#I remember the time when piracy was pretty much one of the only ways to watch anime back in the day

[tariah23]

I knew there was gonna be someone jumping on that CR post and going on about how “I’ve done the math and have concluded that $100 isn’t even that bad for an annual service fee-“

[ari-the-arotistic]

So I was thinking about pirates of the Caribbean, and each characters unique moral code and way of approaching life, as one does, when I remembered a particular scene about our beloved James Norrington... the very first scene in which Jack and James meet. Now, as a long time Sparrington shipper, I adore the Sparrington fandoms adopted head canon of Jack's compass pointing directly at Jack when James is holding it as having a romantic connotation too it, but this is Disney we're talking about, and a Disney from 20 years ago at that, so it is of course just a head canon. And while it is a beloved head canon, I will always be a writer before a shipper, and what that scene says about Norrington from a writer's perspective is far too juicy not to share... So buckle up for a very long meta post about who James Norrington is as a person, and how it was set up in this scene(and later reinforced in the second and third movie). This is my first real meta post, and I'm very excited for it, so let's jump right in.

First of all, the compass scene.

As we can clearly see in the image above, since the red line that points to the object of the holder's desires is no where to be seen, its relatively easy to conclude that it's hidden from our view by the sun dial in the middle, and thusly is pointing directly at Jack. Elizabeth is off to James's right, and no one is standing behind Jack, so unless the compass was pointing at something in the far off distance that just so happened to be in Jack's general direction(unlikely) its pretty clear what(or who) the compass is pointing at. For most potc fans, this is fairly standard knowledge. But it's what this fact says about Norrington's character that I'd like to focus on. After all, what does it say about a man that a compass that shows you what you desire most is pointing at a pirate, and the very face of piracy at that, instead of your canonical love interest, when you're a Commodore of the Navy? As stated above, Sparrington shippers often point at this scene as proof that James has a bit of a pash on the ruggedly handsome pirate, or at the very least, a thing for men. But from a writer's perspective, this just simply isn't the case, and not because the writer's in this instance are the notoriously homophobic corporation we call Disney. The reason why this is so unlikely from a writing perspective is because given the context clues, we as an audience are meant to draw the conclusion that this is the first time that they meet(I have heard rumors of them meeting as children in the books, but having never read them, and focusing only on the movies, I'm not including that in this post). And since this is the first time they've met, it's highly unlikely that the compass is pointing at Jack because James has a bit of a thing for him. Even if James has heard of Jack's many exploits, he does not truly know the man behind the legend, so having romantic feelings for the pirate at this point in time just isn't believable. And even if James was a closeted gay/bi man, it's still unlikely that the compass would be pointing at Jack of all the men around the Commodore(of which there is a lot, some of whom he is incredibly close with) seeing as Jack is the poster boy of piracy, and at this point in the movie it's made abundantly clear that James vehemently detests the notion and all who practice it. If James were to be holding the compass in Jack's vicinity in later movies and it still pointed at the pirate, an argument could definitely be made that it was because he had developed feelings for Jack, but for their first meeting, it's just not realistic. So it's much more likely that the reason the compass is pointing at Jack is because of James's desire to send every pirate he meets to "a quick drop and a sudden stop" as he so eloquently put it to a young Elizabeth. This is further reinforced in the third movie when it is revealed that Beckett's desire to have Jack dead at his feet would prevent him from using the compass to find Shipwreck Cove if the pirate was not already at the aforementioned location, or, well, dead. This is again, relatively common knowledge. But like I said before, it's what this fact says about James that is the whole point of this post... and that is that James cares more about his career than anything else, even the woman he claims to love. Now for some, that statement alone might seem like a pretty obvious conclusion, but it's how this scene subtlety sets up this core aspect of Norrington's character before we even truly get to know who he is, and how it's brought to it's full height in the second movie, and the core aspect of his redemption and subsequent death in the third that I'd really like to talk about. Which brings us to the next segment of this post...

How James lost his commission to the navy...

And how he got it back

So let's start off with how James lost his commission... it's a story we all know pretty well, and one he tells to Gibbs in the scene shown above, when he plans to either join Jack's crew or get revenge on the man that(he believes) ruined his life. After Jack's escape in the first movie, James grew obsessed with capturing the pirate, so much so that he foolishly followed the Black Pearl into a hurricane, resulting in the sinking of the Dauntless, and the loss of countless lives that had been aboard the vessel. It's unclear aside from James himself who had been on the ship at the time, and who did or did not survive, but the death toll was heavy, with most, if not everyone who wasn't James, having perished in the storm. While it is not the most extreme example(which we'll get too in just a bit), this is a pretty clear example of James prioritizing his career above everything else, even reason and logic. And all just to capture a singular pirate, even at the cost of his own ship and crew, and rather ironically, the very career that he had been so desperately trying to hold onto in the first place. Which brings us to the next scene I'd like to discuss... James stealing the heart of Davy Jones. This moment is the absolute peak of this part of James's character. This is the moment where James takes his obsessive need for his career to the max. This is the moment where James truly prioritizes his career above everything else, even the woman he claims to love(and for Sparrington shippers, above the man he's reluctantly come to care about). At this point in time, when James decides to take the heart for himself to regain his old station, he's been on the Black Pearl long enough to know the full situation. That Jack is in some kind of trouble with Davy Jones, and that if Jack doesn't use the heart to bargain for his freedom, then the Kraken will hunt Jack, and subsequently the Black Pearl, down until he and everyone aboard are dead. And that includes Elizabeth. And yet, despite knowing that stealing the heart would basically mean sealing Elizabeth's death, he still decided to do so. Sure, the argument could be made that he thought Elizabeth would be able to escape somehow, but the chances of her dying at sea, or some other terrible fate befalling her before she could safely make it back to civilization would have been highly likely. Of course we as an audience know that this isn't the case, but James does not. So essentially, James was so obsessed with his career, and maintaining the image of the honorable Commodore that he didn't even truly register that he was putting Elizabeth, the woman he loves and has been trying so desperately to woo for the past two movies, in danger. And he won't fully realize the consequences of his actions until the third movie, in a deleted scene no less(I swear when I find whoever decided to delete some of the most important scenes to James's character...), when Davy Jones informs Governor Swann of his daughters untimely demise on the Black Pearl. Of course, almost immediately afterwards, Beckett retcons that statement by informing the Governor that Elizabeth was recently seen in Singapore, but for a few minutes, James has to sit with the fact that Elizabeth was dead, and it was his fault. And even after learning that she was in fact still alive, James has now finally come to the realization that if she had still been on the Black Pearl when it sank with its Captain, he would've been the one to send her to her death. And for Sparrington shippers, James has to sit with the unavoidable fact that he was the reason Jack had died(even if the pirate does come back), despite the fact that it was Elizabeth's betrayal that was the final nail in Jack's coffin, since she wouldn't have had to do that if the Kraken wasn't after them in the first place. Which brings us to the final scene I'd like to discuss...

James choosing a side, and paying the price

Now, before we fully delve into this scene, I'd like to take a moment to talk about James's own perception of himself, and his relationship with honor and integrity. From the very first scene in which we meet James Norrington, we are made aware that he has a strong moral compass. He firmly believes piracy is evil, and that all who partake in piracy deserve a swift end. He perceives his Commodore persona as being the paragon of honor and integrity, and the sole arbiter of justice. We can infer from the line "By remembering that I serve others, Sparrow, not just myself" that James does have honorable intentions when ridding the world of pirates, that being protecting the innocent citizens under his care, but as seen once again in the first time James and Jack meet, wherein James adamantly tries to arrest Jack despite the fact the fact that pirate had just saved Elizabeth's life, his actions to achieve that goal are not always quite as honorable as his intentions are. This is especially highlighted once again when James gave Beckett the heart of Davy Jones. James's intentions here were once again rooted in honor and integrity - he believes that the only way to keep people safe from pirates is too return to his old station, to the image of honor and integrity he had built around the title of Commodore, and the only way to return to his old station is to give Beckett the heart. But the action itself was far from honorable, seeing as James had to betray the woman he loved just to obtain the heart, and that he was now putting it into the hands of a dangerously unstable individual who planned on using it to commit mass genocide.

And now, we finally get to the scene above... Of course, it's made clear throughout his scenes in the third movie leading up to this one that James is already starting to regret giving Beckett the heart after seeing the damage being caused, but since Beckett is targeting pirates specifically(although we as an audience know that Beckett's definition of pirate is very loose) James figures that the ends justify the means, as he often does in situations regarding piracy. It is not until his reunion with Elizabeth, where he learns that Governor Swann is dead, and that Beckett lied to him about the Governor's whereabouts, that James truly realizes the enormity of his mistake. It is in this moment that James has a sudden realization that fundamentally shakes him to his core, and is the reason behind his change of heart later on. He realizes that the honorable Commodore persona that he had tried to cultivate and keep a hold of for so long had never been truly honorable at all, and that by giving Beckett the heart of Davy Jones, he had effectively tied the noose around the neck of his own honor and integrity, as well as the necks of hundreds, if not thousands of innocent people, with his own hands. And as that one vine goes, this was the moment James knew, he fucked up. Which leads to his decision to change sides in an attempt to redeem himself, and his subsequent death in the process. Of course, part of James's reason for helping Elizabeth escape was that he does care for her, but given everything I've detailed about him so far, I think it's safe to say the main reason that James decided to help Elizabeth and her crew was because he wanted to undo the damage he had done, and he had faith that Elizabeth, Will, and Jack would have some sort of plan to defeat Beckett, and stop any further damage to come from his mistake. And now, for his death scene itself... As much as I love the idea of James surviving and joining the pirates(whether at Elizabeth's side or Jack's is unimportant), I firmly believe that his death was a necessary end of this part of his character arc, and that if he were to survive he would still have to go through a major ego death for this part of his character arc to end properly. Because as Bill turner drives that wooden pike into James's gut, it's not just the physical death of his body, but also the metaphorical death of Admiral James Norrington, and the ideals that James had used to build the persona out of. So even if James survived, the Admiral would still have to meet his metaphorical end, thusly causing James to lose a core part of himself that had been guiding most his decisions so far, in the process, which would start the next part of his character arc, where he would have to deal with the loss of a key part of his personality, and rebuild himself from the ground up to finally, truly become the image of honor and integrity he had envisioned from the beginning.

And that concludes this very long post. I could probably wax enough poetics about this aspect of James's character to write a short novel, but I've said everything important to this post, and if I go on any longer, I'm likely to start repeating myself lol. Thank you for reading, and feel free to share your thoughts in the comments or a reblog! I will always love hearing more about our polished peacock <3

[campaignskyjacks]

The more I think about piracy, the more I believe it is the most structurally sound work situation under capitalism.

Every pirate ship was a worker owned company. If you were part of the crew, you were a literal shareholder. You got paid at least one share out of whatever venture you were involved with, and you got to vote on what the ship would do and who would be captain. That's already a pretty ideal situation, but it gets better.

The Captain is paid a double share as the position was seen as difficult and important work. But that is only twice as much as your general crew. Compare that to today's CEO and it's laughable how much more reasonable it is. It goes even further than that though.

