#I might just expand more on this thought

[bubba-the-bear]

OK so @ skizz-in-places-he-shouldnt-be made a post were skizz was at the flower dance with impulse and 9 hours later this was Infront of me ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[axolau]

TRANSFORMERS PRIME RANT

content warning: discussions of physical/psychological abuse

I’m going to try to write a rant but we’ll see how good I am at stringing my words together.

I love Transformers Prime with my whole heart, particularly Starscream, and despite and because of this, I don’t like the way his character plays out in season three.

After Starscream rejoins the decepticons at the end of season two, the abuse he receives from Megatron gets way worse. Megatron physically beat Starscream quite often in season one, and as season three progresses, this treatment is on full display and gets so much worse. And these abuse scenes are genuinely horrible and upsetting. Megatron physically dominates Starscream, who is much smaller and thinner, and the show spends a lot of time emphasizing his fear and screams as Megatron beats him.

Alongside Starscream’s abuse getting worse, he also gets significant Stockholm syndrome in season three, which makes the whole situation one thousand times ickier. While in season one Starscream tried to usurp and fight back against Megatron, now he looks up to the person who is actively and regularly beating him half to death.

But there’s nothing wrong with depicting a toxic character dynamic, it’s how the narrative frames it that matters.

Starscream gets treated worse by Megatron while thinking better of him as the show goes on. And the only people we get to see this ugly situation through the eyes of are Starscream and Megatron, who both think this is fine in one way or another.

We never get to see any other character acknowledge the abusive relationship. The autobots are totally oblivious or totally uncaring that it’s happening, and you can bet the other Decepticons aren’t going to do anything about it. Even after Megatron leaves behind his goal of oppression, he shows no regret of how he’d treated Starscream, the person who he had arguably made suffer the most. He just shouts at him and makes him flinch one last time then abandons him. He continues to mistreat him then leaves him behind. Leaves behind the person who he had physically and psychologically destroyed for thousands if not millions of years. Although I don’t expect Megatron to show sympathy for Starscream, since his ‘redemption’ was just him retiring and leaving everyone else to clean up the mess he made. (I have good and bad feelings on Megatron’s ending, but I don’t want to get too sidetracked)

What matters is, without Megatron acknowledging the horribleness of the situation, and without the autobots being aware of it, the only person who can acknowledge how toxic the situation was is Starscream.

But he doesn’t get this chance. His arc ends when the Predacons beat him up for revenge.

Starscream is an abuse victim, and he is never given a chance to heal. No character, himself included, ever fully acknowledges how problematic the situation is. He is never given a chance to be powerful. Over and over again he is forced to be weak and without agency. From the start of season three to the end of the movie, his character is a slow trickle into suffering more and more, being beaten down again and again until he doesn’t get back up.

When watching the show, I was fine with the amount of frightening abuse they were depicting on screen because I thought they would have some amount of healing from it. But it just gets worse and worse until the show ends and that’s it. It just feels like abuse for the sake of abuse at this point.

But the thing is, I’m not even opposed to Starscream having a bad ending. Let me explain.

I think it makes sense after him being conniving and evil and power hungry and cruel for his actions to catch up for him, and for him to be humbled in one way or another.

The thing is, they depicted Starscream’s fall to shame without ever giving him a moment of power. There’s no climax in season three where he takes control of his life again. There’s no moment where he gets to be more than humiliated and shamed.

Starscream is a victim, and he’s an abuser as well. He treats everyone around him horribly. He is a perpetuator of the cycle of abuse, where, after being abused by Megatron and others, he started to replicate their cruelty in order to have power.

The story needed to recognize him as both an abuser and a victim. It seemed to think these cancel out. That Starscream being beat by the Predacons in the end is the consequence of his abusive actions towards others coming back to haunt him. But just as a middle school bully doesn’t deserve to go home and be bullied by their sibling, an abuser does not deserve to be abused by another person. No one deserves to be abused.

Starscream being abused doesn’t pay for his crimes. And he isn’t just being humbled for treating the predacons badly; he’s being tortured.

As an abuser, Starscream deserved to see the consequences of his actions in some way, but as a victim, Starscream deserved any kind of moment of victory.

All this to say, this isn’t about wether or not Starscream deserved to be beat by the predacons (although I maintain that we should have better mindsets about paying for our crimes than “abusers deserve abuse”). This is about the fact that he deserved to see a shred of honor before his fall as well.

