#I know it gets a bit overly meta at the end but I hope you get the sentiment

[hephaestuscrew]

Prior to the revelation around the aliens receiving his logs, Eiffel's logical expectation is that the only people who'll listen to his logs are people at Goddard Command. And yet the way he speaks in those logs is often not really addressed at Goddard staff. For example, in Ep8 The Empty Man Cometh, he says:

Oh, hell, speaking of logs... I guess you caught all of that, so you might be able to pick up the effect your twisted experiment had on us. Hint: IT WAS AWFUL. Sorry if things got a bit crazy for a while there, dear listeners, but... well, you see the kind of things we have to deal with.

The first part of that quote is obviously directed at Goddard staff, at the people who create many of the situations Eiffel and the rest of the Hephaestus crew have to deal with (such as the empty man panic). But the second part - the part addressed to Eiffel's "dear listeners" - feels like a switch, like it's directed at a sympathetic audience who are witnessing Eiffel's plight without having any role in it. In other words, it feels like it's directed at us. Before the aliens come into the picture, we are the "dear listeners".

There's no logical reason for Eiffel to make this kind of switch between the listener he blames (i.e. Goddard Command) and his more sympathetic "dear listener". He's mentally constructing a listener to his logs who is on his side, when he has no in-universe reason to believe that there is one. It's an interesting kind of coping mechanism - potentially linked to the unconscious, perhaps misdirected, desire for connection that led him to transmit his logs into deep space.

There are other signs that the "dear listener" Eiffel directs his logs towards has very little to do with Goddard, such as the way he explains things that Goddard staff would obviously know (which is obviously useful from a storytelling perspective, but also feels in-character and in line with his other behaviour), as well as telling the listener things that could land him in trouble with Goddard.

Eiffel is the kind of genre-savvy character who is regularly on the brink of fully breaking the fourth wall. He doesn't know he's in an audio drama, but he's so prone to narrating his life that he might as well know. He's always constructing the narrative of his life in his head, so perhaps he finds that it helps to imagine someone on Earth who is listening sympathetically to the story he's telling himself. In his world, at the beginning of the show, he doesn't have that listener, or doesn't believe he has. But his words reach across from the universe of his story into ours. And his voice finds the kind of dear listener he was imagining without hoping for - someone who has no role in anything that happens on the Hephaestus but who is willing to listen to his story. In pressing play on your podcast app, you become the listener he was longing for.

[gffa]

JEDI ORDER CITATIONS IN STAR WARS CANON, PART V [A Meta/Reference Guide on AO3] Welcome to my Jedi Culture and Teachings in Canon series, where I collate various quotes from current canon to provide a worldbuilding and reference guide, whether for better fic writing, just general interest in getting to know the Star Wars lore better, or if you want to be able to pull out some quotes when you're fighting the internet on behalf of the fictional space wizards. ;) So, what's here? Basically anything I think would be of interest to people who want to know what the Jedi are like in the canon--any worldbuilding bits (what special abilities do the Jedi have? do the Jedi have art? do they have funeral rites? what do we know about Knighting ceremonies? what are the themes of the Force? are the Jedi telepaths or empaths and what scenes in canon support that? what do we know about Jedi schooling?), any quotes from Lucas himself, all arranged in categories to help you find what you're looking for. Feel free to take this guide or leave it, it's not about telling other people what to do, if you scroll on by, that's fine, I'm not your mom, do what you want. But if you want to know what the Jedi have to say about Force bonds or what kind of clothing they way or everything we know about the main ziggurat of the Jedi Temple, I got you covered, babe. This section is admittedly overly large, where previously I would get to about 25k words of citations and post the next part, feeling that was a manageable chunk for readers. But with The Acolyte coming out, I made a challenge to myself to get caught up on all of The High Republic before it aired and I drop citations in as I'm reading, so suddenly I found myself with nearly 50k of citations and I was feeling in the groove, I had all my references easily accessible, I was getting through my backlog, I had access to some of the roleplaying guides, I was seeing a light at the end of the tunnel, and, wham, suddenly it's ~70k and here I am now. But that's 70k of examples of what the Jedi say and do, my best attempt to give context to show the consistent themes and parallels within the Jedi Order all across this continuity. How to use this guide? Well, you do you, for starters! But I hope you'll read the intros, as often some books need to be put in specific contexts, and if you have any suggestions for future categories or better organization, feel free to mention it! I do this for me, but I format it for sharing, so I'm game! Feel free to check out previous sections for more examples, and just scroll through to skim the bolded sections to try to find what you're looking for, since not everything always fits neatly into a single given category! (Or just ask me! I love being a nerd about Star Wars worldbuilding.) The guide is broken down into seven sections as before:

How the Force Works

Jedi Culture & Philosophy & Teachings

Jedi As a People

Psychic Space Wizards Doing Psychic Space Wizard Things

Jedi Temple (Living Quarters, Training Rooms, Meditation Gardens and Dining Halls !)

Jedi Outreach, Politics, and the Bigger Galaxy

Fantasy Flight Games Are Not Canon But Canon-Compliant Is Close Enough

Jedi, Buddhism, and Everything Else

[mineral-vulture]

The Road to Hell is Paved with Good Intentions

You know, for Go Rush (and Sevens) being the lighter and sillier Yugioh series in tone it really does have moments of sorrow.

OKAY I wanna talk about Sevens and Go Rush and how both series have this weird underlying of tragedy in it. So uh spoilers for both series below. Oh and it will be long.

My boyfriend @siromany and I watched Go Rush first because we were fascinated that one out of the three protags (I will die on the hill that Yuamu and Yuhi are protags along with Yudias) is an alien. We were watching it and wondering the series' connection to Sevens especially when we would see shots of Yuga. We did eventually figure out it was in the past. After we watched the episode where Yuga, Yuamu, and Yuhi go to the future as cats seeing the time period where Yuga came from we discussed the possible turmoil that Yuga feels. At this point what we knew about him was that he made rush duels in his time, somehow ended up on the past, and had to make rush duels to help prevent the valgerian's war. Seeing one of his friends inform him that the game he created, rush duels, also went through the same thing like in the real yugioh meta. Overly complicated, unfriendly to new players, and pushing out children who are the main demographic from the game. We both felt sadden for him finding this info out but it seemed like he was able to take it in a "Well that just means someone else has to come by and fix it again" sort of positive view. Not long after watching that episode I suggested we watch Sevens since this series is going to have more references and connections to it. That and there is context we are missing. So we did just that and I will say I am glad we watched it the way we did because it gave a unique perspective on both series. Watching Sevens we were able to see how the Go Rush counterparts are inversions to how each dynamic was different which was super cool. When we were getting to the ending of Sevens both of us felt the pain of knowing what was going to happen to Yuga. We kept thinking back to the Go Rush episode where he returns to his time and now that episode is more painful with full context.

Returning to Go Rush and watching Yuga's journey it truly sunk in that him going back to the present for a bit only to be told that what he did in the past did not change the present but in fact CAUSED what all happened was NOT good for Yuga to find out. Yugioh in 7 out of 8 series has always had the theme of going against destiny and being able to fight against it, Vrains being the exception, and how the main characters can prove the antagonists wrong in some way. Sevens and Go Rush seem to have more of the theme of "You can fight against destiny but there is a consequence to it and you may not like what that is". I vaguely know there are people who don't really sympathize with what Yuga did in the later half of Go Rush which like I can kind of get. However lets put ourselves in Yuga's position, shall we?

You are a 10 year old child who has been thrust into the past after trying to protect your creation from a man who wanted it destroyed. A creation that was made from joy and love of duel monsters. Trying to bring the game back to the demographic it was made for, children. Making rush duels simple to understand but also fun to play. You a stranded in a place that is both familiar and unfamiliar and you need to find a way back home. But you are stopped by a man and his crew who are demanding you to create rush duels. You don't want to do this, you know this could affect the past. But you overhear that his man's species have been fighting in a big war for a long time and that the conflict has not ceased. Dueling from your experience has brought people closer and you can communicate through to people's hearts to make them understand (a common yugioh staple about dueling) and while you may not know why this guy wants rush duels to exist or how he knows of them, you have hope that maybe this could help stop strife. Maybe making them this early wouldn't be so bad? That and maybe making it early that could mean you could change the past of dueling and therefore the future of it for the better. You not just do such but along the way meet the ancestors of people who look similar to your friends. But they aren't the same people which logically makes sense but doesn't hurt any less. They remind you of home, a place that now you have kind of given up going back to. But hey, chin up! Rush Duels ending up saving the Velgearian and ending their war! That's great, you DID have a positive impact! Making Rush duels in the past was for the better.

Wait, now these two random guys have created Maximums by turning people into cards? Uh, that is a lot worse than how they were originally made. You get turned into card and two whole years pass while you are in that state. But no worries, you know you can trust you ancestors and their Velgearian friend to solve this. It'll all be fine. You then get sent back to the present just for a bit to observe your friends. But going back you are told by one of them that Dueling became complicated and out of the reach of kids. What you did in the past didn't change it. In fact, YOU caused the same cycle to happen. You try to ignore that thought and tell yourself that it can be fixed, you can change this. You head back to the past promising you will return home...hopefully. unbeknownst to you, your presence is creating a rift between two best friends because of their feelings for you. Feelings you are unaware of because at this point you are a 12 year old boy. One of them is the ancestor of the six ceos of Goha company, a company that in the future creates duel monsters, while the other is the ancestor of the Mutsuba company that deals with construction and is of now the owner of the city. Where you came from the town was called Goha city, not Mutsuba, the descendant of Mutsuba talked about how her family lost power and how Goha took over everything. In the past both companies were super close but then everything fell...and that falling is happening before you but you aren't even aware of it. But well at least the Maximum situation has been sol-oh a prototype of the Velgearian species is causing issues? Great, okay that can be solved. While it does get solved...you find out that the Velgearian are dying and fast. They are being wiped out, but why? You thought they were immortal, what could possibly be causing their extinction? They are using their energy while rush dueling which is shortening their lifespan. The thing you created to help them is what is going to end them. You are responsible for their demise. But then you find out that proto-Velgearian was trying to find a way to stop this. That he was looking into a way to revive the Velgearian but that research stopped. Your friends are trying to complete his goal but you begin to put the pieces together and realize what is being made, Monster Reborn.

The card that began the domino effect of the destruction of Rush Duels in your time. A card that alters the memories of others. The card that caused strife between siblings where they decided to destroy rush duels along with each other. It is now sinking in how everything is repeating itself and how this could be your fault. You have to, no, you NEED to stop this. Even if it means hurting those you care about. Even if they see you as their enemy and you are alone, you have to do this. You have to destroy what you love, you have to become the person you tried stopping before coming here. You now understand why he was trying to stop you those years ago. What other option is there? You can't tell them why making this card would be bad because your Velgearian friend wants his comrades back. He won't listen. No one will listen. The needs of the many out weigh the needs of the few as they say. You fight your ancestors tooth and nail only for the card to be used and now all three of you can see each other's memories. Your ancestors now know what all will happen. You loose against them and the card is now unleashed. You couldn't stopped it. Your duel caused a rift in reality to open where now you can go home but you are leaving behind a road of the damage you have caused. Made worse with the fact that Monster Reborn can't even revive the Velgearian which is why the proto-Velgearian stopped his research. Making the card was pointless, and trying to stop it was utterly pointless. Your fighting to change the future only caused it to happen. You have to live with that. But not just you, but your ancestors too.