The Captain is likely actually working way more than the rest of the crew. Most pirate ships were heavily overstaffed. The general strategy was you would catch up to a prize, board their ship and have like 200 guys. Merchant ships were staffed by capitalists, so they favored lean staffing. They wanted to pay as little wage as possible to maximize profit on the cargo they were transporting. A ship that would be comfortably staffed by 40 was probably being run by 25 to 30. Pirate ships would have way more people, so if they caught up to you there would be absolutely no way you could fight them off.

All of that means pirates didn't actually have to work that hard¹. There were way more people than actual things to do on a pirate ship. Even considering the fact that there is alot to do to keep a ship running, it's diffused over so many people that you really have a lot of down time as a crew. People like the Capitain, the quartermaster, the navigator, the doctor, or the cook all got somewhere between 1.2-2 shares, but they are working so much more than the average buckaneer.

I know some of you must be thinking "well that sounds very nice but the job gets pretty ugly when you're raiding." And the answer there is sort of. Pirates most certainly engaged in some pretty unsavory work and as crew you would be on the front lines of a lot of that. However situations where crew were actually getting in fights and putting their lives in the line were not the norm. A lot of the time pirates were hitting merchant ships, which once again were really understaffed. These people aren't crazy these people are hired to do a job so they're not going to throw their lives away over a couple dozen barrels of coffee or spice. Most of the time a pirate ship would catch up with a merchant ship, raise black flags, and and the captains of each ship would negotiate a surrender. Most of the time pirates were not requesting all of the cargo because the ideal situation is being able to hit the same ship over and over. You want to skim enough cargo that whoever commissioned the merchant ship isn't going to gripe too much about cargo being lost and complain to the navy. That way your crew can have a steady stream of whatever goods coming through to keep your vessel afloat. So most pirate merchant relationships were pretty transactional. The pirates would show up the merchants would give up abortion of their goods and everybody would go on their way.

Which means most of the time your average crew didn't have to do shit!

Pirates also had benefits. Remember when I mentioned you were going to be paid out "at least" one share? Well, if you lost a limb or something in the line of duty you would be afforded bonus shares to compensate the loss. They had entire systems of calculating disability compensation based on what injuries could be expected and how they saw it affecting your life. So if something bad did happen, you'd have pay to cover it.

It gets even better than this. The name "buckaneer" comes from "barbacoa" which was a type of mobile grill that was popular aboard ships². The folks who sailed were so commonly associated with these grills that people created a nickname for the profession based on the grills they used all the time. You'd see a privateer or a pirate at Port Royal and go "oh look, it's one of those guys who barbecues all the time."

Also, they were fucking queer. You've probably already heard that the term "matey" was a form of piratical gay marriage. If you designated someone else on the crew as your mate, if you died your share would go to them. I have to acknowledge that there is a slight chance that this isn't a 100% gay practice, there are conceivably reasons that someone might identify another person as their mate that doesn't have to do with romance or sex. Not a lot of pirates were literate and not many of them kept records of day-to-day life that really survived for historians to document. We can guess but in most circumstances we don't know for sure. But come on, grow the fuck up. These seadogs were banging.

Piracy and the type of sailing adjacent to piracy was a way for a person to make a life for themselves very far away from most of European society. And because of the way gender roles existed at the time, it's pretty much only men hanging out with men. If you happen to have desires that are unpopular at that time which involve other men, this is a pretty good situation for you.

So yeah piracy is a worker owned endeavor with reasonable compensation for management, benefits, frequent barbecues, and plenty of downtime to have all the queer sex you want.

It's one one those things that only exists because of capitalism, but as a response and a rebuke to it. These were endeavors that were so much more reasonable and fair then the legitimate businesses operating at the time.

And yes there were horrors. There was fighting and killing, torture, and worse. That is what the capitalists and colonizers would like us to remember. These things did really happen. However part of that was an effort to preserve and defend this better life people had made for themselves. To keep it alive inspire of the corporations and nations who would exploit or destroy their way of life.

So yeah, there was a lot about piracy that was violent and fucked up. But the truly wild thing is that it probably made more sense for the people involved then whatever you do right now. The next time you get bummed about your job or place in the world remember that piracy makes more sense.

Then go eat some barbecue and have queer sex.

¹This means in OFMD when Izzy was being a little piss baby about the Stede's crew not working hard enough he was 1000% wrong that's how the vast majority of pirates live their lives.

²Worth mentioning that these grills were originally used by native people, so this cool thing was adopted/appropriated by sailors. It did not originate with them.

[wordy-little-witch]

Dropping random One Piece ideas bc this is it now. This is how I cope.

Buggy focused bc I love this little blue haired buffoon

Buggy

• AuDHD

• BPD

• gender is a performance and he LOVES THE SPOTLIGHT BABYYYY

• Buggy is actually a year or so younger than Shanks, and they both use this as an insult point for arguments. Buggy calls him old man, Shanks calls him a teeny tiny little clown baby, Buggy punches Shanks, Shanks cries dramatically, the works.

• in my perception between them, their relationship could go either way - I love the interpretation of them seeing one another as brothers, I love the interpretation of them being lovers, I think either one fits them and it's precious and depending on the Shuggy flavor of the day. It's never both at the same time though. One or the other.

• Buggy has always been terrifyingly flexible. It was waved off when he was very little, but it was only around the time Crocus joined the crew that he noticed Buggy was much more flexible than most kids his age. Turns out baby blue has hypermobility syndrome. The Roger pirates helped him learn wrapping techniques to help stabilize his wrists and knees and hips, his biggest problem areas, but after the Devil Fruit Fiasco, he can and will just drop a limb. Floating is so much easier on bad pain days.

• Buggy still wraps and braces his body when he can, but he also hides most of them beneath his clothes. Few have seen him freely in braces. Cabaji and Mohji are the most familiar with that. Ritchie takes his role thereof as a living, furry weighted heating pad.

• kinesthetic and visual stimming Buggy my beloved.

• sometimes he's just. Touch Alvida. Not in a weird way, just... her Devil Fruit makes her skin and hair feel absolutely DIVINE and he can spend hours just. Playing with her fingers or brushing her hair. He's embarrassed by it.

• he has a very meticulous skin and hair care routine. It's one of very few routines he keeps to. Not even being in prison stopped it.

• he's actually really damn good with money and running a business. The situation with the Cross Guild was a Bad Time, Bad Place, Bad Luck situation, which is honestly just his brand at this point.

• He was a warlord for all of a few months, but in that time, he did, in fact, have to attend a few meetings, and he did, in fact, make a friend! A friend nobody ever expected.

• Boa Hancock and Buggy are the most underrated Mean Girls Squad ever and I'll die on that hill, I think they'd be so funny as friends. Ask me more on my Boa Buggy Besties ideas please I am begging I love them so much

• Cross Guild happens, and it goes fairly similar to Canon, but Buggy quite literally within that three week time frame got the entirety of his loan back AND the interest and was like "hey so like. Did you still want this or-?"

• the mercenaries at Karai Bari are all very progressive. Buggy is a lax ruler, by most standards, but he puts his foot down firmly regarding bigotry, racism, sexism, etc.

• Buggy is not actually human, but he doesn't know that. He was orphaned at a VERY early age, was adopted by Roger pretty young, and he doesn't really remember much pre-piracy. He does know his genetics are a little weird, #ThanksCrocus, but not much beyond that. This may be Important later on if anyone wants some silly little concepts

• demisexual nblm, but once he catches feelings, he becomes a harlot harlequin

• once took off a limb and forgot where he left it. Has genuinely devoted microchipping his limbs.

• some people have comfort activities like hiking or painting. He makes bombs. It's very soothing and he likes the BOOM

• has a multitude of explosives btw; everything from large range, highly damaging, lethal weapons, to flashy, mildly inconveniences. He once made a batch of mini muggy balls full of itching powder just to see if he could and now it's his favorite thing to prank people with. ((Yes, he designed those while a Warlord. Yes, he tested it on the Navy. No, he was never definitively caught.))

• when he's busy, he ties his hair in a bun and puts pens, pins, etc in his hair, ends up looking like a porcupine or sea urchin.

• he has a really bad habit of hyperfixating for hours upon hours on end. Galdino, Alvida, Mohji and Cabaji have a rotation system to check on him if he hasn't been seen for 5 or more hours. They'll drag him away from his work (some more gently than others), make him eat, drink, etc. ((Alvida huffs and puffs about it, but she's also among the first ones to wipe a grease smear from his face, look him over head to toe and determine whether she's pulling the Girls Night card. She will die before admitting that she adores this bastard.))

• Buggy is allergic to pineapples.

That's all I got rn okay ily byyyeeee

[dragon-kazansky]

Spirit of the sea

Izzy Hands x Reader (GN)

You were a member of Blackbeard's crew long ago. Then you became a ghost story. Izzy Hands only sees you in his dreams these days, until he sees you for real when investigating Stede Bonnet. This sets him on a rollercoaster of emotions between you and what his captain is doing.

{Masterlist}

{Previous Chapter} - {Next Chapter}

Warnings: Swearing. Izzy likes to swear. Buttons is naked. Also I'm pretty sure Izzy makes heart eyes at you without me actually typing out heart eyes.

Chapter Eight - Captain Hands

♡♡♡

The English came aboard the ship and promptly captured every pirate onboard. They cornered some of the crew and tied them up. A naked Buttons runs past you at one point, everything hanging out. You try to blink the image away.

One of the sailors grabs you from behind and takes your hands behind your back. You're then pushed down to the deck, face against the wood.

Edward and Stede are next to each other, looking at one another.

One by one everyone is taking in for questioning. It's only here you learn that this was about the murder of Badminton. You had totally forgotten about that guy.

This was his twin brother.

You're taken back outside with the rest of the crew and left to sit there. It's only then that you realise who else is here. Someone you thought you wouldnt see again.

"Izzy," you whisper, looking at him.

He's looking right at you.

It feels like all the air has been sucked out if your lungs. You've forgotten how to breathe. You don't even realise a tear has formed until it trails down your cheek. It splashes on the deck below, silent and unnoticed by anyone. Anyone except Izzy.

You turn your eyes away from.

Apparently Stede confessed to killing Nigel Badminton. His punishment was death by firing squad. At least it would be quick, you supposed.

Izzy was watching mostly you as Stede and Blackbeard were being given their sentences. He has missed you.

"In the name of His Majesty King George, this tribunal shall come to order. Edward Teach, or Black Beard."

"It's just Blackbeard. Like, just run it together as one word. 'Blackbeard'. Don't have to put a gap in there." Ed spirals on.

"You face death for general crimes of Piracy against the Crown."

"Yeah." Edward agrees.

"But a friend of the Crown has prevailed upon me to remand you to his custody. You shall be released to Captain Hands in exchange for his service to the King."

You turn slowly to see Izzy give Ed a little wave. Oh, now you get it. Izzy had made a deal with these bastards for Edward's protection.

While the crew of the Revenge boo Izzy, you try and find a way to control your breathing.

"Stede Bonnet. For the wanton murder of Nigel Badminton... your sentence is death by firing squad."

"We'll find a way out of this, OK?" Ed says to him.

"Ed, no. I deserve this. At some point in a man's life, he has to face the music." Stede speaks calmly.

