#I don't remember if it was something said in the comic (I desperately need to do a full reread but every time I Start something comes up/ | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

genericpuff · 7 months ago

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Lore Olympus just pulled off the biggest whiff in webtoon history.

I promised I would choose one of two headlines and of course, this is the one we wound up with. But should we really be surprised? Rachel herself seemed to be telling on herself down to the minutes leading up to the finale, fully confirming to us that yes, she's been writing this comic at the last minute, by the seat of her pants, for ages now.

(that second one was literally posted TWENTY FUCKING MINUTES BEFORE THE COMIC UPDATED.)

Welp, let's get into it. Possibly the last essay I'll ever write about this dumpster fire of a comic (but probably not, let's be real LOL)

CONTENT WARNING: DISCUSSION OF SEXUAL ASSAULT AND FASTPASS SPOILERS FOR THE SERIES FINALE AHEAD!

Holy crap, where to even start with this. I knew it was going to be bad. I knew it was going to be rushed. I knew it wasn't ever going to live up to what I had hoped it would be years ago when I was still a diehard fan.

But I didn't think it was going to fall quite this hard. Despite bracing myself for the worst, Rachel has once again let my expectations down through a final display of explosive mediocrity and disappointment.

Yes, the episode is called "You're Welcome", and yes, that instant "ick" you're feeling is the exact same as what we're all feeling. This title plays into the dialogue later, but what a shitty, lowkey mean-spirited title for the series finale.

Now, before we get into the actual episode, the WT ads for this are just... so desperate and misleading.

They are trying SO HARD to hype up something that isn't there, and at the last minute to boot, because Rachel definitely hadn't written any of this ahead of time.

First off, the bit about the gods being in "eternal chaos" of course isn't a stake worth worrying over because Gaia literally does away with Ouranos in the first 5 panels.

Did you really think I was joking about that 5 panels thing?

That's it. That's the death of Ouranos. As mysteriously and quickly as he arrived, he was gone, after Gaia ripped out of him what appeared to be some purple sunny side up - but it's actually, in fact, Apollo.

And that's when we start to get some of the worst dialogue I've ever seen throughout LO. Remember when I said LO's dialogue was like Shenmue 3? Welp, the finale decided to continue that tradition and further fuel the suspicion that this entire thing was written by ChatGPT.

Oh, by the way, that "thank you, ma'am" was Artemis' first and last line of the episode. So once again, just like in Episode 248, we're completely robbed of her reaction to Apollo being a rapist piece of shit and the character development she could have had as a supporting character. The women in this "feminist retelling" really couldn't be more half-baked.

Gaia stumbles upon Persephone, and I'm not even gonna fucking bother showing the panels where Gaia says it's time to "make things right" because they literally don't matter. Why don't they matter? Because Rachel just had to get in one more pointless time skip.

We're shown a sequence of pointless images that I'm not gonna show as I don't want to waste my image limit on them, depicting Hades having a sad day because his small wife isn't with him and oh nooo what could have happened?? Did Persephone finally divorce him ??

Nah, we couldn't possibly have an actually happy ending in this comic. Instead we get a completely pointless phone conversation between Hades and Hecate-

Not only is the grammar particularly bad in this episode, but the actual script-writing is atrocious. We literally did not need this phone conversation to happen because-

-we're cutting BACK TO THE PRESENT THAT WE JUST CUT AWAY FROM FOR A 3 MONTH TIME SKIP. FOR NO REASON BESIDES SHOWING HADES BE SAD OVER SOMETHING THAT ACTUALLY ISN'T THAT BIG A DEAL, AS YOU'RE ABOUT TO SEE.

I- I LITERALLY HAVE NO WORDS. I HAVE NO WORDS TO DESCRIBE WHAT THE FUCK THIS IS. ALL I CAN HEAR IN MY BRAIN IS THE LEGEND OF ZELDA ITEM GET MUSIC-

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-BECAUSE THIS WHOLE THING SUDDENLY SOUNDS LIKE SOME CONTRIVED FETCH QUEST. WHAT DO YOU MEAN HADES AND PERSEPHONE HAVE PROVEN 'TRUE LOVE' IS REAL? WHAT DO YOU MEAN THEY HAVEN'T USED 'LOVE' AS A FORCE FOR DESTRUCTION?? ARE WE FORGETTING THAT HADES MUTILATED A GUY IN THE NAME OF 'LOVE'? THAT PERSEPHONE LITERALLY INVADED THE HOME OF HADES' CANONICAL FIRST WIFE BECAUSE SHE FELT MILDLY THREATENED BY HER?

This whole concept of "true love" that Rachel is trying to convey feels so juvenile especially for a series that has sold itself as being mature and thought-provoking and progressive.

HAHAHA SO FUNNYYYYYYY why does Rachel write like this. this is, at best, the writing of a 13 year old on fanfiction.net, which I SHOULD KNOW, because I WAS ONE OF THEM. BUT I'M 28 NOW AND RACHEL HAS ANOTHER 10 YEARS ON ME.

Okay, this is the part where I'm CONVINCED Rachel either just mashed this into the episode in the MINUTES leading up to its release, or she used ChatGPT or something. Because NONE of this dialogue makes any sense. Beyond how stilted and lifeless it is (seriously, this dialogue reads like something from Empress Theresa) Gaia is clearly meant to 'replace' Erebus here which I SHOULDN'T HAVE TO EVEN EXPLAIN IS SO FUCKING DUMB, but ALSO what is even Persephone trying to communicate here? "That is true, but it was a deal I was willing to make and ties me to the Underworld. Please don't change me." What? Gaia hasn't even insinuated that she's going to do anything to Persephone, why is Persephone immediately jumping to this conclusion? What does 'changing' her mean? Is she asking Gaia not to force her to sacrifice something (which she never did)? Or is she asking Gaia not to strip her of her Underworld status? Because again, why is that even something Gaia would do?

Maybe this is harsh but I'm pretty sure even Empress Theresa is more coherent than this, what in the flying fuck is Gaia talking about?

"I can just see the potential for conflict! To relieve you from the burden of the whats, the hows, and wheres." Like... okay, first of all, that second sentence isn't even a complete sentence, it's a dependent clause left hanging, but also what the fuck does this MEAN. Is she EXCITED for the conflict but then contradicting herself by saying she wants to relieve Persephone of that conflict? Or is she saying she can see the conflict it would cause for Persephone to have to perform duties in both realms and trying to insinuate that she's going to relieve her of those complications?

Here's what I think happened - I think that second 'sentence' wasn't supposed to be a sentence, but the start of the sentence to the next panel-

So with that theory in mind, the sentence becomes, "To relieve you from the burden of the whats, the hows, and wheres, you are to spend three months in the Mortal Realm to do spring and the rest of the year in the Underworld. That seems fair to me."

It's still a very poorly written line of dialogue, but at least with that fix in mind it makes sense. But man, you can really fucking tell this episode was submitted at the last minute because that's a serious syntax error that should NOT have happened in this two-time-Eisner-winning comic.

Errors aside, it's clear that Rachel is following through on having Persephone spend only three months in the Mortal Realm, rather than the traditional six. There ARE other translations that have that number closer to four, but those four are the time she spends in the UNDERWORLD, meaning she's always spending either equal or MORE time in the Mortal Realm. Of course, Rachel doesn't want her self-insert small wife power fantasy to actually have to be separated from Hades despite this being a retelling of The Abduction of Persephone, so instead of her spending three months in the Underworld, she's now spending them in the Mortal Realm, literally doubling the MINIMUM amount of time (four months) she was originally meant to reside in the Underworld.

But oh no, apparently those three months are STILL NOT SHORT ENOUGH FOR PERSEPHONE-

Of course, Rachel "Retcon" Smythe had to have her cake and eat it too. I always worried something like this was a possibility, but I never thought she would actually prove me right - not only is Persephone only separated from Hades for three months out of the year, but actually he can visit her any time he wants to, so really, they're not separating at all.

I think Rachel needs to look up "reunion" in the dictionary, because if you can visit each other any time, then that means the 'reunions' are no longer special occasions. This completely removes any semblance of depth or meaning from all of the storytelling leading up to this, all of it with the expectation that this was a retelling of the Abduction of Persephone, because that's what Rachel said it was going to be. At this point it's safe to say that Rachel has zero business attempting to "retell" mythological stories, because she doesn't even seem to grasp the concept of why they were written the way they were to begin with. Either that, or she really just doesn't care, and the only reason for making LO a Greek myth comic at all was to propel her career.

This also brings me back to those promotional ads, the other one that posed the question, "Will sacrifice be enough to bring these two back together?"

This is stating the obvious, but I need to make it perfectly clear - Hades and Persephone have never sacrificed a single thing. The only thing they could POSSIBLY quantify as a "sacrifice" is "not being tied at the hip for a few hours", because even Persephone going on the equivalent of a work trip next door is apparently enough to make Hades sad as we saw in the 3 month time skip panels. Why is Hades so sad and lonely if he can visit her any time? Why is he acting like he hasn't seen her in years when he's actually on his way to reunite with her? Why is Hecate calling to ask him if he's "okay" as if he JUST got separated from her, but actually he's about to literally go to the Mortal Realm to reunite with her?

Hades hasn't 'sacrificed' a damn thing, neither has Persephone. They've both always gotten exactly what they wanted, even at the cost of breaking the story's own established rules. Their 'sacrifice' is equivalent to what billionaires think are 'sacrifices' when they can't buy another yacht or go on that third overseas vacation for the month.

And even outside of this episode, when have these two ever sacrificed anything?

I've tried so hard to think of what sacrifices have been made by the characters within LO, and I genuinely can only think of one - and that was when Artemis chose to go to the Mortal Realm with Persephone instead of staying with her family in Olympus. That was a genuine, selfless sacrifice, made by a character who has been shelved in favor of focusing on the self-centered pink and blue airheads.

Being forced to be apart for a couple days to do the equivalent of a day job and whining about it the whole time is not a 'sacrifice'. Neither of these characters have ever sacrificed anything, they just feel like sacrifices because they have the integrity and empathy of soggy cardboard.

sigh Anyways, we're back in the present and Hades and Persephone immediately decide they're gonna have sex because ofc, and then we get this gem of a panel-

MMMMMM

FUNNYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY JOKE

For some reason it's just a common thing for people to just be in Hades' home, and they can't seem to get any privacy as a result of this, but I digress. Turns out they still need to have that coronation for Persephone.

There is... so much wrong in these three panels.

