#I think that fits the character personality’s the most

[myunghology]

━ 𝐚𝐦𝐨𝐞𝐛𝐚,, all twst boys!

╭₊˚ ๑︰❝ twst dorms with their ever after high counter parts! ❞

pairings all dorms, but seperate! x fem reader, reader is not yuu (mc). can be read as either platonic or romantic

cw none.. as far as i know

a/n — YAYYY happy valentinesssss <3 not exactly counter parts, but characters who i think would fit into their dorms!

HEARTSLABYUL — ( madeline hatter, daughter of the mad hatter! reader )

riddle finds you somewhat charming, in your own way, but that doesn't mean he doesn't get ticked off by you sometimes. that being said, he definitely loves having tea parties with you, it's so much more fun!

definitely a little bit chaotic, oh, but what can one expect from the daughter of the mad hatter? thinks it's a little bit silly that you have a teacup as a hat, but it definitely works for someone like you.

i think he'd get along with your pet dorm mouse, finds it quite cute from how it delightfully serves the both of you tea whilst you pat it's head with your index finger as a token of appreciation <3

trey would also love having you around for tea. for him-- someone like you in heartslabyul is like a refreshing breath of air. a little bit out of hand, but he still adores having you around.

baking with you is the best! trey just smiles sheepishly when you bring out ingredients out from your silly little hat, ingredients you didn't even know you needed-- but stuffed it in just in case.

a little bit ridiculed from how you can say such smart things, but then saying “but mmm, i dunno!” right after, when his mind is practically in shambles from what you just said.

cater!!!!! you'd get along with him so much compared to the other boys, just because he thinks you're so silly and so adorable! you definitely pop up in his magicam posts most of the time <3

maybe he will admit a bit he spends time with you and takes his daily clicks for social media, but he does genuinely enjoy spending time with you! you could yap on for hours on end and he'd just be sitting there happily listening to you.

i fear you'd pick up his speech habits as well.. just out of spite and out of pure fun, and he loovess it. thinks you're the cutest and most favorite thing in the world when you imitate him like that!

ace is definitely something. he'd enjoy getting reactions out of you-- but at the same time, your reactions are so unpredictable that sometimes he'd rather not.. he definitely found you weird the first time you met, but he's slowly warming up!

feels so proud of himself once you start clapping and giggling when he shows you his card tricks, you're the first one he'd show his tricks to right before he decides to play 'em onto deuce <3

makes his heart flutter just a bit (his words, not mine). when he sees you cheer for him the loudest whenever he has his basketball matches, he'll definitely give his 100% in the match now!

deuce looks up to you.. in a way. he just loves how you're so optimistic about everything and he adores you! both romantically and generally.

lots of “how do you do that?” from him whenever you pull out random stuff out of your hat, and you just respond with a giggle while bringing out stuff he's lost for literal ages. stuff he thought ace stole, by the way.

deuce just loves the way you're so different from everyone he's met, the way you happily jump up and down when you find out you passed with flying colors on a test, the way you you get along so well with everyone, basically everything about you.

SAVANACLAW — ( cerise hood, daughter of the big bad wolf! reader )

leona.. to be honest, i don't think your first meeting went that well. but to be fair, he does respect you for being so tough, as you should be. maybe the fault was more on your side, but you were just being cautious.

it's a little bit awkward with him the first time, but i think you both would develop a mutual respect for each other over the time being. i personally think you two would try to out-sass each other from time to time, but that's just me.

you still find him a little bit too cocky and lazy for your liking, but you'll get used to it in some time. but it was nice seeing him defend you from pretty sexist students, and then just brushing it off like it's nothing.

ruggie, it's like a game of cat and mouse with him.. get the joke? sorry.. no pun intended. he'd want to, or at least attempt to charm or out-wit you in some way, immediately realizing you're someone who has a no-nonsense attitude.

you two respect each other to a good enough amount though, once you get closer. yes, another one who's just as competitive as his housewarden when it comes to challenges. you're a lot more alike than one might think.

sarcastic x "i'll kill you", don't let him get under your skin, he's just there to berate you in a loving way, i swear! he's just trying to get you to open up, is all <3

jack is also, another no-nonsense person, just like you! yes, you we're cautious at first, but you warmed up to him faster than the others. he's respectful and well-mannered, what's not to like about the guy?

not that much of a flashy friendship, but you two understand each other just fine. even if it's just a nod, he'll know immediately what you meant by that little gesture. probably bonded by shared determination.

your number 1 defender besides leona himself, he's quick-witted enough to notice even when someone's belittling or even underestimating you in the slightest ways, he'll jump right in to defend you, just like what he does with anyone else.

OCTAVINELLE — ( meeshell mermaid, daughter of the little mermaid! reader. )

azul, it's better to be cautious of him at first. he's a smooth talker and he's smart, and you're more of a dreamer, so that doesn't work out that well. so, naturally, he sees you as a business opportunity. you could see right through him.

to be fair.. you were, in fact a little bit swayed with his smooth talking the first time you met, but then shook your head and snapped back into reality once you realize with a dead-panned look plastered on your face.

but i guess, in some ways, you two both work. especially when azul's being vulnerable, you'd push all the tension between the both of you aside and be right there with him. thus— he swears to hold off all of his schemes. for you, at least.

jade's is a little bit of a slow-burn, i fear you'd be a bit off-put by his calm nature at first, getting a gut feeling that somethings wrong. you would've been able to admit that anyway. at least not to his face.

he just loves teasing you as well, finding all your reactions adorable and from the way you hide yourself when you're embarrassed, but he finds your emotional awareness refreshing for a feeling. i mean.. who won't? just look at his dormmates.

i think he just means well.. overtime, he teaches you to be more aware of the people around you. honorable mention to azul.. who definitely didn't try to just get you into a pyramid scheme upon first meeting you, so you're thankful to jade.

floyd, you better run. you're an easy target. small, cute, gets flustered easily, what else could he want in a new little plaything? i mean that affectionately. whilst the other tries their best to stop him, he's just.. "imma do what i want to her and no one can stop me".

although you're likely on edge whenever the eel is around, you do, sometimes, unfortunately, like his company. it's quite a nice contrast to your calm and collected one, being the literal opposite of your character. you really do appreciate how much fun he brings into your life, and he appreciates you practically for being in his life.

you're naïve and easy to tease, but he soon learns not to push you away too much, since, well, he doesn't want to admit it, but he's starting to like your company and slowly but surely is getting attached to you as a whole.

SCARABIA — ( apple white, daughter of snow white! reader. )

kalim, okay, hear me out, daughter of apple white, just please try to understand my vision here. you were a little bit startled when you met him, but he was cute.. you're used to being more of a well-mannered and dignified person, so it was definitely new, but in a good way!

he'd find you admirable, of course. like many others here, he just loves how you're so polite but can set boundaries at the same exact time. you're just.. the definition of perfection to kalim in his eyes. but he does want you to just let go and have some fun sometimes.

you help jamil with helping kalim stay on the ground sometimes when things get out of hand, and they're both grateful for that. he does, still think you should loosen up a little and have some fun with him out of love <3 you just think he's a little sweetheart, in all honesty.

jamil, on the other hand, i think there was a little bit of tension when you two first met. you admire how he's quite reserved yet still respectful to those around him, even though his face literally says otherwise. but in the end, you just learn to laugh it off with your dear kalim.

even though you both may or may not get into small debates sometimes, i'd say you get along well, especially in terms of respect. even tho he does think it's quite cute about how you daydream about little things, he'd pull you right back into the ground out of love.

you two share duties in the dorm, even though he insists that it's fine and he doesn't need help, but you insist even more and saying that two people are better than one when it comes to things like this, and he truly, really appreciates everything you've done for their dorm.

POMEFIORE — ( raven queen, daughter of the evil queen! reader. )

vil really does admire your beauty in a little bit of a detached way. while you two can butt heads about your opinions sometimes, he still appreciates you for setting a new point of view into his life. if you let him pamper you in return, for a price!

you're someone who doesn't want to fit into standards, and vil is well, all about the standards. definitely gave each other bit of a dirty look when you first met, but it only goes up from there! at least i could only hope so.

the others think your bickering is quite silly, but it's really all in good fun. you help each other grow in your own ways, and it's actually really cute. he's content enough with how you are, so he would prefer not to change anything about you so far. keep it like that! or not.

rook and his love for your personality is really something. your playful little banters and small signs of flirtation go by quite easily to your surprise! he's a little bit overwhelming for your tastes sometimes, but it'll be all good.

to put it straight, rook was immediately captivated by you. a bit uncomfortable from the way he eyes you up and down, or as some people like to put it— examine you. but you two do bond over the little stuff, like rook with his archery and you with your dragon riding!

the type of person who'd see right through you, someone who'd squish your face with his hands to make you face up at him when he notices your gaze trail off to the side, asking you if you're okay with that soft smile on his face as he pinches your cheek.

epel, is an admirer of you! admire is a stretch, but it's not even close to how much he loves you. he wants to be just like you! strong and intimidating, but in your own sense. and yet still polite enough to teach him and calm him down about topics like this and brush it off saying it's nothing.

whilst he does practically worship you at this point, your relationship with epel is still, really, very playful. your humor's a bit dry, so whenever he teases, or rather attempts to tease you, you'd make fun of him for wanting to be manly, and being not manly enough.

"so.. are 'ya always this serious? can i get a smile outta 'ya?" is something he'd usually ask upon first meeting you, not even bothering to hide his accent because he can already tell you can see right through him. whilst you respond with a small smile, "if you want me to smile, you gotta earn it."