Except, when he's up there with his blindfold on, he's screaming about much he doesn't want to die.

You had been cut free and permitted to stand with Blackbeard. One of Izzy's other demands was that you were safe.

You watch Stede with a sad expression.

"Edward... I know you're upset, but it was the only..." Izzy tried to explain himself, but Ed turns and punches Izzy hard. Izzy falls to the deck harshly. At any other time you would help him up, but not today.

The crew applaud what they just saw.

"Oh... that's fair." Izzy grunts as he stands up and brushes his hair back again. "Remember, though. You said when you made me first mate, 'Above all else is loyalty to your Captain.'"

"Rifles at the ready!" Chauncey orders.

"You're my captain, and I was never gonna stand by and let you destroy yourself for that... twat. And this, this is a humane way of ending it."

"Aim!"

"It's quick. It's clean. Edward you KNOW that." Izzy is basically pleading with him.

"Act of Grace!" Blackbeard calls out.

"No... No."

"Act of Grace!" Edward stands in front of Stede. Izzy looks defeated. "Act of Grace!"

The crew shout for Stede to say it too. "Say it! Act of Grace!"

"What he said!" Stede calls out.

Edward removes the blindfold from Stede.

"Fuck me," Chauncey mutters.

Edward explains the Act of Grace to Stede.

"So, you want to go to war for the King?" Chauncey asks them.

"We'd rather eat our own faces, but, yes." Edward replies to him.

"Two acts of Grace, please." Stede pleads.

"Ah. I'm afraid the offer doesn't extend to you, Bonnet. After, the King was only referring to real pirates. He turns to Edward, "He's from my world, not yours."

"Raise your rifles!"

"June 3rd. An excellent day!" Lucius stands up with Stede's diary in his hands, reading from it. "Raided a commercial vessel after overwhelming the hardy crew. We claimed a prize of lush vegetation in conquest." Lucius turns around to show a drawing of the plant.

Oluwande holds the plant up. "And here's the vegetation in question."

"They'll never forget the Eccentric Pirate Bonnet and his savage, insane, vengeful pirate horde." Lucius closes the book. "See? He's a pirate. a real, proper pirate."

"That man is a fearsome pirate if e'er I seen one." Buttons joins in.

The rest of the crew begin to agree. Stede looks proudly at them.

"Well, rule-of-law-wise, I'd say that settle it." One of the Navy officers says.

"A plant and a drawing?" Chauncey asks. "Settles nothing."

"It's enough for us. Blackbeard renounces piracy to serve the Crown? We'll be dining with Ol' King George himself."

"Why?" Chauncey asks the crew. "Why do you all show such loyalty to this... this... nothing?"

"I'd attribute quite a lot of it to a people-positive management style," Stede says.

Chauncey draws his sword. "Shut up!"

"Stand down, Admiral." He is warned. "Or will be forced to use measures."

"Measures? Against me?! He's the criminal!" Chauncey says, waving his sword about at Stede. "He's the murderer!"

"All right! Calm down, Mr Wavy Blade." Says Stede. "Chauncey! Sometimes, when we get a bit angry, do you know what we like to do? We talk it through."

"As a crew!" The others join in.

You smile from where you stand. Izzy notices.

"Oh, I know. I know what's happened. Yeah, we've somehow drifted south of the equator, and ended up in Backwardsland!"

Chauncey is promptly restrained.

You laugh softly. Izzy can't seem to keep his eyes off of you.

♡♡♡

Edward and Stede are taken into the captain's quarter to sign the contract for the Act of Grace. Izzy is in there with them.

You're sat on deck looking out at the sea.

It isn't long until the Navy retreat, taking Stede and Edward with them. You watch them go. Edward looks at you before leaving the ship.

That's how you know Izzy is standing behind you. You refuse to look at him.

Stede and Edward have gone.

Izzy opens his mouth to speak, but you're already pushing past him to walk away. He calls your name but you don't stop. He sighs as he watches you go.

♡♡♡

While Izzy sets things his way on the Revenge, by getting the crew in order and showing his leadership, you sulk down in his old cabin.

Since he's captain now, he won't want this old room back. You curl up on his bed and hide your face in the crook of your arms. It has been a long day.

You're not sure how much time has passed, but eventually your solitude is interrupted.

"Thought I might find you here."

You don't look up. You don't move an inch.

"You not gonna look at me?"

You remain still.

You hear Izzy sigh and he walks across the small cabin toward the desk. You hear him put something down, the item hiding gently against the wood. You can tell from the light rustling sound that he stands there for a moment before leaving again.

You look up once you're sure he's gone. Your eyes are drawn to the desk. Sitting there, just as you remembered it, was the wooden sparrow you whittled for Izzy.

Another tear escapes your eye.

♡♡♡

Izzy works the crew hard, all while not lifting a finger for himself. He throws round orders and makes sure every man onboard does his job. He states he's tough, but he's also fair

The crew still hate him.

They don't hate you, however.

Lucius finds you sulking away. He was sent to grab something for Izzy, but he decided today least check in on you.

"Dizzy Izzy confining you?" He asks, half joking.

You look up at him and sigh through your nose.

"What's he doing?" You ask.

"Ordering is around."

"Course he is."

Lucius frowns as he looks at you. "Thought you might be glad he was back, despite literally everything else."

"Would be had he not sold us out to the Navy and pushed Ed enough to go serve the King."

"He sucks, for the record."

"Yeah. He's a dick."

Lucius and you share a smile. The moment is only broken by the yell of "SPRIGGS." Lucius bolts out of the cabin to reach Izzy before he gets mad.

You return to sulking.

♡♡♡

As evening draws in and the crew go about their business, you come up to deck for some air. You hold the wooden sparrow in your hand as you rest against the railing of the ship. The breeze is a bit chilly tonight, but you don't mind it much.

You've become aware of when he's nearby. It's like you have a sixth sense for Izzy Hands.

"You'll catch a chill up here."

You do nothing but hum quietly in response, turning the sparrow around in your hand carefully.

"At least talk to me."

You keep twirling the sparrow.

Izzy shifts his weight to one leg as he stares at you. You can't see the pleading look in his eyes, at how desperate he is get you to look at him.

"I did this for us, you know. Edward was never supposed to do what he did. He wasn't even supposed to be on the ship... Jack was meant to take you and Edward with him."

"You sent Calico fucking Jack to get us?" You ask, hissing the question out. You still refuse to look at him.

Happy that you're at least talking to him, Izzy goes on.

"I wanted you safe. Safe with me. We could have had Blackbeard back. We could have been a crew again. No more Bonnet. No more ghosts. Just us and the sea."

You inhale sharply. Izzy realises in that moment that you're upset. He wants so desperately to reach out and hold you.

"Safe? No one is ever safe, Izzy."

You drop the sparrow and it falls down into the waves below. You grip the railing of the ship, knuckles turning white as you lean against it.

"I should have stayed dead. Maybe none of this would have happened," you say softly.

"Don't say that. Don't ever fucking say that." Izzy takes a step forward.

"You left me, Izzy!" You turn sharply and glare at him. "You bastard! You left me behind over some stupid fucking duel and then sold us out!"

You lunge forward and smack Izzy across the chest. He tries to block your attacks, but not with much effort. Izzy wants you to let your anger out on him.

"You bastard! You fucking idiot! Why? Why do any of it? Why did you leave me?" You cry out.

"What choice did I have?" He asks, still blocking your attacks.

"You could have stayed! We could worked something out! Anything. We could have done anything! At least we would have done it together."

"I offered you to come with me," he says softly.

"No!" You yell. You stop hitting him and glare at him. "We belong out at sea. That's our home. We made a promise once, do you remember? A promise to stick together and explore the world. Well, fuck that promise I guess!"

He says your name softly.

"No, Izzy. You betrayed me twice. You left me and then sold us out. How can I ever forgive you?"

He falls silent as he looks at you.

You push past him and walk away again. Izzy is left standing there, looking at the sea.

♡♡♡

Izzy wasn't ready to give up on you. Not now. Not ever.

He waited an hour or so before coming down to the cabin. His old cabin. It warmed his heart to discover you had taken it as your own. He knew you missed him just as much as he missed you.

"Leave me alone," you mumble.

"No."

You sigh as you sit up on the bed. "What do you want from me? Want me to scrub the deck? Shine your boots? Worship you?"

Izzy frowns. "No. None of that."

"Then what?"

"I want... I want us to talk it through."

You look at him silently, and then start to chuckle softly. "Talk it through? Now you want to talk it through. What? Like a crew?"

"Like friends."

"Oh, so we're still friends are we?" You scoff.

"Never stopped, at least on my end."

"Well it did on mine."

Izzy stands there staring at you. His eyes are soft and there is something about this posture that feels wrong. Not in a sense that he would do something to you, but like something that doesn't belong there. He's standing wrong.

"What is it, Izzy?"

"I fucking missed you, ya know."

"Did you?" You ask flatly.

"Yeah, I did."

You take a deep breath and calm your mind. You let most of your anger put on him up on deck, so the least you can do is be civil. Your choices were limited.

"I'm sorry about the sparrow. I, uh, I appreciate that you took it with you."

Izzy almost smiles. "Couldn't leave it behind."

"I'll have to make you a new one."

"Only if you forgive me."

"Maybe not then," you sigh.

"Do you hate me?" He asks.

There's a few moments of silence that pass that make him believe that the answer is probably yes. You have every reason to, he supposes. He left. Then Edward, for a moment.

You have every right to be upset.

"No."

Izzy finds his whole body relaxing from that word alone. Relief floods his heart and his lips actually do curl into a gentle smile for once.

"Good. Pretty sure the crew do, but I can live with that. I can't live with you hating me, though."

You meets his eyes and suddenly feel lighter. You never thought a simple gaze could take away so much heartache and pain.

"Pretty sure they're planning a mutiny. They tried once with Stede."

"Fuck."

"You are a bit of a dick, though, Izzy."

He looks at you with a faux sense of betrayal in his eyes. You chuckle softly, but know that the crew would most likely throw him off the ship.

"I'll see what I can do."

Izzy smiles gratefully before leaving. He has said his peace and for now that's enough. He bids you goodnight as he goes.

"Goodnight, Izzy."

♡♡♡

Yeah, the next morning the crew planned a mutiny. Izzy was promptly tied up.

"You said you'd see what you could do." Izzy looks at you, fire beginning to burn in his eyes. He kind of felt betrayed.

"Yeah, I tried. I talked to them for hours. They are adamant on throwing you off this ship." You tell him, looking at him firmly.

"You're just going to let them?"

You keep your eyes on him. "Yeah."

"If this is about leaving you-"

"Izzy, no, no. It's not like that." You raise your hands. Izzy furrows his brows. There's rope around your wrists.

"What?" He asks softly.

"I said, if they wanted to throw you overboard, they would have to throw me too. Or I'd kill them all in their sleep."

Izzy states at you.

You give a smile

"You...? You told them to banish you too?"

"Yeah. Either you stay, or we both go together."

Izzy is at a loss for words.

The crew come over and picked him up. He pleads with them to change their minds. He will listen and make changes. He will do what they wanted him to.

He wanted to stay on this ship with you. You shouldn't banish yourself for him. He had no idea you would go so far.