First, to state the immediate issues - why the fuck are they mentioning Apollo at Persephone's coronation? Like first of all, no shit Apollo isn't gonna be there, but also, if this is supposed to be an event for and about Persephone becoming Queen of the Underworld, then why in the WORLD is Apollo even being mentioned? This is supposed to be a "feminist retelling" where the victims are empowered and heal from their trauma, but LO once again can't try to show any sort of positive growth for the victims without bringing up the assaulters and giving them screen time. It just goes to show that Rachel's idea of "healing" is purely rooted in the revenge, and not the growth. It's a very high schooler approach to this subject, hellbent on showcasing how all the meanies from the past are losers now and life just sucked for them forever, but inadvertently proving its own point that the victims haven't and can't move on because the narrative is spending so much time on caring what's going on with the abusers. It's the "I don't care! Look at how little I care! I'll prove it to you by putting in the effort of showing you how little I care!" approach, it doesn't really feel like moving on.

It's not about how Persephone and his other victims could have grown and healed, no, Rachel always needs to highlight just how much worse the bullies and haters and abusers are doing to make the victims seem like they've healed by comparison. Don't get me wrong, I can understand wanting to showcase the downfall of a character like Apollo, but this just... isn't the right context for that? Because it's once again taking attention away from the victim to focus on the abuser. It's once again spending screentime on the voices of the oppressors rather than the oppressed.

And speaking of, what the fuck is this punishment even? I knew Rachel wasn't gonna be able to resolve this plotline properly, she never had the capability to, but ... community service? Are you fucking for real? What is this even a punishment for even? Was this EXCLUSIVELY the SA, or does this ALSO include his attempts to overthrow Zeus by poisoning him, nearly killing Daphne, Eris, Eros and Psyche, trapping Eros and Psyche in an enchanted basement, and framing his father's 'death' on his half-sister? Because if so, how in the world is anyone content with community service? He hasn't even been turned into a mortal, HE'S STILL A GOD, so what's to stop him from going "WE'LL MEET AGAIN, SPIDERMAN" and trying something else? How is this a reasonable resolution in ANY context?

This is why I talked at length about what an issue it was to hide what Apollo really admitted to. Because now we really don't know what exactly he confessed to, and thus we can never really see the point of views of the victims outside of just Persephone - and we still don't even get Persephone's, because she just walks away from him and then he gets eaten by Ouranos and next we see of him is him doing community service! Once again, any emotional development that could be given to Persephone and the other victims is stripped away to make room for the point of views of the oppressive men. In this, the two-time-Eisner-winning "feminist comic" that is LO.

And that brings us to the "where are they now" segment. Yes, as we all feared, there's a "where are they now" segment, and it's as rushed and underwhelming as we ought to have expected it to be.

There is just... so much to unpack here, and yes, all of it is delivered in the dumbest way possible that only raises more questions than answers.

So Rhea and Metis are just back and we're not gonna talk about the implications of them being alive again?

Dionysus is a 3 month year old in the body of a teenager / young adult, and his mom is just alive now because Hades conveniently got his hands on more ambrosia and brought her back to life offscreen? But somehow Triptomelus and Hedone are still child-sized relative to their ages?

How did they 'heal Zeus'? And why is he so content with losing his power as King and Apollo being sentenced to community service after making an attempt on his life? How does he feel about the letter that Hera gave him? Did he even read it?

Where the fuck is Hebe in all of this? Is she okay? Do people still think it was her who put Zeus in a coma? Or did Apollo confess to that, too?

You're telling me Hera and Echo are just in a relationship now despite the fact that Hera is literally racist towards nymphs and there is ZERO reason for them to have a relationship in the comic beyond the fans making gratuitous headcanons out of it? How is Rachel, a bisexual woman, so bad at writing actual lesbian relationships and giving them the same amount of attention as the heterocis ones without shoving them into the background as props for insincere queer rep? And what about Hera herself? How did she overcome her role as the Goddess of Marriage to finally divorce Zeus?

"Ares is still a dog!" Haha! Ares is still a Persephone simp! Happy end!

Why is Eros just standing there smiling at the camera struggling to be seen past Hedone who's just floating right in front of him? You're telling me there wasn't a better place to put her out of that entire panel?

"Hades and Thanatos have been making more time for each other. Sometimes they even have a conversation." I'm sorry, is this supposed to be funny? The man abused Thanatos for years, treated him as just a lowly employee when he was literally his adopted son, and now you're trying to play it off as a joke that they're "making more time for each other"? What the fuck is this?

TGOEM disbanded? Why? What about the women who were genuinely a part of it?

Also, Artemis and Selene are just good friends now because reasons? Because they're both affiliated with the moon, I guess? Why is Selene even in this comic-

"They are still looking for Kassandra". Who? And why? This feels like such a last minute addition to acknowledge a character that the comic spent WEEKS foreshadowing only to have her finally appear as a pointless McGuffin, but it's so last minute that it does nothing. I'm assuming it's Eros and Psyche looking for her, but like... why can't they find her? They're gods, tracking down one mortal shouldn't be that difficult LOL ???

And also, where the fuck is Leto?? You're telling me she was an accessory - maybe manipulating Apollo, maybe not - but we don't see what happened to her? Is she just back to being a social outcast then? jesus christ this comic isn't finished-

Kassandra is where the "where are they now" sequence ends, and we're treated to one final horribly written dialogue scene between Hades and Persephone, where they tell each other how much they love each other in a desperate attempt to convince the audience that this is, in fact, a romance.

There's this thing in romances called chemistry, and if you're good at writing it, you shouldn't have to write dialogue like this. You should be able to see how much the characters love each other through their actions, through their small behaviors around each other. It's not always about what they say out loud, it's about what they don't have to say, because when two people really share that close of a bond based on love and trust and chemistry, words often aren't necessary.

Hades and Persephone do not have that chemistry. It has been apparent for years now, but this final exchange really is the nail in the coffin. There are no microexpressions or subtle emotions, no subtlety in their word choice, and nothing unique setting their voices apart. It's all just "wow thank you for being such a wonderful amazing partner, you are amazing and I love you" word salad that has to do all the heavy lifting for the completely non-existent chemistry that's been at its absolute worst throughout this entire season.

And worst of all, despite this story trying so hard to be focused around Persephone, around her story, her trauma and her healing, her voice... it's still all just about Hades. In the end, she's thanking Hades, and forcing him to say "you're welcome". All of it is trying so hard to convince us that Hades has been a positive addition to her life, that she 'owes' so much to him, but we've obviously seen plenty throughout the comic that begs to differ. And even if he were a better person than he is, it still doesn't change the fact that once again, the men are being held up above the women, with the women being grateful to the men who choose them. LO can try its hardest to convince people that it's feminist, but it is, at best, reinforcing the very same structures of the patriarchal system that it claims to despise and rebel against.

We do get one line from Hades acknowledging Persephone's part in the relationship-

-and it falls so fucking flat because it's still about him and what she does for him, and because nothing about their relationship was built on any sort of organic chemistry. There was a lot more chemistry back in S1, but it was still predicated on Hades lusting after a vulnerable 19 year old girl.

Yep, and that's it. That's the end.

Except it isn't because Rachel wanted to try and be smart by including an 'epilogue' that's really just stretching the episode out pointlessly for another few panels. And of course, we had to get another time skip, just a final dose of salt in the wound, this time to years ahead when we inevitably had to reconnect with Persephone and Hades in the future after Melinoe was born.

To recap, Melinoe doesn't remember... because Hades had Morpheus erase her memories.

This plotline has really started to give me the ick because it actually feels very familiar. Bear with me here, because I'm gonna go on a bit of a tangent about my own original work, but it's because I wrote a plotline exactly like this years ago.

There's this... turning point, in Time Gate: Reaper, when the main character Uzuki is kidnapped by a Reaper (see: undead) who wants to experiment on her in the hopes that he can somehow gain her abilities to bond her soul with others (which later allows her to literally possess people after she becomes a Reaper herself). Mitsuhiro, the male deuteragonist who kickstarts the plot by telling Uzuki she's got a limited amount of time left to live (which he knows thanks to his magical death timers that mark themselves on his skin), feels an immense amount of guilt after finding out she was kidnapped by the Reapers (at this point she's been gone for three months), as they were originally after him; he worries that she was made a target simply due to him associating himself with her, and vows to rescue her.

With the help of some other spunky teenagers and anime trope characters, Mitsuhiro does eventually rescue Uzuki - but for the three months she had been gone, she had been tortured, abused, and experimented on, causing her mind to split and for her to lose any sense of awareness of who Mitsuhiro or her other friends were. She was no longer herself after the hell she had been through.

Mitsuhiro's solution to this is to have Springlock - another Reaper with motivations that are not yet clear to the cast - erase her memory. This is not a light decision that comes without consequences - for the remaining duration of the story, Uzuki is plagued by night terrors and panic attacks, unable to really remember what happened to her aside from whatever brief flashbacks her brain recalls in its haze of memory loss. She is traumatized, both physically and mentally. She has lost three months of her life and memories, and doesn't know how to explain why she's covered in scars that are still healing, why she's missing organs, why she's now blind in one eye, and why the sound of scraping metal and ticking clocks gives her panic attacks. Mitsuhiro has convinced her friends that she's suffering from memory loss due to trauma, but only he knows the truth that he forcefully took her memories away from her, without her consent. This was not the right choice to make. It was not noble of him, it was not a grand gesture of love, he made a decision on her behalf without her consent that has now resulted in her becoming a nervous wreck. Sure, she still would have had PTSD if she remembered what happened, but at least she would know why and could then seek adequate help. Without those memories, she has nowhere to begin to heal. And so we see the consequences of this throughout [AFTERBIRTH] and even the upcoming Thread of Fate. It is a long-term problem that is not going to be solved overnight, especially not with Mitsuhiro withholding information from her.

Reading about Melinoe having dreams about her experiences trapped in Tartarus with Kronos ... it felt familiar enough that I had to talk about why the insinuations of this are so fucked up. I know there are people who are gonna handwave it away as "she's just a kid", "these are gods so what does it matter", etc. but ... it just feels like such an oversight to have Hades effectively erase her memory of her trauma and then hint at them still being present in her mind through her dreams. She did not ask for that. And the fact that she's now dreaming about it all does not bode well. But we're supposed to think Hades made the correct choice, regardless.

But none of this is effectively expanded on or explained, because we get one final scene of Melinoe and Demeter visiting Persephone, who has just given birth to... Makaria?

So it turns out Persephone and Hades are just able to have biological children now. Don't know why, but of course they both look exactly like Hades.