This is about the fact that as an abuse victim, he is given not a shred of dignity or an acknowledgment of his pain. His descent in season three isn’t even a character arc. There’s no growth, no resolution, no rising or falling climax. Like I said before, it’s just him suffering over and over, until the series ends.

Starscream is perhaps a good, although tragic, depiction of an abuser: a character who treats others poorly until it finally catches up to him. But he is a bad and problematic depiction of a victim: someone who never gets to be seen, even by himself.

[puppppppppy]

i feel like im not making any sense but does anyone else feel like there are stories that let u run with them and ones that spell everything out for you

[mushramoo]

it’s so weird to me that ppl are like “u can’t like William Afton cos he’s a murderer” bro ppl simp for murderers in fiction all the time? Jeff the Killer? Jason? Slenderman lol? he’s fun and he’s got a lot of potential, as long as ur not simping for irl murderers I really don’t see the issue with it. Let me think my murderer is goofy in peace

[yourlocalgrass]

I’m bored and thought of another scenario to put in tension and angst for obey me characters to go through. I like this one by the way.

_______________________________

Sorcerers’ society find out the causes of earthquakes happening faster than usual was MC due to their magic potential (MC being the cause of all the natural ‘phenomenon’ in S2) and now want to investigate MC and call them in.

Drama has already started baby.

Solomon who’s against this but goes with MC to make sure they’re ok because it’s not a good idea to ignore a seemingly threat invitation I mean.

It’s explained the Ring of light was used to console MC’s magic and everything is fine now but they’re doubting it and want to investigate the Ring of light for themselves, if it’s actually successfuly tamed their magic or just a temporary device to tone it down- simply meaning if MC’s overflow of magic would still be leaking and not fully restrained.

[Also add overprotective Solomon drama who’s against this because that’s hot and more dramatic]

It’s found out the ring of light isn’t powerful enough to completely prevent MC’s magic from overflowing and now…

The sorcerers’ society have deemed MC a threat. A large threat to the human world.

Who would be better off dead. No. SHOULD be dead.

_______________________________

「If only the story actually did have good drama like this~

Anyways I’m just describing the scenario since I can’t write at all lol if I had enough confidence I probs would haha」

[impbites]

OCtober day 18 - swap 🩸👼 (their original forms look like this!)

i went with "role in the story" for this one. i've thought abt this AU a bit before, but i think a lot of things would change if gwyar was sacrificed instead of claret…

The Cooler Claret spawned from a face monster and so i thought it would b cute to have gwyar mutate from a crimera! (<- objectively uncute thing to say). the monsters r somewhat significant bc they represent unfulfilled desires from when they were still ppl, like claret becoming strong enough to protect her home/family and gwyar's desire to be free (hence y she can fly now).

even though claret emerges as an adult in canon, i chose to keep gwyar as a child in the swapped version bc it felt more fitting. clarets new role in the story is similar to gwyars in that she aims to purge the crimson, but where gwyar becomes quite apathetic, claret takes on a much crueler personality... 😔

[dark-daphne]

some concepts for a httyd mandalorian au i had after rewatching the How To Train Your Dragon movies.

someone needs to expand on the untapped potential of a httyd x mandalorian crossover because the armor designs are nothing but extra when it comes to Hiccup especially in Hidden World. but alas I suck at drawing armor.

[2hoothoots]

i was having a chuckle to myself last night about Gristol, and how his plans are basically:

Restore Ford Cruller's memory

Find Maligula

???

Profit

but then... of course they are, right? this is Gristol we're talking about. Fatherland Follies drives home again and again that he's still operating on a child's logic, a warped and reductive version of the world that he never bothered to grow out of. both of his memory vaults center on the images of his childhood, this idealized version of the past that he clings to no matter what. and that's still how he remembers Maligula, too - as this saviour figure, who rushes in to help him when he's in trouble.

[ID: Two slides from Gristol's memory vault, Glory to Grulovia! Left: Gristol clings to Maligula's back as she summons waves to sweep away his assailants. Right: Gristol and Maligula waving from a balcony as the people cheer. Gzar Theodore brandishes a dagger in the background.]

like so much else, Maligula represents a return to this idyllic childhood - to the peace and simplicity of his youth, when he was free from worries and responsibilities. in his mind, he doesn't need to make any further plans - once Maligula's back, everything will go back to normal. Maligula will make everything better.