I know this is the goofy card game show but what the fuck. I didn't expect Yuga to become one of the most tragic yugioh protags. Watching his desperation of trying to stop the pain that is going to happen in his time and in turn having to destroy the very thing he loves was just heartbreaking. Anyway, I hope whoever reads this enjoyed my ramblings on Sevens and Go Rush. That and I hope people who weren't sympathetic to Yuga try to at least understand my perspective and such. Though I tend to like tragic characters a lot so maybe that is why I am sympathetic to him.

[ananke-xiii]

My ranking of SPN seasons (based only on their PLOT) pt. 2

In my previous post I'v covered the following:

15: Season 14

14: Season 15

13: season 7

12: season 3

11: season 6

Let's continue!

10. Season 13: this season was a HUGE disappointment to me. The first 6 episodes are brilliant, the writing is excellent, the actors gave their best performances, the scenes were well thought out, the pacing is slow but keeps the audience interested. The plot is intriguing: the heroes are mouring the death of Castiel while trying to both find a way to find their mother and to take care of Jack. In the meantime, the audience comes to understand that there's a new player in town: The Empty. It's mysterious, it seems evil, it seems total. I'm hooked. However, after episode 6 the plot sort of changes, it's like the first 6 episodes were a completely different season. By the end of season 12 we were already introduced to the existence of a parallel world and after episode 6 of season 13 we kind of explore more of it. The plot goes in that direction: the heroes must go to the alternate universe to save their mother. However, frankly, it's all very messy and overly complicated. I'm usually super pro AU, different timelines, same characters but from parallel realities and the like, but this time I was not engaged. I felt quite let down by this season (which also ends in a ridiculous battle that, once again, undermines everything that was said&done in season 5 but OKAY!).

9. Season 12: this season is a bit of a mystery to me. The main plot is: find Lucifer, consequently find Kelly Kleine and ultimately find Lucifer's son. So far so good. I like it. Clear, linear yet stimulating. The subplot is Mary Winchester and the British Men of Letters. Now, while I enjoyed Mary's character I utterly hated the whole BML arc. Just hated it. That Ketch? I hate him. I have no rational reason to explain why but I really hoped he would be killed off by the end of the season but surprise! He'll stick with us until season 15. Not amused. To be fair, the BML is not really a subplot, more of a parallel plot in that it has no correlation whatsover to the main plot. Also, some crazy shit happens in this season like Dean and Sam get caught by a super special police force, are imprisoned for like 3 months or something? unalive themselves, come back to life by making a reckless deal with Billie the reaper, and then go back to normal and no mention of it all is ever made. Well, okay writers' room. All in all, I gotta say that I place this season here in my ranking because it has some amazing episodes and the ending is a bomb. So I gotta give credit where credit's due.

8. Season 1: hear me out, I know that for some this is an iconic season and, honestly, fair enough. But, as any other season 1 of the majority of TV shows, the plot is not exactly exciting? Sure, we get to know our heroes and their backstories, but there are no allies, no other interesting characters, the 2 heroes seem to be living in a vacuum. The plot is simple, clean and intriguing enough to keep you watching, but it doesn't exactly keep you on your toes.

7. Season 10: oh my, oh my. Season 10. WELL. I have to confess that I hated this season with a passion. This is where I was tempted to stop watching Supernatural. I'll tell you why but first, the plot: Sam and Cas try to save Dean from the Mark of Cain. The subplots? Cas trying to bring angels back to Heaven (?), then the whole Castiel/Claire arc, then again Castiel vs Metatron, the mini and insignificant arc centered on Cole... Many, too many for my taste. The effect is that all these subplots are smoke in the eyes to cover for the total absence of creativity to solve the Mark of Cain plot. HOWEVER, however. Since I hated it with a passion, I've decided to watch some episodes again and to read some meta about it. And I gotta say, I was not paying attention. Sure, the plot is what it is and I won't change my mind about it, but ACTUALLY what happens in this season is that the REAL plot is characters' development, specifically Dean's and, to a lesser degree, Cas's. It also makes more sense if you understand that the whole season is about the Dean-Crowley-Cas love triangle. If you get that, you will enjoy the season. I didn't and, as a result, I didn't quite like it. But I gotta be honest and say that the writing for this season was pretty good. Finally, like season 7, this is a connecting season, it prepares us for season 11 where the real prize is. So, in retrospective, I think it deserves ranking number 7 because it didn't give us anything substantial in terms of events but the characters grow a lot after this season so good for them (and for us).

[lurksunderthebed]

Thoughts on CoD dudebros that attempt to gatekeep their "role" characters? Over the course of last year it's funny how many i've seen upset that Laswell has a wife because they genuinely thought Price was "bonking" her according to them. Even more so going as far as to say that they'd be into experimental poly relationship. And don't get me started on YT side of the base where people say stuff like Soap & Valeria, Ghost & Milena double date, it's hilarious really. But god forbid you post anything about GhostSoap remotelly romantic. It's like hellfire out there.

Oh man that's a good question. I haven't actually thought too hard on that tbh. Funny timing because I literally watched an opinion piece on YT on what they [the male fanbase] thought on mwiii(23).

I think people want to read into things as they prefer. People are so conditioned in these action movie style sort of storylines to assume Man + Women talking = relationship. And in that sense I can see why people would ship Price and Laswell because they do have a friendly relationship, one that implies years of knowing one another. (though Valeria and Milena /soap or ghost?? Why??)

I think the biggest shame is the fact that male and female platonic friendships are so rare in these instances that for a significant part of that vocal fanbase, it blows their mind to have heterosexual friendships that are just that: friendships.

And it's always a bit ironic we have this situation when you have those dudebros pile on the ghostsoap ship and say, "can't friendships just be friendships, stop making everything gay". Can't friendships just be friendships, stop making everything het.

Bro, we ain't making anything gay, it's there in the text. Call the spade a spade. They flirt with each other. I can even pull up the receipts and go through every bit of possibility and still think, wow, even them joking is pretty sus with all the context. Especially when it's Ghost who flirts back, out of all people—the man who is so emotionally constipated that showing his face and letting people use his name is a Big Deal™.

I always wonder what that fanbase would make of these meta posts. In a weird way, I do sort of welcome that critique. It would be interesting to see what would come out of that.

I mean, yeah you can read Ghost and Soap's relationship however you want. But it's definitely not something as clear cut as, "they're just friends. That's what brothers in arms are like. You just don't understand!" sort of thing. I think reducing them down to 'just friends' would be doing a disservice to how much Soap meant to Ghost in terms of the actual codmwii plot line.

The nice thing is that despite all the differences we all have with each other, we as an entire fanbase all agree on this: Codmwiii(23) has the worst campaign out of all codmw games.

The storyline sucked and didn't go anywhere. The ending was there for shock factor. It didn't really add anything to the story aside from making one feel upset. It was sloppy storytelling, and it really felt like it could've been better.

But yeah. Lol 😂 sorry for the rant guys. Hope you enjoyed the Ted Talk.

Btw, much thanks and love from everyone reading my meta posts. All the encouragement fuels me for my next overly long post. 💞🥹

[ahyesmygoodomenssideblog]

Hey, I wanted to thank you for writing those metas, I love reading them !

I watched good omens only recently and when I initially went through the good omens meta tag I felt kind of frustrated, since there is a lot of the "Crowley really has to learn to stop running away at the slightest problem" and stuff like that going around.

There was also a lot of "why are there so many people hating on aziraphale" but honestly I have trouble even finding a little criticism of him, so I don't understand why people are defending him, since there isn't even a threat? Or is there a tag for Aziraphale criticism I don't know of? ^^'

I'm a bit of tired of treating him, as if he isn't part of the oldest beings in the universe and didn't have time to challenge his thought process or learn how to, especially on earth with Crowley trying to help with that. When I was watching, Aziraphales well meaning behaviour hurt and his ignorance stung. He really is kind of delusional and I don't even know where I am going with these thoughts.

I hope dumping this wall of text in your askbox was okay. Are there any more metas planned? Thank you again, I hope you have a nice week!

Hi anon, thank you so much for the message! Sorry for the late reply. I 100% agree with you. Pretty much all I've seen on Tumblr is people defending Aziraphale or trying to reframe it so that Crowley and Aziraphale are equally at fault. I did see people talking about hate Aziraphale was getting on Twitter, but I don't use Twitter so I don't know what anyone might be saying over there.

Aziraphale is definitely woobified by the fandom, and it gets incredibly frustrating. Like, yes, Aziraphale has a lot of religious trauma. But so does Crowley. The opening scene of season 2 establishes that they've had this fundamental difference in views from the start, even before the fall, so I don't get why Aziraphale still gets so much leeway after refusing to change or grow for 6000+ years. He knows the complexities of humanity better than any other angel, but he keeps doubling down on his flawed belief system.

And season 2 really emphasized that Aziraphale's well-meaning ignorance is legitimately harmful. Like he got Morag killed by applying his overly simplistic worldview to a morally gray situation. And then there's the ball scene? The way Aziraphale dragged others into his rose-colored fantasy world was disturbing, especially with how freaked-out Nina was by it. Then Crowley shows up terrified and asking for help, and Aziraphale dismisses his concerns out of hand. He refuses to let Crowley’s worries put a damper on this Jane Austen ball nobody signed up for.

And Crowley was right. Like he was trying to raise the alarm about the very real danger that everyone was in. I’ve seen it framed a lot like Aziraphale is just an optimist and Crowley is a pessimist, but it goes farther than that. Crowley consistently has a more realistic view of Heaven, Hell, and humanity than Aziraphale does. Aziraphale's inability to engage with reality causes actual harm to both humans and to Crowley. It contributed to the world almost ending in season 1, because Aziraphale wasted a lot of time trying to reach the "right people" in Heaven instead of accepting that Heaven is as bad as Hell and trusting the one person that’s been trying to save the world with him for years.

And it's like, yes, Aziraphale is sympathetic. He’ll be very conflicted, and distressed about how conflicted he is, and then he’ll come around and do the right thing in the end. But it's frustrating to watch Aziraphale seeming to grow and then immediately backsliding. Like, he was ready to fall to protect Job's kids. But he didn't, and he went right back to his beliefs. He didn't lose his faith in Heaven despite the Flood, and Job, and Jesus, and the apocalypse.

He also has this superiority complex, where he's the nice one while Crowley is stuck doing the dirty work. "I am a great deal holier-than-thou" and all that. Aziraphale's belief system makes him "good" by definition. He dismisses and overrides Crowley's opinions instead of changing his own because, on some level or another, he thinks he's better than Crowley by design.