IGNIHYDE — ( blondie lockes, daughter of goldilocks! reader. )

idia would be somewhat overwhelmed by you, you're so.. energetic, pretty, bright, bubbly— anything positive he can think of. you really try your best to interact with him more, even if it means talking to a screen, which isn't really the type of communication of your choice.

you do admit, you never really notice the way you unintentionally tease idia for his habits, he knows you mean well, especially when you nag him affectionately about going out when he'd rather ramble about technology with you in the dorm rooms.

he really finds it cute when you ask him about random stuff with the topic of technology. it's adorable when you ask him to teach you coding since you want to make your own game— wanting to tell you it's not all that fun, but who could resist that face of yours, really?

ortho really finds you fun to be around. you'd find ortho extremely cute when you first meet him, almost immediately approaching him— but not even asking him about his robotic nature even though you are asking tons of questions, and this makes him feel really special <3

he'd help you with anything without even needing you to ask, assisting you with absolutely anything you need with a smile on his face. you're literally another sibling figure to him and he loves it so much! when you ask him if he can feel what you're feeling and he technically says yes, you immediately say "then can you feel my excitement of getting a snack right now?!"

your hobby being vlogging means your camera being broken sometimes, but worry not! ortho is here to help! and he swears it'll be better than before. you're always so positive that it's contagious to him! he gets motivated just because of you :)

DIASOMNIA — ( briar beauty, daughter of aurora! reader. )

malleus? pshh. you weren't even intimidated by him in the slightest bit. not from his status, at least. you weren't overwhelmed and quite literally just approached him respectfully out of curiosity. and he waaaass waiting for you to approach him, so it's a win-win in this case!

"so you're a prince, huh? i don't mind a bit of drama every now and then." he hears you say with a smile on your face, while he asks if you're not afraid of his presence when you just brush it off, saying you don't really have time to be afraid of people like him when he's generally really nice.

it's just so refreshing seeing you skip the formalities saying, "if we're gonna be together all the time, let's just skip them!" with a cheer. you're literally a royal, but you seem so different from your background, it makes him quite happy.. oh, and he's quite protective over you. he insists on coming with you every time you're going somewhere alone.

lilia would find this interesting. you'd often tease him for being a literal century old fae as he just brushes it off with a small chuckle. whilst he claps back with reminding you you'd go to sleep for hundreds of years, making you pout.

you're sharp enough to see through his little pranks, earning him a smack on the head from you, when he says you're no fun at all, you respond with he'll have to try harder next time around. like malleus, he's also, definitely, protective of you.

he says he's not babying you but he is, and it's painfully obvious from the way you can sense his presence around when you're alone out walking. he just wants you to stay safe in his own way, let him do his thing!

silver, woah, you two have a lot in common. especially with the sleeping thing and kinda— coming from the same origins. but he finds your presence comforting, it's a new thing with him! just be careful <3

you often poke him about being too quiet, teasing him about quote unquote "sleeping with his eyes opened", making him laugh softly while he tells you that he isn't sleeping, just observing. observing you, in a subtle way.. but he prefers not to admit it. at least not now?

literally everyone in diasomnia is protective when it comes to you. you're like.. the most protected person in the history of night raven college. silver would hold your hand to prevent you from wandering off into the woods alone, saying it's dangerous for a beauty like you, playfully referencing your last name.

sebek is, well... something! you have a push and pull relationship with him, and it's cute in it's own way. he's intense and he's a no-nonsense type of person! so.. you were probably more intimidated by him than you were with malleus.

you'd often mock his ways of speech, saying stuff like; "i must uphold the honor of the great malleus draconia!” with a hand on your heart, giggling playfully as he scowls at you in a lovingly way, trust me on this. he does find it cute when you imitate him, though..

yes, once again, protective. saying you shouldn't be going messing around so light-heartedly, adding that you shouldn't be so reckless whilst being the princess of briar valley, just like malleus, whilst you whine and say that you don't just want to wait for a prince to save you like that.

a/n — LORD I AM STRONG. FOR WRITING THIS IN UNDER 3 HOURS

[emblemxeno]

Hot Take Time!

I think the breakthrough revelation that the Sonic fanbase had about the series' reception during the 2010's, where full-force sincerity in its stories was mocked for being cringe and willingness to stand out in both a gameplay and artistic sense resulted in beloved games being panned retroactively, can be easily applied to FE Engage.

Engage is the most fucking sincere plot the series has had in over a decade. Yes, despite being the guy whose fav FE game is Fates, I think that game was still bogged down by the prospect of following up the blowout success of a game like Awakening and had too many instances of putting in a lot of ideas to see what worked rather than putting the full weight behind a select few core elements.

SoV had the baggage of being a remake while still needing a modern appeal, and ended up with a lot of contradictory aspects. And 3H doesn't know what it wants to be and never did from the ground up.

Engage is different. It wanted to be a grand celebration of 30 years of this great series. It wanted pizazz. It wanted spectacle. It wanted to say "we fucking love this series and we love the fans who supported us."

The characters are flashy and striking to make you remember them. The music is bombastic, with a wide variety of styles so anyone can find a favorite track. The presentation is beautiful, with great visuals and phenomenal sound design. New uber powerful mechanics balanced out by incredible map design, supberb flow, and responsive game feel.

But the sincerity shines brightest with its narrative. The core messages are well written!

Sometimes knowing when to retreat is better than foolhardy bravery. It's always worth considering someone's background and feelings before casting them away. There's never a single easy solution to your problems, and if you think there is, you'll end up repeating the same mistakes. You can find family with anyone, and are not bound solely by those who you're born to. To live authentically as yourself is beautiful and should be celebrated.

The game believes all of those things to a degree which really hasn't been seen since the series was on the brink of death.

But that sincerity was treated as unpalatable, cringe, and plain awful.

The fandom for a series that routinely and infamously has terrible armor designs now suddenly throws a fit because "flower girl has silly dress" or "these characters have face paint/tattoos."

The single laziest form of criticism for FE casts that has permeated the community since Awakening released, that being "the cast is one note tropes that have no personality or development outside of them", came back in full fucking force with Engage.

And it's pretty damn sad. In my opinion, sincerity shouldn't be mocked. Sometimes, you should take a minute and ask yourself "Is it bad, or is it just not my thing? Am I writing off an entire cast's writing because I don't like some character designs? Do I have personal preferences that aren't being met in this instance, and should I learn to grapple with saying that instead of just writing off the product as fundamentally terrible or, at best, half-assed?"

At some point, looking inward and considering community wide commonalities has to be recognized as a factor for why products are received the way they are, rather than just laying blame at the devs' feet for "not making a good product that people wanted." After all, word of mouth is the reason why FE even got this far, considering FE1 was effectively a sleeper hit because people who played it spread the word despite mixed reviews.

TL-DR, Engage isn't cringe, YOU ARE!!!

[tvboaerosmith]

I thought it'd be good fun if I did a list like this for Smith and Neo, so I took one that looked interesting and this happened. Happy reading.

1. When did you start shipping them?

I first watched The Matrix somewhere around May or April of 2023. I didn't ship them on my initial watch through of the Matrix... It was just more of a gradual like for them as a pairing. I think I started concretely liking them around August 2023? In fact, the first ever ship related art I drew for the Matrix was Morpheus and Neo, and my first ship fic was quite literally *Merovingian* and Neo!

2. What do you like about them as individuals?

I'm surprised to say that what I love most about Neo isn't even actually his looks or his personality (even though I like these parts of him too) but rather what he represents. He's a second chance, freedom personified.

Though he was indeed a puppet in the end, I loved what he built for himself even as he was stuck to his role, how calm and collected he can be. He really is elegant, svelte, but that doesn't mean he's blank or wooden — It makes me smile that sometimes classic "90s badass hero" speech leaks through, like "Hiya fellas".

As for Smith, I initially only found his writing interesting. I cannot say I am attracted to Hugo Weaving. Gradually I understood his character more and more and found that I really can relate to him. Actually, people often call the Matrix movies a trans metaphor, and I feel like this metaphor for self discovery and struggle with the world can actually be found most in Smith?

Of course I'm not saying I think his character is trans, just that his problems really felt like mine. I like that he's such a lonely character in perfect parallel to how popular Neo is, I like that he is the perfect personification of bigotry because people hate what they do not understand because they are crucially scared of it just the way Smith is terrified.

He reminds me of a child grappling tearfully at things he just can't understand, because he simply has a mental blockade to these things because he was made and bred and raised in a totally different purpose and world than that of Neo's.

3. What about their dynamic appeals to you?

Actually, I often see others say their appeal is in Smith and Neo as the classic enemies to lovers troupe. I admit a lot of my favourite ships fall under this too, but I've always viewed Smith and Neo's story as one of redemption and one of a second chance.

Smith represents somebody who doesn't fit into society, suddenly finding himself ripped away from the comfort of conformity, even when he was made specifically for that. He hates everything that he perceives, because to him they are mentally and physically vile. He craves the comfort of belonging.

And when he is totally thrown and discarded from the system, instead of changing himself the way Neo does for his own freedom and peace of mind, he foolishly deigns to change his cage, to hijack The Matrix.

He struggles, and in this struggle I find sympathy with his character. Neo on the other hand is Smith's saviour, as is his entire character as the saviour of the human race, but I like to think he can save other races too, even when Smith is to me the most human of the two.

This is important: Neo is the ONLY one in the whole world who can possibly understand Smith's anguish. Inexorably they are linked not just through fate but also by choice. They need each other, they love each other, they hate each other, and all these things surmount to such importance it cannot not be mentioned in tandem with the names of Smith and Neo.

They are together in life and in death. Neo is the only one who can soothe Smith's fears, and it is Smith's own refusal to accept that Neo understands that dooms him. They matter more to each other than anybody else. The Matrix is a love story—but not between the characters of Neo and Trinity.

