#I just need SOMETHING new and different

[kellerybird]

the urge to pack up and move to the pnw is strong tonight lads

[tierras]

the mutual aid los angeles network (malan) has put together a spreadsheet with valuable resources for people affected by the ongoing los angeles wildfires and wind storm. the sheet is constantly being updated with resources such as shelter info, animal boarding info, addresses for distribution centers, volunteer opportunities and so much more.

please share this spreadsheet widely

[vaguely-concerned]

thinking about not only the specific people lucanis pulls in to represent the 'locks' in his psyche, but the storytelling that happens in the structure/order of them. the underlying ideas are presented something like:

the lucanis who went into the ossuary never came back out again; he died down there (the boy caterina raised is gone forever) -> you're putting yourself in danger doing this (by being close to me), you should leave because I can't bear it if you get hurt because of me -> it doesn't matter even if we do try this, it won't work anyway (again because of me) ('you know what he's like, you can open the door but he won't walk through it' :'( oofie doofie) -> what if the real secret is that there was never anything but the monster in here from the beginning. you should leave, there was never anything here worth saving in the first place. (implicitly: what if I deserved what happened, all along.)

it runs pretty cleanly from outward-oriented attachment anxiety ('caterina won't even want me back like this, she won't recognize me (the same way I no longer recognize myself)) and gradually deeper inwards until we reach self-image and self worth. or you know, the harrowing basic lack of it lol.

"careful -- they'll know we're not right," spite says in one of their first scenes... but clearly, some very deep part of lucanis has feared or suspected for much longer than that that there's something inherently not right at the core of him, way before any demon entered the picture. and the voice he gives those lines to is the person who should know him better than anyone in the world, who he has loved more than anyone in the world -- and who deliberately chose to hurt him so horrifically anyway. 'It's better if I'm just a monster and deserved what happened than it is to allow for the idea that the brother I love doesn't really exist and maybe never did'. it's better if he's fundamentally flawed in some way that needed fixing to help him survive, and that's why caterina chose to hurt him again and again -- out of love. (this one I think he might have a very sad wakeup call on one day if he ever ends up with the responsibility and care of a child of his own in some way and realizes just how alien the idea of ever intentionally hurting them for any reason is to him. oh buddy. also interesting that he keeps caterina as the outermost lock -- there IS a distance he keeps there that he hasn't with illario. he doesn't resent her 'anymore' he says, but he also keeps her carefully further away from his deepest self.)

as far as I could tell the only note in the mind prison that's fully hidden and needs to be uncovered is the sad painful helpless stupid little truth that even after all this, even knowing what happened... he still loves his brother. is there anything illario could ever do that would make lucanis completely stop loving him, do you think? sometimes the trouble with unconditional love is that it is, well. unconditional, even when some terms and conditions probably would have been in order haha.

that's the pattern you see there again and again; he would rather destroy and abandon and imprison himself at every turn than let go of love, even when it's just scraps, even when there's only ever enough of it to hurt him. it's only when rook shows up and as it were takes his hand and walks along with him that he can entertain the idea of changing the story of what walking out the door might mean in the end.

[bunnieswithknives]

OH MY GOD??? HAS IT SERIOUSLY BEEN A MONTH????? I am so sorry guys

Prev | Next

[deoidesign]

Doing master studies the only way I know how: Stealing them and making them my guys.

(Barberini Faun)

(The Fallen Angel - Alexandre Cabanel)

(Covent Garden - William Bruce Ellis Rankin)

[chipper-smol]

So...... Loop and Odile huh?

v THE OTHER RESPONSE I DOODLED v

yeagh

[thatringboy]

haven’t finished Amphoreus yet but if they send Sunday down to the surface he’s literally gonna get confused for titankin with his funky clothes and halo he’s gonna get his ass beat by mydei and NOT in the way my current wip suggests