What I was really confused by though is the fact that it's Makaria and not Brimos. Do you remember Brimos? The child that was foreshadowed in Hades' original fantasy dream sequence about his future children about Persephone?

Either Rachel completely forgot about him, or she saw all the criticism over the fact that Brimos isn't a confirmed child of Hades and Persephone (rather, an epithet that can apply to basically any Underworld god including Persephone and Hades) and that her "research" was dependent on a book she read when she was 13 and decided to axe that. But she went to the effort of establishing that all the dreams Hades had were , in fact, canon visions of the future, so good job Rachel, you created yet another plothole on top of the hundreds of others.

And that's where the series ends, on a final nuclear-family-photo of Persephone, Hades, Melinoe, and Makaria. Of course, Dionysus and Thanatos aren't present in this shot because this is Lore Olympus and only biological children count /hj

Why Rachel couldn't move the "the end" portion to THIS part, I don't know, but I'm also expecting way too much of the person who finished this 20 minutes before it was due.

So that's it. Six years and that's what we get. I didn't expect much, but I was still incredibly disappointed, as were many others who walked away from this dazed and confused. Maybe it's all the "haters" deserve at this point. But what of the fans? While many of them are celebrating this ending at best and tolerating it at worst, I can't help but think of the fans of this comic who hung on for so long in the hopes it would "pay off", just for it to go out as gloriously as a wet fart.

As for me, I have such mixed feelings about Lore Olympus ending, but none of them pertain to the comic itself. Most of what I'll miss from this comic isn't the comic itself, but the people who have made reading it every week so fun, the artists and writers who have enriched the content with their own interpretations of what could have been, and the experiences of being part of such an amazing community made up of people who are as long-term-obsessed about this piece of media as I am.

I get people who ask me a lot if it's "worth it" to be so engrossed in the LO slander, who assume that I'm going to "regret" ever being a part of it all... but from where I'm standing right now, I couldn't ask for a better view.

Even if I didn't love every minute of it, everything I have here I owe to this comic. This stupid, wonderful, boring, amazing, pile of shit comic.

#lore olympus critical #anti lore olympus #lo critical

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kandadze · 21 days ago

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FoF rewatch ep 3: or, Gone sleuthing (gifs and loose thoughts)

Before we begin, let's take a second to appreciate our beautiful elven boy and his (absolutely adorable) tiny bright blue horns hair clips (while he's roasting ZYZ for being sarcastic at the prospect of the rest of the squad losing their heads in 5 days' time... that's why you never sign a binding document in blanco, folks!):

Speaking of signing binding documents, let's look at the Great Demon acting all cool while literally at the feet of our archivist:

This moment, the way it was lit and the angle at which it was shot, is just everything:

(Look at him, so pleased with himself:)

And now let's take a second to appreciate ZYZ's slow blink at ZYC after telling him about the life contract with WX:

Overall, knowing how the story progressed, ep 3 is the last one where humor definitely outweighed the angst, and any hints for our characters' backstories were merely sketches. We get a lot of running around collecting clues, with Bai Jiu being the main comic relief, the girls not far behind, and everyone roasting the hell out of ZYZ while he only sometimes nips back, pretty jovially, and mainly at ZYC.

(Damsel Bai Jiu, desperately in need of smelling salts)

The girls:

The boys doing their sleuthing in their own ways:

Also, this is the first ep with our characters shown outside of the city, in nature, and it's so beautiful:

"All demons are ugly." "Nonsense!"

(Reader, it was indeed nonsense.)

ZYZ: talks about white hair being beautiful to demons

ZYC's Petty Little Bitch mode: activated

(But soft, reader, here's proof that our lovely ZYC has since matured lol)

Right in the middle of the sleuthing shenanigans, we have a beautiful conversation about dreams, human nature, how everyone wishes for something, how everyone has something they want to escape from. We get a mention of the Truth Eye, together with a blink-and-you'll-miss-it wistful look from ZYZ that makes so much sense later.

We find out that ZYC doesn't dream; in WX's memory, we hear ZYC's explanation of why he fears to dream, and for the umpteenth time on this rewatch, I went (say it with me), foreshadowingggg!

Aaaaaand we get introduced to our sexy possessive demon, though we have no clue who the heck he is at this point, only that he knows ZYZ and is clearly uhhhh conflicted about him.

Also holy shit but only now on the rewatch did I realize what the illusion Ran Yi tried to use on ZYZ was - and why ZYZ was so freaked out... (all together now: foreshadowing!!!! I swear if I took a shot each time I say it while rewatching I'd put myself in a goddamn coma.)

Huh, Ran Yi thought ZYZ had the Truth Eye... on the first watch we still don't quite know what that is, only that it helps to see through the illusions, so it would make sense that ZYZ has it. Rewatching, and knowing that he doesn't, *and* what happened to it... makes for a nice little circle going back to LL's introduction.

Speaking of the devil, the possessive demon is gonna possess (*and* also look good while at it):

And our demon hunter now knows that there's definitely something... fishy going on in the Qi manor:

Ahhhh I forgot about the low maintenance pets exchange! XD All the kinks unlocked in this drama istg...

Huh, I also completely forgot about him catching the arrow!

ZYZ flashing back to the younger, softer LL just as he half shields WX from what he knows is a completely different animal *now*, is absolutely not hitting me in any feels, nope:

(There's also something to be said about the fact that ZYZ is not surprised by LL possessing some (not so) random dude, so even on the first watch we're bound to assume that it happened before and ZYZ is not a fan. We don't get to see any of those instances, but one sentence from ZYZ is enough.)

WX immediately recognizes LL's name but still thinks it was him who killed her shifu, simply because being tossed aside like a rag doll by him is the last thing she remembers from that day...

I was close to screeching at my screen when he activated the true seeing in her, and not only is he ::gestures at the whole of him:: but then she looks to the side and ZYZ looks like *that*, and the effect is still not lost on me on the second viewing:

They made sure to end almost every ep with a well timed cliffhanger, but since we don't have to worry about that anymore, on to ep 4!

I'll just leave this pretty shot here before I go, because those swirly things are so cool (and so unsettling when put in context):

#can we please get an increase in the image limit i feel like choosing a favorite child when putting these together lol #fangs of fortune #fof rewatch ep 3 #fof musings #fof gif by me

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ecogirl2759 · 1 year ago

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THE MOMENT WE'VE ALL BEEN WAITING FOR!!!!

Here it is, guys!

The Kiyotaka Ishimaru Mastermind comic from 4コマ KINGS Vol. 4!

SPECIFICALLY CITING THIS SO THAT OTHERS KNOW WHERE TO FIND THIS COMIC!!!

Huge, HUUUUGE thanks to @panicuriprince!!! They helped me with clearing the text, rewording panels and putting everything together! Pages 4, 5, and 6 are her doing! PLEEEASE go send her some love, they REALLY helped me get this done and I literally couldn't have done this without her :D

There's a document below the break with more literal translations for the comic, as well as translation notes, a link to a Google Drive folder with ALL of the pages, and other interesting tidbits! Please give it a read!

The Japanese pages will also be below the break! (As well as a little spiel of mine. It's quite long, so be careful!)

(also please forgive how many tags there are here-)

Remember to read right to left <3

As promised, here are the Japanese panels:

AND HERE'S THE DOCUMENT!

✨ WOW ✨

I can't begin to describe to you all how AMAZING this feels!

I've spent the past 2 years on what felt like a wild goose chase, desperately searching for this one comic that I wasn't even sure existed.

This all started with me finding a photo on Tumblr of this comic and spiraling into this deep dive. First I didn't know if this was even real, then I found out that this comic series had ceased printing, then I couldn't be sure which book it was actually in.

There is literally almost no information out there about the fourth volume of this anthology series. I've said this before and I'll say it again, volumes 1 and 2 both have full translations that you can download off of other websites, and while 3 doesn't seem to have that, there are a lot of separately translated comics floating around out there, namely on Pinterest.

The 4th volume had NOTHING! No matter how hard I searched or how many links I clicked, no one has really said ANYTHING about this book, which was why this specific comic was so hard for me to find.

But I have all of the books now, so I definitely want to do this again for all of them so that people have easy access to these translations. I'll start with book 4 though haha.

Also, I'm not sure who it was, but HUUUUGE thanks to the kind stranger on Ebay who was willing to sent me the whole series!! I literally don't know where I would be right now if these books weren't with me, so thank you <3

Also, thank you to all of my Japanese teachers that I've had throughout the years. If it weren't for them, I wouldn't have been able to understand the comic, haha! One even helped me out in the early stages of this process, so extra thanks to him <3

I feel really passionate about accessible media. I think that everyone should be able to read and find whatever they want. That's part of the reason that I've endeavored on this project. I want everyone to be able to seek out and find these comics if they really want to. And, of course, I want everyone to be able to understand them, too.

So please enjoy this comic! If you'd like to repost it, I'd appreciate being credited just so that others know where they can go to find the full comic.

This one-man project isn't so one-man anymore, and I seriously can't thank everyone who's helped me enough!!! I'm honestly so glad I didn't have to go through this alone <33

ALSO

If you see anything, LITERALLY ANYTHING, that you think I could change/improve (like formatting or different interpretations of the Japanese text), PLEASE shoot me a message!! I want to make sure this comic is as good as it can be, and I'd love to hear your thoughts!

Even if you don't have a suggestion and would just like to reach out to ask a question or something, PLEASE don't be afraid to do that! I know I get really cold feet when sending people asks, so I'm going to reassure everyone who needs to hear it now: You're never going to be a bother to me! I love getting asks! Whenever anyone sends me something, I get really excited <3

So ask questions! Tell me I did a horrible job and got none of the text right! Ask why Ishimaru literally cannot be evil! I don't know the answer, either!

Thank you all so much for the support and the kind words you've been giving me ever since I first announced I was translating this comic! Your support has been extremely motivating to me! Also, you guys are hilarious with your tags!

Seriously, thank you so much! Words literally can't express how I feel right now, but I guess the best way I could describe it is cathartic. I'm REALLY happy that I finally get to share 2 years worth of work with you guys! You've all been a massive help to me in more ways than one <333

KEEP BEING AWESOME <3

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sm-baby · 1 year ago

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HELLOOO I'M BACK ok ok remember how I said in Jax's analysis that the zapping scene could actually have a lot of information into it?? Let me elaborate:

There are two things that mainly caught my attention in that scene:

1 - How the lightning bolts that come out of the collar are yellow

2- How the shock is really quick (literally just a snap)

"Oh that must be just a stylistic choice right? don't look too deep into it-" WRONG!!!