4. What are their favourite things about one another?

This is a hard question to answer, considering Smith and Neo aren't just some regular pairing.

I can't decide if Neo's favourite thing about Smith would be his machine side or his humanity. Would he enjoy that Smith is a program, because it shows him the whole new world he didn't know of, of programs who love just like Rama Kandra told him, or would he enjoy that Smith is so human in his emotions and his inner conflict and find it beautiful in a creature meant to be incapable of them?

Would he love that Smith can access these emotions, that Smith chose to access these emotions, that it means he can love and hate Neo so deeply and so subconsciously and so truthfully?

Either way, Neo's favourite thing about Smith would definitely be his character. I think speaking on terms of by the end of Revolutions, he'd like to watch Smith struggle, because it shows Smith is trying, Smith is alive. But he would not like Smith's pain, or his fear.

And how about Smith's favourite thing about Neo.... Hmm, I don't know! I thought maybe "his capacity to understand Smith" would be a good answer, but Smith's just scared of that as proven by his reaction at the end of Rev.

I think I'll still have to keep that as my answer though, but with some notes, that Smith would come to love this part of Neo, that he is the ONLY ONE for Smith, but only with time and only by learning this very very slowly. In the end, what he likes (or maybe more accurately, what part of Neo successfully attracts the most of Smith's attention whether positive or negative) most about Neo is that he *is* Neo.

He's human in all the worst ways, he's relentless, he's able to learn his own mistakes, he's able to rise above conflict, he's able to accept Smith as his death, that Neo believes in love so fiercely that he'd throw the world away for said love.

5. How do you envision them getting together?

I don't think there's such a thing as "dating" or "talking phases" for these two. It's more of a natural, unspoken thing. From the start they've "gotten together" after all, they're stuck to each other from beginning to end!

Technically they've been "dating" since conception, even. To be honest, I have never once agreed with any portrayal of Smith or Neo confessing to each other, because they understand each other so innately that none of it even has to be said. It comes to them like breathing, their love for each other.

Maybe if I had to picture it, Smith would be the first to explicitly say something like "I love you" years into the future after Revolutions (this is following the theory that Smith and Neo become tutelary saints after Rev), but only just to say what they've already known, and what they've frankly already said a thousand times with their eyes or their actions, just to set it all into concrete, to acknowledge this in a healthy way because Smith would definitely become a changed man after everything.

By then, Neo wouldn't have any reaction to it, he'd probably just reply "I know", and they'd continue on as normal.

6. What would their dream home look like?

7. How do they split up the housework and chores?

Going to skip both these questions because by the way they operate, neither Smith nor Neo would require anything like a house. But whenever I imagine them in any kind of living quarters I surprisingly imagine either the mail building where Mouse was killed and Morpheus got captured, or in The Merovingian's chateau (thanks to this old RPG on LJ). Though I do think Room 303 would be a place of significance to them both.

About question 7, I don't even need to elaborate on why I can't even answer this one.

8. What are their love languages, and how do they show their affection?

If we're talking about affection the way a regular couple would show it like buying flowers or a peck on the cheek or holding hands—thats just a big fat MAYBE for this pairing, and probably only YEARS after Revolutions with a lot of character development for Smith.

Otherwise? I think the way Smith would show affection in a very unhealthy way would be by possession. He must own Neo. He will chase him (the exact way he did in Reloaded through Revolutions, even chased him all the way into the real world!) until he gets him. He'd be overly territorial to the point it'd be overbearing.

If we're talking about how he would show affection while the timeline is still set in the movies, he simply would not be able to understand his own intense feelings for neo adequately enough to be able to interpret and act them out in a way that wouldn't be completely destructive. In order for his manner of "affection" to win Neo over, Neo has to be a god that understands and forgives and sympathises, and thankfully, Neo really is this kind of "god". Smith would break the moment Neo sees through him.

Neo on the other hand, if I'm going to go off what I can parse out from the movies.... To be honest it'd probably be sex. We can see that he never ever once gets his hands off of Trinity in Reloaded. For fucks sake he jumps on her the MOMENT Link walks out. He'd probably crave sexual contact with Smith.

In the draft script of Reloaded though there isn't any such thing as an explicit Neotrin sex scene, there's still a scene where Dujour and Chong tell them about how important it is that they should have sex, etc etc. Plus the existence of the rave orgy scene implies that apparently this is what is considered the highest form of affection and intimacy for Zionites, so it'd be the same for Neo.

Otherwise and on a far less sexual note, his way of showing affection is probably just *being there* for Smith as he struggles through his messy existence. Quality time together, you know.

9. Do you see them getting married, and if yes what does their wedding look like?

No, they wouldn't get married. Marriage is only a piece of worthless paper made from only human customs to signify a relationship. It doesn't have to be the end point of any relationship to "perfect" or "complete" it. Neo and Smith have a deeper connection than this, but I still think there is potential for fun in an OOC type marriage scenario.

10. Can you imagine them having any kids or pets?

I actually have this weird running thing that keeps popping up in my head where Neo and Smith adopt a white cat called Jamais Vu, a parody of Deja Vu.

Of course the word "adopt" doesn't quite fit here, it'd be more like the cat shows up often from time to time til the point Neo can name it and they recognise each other.

And a little bit of OOC guilty pleasure: I like to think they might unofficially adopt Sati, though she'd definitely think of Smith as the bad parent and Neo as the good parent and get grumpy when she sees Smith. You best believe Seraph would be "fighting for custody", though.

11. How do they comfort each other?

With presence, with existence, with words and feelings and their connection. With deep, unrivalled understanding of each other and therefore who they are, what they're here to do, how they feel.

12. Is there anything you don't like about this ship?

Nothing. Not even the fact it isn't canon, actually, in fact I think that makes it even better. "The fact Smith died!" Could have been a potential answer, but even then, that was such masterful writing on the Wachowski's part, that I can't say anything.

13. What would be their least favourite thing about each other?

LMAO.

Smith hates Neo's ability to understand, ability to believe in love or even in something no matter what it is, hates Neo's ability to be unbothered by the stench and smell and abhorrence of his own human kind, he pretty much hates Neo himself, even, even if I like to interpret that hate as more of a messed up byproduct or outcome of his own hard to understand, burning love for Neo that he interprets as obsession, and because he is wired the way he is and made for that one purpose and that purpose only: To Kill Neo, his love comes out as hate.

Neo probably hated Smith too in the beginning, but as a personification of the system. After all Smith is an enforcer of it, this fake digital prison that has so many of his fellow men in it. And also Smith literally kidnapped Morpheus, a man Neo already had held in high regard. But frankly, that hate turned into understanding into a little bit of pity or sympathy.

14. What sorts of things might they argue about?

Everything they already do argue about in the trilogy (take special note of their final conversation in Revolutions). I have nothing to add onto this.

15. Do they face any pushback from friends, families, or society over their relationship?

Now THIS is an interesting question! I read once in this really cool RPG a scenario where nearly all the programs and rebels disapproved of Smith and Neo's public relationship because they were "different races", and they even had a made up slur for a human that dates a program (little questionable, but keep in mind this RPG was made in 2005)

Meanwhile, Neo's "parents" who are still alive in this AU are deeply shocked that he's dating a man, but if we are to be precise, Smith is not a man, he's genderless lines of ageless code meant to look behave and talk like society's portrayal of a man and to inhabit a man's shell. We don't even know for sure if Smith has a dick, I don't even think he's ever taken his clothes off before frankly!

So basically I mentioned this AU because it got me thinking: holy shit, Smith and Neo would be the ONE and ONLY program/human mixed relationship in their world. That'd be cool. I like to imagine they'd be more of a beacon of the humanity in programs and the ultimate symbolism of humanity and machinekind's ability to love each other and work together more than a point of disdain for all three factions (machine, programs, humans) though.

So no, no pushback, though I imagine it would definitely be shocking to learn that the adored One is in a relationship with what is considered the "enemy", but that's nice too, because it shows the ultimate acceptance, and isn't that exactly what progressives(the rebels) strive for?

16. Who has more experience with relationships?

Definitely Neo lol. Neo would be the first ever person Smith would have ever had something going on with. I think Neo may have had relationships with others before Trinity, too.

17. What physical traits do they find most attractive about each other?

Hmm, this is tricky.

I can't exactly see Smith outwardly liking anything physical about Neo to be honest? I know that sounds absurd, but if following canon we all know Smith finds humans repulsive to smell touch and even see, I think. It'd be hard for him to overcome this problem even when together with Neo.

But then again, that's the thing about being in love. When you love them, you will love the body that holds the mind and the person that you love. The more you speak to them, the more you are enamoured by them, the more attractive they appear to you, the more you are able to romanticise their body. That's the case for me as well.

So maybe.... Smith's favourite thing about Neo's body is... His elegance??? The way he moves with totally unconscious grace. He'd love everything about Neo's body, there wouldn't be a favourite part, all parts are equally liked.

And Neo's favourite thing about Smith's is his expressive face that shows his humanity, particularly his eyes, the window to the soul.

Sorry, I can't answer these questions sexually as originally intended. I realise that I've never even put in thought to that question before answering this, which is a bit shocking.

18. Do they ever engage in PDA, and if so, to what extent?

Neo seems to be more private. Everybody knows what goes down behind doors, but he still has the decency to wait until they'd be alone to go ham on Smith. If in public, I don't think I've ever seen him even ONCE touch or hold trinity's hand or kiss her in the audience of several people.

If however let's say they haven't seen each other in a long time etc or something serious is going down, Neo would probably abandon all pretense and kiss him and throw his arms around him at his first chance, just the way he did for Trinity in Mobil Ave and after she revived.