[s0fter-sin]

one of my favourite aspects of supernatural that you very rarely see in paranormal shows is that sam and dean are already versed in the world they live in. there’s no sudden discovery of ghosts and demons and now they have to learn about them along with the audience; they are born into it and already know all about it. it allows the audience to follow their personal story instead of also trying to figure out this new world and its rules

the first season is full of knowledge we never see them learn; “w*ndigoes are in the minnesota woods or- or northern michigan. i’ve never even heard of one this far west.” […] “great. well then this [his gun] is useless.” (1x02), “you don’t break a curse. you get the hell out of its way.” (1x08), d: “it’s a god. a pagan god, anyway.” […] “the annual cycle of its killings? and the fact that the victims are always a man and a woman. like some kind of fertility right.” […] s: “the last meal. given to sacrificial victims. d: “yeah, i’m thinking a ritual sacrifice to appease some pagan god.” (1x11)

almost every episode in the first season is a monster they’ve faced before that they then explain to the audience in a way that should feel patronising; like it’s the same speech given over and over again but instead, the audience almost feels included in the knowledge. it’s stated with such an innate confidence and comfort in said knowledge that it feels like we already knew it too; “spirits and demons don't have to unlock doors. if they want inside, they just go through the walls.” […] “the claws, the speed that it moves; could be a skinwalker, maybe a black dog.” (1x02), “it's biblical numerology. you know noah's ark, it rained for forty days. the number means death.” (1x04), “no no no, not the reaper, a reaper. there's reaper lore in pretty much every culture on earth, it goes by 100 different names.” […] “you said it yourself that the clock stopped, right? reapers stop time. and you can only see 'em when they're coming at you which is why i could see it and you couldn't.” (1x12)

they already know and, at least in the first season, already have what they need to kill whatever they’re hunting; already know to salt and burn bones for spirits, fire for a w*ndigo, exorcisms for demons, a silver bullet to the heart for shapeshifters. there’s only three times in the entire first season that they run into something new to them; 1x14 when sam gets his first vision that leads him to another psychic, 1x16 when dean calls caleb for help on the sigil he put together and he tells him about daevas, and 1x20 when they find out vampires are real- and they only don’t know that bc john thought they were hunted to extinction and not worth mentioning

(there’s also technically two half instances if you count one of them knowing something the other doesn’t - sam figuring out the tulpa in 1x17 and dean already knowing about the shtriga in 1x18 - but those still rely on sam and dean having prior knowledge)

even when they’re uncertain about facing something, it’s not bc they don’t know what it is; it’s precisely bc they know what it is and acknowledge that it’ll be a difficult hunt (“i don't know, man. this isn't our normal gig. i mean, demons, they don't want anything, just death and destruction for its own sake. this is big. and i wish dad was here.” 1x04)

so much of the tension in paranormal shows typically comes from the main character(s) not knowing what is happening to them/the people around them and having to find out how to resolve it. supernatural is unique in that it operates more like a police procedural. the tension comes from solving the clues and identifying patterns to figure out who (what) the killer is and intercepting before they can take another victim

it’s such a different tone to go for when compared to other shows that came both before, during, and after its run. it sets sam and dean on even footing with each other since they both have the same knowledge going in, and it puts them in a place of authority usually reserved for an outside character

the shows i compare spn to most is charmed, buffy and teen wolf; every main character in those shows are brought into the paranormal world knowing nothing, putting them on the same level as the audience, and they have their mc interact with others already knowledgeable about that world in order to overcome their problem/monster of the week. the audience organically learns about this new world as the characters learn about it. it’s a sound writing strategy that prevents “as we already know”-style exposition but something that complicates it is if your world building isn’t unique or intriguing enough, this slow introduction can become boring

we’ve seen shows like these before; sitting through the same tropes of characters learning to use their powers, struggling with no longer feeling normal/relating to the regular world around them, and not knowing how much they can trust the people already involved in this new world gets repetitive. all three shows eventually reach the same level of comfort with their new world that spn starts with but if the characters aren’t enough to draw you in, you can end up dropping it before they reach that point (and often, before the overarching plot can really kick in and evolve the show beyond the villain of the week format)

it’s the superhero origin movie in tv format; dragged out and overplayed. dropping the audience into an established world of course comes with its own problems but you also have the benefit of pre-existing established character dynamics that let the audience slot in like they’ve always been there instead of just getting to know all the characters while the characters also get to know each other

sam and dean already knowing about the supernatural lets the audience immediately get to the core of the story; the conflict between sam and dean, the search for their father, and the mystery of what killed their mother

[wizardsix]

local guy claims intellectual superiority by declaring people who criticise veilguard just haven't played long enough and don't really know what bad writing is. it must be very peaceful to have such an empty head.

