#I think it would be pretty neat to play someone who is “allies” with the bad guy

[skyloftian-nutcase]

TotK DLC idea!

The screen is black. You don’t hear anything for a long time. Then, faintly, in the distance, you can hear it.

Link. Link. Open your eyes.

While the line echoes familiarity, the voice does not.

Or. Well. It does. Because while it isn’t Zelda, it’s a familiar man’s voice speaking gently, so gently you almost don’t recognize it because there’s no way he ever spoke like this in the main game.

But he is now. And instead of a golden light being the first image you see before the screen shows Link awakening… you see gloom floating in the air. The image cuts to a Hylian waking up who… doesn’t look like Link from TotK?? He’s different, still small in stature, with slightly tanner skin, platinum light blonde hair, and red eyes. But… something’s wrong with his forehead. There’s a weird line on it.

This new character you apparently are gonna be playing in the DLC blearily blinks his eyes open, clearly groggy and too weak to really move. But then that line on his forehead moves a hair, it splits apart, and you realize it’s a freaking eye, red and yellow and it’s like the ones on gloom hands and oh gosh what the hell is it doing on his forehead—

Link realizes something is off and his eyes blow wide, his hands reach for his forehead and he screams in agony and terror, only for someone to scoop him into a hug to soothe him.

And suddenly you realize why that voice was eerily familiar.

It’s Ganondorf. He resurrected you from the era of the Imprisoning War. You, who have a history with him and his family. You, who he wants to protect, who he views as his kid, who he calls a prince and says he’ll keep you safe by controlling your body with his dark magic if he has to.

Welcome to Tears of the Kingdom: Hero’s Shadow.

You have to play a long gone Hero who was resurrected. Ganondorf, who is still recovering his strength in preparation for killing the current Hero, tasks you with finding your betrothed, his daughter, as well as his wife. They’re buried somewhere in the Depths like you were. He wants you to find their burial sites so he can use his secret stone to resurrect them like he did you, and control them as well. Which is doubly bad when you realize his wife was the original Sage of Lightning. He gives you free reign to wander once you go through a tutorial (he tests you to see if you’ve recovered enough strength), because he knows you love wandering and collecting things. Your own personal objective, however, is trying to help Hyrule from the Depths, to break free from Ganondorf’s control, because Link would rather set himself on fire than let Ganondorf resurrect and control the love of his life and his mother-in-law. Your best hope is to find shards of the shattered Master Sword to try and stab the eye on Dark Link’s forehead and break the control Ganondorf has on you. Until you can, though, the monsters are your allies, you can teleport across the Depths by manifesting out of the gloom created by gloom hands (just like what Phantom Ganon does), and the world below is your oyster. If you get too close to sword shards when gloom hands are nearby, Ganondorf can see your attempt and immediately takes control of your body, and no matter what button you press Link just walks back to Ganondorf’s location and stays there until you get a chance to try again.

You start with three hearts, all empty looking like when gloom hurts you, and if you get injured they just shatter. Whenever they all shatter, you respawn at Ganondorf’s location because his gloom hands came and rescued you from dying. The only way you can get more hearts is by collecting poes and offering them to the statues in the Depths. You can communicate with the spirits of soldiers, who may give you combat tips or info about the area. If you gain enough of Ganondorf’s trust, he’ll let you command monsters, and he might even let you wander the Surface (under his supervision) during a blood moon.

You learn of Link’s and Ganondorf’s history through discovering ancient relics/texts that trigger memories. This connection between you and Ganondorf stems back to time before the war, well over ten thousand years ago. Link was engaged to Ganondorf’s daughter, but during the Imprisoning War the family fought against the demon king. Ganondorf did love his family, but he loved power more. Link sacrificed himself, letting himself get mortally wounded to save Rauru from a killing blow. Gan held him as he died, and it allowed Link to both beg him to stop and stab him in the heart with a light shard. The shard didn’t kill him, but it was what Rauru connected with when he hit him in the chest, allowing him to seal Ganondorf away. Ganondorf still wants the world, but his love for his family is still present, though now twisted, so he thinks he can control Link and everyone else with his dark magic in order to keep them safe and in line. Once the threat of the current Hero is eliminated, the world will be his, and his family will be safe. As such, he treats you, Link, the player, like a stubborn child, reeling you in, but does so in a horrific way, torturing Link by controlling him.

You have to break free of this and stop him, and the only hope you have is the distant call of a sword spirit…

[ghosty-elle-thingz]

ooooh for ur epic au i love the idea of the other winners as the gods! i think scott - aphrodite works really well with his focus on the social aspect of the game, and martyn - ares fits too bc of mean gills, and him just generally being pretty aggressive! cleo - hephaestus is a good match for personality and watcher!grian - zeus absolutely fucks. pearl and scar don’t fit as neat with apollo or hera, but i do know scar would absolutely rock the disco look lmao

Honestly yeah you are pretty much spot on with what I was thinking

Grian as Zeus: Watcher, maker of the games, first winner as the technical eldest god, “thunder bringer” smites Scott to end Last life

Cleo as Hephaestus: “Trust is not given its forged….. he sacrificed his own cohorts” loyal to their day one allies until they do something to break that trust (most notably Big B killing her in last life) and fire (arson)

Martyn as Ares: literally what you said about Mean gills and Martyn in the life series in general, the ending of limlife is so Ares coded

Those were the ones I was absolutely sure of

For Aphrodite I was between Scott and Pearl

Scott because as you said, he is very social in the games and is one to love his allies wholeheartedly (man can’t go one season without sacrificing himself to a friend when he is able to) plus one head canon I’ve seen is that the watchers are unable to feed on Scott because he’s just so full of love for his allies (flower husbands, the healing GGGs, mean gills, etc) but even love can be ruthless when need to be

Pearl on the other hand is more so the opposite focusing more on how she knows the pain of being alone “but let her die of a broken heart… let him feel the pain that his mother felt and rot” the winner of double life, the one series where everyone was meant to have someone, she was scorned by everyone around, rejected by her bound, called wicked by people who could have been friends and in the end died without her one true companion, Tilly. But in the same with the following games, she is in a way “healing”. From then on she is never alone (nosey neighbors, mounders, 4Gs and the adopted strays) and makes sure her allies know that she will stand with them

Scar I did have trouble with placing him but honestly him as Hera is a fantastic idea. Like Hera in god games comes off as very carefree in a way but still a threat which is kind of how Scar plays the games (I’m mainly thinking of wild life with the bamboozlers and the rollercoaster) plus the “never once has he cheated in his wife” makes me think of Athena!Gem saying that and Scar just gets flashbacks to double life and the “secret soulmates” which becomes infinitely more funny/angsty since Grian is Zeus

Plus yes he would absolutely rock the disco look I mean just look at his limited life skin

But yeah Apollo is the one I can’t really place with a life winner

[tired-enby-thats-obsessed]

Been thinking about Dragon Age Inquisition.

Specifically, Trespasser and how it just absolutely rips the soul from your body.

Massive spoilers ahead.

It is a slow, foreboding march.

Even when I played it the first time, their were two inevitable conclusions that loomed over the story.

Solas did this. (Something that's actually pretty nicely foreshadowed. Don't get me wrong, I would absolutely crack the egghead open if given the chance, but he is a brilliant character.)

The second is that the Inquisition isn't politically convenient anymore. And that only ends one way. (That's made obvious by the fact that the Inquisitor either has the relinquish all power or let the the powers that be have final say.)

And every interaction along the main story, just fills you with more dread. It becomes more and more apparent that there isn't a good ending here.

This is what happens after you got the 'good ending', where everything was wrapped in a neat bow. The thoughts about probable implications for the holy war you started just are swept away.

The best part about Trespasser is that it claws you back into an epilogue where you have to face those implications.

Given the Dragon Age world and universe, it actually seems a lot more like the ending we should've gotten in the first place.

In fact that's the worst thing about Trespasser, is that the true ending/epilogue to the game was put behind a fucking paywall. (and new game plus because god EA is a dogshit company)

There's also just an air of finality. This is the last time the Inquisitor is going to be around their inner circle, so you're all the more compelled to see everyone's dialogue and really take in the downtime. Because you know that by continuing your heading towards the destruction of everything you've built up for the last 40-60 hours.

Your companions have other things they need to pursue, they promise they'll provide whatever aide they can to help the Inquisitor find Solas, but the quiet part.

The unspoken trade off, is that means the amount of allies the Inquisitor actually has side by side with them, dwindles each time they're promised the nebulous all aide that can be offered.

Then Solas takes the last thing he can. I fully believe he intended for the Inquisitor to die after ripping the anchor from them. He only paused the reaction killing them, so he could have one last opportunity to justify his actions, in hopes that person he was about to murder in cold blood didn't think him a monster.

And there's the opportunity to give him exactly that.

If promised that he can be changed and it doesn't have to be like this. Then everything he's done, the skulls he's crushed, and the bodies he has left to bury, were all for a higher, greater cause, and even one of the people, or the person he betrayed most, in some small way can see that.

If promised, he will be defeated. That changes nothing, that prospective comes from someone that simply can't see reason and barely a threat worth considering.

Either way, he leaves the Inquisitor to die, to be consumed by the very magic he helped create, one final act of betrayal that it wouldn't even pass his mind to rectify.

The thanks, the celebration, the accolades after that.

After your Inquisitor had lost who they were to be a religious martyr for a god and a country they might not even believe in.

After they potentially save the lead monarchy.

After they purged the world of the apocalypse that literally scarred the sky.

After defeating lost legends and long dead gods.

After stopping yet another war from breaking out.

After having their arm severed from their body because the people around them couldn't handle the thought of them dying forgotten in such a place.

They have to walk into a room of people who have hated them and every god damn thing they have stood for since the start.

There is no hesitation in being handed the entire list of the things you and your inquisition have done to piss these people off.

A complete bombardment, the full intention to spell out every good deed that will not go unpunished.

Finally there is that ultimatum.

Do you keep the Inquisition's forces with direct and full communication with both governments, that barely get along at the best of times. And face complete military retaliation if you step a single foot out of line.

Or.

Do you disband the Inquisition. Let the world take the very last thing it can from you. Give into the final set of demands made, and hope that the bonds with allies made will be strong enough to survive complete, willful annihilation.

The closing scene is the Inquisitor in a room and dagger in a map, pointed to Solas, Tevinter.

Then there's my Inquisitor. Salmon.

A Dalish Elf. An archer. Iron Bull's lover.

All of these things just add to the tragedy of this ending.

He always promises to kill Solas. It's just what needs to happen.