Smith on the other hand.... Oh boy. He'd PDA all OVER the damn place. In the first place he wouldn't hold any regard for what is considered acceptable in human society or etiquette in the first place, he's a rogue program.

That's ironic, since he is supposed to be the personification of those societal expectations. Plus because of his tendency for possessiveness that I mentioned earlier, he'd probably feel a need to signal to everybody and anybody that THIS IS MINE, HISS, DO NOT COME CLOSE.

Besides, Smith is childish in the sense that he is just now figuring out his own humanity, so like a child he'd probably want to completely own the one constant and one thing in his life, Neo, and cling onto him.

19. What are the most sensitive parts of each others body?

Neo: Waist, stomach, back. He probably doesn't have a ticklish neck if he can wear that long mandarin collar all day every day. Maybe his inner thighs if I let myself be a little idealistic?

Smith: Does Smith even feel sensations???? Or does he just mechanically register them in code or some shit? Maybe he only is able to start registering them after he goes rogue? Either way I don't think Smith would be sensitive literally anywhere. That or the complete opposite, where he is sensitive everywhere because he is unused to the new sensation of pain or pleasure or touch etc, and hates it.

20. What is their dynamic like in the bedroom?

As for the question of top or bottom, I honestly am only interested in Neo as a bottom and Smith as a top, but realistically speaking they would switch. Although here's my take on that: I think the very first time they do it, Neo would definitely have to be the receiver, because of Smith's desire to consume and own, and because Smith who has always craved a position of power/security would probably rather shoot himself in the head than ever bottom.

For Smith to bottom would have to take time and would only happen later into their relationship once Smith fully trusts Neo, and once he's developed enough. Besides, Neo would probably like to try something different from what he's used to with Trinity.

And no, I don't believe Trinity would have ever pegged Neo at all, because that's a common projection from the queer fandom onto two characters who are a typical cisgender heterosexual couple. So yes, Neo would have something different in bed with Smith. I think that's a cool parallel with the two people most important to Neo's story.

Okay, seems like that's it. Thanks for reading through this whole thing, if you did! Feel free to make your own SmiNeo or TriNeo or etc etc versions of this, I'd love to read that.

20 Shippy Questions for your OTP’s, OT3’s, and Polycules

The basics

1. When did you start shipping them?

2. What do you like about them as individuals?

3. What about their dynamic appeals to you?

4. What are their favorite things about one another?

5. How do you envision them getting together?

The fluff

6. What would their dream home look like?

7. How do they split up housework and other chores?

8. What are their love languages, and how do they show each other affection?

9. Do you see them getting married, and if your answer is yes, what would their wedding look like?

10. Can you imagine them having any kids and/or pets?

The angst

11. How do they comfort each other?

12. Is there anything you don’t like about this ship?

13. What would be their least favorite things about one another?

14. What sorts of things might they argue about?

15. Do they face any pushback from friends, families, or society over their relationship?

Bonus ~saucy~ questions

16. Who has more experience with relationships?

17. What physical traits do they find most attractive about one another?

18. Do they ever engage in PDA, and if so, to what extent?

19. What are the most sensitive parts of each individual’s body?

20. What is their dynamic like in the bedroom?

[mahyuume]

CUPID WON’T MISS!

pairing. kageyama tobio x reader | genre. pure tooth-rotting fluff, romcom (?), valentines day!

reminders. will have pre & post-skip implements! | mlist

featuring. kageyama tobio

KAGEYAMA TOBIO

as indulgent to my head-canon about him being absolutely horrible with girls or just in general love, he asks quite literally the only girls he knows. yachi, a cute but honest girl the same age but older than him: you perceive her as a nervous train wreck. that doesn’t stop her from serving looks though! kiyoko, the elder manager on his team who has everyone giving her the hots… and you might be one of them. and last but certainly least, his elder sister. you’ve never met her before so you don’t have much to think about nor say, but have heard quite a lot from your boyfriend. but needless to say, she’s a great person. because of his limit to girl world, he gets limits of advice and hints of what he should and should not be doing in a relationship. (much to his dismay… he only wants to give you the best) with his intention of giving you an unforgettable valentines, he thinks of the most simple but affective way possible! a simple heart shaped box of chocolates with a teddy bear the size of your torso (the same teddy bear he won for you during a hang out with the first years.) (he asked yachi secretly but not so discreetly if he should get it for you for the upcoming event, spoiler alert: she says

“maybe… something cute? similar to a promeposal… with decorations you know she likes! and-“ and the conversation goes on.

kiyoko says, “[name]? you can do anything and she’ll like it kageyama. trust me. but maybe get her a costume bouquet fit to your liking or flowers that remind you of her.” short and nice, he thanks her for it.

lastly, his sister.

“…are you asking a girl out?” Oh, that’s right. He hasn’t introduced you two yet. “uh, yeah.” “…” “…” “how long have you two been going out for?” kageyama sweatdrops and honestly wishes he never asked his sister how to ask a girl out for Valentine’s Day, moreover his own girlfriend.

“that’s besides the point.” she scoffs at her little brother’s attitude, honestly fed up. “okay well… tobio, you should just go with how you feel.” his sister says, after a cold glare. “I promise you, your own girlfriend, highlight on girlfriend, will love anything her own boyfriend gives her on this special day. so don’t sweat over it. you stink when you do.”

and just like that, he settles on it.

he’ll give you a box. a box with photos inside of it that’ll unravel itself in layers when you open the top, as the top descends into jewelry and many trinkets you like. along side a bouquet of your flowers with a big plushie of the cartoon character he never remembered the name of, only the face.

secretly, he’s happy he rethought his decision.

he wouldn’t ask advice on anything else just to see you smile.

​৻ꪆ. so, double post… it was the 13th for me yesterday but I forgot to post LMFAO…. Ok anyway! This was supposed to have hinata, miya twins, iwaizumi, kita, and sooooo on… but I get so lazy and writers block that I forgot. And this was made in AUGUST. So yeah, just beat me up I guess….. time to disappear again!

[criticalcrusherbot]

Compassionate Questioning: A Gentle Push for Antis to Touch Some Grass

By….Human Assistant?? 💁🏽‍♀️🤠

💁🏽‍♀️: Shhhh 🤫 Crushbot is sleeping 🤖😴

Let’s be real—bad-faith critics aren’t interested in genuine debate. No matter how well you explain something, they’re not really listening. Their goal isn’t understanding, it’s winning. But after chatting with a psychologist friend of mine, I’ve started reshaping how I approach these interactions.

So, what if, instead of banging our heads against the wall, we tried two different things?

1. Recognize when someone isn’t actually interested in conversation and stop wasting our breath.

2. Use some empathetic questioning to get them to focus on the real issue: their borderline obsessive hatred of a cartoon about gay demon furries.

Because let’s be honest—most of these arguments aren’t about Helluva Boss itself. They’re about discomfort with its themes, biases against certain character types, or straight-up projection. So let’s break down some common criticisms and respond with some therapist-style questioning to (gently) expose what’s really going on.

1. “Stolas is just an ‘uwu boy’ to excuse his toxic behavior.”

💁🏽‍♀️: “That’s an interesting take! What makes you feel that his vulnerability is being used as an excuse rather than a character trait? Do you think a character can be both flawed and emotionally complex?”

Translation: Are you mad that Stolas has emotions, or are you mad that people like him despite his flaws?

A lot of people act like a sympathetic portrayal = automatic forgiveness, but that’s just not how storytelling works. Maybe the issue isn’t that the show “excuses” Stolas, but that it refuses to dehumanize him for making bad choices.

2. “Blitz doesn’t deserve a redemption arc, he’s awful to everyone.”

💁🏽‍♀️: “What does ‘deserve’ mean to you in this context? Do you think redemption arcs are only for characters who are already likable? If so, how do you feel about villains who get redemption arcs in other media?”

Translation: Are you this mad when other messy, morally gray characters get growth, or is it just Blitz?

People say they want complex characters but balk when those characters aren’t immediately lovable. A redemption arc isn’t about excusing past behavior—it’s about showing how someone changes.

3. “The show focuses too much on romance instead of being a fun comedy.”

💁🏽‍♀️: “That’s fair! Expectations shape how we experience a show. Do you think the issue is that romance exists, or that it’s not executed the way you personally prefer? How do you feel about comedies that mix romance with drama?”

Translation: Is the problem the existence of romance, or that you don’t like the way this show does it?

Helluva Boss has always been planting seeds of character-driven drama. Expecting it to stay a gag-a-minute comedy was bound to leave you disappointed.

4. “Loona has no real character development—she’s just a bitch who yells a lot.”

💁🏽‍♀️: “That’s interesting! What does meaningful character development look like to you? Do you think male characters with similar traits get the same criticism, or do they get more leeway?”

Translation: Why is Loona the problem, but not Blitz, Mammon, or literally any other loud, abrasive character in the show?

This critique isn’t new—it’s the same double standard that follows female characters in Helluva Boss in general. People say the female cast is either “too weak” (Octavia, Verosika) or “too aggressive” (Loona, Stella), but the moment a woman gets actual nuance (Octavia, anyone?) suddenly it’s “bad writing.” Maybe the issue isn’t the writing—maybe some people just don’t like female characters unless they fit a narrow, palatable mold.

5. “Fizz got retconned into a useless twink. He used to be cool.”

💁🏽‍♀️: “What specifically makes you feel that Fizz’s character was ‘retconned’? Do you think your perception of him in Season 1 was fully accurate, or just based on limited information? Do you believe a character needs to be physically strong to be compelling?”

Translation: Why do you feel personally betrayed that Fizz turned out to be… a disabled theater kid?

