#I suddenly got to understand a lot more

[hazbinbabbling4ever]

Ok I was re-watching the last scene of ep6 and I feel like the light of understanding dawned on me, how did I miss so much nuance the first few watches??? Aziraphale and Crowley literally were saying 2 different things: Crowley wants to run from Heaven and Hell ("both toxic"),but Aziraphale only understands that he wants to run away as usual, he doesn't understand Crowley loves him (even Crowley didn't realize it until 5 minutes before).

Not at first. That confession is a mess and from a communicative pov, quite a fail. Basically Crowley is saying "we've always been a team, let's keep being a team by running away like Gabe and Beez run away from their responsibilities". That's what Aziraphale understands, he's so confused when Crowley says "We're a group, a team, an us". That has to be the dumbest (affectionate) confession I've ever seen actually, is he confessing or hyping his team right before a big match?

Aziraphale doesn't understand the love behind the "love confession": he probably still thinks Crowley thinks of him as a "friend" and he still wants him by his side. He loves him so much that he is ready to go back to Heaven and offers him what he thinks is the thing Crowley wants the most: become an angel again. From Az's pov, that's the best thing he could ever give him. Crowley, his nice, dear Crowley, finally safe and happy again. They can finally be safe, together, doing good, making a difference. But Crowley is throwing it all to the wind, choosing to stay a demon instead of choosing Aziraphale and "good, light". Az considers himself to be the good in their "us". Crowley is refusing good, Heaven, him. It stings, that refusal, feels like a betrayal of all those 6000 years where they helped and protected each other. Crowley is always saving him, but is refusing to be saved.

"We could have been us, you idiot". Aziraphale doesn't understand, because the kind of us Crowley was proposing was the same thing of 6000 years. Yes, a beautiful agreement, companionship in their loneliness, but also forced to hide from Hell and Heaven so they don't get killed. Hiding, running away, always a breath away from being together, but never together, because they're so fundamentally apart, demon and angel, always separated by this big rift. That for a moment seemed adjustable, but now no more.

He's not expecting a kiss. He's shocked beyond everything imaginable: he loves Austen, sensible romances, people having misunderstandings but in the end, agreeing and seeing it eye to eye, a sensible marriage/union, chosen together over shared goals/ideals. A kiss is, if anything, the seal of that agreement, the culmination of all that sensible, old timey wooing stuff. Instead, Crowley just rejected the best offer and he's tempting him again, like that night when he offered him the meat and he thought he'd be a fallen angel, after that. But this time he's offering so much more. Something Aziraphale has probably denied himself for centuries. Come with me: you will have me. But choose me, not heaven. It's lonely. It's us. Our own side.

Did he actually understand what Crowley meant? Or is he just hearing "you have to come with me on my own terms and completely give up heaven, the good side and possibly yourself, possibly at the cost of Falling"? Which is also what Aziraphale is asking Crowley: "renounce to who you are and you can be with me, doing good, eradicating the part that is now you forever". A different Falling, a reverse Fall. An ascension to light, pureness, good (very interesting choice of poses, btw).

It's all this and a lot more: there's pride, there's prejudice, there's 2 people who see things differently and have a lot of problems, they're "never saying what they're really thinking" (like Maggie said). Like that night preparing for the West End:

Aziraphale: "thank you for saving my books (why do you keep saving me and being so nice to me?)" Crowley: "shut up (Don't make me say it)". Crowley: "Cheers for getting me off the hook (are you just doing this out of the agreement, for yourself, for me?)" Aziraphale: "Oh don't hank me (don't say it out loud), that's what... friends... are for (we'll always be there for each other, like always, we just can't say it more explicitly than this, me and you, angel and demon, forever bound to suffer because of our natures).

Saying what they really think, for once. That way they could have actually discovered all the things that transpired in the final discussion... a little sooner? Before the Megatron came into the picture meddling, muddling the waters? Who knows.

[cfffrk]

+ little bonus

I think I accidentally created their son instead of Jeeves when I was drawing the first frame😭

[kacievvbbbb]

Honestly despite my feelings about how the last arc of MHA went down I really love Deku and his story.

I just feel like a lot of the time we get these protagonists whose whole philosophy is it doesn’t matter what you were born as everyone can achieve greatness. But then the series goes on and it turns out that actually it DOES matter because the protagonist has this really great lineage and these really great powers you can only have through birth they were actually born born, predestined if you will, to do this.