The game, and surrounding dragon age lore, makes it pretty clear that Lavellan doesn't really have a place back with their clan. They've strayed to far. Gotten to involved in human politics for the clan to be anything but a target if they were to return.

Even if the keeper welcomed them back, the act of returning would in itself be irresponsible.

Then there's the lost of an arm.

Apart for the general rehabilitation that would need to take place, an archer specifically, would lose just another piece of their identity.

Sure Salmon would preserve with another weapon, but he would never be able to use a bow again, something he's probably had with him from birth.

And then Iron Bull. Another thing made clear is that Iron Bull doesn't bring the Inquisitor along for a far amount of the mercenary trips. Even in the base game ending, this is true.

(This is the one thing thing I also know to be confirmed in Veilguards)

So he probably spends months, by himself, learning how to fight again, using whatever connections he has, focused on the one goal of finding Solas, just so he has a fleeting chance to kill him.

It's just so sad to think about.

Trespasser is a depressing, miserable, spiteful, loathsome experience if you cared about this game. Which I clearly do.

And I haven't even gotten into the whole 'the elven gods are the only true gods and thus centuries of oppression and hate were over complete falsehoods' and what that means for any of the Inquisitors.

And yet, it has got to be one of the best endings to a game I have experienced.

It was a crash grab. I'm not even going to deny that. It was the entire set up to selling a fourth instalment.

However it felt like dragon age. All of the other games had similar themes for the endings, where yes, you saved the world, but at what cost?

There was always that effort to make you think of the sacrifices you had to make in order to get that far. And I think Trespasser just did a really good job of that, by literally stripping the Inquisitor of everything they cared about.

You can't even marry Cassandra if you help her achieve her dream of being Divine.

Even if you romanced Iron Bull, he'll still betray you if you didn't do the Charger's mission, or let them die in said mission.

Dorian is going to Tevinter and you can't follow.

And then there's the fucking Solas romance.

And that's top tier. I adore the fact that there isn't a happy ending here.

It makes subsequent playthroughs a lot more interesting, in the fact that making certain decisions that seem like the right thing only ends in fucking you over more in Trespasser.

So do you play, in a way that makes the Inquisition's death sentencing a little easier, or do you go through in spite of it.

That your inquisitor is going to end up stripped of all personal identity, so should they do the best with the one they're given. Or lash out and make it everyone's problem, because they won't be remembered as who they are, and depending on your choice in Trespasser, they probably won't be remembered as the Inquisitor.

I don't really know how to end this whole rant.

But do keep in mind if any of this changed or was recontexualised, or was just reconned in Veilguards, I don't have knowledge of that.

I haven't played Veilguards, I don't plan to, so I'm not familiar with any of that game's canon/lore. And to be fair both DA O and DA 2 are more like hazy memories to me at this point as well.

So yeah, I just wanted to rant about Trespasser and how it pretty much making the rest of the game redundant or that it meant nothing, actually worked here.

[mtqcomic]

Hi there! I just read through the whole archive, and I wanted to say — this comic is *incredible.* I'm really impressed you've kept it going so long, I love your character design and your character writing, I'm incredibly excited to see where the story goes, and I love where it's gone so far!

You're also exceptionally good at the simple style you've taken up, your skill at building in Terraria really shines, and it was really cool to see your art grow and develop. Lastly, I love the way you've been playing with Terraria's world; you've really made it your own, without feeling like it's just someone's original setting with some recognizable nouns slapped on. (Also, you're conlanging, which is a), insane, and b), really cool.)

For a couple specific things I like/liked:

Mysta truly feels like a Terraria PC. yeah sure cave time! yayyyy Oh we're doing things now? Neat! — but she's also interesting as a character, not just heehoo sillyfuntimes

Eth is a wonderful example of someone struggling with their loyalties; he does really feel like he's fundamentally allied with the idea of the Order that he joined, but he's having to deal with the fact that he might be more of that idea than they are. It's great. Also I love a guy making unwise deals with mysterious demons

I am, sadly, horrible with names. sorry. I don't remember more of them that said: I love the way that even the a little more minor characters all feel like people with enough characteristics not to just be flat and boring, but they're all distinctively written and feel like themselves.

Can I compliment your building skills? I'm gonna compliment your building skills again. everyone's houses are so great

The Dryad is a really fun character; I particularly like the world building detail that dryads in general only really work well in pure areas. She feels like she's incredibly understandably bitter towards the Order, and also that the health of their world is more important than grudges. Her mysterious plots are also very fun.

The previous Terrarian is great, from what little we've gotten to see of him! Love it when characters cheat death. Love it when characters are doing god knows what with unwise corruptive forces.

Barian. How did you get yourself into this situation old man. Again: big fan of characters making disconcerting pacts. (Sidebar: fun of you to make your dealmakers called sorcerers instead of just D&Ding it) what did you make a deal with to obliterate that worm Is That Why You're Here Now. Also thank you for giving that old man his ominous magic in the forefront he deserves it

The dryad he's working with is also very fun! Not sure I've seen enough of xem to know exactly what the deal there is. But xey (sorry if I'm mixing up the pronouns) seem neat, and I like how you're using them for a little world building detail without needing to exposit everything

Speaking of worldbuilding: yours is very fun. I mentioned it earlier but I'm saying it again

also the art. still really good

That's not it but I think Tumblr may kill me if I keep going and I am failing to pull more details out of my brain

good comic thanks please keep writing it

Hey woah wow thanks so much!!! I'm gonna keep re-reading this for a while <3

I've been at this for a long time now, and I've come a long way! It can get pretty demoralizing to work on something that so few people would ever care about, but getting a message like this really helps me keep going.

While the story plan and worldbuilding has changed a lot from the early days, I've got a really solid direction now, and I promise I do know the answers to all the weird questions I keep raising. As long as there's someone out there who cares, I won't stop writing!

[violent-backed-starling]

Pairings/Groups I would like to see in the Life Series.

Grian & Cleo: They can both be extremely chaotic and murder-happy but they can also just be someone exhausted parent. I think they could really cause some trouble together.

Team Piss (Pearl, Impulse, Skizz, and Scott): Listen, the acronym is funny also putting two dynamic duos together really works. Imp and Skizz is a classic and Pearl and Scott work either really well or are batshit insane together. Also Imp and Pearl are also another awesome duo, so this is a very skilled team, two former winners an angel and a devil. I love that for them.

Scar & Big B: Cookie boys!!! Listen I just think it would be neat and they could live in a cookie themed flying saucer, raining down tnt minecarts and arrows onto anyone within range.

Jimmy, Cleo, and Ren: This would be fun okay. Ren and Cleo get on pretty well and I think adding Jimmy to them would be awesome. You know Ren is gonna be dramatic as hell and that he would have a blast playing around with having Jimmy as like a squire or something where he eventually gets promoted. Then Cleo could look on at her two dumbasses just like she did in Limited Life.

GIGS: I just love the phasmo-boys. Listen is it is the dads and their idiots sons. I think this would be a great way to work in the desert duo but in a way where Scar has several people looking out for him and Grian is allowed to go buckwild and isn't feeling like he has to be responsible all the time. Skizz and Scar could go out at do some bonding by murdering enemies when they're both on red and Grian and Impulse can cause insane tnt explosions.

Pearl, Lizzie, Jimmy, & Grian: This is the ultimate sibling energy team okay? Seablings, sky siblings, Jimmy and G, they are just siblings your honor. I think this team would bully each other mercilessly but heaven help whomever decides to hurt one. I am sure that they would accidentally kill each other though.

Martyn, Skizz, Scar, & Impulse: Team SIMS would rock. Martyn is scary competent and would contribute. Scar is a great shot and could probably run a brilliant scam to get their team resources. Skizz would keep the team together and be a source of comedy as always. Impulse is for sure the team dad and is setting up traps and could probably win a season. This is a power team and I just think they'd be neat. There hasn't been a Martyn and Scar team up and I think it would rock.

Grian & Tango: I think these two would be unstoppable! Also The explosions would be fantastic. You know that they would be a chaotic force for evil and I love that for them <3

Joel & Ren: Wolf boys okay. I think that Joel would be feral for any teammate and something about Ren makes his allies absolutely insane. This team up would fucking rock and that is that.

Tango & Joel: Listen Tango could work well with someone who loves and is so utterly loyal to their teammates that they would die for them permanently. That someone is Joel through and through. I think that they could go far together and maybe Tango would get a more impactful death story-wise.

Lizzie & Jimmy: Seablings! She'll be Jim's scary big sister and he can be her sopping wet cat of a younger brother. They are just so sibling ya know.

[twisted-kratts]

Now that my WK Villain OC's are out of the way, what do you think of my WK Allies OC's?

Michael Pyrceham - similar to Aviva and Koki in that he is heavily science and tech savvy and similar to Jimmy in that he does like to play out video games. He has a Tony Stark style intellect, despite him a middle-low class family, able to turn pieces of scrap into functional machines.

Faith Sunwalker - the team's medical expert and veterinarian. She is kind and gentle, having a strong set of morals and very zealous about the Hippocratic Oath, even if said zeal gets her into trouble sometimes. Because she comes from a Navajo reservation in Nevada, she does have extensive knowledge of various Native American histories, mythologies, and traditions.

Z3K3 and J3RR1 - robots that Michael and Faith both made together during their shared college tenures, they help both them and the rest of the Wild Kratts crew in any way they can, even if it means doing field work with the Kratt Brothers and helping Aviva with experiments. Z3K3 is the only one who speaks fluently while J3RR1 can only speak through memes and references from various movies, TV shows, video games, and audiobooks.

Let's do this cracks my knuckles and regrets it immediately

About Michael Abigal: "Oh we could get along, but I doubt we would currently unless I listen to ethics (never) or he stops listening to them which probably won't happen" Kita: "Seems chill I guess but eh I do wonder what secrets he got in that head of his" Charles: ". . .Do I care not really" Mateo: "Come on Charles, I think his stuff is neat" JT: "He's probably less likely to make some strange thing that horrifies most people" Abigal: "The last one didn't try to eat someone that's progress"

About Faith Abigal: "Oh she's like an ethics committee, ignorable" Kita: "Oh a goody two shoes, huh, yeah me and her won't get along ever" Charles: "She's probably too annoying when it comes to patching someone up, but I respect her knowledge of where she's from" Mateo: "Oh she sounds nice, if not a bit much I guess" JT: "She has skills, but the zealous part will probably be an issue, I'm sure I'm better than her in the medical part, especially when dealing with these maniacs"

About Z3K3 and J3RR1 Abigal: "Oh my interest is piqued and I wish to see how these work, heck I might even fix the issue with the other one" Kita: "I wonder if they recorded anything interesting in their memories. . .Hey, Charles what do you think of the l33T speak robot!" Charles: "Any artificial thing made by humans is a waste of time and energy that you could do with anything else with said time and energy" Kita: Sounds about right for youMateo: "I find the one who speaks in memes pretty funny" JT: "Seriously you have one that speaks like movie bumblebee from Transformers"

Overall thoughts Abigal: "I think i'd have fun dealing with Z3K3 and J3RR1 hehe" Kita: "I guess they might have something interesting to look into but eh" Charles: "I don't generally care for them" Mateo: "I think they'd be cool to hang with. . .not much else after" JT: "They're skilled and helping a version of our counterparts, I would be rather pleased to work with them if things aligned but no and I'm fine with that"

[hn-undercover-9503]

Who's all part of Ren's crew? Obviously, the Red Army members but are Impulse and Joel there? They were part of Dogwarts in one way or another. Any Hermits or just Life Series Members?