Did this mean you had forgiven him?

He looks at you, head bent as far back as it could go to look at you. You stand there and smile at him. God, why are you smiling? You can't be this happy to be mutinied with him.

"One!" The crew start to count.

"No! No! No!" Izzy pleads.

"Two!"

Izzy looks back at you again.

"Three!" "Hold it!" Pete stops them.

Everyone turns to find Blackbeard unexpectedly climbing onboard the ship. You stare at him confused.

"Izzy... I'll take tea in my room." Ed says, walking past everyone.

Everyone just stares.

Izzy is put down.

"What happened to his beard?" Roach asks.

You turn back around to Izzy and bring his attention to you as you work on undoing his restaints. He stares at you as you do so. You look at him and then back at his hands. Once his hands are free he reaches out and gently holds yours.

"You were really gonna do it?" He asks.

"Yeah," you say softly. "I was gonna do it."

Izzy really wanted to kiss you.

"Why?"

"For the same reason Edward protected Stede."

Izzy looks confused.

"Forget it."

All Izzy Hands can do is look at you. He untied your wrists and Olu sees to it both of your feet are intied too.

Izzy's heart was racing.

He wondered, did you mean what he thought you meant?

♡♡♡

@grippleback-galaxy - @askmarinaandothers - @godlikegallagher - @for-fuck-sake-im-alive - @whiskeyswriting - @lxsm2 - @bloody-bunni666 - @the-chocoholic-writer - @bugbugboy - @callmemana -

[snippychicke]

Cats & Ships Chapter Three

Title: Cats & Ships

Overall Rating: Teen for now? May go into mature at a future date

Trigger warnings: Nothing beyond what's in the live-action series. I mean, Kuro's still manipulative and paranoid. It gets better tho? Slowly?

Pairings: Captain Kuro (Klahadore)/Reader; hints of Kaya/Usopp

Summary: It started out as a means to get information as Khaladore. Who would be better to provide information regarding the high seas than Syrup Village’s Harbormaster? Except, for the first time in a very long time, Kuro found himself trusting, and even liking, the young woman he shared tea with every week. 

And then the Straw Hat Pirates arrived and ruined his plans. Except fate decided his story wasn’t done there. 

Nor was yours.

Masterlist here! | Read on Ao3!

Returning to piracy was inevitable, as much as Kuro disliked it. He hated the fact that living in relative luxury and peace was at odds with his more… violent tendencies and that occasional thirst for blood. 

Which had meant finding Jango and Bezen Black (which wasn't hard. He just had to find the most popular dance hall in the East Blue and there was his First Mate), and then rebuild a crew. 

The new crew were as incompetent as his old ones, barely able to follow direction and often trying to improvise instead of sticking to the plan. But after making a few examples of those who crossed them, they had mostly fallen in line. 

Kuro couldn’t trust them -- but he couldn't trust anyone, not even Jango. Gone were the moments he could relax and not worry about finding a knife suddenly in his back, or poison in his drink. 

He had to be on guard. Always. Show no mercy, not a hint of weakness. 

The raiding of a passenger ship between his old haunting grounds of Syrup village and Shell Town  was supposed to be routine. Smash, grab, disappear before any of the marine vessels could answer the distress call. (So far no one had seemed to take his victims seriously when they claimed to be attacked by the Black Cat Pirates, but it was only a matter of time. Soon he would have a bounty on his head and an even larger target on his back.)

But of course, things had to go sideways. But in a way he had not anticipated. And that was when a small black streak shot across the deck towards the huddled group of passengers, snarling and hissing as it launched itself at one of his crew.  

Except a well timed kick sent the beast flying. Kuro's eye twitched when he realized the creature was a black and white cat, but it was the scream that followed that made Kuro pause his descent into the hull. 

“Kuro!” 

He knew that voice. He turned in time to see you try to lunge for the cat, only to be kneed in the chest by the same man who had punted the cat across the deck. 

"What did you just call that fleabag?" The man laughed, which was echoed by the rest of the crew in charge of keeping an eye on the passengers. "Did you really name your cat after the pirate captain? Well, my pretty little bird, it's your lucky day." 

Kuro took a breath. He should ignore it and continue on. Nevermind you or his namesake, or the sudden pang beneath his ribs as he remembered the time he had spent with you over the years. Or how fond he had grown of the one-eyed cat that unknowingly carried his name. 

Yet for some reason, he couldn't. The captain growled to himself as he turned and strode quickly to where the cat was climbing to its feet, obviously not used to the sway of a ship on open water. Or at least, Kuro… hoped. He hoped that was the cause of the cats shakiness and not something else. 

Picking a cat up with his Cat Claws would be impossible, making Kuro hesitate for a moment. Yet as soon as the cat recognized the towering figure, he was quickly climbing up the pirate's pant leg with plaintive whine. 

Soon, his namesake was settled in the nook of one of his arms, acting as if he hadn't just been treated like a ball. 

Which left you. Kuro turned to see you curled in a ball against the deck, shielding yourself from the boots of the pirates. His anger took control before he could think. 

Within a second he was behind the man who started it. The five blades of one Cat Claw easily slide into the man's back, ending the laughter with a choked breath. 

Silence quickly fell just as fast as the dead body hit the deck.

"We're not here to torture the passengers," Kuro stated coldly to the others, pushing his glasses back up as he glared down at the corpse. "Follow the plan, or the next person to step out of line will answer to me as well." 

"Sir, yes sir!" They shouted before scattering. Kuro waited until they were gone before glancing towards you. You were still half-laying on the deck, your eyes wide and full of tears, hair a mess…

But it was the blood smeared across your face and arms that made his temper flare even more. A busted lip, abrasions marring your skin…

"On your feet," he commanded, though far softer than if you had been anyone else. 

There was no doubt that you recognized him, not with the mixed expression on your face. Relief. Hope. Anger. Hurt. 

Which meant you knew. Knew everything. He couldn't trust you either. Not any more. 

You opened your mouth a few times, almost as if to say something before giving up and silently standing, wavering slightly. He wasn’t sure if you were shaky due to the abuse you had sustained, or the fact the seas were somewhat choppy today. Either way, he allowed you a moment to gain your balance before he turned back towards his ship.

 "Follow me." He stated and was able to hear your unsteady steps as you complied without argument  and followed him over the gangway plank that bridged the ships. 

He paused for a moment when you hesitated at the edge, shooting you a glance over his shoulder. It was all the warning you needed as you quickly stepped up on the narrow plank that served as a bridge.   

Despite being more than a few feet in front of you. Kuro could here your faint whimpers as you slowly crossed, and recalled you weren't fond of heights. 

Which, now that he had a moment to think, he had to wonder what in the blue seas were you doing out here? So far away from Syrup village? From the harbor you so dearly loved? You had never expressed the slightest interest to leave before, so what could compel you to do so? 

He led you to his quarters, and carefully allowed Kuro-the-cat to jump down on the swinging bed before removing the Cats Claws. "Please, close the door,” he stated when he heard you linger at the door. “I don't think we want Kuro trying to explore the rest of the ship." 

You closed the door, though you didn't move a step from it. "Is…Is he okay?" you finally spoke. 

Kuro smiled faintly to himself as he ran his bare hands along the cat in question, the cat purring happily with no flinching as he felt his ribs and legs. "He's fine. Cats have nine-lives, after all." 

Once he was satisfied the cat wasn't injured, he finally turned towards you. You quickly looked away, your face flushed as you hugged your arms to yourself, obviously terrified. 

He could hardly blame you, he could only imagine what was going on in your mind. How much of the truth did Kaya tell the village? Or did she just give a small hint and the rumor mill cause the story to develop in unexpected ways. 

Regardless, seeing you covered in blood unsettled him in ways he rather not admit. Kuro moved silently as he grabbed a clean cloth before dipping it in the wash basin, wetting it slightly before approaching you. 

"Now, are you okay?" He spoke as a warning before cupping your face, though you still jumped. His grip was gentle as he guided you to look towards him, carefully wiping the blood away. 

Honestly, they were minor injuries but still made his blood boil. 

(If only he could kill the idiot again. He should have taken his time. He wasn’t usually a fan of torture, but he could’ve made an exception.)

"Khala--" you cut off as his eyes met yours, and he arched an eyebrow, curious. "...Captain Kuro," you finished, as if acknowledging the elephant in the room.

Kuro's smile widened slightly, becoming cat-like as he stated your name in return before asking the question still bothering him. "What are you doing so far from home?" 

Your expression melted into grief unexpectedly before you pulled away from him. "Finding a new one." 

He pushed away the feeling caused by you stepping back and wadded up the bloodied cloth instead.“Did you finally realize you deserved better than that squalor of a village?” he asked as he tossed the cloth in a basket of other dirtied clothes.  

You scoffed, your gaze taking on a hard edge. “Hardly. More like I was no longer welcomed. After all, no one would trust a harbormaster who had been friends with a devious lying pirate.”

Kuro nodded his head slightly, not particularly insulted; that did make sense, he supposed. He hadn’t really given thought about the fallout of that night, other than the chances of the marines realizing that he still lived. 

He could easily see the villagers turning on you, the seeds of distrust quickly taking root and threatening to bloom into chaos. 

“My apologies,” he stated after a moment as he turned to check on his namesake, who had hopped up on the shelving holding items he had collected over the years. “Nothing went according to my plans, it seems.”

“Your plans? Your plans?” He turned back to see fire in your eyes as you glared at him. “For fucks’ sake, Klahadore-Kuro-whatever your name is, I had once admired you for your ingenuity and always being one step ahead, pirate or not. But mother sea, I had never realized you to be such an idiot!”

“Excuse me?” He felt an eye twitch in annoyance, irritation quickly simmering. Him? An idiot? The great Kuro of a thousand plans? Who were you to say such a thing? A tiny little harbormaster that had perhaps one of the quietest ports in all of the East Blue? 

“Why the hell did you think you needed to kill Kaya to get what you want?” You snarled, either not recognizing the signs of anger, or foolishly ignoring them. “She said it herself, she would have happily given you whatever you wanted! You were fucking family to her! Hell, now she's left the manor and the rest of the estate to the village so she can go off and become a doctor! Were you so blinded by greed to not see how much we--she-- cared for you?” 

Kuro hesitated, digesting your words and the implications. Could it have been that easy? Would Kaya have agreed to such a thing? And what did you mean the girl had left the village as well? A doctor? Why would she give up a life of luxury to be a doctor of all things? 

“It never crossed your mind, did it?” you continued after the silence lingered a few more moments. “You lived with us for three years, took care of the girl with such devotion… And you were so heartless that you never paused to think that maybe could be the path to your goal.” 

“You’ll get nowhere if you expect your goals to be handed to you on a silver platter," he argued sharply, stalking back towards you. "It’s best to take them, by force.” 

To emphasize his point, he grabbed your neck roughly, just below your chin to make you look up at him. He could feel your pulse bounding against his bare fingers, your eyes widening in fear.

 It would be so easy to twist your neck. Or squeeze his hand until you couldn’t breathe and he could watch the life fade slowly from your eyes. 

Except the longer he watched you, the more the bloodlust faded and something akin to regret took its place, causing his grip lightened. You… you had been one of the rare ones. 