...is what i thought, but then i remembered this line:

[Screenshot source. ID: Gristol, in Truman's body, bows on his hands and knees in front of the newly-awaked Maligula. The caption reads: "Yes, High Priestess! I am here to correct the mistakes made by my father!"]

and that's kind of interesting, right?

to be clear: this happens directly after Maligula sees Helmut-in-Gristol's-body, and recognises him. her line before this is:

"Little Gzesaravich! Have you come to pay for your father's sins?"

my first thought was that Gristol hadn't expected to still be in Truman's body by the time he managed to find Maligula, and this was him trying to placate her and buy some time until he could explain the situation. but watching the cutscene back, that's clearly not what's happening here. Gristol is answering as himself, and his response of throwing himself to his knees before her is, as far as i can tell, genuine.

so what is going on here?

in Fatherland Follies, there's this line in the ride narration that stuck out to me:

"Why didn't the Gzar help Maligula in her time of need? No one knows, but historians agree - it is Gzar Theodore's biggest failure."

other lines mention Gzar Theodore's "mistake", and it's wording Gristol himself echoes in the screencap above. evidently, he believes that his father abandoned Maligula, leaving her to her fate at the hands of the Psychonauts, and it was that mistake that lead to them being driven out of the country - that mistake which he seeks to correct. maybe he even feels like he has a debt to repay to her for his family turning their backs on her all those years ago.

the 'High Priestess' thing, though - that's kinda weird, and threw me for a loop the first time i played the game. it took me until my second playthrough to connect the dots, and remember how the room in the Lady Luctopus - Gristol's room - was full of Delugionist scribblings and symbols.

[Screenshot source. ID: left, the walls of the hidden backroom in Gristol's hotel suite, covered in scrawlings of eyeballs and Maligula's name. Right, the pinboard from the hidden backroom. On its surface are photographs and newspaper clippings connected by pieces of string.]

i mean, look at this stuff! he had a whole conspiracy board and everything!

we learn very little about the Delugionists and their beliefs as a whole during the game, but i think drawing the connection here suggests two important things. one: that Gristol was in deep with this stuff. i don't know how he linked up with them - maybe via old family connections, or just good old-fashioned digging (we know he's skilled at worming his way into peoples' good graces, after all) - but it seems likely that he's begun to internalise their ideas, maybe even warping his own memories of events. and two: the Delugionists themselves are, if you'll pardon the pun, pretty far off the deep end.

like... i understand why PN2 didn't go heavy on the "mass-murderer cult worship" aspect of things, in the end, but man this is such a tantalising glimpse into the wider mythos around Maligula. Gristol is proud and haughty and thinks himself above everyone else; the fact that his first reaction seeing Maligula is to throw himself to the ground at her feet says so much about the way he's come to see her. he's not just trying to bring back Maligula, his childhood bodyguard. he's trying to bring back Maligula, the High Priestess of the deluge, the semi-mythical figure whose supporters believe even death couldn't stop. he doesn't even flinch at the way she confronts him, and maybe it's because he's bought in so completely to this deified figurehead, this idea of Maligula; more a living force of nature than a person. and it all comes back to the same place: an abdication of responsibility, not just to the person who protected him when he was little but to this avatar of floods and destruction. Maligula will make everything better.

i'd write more about my thoughts on the Delugionists but that'd be taking a hard turn into speculation, and this is already kind of long and rambling so i'd better end it here. but what an unexpected and evocative line, right? it's some of the only stuff we have to go off of regarding the Delugionists as a whole, but i think it does such a good job of hinting at the wider story - at teasing another layer to the mythos surrounding Maligula, one whose ripples we see throughout the game but which never quite breaches the surface.

[draw-you-coward]

power level: how it started vs how it's going

[light-wynd]

So I made a Melusine OC! Yeah it was inevitable at this point lmao.

Very short little attempt at a backstory so far under the cut, for anyone interested.

Like many other Melusines, Maia tends to visit the Fortress of Meropide to see Sigewinne in her infirmary. During one of these times, she wandered off and snuck into the Pankration Ring out of curiosity, where she saw some inmates in the middle of a boxing match. Finding the sight fascinating, she keeps on sneaking in there at any chance she gets, paying careful attention to the way humans fight in the ring and hoping to pick up some techniques herself eventually. Unfortunately, despite her observations and best efforts, she hasn't had a lot of success so far since Melusines' squishy hands weren't exactly made for combat - but this hasn't discouraged her from continuing to try.