That one is a lot less clear haha

I don't think Ren would have a very big crew necessarily, but I don't think he would be comfortable in the Grand Line with, say...only five people like a certain SOMEONE lmao He would definitely want at least 10-15 people on his crew before crossing the Calm Belt, but of those people I don't really know who all they'd be besides maybe a few hermits like False and Doc? But even that doesn't really work because the nature of their dynamic kind of necessitates that Ren be not very close with the rest of his crew

A pretty major part of the original Third Life is how Martyn is sort of Ren's first real ally, and I'd like that to carry over, so I also like the thought of his crew being made up of background characters, at least until the Village people come into the picture, and eventually the main Dogwarts team would form to be probably something like the Commanders of Whitebeard's crew, but on a much smaller scale

That's one aspect of the story I haven't really tackled just yet, and ideally Ren would be alone when he meets Martyn for their dynamics to play out according to 3L, but that doesn't make any sense in context so...generic background crew it is? Could be a neat opportunity for some cameos I suppose :D

Go wild!!

[llycaons]

ep49 (1/3): a shocking numbers of fans watched this scene where jgy cried a lot and fully swallowed his excuses. guys. guys.

oh wwx is annoyed as hell that jgy is dodging responsibility for everything he's done when he, wwx, never once denied his actions and bore the full weight of them and then some

more evidence for my 'jgy actively encourages lxc's crush even though he has no intention of ever reciprocating because it grants him power over him' hc!!!!!

oh jeex lxc looks like shit. I mean I guess he's had a rough couple of days. look at those eyes bags

lxc: I'm not your sworn brother anymore. jgy (realizing he's losing his grip on lxc): NOOOOO 😭😭😭😭😭

okay to be fair I'm sure there is some genuine grief for losing the friendship and camaraderie of the one person who has always vouched for him, saved his life, supported him, etc. lxc was a wonderful friend and a powerful, steadfast ally. wasted on jgy!

you can practically see the forehead vein popping here. I don't think an lxc who fully understands jgy would ever love him. if xiyao is happening in some fic, either jgy is lying or someone's being mischaracterized. not that social factors didn't play a role in the things jgy did, but if you ignore his sadistic and vengeful nature, his willingness to murder innocent people, his unrepentant manipulation and deceptive nature, you're losing a lot of his character. for him to be someone who doesn't hurt others, he'd have to be someone guaranteed safety and respect and a position from birth. but that's so antithetical to his role in canon it wouldn't be the same person anyway

huh. why hasn't jgy tried to harras lwj more? I guess he got what he wanted and beyond lwj sealing himself, there's not much a reaction jgy can provoke

WELL. pretty clear choices here. jgy you could have packed up and fled the country before trying to kill a bunch of people and kidnapping children

lxc: why were you so cruel and murderous??? dude?? jgy: I HAD NO CHOICE BRO 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺 you believe me right??? would it help if I did this 😭😭😭😭

compared to wwx's impassioned, rational, fair defenses of himself and the people he was trying to protect, this is so pathetic. wwx never denied what he did, never dodged responsibility. when he said he had no other choices, it was in defense of innocent people at risk of political persecution and mass murder, not in defense of killing people to maintain his own position, he apologized for the death of jxz and suffered his own death in retribution for even the best things he did

YOU COULD HAVE LEFT!!!! or idk, face up to the consequences of your actions

I am so so sorry to bring the marvel 'cinematic' universe into our beautiful liveblog today but this shot just screamed "Tony, you CHOSE to do that' to me

of course he ~nobly~ doesn't deny it ONCE IT'S ALREADY COME TO LIGHT. but he denied up until the breaking point because he's a slippery eel and it's impossible to get him to face any consequences for his actions!!! if I was lxc I would be exasperated to death too

NEAT FRAMING

ohhh this flashback is so skin-crawling. I really love how deathly pale the robes and jgy's face are. the red of the wedding robes and the decorations are so ominous and omnipresent, like something horrifying about to happen, like something inescapable. the music really adds to the eeriness of the scene

it always hurt so bad that qs was so excited for her wedding night. she was happy! she liked jgy a lot and always respected him and his mother! she was a good and kind and innocent person and she had no IDEA god I feel sick I hate him so much

jgy really never spared a single thought to qs's well-being. it was all about him, and his horror, and his choices, and his position, and the injustices enacted on him. self-centered to the very end. of course he didn't think he had a choice. he would never choose against his own self-interest no matter how many people he hurt. god, qin su should have lived. her suicide was such bullshit

oh my god SUCH bullshit. 'uwu but I worked so hard!' okay yeah I get it's a precarious political situation and the issue isn't even your fault but DUDE. you're placing your own power and ambition higher in importance than this woman's entire life. and you MUST have known you would have murdered any child you two had.

pretty sucky situation all around. shocking idea though. YOU COULD HAVE TOLD QIN SU

jgy truly goes through life as if it was a me-or-them battle for survival in every single situation. in his mind, whoever bore the burden here would be the one destroyed, and he never would choose his own destruction. and it does make sense based on his environment and upbringing. god, he's such a good villain. none of this at all excuses his actions ofc, but it's an extremely compelling and powerful motivator for a villain hell-bent on surviving, viewing every situation as battle to the death, and fully buying into being viewed as the victim of every scenario

another contrast to wwx! wwx hates being seen as someone who was hurt. he dislikes being viewed as weak or vulnerable in any way by his enemies (and often his allies), and the way he wins battle and arguments is though either his power or his own honesty. for someone who omits key information and lowkey manipulates many of his loved ones, his straightforward arguments are more often than not the complete truth

in case we needed a reminder of his active sadism at work. who gaf about his dad but those poor women were treated as murder weapons and then mass murdered themselves

oh I do not like this slap scene, and I'm glad lxc is horrified by it as well. the exposure of jgy's crimes has never retroactively justified the classism and oppression he fought against, nor does it grant permission to his social superiors to treat him like they're inherently better than him, such as with this slap

[rottenbrainstuff]

BG3 playthrough - THE END

I finished my run a few days ago actually - I’ve been letting it simmer in my noggin for a bit. I made myself a fancy dinner with a nice dessert and a bottle of wine, and I sat down and officially finished my run. Spoilers:

So I left off right after I gathered my allies. Heading in to the big courtyard fight, there is an insight check to be able to convince the fleeing city watch that they should fight with you. Nothing I could do could make me pass that check. I realize that I RP my tav as being pretty wise, but his wisdom is actually quite low. I checked my party to see who would be the best to attempt to roll this and was shocked to see that ASTARION was in fact the wisest in my group. Party of dumbasses. His wisdom was 14 but even that wasn’t high enough to get the check, I couldn’t pass it and got tired of reloading. OH WELL.

For that big courtyard fight - I was quickly feeling overwhelmed by the size of the area and the amount of enemies. The allies are nice, but you can only summon one every turn. I wasn’t feeling very good. Then I got the idea to send Astarion through by himself, with his amazing dark urge invisibility cape that he’s had since the beginning of act one, and had him run around picking off one-shotable enemies to make things a bit more manageable. It all reminded me a bit of the way back at the grove siege, when I also had him invisible and by himself in the middle of the fray. It was so hilarious watching him run around and pick things off one dude at a time, watch everyone else come rushing in all concerned, but no one able to do a thing about it. He got a really good chunk whittled down before he somehow got spotted, and then the real fight began.

I think this is the one big area where you’re supposed to bring out all the allies… there actually really aren’t too many other opportunities after this. I didn’t summon anyone for the run up the stairs because I assumed the NPC AI wouldn’t be smart enough to stay out of the nautiloid targeting, and the enemies weren’t challenging anyway. I might reload the courtyard fight and play a bit more with it and see what happens when you call more allies. The only ones I ended up calling were the hellriders - I tried the harpers cause someone said they were good here, but damn they have such low HP and they spawn in such a terrible area? The hellriders were a bit more durable. Plus yay - fighting with Zevlor again! And he’s got his paladin spells back!

While Astarion was doing his sneaky murder job, I had the rest of my party hidden in a corner. Once he was spotted, I had everyone run out and join the fight. I realized once the fight was completely over that I had forgot all about Gale, and he stayed hidden in the corner the whole time. Coward!

Big ol’ brain fight - this was so hard and yet somehow easier than I thought it would be as well? Somehow my summoned deva who almost never fucking lands his hit EVER actually landed a smite on the dragon and managed to make it afraid and wow that made a HUGE DIFFERENCE.

SO the dream guardians appear here, if you didn’t ally with the Emperor - so - this was a neat IDEA - I am actually absolutely fascinated with the act 1 dream guardian setup, just the whole concept of this character and how it’s introduced, helpful but also threatening, seductive and also dangerous. I like the idea that each other companion is also being visited by a version tailored specifically to their own desires. And… I feel like the ball as kind of dropped after that. I think after the second encounter, the companions no longer comment at all on the Guardian? Is it still appearing to them? Is it now focusing in only on Tav? Similarly I wish they had stronger reactions when the guardians appear - I feel like it should be compromising to have to face this comfort character in battle. And, why doesn’t the Emperor include your own dream guardian? Like, there are four of them, and none of them were mine, so there’s one here who is an odd man out. It would have been absolutely fucking devastating for me to have to attack my own guardian that I personalized myself and was really attracted to, why did the game miss the opportunity to include that? Myeh. Oh well.

Hm - I just did a google - it seems that the three female guardians are always the same no matter which companions are in your party (unfortunate), and then it sounds as though, for the fourth one, some players are indeed seeing their actual guardian? They are claiming to, anyway. I definitely didn’t - my guardian IS a male tiefling, but mine was a different male tiefling from the one that showed up in the fight. A wiki also says the guardians at the end are not personalized. Interesting? What did you guys see in that fight?