In the Jax's Doodles, when Caine bites down Jax's head, we can see that he started bleeding in black. Why can I affirm that his blood really is black and it's not just because the comic is in grayscale?

For this reason:

During the Teatre Shenanigans, though it was all an act, it's implied that Ragatha does bleed in red, since, you know, the color is there, and because if it was any other color Pomni might have not believed it.

Also, let's be real, Gangle would not mess up something as simple as someone's blood color - her plays need to be >perfect< I love her so much omg

Still using the Theatre Shenanigans doodles as information, but with the addition of the new comic of Pomni taking the shortest stick, we can see through Gangle's ribbons that if there are colors that are portrayed, even when the comics are in black and white, those colors are red and yellow, so if his blood was actually red, it would've been painted as such.

So with that in mind we can pretty much say that his blood is, in fact, black.

As we can see in the part 2 of the neck pieces, his speaking bubbles are also in black and white, and, through an ask made some time ago, it was confirmed that he can only see in grayscale, and that's the reason why Gangle is the one in charge of coloring his animations.

EVERYTHING, literally EVERYTHING about Jax is monochromatic, grayscale, black and white, 50 shades of gr- you got it. He is NOT supposed to be associated with any color AT ALL

And that really highlights how out of place are the yellow bolts that come out of his collar. Jax is not supposed to have any type of color. The shock emitted from his neckpiece does not match with the way his level is supposed to be, doesn't match with his room, his character, his code, but why would that be??

Is there the chance that the chain wasn't his original collar? It does make sense if you look at some of the theories, especially regarding Kinger's role in the bigger picture. In the Imgur image, Kinger does mention to Queenie that he found a code that could free everyone from their collars, but, the main catch here, is that he could NOT disable it after it was done.

Well, we know that he did disabled it, and as a consequence, Queenie abstracted soon after

After it happened, Kinger probably was really desperate to put the collars back on the other AIs, he didn't want his friends to have the same fate his wife had,

But he couldn't disable the code that took them off, so what could he do now??

Simple answer:

He created a new code, so there could be new collars

That ties up with the ask answered with "it's hard to put a chain on someone if they have a scarf on", Jax's chain was probably not part of his design originally, it was not made for him, it was not part of his code in the first place,

Pure speculation, but this might be why Jax's supposedly new collar doesn't follow in every aspect the whole monochromatic idea that his design was meant to have. The yellow lightnings stand out because Kinger probably didn't put a lot of effort into the new collars, he didn't make sure that they matched with the quirks and characteristics already coded into the characters, as he was too desperate to put them back on and just made the code as quickly as he could.

At most he just made the neckpieces blend in with the AIs designs, so they wouldn't stand out. They just match at a superficial level.

(funny part is that Jax probably didn't even notice the yellow coming out of his collar, he can't see colors 😭).

This is why I imagine that his original design never had a chain to begin with, both because of this information, AND, because in Jax's room, we can see him wearing the scarf in the ripped out poster.

Was the scarf supposed to be his original neckpiece? But why would he still wear it after everyone had taken theirs off (as seen in the restarting scene, in the same comic)? To be honest I think he just liked how it looked, he did seem to have a fashion sense back then.

But, by that theory, of the chains not being his actual design, he has also chains on his feet, was his whole design altered?? Why would it be?? I still don't have any clue on why, gotta wait a little for more information.

I like to think that his current design reflects on his character, being a prisoner of both the game and his mind, and quite literally stuck in the past, being unable to move forward.

OK Now for the second part of the analysis

Remember my comment, saying that the shock he received was really quick? That stood out to me because during Ragatha's reset, when she also received the shock to avoid her abstraction, her shock was actually longer than his, being a "ZPPPPPP" instead of a "SNAP". Something I've also noticed is that both times when Jax got shocked, it seemed to be at a less intensity then when Raghata was, because there was a difference in line thickness and size of the lightning bolts shown.

After Jax's restart, in his room, we can see three centipedes, that's the most bugs we've ever seen in the same room until now, since we had only seen a single ladybug in Ragatha's garden, right after her reset.

Ok, so, I did talk a little about how Kinger might be the one responsible for the collars, and I also made an ask this one time to know if he was using the bugs as a way to keep an eye on the others (that was me!!! Hi!!)

If you pay attention to the relationships between the cast, we can see that Ragatha and Kinger are actually pretty close. They trust each other, while Jax seems to have a rocky relationship with everyone.

That might be the reason why there were more bugs than usual in Jax's room, because Kinger doesn't trust him and is aware of his rebellious nature, so he must feel the need to supervise him to a higher extent when compared to others.

Besides that, while Ragatha is really unstable, she doesn't seem to need to restart that frequently, therefore it's possible that only a small shock is able to make her restart. Jax, on the other hand, has already been shown being shocked twice, both with a bigger intensity than seen with Rags.

I believe that if Kinger truly was the one responsible for the collars, he also must have set the potency of the shocks in a way that it was only used the intensity necessary to reset them, so they didn't need to suffer more than needed.

Since Jax does behave in a more erratic manner when compared to the other AIs, the potency of the collar must have been set in a way that it would be able to restart him as quickly as possible, which means it must be in a higher setting,

On the other hand, Raghata probably needs less power for her to reset, because, while unstable, she's not as rebellious as him, so her settings are lower. In the comic used as a reference, however, she is shown to be extremely stressed, so for her to restart it might have been needed for the shock to be at a higher intensity.

Since her collar is not programmed to give such strong shocks, the solution found was for it to last longer, at least in that moment. That can also be the reason why Kinger appeared in the loading screen, because he got worried with the possibility of the collar not being able to stop her from abstraction, so he went to check on her.

That's everything for now!!! It did take lot of work to transcribe the stuff from the theory board to here (it's pretty disorganized ashuhuash) ,but I think I managed to express most of my analysis/theory!!

-carol

CAROL WHEN I CATCH YOU CAROL- DHLJKHKSJGH

I ADORED THIS SO MUCH- HDKJH i want you to know that I was reading it all in Matpat's voice which made it so much cooler "omg guys a Gametheorist made a theory about me hhehehe"

saving this.. SAVING THIS.. CAROL YOU ARE A GIFT= HXCKJSKA definitely gonna read this again.............

#save

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disguisedcheezed · 7 months ago

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this might be a stupid question, but i see you as a kind of authority on john egbert so i thought i'd ask you. i remember a poll you made a while back about john's favorite color being green, but do you remember where exactly that comes up in the comic? i thought for sure it was in his letter to jade, but then i went to check just now to prove it to someone, and all it really said was that jade seemed to favor green. is it never outright stated, just implied?

Hehehehe, I'm flattered thank you. Anyways-

It always has been the moment you lay your eyes on the first panel. John's Slimer logo and the Sburb beta logo. The color GREEN stands out.

" You find a sweet getup. It's almost as if it was tailor made for you. How weird would that be??? " And then he immediately wears it.

And John wears Slimer pattern boxers... (covered up by the pajamas)

John's letter in a nutshell:

John: jade, look at this shirt and it's BLUE and that means it's AWESOME and you SHOULD wear it. (and it's not because you need to wear normal clothes because you dress weird.) John: :) Jade: :O !!!

Initiating the color switch. (Jade would believe John if it was any color, honestly. She's 4.)

John's favorite color has always been GREEN. This is a fact that has been stated in past John posts from 2014 and 2015. Why was it never stated in the comic itself? Because it follows the rule SHOW, DON'T TELL.

And this page with Terezi shows it:

Terezi doesn't know John's favorite color because she was blind. (Emphasis on the "was".) John never once said his favorite color is green. John types in blue text, has blue eyes, and wears blue pajamas, which led to Terezi thinking his favorite color is blue because that's what she saw.

You could see John was going to say something, quickly spoken over by Terezi, who didn't even care to know his actual favorite color. What is the use of telling a person who is almost dead anyway? John has some really important world saving shit to do. Totally not him executing Terezi's selfishness and desperation to bring back Vriska. HA HA HA, anyway.

In conlusion:

John Egbert's favorite color is known to those who have eyes to see.

To the people who believed it's blue: GET FOOLED, FOOL.

#john egbert #homestuck #asks stuff #also dont worry about asking me questions about John #i love to answer questions about john egbert. john egbert you did nothing wrong just a normal guy who started the end of the world #hes totally so normal not a freak boy who lost all ability to be emphatic hes so TOTALLY normal #hs analysis

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moonspiritmars · 2 months ago

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okay tonight's mismag2 episode really felt like all of the air was sucked out of my room. I'm still at a loss for words over the beautiful, raw, and fucking real depictions of grief by Lou and Danielle tonight and I need to spend time finding the words to explain the way in which they touched me, as someone who has experienced a comically large amount of grief. I felt transported into their characters many times tonight and that has never happened to such an immense degree for me before. Even just thinking about it has me tearing up again jesus. I just want to thank them more than anything.

There's been a lot said about Evan tonight and so I don't want to add too much more to it because I want to focus more on the others but I did need to get one thing out, as someone who has been the Evan Kelmp to many of my friends and loved ones.

K just wanted to help, to fix, to heal, to unbreak the broken, and there are many things that are admirable in that desperate need to help despite your ability to do so.

It's just that the thing K tried to 'fix' wasn't broken anymore. Healed poorly, sure, but healed nonetheless, and yet to K it was still seen as broken, in need of fixing, in need of saving.

To have healed 'ugly,' and have that not seen as healed enough creates a deeply wounded creature in you, if there wasn't one already there to begin with. To be nonchalant, or even proud, of the way something has healed, whether literally or figuratively, and have that be stomped on by someone who believes that if they can heal you just a little bit more, fix you a little bit better, they can ultimately mold your healing to meet their standards, fucking burns. So many people already struggle to feel like they will ever be anything other than broken, and these attempts while often in good faith, just reinforce that belief. Also, it may not be true for everyone, but wanting to fix at whatever the cost, without thinking about consequences, can often be tied back to wanting to feel some semblance of control. K wants to save the world, and they can't, but if they can just save Evan, maybe they'll finally feel like they're worth something.

Evan never asked to be saved, though. Sure, people rarely ask straight up to be saved despite wanting it more than anything, but to assume that is the case for every person who has healed awkwardly is a deeply unhealthy saviorism complex that always harms more than it helps.