[avatarofwar]

i saw your tags of owl and honestly, you are so real and right for it, patricide is cool af and your rant about him was so true (i had the same thought too lol). going to hirata and seeing so many dead people and finding out later that owl was responsible for it (i spoiled myself lol), i had my blood boiling lmao. I haven't reached him but goddamn i am not ready to fight that bastard lol (i am a literal noob) and knowing in the shura ending that he beheads genichiro (my blorbo i love him lol), bruh i wanna kill him so badly lmao

First of all I'm going to state that I agree with everything stated in this ask, and even for the sole crime against your blorbo he deserves eternal suffering.

I'm also going to use this as a jumping off point for an unstructured rant about Owl (and particularly his crimes against my blorbo, who is definitely not made obvious by my Wolf icon). Also Owl is easily my most hated character in any media I have ever consumed and I genuinely cannot see any real life owls without thinking of him and being filled with a moment of blinding rage. This is not an exaggeration.

Putting this under a read more for mentions of abuse. Vague spoilers as well (assuming those are fine since you've spoiled yourself on some things, but trying to keep it vague to limit it just in case).

Prefacing this by stating that while I'll mostly use this as an excuse to rant about his dynamic with Wolf, I don't want to undersell the atrocity of the attack on Hirata Estate, so I'll dive into the rest of my thoughts after briefly touching on it.

This alone says a lot about him as a character. His ambitions for immortality through the Dragon's Heritage are the only thing of value to him. Everything he does is for this goal, and this night in particular highlights how much he values that and how little he values everyone else. The only thing that matters is what he wants, and he will use whatever methods necessary to achieve it. If the chance of immortality results in the deaths of an unstated amount of innocents, it is worth taking.

Ultimately he failed at his goal of achieving immortality through that, but it still important to note that it is still something he did. Owl likely could've come up with any number of plans that furthered his goal without killing innocents, and actively chose to forge his path on the bodies of others. They were all people who were just... living their lives. They aren't important and we know nothing about their lives, but that highlights the dismissive cruelty of Owl's actions; they are regular people of no importance to anyone in the story, and they were still dragged into this, their lives tossed away to further one man's ambitions.

Owl's only concerns are himself and his goals. Everyone else are simply pawns to be used and discarded. He desires immortality, and will forge it on a pile of corpses if need be.

There's more I can say about that night at Hirata Estate, but I don't know how much of that you've pieced together from spoilers so I'll leave it to be pieced together. But with that covered, I can move onto what I really want to talk about.

Owl is very explicitly an abuser. It is something the game makes very clear, and could only make more clear by saying it word for word (which isn't really how FromSoftware handles storytelling), even before his encounter at Ashina Castle (which only further proves it).

It is something made clear in the intro to the game! From the very start it is made very clear that Owl is someone awful, and even without knowing much about him it is clear that, at the very least, he is not someone you should like or trust.

Owl's treatment of Wolf is an extension of how he views everyone else; a tool for his goals and someone to be disposed of. Even with just the intro as your only knowledge of his character it is something evident.

The Iron Code is very blatantly a method of control Owl uses over Wolf, it is something intended not simply guide him, but to define him. His father's word is absolute, it is the first and most important rule of it, and it is simply a part of your introduction to the game and to both Owl and Wolf as characters. And it is something that defines Wolf, whose life for most of the game has simply been defined as obedience to it.

There's no sugarcoating the fact that Owl only ever sees Wolf as a tool to be wielded by him, and raised him to only ever be a weapon and to only ever see himself as one. This alone showcases that!

I could use this to go more into Wolf's dynamic with Kuro, but I'm going to abstain because that will take this in a different direction than I intend. Simply put, Kuro was one of the first people to see him as a person. It is something alien to him, when he is so used to being treated and seen as a tool by his father, when that treatment has resulted in Wolf holding that view of himself.

And then you encounter Owl at Ashina Castle. While Owl plays a significant role in how Wolf views himself, being his abuser, he has been absent from the game. And now here he is in all of his awful glory.