Hey, how do you even get the crown, in the end? I played normally, killed the gross brain, and the crown automatically splashed down into the sea, which suits me fine, but I’m wondering how Gale even gets it to become his silver surfer variant. Do you have to send him up by himself to blow up, then change your mind and take the crown instead? Or something?

We have our big goodbye scene on the docks - I mean I’ve seen this all before, but somehow it hits different when it’s playing on my big computer screen. Huh. I DO agree with you all this time, the game IS pretty cavalier about Astarion’s fate. I know that I’ll see him later on because I’m romancing him, but damn, if I’m not, that’s the last anyone sees of him until the epilogue party, and it makes me sad to think about. I do like his explanation later at the party that he ran because he felt ashamed, this was supposed to be everyone’s big victory moment and here he was suddenly on fire. I find that on brand for him. I just wish everyone had expressed a little concern…

The Epilogue Party: aw, what a nice addition Larian made. I can’t imagine the game just ending at the docks - it would feel so unsatisfying! It was really really nice to have this little denouement moment just to chat with each of them and hear what they’ve been up to, and each one has something so nice to say, it all made me tear up, second time in the game. Each one seems like they’re doing so well now. Shadowheart is enjoying a nice quiet life with her parents as they all deserve, Gale is a teacher, Karlach and Wyll sound like they’re having such a wild adventure, Lae’zel is brokering a historic partnership and said she learned the value of diplomacy from me, Halsin has settled down and is running an orphanage, Jaheira is fussing over her kids. And then Minsc. LMAO so I was wondering who the heck the random dude was by the banquet table, perhaps the caterer? But he seems…… frightened??? And it turns out it’s some random thief that Minsc has been trying to scare straight, who he has, for some reason, brought along with him to the party, lol.

The letters were so nice. It made me so happy to read them. I was… just a little disappointed that Mayrina didn’t mention anything about Kled… maybe she still needs a little time to get over the loss of her husband. I still stubbornly think they will end up together in the future. It was nice to have a letter explaining what Zevlor has been up to, an actual explanation for how he ended up at the battle in act 3.

You know though, I feel like I wish there were more letters. I wish there was one from Thrombo, I wish there was one from Omeluum and Blerg, I know we had the newspaper clipping about Rolan but a letter would have been nice - maybe a funny little story of something weird he found in the tower… would have been nice to hear from Isobel and Aylin, would have been nice to hear more about the city rebuilding from Ulder, I know Barcus talked a little but it would have been nice to have a letter directly from the Gondians, but… most of all, I wish I had more letters from the Tiefling refugees. And just a bigger wrap up with them in general.

I know apparently some players just don’t like them that much, but sorry, I can’t relate - I got very emotionally invested in their story, instantly, and to me, Baldur’s Gate 3 has been specifically about following them on their travels and helping them reach the city. I’m glad to see Rolan settled, I’m glad to read articles about Bex and Danis getting the cafe they wanted, Dammon’s note to Karlach is ABSOLUTELY FREAKING ADORABLE, but man I NEED an update from Cerys, I want to know that everyone is safe and settled. (maybe even that she’s got in contact with Zevlor and they’re trying to patch things up??) I want a letter from Mattis that is just an advertising brochure for an actual shop that he’s set up. I want a letter from Mol saying that she forgives me for killing for patron or something. Doni wrote a letter that you can find in act 1 - I don’t know if this was an oversight - if it’s not, I desperately wish I could have had a letter from him as well. I want a letter from Umi and Ide because they were making me worried in act 3, I want to know how they’re all doing, and if Umi ended up liking his pottery class. Etc Etc Etc.

That’s maybe just me. I was always 100% about the tieflings.

Anyways, I got all the letters it’s possible to get in a good run, but I noticed I was missing a letter from Sebastian, which made me wonder what I did wrong. As far as I know, I did everything I was supposed to? It should have triggered??? And then I realized… Sebastian’s letter talks about how all the freed spawn went into the underdark, how many of them died, some of them just disappeared, and the rest were gathered by Astarion’s spawn siblings and they now live in some ruins.

The reason I didn’t get his letter is because I chose the underdark option when Astarion was asking what we should do next. So, we’re probably in direct contact with Sebastian all the time! We’re the ones who gathered up the spawn, and we don’t need updates, because we’ve been right there for the past six months. I’m glad I figured it out, I liked Sebastian and I was sad not to have the letter I thought was coming.

Tara reminds me of my cat. She was so funny at the party, grumbling about being more comfortable in Gale’s mom’s sitting room. Loved watching her pounce around in camp. If my cat could talk, I think she’d talk like Tara.

And then they all mentioned how they should keep in touch and do this again soon. That hurt my heart. So bittersweet. Being in my 40s, having gone through several different friend groups now… I know……..

They will not keep in touch. They will want to, and they will even try for a while, but in the end they will go their separate ways. It just is not possible to sustain friendships over a large amount of time and space when everyone is doing something so different, when the only thing you have in common now are the things you did in the past. If there’s nothing going forward that brings you together besides that old nostalgia… like… inevitably that’s what happens, sooner or later, that’s just how it works.

And I mean that maybe sounds sad as hell but… somehow it’s also just… one of those bittersweet things that’s also ok. Like death and change. It’s inevitable and it’s sad but it’s also how things go. To me, thinking about that wasn’t like, upsetting and horrible, it was just kind of… wistful. Like aaaah… these “we should get together more often!” conversations, yes, I remember those, so many of those conversations, and then at some point that “we should get together more often!” line becomes the last thing you ever say to that person, because you never see them again. Yep, I know what that’s like.

At least that’s how I interpret it, like I said, being in my 40s and having had this happen over and over and over to me multiple times. Maybe that’s me bringing doom and gloom into something that was supposed to be positive, like my interpretation of the ending of Whisper of the Heart that made my kids sad… just ignore me I guess.

After that is a HALF HOUR OF CREDITS. I know because I sat there and let the whole thing play. I’m going to assume that normal, not-insane people did not do that, so I’ll let you know, first of all it was amazing to see just how many people worked on this game, and then second, a good portion of the credits were thank you messages from various staff to their loved ones, and that was very sweet to read. A large number staff thanked their cats, so I think we all know where the BG3 love of cats comes from.

And after that… I felt legit sad, guys. I’ve been playing this playthrough for about seven months. I really got emotionally invested with my tav, and all their relationships, and all the NPCs and their little stories. I know the game is still here any time I want to start it up again. In fact I have a second tav already ready to go, one that I made months ago but decided to put on hold so I could focus on my main tav. It’s not going to be the same, though. I’ll play my backup tav, and I’d like to play an Astarion origin and see what happens if I make realistic choices, but… is it weird that I would totally, 100% replay this exact tav sometime? Like, just, the exact same stuff all over again?

I’m bummed to be done. Legit bummed. Happy, entertained, amazed, grateful, satisfied, and because I was so thoroughly emotionally invested, I am also bummed. What a great game, how lucky I am to have the chance to play it.

I’m actually going to make one last (?) post a little bit later, ruminating on some more thoughts and my favourite little moments from the game. And this weekend I am attending my city’s comic expo, where I’m hopefully going to get Neil Newbon’s autograph so that’s exciting! To the one or two people who actually read these things I write, lol, thanks for following along.

[goodluckdetective]

A fic idea I pitched a few days ago that I’m considering writing:

So during Infinite Crisis, Dan “hates fun” Didio tried to kill off Dick and was thwarted at the last minute, leading to Kon dying instead. This was a smart move in my opinion as I cannot picture a functional Bruce Wayne in that situation (Jason is back but a crime lord and possibly dead again, he resisted the urge to write the world off because his son is good in this universe only for that son to die, ect, ect) that would be written well. But it did get me considering what would have happened otherwise, if Dick really did die.

First off, I think Bruce would be gone. He’s missing and no one knows if he either he worked himself into an early grave or he just up and vanished. Two of his sons are dead, Batgirl is missing, two Robins died in a month (Dick and Steph) and I think he’s just gonna be too broken to get back up this time, given the surrounding circumstances. Tim obviously is still around but he’s also having a bad time and probably too busy either looking for Bruce or going a little off the rails to be holding down Gotham. Barbara would be a mess cus her and Dick were engaged, Steph has faked her death. It’s a bad situation, the bats would be pretty much in ruins.

Enter Cass, who comes back because she believes in the Bat and someone should do it. Alfred is against the entire idea: he will let Cass stay at the manor and support her non vigilante life and life threatening injuries but otherwise he’s out, he can’t do coms. And so we do essentially a redux of Batman’s first year, except this time, there was a Batman before where everything broke down.

My take on it would be this idea of legacy and how legacy is both a gift and a curse. Cass has Batman’s reputation to work off of, but also his fall lingering behind her, the father figure she once had like the memory of Bruce’s parents was to him. She’s doing her best but also overwhelmed: Gotham is a big city and she is one person inheriting rogues. There is this question of the narrative that is present in a lot of early Bruce stories but slightly to the left; instead of asking if Batman is a good idea in the first place, it’s asking if keeping Batman going is worth it despite the ruin it left.

And like Bruce, she does gain allies as the arc goes and enemies. Barbara comes back at coms at some point. Tim is convinced to take to the fight. Jason serves as an anti-hero who maybe turns into an eventually ally. Steph returns to take up Batgirl. Damian shows up to try to take his father’s mantle and Cass finds herself throwing hands with a 10 year old. Duke is there because I think he’s neat.

And maybe down the line, Dick comes back to life and we play with how much stuff changed.

[lisbetadair]

I've been flirting with this idea for a while now. I have a new character, named Andre, a med student dropout who works as a Torturer-For-Hire. Fascinated with the workings of the human body and the limits of it. A charming, sadistic, and devious tall man with a rather lithe build and with a neat mop of blonde hair. Previously worked for Manuel Roba--doesn't care who he works for, as long as he's paid to do the job.

Simon Riley was one of his victims. Skip forward a few more years, and when Ghost is rescued by Colonel Vargas and his crew, Ghost is, for a lack of a better word, completely different from his past self. He's given a room all to himself to pull himself together to be sent back out to the field. Andre gets hired by General Shepherd to be part of the Coalition.

Imagine the sheer amount of PTSD Ghost goes through just looking at him. The drama. The angst. What are your thoughts 👀

I know in the original MW trilogy, the game was pretty open about the characters being involved in torture in the field, but it sounds you're talking about incarcerating someone at a black site and taking all the time they need to extract information from their prisoners by any method they deem necessary?