Idk there's probably 100 better ways to get this point across, I just have been in this situation before and it hurts in a brand new way. I flinched when K became fixated on the healed bone in Evan's arm because I knew where it was going immediately and didn't like it. It's a wound that never develops scar tissue, a burn that is always a burn no matter how much time has passed. You are not broken, but you are not healed 'correctly,' and no matter how much work you did on your own, how bloody your fingers are from clawing your way out of the deepest of holes, how you learned to save yourself despite everything, it won't be enough. Whether directly or indirectly, it means you won't be enough, either.

Anyways woooooooooo the deeply wounded animal in me flinched and whined at this episode, but also settled in the raw and real depictions of grief by the cast. I cannot wait to write more about Jammer and Sam, about feeling like your purpose is to hold everyone else together, to smile and laugh so people don't worry about you. For now I'll just settle with saying from the bottom of my heart, thank you for grieving in front of us. I have a hopeful feeling that many people will find parts of themselves healed by the beautiful work that was tonights episode, and if those parts heal awkward or a little bit wrong, remember they are healed. That is enough. You are whole, and you always have been. To have brokenness inside you does not mean that you are broken yourself. To heal at all, even at awkward angles, in 'ugly' ways, is a beautiful, fragile thing. Cherish it.

And hey if you feel like you are broken and unhealed and not ready or able to heal or tend to your wounds, and like people will always see you as broken and unhealed and nothing more, I won't. I don't. Pinky promise.

#dimension 20 #misfits and magic #mismag #mismag 2 #aabria iyengar #lou wilson #danielle radford #erika ishii #brennan lee mulligan #grief #episode 3

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turndecassette2 · 8 months ago

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I do remember those magic knight people! Every once in a while I go back on your blog to try to track down those drawings because I like them and the concept in the description so much. I would love to hear more about them. Do you have a story planned out?

yeah, vaguely. so for the cosmology; there's this dystopian city I desperately need to draw a map of built above the fossilised remains of an ancient hell. the city mines the hell for 'hell-flesh', a semi-sentient magical substance that's kind of the physical container of the souls of the damned. I suppose this is like fantasy rare earths for fantasy compute or w/e. this has been going on for a while and the city is, kiruna-style, gradually falling down the pit. also as more of the hell is laid bare, semi-autonomous demonic creatures are let loose, maybe as a kind of immune response against human incursion.

(imagining this sort of thing + branching passages. but in the middle of an italian intra-feuding city-state w a population ca modern day singapore)

a kind of grid of bridges and fortresses has been built above the pit to protect the fancier, upper parts of the city from the decaying/descending bits below. the lower city is mostly miners etc & due to the fucked up mutagenic influence of living near a hell & touching hell stuff all day the people in the upper city treat them with suspicion. there's a 'join the US navy-army-whatever to get health insurance & education & basic human dignity' or like french foreign legion situation where by joining the elite magic army manning the little fortresses, ppl from the lower city can gain some access to the upper. in the reverse I guess for the upper city ppl it functions a bit like 'the wall' in asoiaf where criminals, noble bastards etc go to maybe redeem themselves or die horribly.

the fire magic used by the guards to fight demons etc is derived from the burning corpse of a god that is said to have been there since before the founding of the city (presumably the entity responsible for the hell situation in the first place). by swearing fealty to this dead(-ish) god one gets the ability to summon his divine flame but you forfeit your chance at an afterlife, or maybe you go to hell (no-one is quite sure). everyone kind of assumes once the body is fully burned the god will return/reincarnate (and either save or destroy the city, depending on who you ask).

the politics part; at its founding the city was part of some empire that has since collapsed (pretty recently). the city is dependent on trade to stay viable/fed and to appease the new warring states/mini-empires that have sprung up around it. the current ruler is a reclusive young queen & she has her favourite lord/advisor, an ageing academic who is sort of trying to liberalise the place or make it superficially less fashy. other lords dislike this & are working to either find her a proper king or hasten the return of some deity or other that will return the place to its former glory.

I guess the story? has this noble child bastard protagonist from a shady family* of word-mages who is sent to the 'centre' fortress & works her way up to become the apprentice of some hero-knight demon slayer guy with a possibly shady past (I think rn the name I have for the guy is Chaimé & idk if this is a good name? like the spanish jaime but w more e, & the tiny bastard is Myia I think). I imagine her being the sasuke to a happier, more popular girl who saves her from a demon (embarrassing) then is outed as a half-demon herself (she's the redhead in the drawings) & Myia warms up to her as she (demon girl) becomes increasingly isolated from the outside city (being supposedly dangerous or too powerful? I don't think Myia has much natural magic or w/e in her aside from being a nerd & very persistent).

sorry there's a lot here that would be SPOILERS if I ever actually made this into something coherent enough to be an actual comic ha ha. the knight/mentor guy gets dragged into a kind of fantasy 'business plot' & I guess part of that would be like, seeing to what extent he goes along with it & if he's actually a good person ha ha. + there's a bunch of other characters w stuff going on that I haven't figured out the looks of yet but. they're important in my head. the big bear-ish bf guy who gets sent on an expedition down the pit etc

* I have a distinct image of these people living hidden away in some gormenghast-style estate. they've habsburged themselves into being mostly deaf but the only ones around who can fully read/write the divine language that lets them do word-based magic & the other houses kind of have to put up w their weirdness. also scheming nobles in dune using sign language is 1 of my favourite things in the new film adaption & I like the idea of outsiders being forced to learn to sign (or else being cut-off from higher level magic) as some sort of power move? I don't think they involve themselves that much in politics since that's below them but are def part of the 'bring the gods back' thing, for better or worse. anyway after 'avas demon' (GUILTY PLEASURE I know it has such pretty colours but comes from such an unhinged part of the internet, will never stop apologising for this) started posting again I realised it had a character w the same look & vibe so will try and re-design protag girl to look more like this cute person I saw in a fashion post on IG

... let's see how this goes. came up w all this BS after some viz lady at comicon asked me if I wanted to make them a manga but it's grown from being too little to being too unwieldy to pitch. will see after I finish up my current projects. how much blood, swearing & genocide can a story have before it stops being YA. I think chainsaw man is sort of YA but dorohedoro isn't

#I started reading dorohedoro as a teen & I turned out OK #I mean I draw comics I live w my parents in the woods like a medieval peasant etc but that's no worse than the rest of society #these days #god this is a mess #16 yo me loved the bas-lag books #an ask #sorry abt grammar etc this is a lot of words

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fuckyeahgoodomens · 2 years ago

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David Tennant at the Emerald City Comic Con 3.3.2023:

Interviewer: So you mentioned that fans can look forward to Terry Pratchett easter eggs... what else can fans look forward to in Season 2 of Good Omens?

David: I can never remember what people know and what they don't know, so then I get into trouble, as to what's already been revealed and what hasn’t. I probably already said too much and forgot something everyone knows. There’s great… there’s a great cast, some of whom were in the first series. What am I allowed to say? I just need a little cheat sheet. We know that Jon Hamm’s back, right? Yeah, Jon Hamm is back and plays very central role, actually, in series two, Jon was with us a lot, so that was great fun to have him around. And he is very very funny in series two, he gets to do some very excellent work. You’ll very much enjoy Jon Hamm. I’m desperately nervous of saying something I oughtn’t to. It won’t be long, you’ll see it soon. It’ll be on the telly, just watch it. (x)

#good omens #gointerviewedit #david tennant #jon hamm #gabriel #gos2 #season 2 #interview #emerald city comic con #eccc 2023 #gabriel may be the amnesiac angel :)#s2 interview #david interview

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doctorofmagic · 6 months ago

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No one asked but here's some thoughts about Stephen's current and future life.

First of all (and to be completely honest), before Blood Hunt, I do think Stephen was starting to find joy in being the Sorcerer Supreme now that things were seemingly going well in his life.

Just to name a few, he befriended his general self, his marriage was rekindled, Mordo was finally locked down, Clea and Umar were starting to find a common ground (at least, they were not enemies anymore) and Donna II happened, blessing their lives. Stephen was finally thriving. He was executing his duties just fine despite the challenges of being Earth's magical defender. Conflict was obviously expected but it was far from the struggles he faced in v4, for instance. There was optimism.

The fact that he seems sad in that Pasqual's post could be about anything but if I was to predict why, I'd say it's because 1) he didn't want to pass the mantle down at this point in his life and 2) he didn't want to pass the mantle down to Victor specifically because well, it's Doom. And let's be real, Jed's interpretation of their relationship is not similar to T&T or Infamous Iron Man or even Secret Wars. Even if Victor is rarely portrayed as a villain these days (more like an antagonist), there's still a certain dread whenever he shows up in stories. So it's only natural for Stephen to be worried about what's coming next.

Personally, I think Victor will not be a bad Sorcerer Supreme. He's competent and incredibly complex. There's altruism in him, especially when it comes to protect Latverians and people in general (Doom 2099 my beloved). And let's not forget about his dramatic ego and petty personality. If anything, I'd go for a gray representation. He will not be the king of altruism (aka Stephen), but he will not be a shallow villain by desecrating the mantle (something I'm pretty sure Mordo would do. Hate that guy). That said... Oh, he's also in for a big surprise, not expecting the burden that comes with such a huge responsibility. But that's just my two cents. Could always be wrong. However, I still remember when he tried to go after Jericho and gave up as soon as the light of the Eye of Agamotto hit him, so... This idea does have canon support.

(panel merely illustrative; from an alt future/reality)

As for Stephen and Clea, what comes next for them? I know the fandom is desperate for domestic vibes and a peaceful era for them. But let's be real, it's Marvel. Also it's Stephen and Clea. For starters, Clea is still the Warlord of Manhattan, which means that area will remain under her protection, tying her to our dimension. As for Stephen... We know him, right? We know he will never stop doing what he does, Sorcerer Supreme or not. We have tons of magic characters doing their jobs. Even when magic was practically dead, he found a way to keep doing good because it's intrinsic of his personality. And let's not forget Wong and W.A.N.D. They still need someone reliable, and I hardly think they'll go for Victor when consulting all things mystical. Oh, and Strange Academy, of course.

Last but not least, every change in status quo hardly lasts more than a year or two in comic books. It happened so many times before: Salomé, Jericho, Loki, even Clea. It was only natural for Victor's turn, given how T&T is such an important book to their mythos.

As for me? I think it's not really fair for me to share my feelings assuming how much I love both Victor and Stephen. I've seen some unhappy fans (and I can't relate, sorry 🥲) and some excited ones.

