like pls?? pay attention to what the dm is saying and whats going on then? im like self conscious n anxious that the dm got annoyed w us and if ppl are annoyed w me for trying to play fffhsks cuz my dear friend rp’d her character to pick fights w mine several times throughout even though i was just trying to progress things n the friend of a friend that was invited called us annoying 🙄 but again like i wouldnt be hogging the stage without meaning to if people would pay attention n do stuff without just goofing off and then wonder why we arent progressing to fight scenes or anything. like one of our players was getting annoyed that we hadnt gotten to fight/act yet but then she also kept doing silly stuff that dragged out certain interactions. and tbh i love this group of ppl but at the same time the way they play lowkey annoys me bc when we’re separated as a group or some of us are asleep or smthing people will just want to go off into battle or dungeons alone so it’ll be one person n the dm doing shit for like ten minutes while the rest of us just sit there bc they keep going off on their own. like that friend of our friend climbed right down a rope toward some dark dungeony area while i was investigating and ended up falling right among enemies n nearly died bc he just had to go off on his own  

idk im still having fun overall n love the group but its becoming clear some of us want to play the game differently n i wish the others would be more engaged instead of sitting in silence/not paying attention and then voicing their annoyance when i do stuff to progress the campaign. 

[bidickgrayson]

i’ve finally almost gotten to the place in persona 3 where i stopped playing a couple years ago. just got to october, and i stopped some time in november in my first playthrough

it’s interesting to revisit shinjiro’s death a couple years later, because that death was one of the few things i remembered with any kind of detail. i remember being very angry at the storyline that had a ten-year-old kid plot revenge for the death of his mother. couldn’t really understand that urge/the fact that that kind of storyline was coming from a TEN YEAR OLD

and i’m still not a fan, but i am a little less directly angry with ken. the first time, i wasn’t expecting it, and so i was just angry that ken got shinjiro into a situation where he was killed lol. i had a lot more sympathy for ken this time around, when i knew what was coming the whole time, and could remind myself more rationally that ken didn’t actually kill shinjiro

really where i disagree with the writing around shinjiro’s death the most is around the aftermath, primarily around akihiko’s reaction. first of all, BULLSHIT on the fact that akihiko was like “we need to stop treating ken like a kid” because HE IS A KID!!!! what are you talking about!!!! “he needs to make his own decisions” like OKAY i get that you want to respect his autonomy but....he was just a kid who plotted a revenge-murder of a high schooler who killed his mom in front of him, only to watch in horror as that high schooler THROWS HIMSELF IN FRONT OF A GUNSHOT TO SAVE THE KID’S LIFE and then died in front of the kid. there’s no acknowledgement of the trauma, because they’re trying to treat this precocious ten-year-old like he’s an adult, when frankly, no adult would go through that without some trauma!! it’s just dumb. and i can forgive the sees members for some of it, because this is a bunch of high schoolers dealing with some heavy shit with no good adult supervision (lol @ ikutsuki), and they’re all just kids themselves, so i can’t really blame them for not knowing the best way to handle it and stumbling through on their own

also, what makes it worse is that it was literally just revealed that ken was suicidal/wanted to die like, just a while before, and tbf none of the other sees members knew, but i knew as the audience, and so to have akihiko go like “well, he’s gonna do what he’s gonna do” was so jarring and distressing. GET THIS KID SOME HELP! but. whatever. and then ken of course decides to come back and has a new resolve, and it’s treated as though that’s the really strong thing to do and not a definitely unhealthy lack of concern for mental well-being. “i’m strong so i’m not going to let the multiple traumatic events/my suicidal ideations (as a ten-year-old!) distract me from our mission”

also, back to direct reactions to shinjiro’s death, and maybe this is more personal preference, but i really Cannot Relate at all to akihiko’s resolution in the face of it. i remember that disconnect was jarring to me when i first played it years ago too. because he’s sad, and then very quickly he’s not sad because “it’s what shinjiro would have wanted”. and i just can’t relate to how quick he came to terms with the death, because this was literally akihiko’s oldest friend. and when the other’s express sadness, he’s like, don’t be sad, it’s what shinjiro wanted. LIKE WTF it is still sad??? i just think a better balance between acceptance and grief could have been found, because i really feel like they jumped over the majority of the grief that i would expect from shinjiro’s oldest friend, which is very jarring. but. i mean, who knows, maybe that would be realistic to some. it feels like a shortcut to me tho. i like akihiko, but this particular instance really disconnected me from his character

i’ve heard that with the female protagonist in p3p, you can do a social link so shinjiro doesn’t end up dead. and i’m really curious how that plays out (/why the social link changes it). i just wanna be able to say “YOU’RE A HIGH SCHOOLER, YOU’RE NOT SUPPOSED TO BELIEVE YOUR DEATH IS THE BEST WAY THINGS CAN PLAY OUT ( :( )”

anyway, some other thoughts while i’m here:

my vague recollection of p3 having some social links with ppl who weren’t really good people was correct. or maybe i should say, weren’t people i really found sympathetic. like, the devil link with the shady businessman (which i still haven’t completed), or the magician link with the classmate kenji (he has called me SO MANY TIMES, and i have turned him down every time, because if there’s going to links i don’t complete, i am fine with one of them being his. i just.....am not interested in his quest to fuck his teacher, i don’t enjoy it. i know i completed his in my last playthrough, but i can’t remember how it resolves but....god i could not care less about kenji). then there’s the hermit link with the teacher online (she’s so annoying lol, and i hate that she tells protag that she has a crush on the irl him, like, fuck off. also, she’s such a bad/unsympathetic teacher, it made me really miss kawakami, who had flaws but was ultimately a good teacher imo). oh, then there’s the emperor link with hidetoshi on the student council who....lol, that’s another link i completed last time but have barely touched this time, because i really dislike him. i kinda remember him softening towards the end of the link, but so much of the first part is just about enabling him being a tyrannical class council member which is not fun. and i ultimately like the tower/monk link, but he’s another character who....doesn’t really seem like that nice of a person. but i do like him because he likes the protag

the other links for the most part are good. it’s interesting the differences between p5 and p3 social links, because p5 had a definite theme to all of the links (/the whole game lol) where they were all ultimately good people who were misunderstood/unfairly judged/treated somehow (altho i haven’t done the iwai link all the way through, i imagine it ends up similarly because he’s a somewhat decent person “doing evil to combat evil” iirc). but there’s no real theme for the p3 links as far as i can tell. which makes sense, because in p5 there is a specific reason to have links with them all because they end up helping you, and they all end up as accomplices to all of the crimes the thieves commit lol

i really dislike that you have to romance all of your female classmates in order to complete their social links. what is friendship lol. really really really makes it feel a whole lot cheaper, and really makes it hard for me to care. very glad they stopped making that a requirement in p3p and beyond

what also make it hard for me to care?? the blank and unemotional p3 protagonist lol. i really have a hard time connecting to him, because he doesn’t really do much?? he’s just a blank wall for all of the social links, and it really disconnects me from the emotions of it. some girl will be confessing her feelings to him, and i’m just like, hm, fascinating, who cares, he’s gonna go on a date with another girl tomorrow. it doesn’t feel real to me at all. maybe i’m just totally unfairly biased toward p5 (and i don’t want to compare endlessly, bc p5 is newer and clearly they’ve made many improvements over the years, but it’s the easiest comparison at hand), but when someone talked to joker about how much he meant to them, i bought into it a lot more than i do with mr. low energy, the p3 protag. joker felt like an actual character to me, that i could care about, who i could understand/imagine his feelings and reactions to things. but for the p3 protag, it’s a lot of, well, i GUESS he COULD care about shinjiro dying, but you sure as heck have to read a whole lot into it to get to that conclusion, because the strongest reaction you can make him have to it is to have him tell the callous students at the assembly to “shut up.” which is nice, but hardly anything at all lol. i just find him difficult to project my emotions onto him in the game, unlike joker, who i didn’t have as much trouble believing in his genuine feeling for the people he talked to. i think also, people reacted to joker in a much more specific way that made him more real than the p3 protag, who kind of feels like a ghost most times, except for his social links where he shows up just to say exactly what the other person wants to hear lol. idk, i’m looking forward to replaying p5 and paying more attention to joker this time

(my feelings on the p3 protag are gonna be interesting come end-game, because if i understand correctly from the vague spoilers i’ve gotten about p3, the protag is gonna sacrifice himself to save the world. i keep trying to remind myself/play with that in mind, because i don’t think someone would sacrifice himself if he was actually as unemotional and detached as he sometimes comes across as)

80% of my rage at this game comes from being unable to control my specific party members in battle and so they do things that i don’t want them to, 10% comes from enemy advantage attacks (especially when i swing at them, but they hit me first), 9% comes from this game challenging me/punishing me for being underleveled when i’m playing on easy and don’t want any challenge at all because i want to get past the silly fighting business and back to social links/story, and a special 1% goes to the sleeping table boss in tartarus, which definitely was a primary punisher for me being underleveled and caused me to yell angrily at my screen yesterday

oh, ikutsuki. it’s funny, because p3 was the first persona game i played, and very early on, i was like, i don’t trust ikutsuki at all, so when the reveal came that you should not, in fact, trust ikutsuki, i wasn’t at all surprised. but it’s funny to replay it, knowing that persona likes the “this guy is not what he seems” trope, and realize that...there wasn’t really a specific giveaway instance where ikutsuki said something that was off (a la pancakes, or adachi showing up to a private conversation with interesting timing), it was just a sort of feeling i got about this weird adult who was having these high schoolers be responsible for saving the world, apparently. he really is a terrible terrible advisor though, lol, even knowing he’s evil. it’s sad to realize that the only adult help these kids have got is someone who is absolutely not on their side, and they’re truly on their own