So, I feel these two are doing very separate jobs, and I don't feel like there's really any reason why they regularly need to interact with each other, and if I was a rogue US general hell bent on forcing a change in foreign policy by acts of treason, I simply would not want the left hand of my shadowy task force knowing what the right hand was doing: Ghost is in the going-out-and-doing-things arm of the task force, and Andre is in the staying-in-and-getting-things-done leg.

This said, in this arrangement they still have capacity to interact, if only briefly, at the prisoner hand offs. I guess you can eke as much out of those interactions as you want. Maybe each time a chinook with a hooded and bound person lands they radio ahead so that the black site inquisitors can get the kettle on and open up a fresh packet of biscuits so that whilst refuelling happens, they can all have a good chinwag? I imagine that Andre's appearance would put a dampener on this dynamic.

There's a book I read, The Blade Itself, by Joe Abercrombie where one of the characters, Glokta, was a soldier captured and subjected to long periods of torture during his imprisonment which has left him with long term disability; however, now that he has returned home, he is employed by his own side's inquisition, actively torturing their own prisoners. He sees this as an arrangement of need: he has little other opportunity for gainful employment, and he has an insight into the experience.

Ghost is complicit in torture, if not actively involved too but he is also a victim of torture too, much like Glokta. He's also deeply institutionalised with the armed forces, having known no other life. I wonder if his need to return to active service is partly motivated by the fear of what civilian life holds rather than an active desire to be involved in the sharp end of allied foreign policy?

So, now he's faced with the man who harmed him. I think that for all he has processed his trauma, unless he's extremely stoical he's going to feel Some Kind of Way about seeing him again. He's lost some of his life to what's been done to him, and it's reasonable to be angry about that.

This said, Andre presumably has a role to play within the Task Force, so harming him in retaliation is going to leave them one inquisitor short, and actively breach the structure and aims of the organisation. It would be an act of sabotage, actively harming the institution of which he's a part, so I hardly think he would take that lightly?

I imagine there are lots of real life experiences that you can find accounts of where people have found the people who destroyed their lives in concentration camps or actively participated in the genocide of their people in open warfare, so those might inform your narrative choice. There's also Andre's position to consider. Does he feel threatened? Does he feel like he still has power over Ghost? Does he address the issue or ignore it?

[pythi-the-drawing-writer]

Let's Talk About Taranza

To preface, this isn't gonna be some professional deconstruction or educated/educational essay, this is just me ranting about a Favorite Videogame character of mine. + Disclaimer, haven't played Forgotten Land at the time of posting, if somehow there's critical Taranza/Sectonia lore in there or something then I don't know it yet.

So without further ado let's rant about my favorite Kirby character (aside from Kirby himself), The Master of Puppet, Taranza!

Design: so first off, I'm in love with this spider's color palette, the dark green primary color is just nice to look at, the silver hair is eye catching but not distracting and outlines his brown head exceptionally well, the red scarf is very clear and gives nice separation between head and body, plus scarfs are just a top tier accessory, and the orangish yellow patterns and trim on the coat have a neat contrast and blend with the green. Just good stuff all the way. And something I actually haven't noticed earlier but Taranza's silhouette looks like a spider with it's mandibles open thanks to the horns which is super cool character design and just generally makes his shape a lot more memorable and recognizable than all the orbs and ovals other characters are made of.

Now for the rest of the design. Let's see, straight hair cut that's cleaned up and neat with sharp edges, fancy decorated coat and shirt, nearly folded and presented scarf, clean white gloves, yep that's nobility alright just right off that bat this guy looks like some high class noble or prince. Kirby designs are always pretty straightforward at letting you know exactly what their deal is and Taranza is no exception to that. I'd like to note something very nice is how his primary green color and secondary orange colors neatly complement and contrast Sectonia's Yellow and Blue colors and both share red accents which is just a lovely point of connection between the two.

Characterization: honestly Taranza just gives the vibe of someone trying his best, if you know about the story of Gwain and the Green Knight where the whole thing is that Gwain isn't the most noble, heroic, smart, or fearless of the knights but he keeps trying his best and that's what matters then you know what I mean cause that's just the exact vibe he gives off. He kidnaps the wrong person thinking Dedede is the Hero he was sent to get cause obviously a renowned hero would live in a castle and be the king, every major boss fight in KTD is just him throwing whatever he finds nearby at Kirby, even the whole mirror thing was just him trying to get a good gift for his crush/girlfriend having no idea it would fuck them over so hard.

Now something that's kinda interesting is that just judging by his abilities in Triple Deluxe and Star Allies he may perhaps be one of the strongest magic users in the series. He's able to forcefully control other beings, not by Dark Matter possession but by forcefully pulling strings like a puppet, However there's more, once again he causes every major boss fight in KTD except for Sectonia. He's able to force a flower to grow into a crazy tree, he broke a seal on a cursed painting that's been holding for who knows how long, he summons actual Kracko on his own, and animates/unseals a giant statue all without/before any sort of dark matter or dark mirror power up, compare to Magalor who seems to only be able to summons items and portals and small rifts temporarily without the Master Crown Marx who seemed to have no magic power until he made his wish

Plus Taranza's abilities in Star Allies, the two stand out ones being summoning a mini Dreamstalk and the actual Phantom of Sectonia. The Dreamstalk in KTD was a seed(possibly even a miracle fruit) that all the people of Floralia put their hopes and dreams into and that it grows with the power of the sun stones and dreams, only in full bloom with enough power of dreams. The one Taranza can summit is definitely not even close in comparable to the size of the real one but noticeably it is in full bloom, meaning he has enough magic power and strong enough dreams to make those flowers bloom properly which is interesting.

Next the Queen's Phantom, right out the gate the game just tells you that yep this is the Ghost of Queen Sectiona herself thanks to the move name with it even having the exact same magic circle effect that Sectiona uses and the exact same lightning attack she uses in her fight, as far as I'm aware this is the first time we've seen someone with enough power to summon up the actual dead and use their power, this is noticably different from Star Dream's boss summons who are just clones similarly to the Dedede clones in Planet Robobot. So yeah dude packs a lot of magic

A small detail. In the Haunted Mansion level of Triple Deluxe you can see paintings of Taranza and Magalor, this could mean that the two know each other or at least Magalor has somehow visited Floralia some time long ago, and it's possible that this Mansion might have been Taranza's home some time ago but that's just wild speculation based on some background details.

Also it's pretty cute how Taranza is just so obviously in love with Sectonia and would do anything for her until he realizes that this has gone too far, and is just tragically heart breaking but kinda inspiring that in the end he recognizes how toxic and dangerous his relationship is, and it's just so sad seeing in KCD and Star Allies just how far he wants to go to see her again even though it's hinted in KSA that he knows that it's not possible.

Honestly their whole story is kinda a Greek tragedy. Taranza's blind love and loyalty is what lead him to getting that mirror and enabling Sectonia and Sectonia's vanity is what allowed her to be manipulated and corrupted by the mirror in the first place, no cosmic conspiracy or some kind of destiny led to this just their own personalities and traits in the wrong situation.

So yeah, that's Taranza. A poor lovestruck spider who couldn't escape a tragic fate of his own naivety and loyalty but wants to do his best to do good by those he cares about and just can't seem to let go of the ones he loves even though he knows that sometimes not even his powerful abilities can do anything about it

[cadykeus-clay]

remember a few days ago when i said i was writing a collection of mismatched scenes of all the times that I think jester and caleb should have just kissed on the mouth? hehe :)

I.

“Caleb, can you hear through it?” she’s yelling, head tilting and eyes squinting as she looks at the one-way glass he’s just apparated in the middle of the hall. She leans in, scrunching her nose and sticking out her tongue a little as she detectives. “Can we come into it?”

He grins, he can’t help himself. “Only you.”

“Do we just hit the side of it or -” 

Her fingertips press through the barrier, disrupting the near-transparent bubble with a ripple and he reaches out his hand for hers, guides her in. Her mouth makes the cutest little oh! shape as she passes through and she can see what he’s seeing. 

“Caleb. This is so COOL!”

The grin hasn’t dropped from her face, and it spreads infectiously across his. 

“I’ve been working on this for weeks,” he says, smacking his legs with triumphant fists. 

Her grin gets even wider, sharing in that joy. A few more silent moments pass, as she takes it in with awe. 

“So, can anyone come in, or like, only people you like, or … ?”

He thinks for a moment, grins slyly. He sticks a finger out, just barely missing her nose. “You can come in.”

She leans towards him, returning the affection he seems to be offering. She gets close to his face, on purpose. She likes making him blush. “That means you like me.”

Blush he does. It’d be near impossible not to - they’re alone and unseen together, and she’s leaning towards him, her grin pushing up the freckles on her cheeks he’d love to try and count. And he’s tired, exhausted, barely functional. He’s got no strength left to carry all the layers he usually hides himself behind, but it’s alright, it’s only Jester looking anyways. 

She hasn’t pulled her face back yet, like she’s waiting for him to do something. Tease. 

Even after everything they’ve both seen these past few days, fear seems gone for just a second. They’re safe inside their shell, and no one’s watching. It would be so easy to just lean down, steal a moment to remind her that he cares, remind her that he’ll always care, remind her that he did this to keep her safe, take her mind off why. 

It would be so easy ...

******

II. 

“Can we like. Stick things through the bubble?”

“Uh. Ja, you can put your weapons through it, but no magic can come in or out. But you can leave and come back any time you want.”

“Okay. Just checking.”

She tries to hide the wince in her face as she nods a bit too heartily, jostling the half-healed slash across her chest left from panther-like claws. He notices. She notices him noticing, notices the way his brow furrows even deeper. 

“But, please. No walkabouts when we are sleeping, okay?” 

He looks up at her through those drawn-together brows when he says it, pleading more than he really needs to. She learned that lesson. But it’s still sweet to see how much he cares. 

He’s been caring a lot lately, come to think of it. Chatting with her on the boat. Checking in. Making sexy jokes when they’re supposed to be stealthing. Doing a very bad job of hiding his attempts to make sure she laughed at it.

“I’ll stay right here. I promise.” She settles back onto her hands, hoping it’ll bring a little relief to the pain starting to spark across her ribs.

“Well. That’s good enough for me.”

And he pauses for a second, just a second, like he’s giving her an invitation to double down on that promise, make sure he knows she knows someone cares, and who someone is, and that someone else cares back.

It would be so easy … 

******

III.

When she was little and read a lot of fairy tales, she’d often think about kissing a beautiful boy in a beautiful room full of paintings and tapestries and a billion things on shelves that glittered just to be pretty, and the light would somehow be reflecting off all of them at once, and his shirt would be off for reasons, and it would be glorious.