The reason I'm still kinda blue is merely due to the lack of new announcements, whether it's a new Doctor Strange book or a mini featuring Victor. Also it's almost certain that Jed is done with his work, which hit me like a train. I really don't want to say goodbye to Jed just yet, and seeing his work continue with Moon Knight while going for the X-books makes me a bit bitter. There's still the possibility that he's staying, but it's all conjecture at this point. I mean, I dread that some bad writer comes next, and boi do I have a no-no list. Hopefully, SDCC will shed some light on these dark times of uncertainty.

Well, that's it. Do I ramble a lot? Was not expecting to write such a long post, sorry about that (old testament me comeback?). Just wanted to write down my thoughts since they were making a mess in my head. If anything, I'll still be around for whatever comes next. After all, my love for Stephen knows no shame 🔥

#doctor strange #stephen strange #clea strange #doctor doom #victor von doom #wong #marvel comics

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angels-are-sinning · 5 months ago

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thoughts on how the riley family made simon instinctually latch onto soap.

something about how the generational gap is during simon and his own parents. i think his grandparents -- experienced the world war(s), of course, and from what i've seen from those parents and their children they aren't very affectionate.

they don't normally say "i love you" or display affection with hugs and kisses. maybe it's cultural differences or something. from what i see from that generation, they're more reserved and withdrawn. they leave their children to fend for themselves in a way. like if you think about those stories of immigrant parents and how they don't really say I love you but show their love in other ways. maybe not verbally but physically. in other means.

i suppose i think that way for simon's own parents too; when you read the comics, you don't see affection shared between his parents or himself, but he holds his mother in a high regard.

there's this wonderful headcanon that's about how "ghost doesn't say "I love you" a lot." and i agreed, since i think when he loves someone, he doesn't say he loves them more so than he shows he does care for them. acts of service and stuff. I attended a funeral of someone's mother, who lived through the great depression and second world war. her daughter talked about how her mother only hugged her once in her life, at least when she could remember -- and that was when she graduated medical school. i think maybe the riley family was like that too, even if simon's parents weren't conservative (they were shown to be previous punks Back in the day ((and punks were political)).) they still were Conservative in raising their children.

but to add to the angst, i don't think that simon handled it very well. i imagine him to be touch-starved, even if he doesn't like to say it or admit he needs the company or presence of other people to be around with, to feel safe. i think he was very quiet and shy when he was younger, keeping to himself more, and not one for social crowds and public events. keeping his distance. but i think a part of him longed for a family, a loving one, like the ones in the sitcoms with loud laughter and many jokes which were popular back when he was a teenager. i guess maybe that's why he was also drawn to the 141, seeing them as his family in a way, that he couldn't have, because his actual family and his parents were the type who .. Needed to be asked if you wanted any sort of affection with them. and i think simon's too embarrassed to ask.

to add to the angst: he knows his parents do love him. he's grateful. he has a house. and he has food and a good education and clothes. but he desperately craves love, warmth, attention, things that his parents did not/or could not provide for him. but even if they do love him, love is useless if it cannot be understood by the recipient. he feels guilty that he feels like this, that he needs More of what they've already provided for him.

bonus points if maybe his parents (or at least his mother) worked really hard out of destitute poverty and is stretched thin to give her children a comfortable life, but never really said anything about it.

(((i like the idea of his father was from some wealthier means, but was kind of shunned for marrying someone of a lower class and thus unable to inherit or was excluded from the high society his childhood offered Etcetera because of his "relations".

A marriage for love that was doomed to fail from the start. How his grandparents on "that" side of the family were right about his father.

Simon got hit with the double combo: working class background trauma (you hurt me so much but you broke your back working for me to have a good life) from his mum and the generational trauma (controlling rich parents) from his dad...

it also makes it easier for simon to instinctively care for his mother more than his father because his father Does have somewhere to go back to, if this family fails. he can easily rebuild with another woman and have other children with her. but maybe his mother has no one except this family.

so soap comes in. soap, gaz, price, the 141. somehow he feels at home with them, how they feel more like a family than the one he had. his house was relatively quiet. not many conversations shared during meals. some brotherly bonding, sure. but his father was usually absent (for work) and his mother was always busy, or very tired after work that she couldn't do anything else when she got home.

but the 141?

they were there for him. gaz was there by his side and elbowing him whenever soap made a joke. soap, the sunshine, always cheerful. price and his fatherly nature towards the 141, as if they were his children. his to nurture. his to protect. i think maybe that's also why ghost is more drawn to price than his actual biological father, because price Acts like an actual dad. deep down, he's been longing for this. touch starved. aching for some sort of warmth and affection, even if its just a shared look or a graze of the hand. he craves touch. he craves for attention, after being withheld from it for so long.

#simon ghost riley #mr riley posting #the riley family #soapghost #ghostsoap if you squint #task force 141 #141 as a family to ghost

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caligvlasaqvarivm · 7 months ago

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Hey, I was just reading your idea for the ending of Homestuck and I noticed that in your write-up Davesprite died, which I found very interesting. I have always thought that Davesprite's survival sort of combated the idea of being bound and doomed to the Alpha Timeline, and the fact that he made it to the end was thematically consistent with escaping the narrative. What is your opinion on Davesprite, and what do you think his purpose in Homestuck is?

I really disagree with this idea that the "point" of Homestuck is to "escape the narrative," as if the characters discovering a means to unstick themselves from the alpha timeline (which is defined as "the timeline that brings about LE", and thus, has always been set up to be something that must be refuted for a happy ending) is not, in fact, part of the narrative. I think people tend to forget that John's aspect, Breath, is literally about choices and freedom, making the Retcon abilities a natural final culmination of his aspect, and that to master these powers, John was required to finish his planetary quest.

Or that when Dave and Rose discuss how much they don't want to finish their quests, the two of them are at their lowest emotional points (Rose having just gone sober and procrastinating talking with Kanaya, and Dave having just been reminded of his lost childhood innocence to the point he broke down crying). The point of them saying they don't want to continue their quests isn't "yeah, man, we're people, we don't have arcs, it's dumb to do quests" - because, again, finishing his quest is what grants John the ability to choose a new future. The point being made by Rose and Dave's reluctance is that self-improvement is hard, gruelling, unpleasant, and uncomfortable - that Rose doesn't want to do hers because it's painful to acknowledge that she was, indeed, a kid who needed guidance, and not the know-it-all-adult she was trying to be, and that Dave doesn't want to do his because it's easier to give up on it than to grapple with his feelings of inadequacy - easier to be a side passenger in his own life than to fight for a better future. We aren't supposed to agree with them that shirking their character arcs is cool and fun.

"They're escaping the narrative" doesn't actually mean anything... it's an odd battle cry that I believe arises from the HS audience's general unfamiliarity with postmodernism (and the fact that the story makes a hard swerve after Game Over in terms of themes and character arcs, which - given the context of Hussie's life and internet presence during and after - is pretty obviously the result of balking at continuing HS for any longer than they had to). Homestuck's storytelling methods, including its meta-ness, usage of the author as a character, etc. etc., are actually quite standard for that genre - having characters be genre savvy enough to comment on the tropes they see and act in defiance of them isn't new, Homestuck didn't invent that, and still counts as being "a narrative." It'd be "escaping the narrative" if John got his powers, grabbed everyone, zapped them away to somewhere the audience couldn't follow, and then the comic ended like that. But that's not what happened.

If we actually go back and look at Davesprite, his baggage is pretty consistently about the fact that he's not "the real dave". When Jade complains about Davesprite, Dave immediately goes "omfg, this is about him being salty he's not the real dave, isn't it". But that's not all that's in play with Davesprite, because Davesprite is a Dave, and thus a way for us to peer into Dave's psyche. Remember what I said earlier about Dave's reluctance to finish his quest stemming from his worries about inadequacy? That comes up again from Davesprite. The reason Davesprite is so concerned with being not the "real" Dave is because he thinks it's proof that he's inadequate (and, by extension, that the people around him are better off without him around).

DAVESPRITE: maybe she was that desperate to finally get away from me DAVESPRITE: between you and me john DAVESPRITE: i didnt really handle things with her as well as i could have DAVESPRITE: oh well maybe real dave will treat her better DAVESPRITE: or not i dont know DAVESPRITE: i did her a favor cutting bird dave out of her life

You know, because he's a kid whose brother was constantly physically abusing him under the guise of him not being strong enough, and Hussie outright says that know-it-all-ism, intellectual assertion and superiority, and mansplaining are traits Dirk tends to have at his worst. A huge amount of Dave/Davesprite's baggage is having spent so much of his life being made to feel less than Bro and not good enough, and then Bro died before Dave could get any closure on that front. And now, as a self-fulfilling prophecy, Davesprite's self-loathing and baggage cause him to ruin his own relationships - thus "proving" that he wasn't worthy of having them.

JADE: jeez you sure have some issues JADE: honestly it has become very tiresome listening to this sort of thing JADE: i thought davesprite had problems JADE: his issues i could kind of understand JADE: i thought you might be different, being the alpha dave and all JADE: but no JADE: you might be even more messed up inside than he was!

Therefore, Davesprite's character arc isn't about how "the narrative" has "doomed" him and he must "escape it," it's about how he (and Dave) need to address the root problem - their self-loathing and unresolved childhood trauma - and move past it. It seems to be a Knight thing to struggle with self-loathing, as Latula and Karkat have deep inadequacies and insecurities too, so addressing these emotional problems is literally part of Dave's arc set out for him by SBURB.

Moreover, Ultimate Self is in play, and in general, the comic has suggested that every iteration of every character is an extension of the original character multiple times. It's not just Dave and Davesprite who conflate themselves and play with the idea that they are ultimately the same guy - the Dancestors see their Alternian counterparts as being extensions of themselves, for example, and Heart players are explicitly said to have journeys of splintered selves, which can also be caused by certain classes in other aspects. What this concept of Ultimate Self brings to Dave/Davesprite is twofold:

First, it means that which Dave is "real" is moot - they are both equally real, and equally relevant, because they are facets of the same ultimate person. I think there's a reason that the person who brings up the Ultimate Selfhood spiel in the truncated ending we got is a mixture of Nepeta (the Heart player I think was intended to achieve Ultimate Selfhood in Hussie's original planned ending, since that's so Rogue of Heart) and Davesprite, who explicitly says that his baggage has been resolved by realizing that he's a part of this greater whole - in other words, finding acceptance with his place in the world, and with that acceptance, finding within him the well of strength needed to go fight LE (or, symbolically, to fight for a future free of what LE represents - which includes the shitty stuff that Bro imposed on him).