[icewindandboringhorror]

Pages from trying to keep a little sketchbook-scrapbook type thing going for two weeks lol. I gave myself specific rules in hopes they might all end up more cohesive/consistent seeming, but alas, scribbly chaos reigns, it seems

[cobra-creampuff]

the fact that they made it illegal to make ads louder than programs on tv in 2010 but haven't updated it to apply the same regulation to streaming. who do i have to call.

[dxxtruction]

"Louis acting like a pimp to Armand" And what is a pimp exactly? Quickly. And, oh so sexual trauma survivors can't engage in kink now without it being all about that? Pet names? They can't be submissive anymore? Consensually? Sexually healthy? Be serious. I'd hardly say there's much power difference between them during all this anyway, except that Louis is freer than Armand and it's been putting a strain on their relationship. Louis wants more from Armand, and less of this 'being his past' for them both, and so helping Armand with this could fix that. It's healthy to want to help your partners get out of a rough patch?

I mean, the whole exchange was very clearly set up as a "I want to help you" after such a great moment of vulnerability Louis feels just how much Armand is desperate for it. Louis called Armand so they could work out a plan together.

And the bit with the umbrella was Louis' way of asking 'are you willing to listen to me?' and Armand said yes by unfolding it. Louis goes on and explains, Armand is allowed to argue against it, but Louis makes his point. And then he gives Armand a way to make his own choice in it too. Armand's already decided 'I want you, more than anything else in the world', but Louis still asks after if he's sure of his choice, and with a name, Arun, that is the one of his fullest agency, running the point home. Honoring the situation Armand calls Louis Maitre - as a way of being like 'I'll do as you've said then'. To make this work he's going to have to give Louis some of the control, yes. But it's the first time such a role is ever established, and it was his choice to do it. So so what if they do it in a very suggestive way? They can't like doing that? I think it's them having fun.

I struggle to find how Louis is being overly domineering here when really he's giving and offering Armand the most agency he's ever had. Same with finding it manipulative. The manipulation was more earlier in the episode I think, when he was stringing him along, giving mixed signals. He's no longer toying with him like that. Louis might be pushing Armand, leading him on to make a decision, but he doesn't mean bad by it.

But back to this pimp thing. I find it frankly offensive that this is where people are going with this. I get it, but to run with it being the case is, on many levels, wrong.

Louis told us episode 1 this was the only sustainable line of work to support his family and keep their standing, at the time. It was never his choice to be doing this either but his blackness allowed no other options. He did what he did so his family could stay in that house and maintain all their same comforts. It gave him privileges most black men didn't have at the time that he wanted to maintain and even have more of. Anyway, it doesn't and had never defined him the way 'being good at running things' had. And in that case he just likes having that kind of control where he can get it, which makes sense.

The world is what placed that kind of role onto him of what he was allowed to be able to run, not himself. And on that he actually treated the sex workers he employed well and respected them enough to give them more opportunity.** He recognizes they don't have much in the way of options either.

Louis employed sex workers, yes, but he didn't subject them to abuse, (like how Armand was)*. He didn't oversee things in a way that would go against their consent (see; episode 1 again)**. Sometimes a job is just a job. And Sex work is work.

Armand's particular past with sexual abuses may strike a particular cord with Louis, given all that, but the very last thing either is thinking is that Louis' pimping Armand out here. This is merely their decision as companions, and had nothing to do with adding another line in a laundry list of selling Armands body out to people at the command of someone else. Armand rescinds some of his control to Louis' wishes, because he wants him, and he trusts him, that's all.

If you aren't allowing Armand that choice, and are doubtful it's fully his, you're putting him right back in the box of being defined by his abuses. Putting him back into that space where he isn't given any agency over what he does. (Which is exactly opposite of what the intent of this scene is for)*.

*: (edit) added for clarity.