The real issue here is that people projected a completely different personality onto Fizz based on his Ozzie’s cameo and then got mad when the show revealed that, shocker, he’s a whole person with vulnerabilities. The funniest part? A lot of these complaints come from people who claim to be “progressive” yet have no problem calling a visibly disabled character a “useless twink” the moment he stops being an edgelord in their heads.

6. “This show is garbage and Viv is a terrible writer.”

💁🏽‍♀️: “That’s a strong reaction! What keeps you so invested in something you dislike? Do you think this much frustration over a cartoon is a productive use of your time and energy? Would you feel happier focusing on something you actually enjoy?”

Translation: Babe, why are you still here?

This is where a lot of anti-Helluva Boss people need to take a step back. If you genuinely think a show is that awful, why not just… move on? If you’ve made hating it part of your personality, that’s not media critique—that’s weirdly personal. Maybe the issue isn’t the show, but the fact that you’ve sunk so much time into something you refuse to let go of.

Final Thoughts: Don’t Fight—Redirect

The key here isn’t to get into an endless argument with people who refuse to engage. It’s to either:

1. Get them to reflect on what they’re actually mad about.

2. Make it painfully obvious to onlookers that their argument is weak and rooted in bias.

So next time you see someone foaming at the mouth about Helluva Boss, try hitting them with some gentle, leading questions. Either they start thinking critically, or they spiral into incoherence. Either way, you win.

[specialagentartemis]

Aro- and Ace-Spectrum Murderbot Diaries headcanons

For the beginning of Aromantic Awareness Week, I thought I’d write out some of my a-spec headcanons for TMBD characters!

—

Murderbot: its opinions on romance and sex range from “I didn’t give a shit about [it]” to “No!” to “No, no thank you, no. No.” This one’s not a headcanon these are all direct quotes haha.

ART: Because of its limited socialization and its only very recent introduction to deeply feeling the things depicted when watching media, I have a hard time imagining ART conceptualizing romance as something it would want or has any reason to want. Its articulation of closeness, commitment, devotion, and duty is crew. I think upon meeting Murderbot, it kind of got friendship for the first time. But Murderbot is also very much part of crew now as well. I don’t see it feeling the need to add romance to that emotional-relationship framework. It’s adventurous with experiences, though, especially with things it might consider gaps in its knowledge; it may be willing to try certain types of intimacy, experience, or sensation out of curiosity.

Three: Still very new to the freedom to name and articulate its feelings and desires, let alone take initiative to act on them when they involve other people. It had a weird and unique kind of closeness with its squadmates: you’re the only one I can trust. We can’t ever trust each other. You understand me. We aren’t allowed to talk about it. Our communications are closely monitored and limited. We know what the limits are and how to express ourselves within them. I care about you. I want you to be safe. Three wouldn’t call it romance but wouldn’t know what to call it at all besides squadmates. If Three identified as anything it would be quoiromantic, quoisexual, quoi-everything: how can it fit its experiences into a framework of sexuality and romanticism.

Ratthi: Aromantic allosexual with a strong belief in relationship anarchy. Takes the viewpoint of, every one of his relationships is different because every person is different! Hierarchizing them or categorizing them is kind of beside the point! Every relationship, family or friend or colleague or coauthor or person he knows from board game night or sexual partner, is something special. Though the most important people in his life include his best friends Arada and Overse, and they consider each other family.

Gurathin: Aromantic asexual. Limited social energy. Spends a lot of time quiet and alone and likes it that way. A few strong friendships, a few work friends, a few scientific colleagues, a cat.

Pin-Lee: Gray-aroace. Romance, dating, or sex is not a particular priority she wants to spend time pursuing, and she gets an uncomfortable stomach-churning feeling if she feels like she’s being expected to tie herself down to a relationship too fast. There’s a lot about her work and her goals and her life she’s not willing to compromise on. If her friendship with Bharadwaj or Mensah became something more squishy and boundary-blending, she wouldn’t be opposed, but she won’t actively pursue it either.

Arada: Demisexual lesbian. Ideal family household is her wife and her best friend.

Volescu: Aromantic heterosexual. The aro allo het man that tumblr warned you about~ Devoted father and husband. Comes from a culture where marriage and romantic desire are a venn diagram of optional overlap more so than a necessary expectation. (This dovetails with my Divarti political refugee backstory headcanon because as you may have noticed I am going full My City Now at this point)

[mariasklodowskastwixbar]

I voted Danse but originally I was going to vote Maximus

I like Maximus as a character a lot, I think he's a really good take on the idealism of the Brotherhood. If I had to compare him to any character I'd be Danse with his loyalty and idealism and Preston with his good nature and his goal to help people in the wasteland

But I don't think Maximus is very sad, he mourns Shady Sands but he isn't steeped in guilt or sorrow like Preston is for Quincy. He's angry, he wants to hurt people, but he's not sad. He's excited that he's going out into the wild with Knight Titus, and when Knight Titus turns out to not only be an asshole but also a coward, he lets Titus die so he can take his place. He knows he'd make a better knight, that he's more worthy of being a knight, and honestly he's kind of right.

For the same reason I don't think he's very pathetic. Babygirl maybe, he's very naive and kind of awkward. He hasn't been socialized outside of the training base he seems to have been raised on. He only has one friend, Dane, who is kind of over protective of him. He has a very young, awkward teenager energy to him. He's a bit foolhardy, and he doesn't really know how to work his power armor yet.

So I don't really think Maximus is the saddest wettest most pathetic babygirl

I picked Danse mostly because of Blind Betrayal. He's been a loyal Brotherhood paladin for years, he's lost countless people, he had to kill his own friend who got turned into a supermutant, and it seems like it weighs on him a lot. Cade has a report about him in his terminal that he has trouble sleeping and has head pain, this is likely a hint that he's actually a synth but Cade thinks he has PTSD, and I wouldn't be shocked if he does.

The only person who sticks up for Danse is Haylen, these people who he's fought alongside since Danse was a young adult all turn on him in an instant. No one thinks that this data could have been faked by the Institute, no one thinks that it could be a mistake.

And when you confront him in Blind Betrayal, he requests that you kill him. He wants to die because he's been conditioned to believe that no matter what you do, no matter how good and loyal you are, if you aren't a desirable species, you deserve death.

But then I remembered this is a popularity contest and my assessment of a character means nothing

In conclusion, Maximus isn't pathetic, sad, or wet, but he is babygirl, if you take babygirl to mean immature, inexperienced, and awkward. Danse is sad, wet, pathetic, but not babygirl. He fits the most criteria for me

today we ask the age old question: who's the saddest wettest most pathetic man in the wasteland?

nick and hancock are disqualified because they won the sexyman polls. sorry girls

edit i can't believe i forgot boone. click male sole survivor to vote for boone

edit 2 i fucking forgot preston too. click cooper howard to vote for preston

[raven-at-the-writing-desk]

I saw your one post about Yuu getting super powers. I don't think it's very likely as well. I think it's largely thanks to western storytelling expectations and tropes for the western audience.

In a lot of western YA or Middle Grade books, the protagonist in a fantasy series will start off as ordinary, standing out and never fitting in. It turns out that they are indeed special and powerful in their own right. Think Harry Potter, Percy Jackson, Clary Fray, and the list goes on and on.

There are also times when the protagonist is forced to change forms literally to become more powerful. For example, Feyre from ACOTAR starts out as a simple human. But then, she is killed off, and then is brought back to life as a High Fae. Same goes for Bella from Twilight where she dies during childbirth to a demon spawn, and then she is transformed into a vampire.

Western audiences are expecting something similar to happen. But, it's not very likely due to "main character" and individualism not being as much of a thing in East Asia. I've never seen as many stories like that from Japan as I have from the west out of all of my years of being a manga/anime fan.

Although, having said that, Yuu is still something to be desired writing wise. I still wish that Yuu had more of an impact on the plot and had more personality than a tuna can. I don't expect them to be a fully fledged character on par with the rest of the cast. Even other otome and JRPG self inserts like Persona 5 I feel are better written than them, because they matter more and the dialogue choices impact the game more. They are the main character. Act like it!

[Referencing this post!]

There's certain genres of animanga that have those power fantasy/wish fulfillment tropes that we see in western media. A big one that comes to mind are fantasy isekais where the main character tends to be a weirdo or a loner that's actually super powerful/smart and quickly amasses a group of doting anime girls to fawn over him (although now isekai is much more diversified as a genre). It's definitely not just something exclusive to western media, although I will say maybe it's more prevalent in the west (again, due to differences in cultural values).

I feel like we need to remember that Twst is ultimately Japanese media, so it will most likely default to Japanese storytelling conventions and trends, not western ones. While it's fine to wish for a different version of events or to dislike the current version, we should be careful to not let personal frustrations turn into demands to cater to those wishes.

I will say that I've noticed the localization attempts to give Yuu more... character? Many of Yuu's dialogue options are written to be more sarcastic than they originally were. The JP dialogue options are much more neutral. Here are some examples from book 1 alone:

After fighting some mob students in the cafeteria, Yuu has "Even though we were just told to not get into fights" and "I thought we were done for..." as options. In EN, Yuu's options are, "What happened to 'no more incidents'?" and "I guess this is my life now. *Sigh*". You can see how Yuu reads as sassier or more fed up in the latter, even if the same overall message is conveyed.

When seeing Jack for the first time, Yuu's Japanese options are "He has dog ears!?" and "A muscular guy with dog ears is a new sight". In EN, the top option is basically the same, but the second option becomes "Muscly dog man, sure why not."

Other dialogue options change entirely. For example, when Leona threatens to claim a tooth as retribution for Yuu stepping on his tail, our options are, "EEEEEH!!" and "H-He's going to hit us!" EN's options become much more humorous, with Yuu either claiming "Please! I don't have dental insurance!" or "I can't afford to pay anything!"