So it’s at the point where Aziraphale needs to do some serious self-reflection. He needs to be the one to make the choice to change fundamental beliefs he’s clung onto since the beginning of time. I think he's capable of changing, and I’m looking forward to how it plays out in s3, but I don’t think we’ll be getting a lot of good fix-its from the fandom any time soon. Most of what I've seen is still fans insisting that since they're both flawed they are both at fault, and their relationship can be fixed by just having them both apologize to each other. If people are looking at it beyond that, I don't know where they're discussing it.

[elementclangen]

Moon 263-Leaf-bare

Hopedawn (52) seems to be taking a leaf out of Rootwing’s (30) book and, on a mediation mission to RaccoonClan over herb disputes, ends up making the situation worse.  She claims it due to her being little distracted lately because Stonekit’s(2) always getting under her paws and trying to hunt the bugs that hang out in the Mediator’s den. Downgaze (44)  tries to explain that the mediator needs space to work, but Stonekit doesn’t get it. While most of the cats are annoyed by Stonekit this moon, Bluestripe (38) is surprised to hear him express an ideal she agrees with. She didn’t expect that coming from a star-blessed cat.  Primcrest (104) continues to try and be friendly with Bluestripe and waves to her with her tail as they cross paths on the territory.  Primcrest’s son, however, is being argumentative.  Dawnfreckle (46) was assigned to fix something around camp with Vaxxstreak (146).  The elder was not thrilled at having to do something other than relax and argued with Dawnfreckle.  Tumbleswoop (52) stepped in and helped Dawnfreckle fix it instead.  There’s romance brewing between Tumbleswoop and Rubbleheart (59).  Tumbleswoop shows off some moves for fighting on unstable slopes, that can be done with any type of magic.  Rubbleheart watches with overly admiring eyes.  Tumbleswoop smirks and shows off a bit. Hyacinthpaw (8) continues to be a model student and makes sure to check in on Kestrelcreek (52) when she cleans out the warrior’s den. Kestrelcreek has always been a bit of a loner, but Almondback (34) seems to be growing on her.  Almondback makes her laugh again and again. Streamhiss (34) has no romance on her mind and loves having apprentices in the camp.  It means she gets to play pranks on other warriors and blame them on the apprentices.  Blizzardback (26) joins in on the fun.  Lakepelt (71), despite being relatively new to the Clan, has noticed that Creekstar (117) just seems generally anxious.  She checks in with the leader and offers her some thyme to help her relax.  Creekstar takes it gratefully.  Brightmouse (38) makes sure to check on Archdapple (38) after she gets yellowcough and asks her if she’s heard from StarClan lately.  Archdapple hasn’t, but reassures Brightmouse that she’ll tell her if she hears anything from StarClan, knowing that her sister is actually wondering after news from Shinebreak.  While on a patrol, Brightmouse and Spotfoot (44) encounter some twolegs.  They expertly hunt around them by using Brightmouse’s fire to flush prey towards themselves.  Maybe the Clan’s learning to keep its distance from twolegs! 

Healer’s den: Archadapple (yellowcough), Donwgaze (broken bone), Bluestripe (frostbite), Nettlestripe (dislocated joint), Greenrapid (broken bone), Skipneedle (joint pain), Hatchpaw (scrapes)

Meta: And here we are! We've reached the point in the game that I had played to when I started this blog! Thank you all for sticking with me through these many many moons. And there are many more moons to come! Now, I've played through moon 332. After I started this blog, I made a couple of changes to how I kept track of events in the game. For example, I started tracking who's in the healer's den (as you may have noticed). I also started taking screenshots of each cat's first page of relationships (so the top eight cats they have the most feelings for) every six moons. That means that I should be able to answer any questions about relationship statuses with some degree of accuracy! I also started keeping better track of personality changes, so I can note those too. Hope you enjoy the changes!

[ultimateplaylistmaker]

As someone was there for it, the hype levels of both an anime and a game were off the fucking charts, and while now the dr3 anime is looked back mostly negative, at the time hype carried most of it and left people extra excited for the game. The story of Hope's Peak seemed officially over with the anime, it was done, everything wrapped up. We had been asking for a goodbye despair anime for like five years and we finally kinda got it!

So while a lot of people were drawing connections (shout out to the one person who made a theory video that KANON would be the mastermind of v3 that lives rent free in brain) a lot of people were also ready to move on and kinda come back to a somewhat more grounded plot, because by the end of dr3 the universe had reached quite a peak of absurdity with what was canon especially if you engaged in supplementary material.

So a story free from those shackles seemed pretty ideal, and the story seemed great! A female protagonist like we had wanted with a completely fresh set of personality traits like confidence and brashness! A fresh new cast and setting! Cool aesthetics! A fucking robot student?! New mechanics!

Then Kaede died at the first trial, Shuichi at first just seemed like yet another male self-deprecating passive protagonist, then when we finally had gotten our footing into this world and it's setting... We were shoved back into the remnant plot line, and then given the "ITS JUST FICTION" ending. Which left people REALLY bitter, because it did genuinely at the time feel a bit like a slap of the face to come at the end of all this hype, all this care, all the attention and excitement, it felt spiteful. Like everything we were excited for was just a prank on us.

So we were spiteful back, there's a reason so many articles at the time call it meanspirited or a pointless twist, because the meta elements didn't feel like it was laughing with us, but laughing at us for being excited and passionate.

Killing Kaede, while its own bucket of worms to not dump out, definitely didnt help with keeping the audiences trust of things being in good faith because we were so hyped about her for like, MONTHS. Like that one promotional piece of her and Maki was EVERYWHERE on tumblr. Rantaro was also heavily speculated on, but his death felt a lot more like a proper subversion because he wasn't actually shown to be more then kind of mysterious and wasn't overly marketed as an antagonist or more then just "hey what's his deal?" Meanwhile, Kaede felt personal. Which set a tone for the rest of the game that it never really recovered from.

With some time passed my own opinion has softened immensely on both the ending and Shuichi, but I do really think the hype it went for and tried to generate just turned against it by making people feel tricked and lied to. Especially with how hard it pushed the "no connections!" angle, fan reception for the ending probably would have been better if they had even dropped that one specific angle of advertising.

Going into the game now lets the meta elements shine a lot better because you werent going into it with the same expectations as people did back then. Most people who get into it now don't even KNOW it was advertised to be a different universe or any of that stuff. There's no Hope's Peak fatigue from JUST finishing the anime, which makes it a better game to experience, but truly fails to really show why so many people felt burned by it because of how differently time has made people approach it.

I don't really know how to really describe it or why this is but seeing people red string about V3's connection to Hope's Peak Academy and the other two games in general makes me feel really, really weird.

[lustfulcat]

Hiii. I really enjoyed your chapter 49 meta and love your page! I'm interested to know if you think Yashiro actually forgot about Doumeki ? Also, I have a theory that Doumeki is going to find out about Yashiro's impotence by being a bit too aggressive with Yashiro in the next chapter, what's your opinion on that ? I hope you have a nice day!!

*blushes intensely* thank you!

I do think Yashiro forgot Doumeki but it was more like he forgot who Doumeki was but not the space Doumeki took up in Yashiro's heart. At first I was like "he's definitely faking this" but it turned out as the timeskip arc progressed, we learned that he really did forget, at least consciously. His mind knew something was missing, he kept having dreams about Doumeki but he couldn't recall his face, and he couldn't get erections because that night he spent with Doumeki ruined his lascivious nature. Plus, when he did flirt with men at the casino they all looked like Doumeki.

It does all come back to him the minute he sees Doumeki's face at the bar in chapter 40, which is why he looks so miserable at the end of that chapter.

Since Yashiro can only get it up for Doumeki now, Doumeki won't find out about Yashiro's impotence unless Yashiro tells him and I don't see Yashiro admitting that anytime soon. A few people have mentioned that Doumeki might be a little too aggresive and while he's been dominating, he hasn't been overly aggressive with Yashiro...not anymore than Yashiro has been with him :D :D :D They have been dragging each other around a bit (Doumeki taking Yashiro away from Inami and Yashiro grabbing Doumeki and insisting that HE IS THE BODYGUARD in chapter 48) but sexwise, I don't think Doumeki would be too aggressive with Yashiro. He doesn't want to be his father and that's always in the back of his mind. The old Doumeki is still there: he gets soft around Yashiro sometimes, and that part of him won't let him bring his dominance too far.

At this point I think Doumeki is testing Yashiro, watching him to see if he's really different, prodding him to admit that he feels something and sooner or later Yashiro is going to have another shower breakdown and admit that he's worried about losing Doumeki, or admit his feelings, or both. Please. I need it.

[lansplaining]

Hi, I followed you because you have a lot to say about jin guangyao and I enjoy reading it. When I first watched cql I thought he was an enetertaining and satisfying villain both to watch and also to watch being taken down in the end. Such drama! Much style! Then I read a lot of meta about him and watched the show again and realised how much he was being set up as a villain without there being much truth there. The more I read/thought about this, the more interesting and sympathetic I found him.

I am still reading more and more points which point out ways in which the ending and jin guangyao's portrayal is misleading - like the post today pointing out that nmj didn't know that jgy had a part in his death, for example. nmj apparently just hated jgy by the end of his life and that was why his fierce corpse kept attacking jgy. I am a little skeptical about that last part - it may be true but I can't help but feel that the hatred was pretty equally shared around which makes blaming any one party pretty pointless.

I really enjoy jgy as a character. I also enjoy nmj and jzx (who you were vague blogging about today) and tbh I love pretty much the whole cast minus a few obvious dickbags like jgs. Before I take what these posts have to say at face value, I guess I wanted to know, how much do you dislike nmj and jzx? Neither the nmj post nor your jzx post come across as though they are characters you (or op) like. I personally love them and as much as I want to learn about jgy and see different sides, I don't really want to read a lot of negative content about characters I love - especially if it's not written in a way that is particularly balanced.

I hope this does not come across as impolite or disrespectful. I think I am feeling a bit defensive but I don't want to be rude or for you to feel upset or angry. The obvious thing to do is for me to say I should agree to disagree and just unfollow if it's too much but that always feels so drastic to me - maybe I am misreading/reading in bad faith!