Second, what it means is that Davesprite dying (and getting to join the Game Over crew in killing LE) is, at worst, a bittersweet ending. Part of the Ultimate Selfhood spiel is that ALL characters will eventually reach that enlightened state as a final culmination of understanding their aspect (read: completing their personal growth journeys), so as long as a character survives the ending (which I believe all of them were originally intended to do), then eventually - even if off-screen - that character will remember being their other iterations, and doing the things their other iterations did. In a sense, all the dead ghosts from the bubbles (besides the dancestors, who are an antagonistic force overall) get to live on through the surviving cast.

So what I've given to Davesprite in my ending is this: he talks to Nepeta and is told about Ultimate Selfhood, which comforts him WRT his place in the world and helps him deal with his feelings of inadequacy - we see him dead in the bubbles, where he and (Dave) get to fight/talk and complete their character arcs by reaching an understanding with each other - and then we find out that he died by playing a vital role in the fight against the Jacks, a kind of culmination of his acceptance of himself and his duty to choose a brighter future, which isn't fully a sacrifice/death because there's an explicit understanding that Dave will one day come to be Davesprite and (Dave) as well.

And then Davesprite and (Dave) go to fight LE, because LE is the villain of this story. He directly symbolizes immaturity, cruelty, and the worst parts of society - a child who deliberately stunted his own emotional maturity via greed, selfishness, and ambition, combined with the worst aspects of Equius (a casteist), Gamzee (a religious fundamentalist), and Dirk (Bro).

Let's not forget that Bro became as bad as he did because he was under the influence of Cal, and that an aspect of Dirk is literally part of LE. (Dave)'s arc - his reluctance to fight LE because of his self-loathing - has a clear trajectory of picking up his sword to fight LE not because the game or Grimbark Jade are telling him to, but because (Dave) decides that he deserves to fight for a better future, one where the things LE stand for are consigned to the void. Even if (Dave) himself is not able to directly enjoy this future, post-retcon Dave will, and via Ultimate Self, so will (Dave) and Davesprite, in due time.

As God Tier!Calliope says, and as I believe is how we should view the struggles of those who wind up in the dream bubbles:

CALLIOPE: you don't need to do anything. CALLIOPE: be who you've become, and who i didn't. CALLIOPE: consume the fruits of an existence i could never understand. CALLIOPE: live.

The dead, doomed, and irrelevant - including Davesprite and (Dave) - are the ones to fight and defeat LE, and by doing so, they symbolically render him "nothing more than a bad dream". Moreover, Caliborn explicitly says he's orchestrating his own defeat: if Caliborn has it his way, then everybody loses. Game Over was part of Caliborn's plans BECAUSE it would render everybody dead and in the dream bubbles, where they'd be in position to fight and kill him. This is the ending he's chosen - one where nobody gets to survive, and his servants, the Condesce and the Jacks - get to impose their will on what remains of the new world.

What he wasn't counting on was that the Heir of Breath would gain the ultimate power of Breath - the power to choose something new. Using this, he's able to create a timeline free of LE's will. He isn't escaping the narrative, but he IS shaking off the alpha timeline - symbolically, shaking off the shackles placed on them by cruel ancestors, creepy uncles, abusive guardians, and messed-up society. These survivors are then able to fight and defeat LE's living servants, thus clearing the path for a new universe free of his influence.

(Dave) and Davesprite dying, fighting LE in the bubbles, and being sucked in by the black hole are part of the ultimate sacrifice, a culmination of their arcs and a will to defeat the cruelty that defined so much of their lives - and that is what lets them reap the Ultimate Reward.

#homestuck #dave strider #davesprite #NOW. i will admit I'm still rereading the later parts of the comic #and that i'm a huge troll stan #so i might have missed some stuff because i'm not as invested in dave as a lot of other people are #so feel free to correct me or supplement my evidence

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frogletscribe · 5 months ago

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A:FoP Sky Breaker DLC Thoughts...

Alright so i finished the main story of the DLC and have let my thoughts cook for a minute. This is just some of my thoughts/opinions overall. I will have to do a separate post for my more intense thoughts because I managed to actually hit the character limit and I wasn't even halfway through everything (i didn't even know tumblr had one of those and I've been on here for over a decade)

Spoilers for Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora Sky Breaker DLC under the cut.

The opening? Gorgeous. Amazing. Fantastic. Obsessed with the little cut scene of our Sarentu on their Ikran. I am in love. I was really pleasantly surprised to see Kin right off the bat too! Thats my grandpa, i love him! And then walking with the Zakru and getting to hear other NPCs talking was really nice. I loved the banter about So'lek.

Getting into the main games camp was visually very pretty but confusing. I got lost immediately (distracted by the wandering Zakru) and accidently came in from the back? and then proceeded to not be able to find anything or anyone. I kept getting turned around and winding up back with Etuwa and Ka'nat. I did eventually find everyone else but it was a struggle.

Was Eetu only there at the very start??? He was hanging out with So'lek and having a very cute banter and then as everything progress he completely disappeared. Sosul too for that matter. It made me a little worried when he wasn't there after a while bc it felt like almost all the other key npcs got at least a small cameo in other quests but not Eetu? I got paranoid he died but also i think hes an important enough NPC that someone else would have said something if that was the case. I guess i just wanted more of him in general. (Im biased/delusional and ship him with my Sarentu, i will take literally anything)

Theres also a smaller moment, walking around where Teylan calls and starts talking about Nor, about how he would have loved the games, that really got me. For a second i actually thought Nor might come back later in the story, but given how things went it makes sense that he wouldnt. I do really hope that Nor shows up in the next DLC because I really need closure for him. He deserves to see and be a part of what his fellow Sarentu are building and to heal from all the hurt he has been through.

Can the Zeswa PLEASE catch a break? 😭 First the arches are collapsed, then Pasuk, now this?? I need this to be the last big bad thing that happens to them for a while.

More So'lek all the time please! I love him. I loved his role in the over all story and how he helps us throughout the final mission. He is the reason i am desperate for a romance in this game, but i can't have that so i'll just have to write it myself fhdjskghfs

I will be making a separate post about my thoughts on everything with Alma and Mokasa.

With the last of TAP (more or less) gone now, I'm really curious about the next DLC and the general future of Frontiers. Secrets of the Spires comes out in Fall, which is rapidly approaching, but i doubt we will hear anything until like September at the earliest. I think I remember hearing about a new clan in the new area for that one?? (Could be wrong though) Im really curious what the plot for that one is gonna be now that Mercer and Harding are gone.

Hopefully we will see Nor again. I'm kinda also hoping for a movie cameo? like Norm or Max showing up? We got an audio cameo of Ardmore, i think it'd be cool to see some friendly faces or at least audio for one of those guys. I don't think we will get a Jake cameo but i would lose my mind if we did lol.

Im also really hoping that theres more content coming in the future? More DLC or comics or something cause AFoP is the only thing keeping me sane when it comes to Avatar Brainrot rn.

#froglet rambles #avatar frontiers of pandora spoilers #frontiers of pandora spoilers #sky breaker dlc spoilers #afop spoilers #avatar frontiers of pandora #james cameron avatar #avatar way of water #avatar the way of water #frontiers of pandora #atwow frontiers of pandora #atwow #afop sky breaker #sky breaker dlc #james cameron's avatar #avatar 2009

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wield-the-mighty-pen · 7 months ago

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idk if im late but 129 and ladrien!

Don't worry, you are definitely not late, I am still taking prompts!

So funny story with this one, I went to figure out which song 129 was, and it ended up being Noah Kahan's Stick Season, which I really love, but also is potentially very angsty. And after already writing Ladrien angst, I really wanted to write something lighter

So I turned this option into a wildcard, and after using the random number generation to find a different playlist and song number, I got... Stick Season again kasfdskljgsdkljsd

I told myself that if I got it a third time than I should probably just bite the bullet and do it, but I did not get it a third time

So now... here is Ladrien with Leave a tender moment alone by Billy Joel!

This drabble is fluff with some light mutual pining, hope you enjoy!

ao3 link

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Even Though I'm in Love Sometimes, I Get So Afraid

With the gentle caress of moonlight dancing across the surface of the soft features of her lovely face, Adrien couldn’t help but feel his heart get stuck in his throat.

He couldn’t quite remember how he had gotten here, sitting at night, on a park bench, next to the love of his life, the revered and perfect Ladybug.

He could only remember how his evening began. Sneaking out of his bedroom window in a desperate attempt to escape the oppressive isolation of his house.

Regardless of how he had gotten there, regardless of how she had shown up, regardless of how he had convinced her to stay and sit with him, the entire moment still felt like a blur, and he was only grateful of the warmth of her presence beside him and of the opportunity to spend time with her.

The silence that stretched between them, felt wrong and unnatural. The space that surrounded them was inexplicably charged, and he felt as though something needed to be said, or else whatever fragile thing resided in this moment would break.

The only problem was, his mind was completely absent of any and all thought of what to say to her.

If he were Chat Noir, dressed in the liberating masquerade of his costume, what to say would be easy. He would level her a carefully thought up pun or joke and watch as she received it with either a wrinkled nose or a tinkling laugh.

Of course, the trouble with this was that he was not Chat Noir. He was Adrien Agreste. Model. Perfect son. Person who is definitely not Chat Noir and therefore should not be acting like him.

Still, the urge to make conversation and to make said conversation light, dogged him. And before he could think too much about it, he was clearing his throat and opening his mouth to speak.

“Um.. so anything you were hoping to spot while in the park tonight?” He asked, poking lightly a spot on her shoulder.

For a long moment she said nothing, only blinked at him owlishly, with her mouth slightly open in surprise.

Adrien’s stomach fluttered anxiously. He had ruined things. He was sitting here with her, actually getting to spend some time with his lady, and he just had to go and put his foot in his mouth and mess everything up.

She was going to think he was weird. She was going to walk away in disgust. She was going to hate him. Worse yet, she was going to find out his identity, then reject him again, and then follow the aforementioned steps.

She would never speak to him again, all because of a stupid, mindless joke.

The internal spiraling going on in Adrien’s mind, was disrupted by the calming sound of sweet giggling.

A warm, balm-like sensation coursed through Adrien’s blood as he registered Ladybug’s laughter and the fact that she hadn’t been bothered by his joke.

He let out a soft chuckle of relief that fell in tandem with her lingering laugh.

“Well you see, I actually came here because of you–” She started and then abruptly cut herself off, seeming to realize what she had said. Her eyes rounded comically and her face turned a shade not at all dissimilar from her mask.

“--not that I was stalking you or anything. I–I was just finishing off patrol, when I saw you sitting here, and you looked alone and I thought that maybe you could use some company. Of course, that was really presumptuous of me, and maybe I invaded your private time, and I-I-I I’m sorry, I can just leave you alone.”