I feel it is worth noting that Owl is the only story relevant character towering over Wolf. Most of the height differences are relatively minor, but Owl is massive. To me at least (who has spent an unhealthy amount of its free time thinking about Wolf), this alone speaks volumes about their dynamic. Owl is this looming, ever present figure who is to define Wolf's life, and in comparison Wolf is someone insignificant, someone looked down on. Owl only ever looks down at him, because Wolf is someone utterly unimportant when he is not of any use to Owl.

This is also where you find out that Owl faked his own death. It is something so incredibly fucked up to deliberately lead your own son to believe you are dead, so of course it is what Owl does. Because of course his own goals have to include the most fucked up methods of causing the loss of innocent lives and leading your son to think you're dead. He is only ever thinking about himself and will screw over anyone if he believes it has a chance of benefiting him.

His whole encounter at Ashina Castle speaks volumes of how he sees Wolf, where he only ever gives Wolf orders he expects to follow, and when Wolf disobeys - when he chooses the direction of his life instead of simply obeying his abuser - he has the logical reaction of attempting to kill him. Because obviously the logical reaction to your son making a choice that doesn't prioritise you is to attempt to kill him!

I'll leave the pre-fight cutscene and the resurrection and death lines in the fight for you to discover, but suffice it to say they do a great job of showing how awful Owl is (and emphasising, you know, being an abuser). I will also add that his Japanese VA is fucking incredible and does such a good job at making him feel so so awful. Words cannot properly convey how great the line delivery is at emphasising Owl as someone utterly despicable.

Honestly this was somewhat nonsensical so I apologise for using your ask as an excuse to go on an unstructured rant but like I feel obligated to hate on him. I did not mean for this to be over 1000 words, and this isn't even fully covering everything I could say.

[twinstxrs]

boo *exu calamity au’s your bad kids*

[dangoulains-devotion]

yuffie has many interesting elements to her but people refuse to move past "i find energetic kids annoying" and it makes me sad

[animationismycomfort]

when your in love with something so much you start world building/adding disadvantages/advantages for all the characters

ps.

it’s mutant busters

[hazelcephalopod]

So I’ve gotten back into reading TGH and reached chapter uh… I’ll put that later. Anyway here’s the summary—

“They go to Stedding Tsofu to find a Waygate. Waygate is firmly blocked by Machin Shin. Their journey seems for naught. But at least we get more Loial lore, and learn Ogier women just arrange the marriages and tell the men who they are marrying. Mat -full cringe failboy he sometimes(often) is- says human men would never let a woman boss them around like that. Rand mutters about Mat being wrong. Everyone else presumable at least side eyes him. Because he is wrong. Verin is right there telling everyone what to do. Rand remembers the woman’s council bacually betrothing him to Egwene before he knew what was happening. Fun times. They realize they have to use a portal stone to get to Fain. The Ogier happily show them the portal stone nearby -anything is better then the Ways. The boys keep insisting they are not ta’veren or Dragons or Aiel anything like that. Everyone nods and then ignores that and talk about them being ta’veren and how they’ve basically got no choice but to live in their wake. Rand is reminded again he can in fact channel, in fact doing so with little resistance after being asked -possibly s first? He is also unnerved meeting several Aiel women. Because they tried to kill them and also well… damn does he look like them. Aka “The ever increasing eroding of Rand denial copium receives several serious blows in a few days.”

I’m currently mid Ch 37 “What Might Be”, portal stone icon I believe.

Oh! And just for fine to cover it… Also Fain delivered that Horn, Turok was like “you’re probable lies amuse me for now. Perhaps I will give you to the Empress. Let me describe the terribleness of the royal court. Nvm you’re way too eager about that.” And Fain is just internally grinning and steepling his fingers like “ah ha. Yes give me more information. Give me more access to your leaders. You play right into the plans I have made and am making right now. And will make in the future.” Hilarious.

also…

I’ve decided that Hurin is a lil bit of a dipshit simp. Yes he has sniffing powers. And a wife. And children. But he’s a Gilear if you will. Also probably brain mushed by ta’veren a bit. Selene didn’t show up! (Good) Oh and how deeply I am not looking forward to the parts of Mat featuring “a tale of his sad little misogyny even if it often makes him look foolish. Still a bit too cringe” -at least that’s my fear. We shall see.

[chainreh]

wanting to write mygo fanfic vs. wanting to wait for the anime to finish to get a more clear grasp on the angst orz