**: (strike through) numerous people are saying I'm misremembering these points so disregard it. (Thought he was siding with Bricks, it was the other way around). (Technically one aspect of those opportunities were for getting around the law). I don't have a perfect memory, it happens. Let's not get mad about it. Doesn't change much of the point which is that Louis, now, Louis then, was always considering more about the running things and for stated purposes. So I guess I'd say he may only have respected the SWers enough sometimes for what allowed him to do that, and there are moments he certainly expressed remorse over the fact, but he has a great deal higher respect for Armand that is genuine. It's incomparable. Please read my added notes in the tags, it should address most other concerns.

[secriden]

so i wonder if anyone else has thoughts about mame's choices regarding sky vs tongrak's stories and how she tackled the complexity of loving and being loved.

when i first heard about love sea, i saw a lot of people say that fortpeat were just re-cast as sky and prapai but with tongrak being older and richer than mahasamut. personally, i think that's a pretty reductionist view because mame explored the idea of being afraid to love and be loved from very different angles and perspective in these two stories.

i will give that there are some similarities on the surface - peat's character does that whole 'pretends to hate it but secretly loves it' thing; the cat-like 'push and pull' thing and fort's character is still a overly excited, loveable golden retriever of a human being with a strong sense of self; also both sky and tongrak have had experiences which make them both fearful of 'love'.

but i think while sky's main fear is being loved, tongrak's is very much a fear of loving.

like, sky's story is very... raw. it's an exposed nerve, tender and painful and present. sky's fear is so immediately tied to his trauma which he's still in the throes of. the betrayal he faced was from the one who claimed to love him and it's telling that sky's first flashback is not triggered by his feelings FOR prapai but by prapai expressing his 'love' for him. this trauma is intimate and physical and close, but that means that the start of his healing journey can begin because of an external force (prapai) giving him that safety but also physically removing the threat. when sky begins to feel safe again, he is able to begin healing.

in contrast: tongrak's trauma is relatively... hmmm, separated (? not the best word but...) on a physical level. it doesn't make it less or even less painful (or more, or more painful), but his fear of love largely stems from how he sees the people immediately around him being hurt by love. he's internalised the idea that love doesn't last. mahasamut starts confessing his feelings pretty early on; like episode 4 mahasamut straight up goes, 'well you can't stop me from loving you' and tongrak's disapproving but he's not triggered. what's the difference between this and episode 10, i think, is that tongrak's actively fighting his own awareness of his feelings for mahasamut. it's why his fight or flight response is triggered by vie calling him out about his feelings in episode 8 and also why he tries to force parameters back into their relationship (my take: i don't care if you love me but i won't love you) in episode 10. but it's also why his healing doesn't actually come from an external force - yes, vie kind of knocks him out of his depressed stupor by hiding the bracelet, but note that tongrak's has that breakdown realisation ('please come back, i'm sorry, i'm sorry, can't you please come back to me? i'm afraid you'll end up hating me (emphasis added) if you love me') before he has that chat with vie. he's already realised that the root of his fear of mahasamut's love isn't the love itself, but the fear that if he admits his own love for mahasamut, it will eventually get betrayed. it's also why even after he resolves that he wants to try at a relationship with mahasamut, he still can't say it. at this point, his father's a non-entity in terms of the fear of him going after his loved ones - he's already been proven a weakling and a coward and also they're physically on the island so removed from jak that it shouldn't be an immediate fear anymore. no; this struggle is completely internal and it's why we linger on his heartbreaking attempts to confess (also, love sea had some pacing issues but i'm so so grateful they took time to show this part; bless fort for insisting on it!). tongrak's afraid to love but he pushes and pushes himself, and finally breaks through and its entirely on his own terms because of his own strength.

i'm not saying sky's weaker for (in a sense) needing someone else to rescue him before he could heal, but i think it just speaks to mame really telling quite a different story of healing with tongrak.

like... have you ever thought you'd healed from something and then it comes back in an unexpected way but then your response to the trigger is also different? the pain is there but it's... at once deeper but also more distant? a deep pulse rather than a high pitched shriek? and the way you go about beginning this new phase of healing is also different? i think that's whats happening here.

it's fascinating how us humans can fear vulnerability in so many ways, so many forms, on so many levels but i think the lesson mame's stories tell is that sometimes it really is worth it to become vulnerable. not with everyone, and not all the time (goodness, that would be foolish). but also, keep holding onto hope. keep looking for that right person, keep being kind to yourself and others. know that it's ok if your healing feels different, if you didn't catch it some point in the past, its not too late.

you'll be ok.