One of the few he had trusted. The only one he had trusted in recent memory. 

“Are you going to kill me?” you spoke after a long moment, snapping him out of his thoughts. There was a cold darkness that seemed wrong in your eyes.  “Had that been part of your plan as well?”

No. It hadn’t. He had expected the arrangement with you to continue after Kaya’s ‘unfortunate’ death, until he tired of playing Klahadore and could no longer ignore the need for violence that was constantly itching in the back of his mind.

Hell, he could at least admit that he had entertained the thoughts of seeing if he could progress his relationship with you more than once. There was no denying he found you attractive, both physically as well as intellectually. 

He… had liked  you. 

He still liked you. 

Kuro’s hands traced down the line of your neck, watching the vein in your neck quiver as your heart raced. Your skin darkened with a blush, starting in the swell of your cheeks and quickly spreading. He always loved seeing you blush. 

If only you didn’t look so scared. As if you expected the Cat Claws to suddenly form and end your life. 

That trust he had enjoyed had been irreversibly damaged. No more tea while venting about the little annoyances of quiet village life. Or the warmth he felt when you mindlessly prepared him another cup exactly the way he liked it while you talked, putting a cookie on the saucer if he didn't take one. 

“No,” he finally answered, allowing his hand to drop. He turned, trying to calm himself as he picked up his namesake. Kuro-the-cat initially complained as he picked him up, before shifting and curling against his shoulder, purring. 

Maybe he should see about getting a cat for the ship. After all, they were the Black Cat Pirates. It would keep vermin out of the pantry at least. 

There was no better companion than a cat. 

“I wish you well, in fact,” he continued as he dropped the cat into your arms. “Your talents were wasted at Syrup village, harbormaster or not. Just be careful to avoid any other pirates in the future.”

[one-strugling-bean]

Finished ep 8 of OFMD S2... And I have thoughts

Am i the only one that felt Izzy's death to be kinda.... Eh?

It's just, we've seen people in this show come back from so much worse. The ridiculous ammount of times Stede and everyone else has been stabbed or shot and come out completely ok; the crew starving for who knows how many days in the tiniest patch of land ever; Lucius thrown off into the sea; guy getting his nose cut off; auntie, who in the same episode suffers from a "pretty bad" wound. These are the only moments I can remember off the top of my head rn but there's probably more.

Like, all of these wounds/incidents would've normally been deadly. But OFMD has never been one for very realistic consequences. Izzy sings La Vie en Rose. In the 1700s.

Like. Yeah.

So, for Izzy Hands - Izzy Fucking Hands, who we've been shown, throughtout this season especially, who's a super mega badass - to die from a stray bullet in the middle of what was overall a pretty meh fight (in terms of stakes) feels like a betrayal. At least to me it did.

Or at least, it feels like lazy writing. I dunno. I just think there would've been better ways for him to go. It felt to me like spitting on his character. The guy went through so much development, he suffered so much to get where he was at the end of the season.... It feels really sucky he had to die when he was finally in a better place.

The Unicorn leg. His singing. Trying to train Stede. This was all so hopeful! Like Izzy was turning around. He was relearning what piracy meant and relearning to love it. But then... He's saying he wants to die to Edd at the end. That didn't feel real to me... Maybe I'm just being unrealistic idk, but that felt so much like a basic line. If he'd said that in the beggining of the season I would've believed it. But after everything he went through in season 2? It just sounds a lil cheap for me.

And again, that could've been ok. I wouldn't like it, but I could accept his death, if the show wasn't so characteristic for ass-pulling.

If this had been any other show, I could be sad, and feel bad that Izzy was taken so soon, but I wouldn't feel betrayed. Because "that's just the pirate life". But that's never really been the pirate life that's been shown to us thus far. What we've seen is a bunch of super-humans who can get through anything. Since when has a stray bullet wound killed anyone relevant in this show?

And btw, I'm not complaining about OFMD not being realistic with human bodies. And I'm not complaining about Izzy getting killed by a random bullet wound. I'm complaining over the fact that these two things co-exist. It feels like a cheap death. Like they wanted to kill Izzy for the emotional impact, but hadn't planned for it beforehand, and had to resort to the easy method last minute.

Idk. These are just my thoughts. Does anyone agree with me? Or not? I'd love to discuss this with others, its been plaguing me :p

[docholligay]

On Doc Watching Renegade Nell

Hello friends! This was tact's pick for our draw liveblog, which you enter by commenting on whatever I wrote last month.

I do not know ANYTHING about this show, other than that Disney made it and that this is the premise:

A quick-witted and courageous young woman framed for murder unexpectedly becomes the most notorious outlaw in 18th-century England.

I KNOW NOTHING ELSE, AND IT IS MUCH MORE FUN FOR ALL OF US WHEN WE KEEP IT THAT WAY. It allows me to guess, it allows me to be wrong, to be right, to have contempt for those who don't deserve it, and mercy for those who also, don't deserve it. THis is the fun of a liveblog. I react based on only what I know.

So! Please don't spoil me with anything in the show, and please remember that you have information I do not! So, if I hate Nell, the one character whose name I know, because she...is a coward, or whatever, this is not a good time to tell me that "she's reacting to the murder of her entire family by churchmice" or something, or even, "She has a good reason to hate mice! keep watching!"

I will also add I am BY NO MEANS a scholar on the time and place this takes place. I'm pretty sure this is Highwayman times, which I only know because it's around the Golden Age of Piracy, which I've read some books about. ANYWAY, all that to say that I may make a historical blunder, but, mostly, let me make it. If you have historical context to lend, PLEASE ask me first. This is probably the toughest needle for me to thread, because I love love to learn shit, but, history can, in fact, sometimes be a spoiler.

Don't get me wrong. Totally get the compulsion. I am God's most irritating soldier on anything about the American West.

I am always very clear when I ask for answer, so no worries! It'll look something like: THIS IS A QUESTION I ACTUALLY WANT AN ANSWER TO. Otherwise assume it's rhetorical.

Uhhhh...as always, I am free to think what I think, and if it is REALLY gonna twist your nipples to have me feel any kind of a way, let's us both not engage with it.

The tag to follow or block is #Doc Watches Renegade Nell!

[tobiasdrake]

The Disappearance of Yuki Nagato, Episode 1.

I like how, back in Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya, I said they should just stop the movie halfway through and end it on everyone settling into the new reality and accepting this world as it is. But the movie disagreed with me.

But then they cancelled the show and when they brought it back they decided that they want to make a show in the new reality instead of going back to the original canon.

So I feel kinda vindicated by that.

Anyways, Yuki show on Crunchyroll with screenshots provided by shady piracy website, let's go!

I am so confused by the status quo of Yuki World. Specifically Kyon. But also specifically the continued existence of Yuki World post-Disappearance.

Melancholy was always pretty up-front with the fact that it does not operate on Multiverse Theory. There exists only one timeline, with time travelers moving back and forth between points on the single line - and, in fact, the presence of people from the future in the past is already baked into the present.

Kyon had to travel back in time to meet Kid Haruhi on Tanabata and give her the idea to go to North High because that's how the history goes. Kyon was always there on Tanabata giving Haruhi the idea to go to North High.

So I am already baffled about what this world is. Kyon is part of the Literature Club and has dinners with Yuki and Ryoko, which implies that he remembers the events of the movie. We don't know much about Alt Kyon but we do know that he and Yuki never spoke two words to one another.

So it could be, like, a What If scenario if Kyon chose to stay and not end Yuki's new reality. But this can't be Original Kyon because he's on good terms with Ryoko. Our Kyon was quite understandably freaked out by the girl who tried to stab him with a knife.

Are we in "Out-of-continuity Loosely Based On" territory? Because they're making references to the movie in the first two minutes so it feels like a direct spinoff. Even though it's metaphysically impossible to be a direct spinoff, because this reality doesn't exist anymore.

(Also Haruhi made her intentions pretty clear that she wanted to form an SOS Brigade on this side of the temporal fence so the fact that Yuki World still has a Literature Club is another mark against a direct spinoff.)

I dunno. My mind is spinning.

RUN YUKI

RUN LIKE HELL

"But she has no powers in this reality--" SHE'S STILL HARUHI

Wonder if Yuki still has Haruhi's powers in this reality? Huh.

Also, I like how Yuki Show begins where Disappearance was. This world was created in the days leading up to Christmas, so it figures that a Christmas Party would be the first thing we're doing. The chronology is consistent.

Which. Again. Makes it so baffling. Are we spinning canonically out of Disappearance or doing our own thing? Make up your mind!

That being said,

New Yuki is such an neurodivergent disaster girl. XD

Yuki: I want to be able to experience a full range of emotions and feelings. Monkey's Paw: I mean you're like 15 which is a pretty overwhelming time hormonally but sure. Here you go. Unlocking full range of emotions to process for the very first time ever in your life.

I wonder how much Ryoko knows? Her appearance at the end of Disappearance implied that she retains at least enough understanding of the situation to kill Kyon with a knife without even questioning why he was trying to shoot Yuki full of science gun.

I don't think she's still a Space Robot because if she had Space Robot powers that fight would have been much different. But she fully understood the situation when she showed up with knife in hand. And I think we can be pretty sure that she did that on her own; Yuki did not intend for her to kill Kyon.

But also, it's not clear how much of Disappearance actually applies to the reality of Yuki Show since Yuki doesn't remember meeting Haruhi and Haruhi hasn't formed this world's version of SOS Brigade.

One way or the other, at least she's still secretly vicious. I love her. Ryoko is making a compelling argument for Best Character and we're only six minutes in.

And then they put a knife in her hand hahahahaha.

Spinoff or alt continuity, they at least know exactly what they're doing with Ryoko.

I like how Ryoko is filling our Crazy Asshole quota but she's a very different flavor of Crazy Asshole from Haruhi. Haruhi was a gleeful crime person while Ryoko (who I think I recall being Class President?) is Lawful Menace. She'll stab you, sure, but she's not about to permit a hot pot on school premises. That would be inappropriate.

And she ships it.

Yeah. Okay. Ryoko is definitely Best Character. She isn't my character, of course; My character's Haruhi. But she is quickly making a name for herself as this show's MVP.

She ships it so hard that she's prepared flirtation cue cards. Everyone should have a bestie like Ryoko Asakura. She reels in the crushes and knifes anyone who looks at her bestie the wrong way.

Oh shit it's them.

I guess it was too much to hope that Mikuru and Tsuruya still hated Kyon's guts in this reality.

How does he even know these two? They're upperclassmen. He only ever met them in our timeline because Haruhi violently abducted Mikuru.

I would like to have a moment of silence for Mikuru.

Because Tsuruya just got her stabbed. She is so stabbed.

The "Yuki vs. Mikuru" fight is definitely going to end with Yuki, Kyon, and Mikuru going out for lunch while Ryoko and Tsuruya resort to street brawling each other.

They have the space heater!?

The one they got for performing in Haruhi's film? The absence of which from this reality was specifically one of the ways it deviated from the original?

...come to think of it, they don't have the computer. The presence of which was one of the ways it bizarrely did not deviate from the original.

This really is a continuity-free Loosely Based On, isn't it?