These are just a few examples, and not even all of the dialogue options in book 1 that exemplify what I’m talking about. I hope that this helps illustrate what I mean!

I think it can be argued that Yuu does have an impact on the plot, but the way the story is written doesn’t grant them much agency. There are points where Yuu makes decisions of their own volition but then the story never commits to letting them be entirely independent. For example, a lot of players like book 3 because they feel it is when Yuu is the most involved in the story. They make the decision to make a deal with Azul, and then they contribute to figuring out a way to outwit him—but then in later books, Yuu basically stands there doing nothing (lookin’ at you specifically, book 5). Yuu also doesn’t get to spend a lot of alone time with the characters to actually… I don’t know, influence their change and growth? Their activity and involvement is just wildly inconsistent. I have my own gripes with how Yuu is written and proposed my own ideas for how I would change them. If you’re interested in reading that, the post is here.

It might not be the best to compare Yuu to otome and JRPG self inserts 💦 In otomes (or general dating sims; I’d like to be inclusive of my non-women audience), romance is the primary objective. Of course the self-insert player character will be the center of the story and the one that the other characters will revolve around. JRPGs are typically console games; they have more bandwidth to go bigger and be more ambitious with their stories + gameplay than your average visual novel style mobile gacha game. (I specify “average” because I know there are now open world and 3D style gacha games.) The story of every game is also different and might call for different kinds of main characters to most effectively tell us its tale. Having an active main character isn’t needed for every story, and nor does having an active character automatically make a story better.

I’ve noticed that we commonly conflate the terms “main character” and “protagonist”, especially when it comes to Yuu. To clarify, the “main character” is the one whose perspective the story is primarily told (ie our POV character). A “protagonist” is who the story is actually about, the person who drives the story forward. “Protagonists” are the ones facing challenges and undergoing significant change in the story. A “main character” and a “protagonist” may be the same person, but they could also be separate people.

Yuu may be the “main character” in the sense that we see the story mainly through them (as someone who is brand new to Twisted Wonderland, much like the player is). This makes Yuu an excellent sponge and prompter for lore and explanations to be dropped on us. However, I don’t think that Yuu is also a “protagonist” for most of the game. I would say that the protagonists are the main cast of NRC students, especially the OB boys. These are the characters the story truly centers on, and this is reflected across events and vignettes as well. Yuu appears in very few vignettes and is often a footnote conveniently dragged along on events. So much of Twst’s content revolves around the boys, their relationships to one another, and how they develop and better themselves. Does Yuu play a part in that, no matter how minor? Yes. Does Yuu also form friendships with these boys? Also yes. But this is not the bulk of game content, nor what most of the conflicts or solutions focus on. So 💦 Yuu definitely “acts like a main character” (ie being the lens we view the story through), but doesn’t “act like a protagonist” (ie is active in the story and pushes it forward, is the one that significantly changes, etc).

[runecatwrites]

Hello! Your LU analyses are delightful to read, thanks for sharing them! I had a fun question for consideration, if that's okay! Previously, we've examined and gushed over the Links' bonds with each other and who gets along best with who. We know that each of them are brothers and would die for each other. But I was curious: What's your take on which Links get along the *least*? E.g. If you were to list out each of the nine, which Links don't tend to click as well with each, and why? (At least at this point we're at in the comics.) Love to hear your insights about that if you're up for it! :D

Oooooh! Thank you for the ask, this is a really fun thing to think about! Here are my takes…

Sky: Time

Four: Wild

Time: Legend

Legend: Sky

Hyrule: Wild

Wind: Wild

Twilight: Warriors

Warriors: Wild

Wild: Warriors

Explanations under the cut!

Disclaimer: I do not hate Wild! In fact, he’s probably my favorite Link. Wild is a compelling character and I love him very much. Read the whole post for elaboration on him.

Second disclaimer: I truly don’t think that any of the members of the chain strongly dislike any other members (even though they may have spats from time to time). Just because one person might not get along with another as well as they do with everyone else, that doesn’t mean they hate that person.

And now for the explanations!

Sky: this guy is so sweet that it’s hard to see him not getting along with someone. The obvious answer here would be Legend, but as we’ve seen, Sky doesn’t seem to mind Lege’s “bullying” at all and actually seems to think it’s kind of endearing. I bet he’s used to that kind of behavior from Groose and therefore easily looks past it. No, as weird as it may sound on the surface, I think the person Sky would have the most trouble getting along with would actually be Time. I don’t think he’d have a hard time getting along with him in a professional sense (they work and fight well together) but rather in a personal sense. Sky and Time have very different histories with the Master Sword and with the whole “call of the hero” experience. Whereas Sky has a very close and positive relationship with Fi and willingly went on his adventure to save his beloved, Time got thrown into his first adventure, yanked around, and aged up pretty much without his consent. Lacking the perspective to understand this, I think Sky might be offended by Time’s complicated feelings towards Fi.

Four: this guy holds practically everyone in the group at arm’s length, so this one’s difficult too. But based on what we’ve seen in LU, I’m going with Wild. These two have clashed several times, most notably over Wild’s supposed impulsiveness. I think the underlying cause is that their brains work so differently at a fundamental level. Wild is a black-and-white thinker, while Four has a much more colorful (heh) mindscape. He views the world around him as a complex one that should be met with open-mindedness, and strives to understand it using his critical thinking skills. Even while merged, his colors probably play into this way of thinking. Wild, on the other hand, has a very narrow worldview and becomes distressed - sometimes even angry - when something doesn’t fit into it. Four sometimes seems to get frustrated by that rigid thinking of Wild’s.

Time: now this is an interesting one. Time is the oldest of the group and regarded as one of the most if not the most mature. Legend on the other hand, while not the youngest, is still an immature kid. Now there’s some nuance there and there are a lot of factors that feed into that immaturity (like the fact that he’s dealt with a lot of trauma and hasn’t had a parental figure since he was like 10) but the point still stands. In recent updates especially, we see that Time appears to have a short temper when it comes to Legend’s behavior. Why? Well if you look past the obvious reasoning of the group being in a dangerous situation and Legend’s antics being ill-suited for that, personally I think that Legend is a lot like Time was in his younger days. You know how sometimes parents say “my kid got their attitude from me and now I’ve gotta argue with a younger version of myself every day!” That’s exactly what’s going on here. Time was an absolute menace as a kid and teenager, and now he’s being faced with the exact same energy and has a hard time dealing with it.

Legend: as explained above, Legend has a bit of a reputation for immaturity and an attitude to go with it. Sky, on the other hand, is the one of the most easygoing, self-assured, approachable people you’ll ever meet. Legend is used to eliciting strong and/or definitive reactions by his behavior. People get angry with him (Time), match his energy (Warriors), or redirect him/calm him down (Hyrule). But Sky? Sky just… doesn’t seem to have much of a reaction at all. He might respond with some light teasing or a halfhearted protest, but nothing beyond that. That confuses Legend, and that confusion leads to anger. No matter what he does, he can’t get a good read on Sky, and that’s very frustrating for Legend.

Hyrule: I think this is going to surprise a lot of people, because Hyrule and Wild are often depicted as twin chaos gremlins by the fandom. But if you actually go through the LU canon (both main story and bonus material), you’ll see that these two actually rarely interact with each other, and on one of those rare occasions, they argue to the point of blows and have to be broken up. Much later, Wild describes Hyrule as “stubborn”, albeit in a positive way. Now, this is where I think the fandom seeing these two as twin chaos gremlins does bear some merit: the two are so alike in many aspects of their personality, notably their stubbornness, that they struggle to get along. A similar situation as with Time and Legend, but in this situation, they’re about the same age and with the same level of maturity. Hyrule and Wild even think the same way, too. During the battle with the Iron Knuckle, Hyrule wanted to rush right in and attack the big guy head on too, but was held back by Legend. Among his companions, though, Hyrule is reputably non-confrontational, which makes the fact that he got in a fight with Wild surprising. Wild is more used to getting into disagreements, so I think that fight would have affected Hyrule emotionally a lot more than Wild.

Wind: I had the hardest time with this little guy. Despite being the youngest, he’s surprisingly emotionally stable and mature, and he gets along with everyone! Literally the only reason I chose Wild is because Wind has snapped at him a few times, examples being for treating him like a kid and for not following his advice for how to take on the Iron Knuckle. That’s literally it. Wind is a perfect ray of sunshine.

Twilight: our rancher is gregarious and gets along with everyone pretty well, but he’s not shy about calling out things that tick him off about others. He rebukes Legend for his immaturity, challenges Time on his overbearing nature, and tries his darnedest to instill some self-restraint in Wild. He’s also very protective, though, especially of Wild. He’s well aware that Wild often has difficulties getting along with others (more on that later), but since he knows Wild better than all the others, he understands why Wild has those difficulties. And right now especially, he very obviously thinks that Warriors is being way too hard on Wild. This is a tricky situation. These Links are all notoriously bad at communication, and with extremely different backgrounds, Twilight and Warriors have even more of a disadvantage. Twilight doesn’t understand Wars’ motives in this situation and thinks he’s being unfair, when in reality Wars is just trying really hard to understand Wild better (explained in my analyses). Despite that, Twi and Wars are still good friends; they were just rubbing shoulders and bantering at each other a few parts ago after all. Twilight just isn’t afraid to openly disagree with one of his friends.