But MHA actually sticks to its guns. Midoriya wasn’t revealed to have some great connection to all might that the universe had put in place. He wasn’t defended from some great lineage that makes him uniquely suited to this. Hell All for one didn’t even turn out to be his father, there was no hidden powerful quirk he was always meant to have. He was just Midoriya Izuku a boy who was in the right place at the right time and simply decided to act while the world did nothing. And that’s what really made him a hero.

I don’t know, maybe it’s just me, but I believe him a bit more when he goes anybody can be a hero if you just decide to act

[no-light-left-on]

resisting the urge to write an essay about how the changes in the void and the outsider make narrative sense and pick at every detail of the depictions and what it means for the story

[0fps]

really loving wuwa so far, it still lags a bit here and there but it kinda feels like it just has to marinate for a while? first 10 minutes are painful but after it seems like it has its assets cached or something and it isn't as much a problem anymore. it also looks like kuro games has been working overtime putting in patch fixes asfdjlkadfsj god speed to the devs fr

[sheyshen]

before i went to the hospital today i decided to just afk out on vincent with a dance emote going (cause i always think that's cute when people do it) and right before i left someone whispered me asking if i'm married to gaius (vincent's last name is baelsar in game) and when i said yes they went "nice! i ship it! :D" and man did that make my day.

[nexus-nebulae]

i always really like how i can slowly pick up words as i listen to a language more and more. I'm learning japanese by accident

[bmpmp3]

the epic highs and lows of trying to read an ongoing shounen manga

[inf1nyxw0rlds]

i love complexity. except of course if it's about me . hope that helps

[tortademaracuya]

.

[rearranging-deck-chairs]

i think the villa diodati speech probably had a big effect on how yaz approached the doctor in flux and after

[abimee]

quite literally there is too much to say and pick apart about Tock in endwalker and the fact that her bullshit lore i just made up for the sillies wounded up aligning with canon concepts and therefore what went from ''silly child with accordion hears the songs in others heart'' became ''entelechy child singer of hope meets with the singer of despair at the end of the universe and gets through to her in a way that nobody else ever could"

[neverendingford]

.

[orcelito]

also. what they dont tell you about being a sorcerer (5) bard (1) is that

you get a F U C K ton of spells

[navree]

there's a lot of reasons why that titans show wanting to do batfam specific arcs, especially death in the family/under the red hood, flopped so hard each time, but one of the biggest is that they basically brought jason back after, like, a fucking month and it basically negates the entire thing

[nothorses]

I was talking with my dad recently & we got on the topic of People Thinking They Can't Do Things, and like, he is at his core a well-intentioned person who genuinely wants the best for others, but he has definitely internalized some harmful ideas a la "anyone can do anything, the only thing stopping them is their own attitude". so I was like. I see where you're coming from, but let me tell you a story.

last year, I worked with 10 year olds- many of whom had never really spent time outdoors- in an outdoor education program where they came to spend a whole week doing shit outside in nature. the top two scariest experiences for these kids were 1) very tall metal tower, and 2) walking outside at night in the dark with no flashlights.

I tried a lot of different things to persuade them all to join me for each experience: I presented it with enthusiasm and passion, I did physical demonstrations and scientific explanations to help them understands how safe it was, I voiced my absolute commitment to their safety, I invited them to brainstorm ways to help each other and themselves feel safe, etc.

generally I always had at least 2-3 kids out of about 10 who opted out, or if they did join me, would spend the entire experience crying and freaking out. when it was over, they would conclude that even though they did not die- or even get hurt- it was so scary that it wasn't worth it and they never wanted to do it again.

then I changed the question I asked. instead of asking them to tell me whether they could do it or couldn't do it, I asked them to raise their hand for one of three options:

You can definitely do this.

It will be hard or scary or uncomfortable, but you can try to do this.

It will definitely be too hard, scary, or uncomfortable, and you cannot or should not try to do this.

suddenly, almost nobody was opting out of these experiences.

they would try, even if they were scared, because they know that being scared didn't necessarily mean that they couldn't do it at all. and more importantly, they knew that if they needed to stop, that was an option; they weren't trapped in their decision to try.

and the real takeaway here, for me, is in the nuance: people need to be able to challenge themselves and to be uncomfortable in order to grow, and people need to be able to opt out in order for opting in to be a safe option.