<3 <3 <3

first of all, i definitely think JGY also hates NMJ by the end. absolutely mutual hatred there, stemming from a range of reasons, justified and otherwise.

i definitely reblog some stuff from people who actively dislike NMJ, so I wouldn't blame you at all for unfollowing me if you don't want to see that! i actually really like him-- i watched CQL first and totally bought it when the Wens lied and said he was dead and was really sad! i think his structural role is so interesting, and in many ways the story only works if he is both a guy you don't know much about, but think is pretty cool from what you do know. then you find out things that paint him in a far less flattering light, but there's a kind of tragedy in that.

i actually quite like jin zixuan as well. again, CQL first, i loved his moment with the swords at evil wen summer camp, this unexpected proof of how his pride could be a good thing, and in fact had some courage to go along with it. i was so so shocked and sad when he died!

what makes me occasionally get salty about NMJ and JZX both (and again, that totally happens, and i don't blame you at all for not wanting to see that) is honestly over-exposure to fanon takes on them, which i feel are overly simplistic and smooth over the things that make them interesting in favor of making them just really nice, stand-up guys. for NMJ in particular, i think you'll often see JGY fans going extra hard on all the things that are bad about NMJ because they/we feel like we're always implicitly pushing back against fandom's love of him with reminders that he did bad things, too.

the JZX thing is just a total personal pet peeve honestly-- i think he's fun and interesting because he's probably not the nicest or most generous person, but he is ride or die for this one lady and, by extension, sometimes her family. but if he was out here wanting to become besties with jin guangyao, he had a whole year+ to do that and... did not do that. that's okay!! he's a more interesting character for being an imperfect guy!!

my favorite characters are lan wangji, jin guangyao, and jiang cheng-- i like my little guys to be an absolute mess and a bit mean and to not make good choices. throw in the desire to-- not exactly defend JGY, but to resist the parts of fandom that paint him as a 2D villain, and the accompanying attempts to discuss/remind people of the ways those characters hurt JGY/are maybe not such good people because of how they treated him, things can absolutely take on a tone where it seems like characters like NMJ and JZX are being disparaged. but for me, i like them more for being imperfect.

(i am kinda Actually Mad at huaisang though)

[blindmagdalena]

I’ve got a theory abt homelander—and this is partially canon bc like we see it played out through the show, but its interesting how he sort of shapes himself to be what the ppl he loves want him to be. Or rather what he thinks they want 😅 with stillwell, he was the most “homelander”, if that makes sense. An all american pretty face, saying his lines perfectly, pulling strings behind the scenes to try to achieve her ends. With stormfront, the violence becomes more blatant and extreme, and we even see it to a degree with ryan (because despite how badly he may have wanted a family, he sort of pulled the involved dad thing out of nowhere). It really speaks to his lack of identity, and its also sort of why i disagree with the extreme abusive yandere characterization a lot of ppl have w homie 😭 bc while he is unbelievably toxic and scary, i think he’s extremely cognizant of the ppl around him. If he truly loved someone, i dont think he’d go out of his way to hurt them (problem is, his concept what “hurting someone” actually means is… skewed, to put it nicely). But, more than anything, no matter what he says, he wants be loved. So he’ll do whatever it takes, be whoever he needs to be, to make sure that the people he loves love him, too. He’s mirrorball coded 😭😭 sorry for the essay, i just have many awful homelander thoughts and ur my fav homiewriter so u get the word vomit 🙃 hope ur having a good night!!

don't apologize, I loved waking up to this!!! I think you're 100% correct. homelander is a chameleon. he has spent his entire life adapting to what people expect or want from him. he was abused by vogelbaum, groomed by stillwell, and stormfront was also using him for her agenda. homelander has pretty exclusively experienced love as a transaction. he was drip fed affection in exchange for performing to the expectations of whoever's love he was seeking. I reeeaaaally wish they hadn't dumbed down his relationship with maeve. between all the deleted scenes and the bits of context we got, I feel like theirs was the most complicated relationship he had. I desperately would have liked a more nuanced take than the hamfisted comparison between them and soldier boy/countess. strongly agree that he wouldn't be overly physically abusive to anyone he was smitten with. stormfront had to bully him into throwing her around and even then he still paused or stopped every time he thought he actually hurt her. homelander doesn't need to use his strength to make a point. he's way more cunning than he gets credit for. this is a safe space for meta rambling, my sweet. I also firmly believe in homelander being deeply multifaceted. I tend to write him as initially standoffish, even hostile, and the kind of person to make pretty snap judgements about people. If he decides he likes someone, first comes fixation. it's not love, it's not kind, it's fascination. the next stage is infatuation. I think a key aspect of what you mentioned is 'if he truly loved someone.' I don't know if HE even knows what that looks like yet. he turned on madelyn because she lied to him, but he still mourned and deeply missed her. did he love her? maybe, but in his mind she committed too many cardinal sins. she lied to him, she was afraid of him, and she didn't love him back, which is the only thing he ever really wanted from her.

[cowboyhorsegirl]

omg evren please say more about tonynat on some sort of mission where they need to fake date!! <3

@meidui, you've never known this because i have unfortunately never gotten around to answering any of your asks before, but you always send the best ones <3 I started writing this response back in May and couldn't ever figure out how to write the last scene between tony & nat, but I've taken a crack at it now in the hopes that you can enjoy this insane infodump of meta & a bit of fic before you move on to healthier and happier things :)

!!!!!!!!!! ahhhh yes gladly !!!!!!!!!!!!

(and sorry this took so long i hope you don’t mind that I wrote you a novel lmfao)

((Also I’m going to talk A LOT about IM2 but bear in mind that it's been about a decade since i've watched it so if I misconstrue anything please let me know!))

First of all, I absolutely adore Tony and Natasha separately, and I think had they been able to interact more in the MCU canon they would have served to ease each other’s insecurities and curb their more self-destructive tendencies. There’s undoubtedly a lot of parallels between their histories and their motivations for choosing to be heroes: 

they’ve got a lot of red in their ledgers, so to speak

they’re trying to even out the scale of all the harm they’ve done

they place the blame of those harms squarely on their own shoulders even though they are both–to varying degrees–victims of the systems they were a part of when enacting that violence (I will say I feel this is much more true in Nat’s circumstances with the KGB than in Tony’s with the US military-industrial complex, but the case can be made for him too what with Tony’s enduring addiction and mental health issues stemming from his relationship with his father who expressly expected him to take over the company [sidebar: i would make the case that tony does not and has never liked building weapons as these are not things that he chooses to do with his engineering prowess in childhood or at MIT, and while he is leading SI he acts out in ways that in my view indicate he’s deeply unhappy with his life and is trying to numb the pain] + the way he was manipulated and ultimately almost killed multiple times by Obadiah)

traumatic medical experiences involving painful, life-changing surgeries AND loss of bodily autonomy

But! There’s also some similarities in how they try to cope with these burdens. For example, they’re both extremely competent at what they do and in a perpetual state of trying-to-prove-themselves (this tends to function more internally for nat and more externally for tony) so their default mode is often to obscure what they feel/think in most situations from everyone but an extremely select group of trusted friends as a means of concealing emotional vulnerability. They are also both prone to throwing themselves into an unhealthy work/life balance because there’s always something more they specifically could be doing to help and it seems as though neither of them can bear to forgive themselves for inaction if their involvement could have saved even one more life regardless of the personal cost.

(That last point especially *COUGH endgame COUGH*)

So in my opinion they would’ve come to be able to recognize these habits in each other at a level of familiarity that Rhodey and Pepper do for Tony or that Clint does for Natasha, but in a shorter time period. Furthermore, because they see themselves in each other, I think they’d be much more discerning over when is the appropriate time to push the other hard to treat themself better because a coping mechanism is becoming overly destructive and when they should give the other a bit more leeway because, yeah, what you’re doing right now probably isn’t the most healthy way for you to process things in the moment but I understand where you’re coming from and I know that if I try and get you to work through things too quickly or in the way i think would be best I might accidentally end up pushing you farther away. I’d rather you be overworking and/or emotionally distancing yourself in my orbit so I can be here for you when you come up for air.

I’m going to put the rest of this under the cut because i haven’t even gotten around to the point of your message lmfao (thank you so much for the ask btw !!!)

However! The crux of the issue is that, for all of their similarities and potential compatibilities, Tony and Natasha first met when Tony was dying (stressful in its own right but in Tony’s case, it specifically ties directly back to the aforementioned medical trauma + previous near-death experiences) and Natasha was undercover on behalf of SHIELD collecting intel on him for a superhero initiative that he did not know anything about and did not know he was being considered for. They don’t really get the chance to engage and interact in good faith because of the inherent nature of “Natalie’s” mission, but I think that the sources for potential long-term mistrust go a bit deeper than that superficial subterfuge. 

Natasha in this situation is manipulating tony to gather information on him and denying him full control over medical decisions, and he is not privy to this prolonged, imbalanced dynamic until much later. Plus, Natasha’s own assessment of Tony is that he is not fit for the Avengers, but that Iron Man is. I feel this could be interpreted by Tony as Natasha suggesting that SHIELD reassign someone else to pilot the suit, further digging into those previous harmful thought patterns for tony that he’s only as worthy as the weaponrymachines he builds, no one values or wants him as he is, people are going to force him to relinquish his creations if he doesn’t give them up voluntarily and with a smile with the now added bonus of: this suit makes me feel like my life is worth living again and now they want to take it away from me because I’m not good enough for it.

As is, this setup makes total sense for their first meeting: Natasha is an agent and a damn good one and Tony is a very powerful man who people are regularly trying to pry information/resources/technology/expertise from by any means necessary.

The problem lies in the fact that these two are then tasked with being on an elite superhero squad where they have to place very complete trust in each other and I just don’t really see that happening without some intense heart-to-hearts about what went down in IM2. Now, as we stated before, these are two people who are very reluctant to open up and share their internal strife even with the few people they’ve developed trusting relationships with over the course of years, so I don’t imagine they would willingly offer that painful transparency to each other.

It seems that the ideal conditions for this sort of conversation to take place would call for a mission requiring only Tony and Natasha to work in an extremely close capacity with each other that involves high stakes and high emotions and in which the success of the mission lies critically in their ability to improvise off each other in order to hide in plain site using the cover of an innocuous personal entanglement.

I sense a fake dating mission!!!!!!!

(Bonus points if the context of the mission harkens back to the one or both of their previous traumas.)

So, to FINALLY get around to the point of your ask, my ideal tonynat fake dating mission would serve the primary purpose of allowing tony and nat to work through the events of IM2 and develop their friendship. This would have to involve recognizing the many similarities they share regarding their motivation to undo the violence and harm that they both wrought in their previous lives and then using that foundation of recognition to build trust and eventually camaraderie and understanding! 

And because this is my personal dream tonynat fake dating mission story, the secondary purpose would be to make steve jealous and have an early-onset Feelings Realization™️and/or tony-induced Gay Awakening© because i have perpetual stevetony brain rot and I simply cannot engage with any story without figuring out a way to shove a stevetony plotline into it🤪

The time: the nebulous space after AI/IM3 but before CA:TWS. 

The place: a foreign nation with a highly advanced technology sector (I’m thinking either Singapore or Japan or Germany). 

The mission: identify and infiltrate a corporation that is suspected to be funneling technology and product to [INSERT VILLAIN ORGANIZATION HERE] [PROBABLY DOOM LOL].

I imagine it would start with Fury assembling the Avengers to brief them on the situation and the long and short of it is this: a weeks-long mission that will involve Tony and Natasha attending a technology expo abroad to figure out who is supplying [VILLAINS] with their tech, infiltrate their operations, gather intel, and collect evidence. There should be no reason to expect any flashy shootouts, Fury insists while leveling a one-eyed glare at Tony, but Clint and Steve will rotate 4 day surveillance shifts on the helicarrier which will be hovering nearby over international waters and Bruce and Thor will be on call in case they do need back-up. 