The tunnel they're in can’t really constitute as a room, but the way the crystals shimmer even in the dim glow of the Dancing Lights, rippling all around them is arguably better than shiny decorations. Caleb certainly can constitute as a beautiful boy. After all, she’s just admitted he is neither stinky nor dirty anymore. And arm wraps aren’t quite the same as a shirt, but he has taken part of his clothes off in front of her. 

Creepy snails and the third day without daylight weren’t her romantic vision, sure. But. She feels safe here, with him, and she hopes he feels safe with her. She had meant what she had said, a few days back, when he spilled his fears and his history on the floor of their wagon. She didn’t think he was a bad person. And the way he looked at her when she said it, man, he wanted to believe it. He wanted to believe it so bad. 

She ought to let him know. She ought to tell him, again, that she believes in goodness in him. She believes in love in his heart. She ought to tell him right now, in this glittering cave with his heart and arms bare before her. She ought to tell him in a way where he can’t argue back ‘cause his face will be preoccupied. 

It would be so easy …

*******

IV. 

“YOU GUYS!”

She practically burst the door to their new ally’s house down with excitement when she got back, holding out the little striped carrying box in front of her like it’s the coolest loot they’ve ever found. She bounces on her toes, making it hard for anyone to get a real look at the confections inside. 

“What do you have?” he asks, knowing she wants to tell him.

“Cupcakes!” she beams back.

“A lot of them, or?”

She flips the lid up and pushes her nose nearly into the icing topping as she examines the haul. “Well I have thirteen here, so … one, two, three -” 

He almost says the numbers along with her. Counting things and making Jester smile are both muscle memory at this point.

“ - six, so good! That’s one for each of you and the rest for me!”

He looks in the box properly now, the counting having slowed her jitteriness enough for him to try and piece out flavors. There’s some dark ones that could be chocolate, but he doubts it, and some that are paler, dotted with blue. He reaches for a blueberry one, and takes a cautious bite. 

“Caleb,” she says, pouting, and he’s worried he wasn’t supposed to try one, “you are Missing. Out.” 

She sticks her face in towards him, to make sure he can get a good look at this reprimand. She’s got a little bit of icing stuck in the corner of her mouth. 

“You can get blueberry cupcakes anywhere.”

He keeps his eyes trained on her, longer than he really ought to, but he’s trying to figure it out. 

Is that a challenge, Lavorre? Is that a promise?

It would be so easy...

*******

V. 

She has to get up on her tip toes to reach the shelf where they keep the scribing paper, pulling the stack towards her so she can count out sheets. 

“About 300 gold?” 

“Mmm.”

She counts out the sheets, thumbing them forward into a little pile that she pulls apart, before stretching up to push the rest back onto the shelf. She turns on her heel and marches for the front counter. He lingers a moment to straighten the pile on the shelf, and trails after her. 

His gaze is buried in the inside of his coat as he searches for his coin purse. His hands are still buzzing, just a little, from where she held them earlier and promised him she’d be at his side. He can’t stop thinking about it. It’s distracting him from getting his coins. 

The distinctive clink of metal on countertop jerks his gaze up just as he reaches his hand in for the first coin. She’s already dropped the gold in a neat little pile, pleasantly smiling at the clerk as she snaps the clasp on her purse shut. 

“That’s very generous of you,” he says, hand still frozen holding his own money. 

She swings around, flashing a thumbs up and a grin. She holds it a little too long for comical effect. Of course, he snickers. 

She turns to the paper on the countertop, making to gather it in her arms, but he starts, and she turns back to face him. He’s frozen there, hand just barely outstretched for her, mouth agape like he was going to say something. 

What is there to say? What can he possibly say to her, to repay everything she’s ever said to him? What can he say that’s worth the sound of her laugh, and the way her tongue sticks out a little when she smiles? What’s worth the way she brightens up a room even when she’s grumpy, the bubble to his gloom? 

What measures up to a tap on his shoulder as he turns to leave his study, and hands in his as she swears, with the most somber honesty he’s ever seen, that she watched him face what he could have been, tied up like a feral beast in a prison cell, and she stares in his eyes and tells him it’s ok, she saw it and loved him even through it, and then bought him presents afterwards just because?

He’ll never deserve her, he swears. 

She’s still looking at him, expectantly, and his mouth is still stuck open, and his hand is still halfway between the two of them. Maybe it’s just him, but the memory of her holding it seems to be burning even hotter. 

He tries to say something again, and the words aren’t coming out. She’s still waiting on him, expression starting to tip towards worry as he tries and fails to express just how overflowed his heart is right now. He can’t say it but gods, she ought to know how much she’s worth to him. Maybe he can just show her. He’ll tell her later.

It would be so easy … 

******

VI. 

The hallway is orange. Pale, warm, sort-of-translucent orange, swirling about her in patterns of lollipops and unicorn hamsters. Her own spells wrapped in the tender grip of his magic, handed to her with something like reverence. 

I believe, he had said, I have no choice. 

He’d done little things like this before, casting spells to make her and everyone else happier, letting her play with his cat because it made her smile. But he said he’d been working on this for weeks. Pouring time and sweat and his precious paper into making this thing, just for her. Everyone liked to tease her about the Traveler and how it was totally a cult, and usually she let it roll off her back, even if it stung a little on impact. And Caleb was here, telling her he took her belief in the Traveler at face value, simply because it was hers.

I don’t know anything about faith, he had said, I am learning from you.

He was a suspicious man. She knew that. He held grudges, and he mistrusted, and he had every right to. And yet all these months, he’s been putting everything he had in her hands, sure that she would not drop it. She would hold it as gently as she could.

I am the transmutation wizard, he had said, but you are the one who changes people. 

How was he supposed to know that was what she was afraid of, leaving no mark on the world at all? How was he supposed to know she made art everywhere she got the chance to in hopes that she would stop being erased, start existing outside of one little room and a handful of people? 

He wouldn’t have any reason to, except for he knew her so well, better than nearly anyone. He could tell when doubt was crawling up out of her gut, spilling its black tendrils from her mouth and across her eyes. He could see when the veneer got scratched, and he knew how to brush it just so, so it looked okay again. He knew how to comfort her. 

“It’s beautiful.” 

She knows it’s barely anything, but she doesn’t know what else to say. It caught her by surprise, and she’s reeling a little in the aftermath of seeing just how far he’s willing to go for her. 

He says something else, she barely processes, but it’s enough to get her babbling about some kind of performance. She trips over her words a little, she’s just so excited. He can tell, he smiles, and that just makes her heart jump even more. 

“But you have done so much for m- for all of us,” he says, and he’s not sneaky.

For me. She knows he was going to say it. For me. 

Tears are almost brimming in her eyes, happy ones, and he put them there. Done so much for her, she thinks, has he counted how much he’s done for me? She’s clasping her hands at her mouth, trying to keep all her feelings from coming out at once.  

He doesn’t know the half of it, everything he’s done for her. To make her feel safe, to make her feel smart, to make her feel seen, to make her feel believed in. He doesn’t know it at all, and yet the hallway is orange as a testament to how much he’s done, and she can’t let the sentiment go unreturned. 

It would be so easy … 

*******

VII.

“Didn’t go as well as you were hoping?”

His voice seems to startle her, as if she’d forgotten in her sadness that there were other people around her. He knew the feeling. 

“In some ways it went better?” she says, doubting it even as it leaves her mouth. “But. No.”

His face softens. It’s the only thing he can do, really.

Her breath is coming out shaky.

“I can’t speak for him,” he starts, offering what little encouragement he can, “but you do have us.”

“I know,” she answers, grateful even through the sadness. 

“So, whatever you land on. Jester.” He stops for a second, letting her name linger in his mouth. “We will make it happen.”

She nods, curt, tears still pricking in her eyes. “I have to figure out what I want to land on.”

He laughs, hollow and breathy, what else is there to do. He starts to reach his hand out for her, and catches it, his own hesitance getting the better of him.

He knows what he wants her to land on, he’s known for … longer than he really cares to admit. He knows he’d follow her to hell and back, that’s why he’s here on this island with her. 

He knows how hard it is to love without a compass to direct it. He knows that moonlight makes selfishness a much more appealing color. 

It’s dark, and he’s hopelessly in, and she’s searching for a place to not be so alone. He could show her a place to land. 

It would be so easy … 

******

VIII. 

He’s holding it out to her, a black ball clutched between his fingertips, just a little iridescent in the blazing sun overhead. He’s grinning, and his eyes are bright. He looks so happy, for just this moment, with a pearl in his hand. 

Forget the water pouring down their faces as they come up from the murk, plastering their hair to their foreheads at odd angles. Forget the wrench in both their guts about the monster brewing beneath their feet and in their minds. Forget the clothes sticking to their skin in all the wrong spots. Forget the sounds of their friends arguing twenty feet back. 

She jumped in the water with him for a reason, because he wanted pearls, and she wanted him to be happy, and he’s holding one out to her right now because he is, and that’s all she could really ask for.

Maybe it’ll be extra wet and slippery. Maybe it’ll taste like salt and seaweed and that weird fish stink that all bodies of water seem to have. Maybe her hands are covered in sand and they’ll get some in their mouths and it’ll be disgusting. 

Who cares? She jumped in the water with him and he’s happy. 

It would be so easy … 

******

IX.

The funny thing is, when she was little, she actually planned her wedding in this room. The canopy bed would double as the altar, gauze draping about them and the window lighting them from the back as they knelt with their hands together, wrapping them up with silk ribbon as someone spoke some formal rites. Mama would sit in the guest of honor chair at Jester’s desk, a tear running down her cheek as she watched her baby girl marry the love of her life.

Now Caleb’s in here with her and she’s realizing there’s no good angle to get the window backlight and be in full view of her Mama.

He’s lying down on the bed, because she told him to. She’s flopped down next to him, squirmed up into his side with the excuse of “small bed” but the intent of “I like the way I rest against your side”. 

He’d commented on her array of books - she knew he would. She may or may not have pulled the smarter looking titles up to the front a few visits ago, just in case.

He’d looked at her artwork too, spanning the walls in all its multicolored glory. He’d bent down to get a good look at her earliest, shittiest paintings. But not in the way where he wanted to see how bad they were, to laugh at. In the same way he looked at new artifacts they’d picked up along the road, as he traced his runes for Identify. Like he was trying to glean a missed history out of them, to get to know just a little bit more about what was in front of him now.

So she’s curled into his chest, careful with her horns, wrapping her hand over his to point out every last detail. Her other hand falls to his stomach, her fingers brush his, and neither of them pull away.