[waitineedaname]

we know binghe and sqq still consider binghe to be a disciple of qing jing, but is that recognized by anyone else? I imagine it's pretty awkward with anyone who was around for, y'know, the entirety of books two and three, but ning yingying still tells him to call her shijie so that's gotta count for something. basically I'm asking this because I'm wondering if new disciples were brought onto the peak, whether they'd call him shixiong

[johnny-boy-17]

Say less but say more King, we’re here for all of it.

[queenofthursday6599-blog]

You know I don't think Timmy actually ended up sharing Wanda and Cosmo for all that long with Chloe in the grand scheme of things.

I mean there's various points in the show that seem to imply that having Fairy GodParents is a temporary thing. Like extremely temporary for most kids.

As in even being 10, and having gotten Cosmo and Wanda at age 8, Timmy's considered as having been a GodChild for a long time. Even if that's only a couple years.

Like there's a reason why there's multiple episodes about all of Fairy World being interested in whatever Timmy's up to.

Timmy's an outlier case.

He's going to end up aging out of the system (bar any breaking of any major rule that the fairies can't find a way to forgive) and everyone knows it.

They made a whole live action trilogy of bending the rules just for him where he gets to keep his fairies as an adult, and then turns into a fairy at the end of that trilogy.

He's a, probably wouldn't have made it to adulthood without fairies, kind of a case.

That's not the case for most kids who get fairies, or at least it's heavily implied that's not the case for most kids who get fairies.

Take Cosmo and Wanda being Crocker's fairies in 1972, and having already been his fairies for about 2 years by that point, but having had been Billy Gate's fairies in 1970.

We're never even given a hint that Billy lost his fairies traumatically, because he grew up to invent the internet just fine, and we never hear about him beyond that. And it seems like if a kid traumatically loses their fairies before their ready, it ends with them being a screwed up adult.

Which tells me that whatever situation Billy was in to need fairies resolved itself shortly after the time travel thing.

Heck even then, it was heavily implied that Crocker's life, even qualifying for fairies, was better than Timmy's was. Considering the only things mentioned is that he's got a single mom that works multiple jobs, and when she doesn't she tends to focus on her hobbies, and an evil babysitter to deal with.

He's not bullied at that point, he's not struggling academically, the only things wrong with his life (before getting over dosed on magic mindwipe and being disfigured and losing his mind as a result, which turned him into a social outcast) is that he's got a single mom who works a lot and leaves him with a mean babysitter so she can have me time.

That's it, that's what makes him qualify.

And he would have aged out of at least one of those problems before turning 18. He would have been 14 when he would have naturally outgrown needing to have a babysitter (as that's how old Vicky starts babysitting Timmy).

Then by that point he would have also been old enough to get a part time job of his own. Lightening the financial lode on his mother, and possibly freeing up some of her working time to actually spend with her.

Meaning it's possible that both of his fairy qualifying problems would have resolved themselves by age 14 or 15.

But also the kind of miserable it takes to get godparents (at least when that baseline is first established) is temporary for most kids.

I wouldn't be surprised if the typical Fairy GodParent & GodChild relationship typically only lasted like a year or two for most kids.

[And it seems like the majority of kids we meet who have GodParents, get them at age 10.

I'm pretty sure Timmy being 8 and getting his Fairies, is the youngest kid we ever see having Fairies.

Other than de-aged Vicky that one episode, but because it happened in the constraints of one of Timmy's wishes, I'm not going to count it. Especially because when Cosmo and Wanda are reassigned to Vicky, no one comes to erase Timmy's memory of having fairies, so she doesn't have to worry at all about hiding them which all other godkids do.

Also Vicky is just given Cosmo and Wanda and not her own fairy, which I feel heavily implies that all of this is falling under wish logic, and not normal logic.