One last thing: undercover identities. Trying to conceal Tony Stark’s identity would be like trying to sweep an elephant under a carpet–Hill has to talk quickly to cut Tony off from reminding them all again how he managed to stay under the radar in Tennessee for a week and if it’s so damn hard for him to go undercover then how come the powers that be at SHIELD couldn’t find him in Buttfuck Nowhere, USA?–but it doesn’t matter because he’ll be able to blend in effortlessly at this conference under the guise of exploring new opportunities for SI to diversify its ventures in the tech sector.

Natasha, on the other hand, will need something a bit more involved. She’ll be attending as Nadine Roman, an aspiring model and Stark’s latest conquest, Fury explains while Hill drops a file detailing the persona in front of Natasha.

At this, the energy in the room shifts a bit as Steve, Bruce, and Tony all have subtle, but undeniable reactions to this news. Bruce frowns slightly, as if trying to imagine what this scenario would even look like. Tony’s eyes slip over to Steve and his smirk falls for just a moment before snapping back into place, albeit looking a little bit more forced than before. As Steve tries to clumsily disguise his own surprised expression, he remembers seeing a story in the news recently about Tony and Pepper’s split as he had been flipping between the international news section and sports. 

“So…I’m going to fake date Triple Imposter over there?” Tony finally offers into the silence.

Fury considers him for a second, and is just opening his mouth to respond when Natasha–still studying her file to get the rundown on ‘Nadine’–says “Yeah, if you can handle it,” eliciting an unapologetic snort from Clint where he sits beside her.

Cut to the actual mission, and by all appearances ‘Nadine’ and Tony are technically pulling it off with no issues. Not like it’s hard, really, Red is a literal pro at undercover operations as Tony is quite well aware of having been on the receiving end of one of them. She slips into the role of harmless arm candy flawlessly, batting her eyes and smiling coyly over her bare shoulders at egotistical corporate executives with an almost surgical precision. Her flirting and the prestige that accompanies her temporary status as Tony Stark’s companion gains her access to secret meetings and lowly-lit offices where she fades into the background, making herself known and forgotten with equal efficacy.

For his part, Tony is providing the perfect cover for Natasha to work off of. He parades her around the first day, every bit his ostentatious self to make sure everyone gets the image of her on his arm cemented in their minds. He pretends to be too tipsy to notice when his date seduces men right behind him while skillfully avoiding the drinks that keep getting shoved into his hands. He schmoozes with global industry leaders who make him want to tense his body in disgust, but he forces himself to relax, fielding unwanted touches and unearned familiarity all while trying to pry information out using his own forms of deception and sleight of hand.

It’s strange Tony thinks playing this game again. It hasn’t been all that many years since this was his real life, though it feels like it’s been lifetimes. Considering how many near-death scares he’s had in the past few years, it may as well have been several lifetimes since the last time he’s flounced around one of these conferences with some nameless darling of the night on his arm and one too many drinks in his blood and a desperation to be outside of himself, even if just for a moment, even if he had to kill himself oh-so-slowly to do it.

Oh right.

In all the madness that’s been Iron Man, the ecstasy of building something to do good for a change coupled inextricably with the immense mental toll of his recent heroics, it had been easy to let himself forget what it had felt like to live with the shackles of a duller but more persistent type of misery around his neck. 

It unnerves him, too, how easy it is to slip back into this life, but he supposes he had been born and built for it. It’s practically muscle memory or an instinct hardwired into his DNA, so deeply ingrained in him he couldn’t cut out the rot no matter how badly he might want to.

Tensions build as the days pass, until one day while Natasha is off trying to uncover potential industry connections to [VILLAIN ORGANIZATION], it happens. Tony’s in the middle of a conversation that he hates about the merits of private-sector civilian surveillance. But, because he’s Tony Stark and he’s smarter than all of these sleazy business fucks put together, he finds himself dominating the discussion. And, because he’s working this goddamn mission right now, undercover in plain site, he’s arguing for it. Arguing the merits of private sector civilian surveillance. 

He finishes the point he was making, met with painfully unsubtle nods of approval and he can practically see the rusty gears in the brains of his so-called contemporaries trying to figure out how quickly they can relay what Tony’s just said to their own company boards. 

He knows he’s lived this exact scene at least a hundred times before at no less than a few dozen past expos. He’s never been able to observe the charade so clearly before, though.

As he’s turning away from the crowd of executives surrounding him, Tony doesn’t register that instead of sipping at the glass of water he’s been nursing all night, he’s raised it to his lips and forcefully thrown his head back to drink until his brain realizes that the burn he expected to light a path down his throat hasn’t come yet. 

Muscle memory. Just like all the worst parts of him, the parts he will never be without.

Horror dawns on him as he slowly lowers his arm, and the breaths start coming fast and shallow while the cold, cold weight of hysteria begins to settle in his chest, freezing him from the inside out.

I need a drink he thinks for the first time in a long time, and that… That scares him. Because he could do it, it would be all too easy to start again here, now. Someone would no doubt be thrusting another drink innocuously into his hands soon enough because of course they would, he’s Tony Stark and Tony Goddamn Stark is a drunk. Ever since that first drink in the dark of Howard’s office when bourbon branded his mouth with its awful liquid fire and his father branded his soul with a taunt Tony never stopped repeating Stark men are made of iron Stark men are made of iron Stark men are made of iron.

The next few seconds seem to collapse and stretch simultaneously around Tony as if he has suddenly found himself suspended in the middle of a black hole. There’s a slight tremor to his hand as he sets the now empty glass down. The conversation is still moving around him: attention snaps back to him and predatory smiles greet him in excess before he’s even finished turning to face them again. A thought passes through the haze in his oxygen-starved brain that he’s about to be eaten alive, consumed whole and used up so thoroughly that there will be nothing left. It’s so asinine that for a brief instant mounting distress gives way to sharp disgust at the momentary lapse of rationality.

A light hand settles on his shoulder, and Tony’s entire body tenses under the phantom weight of a much heavier grip. Someone else used to know how to spot the onset of his little outbursts once. A friend, a desperately trusted father figure, or so he had deluded himself into thinking once because he had wanted that, had wanted anyone to notice when he was trapping himself inside his own brain again and maybe even to care enough to bring him back down to earth when he did.

Panic seizes Tony’s heart in an iron grip, and it feels like Obie’s hands inside him.

Natasha looks up at him, but he doesn’t catch the expression on her face, eyes zeroing in on the spot where he had just set his empty cup down. On the table, someone has helpfully cleared the glass and set down a complimentary martini on the corner of a napkin.

It’s all a blur of a crashing martini glass and his own breath and blood loud in his ears and his body on autopilot getting him the hell out of there because yes, yes this is bad but if he doesn’t leave now it’s going to be worse. Vodka drips down his hand as he practically runs out of the hall back to the refuge of their hotel suite and he hasn’t even thought about the consequences, the damage control until he hears Natasha’s voice light and unbothered and a second later a round of raucous laughter from the crowd he’d just had eating out of the palm of his hand and then the door slams shut behind him and all he thinks about is the path back to the hotel.

When Natasha slips into their rooms later that night, Tony doesn’t waste any time deploying his own damage control strategy, but not so he can manage appearances in front of the men waiting to pounce on him once more on the expo floor. He can’t really bring himself to care less about keeping up appearances with them, and it won’t matter after tonight, anyway.

“I’m going back to the helicarrier. I’ll be much more useful there running surveillance and the suit is always available in case you need it.”

Natasha tilts her head and raises one eyebrow pointedly as she silently considers Tony’s words for a moment. 

“No.” She says firmly, with a tone that would have ended the discussion before it even began were she not talking to a man whose stubbornness was outmatched only by the magnitude of his lack of self-preservation.

“Excuse me?” There’s just the slightest edge of panic to Tony’s voice, but even that small crack is threatening to collapse the entire facade. 

“I need you here. There’s no other part of this mission where you’d be more useful.”

“That really isn’t your call to make,” Tony says brusquely, getting up from where he had been sitting in their lounge and walking over to face the view of the nighttime city skyline as it shines through the massive windows.

“It’s not yours either. I wouldn’t have taken this mission if I didn’t know you could do it, Stark.”

“Why?!” Tony bursts out, expression crumbled when he spins around to meet her head-on. “What changed Natasha? Two years ago, YOU said I was a liability, so what exactly has changed?” His chest is heaving with the effort of catching a breath, eyes wild and body frozen still against the backdrop of the city lights, held captive under Natasha’s assessing gaze in a way that’s so much more restricting than even the bounds of social convention he broke to escape the expo floor an hour ago.

For a few, awful seconds, Natasha’s face is totally blank as she stares back at Tony and he wonders desperately for a moment if she’s evaluating him in real-time, if she’s writing the mission debrief in her head right now about how Tony Stark has shown himself unfit for espionage, unfit for combat, unfit for superheroics, unworthy of so much more than just the Iron Man su—

“I did.” Her voice shatters the spiral he had just begun to fall into, sympathy written in the downward tilt of her mouth and the way her eyebrows draw towards each other, wrinkling the skin between them. Tony is so abruptly, acutely aware that this is an emotion she’s choosing to let him see, but unlike the way she had laughed airily at the jokes made by the businessmen at the conference downstairs or their first interactions together when she had still been Natalie, this is not an act. The masks have all dropped.

“What?”

“ I changed. I made the wrong call about you.” She slowly makes her way over to him.

Tony breathes out an incredulous laugh, one hand coming up to rub his face. “You’re really going to try and convince me that I’m not everything you wrote in your report to Fury? After what you saw down there?” The words are quiet in the still air between them.

“What did I see? Tell me why I was right.” She raises one hand to lower his from his face, not letting it go once she does. 

“Isn’t it obvious? This… all the— the schmoozing and the grandstanding and the— God, the weapons. It’s like I never even left the industry, it all comes back so easily. That’s who I am, who I was raised to be. You saw it down there, I know you did. Please don’t— don’t lie to me.” He swallows heavily around the last admission, the unspoken again echoing louder than if he had just said it.

“I don’t know,” Natasha starts, a small smile forming on her gorgeous red-painted lips. The shade matches the color of the tie Tony wore today. She had hidden a microphone in the knot before they left earlier this afternoon. “Doesn’t seem like it comes all that easily to you. I imagine we’d still be down there schmoozing and grandstanding together if it did.”

A beat of silence passes before Tony breaks into a startled grin, Natasha’s smile growing in response to his. “I always forget that making jokes is something you do,” he admits, chuckling softly.

“Looks like we’ve still got a lot to learn about each other then.”

“Guess so,” the words just shy of a whisper as he finally pulls his hand from Natasha’s gentle hold and breaks their gaze to look away. 