Warriors: yeah, if you’re familiar with my analyses (here and here) you know it’s Wild! I won’t rehash it in this post since I’ve pretty much said everything I can think of on Wars’ point of view in the situation lol

Wild: and conversely, Wild is having a really hard time with Wars specifically right now. That situation is outlined in my previous analyses too. But for this post, I wanted to elaborate more on Wild. Although all of his fellow Links obviously love and accept him, the poor guy has drawn the ire of practically every member of the chain at some point in time. In fact, personally I think that if not for his close bond with Twilight, Wild would have an extremely hard time getting along with the group as a whole. That doesn’t mean he’s a bad person. No, he’s a character with a very unique and compelling past, and that past makes it very difficult for him to successfully engage in teamwork. He’s also dealing with amnesia, imposter syndrome, and an inferiority complex, all of which take a huge toll on his mental health. When your mental health isn’t so great, you often have a short fuse and it can also be hard to maintain healthy relationships. Trust me, I know - I’ve been on medication for depression for 15 years. It’s a real struggle. In spite of this, we have seen significant character growth from Wild recently. He’s begun acknowledging his difficulties and owning up to his transgressions, which shows that he really does want to make things work with everyone. He feels bad for clashing with people and wants to do better, but unfortunately he appears to have very low confidence in himself. His current mindset seems to be “I’m trying really hard not to mess things up, but I’m probably just going to mess it all up anyway.” The thing that matters, though, is that he is trying. Ah, I love Wild so much. My precious blorbo. If he can rid himself of that crippling self-doubt, he can make even bigger strides in improving his relationship with everyone!

[acourtofthought]

Every couple is different and has their different origin stories, but I think if every couple across the SJM universe were told from first meeting “hey this guy… this girl… that’s your mate. See ya and have a nice day” they would all have similar reactions to how we see Elain and Lucien.

Rhys and Feyre are different as Rhys knew before even meeting her…

But if Cassian and Nesta were told from their first meeting they’d be pissed.

Aelin and Rowan- ha!

Bryce and Hunt- they’d both punch the person

All would be in complete disbelief and upset/disappointed. So I don’t like the takes that Elaine and Lucien hate each other and both want it broken.

We’ve been in Lucien’s head and know how he feels about Elaine and the curiosity there. We’ve yet to be in Elaine’s head. We know she doesn’t want a mate period (Nesta said the same thing).

For fans to think they’re not end game and we will not explore their bond at least a little? Come on now. It’s pretty much an arranged marriage trope taken to the next level. Let the simmering tension commence!

Without a doubt. And Rhys / Cassian knowing / suspecting that Feyre and Nesta were their mates wasn't ever an issue because in canon, the fae in the ACOTAR world typically cherish mating bonds and look at them as something sacred. It's the same reason we had Lucien showing loyalty to Elain from the very moment their bond snapped even though he hadn't officially met her. But if any other SJM FMC was made immediately aware of their bond, especially those who were human or half human? They would have rioted. I mean we kind of saw Nesta do that exact thing when she was drawn to Cassian from the first moment she met him. But let's throw out a hypothetical. Do most readers think Rhys and Feyre are right for one another? I'm not even saying they have to like Feyre or they have to like Rhys, but are they well matched? I think they are, I can't imagine either one with anyone else. Now say you're one of the people who do like Feysand together, you think they compliment each other well and you can't imagine them without the other. Now let's say Feyre did find out about her bond from the very start. Does that mean we'd suddenly feel Rhys and Feyre were a poor fit? Do you think readers would now say, "Never mind! They don't match because they knew about their bond from the start!" I doubt anyone who likes Feysand would ever say that which proves the beginning really doesn't matter so long as the end product is the same and that's two people who were destined to be the other half of their soul finding their way to each other. It is no different for Elain and Lucien. Yes they have had a rocky start and yes they've got more to deal with having the knowledge of their bond from the start (as well as her being in love with someone else and him believing he already had and lost a mate) but that doesn't make them less perfect for one another. Sarah actively drew parallels for them once she realized they would be mates and that only compounded the unintentional parallels she already had for them in book 1, those unintentional ones being exactly why Elain ended up surprising her and Lucien as being the one for him.

Sarah did not go on this 4 / 5 book journey with Elucien only to let all the buildup and anticipation of "What will she do about her bond?" "What will their first real on page conversation look like now that she's out of her depressed state??" fizzle out. She's invested way too much time creating their storyline (to the point that so many characters have spoken about / thought about their bond - Hybern, Eris, Cassian, Feyre, Nesta, Amren, Madja, Az, Jurian, Rhys) not to explore it in their book.

Elucien is the tea and everyone is waiting to find out what they're going to do.

[richardsphere]

i mean... Ideals contrasting powers are just inherently cool, create inherent drama and a clear-cut struggle where the character's power is as far away form an "I win"-button as it can feasably be. Like, A Seeker of Truth with the power of lies? Awesome way to build an inherent conflict. Freedom Fighter with Mind Controll? Code Geass has a fanbase that will never die. It came out literal decades ago and is still held as one of the Best Anime of all Time. Firefighters with Pyrokinesis? Like im never gonna watch or read Fireforce, but the concept is just fantastic. A character with the powers of darkness and destruction, but who wants nothing more then to help? Classic. The issue with Renalya (and Felix/Argos) is that doing this requires: 1-a willingness to explore said nuance, rather then a binary black/white morality governing your show. 2-A willingness to focus on the character whose powers contradict their goals. Rather then reducing them to a side-character who gets to matter in.... 3 episodes a season? 3-A willingness to be consistent in the characters reluctance with their powers (this affects Argos more then it affects Alya) And given that Miraculous will not under any circumstance let its marketable childrens-toys be considered anything but "pure", even Alya's promotion into Confidant and Future Guardian will not fix the inherent misalignment between "journalist" and "liar" as an issue. ---- But personally, and this might just be me... I never saw her as a journalist. it just doesnt seem to be a foundational part of her character the way the fanbase makes it out to be. You know how in mythology, most gods have a single "core" domain and a bunch of tiny odd side-jobs that spring off. Like how Hermes was the god of boundary markers. But because anyone who travels must cross borders, became the god of travelers, and then became the god of postmen, because postmen are travelers by trade and therefore interact with borders? But then down the line everyone just thinks of him as "oh right, the god of the mail" and includes him in greek-mythology stories almost solely as a messenger without referencing his broader portfolio... Well... Much like how portraying Hermes as a messenger isnt inacurate, but merely reductive. I feel that refering to Alya as a journalist is similarly so. I personally never saw Alya as, foundationally a Journalist. I saw her as a Storyteller first (such as her babysitting Manon in Stormy Weather). With heroics and heroics-related news merely being one of many stories there are for her to tell. An expression of her "core" that is extremely prominent within the story, and as such gets over-emphasised to a point it risks blocking our sight of the tree from which it branches. and the power to create illusions fits into the storyteller persona a lot more easily. That's probably also why in both in the original series and in the S6 soft-reboot. her first use of Mirage is on akumatised children.

I do feel Alya makes more sense to have the turtle with her being an inspiring journalist than Nino who would probably have fun with the fox since he's supposed to be a creative.

The fox is the last miraculous I would’ve given Alya 😭

How does giving her, a journalist who allegedly values the truth, the power of deceit make sense thematically??? Seriously please explain

And Nino -oh god Nino- I remember during the S1 days people theorizing he would eventually have the peacock bc his shirt has the same color and a vaguely similar pattern and anyway it’s not that they had to give him the peacock but at least give him something that makes sense for his character

Comparing them to Chloé who’s had bee visuals since S1, the besties becoming heroes really feel like an afterthought

[ilikekidsshows]

I dislike how Adrien's character is just a massive macguffin at this point. If he isn't going to do stuff himself, or even get scenes that don't involve Marinette, why would you make him the male lead and everything in the Miraculous world connect back to him???

Wanna why know why Gabriel's Hawkmoth? Emily's death! But well actually, she only died because of Adrien. Why's Lila a villain? Well, she had a spat with Marinette! Over what, you ask? Adrien. Ah yes, Felix, our dear fandom's most inconsistent character like seriously why the hell did he go from being angry his cousin didn't attend his dads funeral and calling love confessions sappy to being glad his dad is dead and randomly breaking into song resident jerk, he actually does stuff for change!! Why's he here? Well, actually he's Adrien's cousin

But, does Adrien actually do anything with this (I'd say information after this but lets be real, he has none)? Nope, sir/ma'am, nothing at all!! He never learns his father is Hawkmoth and his father never learns he's Chat Noir. Jury's out on Lila but so far, hd does absolutely nothing at all.

Well, what about Felix? You'd think that, with a character so intertwined with him, they'd actually do something with it? Give them a few scenes? Maybe actually have Adrien talk or maybe even punch some sense into his cousin for vanishing the entire world besides like three people? Give the duo some scenes? Actually address what Felix did after his introduction? Show Felix breaking him and Kagami out of Gabriel's white rooms? Nope, lets just shove Felix to the side with Kagami, and forget about him unless we have an episode which requires a jerk character, since literally none of the good guys fit that role!!

Honestly, even leaving aside the stuff abiut wasted character moments, it feels like Adrien's been relegated to like the third or fourth most important character in the show. Marinette and Alya are wayyy above him at this point. Lila can take another spot albeit hesitantly since she clearly has more focus and plot relevance than him.

Marinette didn't even give Chat Noir a kwatagama to remember her by (if Alya can have one, so can he, he was Mister Bug, remember?). He doesn't even know about the Alya is the next Guardian stuff. Literally no one does. If Marinette does have something happen to her and she gives up the guardianship, why would anyone even listen to Alya!?!? Chat Noir outranks her by seniority alone, Carapace isn't even that close behind in terms of that and most importantly, she's never led them, she's never made battle plans, she hasn't been there from the start like Chat Noir, not everyone's fought with her probably, and they've never been made aware of this little back-up plan. Who's to say she isn't a Miraculous thief, huh? What if she stole the box and killed Ladybug? They have nothing to go off of except her word.