Lawful Menace. Ryoko found just the right hoops to jump through in order to obtain formal permission to violate the rules.

I love how she brings just enough Haruhi-esque attitude to the show while still being so distinctly separate from Haruhi in personality and behavior.

AWWWWWWWW They kept that! YIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Oh no, she is going to be part of the show.

Yuki. Yuki, run. You have no idea. You have no idea. RUN.

^_^ This show is so cute. I think I'm going to have a good time with it.

[eerna]

Hello! This is incredibly random, but as a fanartist, enjoyer of critically examining media, and critic of capitalist corporations (*cough* Disney), do you have any thoughts about fan art being a form of unpaid labour?

Context is I’m writing an essay about digital labour and how fan creation is basically kind of like free PR for big corporations… and now whenever I do fanart I can’t get that thought out of my head uGH. I want to believe that drawing fanart is my own form of creative expression and way of showing love for the media, but at the same time I’m like “am I being exploited???” since I’m helping advertise smth for free and these corporations are just capitalizing on my love for said media??? and I can’t reconcile these thoughts 🥲🫠

Also I’m struggling with the essay LOL my eventual conclusion is that we as fans do have agency but we kind of still are being exploited… so it’s not a very optimistic outlook haha. Doesn’t help that the scholars’ articles I’m reading are all very negative about this digital labour thing. Help.

Sorry if this is unexpectedly deep!! 😅 just really curious to hear a fellow fanartist’s thoughts, and I respect you a lot for being unafraid to criticize media 🙏🙏

Hi! First of thank you for your kind words~ Second off, what a cool concept to discuss. Your message is pretty much how I feel. It is very frustrating to remember that so much of the media I love is so closely tied to the harmful cycle of capitalism. I grew up in a country that didn't have access to merch or much in the way of official media so piracy was my go-to most of the time. This means I was introduced to the concept of consumerist aspects of fandom via the Internet as a teenager and started feeling bad about "not supporting" stuff I love, but I told myself "Well I pay back by doing fanart and talking about it online". And then I found out about the way capitalism shapes the media landscape and started feeling bad for playing into it, the same as you. It gets even more conflicting when I am talking about something I dislike made by a company I dislike - yeah, I am probably preventing some people from interacting with the media for themselves, but I am also probably making others interested. What makes me feel better about the entire thing is that the "digital labour" I do is that I'm doing it for other fans like me, and to express myself. I love things so much that it makes me feel like I am going to explode, but pouring it out onto paper helps with it! Of course, I don't have to post it online for it to be worthwhile, but sharing it with others who feel the way I do makes the feelings even better. BUT one of the most important aspects of the issue is how willing those companies are to let me gain something monetary from the relationship. Are they ignoring fanworks being sold as fan merch, as commissions? It is illegal, but I feel like it should absolutely be allowed as a sort of unmentioned perk of being a fan worker, and the companies that don't allow that are evil. My audience gets bigger, I sell more prints, and so do they. (This is also why I never accept money for fanworks made by small creators, such as webcomics)

There's also the fact that lately I've been seeing the rise of "If you REALLY love this piece of media, it is your DUTY to consume it as much as possible and spread the word about it as much as possible and make the company as much money as possible if you want to see more things like it!" takes. These are utter bullshit and where enjoyment of media goes to die. The moment you reduce your love for something only to how much money it can make the evil capitalist overlords who allowed it to grace your eyes, you completely deny any kind of artistic worth. Media should exist because we deserve to have our hearts touched by stories, not because it makes someone money.

I don't have a clear answer or feel like my approach to the issue goes entirely along with my morality. But I don't think we can find a way to feel good about the entire situation as long as our media is dictated by capitalism. It's the sad reality of loving something in a system that will squeeze any money out of you that it can. But we gotta march on, remember that we are the ones allowing them to survive and not the other way around, and love while we do it. Good luck with your essay, stay positive!

[dude1818]

The Glass Sentence

Went on vacation last week, which means plenty of time to read on the flight. On the way out, I read The Glass Sentence by S. E. Grove, the first book in The Mapmaker's Trilogy. The Goodreads synopsis recommended it for fans for His Dark Materials, but I would go as far as to call it a clone (although without the fun animals). That's not necessarily a bad thing, although it makes comparison unavoidable

The setting is an alternate history that forked from our own when history itself broke. The Earth exploded and reassembled itself with fragments throughout time: the protagonist is from 19th century Boston, Canada has fallen to the prehistoric Ice Age, the Caribbean is in the Golden Age of Piracy, and Mexico and the western US are an amalgamation of anywhen from 500 to 2500 CE. It's a fascinating premise, and I was hoping for a sci-fi version of HDM

The plot is that Sophia (14) comes from a family of great explorers and cartographers. When her uncle is kidnapped by a cult that wants to reforge the world into their timeline of origin, she and her new friend from the West have to take his special glass map to an old acquaintance in Mexico. Along the way, they join a pirate crew who get them across the Gulf and into the palace at Mexico City, while the cult chases them down. Turns out, the Ice Age to the south is actually from a future snowball Earth, and Sophia has to somehow stop its rapid spread north

Pretty early on, we were introduced to the Macguffins of this world, which are weird maps. Clay, cloth, glass, metal, water maps, only the Avatar can read all five. The gimmick is that they all encode human memories somehow, and reading them makes you "remember" various attributes of the location they describe. It was weird, but I guess we can chalk it up to possible future tech and being the one weird thing

But then halfway through the book we get to Mexico, and it turns out there's a whole caste system about people who have plants growing from their bodies and people who have metal bones. Like what the fuck. HDM pulled off stuff like witches and the underworld by establishing them as being weird and exotic to Lyra, but she knew they existed as part of her world. Here, it felt like a complete genre shift out of nowhere. It wasn't until literally the day after I finished reading the book and was complaining to my dad about that twist that I realized it was supposed to be deep foreshadowing of the sci-fi twist in the 11th hour. I had just thrown up my hands and accepted that the story had magic now, because it hadn't established itself as a book where I'm expected to be able to figure out what the twist is

Other than that it was fine. Obviously it's YA, but it felt more YA than HDM, or at least it clicked with me less. Hard to give it a fair shake while I'm still in the middle of the HDM sequel trilogy. I do want to know more about this world, and while the plot beats are fairly predictable, I'm still going to give the rest of the trilogy a shot

The plant/metal twist I didn't get:

Much later after we learned about the plant and metal caste system in Mexico City, the royal botanist examines some soil samples from a new time period that appeared. Planting a seed in it causes the plant to rapidly grow, and it has metal roots. He tries to use that soil to regrow his own wooden leg, but it grows back as metal instead

Later they're escaping through caverns under the palace, and the botanist drops seeds along the path. They instantly grow into metal-rooted trees. We also know that in the future ice age realm, people had invented artificial soils that allowed them to plant plants through the ice and rock of their world. We were supposed to realize this meant the caverns were from that era (which was later explained as being why they survived when the glaciers reached them)

The big twist is that since this artificial soil lay under the city, people who were born and raised after time broke were exposed to the soil as they grew, which is why they had pieces of plant or metal in their bodies. I have no idea how you were supposed to solve that mystery when there was no indication there was a mystery to solve in the first place!

[brigdh]

I can't stop thinking about rewriting S2. I don't know why – it's hard to find an activity that's actually less productive than writing fanfic, but surely this is it – but my brain won't stop circling around the idea, so I'm writing this down to hopefully shut it up.

A proposed outline for a better S2 of Our Flag Means Death.

Episodes 1-3 are pretty much the same as what aired. The big change is that I'm cutting out Prince Ricky. I think two big antagonists are too much for an eight episode season, though I went back and forth on whether to cut Zheng or Ricky. I decided on Ricky because the "end of piracy" plot is way too overwrought for a comedy series, and there's no way it was ever going to work without a lot of build-up. Like, a lot a lot. Possibly multiple seasons of it, and we just don't have time for that here. Also, although Ricky makes a fun foil to Stede, that never really goes anywhere. So he's gone. This doesn't make much of a difference to these first three episodes, since he's only in two scenes, but it will help tighten the focus at the end of the season. One other change is that it's clear (perhaps even referenced in dialogue) that Ed is still not killing anyone directly with his own hands.

Episode Four: This is where I start with the big changes, rewriting this whole episode. Now it's focused on the crew wanting to kick Ed off the ship. Stede goes back and forth between the crew and Ed, trying to talk the crew around while simultaneously trying to romance Ed. He fails on both sides. Perhaps we still have Ed's corporate "apology", as an attempt at compromise, but the crew refuses to accept it and this time, they're in charge. Lucius has his plot about being traumatized and drawing Ed's face everywhere (but not the resolution, not in this episode). Ed is angry at Stede – they get to have an actual fight, about Stede leaving, about Ed marooning the crew/tossing Lucius overboard, about Ed's mermaid dream vs Stede's masculine pirate hero dream. Ed fears he's unlovable, and Stede's unrealistic declarations of love are just making him feel like anything between them is impossible. (Maybe Ed & Izzy have a fight too – I'm not committed to including this, depending on time, but it could be good. Maybe Izzy gets to say, "A rotten leg's got to come off" to Ed!) At the end of the episode, Ed leaves the ship and tells Stede not to follow him. Everyone's angry and upset.

Episode Five: Ed spends the entire episode off the ship, throwing himself into his new career as a fisherman (it doesn't have to be fishing. It can be anything, as long as it's new. The point is Ed running away from himself and his past and trying to become an entirely new person). He's using a new name – Jeff? – and has a whole backstory he's made up. At the end of the episode, he realizes that this isn't making him happy either, because he keeps thinking about his guilt, about Stede, about Izzy or Lucius or whoever he centers on as someone's he's mistreated, and so he leaves.

Meanwhile, on board the Revenge, everyone's having a miserable time. This is where the 'traumatized crew comes together to make the unicorn leg' plot goes, except this time it's a three-sided hot mess, with the crew, Izzy, and Stede – heartbroken over his idealized view of 'true loves fixes everything' having crashed and burned in the previous episode. Buttons turns into a bird, but this time Stede is the one to witness it. It inspires him to patch things up with the crew and go after Ed. Together, they all come up with a motto for the season – something like, 'change is possible' or 'you've got to try again', idk, except it's probably cheesy and rhymes and yet is weirdly inspirational, a la 'talk it through as a crew'.

Episode Six: Ed runs into Anne Bonny and Mary Read, and goes to stay with them. Before Stede shows up, Ed gets a bit of time to talk and reminiscence with them about their own "good old days", back when he was happy. It becomes clear though, that remembering murder and torture and etc is not making him happy now. Ed asks them about feeling guilty. Their advice is terrible: only losers care. Ed laughs it off, but clearly is conflicted. Stede tracks him down, and the rest of the episode play out pretty much like it did in canon (I think Jenkins & co really wanted to do "Ed and Stede as exes at a party", so I am giving it to them here). However, the vibes are a bit different – it's less that Ed and Stede haven't spoken at all as in canon, but that they had their big fight in E4 and are now dealing with the awkward aftermath of wanting to make up, each wanting to maintain their pride, and not knowing how to do either. At the end, Stede gets the courage to put himself out there and asks Ed to come back to the ship. Ed refuses at first – the crew doesn't want him and he doesn't know how to be a better person. Stede passes on the motto the crew came up with in the previous episode – 'change is possible' or whatever – and Ed agrees to come and try. They have a brief, chaste, kiss.