“Tony,” she says, resting one hand on his cheek to gently guide him back. “The man on this mission? That isn’t you. Maybe it was, once, but I know it isn’t now because I see you choose to be better than him every day. To do better than him. That’s who you are: the choice you make, over and over, every day, to be better.” Her eyes flicker away for just a fraction of a second, almost imperceptibly, if Tony hadn’t been hanging on to her every word, eyes fixed on hers. “And I… I wouldn’t hold yourself responsible for the person you were raised to be.”

He takes in a shuddering breath, unsure how he found himself here without any of his social armor. How Natasha disarmed him of his usual tactics, avoidance and distraction and redirection, he isn’t quite sure. But there’s a trust he feels blossoming in his chest as she cradles his head in her hand that pushes fear at bay, and he knows he should be wary, trusting the spy, but there’s a haunted edge to her expression that makes Tony think that, for once, perhaps he isn’t the one who stands to lose the most if he falls headlong into trusting.

“It’s too much,” he admits, “pretending to be who I was. It— it reminds me of Obie, and drinking, and… it’s just a lot. A lot to deal with alone.” 

The corners of her eyes wrinkle tenderly as she smiles warmly at him. “It’s an act, Tony. You know this. You’re the only person who can do it, exactly because you’ve done it before, for so long. You fooled me didn’t you?”

His lips quirk up at the quip, he imagines that he’ll never quite get over how bizarre it is to hear Natasha banter with him like this, but it doesn’t much matter as long as he gets to experience the delight of her humor again.

“And Tony?”

“Yes?”

“I promise you, you’re not alone anymore.”

—

as far as the steve b-plot goes i’m thinking that steve would initially be feeling a sort of vague discomfort that he can’t quite pin down a reason for so he eventually just decides ‘oh you know what Nat is right and i’m probably feeling lonely and should try dating again after this mission is over’. but then he starts to see tony and nat acting more and more comfortable and affectionate and intimate with each other during the expo in a way that feels…. not so fake anymore and discomfort intensifies into a weird sort of frustration and anger and ultimately he realizes it’s jealousy and he spends a few days stewing in the helicarrier watching tony dazzle natasha in front of god and probably some villains and everyone else on the expo floor and he’s like this is so weird am i jealous of tony?? I don’t like nat like that she’s a great friend but i only see her as a friend and then one day on the ninth day of his latest shift because he’s started insisting to clint that he extend his rotations (clint is very on board with this bc as far as missions go this is literally a cakewalk to him & Nat and he promptly peaces out to go raise his secret family) steve’s watching the surveillance footage of the expo and he sees tony laughing so genuinely as he and natasha demonstrate an iron man gauntlet and he’s so enamored by tony’s joy and the way he squeezes his eyes shut and presses his lips together into a smile because he physically can’t contain his amusement and his laugh lines deepen so beautifully and he’s like oh. OH. i’m not jealous of tony i’m jealous of NATASHA. Because she gets to make tony laugh like that and touch him and be his and it’s all for a mission of course it is but what if it isn’t?? Because steve’s never seen tony laugh like that before and that was all for natasha and cue steve-centric shenanigans as he works through his gay pining for tony stark while simultaneously convincing himself that tony and natasha are now in a real relationship and angsting over that too. i feel like this would eventually resolve itself by nat and tony somehow getting themselves in danger as they finally hone in on their target and steve has to go save them and he’s carrying a bruised and bloodied tony stark out of his makeshift prison and tony is so delirious with gratitude that he kisses steve and steve feels guilty about THAT bc even though he’s elated he’s like ‘oh naur :( tony is cheating on my best close friend natasha with me and how could i do this to her’ meanwhile natasha is completely oblivious to this whole pity party steve is throwing himself and tony has literally been asleep in a hospital bed for 17 hours and thinks he dreamed that kiss when he wakes up steve thinks he’s in a love triangle but it’s literally all in his head bc he’s an emotionally constipated idiot but damn it if he isn’t tony’s emotionally constipated idiot

[descriptev]

I think for a lot of people, c!tommy is the main character in the dream smp.  he’s their hero, their protagonist, the person they’re rooting for.  but the thing is... there are no main characters in the dream smp.  the ccs have made it a point to state this, clearly and often.  the beauty of the dream smp, is that the medium in which it is told allows you to follow any story you want to follow, which means we’re all getting a slightly different version of events than every single other person in the fandom.  it’s cool.  

but for some of you, those who are more comfortable with the hero’s journey story structure, have forced this main characterization and underdog plot-line onto c!tommy.  and that’s fine.  you are free to do that.  but I think you’re doing yourself a disservice.  the dream smp is not a conventional narrative.  it is a gorgeous masterpiece, a sprawling epic fantasy wrapped in weird little packaging where characters have ridiculous names and are played by people with real lives within and outside of the narrative.  it is meta as fuck and so hard to explain to outsiders but it’s worth every minute I spend thinking about it.

if c!tommy is your hero and you want him to defeat the big bad villain in the end, again, that is fine.  but just so you know... I really don’t think that’s what you’re going to get with the dream smp.  c!tommy is not my hero.  he’s not a lot of the fandom’s hero.  and he’s definitely not the other cc’s hero.  so if you think these content creators are working toward a c!tommy boss battle where he defeats c!dream once and for all, I’m sorry.  truly.  I’m almost 100% sure that’s not where this story is going at all.

and don’t get me wrong, I like c!tommy.  he’s a very interesting character with surprising depth and is really well acted by cc!tommy.  but while some of you think c!tommy can do no wrong and that the current trajectory of his plotline will be good for his character development, I think the opposite.  since c!dream is not the villain in my version of the dream smp, I’m able to look past the boring overwrought narrative of “defeating the villain will solve all my problems.”  it’s not true of the real world, and I think the dream smp writers want to portray that in a way that you’ll understand completely and all at once.

it is my personal opinion that cc!tommy is purposefully making his character overly meek and traumatized, not so that we’ll feel bad for his character and want to root for his underdog spirit, but because he wants to point out weird it is that our initial reaction to seeing c!tommy all traumatized and sad is to feel bad for him, and woobify him, and root for him to overcome his trauma by defeating the villain.  when that’s just not how real life trauma works.  

I believe that cc!tommy is completely aware of what he’s doing by making his character just a tad bit annoying and obsessive and scared and suicidal.  it’s pissing me off a little, but I do believe I understand why he’s doing it and am looking very much forward to seeing how and what the end result will be.  it’s just... really not that much fun to watch, personally speaking, and I hope that the trajectory of his character will change as soon as possible so I can watch his pov again without wanting to click off and find a brief summary of events online somewhere the next day.

[scary-senpai]

Late reply is late 😅

First at all, I wanted to thank you for the answer about Garou's parents and the links you included about your others works! It took me a while to read them all! (Life has been busy lately) 😅.

But anyway, if it is possible, I would like to ask you, what do you think of the last chapter and what awaits for the future?

Mainly with the HA and Garou possible join them?

I believe people like Amai Mask would take it pretty badly considering he wanted to go straight for the kill and if Garou ends up as a S class hero, it would just add salt in the wound.

I think many of the C, B and A heroes would quit immediately, but the fact that Garou did not fight all the S class heroes gives a little ray of hope of being accepted (or at least tolerated) more easily.

Not that they would welcome him with open arms or something, but not having to apologize to them in particular could help.

(I sure hope as hell that Bang would not make Garou apologize to the ones who hitted him back then, they lost their right to an apology after that).

And also, I know I mentioned this before, but have you noticed that there have been more people trying to prove the 0.01 % chance of the theory of "Blast is future Garou" after the last chapter? They are a lot of memes about it!

The thing that caught my attention about this the most, and the Neo heroes arc, it is if there would be any interactions between Garou and Blue.

That would be very interesting...

Those 2 right now, represent everything their ideas oppose, with Garou being a "former criminal" and Blue being the "leader" of a lot more corrupted organization who believes they have any right to turn whoever they seem fit into cyborgs (pretty sure that in the webcomic they tried to capture Garou for that porpuse).

And in the 0.01% chance of Blast being actually Garou in the future, that would be mean that Blue would meet his dad when he was a kid like himself and, don't know, understand him better perhaps?

So? What do you think of this?

Gaah—oh my goodness. If you read all my stuff, you are legally entitled to my hand in marriage, and/or a bowl of soup <3 (But you're under no obligation! I reblog/link stuff hoping that somebody will read them, but never anyone in particular.)

Anyway, thank you so much for writing, Cherished Tumblr Compadre. I’ve been thinking a lot about the last chapter! I could literally meta for days about all the red flags happening in the Hero Association right now, but I’ll try not to indulge in too many tangents. I already vented a bit about the hiring process, the apparent lack of background checks, and Sitch’s consistent failure to communicate.

Going back to your ask, though, there’s a technical term for many of the snide interpersonal interactions we see at the HA, and that’s workplace bullying. Even if he’d come in under the best of circumstances (fresh from the dojo, no hero hunt and no criminal record), Garou would certainly get shit from somebody and suffer from the utter cliquey-ness of the place. For an organization focused on Justice, they can be patently unfair--as Garou knows from his convo with Death Gatling. (And Bang knows this, too, because we’ve seen him comment on his colleagues behavior—although he doesn’t really address it directly).

Anyway, my Overly Sad Headcanon / Depressing Meta is that Bang, well aware of Garou's childhood angst, is doing his own crude version of Exposure Therapy and in hopes that Garou will learn to rise above conflict, and to play nicely even when folks actively antagonize him. I think I prefer that to my other depressing meta, which is that Bang has yet to see Garou for Garou, and instead simply imagines his protégé as a younger version of himself.

In any case, I’m curious why Bang resigned immediately, as opposed to reducing his schedule and/or taking personal leave as he supports Garou’s transition, and then returning together with him—it almost feels like there were ultimatums involved. I think Bang’s presence will be crucial for Garou’s success at the HA—not only so that Garou feels like he’s got somebody in his corner, but so that the other employees feel more comfortable, because Garou’s always hanging around a chaperone. I love Garou, but he has the potential to be very dangerous in response to a perceived threat. Additionally, he’s put a lot of effort into making himself seem scary and that will come back to bite him in the ass, even among people he has not actively battered. Fear/anxiety responses are not something we can so easily override, but that’s a CogPsych digression for another day. I am still triggered by a current client that reminds me of my emotionally abusive ex-boss, even though it’s been several years since I left that job and I was never in physical danger.

OPM feels like it was written by someone who understands behavioral economics / organizational psych very well and/or is quite familiar with how Kafka-esque managing a company (particularly a nonprofit) can get…or someone that knows very little and has somehow gotten lucky and lampooned all the right things. Catbert would be proud.

So, I am not endorsing this approach, but here’s a real thing that happens at companies: getting people to quit is sometimes a deliberate gambit, even a strategy. Sitch (or another executive) might have done the math and decided, "yes, I one solid S-Class hero adds more value than 100 B/C class heroes. Let’s make that sacrifice.”