She always figured they’d fall like this, her and her husband, backward onto the bed after the ribbon was knotted to finalize their union. They’d be too happy to stand and they’d just collapse at each other’s side, and they’d plan their honeymoon like this. Pointing out places they wanted to go in her little snapshot of the cityscape, nestled into each other’s chests. 

Caleb’s enraptured, she can hear excitement in his breath, and she’s more than a little pleased. She didn’t know people cared this much about her art, about her childhood, about who she was before she became who she is. She hopes she has all the time in the world to tell him more. 

She’s still on his chest, their hands are still touching, even though she’s finished pointing out the painted landmarks. She’s kissed a lot of imaginary boys in this room. 

It would be so easy … 

******

X.

Spinning with her arms out, feet tracing circles in the snow, they haven’t even made it to the dance hall yet and she’s already waltzing like he taught her all those months ago in a scroungy gnomish bar. The cold is bringing a flush to her cheeks and god damn it, it’s cute. She’s humming. 

They could get inside where it’s warm, where they don’t need to get close for heat but they do anyway. Wrap an arm around her waist and take her hand in his. Keep her close enough to hear her giggle with each twirl he leads her on. Get drunk off her smile alone. 

Find a far corner where the music is softer and they have space to just sway together. Write new memories over old, equally as sweet, slightly less bitter. Look at that smile that won’t have faded since before they stepped through the door. Run his fingers across her jaw, save this moment in tactile too. Lean down in slow motion, as she stretches up.

It would be so easy … 

******

XI. 

“What are you drawing?” he asks, not even looking up from his spells. He’s grown comfortable with having her in his space.

“A cup of hot cocoa.”

“Are there dicks in it?”

“No, just two very lovely marshmallows.”

His head lifts up at that, gazing at her with the gleam he’s been giving his runes. He’s trying to figure her out.

“Shnuggling up next to each other,” she continues. “With consent.”

“We’re not talking about grass are we?”

“No. I’m talking about marshmallows.”

“Marshmallows?” The gleam in his eye grows a little brighter. He leans a little closer. “I thought there was a hidden meaning for a second.”

There’s a reason why she sat down here, why she wanted him next to her as she thought about love and commitment, and telling people things after all these months. There’s a reason why he didn’t start as she settled at his side. There’s a reason why he’s looking at her with a cocked grin on his face, sure of himself, in a way that he so rarely is. 

Maybe she wanted him to figure her out. Maybe she’s been trying to get him to figure her out for a while. He’s starting to turn back to his spells, so maybe she needs to get even a little more obvious.

It would be so easy...

******

XII.

She knocked on the door with her heart already in her throat, but the second she stepped through the door and saw him looking over at her, tired but welcoming, it started to settle back where it belonged. 

“Caleb. Will you cast tongues on me? YouknowImeanthespell,” she said, rushing words out because her heart was starting to leap back up again. “I just want to read the book.”

He nervously tucks some hair behind his ear. “I could read it to you, if you want?”

She knew he’d offered before, but she’s still surprisingly happy that he’s done it again. “Okay.”

He stands, wiping stained ink from his fingers on his pants as he leaves his desk, gesturing her over towards his fireplace. She swears as she walks over the flames get a little taller. She’s always liked it warmer than Caleb does. 

She flops down onto the couch, wiggling a little bit to get comfortable. She pats the seat next to her and he obliges. She holds the book out and he takes it from her, so very gently, and she can’t tell if it’s just the way he treats books, or the way he treats her, or both. 

He clears his throat as he prepares to open the cover, glancing over to make sure she’s ready. She scooches a bit closer, resting her cheek against his shoulder, you know, to see the pictures better, and hums to let him know he can start. 

He talks to her in a quiet kind of voice. It’s soft, and it makes his chest rumble, and it feels like home. She could close her eyes and fall asleep here, and she can bet he wouldn’t even get up and risk disturbing her. She nearly does, but he’s stopping every few sentences to show her the pictures, without her even asking, he just knows she wants to see them. He’s pointing out the hidden cat on every page. She loves that he still remembers where they all are.

“That was a happy story, Caleb!” she says, mostly to his shoulder, because she doesn’t want to move from where she’s nestled herself. 

“Mhm,” he agrees. “That’s why my mother read it to me.”

“I really thought, like, the cat prince was going to trap him in there forever, and then he wouldn’t be able to go and see his mother.” She cranes her head up now, propping her chin on his arm, stabilizing herself with arms she was barely aware she’d wrapped around his waist. 

“Well,” he says, turning his head towards her and finding their noses nearly touching, “a lot of Zemnian stories do end that way.”

She laughs, he smiles, and neither of them want to move. 

“The Cat Prince kind of reminds me of the Traveler,” she muses. She buries her face back in his shoulder as she talks, squeezing her arms a little tighter around him. 

“It’s true, isn’t it?” 

It’s a question only in technicality. The way his voice sounds as he says it, she can tell. He’s read so many stories, he could have picked any to leave in her room, but he chose this one about a boy and a bedroom and a magic cat and a brief escape, with a happy ending. He knew she’d ask. He wanted her to. 

She’s glad she did. She’s glad he knows her so well. She’s glad for the way he turned up the fire to make her comfortable. She’s glad for the smile that’s still on his lips, lasting longer than his smiles usually do. She’s glad she’s here with him, after everything they’ve seen and heard and done. She’s just glad. 

Gods, she’s so in love with him.

It would be so easy.

fin.

[mittelfrank-divas]

I have some initial thoughts after seeing Claude's scene with Byleth after Jeralt's death that may or may not change as I get further into the route

I've seen some wildly different takes on this scene, so I was really curious about how it played out. I've seen some people say that it startled them how cold Claude comes off, which isn't unlike similar reactions to Edelgard's version of this moment (which I have a whole other set of thoughts on).

I think the biggest key to this scene is the context.

If Claude had shown up while Byleth was still crying over their dad to ask to read Jeralt's diary, that would have been hugely insensitive, but that isn't the context of the scene at all. When Claude approaches them, they're already reading the diary, even enjoying it, focusing on the parts that make them happy. They're getting to learn about Sitri, something they so rarely get the opportunity to do. 

So getting to actually share those stories with someone? Having someone else read about the flowers Jeralt brought back for Sitri every time he went out on a mission? It's actually very sweet.

Claude straight-up tells Byleth he wants the diary to uncover the church's secrets. He's not shy about it. Again, this would come off as pretty harsh if it were framed differently. But it's clear that he's not interested only for his own sake, but also for Byleth's sake. The mystery of Byleth's origins is tied to the church's secrets. By realizing this, Claude and Byleth are becoming allies in seeking these answers.

Byleth gets someone actively working alongside them to learn about the secrets of their birth. Which is not something they get in any other route. Dimitri isn't interested in his route, because he's got his own conspiracy to uncover. In Silver Snow, Byleth is alone in it, receiving only hints from Seteth and Flayn and vague promises of the truth when Rhea is found. Edelgard has her suspicions, but she seems almost afraid to learn more, afraid that Byleth will be taken from her by a destiny that doesn't align with her own. So I find it neat that Claude gets this very specific dynamic with Byleth that nobody else shares. 

The one thing that kiiiiinda crosses a line for me is the fact that Claude "jokes" about sneaking in to read the diary anyway if Byleth does not agree to it. But at least he has the decency to tell Byleth this, unlike Seteth, who goes ahead and does just that without ever owning up to it.

[torterrachampion]

Chloé d'Apchier, Revenge, and Love

Yep, I'm giving you an essay(?) about this woman and why I think she's neat. Not sure this will be particularly interesting or informative but I wanted to reward myself for studying hard by letting myself gush about Chloé. I'm going to do my very best to pretend I have a point here but tldr Chloé is cool and I like her

Chloé is at the centre of the Gévaudan arc of vnc and I'd make the claim that she is the heart of this arc, and is the most important character throughout. In the present day 19th century Gévaudan she takes on the antagonist role, her actions interfering with Vanitas and Noé and causing the largest problems during the arc. (Yes, Astolfo and Naenia/Faustina also have this role in the present but they aren't nearly as important imo). However, throughout the flashbacks to the past she acts as the main point of view for us readers and serves as the protagonist during those chapters. This grants Chloé an interesting duality which makes her journey incredibly compelling.

When she is first introduced Mochizuki paints Chloé as at best incredibly suspicious and at worst outright malicious. It's heavily implied that she is the Beast (though this turns out to be untrue) and she appears to be working with Naenia, the main villain of the series thus far. Additionally, she drank Noé's blood without consent and confesses to having given Naenia her true name willingly. This immediately throws her into opposition with Vanitas and Noé to a far greater degree than any other curse-bearers encountered prior, who had all been rampaging without control.

However, Mochizuki doesn't take long to start peeling back the layers behind Chloé and her motivations. Directly after learning that she wants revenge, from the cliffhanger at the end of memoire 30, we jump into the past in order to learn more about her. And even before this there are brief glimpses of her past relationship with Jeanne during the early chapters of the arc. Although these moments don't make her any less threatening it does help foster a connection between us and Chloé. Even if she appears villainous her association with Jeanne and unique position as a willing curse-bearer creates a lot of intrigue that makes it easy to quickly become invested in her.

As we see her backstory it becomes increasingly clear that Chloé has lived a very long and oft unpleasant life. Chloé never quite fits in with anyone and it's obvious she's very lonely. Whether it's humans or vampires Chloé isn't able to connect to them entirely.

Chloé is distant from the d'Apchiers and even more so from vampires. She has to remain hidden from public, so she lives separately to her family while they research how to change her into a human. The d'Apchiers do eventually abandon the goal of making Chloé human again while continuing to benefit from the world formula research, but the original intention is still important. Chloé also has to watch as her family dies around her while she remains the same because of her immortality, further isolating her. And Chloé has almost no connections to vampires. Her isolation makes her completely ignorant to the outside world and she is presented no opportunities to meet anyone like herself until very late in life when Ruthven approaches her.

When Chloé asks Ruthven whether he sides with humans or vampires it's unclear which side she places herself on. Unlike Ruthven who, when he asks Noé the same question in memoire 19, explicitly states he in on the vampires' side. It's possible that Chloé doesn't even consider herself part of either group.

It's interesting then that her first friend, Ruthven, could make a place for himself with either group at the time, stating outright that he views them as equal. Chloé's isolated from both while August has somewhat integrated with both.

And Chloé is at her happiest when she's friends with Ruthven. She gets introduced to Jeanne, who gives her the confidence to disobey orders her father gave her decades earlier. Chloé gains confidence in herself through her vampire friends and is even able to connect with her family because of it. Her 'granddaughters' want to play with her because she's started showing interest in going outside. This point in her life is a bright spot where she has managed to find acceptance for just a moment from both her family and from vampires.