The crew back on the Revenge should have a B-plot too. I love the cursed suit subplot and would stick it here, but honestly I'm not sure it works if Stede isn't around to be the pro-suit side of the debate. Maybe we have a training montage, but it's Izzy and the crew instead of Izzy and Stede. Whatever happens, we also get the Lucius and Pete proposal. This goes along with the hopeful, new beginnings vibe of what's happening with Ed/Stede.

Episode Seven: Ed and Stede return to the ship, and the crew agrees to let Ed try out their new motto. Calypso party preparations begin, but this time Ed is not just handing out money but taking part in finding and putting together decorations and set-up. We get scenes of him and different characters working together; things are awkward but improving. Izzy and Wee Jon can still do drag and sing. Ned Low shows up and disrupts the party.

The big change here: Ed is the one to kill Ned Low, not Stede. I love Stede's plot about becoming a pirate hero and killing and not dealing with it, but it's just too much for a season with a lot of other stuff going on. Sorry, Stede; your masculinity issues have to wait for S3.

Ed killing someone is portrayed as a very big deal. Ned is more dangerous here – it's seen as necessary for someone to kill him, and Ed taking on the role is cast as him becoming the protector of the crew rather than their tormentor. Nonetheless, despite Ned's death being a 'good' thing, Ed is traumatized and he and Stede still have ill-advised sex about it. Izzy can definitely still sing La Vie en Rose during.

Episode Eight: Zheng has (like in canon) been collecting all of the pirates in the Caribbean into her alliance. Now she's finally coming for the Revenge. It's them against dozens of ships. I think, since I'm making Zheng more of a straightforward antagonist than a reluctant ally, I have to break up Olu/Zheng. That's okay. In fact, it can make a nice parallel – sometimes people grow apart and it's not anyone's 'fault', it's just life. Are Stede and Ed also growing apart, or will they find a path forward together?

Stede comes up with what someone describes as a suicide mission. Ed says, 'what if we don't commit suicide?' He wants to live. He wants to be happy. He's still grappling with having killed Low, and he realizes that he can't do that again – can't even put himself in a situation where it might be kill or be killed. He proposes they surrender and just go and live on land somewhere. Why not? What is piracy good for, even, other than violence and theft? Izzy makes his speech about belonging to something. The crew – which has been swaying back and forth, debating both for and against fighting Zheng – is convinced, and decide to go to battle. Ed isn't. He agrees that community is important, that it was there when he needed it, that he'll always be glad he had it, but he can't stay. He's changing. This is him changing, for real. He and Izzy have a final exchange about Ed moving on and Izzy accepting it.

Ed and Stede have an emotional goodbye, where Ed says that he won't be like Anne & Mary – he won't let Stede leave piracy for him, but maybe Stede can come and visit some time. They make some long-distance relationship jokes. Ed leaves. They're both being ~super~ mature and adult about it, but they're clearly both not really happy.

Stede and the crew prepare for battle. Lucius and Pete get married, as a last hurrah for the Revenge in case not everyone survives the coming confrontation. They carry out Stede's plan (I don't know what that is, I'm not an action scene writer, something cool and out-of-the-box. Though it's not like 'dress up in British uniforms' was a unique and exciting plan either). They succeed, either by defeating Zheng or just escaping for now. (Does Izzy die in battle? It doesn't really seem necessary. If he does, it's clearly about becoming one of the crew and they're the ones his death scene centers on, since Ed isn't even there.) There's a big celebration scene and/or funeral, and everyone is bonding, people are cheering Stede's plan, but Stede himself can't join in wholeheartedly. He's off in the corner, clearly not quite satisfied. He pulls aside Frenchie and tells him, "I have something to give you".

The final scene: Ed is working on his new career. Maybe he's running a bar & grill in the Republic of Pirates. He's not hiding who he is, even using the Blackbeard name for PR, but it's not a fighting-focused career. Stede walks up, clearly unexpected, and Ed's like, "thought it'd take a lot longer for your first visit." Stede gets a big speech about piracy. Everyone's gotten to define it for themselves; for Ed it was about violence, for Izzy community. (Maybe some of the rest of the crew have gotten to voice their own takes as well.) Stede says that for him, piracy means freedom. That's what he was dreaming of, when he first set out to be a pirate, what he's been looking for his whole life – the freedom to be who he really is. Ed says, "and who are you?" Stede replies, "the man who loves you." They kiss.

We get an overhead shot, swinging out to sea, with the Revenge sailing away with Frenchie as captain. Distantly, we hear Ed and Stede talking as sound fades out –

Ed: You promise you're not going to burn down my bar when you get bored? Stede: Why would I be bored? I have so many ideas! Theme nights, cocktail recipes, waitstaff uniforms... Ed: Hey, what happened with Zheng? Stede: Oh, she might hunt me down for revenge. Another reason we won't be bored!

[trackernivrig]

A work (in any medium) that has extra meaning to you because of when or where you experienced it?

Took me way too long to respond to this sorry.

This is an amazing question, and there's a TON of shows that I can think of that are special because of when I watched them. Here's a list of a few.

Bleach. This was my first anime, and I watched it with both my father and my brother every day, staying up way past my bedtime watching it. The end of the Soul Society arc was amazing, and it was somewhere within the bount arc that both my father and brother grew bored of the series, and I continued on my own. This portion is still special to me though, because I remember watching a bunch of it on VLC until the subtitles were corrupted. This prompted me to look on youtube, and I found a few of those ancient part 1/3 with part 2 missing Spanish sub videos that had the English subs overlayed on the Spanish subs. It was horrible but I look back on it fondly. Eventually I found Crunchyroll, and watched on that until the end of the Aizen arc and started FMA:B instead.

Your Name. I remember that one of my friends that wasn't huge into anime recommended this to me, and I really wanted to check it out. Unfortunately, I didn't know anything about anime piracy sites, and only watched on Crunchyroll, and at the time Your Name wasn't on Crunchyroll. So I did a ton of googling and eventually found this really sketchy pirate site that hosted it. It had constant ads that would pop up new windows that I had to close (this was also before I had UBlock Origin), and the video would buffer every 3 or 4 minutes for at least a minute each time. Again, horrible to experience in the moment, but this had a pretty funny effect. Because I had to spend SO MUCH more time to actually watch it, I felt like every scene was like triple the amount of time that it actually took up, making me grow way more attached to the characters that I would be otherwise. I didn't even realize that this was due to the video buffering so much until years later when I was showing it to another friend and felt like it was going at a breakneck pace lol.

Fallen Skies. I don't remember anything about this show, but this was another one of the shows I used to watch with my dad and brother every night. This one we watched for longer though so even though I don't remember the show itself, I have fond memories of the time we spent watching it. This was also before my parents got divorced and we were forced to move, so it reminds me of what our old basement used to look like.

Re:Zero. This was another one of the anime I watched early into my "career" watching anime. I had been watching a lot of FMAB at the time, and still didn't really know much about anime (so I didn't even know what isekai was). I watched it by myself and I couldn't really place how I felt about it for a while. It seemed really good, but I didn't know anybody that had seen it (as opposed to everyone that I knew saying that stuff like FMAB and AoT and everything was the best of anime). I ended up rewatching it at least 4 or 5 times thinking it was good, but unsure if it was just me or not. Eventually Season 2 came out and I rewatched it with a friend and they finally made me feel like I wasn't crazy and said it was amazing lol. It wasn't until about halfway through the second season that I realized the first season was highly acclaimed. Season 2 also reminds me of when I would watch the show weekly with a ton of friends. We'd all get in a discord call and watch it together on Watch2Gether. It was a fun time, and while we still occasionally do it, we don't do it nearly on the scale we used to. Hunter x Hunter, No Game No Life, Made in Abyss, and Mob Psycho 100 are all other shows that I watched in this era and thus have fond memories of.

Steins;Gate. I distinctly remember watching the entirety of S;G (not 0, that was more drawn out). I had watched HalcyonMusic's "100 anime songs in 30 minutes" piano medley a TON of times, trying my best to follow along myself (largely unsuccessfully), and I wanted to watch some of the shows from it (video link: https://youtu.be/JPZ-QyVBOf8?si=cLMYPoJyUK05UT_v&t=1067). I had added anything that sounded good to my to watch list, and one of the songs I really liked was Gate of Steiner. It sat on my watch list for ages until eventually I decided to watch it. I read the description on whatever pirate site I was going to use to watch it, and saw that it was about some organization and a mad scientist. This led me to believe that Okabe's insane ramblings were actually all real for half of the first episode lol. I know a lot of people say that S;G has a slow start, but I was IMMEDIATELY invested, and ended up watching half the entire show until around 3AM. I had online morning classes (was in high school during COVID), so I went to bed right as one of the saddest parts had occurred. This led to me stewing in the depression in my bed for a while and I ended up crying to it. This was the first show I had cried to in probably over 5 years, and I don't think anything has made me cry since. After waking up I did my online class and the proceeded to finish the entire series, meaning I finished the entirety of Steins;Gate within 24 hours. After this I spammed my friends on discord and about a week later started watching it with one of them. After watching with him, I watched it with another friend. Then another. Then another. This happened so many times that in the end I think I had watched the show with 5 or 6 different people, and had seen the show 10-11 times (due to rewatches). It is still my all time favorite show, despite how much I love Fate.

Fate. I had to put this on there. It's my favorite overall series (while S;G is my favorite individual show). I had heard somebody in an ani-piano discord community I was in talk about it, and it seemed interesting so I asked what it was about. This led to me getting the whole "well the community is very divided on where to start" talk, which ironically made me even more interested. I started making my own list of the watch order and how everything worked together in order to figure out what everything was. The thing was, I did this pretty much by myself, so I got A TON of misinformation that I have no idea how I got. Apparently Grand Order was the 1st Holy Grail War, Apocrypha was the 3rd, and a ton of other super weird things. Eventually I watched UBW, enjoyed it, and watched Zero and REALLY enjoyed it. There were only 2 HF movies at the time so I didn't watch that until the third came out. I'm now really into Type Moon as a whole and intend to play through a bunch of their VNs. I just haven't had the time yet.

Switching gears a bit, I'm going to go into books for a second. Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children. My mom actually recommended I read this book, and I read it on her old Kindle. This was the only thing I had ever really read on a kindle, until recently when I bought my own and have started re-reading some of my old favorite series. I also look fondly on it because it was my mom's suggestion.

Talking about how my mom suggested the previous one, she also had me watch Game of Thrones with her. I feel bad because I am a very quiet watcher of things, so I showed pretty much no reaction to a lot of the really good twists despite them really surprising me. Even so, I enjoyed my time watching it with her. I also watched The Tudors with her and while I didn't enjoy it as much as GoT it was also really good.