Crocker is the second youngest, because he had Cosmo and Wanda at 9.]

Especially in cases where the root of the kid's misery is something they have the power to personally confront and change.

Like if a kid gets a fairy because they're being bulled at school to the point it's ruining everything else in their life. [Bully is making it to where they can't complete school or home work, causing grades to drop, meaning no extracurricular stuff, and getting in trouble with parents.]

But that kid manages to reveal what's happening, and gets things to change, and their life goes back to how it was before. Then that kid obviously doesn't need a GodParent anymore to make up for their miserable life.

I could easily see plenty of situations where a kid might only have a GodParent for less than a year.

Like Hazel's situation from A New Wish weirds me out, because all her problems are super temporary problems that resolve in like a few months to a year for most kids who have those problems.

It's missing her older brother who left for collage. Which most kids eventually get over after just getting used to them no longer living in the same house as them.

When the younger sibling gets used to the older siblings absence, a pretty good chunk of them revel in the bizarre experience of being either the new oldest, or an only child for the rest of their own childhood.

It's moving to a new city and having to make all new friends. Which Hazel does over the course of season 1. She's got 3 friends if Dev counts.

Everything causing her to need fairies is all extremely temporary. Which is a large part of the reason why I don't think she'll be one of the kids to age out of the system the way Timmy was.

She's got parents who love her, she's not struggling at school, she doesn't have an abusive babysitter, she's already started making friends at her new school, her brother came home from collage, but even then that's something she'd just grow out of eventually.

So I feel like unless something in her life changes for the worst, she's going to only have Cosmo and Wanda for a few years at most. And lose them around age 14-15.

Sure her problems are a lot more relatable than Timmy's ever were.

Which is understandable considering Timmy was a kid who had literally everything going wrong in his life, except he wasn't living in poverty.

From neglectful parents, being bullied as school, an abusive babysitter, being specifically targeted by a teacher for harassment, being the target of a girl's stalker crush on him, being canonically considered an idiot even without Crocker targeting him (even though I'm pretty sure he just has ADHD). And that's just the major stuff he starts off with.

That's not even getting into like the magical enemies he makes over the course of the show. Who are out to get him from then on.

And the fact that his parents weren't actively malicious towards him, just forgetful and oblivious.

But Hazel's problems are also all a lot more temporary than Timmy's ever were.

And that's like, the big thing that makes them different and give me the feeling that, while Timmy definitely aged out and had fairies until the last possible moment, kids like Chloe and Hazel probably only had fairies for a few years at most.

That's most likely why Wanda and Cosmo still refer to Timmy as their last godchild before retiring. Even though they were assigned Chloe years after they were assigned to Timmy.

Chloe's issues probably resolved at some point and Timmy returned to being a singular GodChild from that point on.

[I'm guessing she grew a backbone at some point, lets her parents know all the pressure they put on her was making her miserable, and stopped being a complete doormat for literally everyone. Because those were her big problems that caused her to qualify for Fairies.]

Which was probably extremely awkward for Timmy in the aftermath of Chloe having her memories purged of fairies, considering they only spent time together because they were made to share fairies.

Sure Timmy had seen kids lose their fairies before, like with Remy, but he'd never cared then because he hardly spent any time with Remy, and no one would call him and Remy friends.

But it had to be weird when it inevitably happened with Chloe, because by the end there, she basically lived in the Turner house.

Heck of the two kids who get fairies in A New Wish, I'd say that Dev is the kid more likely to be an age out case than Hazel. If he ever regains godparents.

Considering having a single parent, who literally loves business and money more than he'll ever love his own kid, is a bit more of a permanent misery than "I moved to a new town and have no friends, and my brother went off to collage" is.

Just to be honest.

Like maybe it's different rules because Hazel is a post-retirement passion project for Cosmo and Wanda, and they can stay with her until she'd age out because they're not on official rotation or whatever.

But no one will be able to convince me that she'd actually need fairies the entire rest of her childhood unless something horrible happens to her in season 2.

Like baby girl those are some temporary issues that tend to resolve themselves within a year, how are you going to keep qualifying for fairy godparentship the rest of this series?