Ideally you would work hard to make all your staff comfortable, but that isn't always possible, and some companies can’t be bothered. Unhappy / anxious employees are unproductive employees. In that case, Upper management might well say, "if you don't like the direction we are taking, then by all means--please, go with God. And also, you’re not worth the headache.” And we have seen upper management get very, very ruthless about strategy. And besides, not everybody can just up and leave a job. It probably helps that the HA is the only game in town, at least for now

I spend a lot of time thinking about the economy in the OPM-verse—it can’t be good. In a world --where your entire commercial district might be flattened under a giant monster corpse at a moment’s notice, or your public transit / highway system becomes suddenly FUBAR due to yet another monster-induced catastrophe, Hero work would probably be a comparatively stable career.

Anyway, @gofancyninjaworld used the analogy that "the Hero Association hiring Garou now is like opening up a marriage after your spouse has cheated," but I'd go one step further and say, "it's like opening up a marriage because your spouse has been cheating chronically for years." There are many things that will likely come to light because of Garou--lack of transparency, lack of supervision/oversight, unequal treatment. Nothing that’s Garou’s fault, but Garou’s presence will likely crack already faulty foundations.

Speaking of which:

I know this arc been a journey for everyone, mostly ending in positive changes, and this includes Waganma's dad, Narinki. He probably has an improved opinion of heroes now.

But if one high-ranking executive thinks like this, others likely share this perspective--because if they didn't, then Narinki probably wouldn't be there in the first place. My old company was not the healthiest or most cohesive work environment, but if anybody ever implied the front line workers weren't earning their keep, even on an “easy” shift, they would be immediately and mercilessly eviscerated by the rest of the office staff (many of whom had been front line workers previously). We didn’t always see eye to eye, but we agreed that the frontline workers should be making as much money as we could possibly afford to pay them, all of the goddamn time.

Speaking of which. The HA could stand to have some heroes on their executive board, if they don’t already. Most successful orgs try to diversify their leadership with current/former employees, and (usually if they are a service oriented nonprofit) from the populations they support. You don’t have to be a wealthy businessman in a suit to serve on leadership committee—but it does get frustratingly insular sometimes.

In that sense, maybe the HA does need someone like Garou, who can see through PR bluster and speak truth to bullshit power. He just needs to sharpen his diplomacy skills.

Speaking of diplomacy, it seems like Garou is certainly primed for conflict with Amai Mask. On the other hand, I like to think that Garou is also uniquely positioned to understand Amai, perhaps moreso than any other character. Garou knows the anger and fear that comes with being a monster, and (if he does join up with the HA) the crushing pressure to uphold a positive image in spite of whatever storm is roiling inside you. Amai externalizes his pain and sadness on to other people. That was Garou’s downfall, too.

I do have this bittersweet headcanon where Garou figures out Amai’s identity and his mind is absolutely blown, because, well...

Garou, pacing frantically: If you're a hero but you're actually a monster then... that means... you aren't actually popular you're... oh, wow. [[Garou abruptly stops pacing and makes eye contact with Amai]] That sounds really fucking hard, actually.

Amai, coolly: I’d certainly say so.

Garou, pacing again, and biting his nails: See, ever since I was a kid I've always rooted for the monster. but I don't know if it was actually about the monster...now that I think about it, and I’ve finally met some monsters, I’m starting to think that it might have been about the rooting for underdog, you know?

Amai: I’ve never been one for cartoons.

Garou: and... you're kinda the underdog here... so... I think I might, uh... I might... be a fan? I mean, I might be your fan--

Amai, smiling slightly: that is quite kind of you to say.

Garou, practically tearing out his own hair: --possibly your biggest fan--

Amai, magnanimously: I suppose it’s no surprise that you’d come around eventually--

Garou, cutting him off: --but I absolutely hate your music...and literally everything else about you.

Amai: ...

Garou: like, I’m on your side, but I don’t wanna be in the same room as you, you know?

Amai, sighing: you really ought to quit while you’re ahead. 

“I’m on your side, but also I don’t want to be in the same room as you,” is probably something Garou hears a lot, bless him.

OPM has this almost-but-not-quite hopeful motif that “the best possible outcome arises when the absolute worst thing occurs,” and if I had to guess, I’d say that’s how Garou’s story will go—in many ways, he’s been through more than anybody else and in that sense he has the most potential to help everybody else.

Now, you mentioned apologies. I would say that (in most cases) everyone deserves an apology, but nobody’s entitled to forgiveness. Those are two very different things.

It is my (probably unpopular) opinion that forgiveness is something you do for you, as a way of moving on--it is not necessarily for the benefit of the person apologizing, especially in extreme cases like this, Sometimes forgiveness means setting boundaries. Someone once described forgiveness as “take a boltcutter to the chains of an unpleasant experience so that it no longer has power over you.” When it comes to some people I’ve forgiven, like my former employer or an abusive ex, I honestly prefer not to think of them. In other cases—like forgiving my loved ones for things they’ve done (usually unintentionally)—it’s the mistake that we’ve agreed to move away from, not each other, and we mutually agree on the work it will take (and consistent behavioral changes we need to see) in order to repair / strengthen our relationship after a misstep. It really, really depends on the scenario, and the people involved, and what your goals are. Healing alone takes work, and healing together with somebody else usually takes twice as much effort (if not more, tbh)

Someone can sincerely accept Garou’s apology, and hope that he turns his life around, and also never want to see him again (or work for the same employer). None of those things are mutually exclusive, nor are they wrong.

I think Garou’s preliminary (and most daunting) challenge will be to forgive himself for his past actions. Until he accomplishes that, he can’t fully conceptualize what makes a heartfelt apology.

We never actually saw Garou apologize for dining and dashing, for example--instead, he notably rambled off on a tangent, justifying previous crimes. It’s funny and sweet and a little troublesome. But I think we can guess where it comes from... Garou does not often see people apologizing to him.

Garou’s temper and incorruptible stubborn streak are why I doubt he’s actually Blast—although admittedly I’m having some fun imagining that theory. But Blast works on a team. Blast is level-headed. He’s a straight-shooter and a clear communicator, even under pressure...and these are all qualities that Garou does not fully embody right now. He might have demonstrated a talent for teamwork, but he won’t admit to it. He helps Sai to focus enough to time travel, but those are memories he can no longer access. I do hope he finds them again. Anyway, the potential is certainly there, and i believe that Garou could (in time) cultivate these qualities and ultimately excel at them…but honestly I don’t see anyone around him to guide him, or even to model this behavior. If anything, I think Garou will end up enlightening Bang more than Bang could ever hope to enlighten Garou.

I think it’s interesting to consider how Garou and Blue might interact, if the “Garou is Blast” theory comes true. I feel like it would probably be... traumatic for the both of them, honestly.

Think about it: Garou hasn’t quite figured out his own childhood and already he’s tasked with being an adult. I mean, wow, can you imagine the pressure?!? “Bang is like 100 years old and he’s still not ready to be a father,” Garou probably thinks to himself but lovingly, and with great affection for his mentor. “So what the fuck am I supposed to do?!?”

If Blue is Garou’s son, I hope Garou discovers this quickly , because Garou it seems like he would feel... immense regret and sadness for failing to be a fully present parent. Even if he’s still just a kid himself and the whole situation is patently absurd, he might end up chastising himself for not being a good father even though he had no way of knowing he was actually supposed to be one.

Thinking about this from Blue’s perspective? I imagine it would be very hard for him also. Again, I haven’t read most of the wc, but Blue more mature than Current Garou. Current Garou is someone who is really in need of a parental figure right now (honestly he needs multiple mentors and/or parental figures, partly because he needs so much support and partly because he needs to regain trust / feel safe around other adults). So, in that sense maybe he’d be better off hanging around another kid? It’s really hard to tell. Garou’s kind of a wild card.

Garou is also emotionally immature, which tends to exacerbate any existing interpersonal struggle. We’ve seen how he handles emotional closeness--he runs away, and challenges people to find him. Like most teenagers, he lashes out to test boundaries. He can’t even tell Bang, “I missed you, and I’m glad you’re here.” He just says “took you long enough, you old windbag!” And Bang doesn’t seem to want to use his words either. Garou struggles to keep his anger under control. He seems to feel a little bit awkward and anxious in social situations, unless he’s masking or performing in some capacity. Even a friendly conversation with his most trusted person hit some rough patches… so imagine him navigating such an unusual one?

Your idea that the Neoheroes wanted to turn Garou into a cyborg is a really good one! I hadn’t considered that, but it makes a lot of sense.

So as we know, Neo-heroes are into extreme body modification. That seems like it would make them the obvious baddies. But, as we learned in Ch 167.5, there are some folks at the HA pushing for a similar approach:

The higher-ups want me to try drugs, body modifications, whatever it takes!

And the heroes are questioning my awareness of human rights and threatening me with lawsuits!

I suppose Gobrich means to say that the employees are threatening to sue the company, which is, again, an inadvisable tactic, but not an uncommon one: some companies decide the cost of getting sued is worth the overall benefit they’d see from a particular strategy. Also, winning a lawsuit is often more about weasel-wording and the evidence/strength of a case than actual reality… and that’s assuming you have the resources to follow through with a lawsuit, which not everyone does. I would not want to go toe-to-toe with an entity like the HA, I’ll tell you that much.

Scarily enough, this Gobrich situation is not an uncommon scenario IRL, either--sometimes it’s just one rational person in the right position that’s able to hold back an unfair, inhumane, or otherwise detrimental change.

Right now, the HA is pretty much the only game in town. Normally, that’s a bad thing--folks that want to work as career heroes don’t seem to have options when it comes to employers, which would give the HA more leverage over its employees, perpetuating things like unfair (or downright unjust) treatment. In this case, though, there’s an unintentional upside: while there isn’t a consensus about how to improve the current roster of heroes, there are at least some forces (or just individuals, like Gobrich) putting a kibosh on more extreme techniques, like body modification--at least, for now.