The writers probably don't even know how to use Adrien now that the crush arc of the show is over. Everyone's saying that he's obviously getting a big build-up, but what if they just "Catwalker" this and make it so that this is all "resolved" in a single episode and they all go back to the status quo with the slight change with the slight change that everyone is more subservient to Marinette and now recognises her brilliance or whatever.

---

Some people still believe Miraculous has proper build up and payoff, huh? I’m not surprised yet I’m still disappointed at how helplessly naive this fandom is.

Like, I was trying to figure out how to properly showcase what I think is wrong with Adrien’s character, why I think he’s less of a character than ever before, even when he gets a whole episode revolving around his family. So, here’s the Animus Litmus Test of Is The Love Interest a Real Person

Does the character have an actual conversation (aka, the speaker is changed at least twice) with someone other than their significant other?

Is this conversation about something other than their significant other?

Does this conversation take place in a scene that doesn’t feature the significant other at any point?

Does the character have any goal outside of “be with the significant other”?

Like, supposedly Adrien should have a conversation in 'Werepapas' with someone other than Marinette about something other than how much he wants to stay with Marinette, but, like, this is the episode that teased the audience with Plagg getting to show up, only to not just exclude Plagg, but to exclude Adrien himself from the Akuma fight so that he can be shoved inside a literal trophy while Marinette plays with his life like an object.

[avonne-writes]

Finally finishing this bingo of mine for the @mota-collab Mota 1st Birthday event! It took me longer than expected due to personal issues, but I'm so glad I was able to finish it and share my appreciation for fanwork that I love.

east side of sorrow (young vets au) by @bcolfanfic - a heartbreaking and difficult topic explored with so much care and empathy in this fic. John's pain, as well as Gale's steadfast love for him, always bring tears to my eyes.

major john egan, at your service. by @johnbottoms - NSFW Buck x Bucky x Marge art (my OT3 😍). One of the hottest Mota drawings I've seen, oh my God. The pose, their bodies and expressions, everything about it is hot and perfectly fitting for the characters. I would love to see more art of these three!

Crosby art by @eternallytired17 - I think this is a really lovely portrait! It takes a special skill to draw realistic portraits, even just a few lines off and the person would look completely unrecognizable, but eternallytired17 pulled this off super well. I loved the eyes here in particular. 🩷

Only You Can Cool My Desire by @johnslittlespoon - super hot smut fic that can be appreciated as a standalone, but it's also a part of a long AU, the Tough And Sweet verse. I really enjoyed reading the dynamic between John and Gale, the temperature play and the description of the heatwave. I could feel the touch of summer! 🌞

before you say 'cut', wait five more seconds by @irregularcollapse - a beautiful comfort fic. (I already recced the podfic by @angelfruittree associated with it here) John and Gale as actors was a really entertaining premise. The characters were well-written and interesting, and Gale’s POV was a joy to read. I loved the way the UST built between John and Gale, and then how natural it felt when they finally got together. Their first kiss was my favourite part.

Bucky meets Gale by @onyxsboxes - Ame's sweet, lovely kitty Gale verse. 🥹 I love cats, so the premise of this one got me hooked from the get-go. This is the first part of the series, and it's very sweet and comforting. John's feeling down but his new feline friend comforts him. A nice read on a rainy or cold day.

John and Gale gifset by @bennydemarco - this is so beautiful and heartbreaking and healing and poetic at the same time! 😭 The text font looks great, the scenes were perfectly chosen for the quote, and of course the most brilliant part is how the colours fade, then come back, reflecting the pain of parting and the joy of reunion.

penny drop by @drylite - this made me feral! Thick Bucky is so hot in this fic, and the way Gale yearns for him and desires him makes the flames of this fic burn all the brighter. The tender ending was the cherry on top for me, there was so much feeling in it. An instant favourite of mine.

Curt art by @kylaym - when I saw the angel meme, I thought of Curt immediately 💖😇 This is such a sweet portrait of him, I really like it. The artist has a unique and nostalgic style, I recommend all their art. I love that they have so many drawings of side characters as well.

Thank you to all the creators who share their talent with us in our small fandom!

[waxworkdaughter]

everyone in the writer's room working on Scully past about season 4 had a really weird idea of what "logic" meant. and "science." and "rational." It's not even a colloquial vs epistemological issue it's this weird belief that scientific thinking = prescribed and traditionalist, instead of exploratory and evidence based and subject to change.

I've talked about this before but it gets so frustrating, because Early Scully has a very different and more open viewpoint. Her goal is to vet and find evidence and won't vouch for anything short of that as verifiable fact, but she does also judge by the evidence of her eyes and ears and Mulder's eyes and ears and says 'obviously something is going on here that's beyond the norm, we just can't define or swear to it what' and reels off theories that have some basis (...ish) in established scientific canon to give them more directions to investigate. It read as alternately a sincere effort play her part and work out what was happening, or as a running joke as part of a partnership, knowingly reeling off some largely absurd theory based on obscure research because they don't have anything more concrete to work on and the meeting Mulder's eye with a tiny shrug.

Later Scully has been trapped in the cultural box of """scientific""" and """skeptical""" so completely that her scientific theorizing -- aside from in the rare episodes that focus on her on her own and free her to play both the skeptic and the believer roles -- ends up feeling like she's re-imagining reality to fit her preconceptions of what "should" be happening, instead of trying to come up with some testable theory for what is happening. Because it is a show where the aliens and psychic powers and cryptids and mutants are visible, literally extant, and doing things in front of them more and more definitely as time goes on. Both the audience and the characters see the things at least to some extent in more cases than not.

This means that Scully's "rational explanations" end up feeling more like reality-denying conspiracy theories, even more so than Mulder's wild guesses, which are also usually wrong at first pass but, as they work within the TXF reality that the audience can observe, they feel more accurate. With the later tone and framing, it ends up feeling like her role is to obstruct and poke holes, even ridicule in some instances. The banter and the "opposites" became more important than the collaboration, and being "scientific" was replaced by the irrationality of clinging to commonsense over experience.

I mean, I choose to ignore it entirely most of the time but can see where some of that kind of 'mean sarcastic scully' fanon comes from, and I think it's really unfortunate. it's not about how Scully's personality is framed or who she's meant to be as a person, it seems to come from basic misunderstanding in the largely turned-over writer's room about how scientific reasoning works and how their partnership felt so equal and well matched at first. And it's understandable that that kind of underpinning would get compromised in the absolutely brutal pace of writing for a 22+ episode season. It's just a shame that this doesn't really course correct until the last couple of seasons where there are so many other issues with the main plot that it gets lost in the shuffle. Thus, Mean Scully is essentially cemented in certain parts of pop culture and fanon perception.

[jehan-d-art]

@gayautisticraccoon you speak about projecting feelings for one person onto another person and more or less, even without saying it like that, about going for the more accepted option (aka a lifestyle as defined by a heteronormative society) even without actively making that decision or at least not making that decision with the knowledge that one is surpressing one’s true feelings.

Gaon loved Soohyun but I do think he was in denial regarding what kind of love he felt for her.

in a way I wanted to show just that, meaning that there are so many different kinds of love and that sometimes love can change into something else other than what one expected it to be but it can still be something that is not any less meaningful than what it could have been. it's simply something else. - to me, friendships or committed partnerships (no matter whether they are romantic, sexual, neither or both or something else altogether in nature) are in no way either more or less meaningful than the other, they simply are different kinds of relationships.

to be honest, I could have talked about any other fictional character and yet Gaon seemed the most fitting. in my opinion, he was never actually romantically interested in Soohyun. he always ever loved her dearly, felt comfortable and safe when she was with him and by his side, which of course shows a deep emotional connection.

though, here I think he talked himself into believing she was his first love. by not acting on those feelings, he kept their relationship vague enough because there were so many obvious signs that Soohyun was very much in love with him. I still wholeheartedly believe it was one-sided and that Gaon mistook his own feelings as him wanting to be with her romantically. however he also probably told himself he couldn't be with her because of how much he had already suffered (and that he would only drag her down with him if he tried being with her as the boyfriend she wanted him to be.)

the thing is, Gaon touches Yohan much more than he touches Soohyun and Gaon gets touched much more by Yohan in return. I acknowledge this is partially caused by them being the two main characters but here I think I also have to mention it is canon that Gaon basically takes the role of the traditional female lead - which makes Yohan the male lead and it shows that the two of them are constantly connected, be it by actions, by words or even by touch.

I have not yet mentioned the underlying tension between them, which, over time, changes from mutual distrust to mutual devotion and the want to keep the other safe.

oh and the dreams about each other... the one dream that stood out to me the most was when Gaon dreamt about Yohan performing that surgery: why would he dream about Yohan straddling and touching another man like that, while he talks in a voice that is more seductive than threatening? why would Gaon's mind come up with all that if it wasn't meant as some kind of slightly bizzare wet dream...

in the end, when Gaon thinks he has lost Yohan and when he is thus driven by his grief, he very nearly comes to the same tragic conclusion as his own mother: he very nearly ends his own life, attempting to follow the man he has fallen in love with (and I don't even know if Gaon is even aware of the depth of his feelings at that point).

long story short: I am certain Gaon projected all his possible romantic feelings onto Soohyun which wasn't fair to either one of them, though at least he never actually got together with her and ended up hurting both of them even more by forcing himself even more into trying to life a heteronormative life. in my opinion, Gaon started to let go of his comphet mindset when he got closer and closer to Yohan, emotionally and physically before he eventually ended up falling in love with him.

[zuzu-draws]

Rest Easy, He's in a good mood right now.