There's probably TONS more that I could put if I were to think of it, but these are the first that came to mind. A vast majority of the reason I enjoy watching shows is due to being able to watch them with others, or the circumstances that led me to watch them. I could put shows like Code Geass down, for a very memorable argument following the final episode of R1, or the fact I knew about the series from Madder Sky, or that I watched a "meme' that literally had the entirety of the Zero Requiem before watching it only to completely forget what happens (ok that's a good one I should have put it down). Or I could put down something like Star Wars, which I have enjoyed with my brother since I was a kid. Another great contender is Erased, which was the first anime I got my sister to watch, and was the thing that finally allowed me to show here how good anime can be, and why I enjoy it so much. Doctor Who I have watched with my family quite a bit, restarted every time we finally wanted to try getting into the Capaldi era before inevitably giving up (insert Sisyphus meme here). Pretty much every show I watch has some sort of significance to it because I watch shows as a social experience. I pretty much only have 4 hobbies and that's TV, Video Games, Books, and Music. Because of that, the only way I really bond with people is getting them to watch, read, or play something with me. I'm hoping eventually my friend that is learning guitar gets to the point we can play stuff together to add music to that list of things to do with friends lol.

Thanks a lot for the question. Sorry again about how long it took me to respond to it. I have been super busy and I had way too much stuff to say to respond on mobile lol. I hope the fact that I ranted so long makes up for it.

[badvgopinions]

Gen 9 is the best gen (when it works.) (Review, I guess.) (Spoiler-free)

You know what? Violet is my favorite mainline Pokemon game now. Gen 8 is still my favorite gen so far (since it has Legends, New Pokemon Snap and the Mystery Dungeon remake that I didn’t play, but I really loved the original) but this is easily my favorite mainline game.

TL;DR: The openness of the game makes it fantastic for someone who likes to plan out the entire game before doing the game.

Also, I’m playing physical, offline, and I’m not fucking with my save files, giving me a nearly glitchless experience.

Nearly glitchless:

People will actually get mad at me for not having a whole lot of issues (not anything more than any other game, at least) so lemme explain-

I play the physical version of the game, not the digital. Nintendo has such a bad record of digital games that they have a page telling you what to do when your digital copy of one of their games fucks up. (But of course it’s Game Freak’s fault somehow.)

I also play offline, because again Nintendo fucked up their online servers. (Mostly by doing nothing for 18 years.) (Again people blames Game Freak for that.) Plus I don’t fuck with the save files, so the anti-piracy measures don’t activate.

So minus some frame issues (that are actually done on purpose. I dunno what it’s called but basically they have low-polygons or frame rates when you’re so far away,) some map loading a split second late, and some weird Tera raids glitches that are still somehow functional (I’ll talk about that below,) I didn’t encounter a single glitch, or even any slow down. I’m sorry if your digital copy on your Australian file is fucked up but it works just fine for me, my husband, my brother-in-law, and BIL’s girlfriend. (When they play offline. It does fuck up when they’re playing online.)

Story:

With all of that cleared up, these are truly the best games in the series so far. (Unless you prefer the restricted linear kind of Pokemon game. Which usually results in better stories, though Pokemon stories never really blow me away) I really, really love how open the world is.

The story is actually three separate stories that comes together in the end. Majora’s Mask is my favorite game of all time because of how the big story effects all of the little stories, so I guess it makes sense for me to like this.

And a lot of the smaller things being controlled at just about any point is so convenient, a lot of the annoyances I had with previous generations doesn’t matter anymore.

Speaking of the stories, they’re not forced on you. Not really. You don’t have to do them to progress through most of the world. Yeah, you do need to do Arven’s story line to get to some areas, but it’s not an annoying pause in the game. You can do those things any time without some BS excuse. No “you have to get Falkner’s badge before you can go to Azalea town for some reason” BS.

I just love the convenience of the game:

I can just have a Pokemon remember a move whenever I want, and have access to my boxes whenever I want, so I don’t have to go all the way to a Pokemon Center just to deposit the Pokemon I don’t want to train. Which means that EXP All isn’t so annoying anymore.

I love it so much, I made a new profile on the Switch to play it again, but with the knowledge I have about the game now.

For example, I know now that disobedience only happens if the Pokemon you caught is beyond a certain level when you catch it compared to how many badges you have. You can still catch them and breed them and the baby will always obey you.

On my second file I decided to have some of the strongest Pokemon I can have on my team (of varying types,) because fuck it, why not? And then I breed them to get an obedient Pokemon that’s a clean slate.

And yeah, it was a  pain in the ass to get Dondozo. Twice. (I didn’t pay attention and I caught a male one first. The Pokemon in the egg will inherent the mother’s species.) But that just makes it that much more rewarding.

And EV training is made pretty easy since you can get brace items once the world opens up to you.

There’s an area where you can basically summon Chansey by eating a Ham Sandwich, which I believe is a sandwich you start with? I caught a Gastly, leveled it up enough to teach it Curse, and use that to train these Pokemon to their mid 30′s before taking on the first gym.

I wanted to start gathering Tera shards but I’d need three badges and to beat Larry first. So I defeated the easiest two gyms and then Larry. I can just do that whenever I want.

I defeated specific titan Pokemon to upgrade my Miraidon the way I want it. While looking away because apparently if you need to push “A” to continue the dialogue it doesn’t count as a cut scene and I don’t want to cry again. (Something similar to that story happened last year, but it didn’t have a happy ending.)

Also, riding Miraidon is just really fucking smooth. Much better than it is in Legends.

Also also, I can treat the game as a diet Pokemon Snap.

Some cons:

-I can’t just catch Pokemon without getting into a battle first, which is a disappointment. But Pokemon don’t try to kill me so it’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make. I guess this is a half-con.

-They removed the sound effect and graphic effect for shinies even though they just had to carry that over from Legends! Sure it makes shinies a bit more exciting to find, when you can actually tell that they’re shiny. My husband’s a color blind shiny hunter so it’s especially hard for him.

I’m not color blind but I know for a fact that I missed some shinies! (Partially because the game will tell you.) I dunno what they were but I’m guessing that they were shitty and that I encountered them when I was EV training and I looked away when they sparkled to see what their EV yield is.

Edit”

Ooooooh.

-Tera raids are kind of glitchy in the most annoying way, and in a way where you can tell what the problem is. They still function so it’s not a huge deal for me but it does get pretty annoying when the HP bar is behind, or ahead, or the text is stopping part of the way through because it’s too damn fast! It’s an RPG! You don’t have to make it go so fast that the game can’t keep up with it! Some Pokemon will interrupt my inputs just to get rid of stat changes and status conditions that it didn’t have in the first place! It’s annoying and it needs to calm the fuck down.

-Rika is never outside, so I can’t get a picture with her.

[elkian]

We waited for official translations; you know those "all according to keikaku" memes? "Everything will be daijoubu"? "People die if they are killed"? Some of those are deliberate jokes, but that was the level of fan translation - fan. Passionate, unpaid individuals doing their best so that something they loved could be shared in the community. "Nakama" was associated with One Piece for years because of this kind of thing.

I liked watching my officially liscensed!- Yu Yu Hakusho DVDs in English and in Japanese because the lines differed and it was interesting to see what changed. But even on DVD, sometimes you were lucky to get subtitles for the English dub. Sometimes you didn't get subtitles at all!

And we put up with this, because at the time, anime was a pretty underrepresented media type in the US. Then there was the boom, tons of pseudo-manga and pseudo-anime being produced, Shonen Jump and Shoujo Beat being officially translated...

We stopped watching mirrored Naruto episodes on Youtube (in three separate parts, because Youtube couldn't support a video longer than 10 minutes at the time) because now you could buy DVD sets with the official English dub!

We didn't think of it as piracy so much as 'the only way to get your hands on XYZ'. There was a guy in my high school anime club who was famous for having a gigantic CD album that was every first DVD of tons of official anime. We're talking probably over a hundred DVDs here. Before the official licensing hit, we had DBZ and Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh! and that was about it. Those things weren't even presented to us as "anime", it was just a cool cartoon where the mouths and words didn't always match up (Speed Racer, Voltron, Astro Boy would be in the grandaddy category).

I have Inuyasha and Ranma 1/2 (officially translated!) volumes in my room right now that were sold mirrored because the US audience at the time had never encountered right-to-left reading styles. Never. The first non-mirrored I got (a DBZ volume) I ended up reading entirely backwards because I didn't know, even though it had arrows at the top to orient me!

We were delighted when things started getting official translations, because that also meant official merch! It meant we could reimburse the creators of series that had touched our hearts!

And now this shit.

It's Netflix all over again. I can't believe I'm old enough to remember when Netflix was good, but here we are. Here we fucking are. Anime fans have done mind-boggling shit to get our hands on releases of our favorite series, and in this era... yeah. Crunchyroll and Funimation can look forward to a rapid collapse, if they're lucky.

Oh…. Well, it’s over for Crunchyroll I guess

[omegasmileyface]

i completely understand (and encourage) hesitancy and distrust of image generation ML (AI) and seeking more regulation and talking abt its use to further deny artists the ability to get by on their work, and i dont think you should like it, but... im very worried when ppl say they consider it "stealing". it detects patterns in data (the data being the pixels in the pictures and the words in their metadata such as the titles), and determines "this pattern is more likely to happen under these conditions, and this other one if more likely to happen under these other conditions..." etcetera, lots and lots and lots of times. and then when it generates an image, it follows the likelihoods it counted out earlier. how does that constitute stealing? if "using a certain color/shape/composition/whatever element with the same likelihood that several artists do" is stealing (or, worse, plagiarism, which has a VERY specific definition that isn't this), then.. what isn't? how do you feel about artists who learn by copying eye shapes? artists who follow coloring tutorials by others? the people trying to reconstruct Johannes Vermeer's artistic process even though he kept it secret out of fear of stolen valor? artists drawing based off things theyve seen before but never asked permission to use in the future? artists who post studies of photos someone else took?

remember, it doesnt work anything like a "collage", and if an image generator IS recreating exact pieces of the images in its dataset, that means its not working as intended and has overtrained on a small dataset, which is considered a bad thing. the only thing an image generator (is supposed to) use from its training images is an analysis of how often certain patterns appeared.

i don't think there aren't issues of respect/credit in using something as part of training data, but i dont think using a generator as described above constitutes "stealing" the art used in the dataset. if it does, then i think the other things i've listed in the first paragraph must also count as stealing, right? and that feels like a very hostile and capitalist mindset to have. i think there are problems you can have with image generation that don't require saying you can steal a probability.

please don't encourage stricter copyright, it has historically only been in the benefit of corporations to take rights away from independent artists, which is exactly what we DISLIKE about the ai situation. there is a reason we like open source software and transformative rights and games piracy and copyleft ideals. instead, please encourage protections for artists, like regulations ensuring artists get livable wages regardless of if anyone wants their art. and regulations requiring disclosure that something is machine generated. and regulations restricting how much energy can be used by non-essential processes/industries. not stronger laws about idea-property, ok?

in other words, attempting to turn matters of respect (such as how you're an asshole if you post someone's art without asking but if you copy-paste someone's nft you're based. it's the same action, and it shows disrespect both ways, but the latter is someone it's fine to not respect) into law is very difficult, and if it is codified, it is pretty much always strengthened and used by large companies exploiting people for profit, because they have lawyers and publicity teams, and never used for the benefit of individuals, who get ignored or paid off.