She made a slight move to get up, but Adrien was not quite ready for her to go yet. He placed a hand on both her arms, with just enough pressure for her not to miss it, but light enough for her to easily walk away if she wanted to.

“I-I’m sorry Adrien.” She said, her eyes failing to meet his and her cheeks still remaining a heated red.

Adrien was confused at her reaction. Had he given some indication that he wanted her to go? Did something happen that he had missed?

No sooner did the confusion come, than did a clarifying thought.

Wait, was she nervous too?

The reassuring, bright smile that he gave her, was surely colored in his current giddiness and relief.

“Ladybug, please stay. I am honored that you chose to join me, and I am really grateful that you noticed me sitting here. Honestly, I had a pretty rough day and I needed to get out of the house, but just you being here and sitting with me has made me feel better in more ways than you know. Thank you.” He gave her the last thank you with a squeeze of her hands.

Ladybug’s answering tender smile was worth the slithering anxiety he had faced when speaking openly to her.

“I’m glad I was able to help. You know, I don’t really have anywhere to be right now. If you’d like, we can just sit here together until you’re feeling better. Does that sound like a good idea?”

“That sounds perfect.”

Adrien leaned back onto the bench and soaked in the feeling of belonging and togetherness that only she ever really made him feel.

For the first time that night, Adrien no longer felt the pressure to speak. He could just leave things alone and enjoy the moment together.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thank you so much for the ask! <3

Request a lovesquare side and a number from my playlist for a drabble!

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oluka · 1 year ago

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Invincible Iron Man 11-13: Emma and Tony's relationship develops

Is it Wednesday? No. Is there an Iron Man comic out this week? Also no. But I've skipped a few months and now I have things to say about Iron Man again. Namely, the developing friendship (relationship??) between Emma and Tony.

Look at this combo attack. Isn't it the best????

Iron Man has been a bit slower paced since the wedding, which makes sense, since the time for desperate reaction to Orchis' attack has passed, and Tony's now firmly in the planning stage for the final boss fight against Orchis/Feilong. It does mean that it's more interesting to look at several issues at once, though. And what I want to talk about is Tony and Emma. Their interactions are kind of a subplot to the whole "get mysterium and make an armour out of it", but every word bubble and action says something about their relationship. Remember, in IIM #8, Tony and Emma were screaming at each other about the Sentinels, Emma was devastated about losing her cuckoos but didn't let Tony give her comfort, and Tony had a panic attack that Emma helped him through.

Where are we now? They're married and have basically been living on top of each other for a few weeks now. First the honeymoon, where they flaunt themselves on the beach (and make innuendos at each other) and Tony secretly breaks into Krakoa.

Emma doesn't have time for this bullshit. It's fun. They banter. Also, Tony brings back a book that her cuckoos made for her, and gives it to Dr. Strange for safekeeping. Emma doesn't know about this.

This is the kind of small thoughtful kindnesses that I love to see from Tony.

And Emma isn't indifferent to Tony either. She may be snarky, and (rightfully so) insist that their marriage is fake, but she doesn't seem to mind when Tony calls her his wife. She even hosts a Thanksgiving dinner with him, and they finish each other's sentences????

They're clearly getting along well. It's even more obvious in the latest issue, where they go on a space trip together to retrieve the big mysterium reserves that the mutants stashed on Gameworld.

They get brought there by Starfox, who hilariously fails at charming Emma.

Notice a few things: One: Tony feels the need to apologize to her. He's been nothing but courteous to her since the beginning, and I dig that. Two: Emma is a sapiosexual, which means she finds intelligence attractive. Draw your own conclusions :)

I also really love the combo attack they did, combining Tony's repulsortech (I'm guessing he turned the beams into only light in order to let Emma refract it?) with Emma's diamond form. Really badass.

But the best part about issue 13 is maybe when they get back and see that the skrull impersonators they hired to play them went on a date at the rockefeller center. And when Emma says that she'd always wanted to skate there, what does Tony do?

He kisses her hand while affirming they will win, and then he takes her skating! As a date! Because she said it had been something she wanted to do!

Aren't they cute?

Honestly, I'm pretty ecstatic that they are getting along so well. Their chemistry is great, and I really like how easily they banter back and forth, always in good faith. It feels like they both have reached an equilibrium, where they know what to say and what to do and understand each other. I'm actually not opposed to them staying together even after the Fall of X event ends, but if they part ways, at least they will do so as friends. I hope. Duggan, don't mess this up now.

Anyways, it's been fun to see Tony be more and more overtly affectionate towards Emma, and Emma not minding it one bit.

See you next time for more Iron Man thoughts.

#iron man #tony stark #emma frost #Invincible Iron Man (2022)#irondiamond #oluka's comic thoughts

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stop-breaking-my-heart-telltale · 1 year ago

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Hey CJ, you mentioned that you disagree with a lot of your old TWDG opinions, any that stand out you wanna share? Also i agree with what you said about wanting to play the series for the first time again with no prior knowledge - i would love to meet louis character for the first time again.

Yeah, some opinions have changed with time and moving on from being a hardcore, active fan in the fandom. I'm pretty sure I've talked about some of them more recently, like how I used to not like Jane but now I've become something of a "Jane apologist," if you will.

I was also super vocal about hating the Clementine comics when the 12-page comic dropped, and I'm pretty sure I was shitty about Tillie Walden... which I look back on now and feel embarrassed. In fact, I specifically remember calling attention to the fact that Skybound turned off comments on the first book trailer and on their instagram, twitter, etc. and being like, "look at these COWARDS! they know we hate the comic and that Tillie's a bad artist, they're trying to shut us up!" ........but then I heard they turned them off because Tillie was getting threats, and it caused me to dig around and see the vile shit fans were saying.... It gave me pause to think things through and I feel very differently about it all now.

I've also changed my mind on Minerva. Like Jane, there was a loooong period of time where I didn't like her, but now? I think she's great. A real tragedy.

In fact, real talk, I think my perspective on most of the female characters in TWDG has shifted dramatically. I've done a lot of thinking on this just in general; I'm much harder on female characters than male characters. I can pretend like noooooo I was always soooo fair... but no, not always. I'm sure it's from some deep-rooted, internalized misogyny I have that I'm working on, but I also think the games sometimes neglect those characters, too. Which makes it easier to brush them off as just "poorly-written" and "bad characters" if I don't like them when that's not always the case.

Or let's be real, we all know how this goes; the games give us a flawed male character and fans are like "he's my blorbo, here's a 50k essay about why he deserved better and a list of my headcanons and the twenty AUs I've written for them-" but then a female character's just as flawed and fans are like "lol she's poorly written, here's an essay on why-"

Don't look at me like that. I know I'm guilty of this. I know y'all remember Mitch. Back in the day, Mitch was my boy and I used to write about him all the time but like... god forbid I put that much effort into writing about Violet or Minerva, right?

Or even look at Kate, for example. Past CJ would've talked about how much she doesn't like Kate and she hates the forced romance with Javi, she's just there as a way to make David and Javi fight, etc. But you ask me about Kate now and I'm like, "Girl, ANF did you so dirty, you didn't deserve this."

Or how about Bonnie in S2? We all love to hate on Bonnie, but like... she's such an interesting character?? She's a recovering drug addict so desperate for a place, and you can see Carver's manipulation at play in the way she talks about him to Clementine. It takes seeing him physically beat Kenny within an inch of his life before she's like "Yeah no, fuck this, we're leaving tonight." And we give her shit about Luke's death and being mean to Clementine but frankly? Yeah, she's mean to Clementine and that's fine.

What, it's okay for Kenny to lash out and call her a stupid kid when Sarita dies because he's your poor meow meow and it makes his character soooo morally gray and complex? But Bonnie lashes out about Luke's death and suddenly she's just a massive piece of shit? No complexities or anything? There's no grey morality? No underlying motive or emotions behind the choice to abandon the group with Mike and Arvo?? She's just a bitch??

And do I even need to talk about Sarah? Hmm? We all know how Sarah was received and how fans still talk about her. Again, Sarah has a complete meltdown over losing her father and people get hurt, and fans wish death upon her... but Kenny has a meltdown and brutally beats up Arvo or threatens to smack Clementine or a number of things.... "that's fine, he's just really upset, he lost his family, y'know? everyone keeps trying to GASLIGHT me that he's bad but if you really think about it, Arvo totally deserved to be abused and it's actually Clementine's fault Kenny hit her because she tried to stop him-"

I just... the lengths we go to justify and defend this violent, toxic character but then act like Jane is the worst, I can't-

It's so funny to me whenever I see someone in the fandom complain about wanting more morally grey, flawed female characters because like... y'all couldn't even handle Jane. Or Lilly. Or Sarah. Or Bonnie. Rebecca. Eleanor. Christa. Minerva and Violet, in a lot of cases. So like... what do you actually want?

Note that I'm guilty of this, too, and I've asked myself that question... haven't fully worked out the answer yet.

That's the major thing that comes to mind about opinions I had that I've changed my mind about. I think a big factor in that is letting twdg go and getting invested in other fandoms, doing a lot more reading, getting back into writing, etc. Obviously I've really gotten into the Dragon Age fandom and that's what triggered this "journey of self-reflection~" when it comes to how I perceive female characters. Like, you want flawed, morally-grey ladies? That's your series... assuming you can actually handle it.

But I also recently finished a playthrough of Fallout New Vegas and remembered my love for Veronica Santangelo, like... I don't care that the game doesn't technically have romance, that's my girlfriend, I love her. Then the other night I finished my first playthrough of Life is Strange True Colors [I know, where the fuck have I been, right?] and I spent 40% of the time looking at flowers, 10% being sad about Gabe, and the other 50% trying to figure out who I liked more, Steph or Ryan.

I've also been reading a lot of wlw novels which is just..... THAT'S a whole mess I won't get into because this is already long enough and you didn't ask. Just know that's also another factor in this reflection.

And to answer the other part of your ask: I miss Louis. I would love to play TFS again for the first time again, that was a fun time.

#asks #twdg clementine #twdg jane #twdg bonnie #twdg kenny #twdg violet #twdg minerva #twdg louis #twdg kate #long answer #haven't posted in a while but i was browsing my inbox and this one caught my attention #this has been on my mind for a while and it's something i'm looking at differently y'know?#and i'm sure there are other things i'm just not thinking of that i've changed my mind about #lemme see..... oh i made that whole post about 400 days! i look at that way more positively than i used to #there ya go that's another one

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