However, this doesn't last long. Chloé soon learns that Ruthven is hurt and Jeanne a bourreau after being separated for a while but is unable to accept Machina's offer to come and live with vampires. She's still loyal to the d'Apchiers, thinking of them when she turns him down.

And after this she is reunited with Ruthven in the worst way possible. He betrays her. He tries to take her alteration device by force and when he fails he disappears. And Chloé, having been abandoned by him, throws herself into her work on the alteration device. Because she doesn't need it for revenge at this point the reason she's so desperate to complete it is so she can become human again. Ruthven was Chloé's connection to the vampire world and after his betrayal she attempts to discard it entirely, clinging to her identity as a d'Apchier. She'd evidently always wanted to regain her humanity to some degree but never so fervently as after Ruthven's betrayal.

It doesn't take long for her to be rejected by the d'Apchiers as well. Her family dies at the hands of the church and Chloé blames herself. She told the Marquis d'Apchier about the churchmen killing people in the hopes of stopping them but only succeeded in putting a target on the d'Apchiers back. One of her last surviving family members calls her a monster and she spends multiple days curled up in bed crying, Jean-Jacques acting as her last ally while she’s been spurned by everyone else she cares about.

It's no wonder that when Jeanne shows up to take her head she welcomes it, asking Jeanne to finish her. Chloé was abandoned by everyone when all she ever wanted was to be accepted so of course she’s tired. But Jeanne can't kill her. So Chloé tries to save them both the and pain dives off a cliff to finish things. Naturally, Naenia interferes, goading Chloé into taking revenge instead in exchange for her true name.

Right up until the last moment Mochizuki tries to convince us that Chloé wants revenge on Gévaudan for all the pain everything there has caused her. But of course that’s not what Chloé wants. She doesn’t hate the d'Apchiers or Ruthven or Jeanne. Chloé hates those who hurt the people she loves. That would be Naenia and herself.

Chloé’s reason for living is Jean-Jacques at this point. The last thing she wants to do before she dies is get revenge for someone she loves. She doesn’t see the worth in her own life or the fact that she’s loved in return. So it’s kind of beautiful that what starts to snap her out of her curse-bearer state is Jean-Jacques affirming her and expressing how much he cared about her. And what fully breaks her free is Jeanne and Jean-Jacques reaching out to her. Chloé’s entire character is about a desire to be accepted and after centuries she finally gets it at the end of Gévaudan. The day was saved by the power of love this arc. Is that cheesy as hell? Yes. Did it nearly make me cry? Yes. 

That’s it. I didn’t really have a point here, I just wanted to talk about Chloé. It’s not even very polished, I wrote this pretty stream of consciousness. But thanks if you make it this far. Here’s a couple of Chloé panels I was really sad I didn’t get to include:

[vaguely-concerned]

The Mandalorian Chapter 15 reactions; *nobby nobbs voice* ‘s all gone a bit percychological, sir

 - so from both chapter 6 and now this: rick famuyiwa is incredible at portraying prolonged discomfort and tension (and also at getting din’s endless love for that baby across through the stress of being separated from him. this is the very first episode with no baby in it at all, isn’t it? wow that’s a heartbreaking milestone to reach im crying)

I liked this episode SO MUCH but I had to pause it pretty often and take a breather because it all made me so viscerally uncomfortable on din’s behalf -- not just the armour and having to take the helmet off and be seen for the (almost, ilu IG-11) first time in decades, people keep touching him in this episode when he clearly doesn’t want them to but can’t stop it and it makes me want to claw my own skin off in sympathy, it’s so awful. that’s really neat film making to manage to keep that tension steady almost all the way through!!! 

honestly this episode felt a little bit like psychological horror, with the cheering storm troopers and din in the wrong armour and clearly not digging it and there’s the palpable absence of baby and that ever present dread of being Perceived when you’re not ready for it; everything’s turned upside down from how it should be. and it’s playing with that discomfort both in the main character and in us, the audience, in having the familiar be made unfamiliar and also introducing these questions that shake up everything (that feeling you get of ‘but... if it’s not the helmet, and not the armour, but there’s his face, but we’ve only seen that face once before so it’s still basically new to us, is this... is this still him. is this still Dad’ (oooh I wonder if we’re... sort of getting some of the ??? the baby would be feeling about it too?) we’ve all imprinted on that t-shaped visor like little baby birds, and this was a very clever episode to break us out of that and start to really get used to the thought of him having several faces that are real simultaneously, in a way, and not just a voice. it’s all very smart and interesting and I’m sure I’ll have a lot of incoherent thoughts about this in the weeks to come lol)    

- the actual reason din can’t take off the helmet is that if people were able to see his wide confused puppy eyes they would no longer find it in themselves to send him on long arduous side missions and would help him immediately just so he’d feel better, and that would rob us of like 80% of the content for this show 

mayfeld in this episode: clearly a casualty of this. he literally sees one glimpse of the vulnerability there and then within five seconds goes on to materialize a few redeeming character traits after being a complete jackass for an episode and a half. (I mean. he was 100% still an imperial so I’m a bit ‘hm.’ about how easily especially cara let him off the hook, but with the way it was set up I guess it would have been quite shitty of them to just throw him back in prison so I mean I GUESS. I would be endlessly grateful someone got my awkward bff out of there alive and well too I suppose)

- I actually think din’s sense/integrity of self has gotten so much stronger and more resilient (though probably still quite fragile pls handle with care precious cargo within); if this had happened in the first season I think it might honestly just have killed him (and if it weren’t for IG-11 it probably would have lol)

- can you beLIEVE din is so bad at lying that they literally should plan for contingencies over it fjkasdlhfskajdhfsdj     

- very grateful for the scene with the spear throw that’s basically there to reassure us ‘uh-huh, he absolutely knows how to use it, don’t worry about that part at least’

I want to make a whole post about that fight scene, though, it’s just so GOOD! there’s so much storytelling and characterization in it! even out of the armour din has some real hand to hand MOVES!! he clearly came out of that aching all over, he can barely get back in his seat!!!

- so what I’m mainly taking away from this is that din absolutely cuts his own hair and you know what? he does a good job considering the conditions he has to work under, I love him  

I still find it so goddamn darling that he meticulously maintains that little mustache/stubble combo under there even when there’s every reason to believe no one will ever see it 

I suppose we can also gather that he did not ask cobb about whatever insane feat of magic he’s come up with to avoid helmet hair, but I don’t care looking a bit frazzled and tousled is exactly right for him (he’s so put together when he’s in the armour and a MESS when he’s out of it and I  l o v e  it) 

- boba fett is honestly so fucking hot in this I don’t know what to do with myself haha. he’s so CALM and CALCULATED and COLLECTED in his newly painted armour and he’s GOT THIS and he made that ‘I’ve got one of those faces. one of jango’s many, many, many faces’ joke and he’s so thicc now, he looks like he could easily lift me over his head with one hand and he’s just quietly steady and undramatically supportive and sdalfhsdjhfsa 

- ...din does know who the clone troopers were, right. I mean of course he does. he has to. but does he though. I’m sure he does and just wasn’t thinking. 

- no matter how stressful it was I’m still really grateful that in the end taking the helmet off was something din got to do himself -- it’s under some duress, but it’s still his choice and for the sake of the baby, and almost in two more manageable steps between putting on the storm trooper gear for a different helmet before taking it off altogether. it’s not something done to him by gideon, for example, that would be. so much yuckier and worse. he still has that control and agency intact, even if it’s been tested really hard, and now gideon doing that doesn’t hold the exact same nightmarish power anymore because there’s already a little space opened in din’s mind for different things it can mean, if you see what I mean. I’m not sure I see what I mean actually I just have a lot of feelings haha. so I guess thank you mayfeld for being decent about it and helping him towards that realization that he can still be himself outside these really really inflexible structures he’s set up around himself for like. stability and keeping himself upright for a really long time, and that even someone halfway decent won’t disrespect the boundaries he still has about it at any given moment. man there’s a lot in this episode isn’t there

- the sigh din gave when he saw even more pirates coming and knew he had to get back up... never has a single moment in cinema better captured how I feel about being alive. most relatable man in the world din djarin

- it was really cruel of them to make me listen to din’s dead bleak voice say ‘the child is gone’ again, it wrecks my heart every goddamn time 

- again... I wish carano wasn’t Like That in real life because the cara & fennec scenes should have been everything I could ever dream. ah well fennec was still wonderful and if I just allow myself to think in-universe for a few seconds it was really touching that din would entrust cara with his entire armour, that’s some prime BrOTP energy right there

I love that we got two female characters who were just allies and working together, no competition or nothin’. listen the bar is low but it’s nice to see something actually leap gracefully over it as well lol

- this was one of those with some pretty big open plot holes (why, exactly, would a scan of a completely unknown face be helpful to get into this classified system lol), but a) I don’t care, the emotional storyline was so sound it doesn’t really matter and b) eh handwave handwave let’s say mayfeld programmed that little stick with the good shit and overrode the code saying there needed to be an identity match within the system, it’s all fine 

- I know I joke a lot about this but din really is one of the most relatable characters I’ve ever had. just watching him struggle with eye contact and going pretty much nonverbal under enough stress is like. wow a bit close to home there could we, perhaps, nOT?? (honestly though these are trauma/anxiety things I really don’t see portrayed a lot, especially in protagonists, it’s so odd but healing to see it in a character I love and who’s EXTREMELY competent in many other settings)

- din repeating gideon’s speech back to him word for word (except for the crucial detail that he calls grogu ‘him’ instead of ‘it’ 😭😭😭) and saying nothing else is truly Everything. I’ve said some stuff about din’s deliberate and thoughtful relationship to language in the past and this is such an amazing example of it; he’s remembered that pitch perfect all this time, he’s kept it around in his head and mulled it over and then redeployed it to change the meaning of it completely from dehumanization to love. can you. can you even imagine. and it’s yet another example of his hilarious wonderful petty streak and I can never get enough of it fasjhdfkjalhs    

- din always noticing the children first and foremost Y_______Y (the kids running by is the only thing you see him sort of acknowledge when he’s walking into the covert in season 1 too)  

- please... please I just need him to be able to hold that baby against his chest all safe and sound and okay again I can’t it’s........ hh

NO SEASON END CLIFF HANGER ON THIS I AM  B E G G I N G  YOU 

- I would be having some thoughts about how much space there actually is on slave 1 and what that might mean (do not kill boba again please don’t kill him again), but honestly there’s only ‘GET BABY’ hours in here now, I can’t speculate about anything