What that means is, though, there might not be a mass exodus of “Heroes that Don’t Like Garou” -- there might also be a second wave of extremists jumping ship to work/play mad scientist for a less morally conservative organization. The latter example is much more scary to me. :-/

[makeste]

About Deku: a criticism that i had seen used againts him is that he never morally struggle about his decisions and that he always does the right think, do you think that this is a flaw of the story, or just people having different personal tastes regarding the main characther.

for me, I definitely wouldn’t call it a flaw, if only because it’s completely intentional. the main character always saving the day in the end and never wavering from their convictions (which are almost always admirable) is a part of the genre. pick just about any other mc in shounen -- Luffy, Naruto, Goku, etc. -- and you’ll find the same.

now, that’s not to say that the criticism isn’t valid. but the thing is, to me it’s like criticizing horror for being too scary, or criticizing comedy for not taking things seriously enough. shounen mcs are supposed to have those idealistic convictions. they’re supposed to have strong morals. it’s a part of the genre. it’s a feature of the genre, in fact. it’s one of the reasons why people gravitate to these stories, because it’s comforting and dependable.

these mcs aren’t perfect, of course, but they almost always have strong, incorruptible moral cores, even if that sometimes makes them a bit less relatable. because the thing is, they don’t necessarily need to be relatable to everyone, but what they do need is to be someone that the average person will root for to succeed. not necessarily role models, but someone who the average person will side with and support. hence why the strong moral backbone is so important. shounen mcs are supposed to reflect all of those shounen virtues like hope and courage and determination and justice and empathy and compassion. all that heroic shit. they have to embody that. it kind of comes with the territory.

and it’s fine to dislike that, because a lot of people see it as overly preachy and unrealistic and boring to a degree, and that’s understandable. it is predictable, and that predictability can be a double-edged sword. it’s familiar and reassuring, but it can also be dull and lacking in suspense, and there isn’t always a way around that. and this does mean that the mc won’t always necessarily be the most complex or interesting character in the series. they tend to be characters you look up to and admire, as opposed to characters you relate to personally. which is fine of course, but it’s a big reason why mcs often rank second or third in popularity polls, because the characters that are the most popular tend to have a bit more moral complexity. but again, that’s just part of the genre though. it’s not the mc’s job to be relatable; their job is simply to be someone that we can root for.

so to get back to your question, as I said, I don’t think this is a flaw of the story, because to me that would imply a mistake in the writing, which this isn’t. it’s very deliberate, and anyone who’s read or watched enough shounen knows that this is par for the course. so while you might disagree about whether or not it should be, imo that becomes more of a general argument against the genre itself than against BnHA or Deku’s character in particular.

and for what it’s worth, while I do understand the criticisms against him, for me at least, Deku is a very interesting character. like, just speaking from a strictly personal and totally subjective standpoint, I like him. I find him interesting. I find his personality, character, and story interesting. I find his struggles interesting. and he does have them, even if they’re not always of the “right vs wrong” variety. just because you know the right thing to do doesn’t mean it’s always easy. just because you ultimately wind up making the best decision doesn’t mean that the struggle is meaningless or boring, at least not to me. Deku often finds himself in situations where there is no easy way out. that’s interesting!! even if he does figure out a solution in the end, that doesn’t make the conflict any less interesting while it is going on. it’s just that it’s more of a “how is he gonna manage to get out of this one” suspense than a “will he make it out” suspense. that to me is the interesting part. when you’re reading about Sherlock Holmes or Hercule Poirot solving a mystery, there’s never any doubt of whether they’ll solve it, because that’s not the focus of the story. the story is about how they will solve it. you’re not supposed to doubt whether the mc in shounen will succeed in the end, because it’s never been about that. the question isn’t will they. the question is how.

and I personally find the how of Deku’s story to be fascinating. this is a young boy who’s had heroic ambitions all his life, but who sometimes questions his own worthiness to fulfill them. he has a power that might be the world’s best hope against the strongest evil the world has ever known, but he’s inexperienced and has trouble controlling that power. he has an admirable need to save and protect others, but that same need makes him reckless, and occasionally puts him at great risk. he has a tendency to be short-sighted, and to make decisions that save others in the short term, but make things more difficult in the long term (take the current status of his arms, for instance -- using them against Tomura was a gamble that didn’t pay off, and in doing so he may have damaged them beyond repair).

and even though it’s the job of a shounen mc to bring all of the other characters together, this is the one thing he still hasn’t personally grasped yet, as he’s still stuck in the “I can’t put anyone else at risk so I’ll just have to do it all alone” stage of his development, and is going to need help in order to finally progress to the “everyone else is aware of the risks and prepared to make those sacrifices just like me, so I’m going to have to trust them and let them help me because it will take all of us in order to succeed” final, Enlightened stage. this is shaping up to perhaps be his greatest personal challenge, and it’s something that for my part I find very compelling. all of these flaws are compelling to me, actually. I don’t know if they count as “real” flaws to everyone or not, but frankly I don’t care. they’re interesting to me, and I could read about that shit all day.

and so for me personally, it doesn’t matter as much whether he’s morally conflicted or suffers too much from What A Good Person syndrome or whatever lol. because so far at least, that hasn’t affected my fondness for him at all. there are plenty of other things I find relatable about him, and the struggles he does go through have plenty of weight to me. ymmv! but to me he is extremely likable, and I enjoy reading about him, and I’m invested in his story and want him to succeed. and those are all of the character metrics I care about. I think that objectively, he’s a good shounen mc, and subjectively, he’s interesting and I like him. and I don’t really have a good, clever/punchy way to end this meta lol, so I guess I’ll just leave it at that.

[humans4vampires]

I caught some of your meta on your posts and I peeped around and saw a little Hardin Scott commentary. I saw you unpack this a bit in a chat but I want to hear more so I’ll ask again: If we sub out Jacob for Hardin, who would Bella pick? Edward or Hardin?

Wow, okay. Let's unpack!

I'd say it really depends on the situation; whether or not we're merging plot lines from both series or if we're just hard-swapping Hardin for Jacob in the Twilight Saga. I have so much to say about the two universes colliding, which I would dare say would have a different outcome and a much more compelling storyline, but since you asked this question specifically, I'll just cover what I think would happen if we swapped Jacob Black for Hardin Scott, cold-turkey, without any other peripheral character changes or introductions.

Edward Cullen versus Hardin Black (neé Scott)

Hardin Black is angsty, a little aggressive, and very popular amongst his friends and peers. He's charming, enough so that he's charmed the pants off of most of the girls his age, so he's quite sexually experienced by the time he meets his childhood friend, Bella Swan when she returns to Forks to live with her father.

Charlie Swan knows Hardin well enough to know he doesn't want him hanging around his teenage daughter, but his dear friend, Billy Black hopes that Bella might be a good influence on his gruff son. Charlie keeps a close watch on them when they're together, though he quickly assures himself that Hardin won't be pulling any tricks on his daughter.

Bella and Hardin were a volatile pair together, and both had no issue telling the other what they thought of them. Hardin found Bella to be a boring, plain-Jane, goody-goody, which only was made more apparent in her choice of a boyfriend; the incredibly tame and aggravatingly perfect, Edward Cullen. Over a fish-fry dinner with Billy and Hardin, Bella made a passing comment about Edward to Charlie, to which Hardin's response was, "Even worse than the Newton kid."

Bella saw Hardin as a fuck-boy, to be entirely honest. To her, he was rude and crass, spent too much of his time looking for destructive things to do. And once Edward came into the picture, she saw all of Hardin's flaws in direct comparison to her perfect gentleman in Edward.

Things changed, though, when Edward left Bella in the time during New Moon. Bella spent months essentially catatonic before discovering her new-found passion for adrenaline charging adventurism. Who better to create chaos with than Hardin?

Now, here's where some things take a turn. Hardin isn't interested in wholesome 'fun' like our sweetie pie, Jacob Black. Hardin drinks and parties and stirs up trouble. Bella falls in with Hardin, but does a good job of leveling him out a bit. They bond over their shared love of classic literature and spend their days recovering from their wild teenage nights by reading passages to each other on an old quilt on the beach in La Push.

Eventually, the two build a strong and trusting relationship, full of witty teasing and more balanced joy. They spend less and less of their time with friends at parties and more and more time alone. Bella proves to be a good equalizer for Hardin and Hardin a good measure of happiness for Bella. The two do end up having sex and continue to have a sexual relationship leading up to the time Hardin transforms into a werewolf.

Both Bella and Hardin manage to help each other with a lot of their varying emotional baggage, and in many ways, they are able to supplement each other well. Hardin's fear of abandonment is well cared for in Bella's over-attentiveness and need to be the "parent," while this quality in Bella is better balanced by Hardin's more carefree and narcissistic tendencies. In this, I mean to say that Hardin encourages Bella to let loose and think of herself first - which becomes even more liberating for Bella when the two begin their sexual relationship.

I'll pause here to unpack this more: I'm not just putting in this saucy tad-bit for your reading pleasure. You cannot have Hardin as a character without the sexual chemistry with the female protagonist. At his core, he's still an adaptation of Christian Grey and Harry Styles. This is not a comment on Harry Styles' sexual prowess, just to be clear - but Christian Grey is sex personified, and thus, is Hardin Scott (or Black, in this case). Which is so interesting to think about, considering Christian Grey is just an adaptation of Edward Cullen, thus, Hardin has enough at his core to be a strong contender for Bella. And, Bella Swan, at her core, is very in-tune with her sexuality. Stephenie Meyer may not be overly colorful with Bella's lustfulness, but it's obvious and apparent throughout the series. Bella and Hardin would have sex eventually and this would complicated things for the both of them, especially when Edward returns.

Now, as the whole werewolf thing unfolds and Bella is forced, by Hardin, to separate from him, the gravity of their relationship and their sexual encounters pushes Bella to another breaking point. She feels rejected and isolated with Hardin distancing himself and the feeling that she loses Edward the more she let's Hardin in hits her harder in Hardin's absence. Not to mention, her relationship with Hardin isn't exactly as easy-breezy beautiful, Cover Girl, like her relationship with the subbed-out Jacob was. Jacob, remember, is very go-with-the-flow, sunshine with a candy-coating sweet - and Hardin is very much not. All of those character flaws that make Hardin who he is are still there. Their relationship is tumultuous, which makes Bella question herself and exacerbates her insecurities.

There's not much time between the two reuniting after the werewolf is out of the bag -Get it? like the 'cat out of the bag?'- and when Bella leaves for Italy to save Edward. This moment triggers Hardin's abandonment issues big time and this is the moment Bella spends the next three books trying to overcome with Hardin. She does come back with Edward and she does continue her relationship as she did in Eclipse and Breaking Dawn, but with the added layer of sexual history and intense chemistry with Hardin throughout the rest of the saga, Bella struggles much more with her feelings for both men. Sex complicates things in a big way and definitely proved her feelings for Hardin very early on in the saga.

This also adds so much more complexity to her relationship with Edward, who very much knows what happened while he was away and very much blames himself for how Bella and Hardin's relationship developed - as he did with Bella and Jacob.

Ultimately, do I think that Bella would choose Hardin over Edward in the end? No. But Hardin does present a compelling swap that I'd say could keep you truly wondering if she was going to change her mind at any point.

I would like to assert here that Renesmee should never have happened like that and I will not even discuss the repercussions.

In the end, Bella would choose Edward for all the things that Hardin is not and cannot be; a perfect God-like creature that shifted her entire perspective of what life was and what life could be. Hardin, or Jacob, could never compete with that.

But the saga would have been so much more dynamic with the tension and the complexity that sex brings to a love story. Imagine Bella tossing and turning at night, Edward agonizing over hearing Hardin's name on her lips. Imagine Edward being tormented by Hardin's mental replays of his nights with Bella every time he looks at her. Imagine how much more conflicted Edward would be about his sexual relationship with Bella! The added complexity of his feelings of her being with Hardin and being nervous!! Oh, I can't even go into that right now...

It would make so much more sense for him to want to commit to her in marriage too! He'd want to solidify their love in a new and different way than she had with Hardin. And it would probably be the reason Bella would agree to it.

Thank you for coming to my TedTalk.